Stay Interview

A stay interview is a proactive conversation between a manager and a current employee — focused on understanding what is working well, what would motivate the employee to leave, and what changes would increase their commitment to staying. Conducted while the employee is still engaged rather than at the exit interview stage after they have decided to leave, stay interviews provide actionable intelligence for retention at the point when it can still be used. The most important stay interview principle is follow-through: employees who raise genuine concerns and see no change in the following 90 days are more likely to leave than those who never participated in a stay interview, because the conversation has confirmed that the organization heard their concerns and chose not to address them.