An Unfolding Model of Voluntary Turnover of Air Force Reservists and Air National Guard Members

Retention is an important issue for every organization due to the high costs of replacing members. This issue is becoming increasing important as the role of guard and reserves has continually increased over the past several years, and so research needs to be conducted on the retention of these groups. Therefore, a web-based questionnaire was administered to Air National Guard and Air Force Reservists from various units and locations. The data from 581 participants was applied to an adapted version of an unfolding model of voluntary turnover originally developed by Lee, Mitchell, Holtom, McDaniel, and Hill in 1999. Data collected indicated that very few people actually have a script to leave the service at the completion of their present obligation. Therefore, many people can still be influenced to remain in the service and so the leaders need to understand what will retain these members and what will cause them to leave. Hopefully leaders will gain a better understanding about the psychological process members go through when deciding to separate, and be able to make recommendations on what issues should be addressed. Recommendations on retention issues and future research are discussed.