Book excerpt: During the past decade, employee turnover has become a very serious problem for organizations. Managing retention and keeping the turnover rate below target and industry norms is one of the most challenging issues facing business. All indications point toward the issue compounding in the future and, even as economic times change, turnover will continue to be an important issue for most job groups. Yet despite these facts employee turnover continues to be the most unappreciated and undervalued issue facing business leaders. There are a variety of reasons for this, for example, the true cost of employee turnover is often underestimated. The causes of turnover are not adequately identified, and solutions are often not matched with the causes, so they fail. Preventive measures are either not in place or do not target the issues properly, and therefore have little or no effect, and a method for measuring progress and identifying a monetary value (ROI) on retention does not exist in most organizations. 'Managing Employee Retention' is a practical guide for managers to retain their talented employees. It shows how to manage and monitor turnover and how to develop the ROI of keeping your talent using innovative retention programs. The book presents a logical process of managing retention, from identifying turnover costs and causes, designing solutions that match the causes of turnover, developing tools for tracking turnover and placing alerts when action is needed, and measuring the ROI of retention programs.