One Hays figure that's been making the rounds is that 61% of Australian workers are planning to change career path or job in the next 12 months.

Let that number land for a second.

If you've got ten people on your team, six of them are quietly considering whether to move on. If you've got 50, you might lose 30 of them in the next year. If you've never thought of retention as a hiring problem before, it's time to start.

Let's break down why people leave, and what you can do about it.

The three reasons people quit

The Hays data, and similar research from LinkedIn and Robert Half, has identified the three biggest drivers of voluntary turnover in Australia.

45% say there's no future at their current job. No growth, no new skills, nothing to aim for. The work stays the same. The career goes nowhere. Eventually, people give up waiting and leave.

42% say they're not earning enough. This isn't necessarily greed. It's usually a sense that the salary stopped reflecting their actual contribution two pay reviews ago. Inflation has hit. The role's grown. The pay hasn't.

21% say the work is boring. People moved on from "a job is a job" expectations a long time ago. They want to be challenged. They want to feel like what they're doing matters. If the work has become mechanical, they start looking for something more interesting.

Notice what's not on this list. Nobody's leaving because the office chairs are uncomfortable. Nobody's leaving over the snacks in the kitchen. The fancy perks most companies bolt on don't show up in the reasons for leaving.

The stuff that drives people out is structural. Career path. Pay. Work itself.

Why "no future" is the biggest driver

The single largest reason, 45% of leavers, is the feeling that they're stuck. Let's unpack that, because it's specifically actionable.

"No future" doesn't mean people want to become CEO. On the Coast especially, most people aren't chasing huge promotions. They're not after corner offices. They moved here because they wanted a balanced life, not a corporate climb.

What "no future" usually means is more subtle. It means they're doing the same thing they were doing two years ago. They haven't learned anything new. They haven't been trusted with anything bigger. They haven't been given any sense that they're growing.

For a tradie, that might mean still doing the same kind of jobs at year five as they were at year one. For an accountant, it might mean still doing compliance work without ever getting closer to the advisory side. For a hospo worker, it might mean still on the floor with no path toward management or sommelier or anything beyond.

The fix isn't promotions. The fix is visible progression. People need to see what comes next, even if "next" is a year or two away.

Why the pay one is more nuanced than it looks

42% say they're not earning enough. The obvious reading is "give people pay rises." Fair enough. But there's a deeper layer.

Most people who say they're underpaid aren't asking for above-market money. They're asking to feel like their salary reflects the value they bring. The frustration usually comes from the gap between the work they're doing and the pay they're getting, not from comparing themselves to LinkedIn millionaires.

In practice, this is fixable in two ways. Pay rises that track to the actual market, ideally proactively rather than after someone resigns. And explicit conversations about what their contribution is worth, with visible logic behind the numbers.

On the Coast specifically, you can't always match Brisbane salaries. Recognise that. Then make the case for everything else you offer. Lifestyle. Lower cost of living for similar roles. Less commute. More autonomy. Real time with family. Match Brisbane on pay where you can, then make sure the other reasons your business is genuinely better are unmistakable.

The boring problem

21% are leaving because the work itself bores them. This is the easiest one to overlook and the hardest one to fix.

Most owners assume the work is the work. "It's just the job." But the same job can be interesting or deadly boring depending on how it's framed and what surrounds it.

The interesting version usually has variety, autonomy, and the chance to do work that visibly matters. The boring version usually has repetition, micromanagement, and outputs that disappear into a void.

If your most reliable team member is starting to phone it in, before you assume they've become lazy, ask yourself if the work has become monotonous. Then look for ways to introduce variation, give them ownership over something new, or connect their daily output to a bigger purpose.

What "nobody asked" means

The through-line on all three drivers is connection. Career path. Recognition. Interest. All three exist or don't exist based on whether the leadership is paying attention.

Most people who leave don't leave suddenly. They drift. They get quieter in meetings. They start putting in just enough. They stop volunteering for things. They take more sick days.

Most owners don't notice until the resignation email lands. By then, the person made their decision two or three months ago and the email is just the announcement.

The single biggest retention intervention is conversation. Regular one-on-ones. Honest check-ins. Asking "how's it going" and meaning it. Asking "what do you want next" and actually listening to the answer.

The data is clear. People don't leave because of perks. They leave because nobody asked.

Why this connects to your hiring strategy

Here's the part most owners don't see. Retention is hiring.

Every person who stays is a person you don't have to replace. Every person you don't have to replace is a hiring campaign you don't have to run. Every campaign you don't have to run is thousands of dollars and months of disruption you avoid.

If you spend $5,000 on retention activities and save one bad-fit hire, you've made an enormous return. Recruitment is expensive. Vacancy is expensive. Onboarding is expensive. Retention, by comparison, is the cheapest hiring investment you can make.

The businesses that get this right hire less because they keep more.

What to do this week

If you've got people you can't afford to lose, here's the first move.

Sit down with each of your top three people in the next two weeks. Not a performance review. A conversation. Ask them three things. What's the most rewarding thing you've done here in the last six months. What do you want to be doing in two years. Is there anything that's been bugging you that we haven't talked about.

Listen to the answers. Don't try to solve everything on the spot. Just listen.

Then come back two weeks later with a specific commitment to something they raised. Some growth opportunity. Some pay conversation. Some change to their role. Something concrete.

That conversation, repeated quarterly, is the single highest-leverage retention activity most businesses don't do. It costs nothing. It saves thousands.

The takeaway

61% of Australian workers are planning to leave. The reasons aren't perks or office snacks. They're structural. No future. Not enough pay. Boring work. And underlying all three, nobody asking what they need.

This is fixable. But only if you know it's happening. And you only know it's happening if you're having the conversations.

The best retention strategy isn't a benefits package. It's regular, honest conversations with the people you can't afford to lose. Do that, and your hiring problems get a lot smaller because you stop creating new vacancies.

Got people you can't afford to lose? Book a 15-minute call and we'll talk through how to make sure they stay.