I Used to Blame Employees for Turnover. I Was Wrong.

What Owning Six Retail Stores Taught Me About Hiring, Leadership, and Taking Responsibility

Years ago, I owned about half a dozen Boost Mobile stores.

And I had a problem.

Turnover was terrible.

People would start.

We'd train them.

Then they'd leave.

Someone wouldn't work out, so we'd replace them.

Then we'd replace the replacement.

At the time, it was easy to look at the employees and think:

"Why can't we find good people?"

Today, after years in staffing and leadership, I can answer that question much differently.

We could find good people.

I wasn't doing a good enough job finding the right people.

There's a difference.

And a lot of that turnover was my fault.

I Was Hiring Bodies Instead of People

This is uncomfortable to admit, but it's true.

I had stores that needed coverage.

Someone quit?

Find someone.

Schedule needs filling?

Hire someone.

We were solving the immediate problem:

Put a body in the store.

We weren't asking enough about the person.

What are they interested in?

What motivates them?

What kind of environment do they enjoy?

What are they naturally good at?

Would they actually enjoy selling phones and talking about technology all day?

I was hiring for an opening.

I should have been hiring for a match.

A Good Employee Can Be in the Wrong Job

This became one of the biggest lessons of my career.

Someone can be hardworking, dependable, intelligent, and personable...

…and still be completely wrong for the job you hired them to do.

Imagine someone who loves fashion.

They know brands.

They notice styles.

They genuinely enjoy helping someone put an outfit together.

Put that person in a clothing store and a difficult customer might still frustrate them.

But they're operating in an environment they enjoy.

There's something underneath the frustration that keeps them engaged.

Now put that same person in a phone store talking about devices, plans, upgrades, and technology they couldn't care less about.

Same person.

Completely different employee.

We sometimes label someone a bad employee when the truth is:

We put a good person in the wrong environment.

That's a Leadership Failure

This is where I had to stop blaming turnover entirely on employees.

Yes, employees have responsibility.

Show up.

Work hard.

Treat customers properly.

Be accountable.

But leaders have responsibilities too.

If I hire someone after a ten-minute conversation because I'm desperate to fill tomorrow's schedule, then six weeks later complain that they weren't a good fit...

I need to look in the mirror.

Did I really qualify them?

Did I understand what they wanted?

Did I explain the job honestly?

Did I hire because they were right for the position—or because I needed someone immediately?

Those questions changed the way I think about hiring.

Then I Ended Up in the Staffing Business

There's some irony in this story.

Years later, I found myself building Flat Staffing.

A staffing company.

Now the problem I had struggled with as an employer became part of the problem we were helping other businesses solve.

And those Boost Mobile mistakes followed me.

In a good way.

They gave me perspective.

When a customer says they need five people tomorrow, I understand the urgency.

I've been that owner.

But I've also learned what happens when urgency becomes the entire hiring strategy.

Five available people aren't necessarily five right people.

Skills Matter. Environment Matters Too.

This is something I think businesses underestimate.

We hire heavily around qualifications.

Can they perform the task?

Do they have experience?

Can they work the schedule?

All important.

But there's another question:

Will this person thrive here?

Culture matters.

The manager matters.

The pace matters.

The physical environment matters.

The team matters.

Flexibility matters.

Whether someone feels respected matters.

Compensation can get someone through the door.

The environment often determines whether they stay.

Sometimes Turnover Is Telling You Something

Businesses tend to view turnover as an employee problem.

Sometimes it is.

But high turnover can also be feedback.

Maybe the pay isn't competitive.

Maybe the schedule is unreasonable.

Maybe the manager is driving good employees away.

Maybe the hiring process is selecting the wrong people.

Maybe expectations during recruiting don't match the reality of the job.

Maybe nobody has bothered asking the people leaving why they're leaving.

Turnover is expensive.

But if we're willing to listen, it can also be informative.

People Aren't Interchangeable

This might be the biggest lesson I carried forward.

People aren't interchangeable parts.

You can't simply remove Employee A, insert Employee B, and expect identical results.

People bring different personalities.

Talents.

Interests.

Motivations.

Life circumstances.

Goals.

That's what makes leadership difficult.

It's also what makes it meaningful.

The better we understand people, the better chance we have of putting them somewhere they can succeed.

Faith Changed My Perspective Too

My faith reinforces this because Scripture doesn't describe people as identical.

We're given different gifts.

Different strengths.

Different roles.

1 Corinthians 12 talks about one body having many parts.

That concept applies far beyond church.

I think good leadership recognizes differences instead of fighting them.

The goal isn't to make everyone identical.

It's to help people use what they're good at in a way that contributes to something larger than themselves.

I Wish I Had Understood This Earlier

If I could go back to those Boost Mobile years, I'd hire differently.

I'd ask better questions.

I'd spend more time understanding candidates.

I'd stop treating an empty schedule as the biggest emergency in the business.

Because sometimes the person you hire quickly to solve today's problem becomes next month's bigger problem.

That lesson cost me money.

Time.

Stress.

And probably some good employees who might have succeeded somewhere else.

I can't change that.

But I can learn from it.

Final Thoughts

One reason I'm comfortable talking about my failures today is because I don't think leadership comes from pretending you always knew what you were doing.

I certainly didn't.

I've made hiring mistakes.

Business mistakes.

Leadership mistakes.

Plenty of others.

But mistakes become valuable when we're willing to own them.

For years, I thought I had a turnover problem.

Looking back, I had a matching problem.

And sometimes I had a leadership problem.

That realization changed how I hire.

It changed how I lead.

Eventually, it influenced how we built a staffing company.

Sometimes the business lesson you need most is hiding inside the mistake you'd rather forget.

I'm glad I didn't forget this one.

— Nino Mihilli

Stay Connected with Nino Mihilli

🌐 Personal Website: https://www.ninomihilli.com

🏢 T47 Group: https://www.t47group.com

👷 Flat Staffing: https://www.flatstaffing.com

📖 Read Nino Mihilli's novel, The Variable, on Amazon: https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0GX3783RG

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