Tuition Aid Pays Off in Loyalty
What happens if a company has a tuition reimbursement policy? Do employees who use it tend to stay longer, or do they abscond shortly after completing their coursework?In its May 21 edition, the Wall Street Journal reports on research indicating that the answer is the former. For instance:
One new study, by Stanford graduate student Colleen N. Flaherty, found dramatically lower attrition among participants in a tuition-reimbursement program at an unnamed nonprofit institution. Among employees hired the year after the program started, only about 33% of participants had left the employer within five years, compared with about 60% of employees hired the same year who didn't use the tuition program.Erin White's article cites similar findings (pdf) of Peter Cappelli, a management professor at the Wharton School. Cappelli's research showed that tuition assistance can help both with retention and with recruitment of high-quality employees.1
White points to the Employee Scholar Program at United Technologies as a particularly comprehensive program — and one that has demonstrated positive impact on retention.
The moral of the story: Companies aiming to attract and retain top-notch talent need to make sure that their tuition reimbursement policy supports this goal as robustly as possible.
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1 The papers of Colleen Flaherty and Peter Cappelli are available online for $5 apiece through the Social Science Research Network.
Labels: Employee development, Hiring and getting hired
posted by Karen Nelson @ 11:01 PM
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