I. Case
The top management of Ernst & Young grew concerned about the firm’s retention rates for women & by critical report from the research group Catalyst. Chairman Phillip A. Laskawy, who personally headed Ernst & Young’s Diversity Task Force, responded by setting a planning objective to reduce turnover rates for women. Rates at the time were running some 22% per year & costing the firm about 150% of each person’s annual salary to hire and train new staff.
Laskawy then organized to meet his planning objective by first creating a new Office of Retention & then hiring Deborah K. Holmes to head it. As retention problems were identified in various parts of the firm, Holmes convened special task forces to tackle them & recommend location-specific solutions. A Woman’s Access Program was started to give women access to senior executives for mentoring and career development.
Holmes identified the core problem: work at the firm was extremely intense, & women are often stressed because their spouses also worked. Holmes became a champion for improved work-life balance and pursued it relentlessly. Although admitting that “there’s no silver bullet” in the form of a universal solution, new initiatives from her office supported & encouraged better balance. She started “call-free holidays,” when professionals did not check voice mail or e-mails on weekends and holidays. She also started a “travel sanity” program that limited employees’ travel to four days a week so that they could get home for weekends.
Laskawy and Holmes both knew what the retention rates were when they started the new program, and they were consequently able to track improvements. Through measurement they were able to compare results with ...