How Leaders Can Reduce Turnover by Rethinking Team Culture | Eric Termuende

You hired someone with huge potential. You trained them. You invested in them. Six months later, they’re gone.

If turnover feels constant, the issue might not be talent. It might be how your culture is being experienced.

In this episode, Desiree sits down with global keynote speaker and bestselling author Eric Termuende to unpack what’s actually driving turnover in today’s workplace.

They explore why high turnover is often a symptom of a dysfunctional relationship between employees and companies—and how leaders can shift that dynamic.

You’ll hear:

• Why generic mission, vision, and values statements fail to attract the right people
• How to differentiate your culture so the right talent opts in (and the wrong talent opts out)
• Why alignment in how work gets done matters more than perks or flexibility
• How misalignment quietly drives away your best performers
• Why small, one-degree shifts build trust faster than massive culture overhauls
• How healthy conflict, built on trust, is required for high-performing teams

If you’re frustrated by disengagement, misalignment, or constant turnover, this conversation will change how you think about culture—and how you lead.

 ● Eric Termuende’s Book: Rethink Work 

●Connect with Eric on LinkedIn

●Eric's Website

Books Recommended by Eric:

● The Culture Code — Daniel Coyle
● Predictably Irrational — Dan Ariely
●

Taking Intentional Action: How to Choose the Life You Lead

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Transcript

Desiree (00:01.293)
All right, friends, we are here with Eric and Eric and I met yet again on LinkedIn, sort of, but Eric, I am loving the work that you're doing in regards to trust and turnover and values within Teams. if you had one minute to explain to someone what it is that you do, how would you go about that?

Eric Termuende (00:20.672)
I help leaders of all levels and all levels of performance and all levels of size organization navigate the future of work by building incredible teams that can thrive in whatever the future may throw our way.

Desiree (00:35.277)
That was perfect. And it brings me to the segue of I have been devouring and that's I've read the whole book in a weekend. So I've been devouring your book over the weekend. And I was telling Eric, if he went to set in his intro that he was 24 when he read it, I would not know that it wasn't a current book. The reason I say that is because you were talking about the future of work 10 years ago and it's still really relevant. So how have things changed from when you wrote that to

what you now see as the future of work, what's different outside of maybe the pandemic having shifted things.

Eric Termuende (01:08.308)
I well, I appreciate you saying that, that I got lucky, which is nice. I I try and talk a lot about universal truth when it comes to leadership and building these high performing teams. I would have never anticipated a pandemic for sure. I would have also never anticipated this speed of change, you know, that's for sure. Look, I think directionally,

we can anticipate the future. And sometimes it's pretty easy to get the horoscopes right or, you know, bring up the crystal ball and directionally get it right. You know, I can tell you that things are going to get faster. I can tell you that they're going to get less certain. I can tell you that there's going to be uniqueness and variability in the workplace like we've never seen before. And I can almost with 100 % certainty, tell you that that's what the future is going to look like. Now, if you ask me to get into any specifics whatsoever, I can also promise you I will be 100 % wrong.

in any one of those specifics. So I think the book was great directionally, but I think, and you know, I kind of bubble wrapped it for that reason, I didn't get in into any of the specifics. So what's changed in the last 10 years? A whole world of things that has ultimately got the highest level of predictions of the book correct, and when it comes to change uncertainty and the uniqueness of the workplace today.

Desiree (02:25.921)
Yeah, one of my, we'll move into the actual future of work here in a minute, but there was a couple of quotes in your book that are still, again, like I said, so relevant. And I want to hear where your head is at now on this specific quote. High turnover is a symptom of a dysfunctional relationship between employees and companies. And high turnover is one of the main concerns that I hear from teams that I work with is someone will come in, whether they...

say it's a younger generation or it's just in general high turnover. And they're like, it's not worth it. The people who are training these individuals are getting fed up because they train people and then they leave right away. So how is it the leaders or even if we go a little more broader, the company's responsibility to start to fix that dysfunctional relationship and how do we go about that? It's a big question, but what are your thoughts?

Eric Termuende (03:18.594)
Okay. So let's, let's break it down into two opportunities. number one, it's in the, at the talent that we attract and number two, it's in the talent that we keep. Okay. So let's start about a talent attraction element first. You know, we've heard it before, hire slow, fire fast. but I also think, and I think you're going to talk a little bit about this with, when it comes to values as well, I think differentiation of the employee experience or what the team values is really important to, you know, rethink work.

would have mentioned, you know, the difference between whether we're in the, in the work, sorry, in the office or hybrid or flexibly sort of somewhere in between, you know, what do we value in terms of the work experience? Well, I value coming into the office five days a week. Maybe you value being remote five days a week. If we fundamentally value different things, it's going to be really hard to pull you into the office five days a week and have you be happy, you know? Maybe we are an office that is, we have pets and foosball tables and air hockey tables. And maybe I've got a

very bad allergy to dogs. You know, like that's not going to work so well. So what I've found is that when we're trying to attract talent that is aligned with the experience that we offer our people, we have to really differentiate our culture right out the gate. And one of the things that I like to say is that we should treat our workplace culture almost like cilantro, like black licorice, like pineapple on pizza. And usually when I say those three things, there's like this visceral reaction, like either love or you hate cilantro. You love or you hate black licorice.

pineapple absolutely belongs on pizza or it absolutely doesn't. And I think we should treat our workplaces the same. Like here's what we stand for. Here's the experience we provide. Here's how we do things around here. It's not just like, you know, our mission, vision, values, which are, are still very important, but here's how we do the work that we do because yet I believe we need a diverse and inclusive workplace, but we need to be completely aligned in how we get that work done. And if there's a lack of alignment in how we get that work done,

then people are going to get frustrated. You're going to hire someone who's on the surface grade, who has the skills requirements, you know, education qualifications, but you know, they were maybe we're never a right fit in the first place. And what happens when we hire someone that wasn't a right fit in the first place? Well, what happens is they stick around for six months, even though they hated it from the second weekend, because it's not acceptable to tell your mom or your dad or your husband or your wife or your kids that it wasn't a good fit. You drag down all the eight players who are on the existing team.

Eric Termuende (05:46.082)
They can't stand being around, we'll just use me as that person as an example for very long. So they leave and because they're A players, they're going to be able to find a job somewhere else. Six months later, when that toxic person leaves, you've now lost the toxic person finally. And you've lost your two or three top players too, because it had nothing to do with your lexical culture. It had everything to do with the fact that you attracted the wrong person in the first place because you told the wrong story. So I think we need to differentiate culture and experience right out the gate.

Desiree (06:11.405)
you

Eric Termuende (06:16.212)
Second is the retention piece. And I'll be a little shorter on this one. If we want to make sure that we're decreasing turnover and making sure that everyone feels like they've got a seat at the table, so to say, or a voice in the conversation, we have to do just that. We have to be able to ensure that everyone is seen, heard, and understood. Now, does that mean that everyone's ideas have to be implemented? They have to take some...

you know, kid who's 22 years old, who's fresh out of school and implement all their wonderful employee or game-changing ideas. No, but if you hear what they have to say and treat it as a learning opportunity, if the idea isn't gonna work for whatever reason, I think everyone wins. So we have to be able to differentiate our culture to attract the right people. And we have to be able to build trust and give everyone a voice for the people who are already there if we wanna maintain that great culture.

Desiree (07:06.785)
So essentially you're saying give them the possible negative pieces of what they could get themselves into so that they can filter themselves out if it's not gonna be right for them.

Eric Termuende (07:17.688)
For sure. I still think something that's dying a slow death in the workplace right now is just flexible work environments. We've got a flexible work environment. But if you and I are on the same team, I come in Monday, Tuesday, you come in Wednesday, Thursday, Friday, and you and I just Zoom or Teams or Google meet each other every day for like, how long is that going to last? Sure, it's flexible and seems to be really accommodating.

for everyone until it ends up being accommodating for no one. And so again, I think hybrid is great. Sure. So long as there's alignment in when we're gonna come in and when we're gonna not come in so that we can get the most of the time that we have when we're there together.

Desiree (08:03.937)
Yeah, and I don't know if it was in your book or one of the other 50 books I'm currently in the process of reading, but something along the lines of when you ask someone what it is that they love about their job, a lot of the times it's the people they work with. So like you said, if we're here on Zoom and we're team members, we can't build that same type of bond and trust that we could if we were in the office at the same time in each other's orbit, experiencing one another's life.

Eric Termuende (08:30.568)
So I guess, so yes and, I can yes and this one. Yes and what if you don't need to, you know? And I think that this is what I mean when it comes to the future of work too. I think there will be a lot of hyper collaborative work, you know? You're on the marketing product design team, innovation team. You want as many minds at the table as possible. You want to be able to roll up your sleeves and sort of box these ideas around. What if you're an individual contributor? What if you're a writer? What if you're on a communications team? What if you're on the accounting team?

you know, if I were to anticipate what the future is going to look like now is that a company will function as a collection of the departments that it's catering to. And so, yeah, the marketing team may be in the office five days a week. The finance team may never be in the office because they don't need to be. Now I'm making assumptions and that's not necessarily fair. Maybe the finance team is hyper collaborative and maybe the accounting team, you know, vice versa, maybe this. But I do think that, you know,

The idea that you have to be in the office to function better is not necessarily true. It depends on the function of the job. And I don't necessarily think being remote is the best answer for everyone too. But there is a best for you and there is a best for me. And I think that it's a mutual obligation for the employer and the employee to share what that optimal environment is and allow somebody to find it. There's too much choice out there right now.

for somebody to not be in an organization that allows them to thrive and for them to contribute their maximum capabilities to the organization they work to. know, rethink work and what was that really about? It was about removing the negative connotation associated with work. I mean, work is something that we have to do. What if it was something that we got to do? What if instead of dragging our feet to work on Monday and skipping out of the office on Friday afternoon, what if there was somewhere in between, you know? And I think that if we can align work

and the people that we work with and the work that we do with the way that we like to work and who we like to work with. I can't help, I'm not gonna use like fun or play or, know, that sort of takes away from, you know, the capitalism productivity side of things, but work can be something that we enjoy doing with people that we love to do it with.

Desiree (10:38.317)
So this would be a great way to get into the values conversation. Cause I've been a part of so many different values workshops with the different companies that I've been a part of. And they say, list your top five values. And we all inevitably say faith, family, fun. Exactly. Yes. And it's like, what does that mean? Cause everyone defines those words differently. But my favorite section of what you were talking about with values was kind of some of the hard things. Like, do you like feedback or would you prefer your boss leave you alone?

Eric Termuende (10:42.222)
Mm-hmm.

Eric Termuende (10:51.438)
integrity, respect, fun, communication. Yeah.

Eric Termuende (11:07.566)
Yep.

Desiree (11:08.193)
You know, do you like being able to sit and kind of argue around a table, a conference room table and really get into the thick of it? Or would you rather be a solo contributor that really doesn't need anyone else's? Like those don't seem like the kind of values that we've been told. But when a company is describing what a job is like, those are the kind of values that are going to either speak to someone or say, yeah, that job's actually not for me. Can you talk a little bit more about your mindset around the values piece? It's so fascinating to

Eric Termuende (11:23.683)
Mm-hmm.

Eric Termuende (11:35.225)
So look, what you're saying, and there's so many people that do this work and it's great work, you know, the values piece, integrity, faith, honor, respect, like those kinds of things. But I found that it wasn't differentiated enough for me. And so now you can, when I first did this work, there was no like chat GPT and stuff like that. But I looked and don't quote me on this, anyone can do it in like 30 seconds now. I said, take an aggregate. I think I went to like a fortune 500 or something like that. I said,

take a look at the Fortune 100 companies and they probably do this by the hundred different Google searches. And I said, and I put them, their top five values in an Excel sheet or something like that. And like 40 % of them had integrity of 45 % had like communication. I'm like, Oh my gosh, like it's not that this isn't true. Of course it's true, but it's not differentiated. So if I'm a call it a 22 year old kid or a 65 year old guy, you know, how do I actually know what I'm signing up for?

You know, so, so when I talk about values, I talk more about experience and the employee value proposition. What do I value in terms of how my day has to be constructed so that I can get the most out of it? And now that I say that sounds kind of like a millennial or a Gen Z thing. Like I need to optimize the experience for me, but I don't necessarily think that's, I don't actually think that that's a bad thing when that opportunity is already out there for me. You know, there's just too many places to work. Here's an example.

Desiree (12:52.237)
We're both millennials there, it's okay.

Eric Termuende (13:03.854)
When I was first starting, we did some work with the forestry products association of Canada. It's an industry association for forestry companies. And they, think they had like, you know, 60,000 people in the workforce. They were really hungry for talent at the time. We helped them with a big report, but all these forestry companies are looking for accountants. They're all looking for HR managers. They're all looking for, you know, project managers. Of course they are.

then you get the forestry specific jobs. But let's just say you are an accountant at a big forestry company. Look, you could be an accountant at Nordstrom or at Starbucks or at a boutique accounting firm or at a forestry company. And I think we often kind of forget that, that the lifestyle at a forestry company could be perfect for me. Maybe I live in a small town in the Rocky Mountains of Canada, which is where I grew up. And that...

I could do the job that allowed me to be my very best with a group of people that shared the same values and the things that they like to do. Where after work we jump on like snowmobiles or four-track or something like that and go ripping up at the mountains. I mean, look, what I'm saying is, and this is probably the message that I'd want your leaders to hear, is that you don't have to be everything to everyone. You need to be exactly who you want to be to the people who are going to thrive in the same environments that you do.

This is not about getting on TikTok and Snapchat and bending over backwards for the next generation. This is about being firmly rooted in how you like to do your work, who you like to do it with and why you like to do it. And if you can articulate those three, I don't think you'll have any problem attracting the next best talent. And I'll share one more reason why. Because I think we've had this sort of scarcity mindset. We think that if we've got 300 resumes that are stacked up on our desk, that we're going to have 300 great people to choose from. I think what happens when you execute what I'm sharing right now,

is that the list gets a lot shorter, but the quality gets a lot higher. And I would rather have five incredible people to choose from than 250 people that would never be aligned in the first place.

Desiree (15:05.803)
Yeah, especially because the resumes share a list of skills and experiences that could never tell you someone's demeanor or values for that matter.

Eric Termuende (15:14.85)
never or like, or what the office is like, or what everyone does outside of work, you know, are you part of these faith groups or sports groups or knitting groups or drinking groups? I don't know. There's something for everyone. There's something for everyone. And you find out pretty quickly after you've signed the employment contract. Very rarely do you find out before.

Desiree (15:27.009)
That a thing.

Desiree (15:37.739)
And then you leave, like you said, after six months and you kind of feel like you failed a little bit and the company is back to square one.

Eric Termuende (15:42.304)
Yeah, so does everyone else. Yeah.

Desiree (15:45.867)
Yeah. So we talked about how to take down the barrier of actually getting good people into the company. Talked a little bit about how to make sure it's a good fit. But how do we continue to build up that trust, especially if there are new people coming in? We have the old guard who likes things done a certain way. We're now bringing in people of different generations who maybe have a different expectation.

values align, the way that things are done are different. How are we continuing to build up that trust in the day to day to make sure that it is continuing to be a good fit for everyone?

Eric Termuende (16:21.07)
Yeah, I mean, I like to this notion of what I like to call our small one degree shifts. And a one degree shift is like that smallest viable change that you can get to us that gets us a little bit further from where we've been and a little bit closer to where we want to go. And I think the more voices we can include in creating and implementing these one degree shifts, the better. Um, I'll give you a quick story on this one. I was, I was in DC and I was talking to a CEO actually from Riverside, California.

And he was the CEO of a firefighter helmet manufacturing company. It was called Phoenix technology is called Phoenix technology is thriving. they had 42 people in their plant and, every morning, name is angel. Angel Sanchez brings his team together for 10 minutes for what he calls improvement time. And, and I said, you tell me every morning you bring 42 people together to improve the business. How does that work? And and he says something that could stop me kind of in my tracks. said,

I just asked the team what's bugging them today. And I said, really? That sounds really simple. He said, it has to be simpler. We wouldn't, it wouldn't, we wouldn't succeed at this. And so every day he asked the team what's bugging you today. And every single day someone will put their hand up and say, you know, the bathroom's not clean enough. The tools aren't put away properly. The drill bits that we're using aren't as effective. The, the plastics that we're using for the helmet. I think I might've found a workaround. I think we can onboard more effectively. think we can use performance management tools that we haven't used before.

And every single day, they will implement something that fixes something that's bothering someone. Over 10 years, he said they did this for 10 years, the company grew 1000%. And the team that was part of this growth, they didn't leave. And they didn't leave because they all had a voice, they all felt seen, heard and understood. They all felt that they were something, they were part of something bigger than just their job title and their role.

And now they're winning awards statewide for how efficient and how effective and how great their culture is and how well they're performing. just, it's been an incredible example to say, if we can continue to make small incremental shifts every day of the week by fixing something that bothers somebody on the team, then everyone feels seen, heard and understood and we can get to where we're going. If not, maybe even further.

Desiree (18:32.288)
I have a follow-up question, either to Angel's specific way of doing things or maybe just your thoughts on it. Conflict is often seen as a negative thing, but it sounds to me like he's created a safe space for people to directly bring conflict up. Would you anticipate... Yeah, sorry. I'm going to finish the second part of this question, but would you anticipate that it ends up being kind of a conversation of conflict or is it usually taken at face value? Like, this is bothering someone, we need to do something about it.

Eric Termuende (18:47.35)
It's great. Sure.

Desiree (19:00.671)
Or is it often met with no, it's fine the way that it is.

Eric Termuende (19:05.058)
I think it depends on the situation, but I'm going to borrow from Patrick Lenzioni. He's the author of five dysfunctions of a team, founder of TableGrip. Like, you know, he's one of the best at this. And he said the foundation of the highest performing teams is a foundation of trust. But after we have that foundation of trust, conflict is a requirement actually in the workplace. You know, we used to think that conflict is a bad thing. But conflict built on a foundation of trust, healthy descent.

can help us bring our very best selves forward because we're not fearing reprimand, we're not fearing judgment. Instead, we know that we've got what Amy Emmonson would call a psychologically safe space where we can bring our best ideas forward. And I don't think that happens overnight, but I do think it happens if we're the leader by setting the vulnerability bar, admitting some mistakes, sharing some ideas that maybe didn't go so well, and opening up the floor for other people to share some of these one degree shifts too. I think the risk is that the changes that we're suggesting.

are too big and that's when the conflict can get maybe a little bit out of hand. But if we start small and measure everything that we're doing along the way, you know, we've heard it before, you you can't improve what you don't measure, then it's going to be really hard to get to where we want to go if not further.

Desiree (20:17.997)
Amazing. Eric, I'm so glad that you came on and joined us. Two last short questions for you. One, if there outside of five dysfunctions of a team, because I'm right there with you, if there was one book that has kind of shaped the way that you think of this outside of your own, which we will link in the show notes, what book is that?

Eric Termuende (20:26.52)
Mm-hmm.

Eric Termuende (20:37.272)
I like the Culture Code by Daniel Coyle. Do you have that one too? One of your 100? Yeah, yeah, nice. I mean, other books that aren't necessarily as relevant, you I liked Predictably Irrational. I think that's just a really good, like, basically why we do things that don't necessarily benefit us. It just really helps with sort of human psychology. I like Range by David Epstein. Again, not necessarily related to the conversation we're having today, but probably one of my favorites.

Desiree (20:40.801)
I'm reading that right now, that's why I laughed, sorry. Yeah.

Eric Termuende (21:06.318)
I think I'll probably stop there.

Desiree (21:08.341)
Awesome. I'm always looking to add to my hundreds of books on my to be read pile. And the last question, Eric, I'm positive there's a billion other questions I can ask you, but from the stage, is there a message that really touches people that you share with them that they walk away and they say, will never forget what Eric said? What is that? How can we learn from you in this?

Eric Termuende (21:11.758)
Nice.

Eric Termuende (21:27.374)
So it's the real, you know, look, I'd be giving myself to my credit if I said that, yeah, there's definitely one. But you know, the message that really has resonated with me, because that's all I can really speak for, is that I think we just, I think we've been asking the wrong question about the future of work, you know, and how we're building teams. I think we've been asking, what does the future look like? And I just don't think that's the right question to ask anymore, because it's changing too fast and it's too unpredictable.

I think the question we should be asking instead is how can we build an incredible team that will help us navigate whatever the future brings? And if we can put a lot of these things in practice, like we talked about today, my message to the folks that are listening is you don't need to be able to predict the future to build a team that can absolutely thrive in whatever throws our way.

Desiree (22:13.003)
Awesome. Thank you so much, Eric, for joining us. And friends, just remember that leadership is a privilege, but it is also a really big responsibility. And you're the boss now. So what are you going to do with it?