Why do employees really quit: the shock that starts it.

The old story about slow unhappiness.

For most of the last century, everybody assumed one thing. People get unhappy, unhappiness accumulates, and eventually they go. So the answer to why do employees really quit seemed simple. However, Lee and Mitchell proposed that most departures are not slow at all. Instead, a specific event interrupts the ordinary run of things. Until then, ordinary life absorbs almost any amount of quiet unhappiness.

Why do employees really quit when everyone is fed up.

Compare the people who left with those who stayed, and dissatisfaction is about the same. So your colleagues are roughly as fed up as you are. Yet they are not going anywhere. Therefore your unhappiness is a variable that does not predict much. What predicts leaving is the shock: a review, a restructure, a doctor's appointment.

Counteroffers put a price on delay.

Recruitment firms say most people who accept a counteroffer leave anyway inside a year or two. But those firms make money when you do not accept, so discount them hard. Still, the direction points somewhere useful. More money to stay does not fix a ceiling. Instead, it just puts a price on the delay.