A client was facing a surge in attrition driven by a mix of external and internal pressures:

• Rising market demand for niche financial and technology skills
• A new competitor is establishing an office nearby, actively recruiting top talent
• Ongoing IT and Finance transformation is creating uncertainty and fatigue

Rather than react with blanket retention strategies, the organization sought a data-driven, targeted approach to understand the root causes of attrition and deploy tailored responses.

We conducted a comprehensive diagnostic by combining:

• Exit interview insights and voluntary attrition trends
• Engagement survey results
• Demographic and skills data to assess risk profiles by team and function

From this analysis, we built employee personas based on reasons for departure, segmented into three key groups:

1. Market-Driven Leavers

• Departures were driven by external demand and more competitive compensation elsewhere.
• We led a compensation benchmarking exercise to identify gaps and recommend adjustments.

2. Competition-Pulled Talent

• This group disengaged following outreach by competitors.
• We partnered with HRBPs and leadership to conduct targeted stay interviews and launch recognition initiatives that reinforced employee value.

3. Transformation-Affected Teams

• Leavers in this group cited poor communication and uncertainty about their future roles.
• We introduced monthly transformation updates led by leadership and created safe discussion spaces for clarity and feedback.

For teams not directly impacted by the transformation but experiencing departures, we addressed the risk of "contagious attrition" by:

• Enabling managers to lead clarity conversations
• Reinforcing consistent messaging about what was changing—and what was not

Within 6–12 months:

• Voluntary attrition dropped by over 50%, even in high-risk functions.
• Internal mobility and employee confidence improved, driven by transparent communication and leadership visibility.
• HR was recognized as a strategic partner—aligning workforce action plans with business priorities and gaining credibility through data-backed insights.
• The use of both qualitative and quantitative data enabled clear, outcome-focused conversations with leadership, reinforcing a culture of accountability and progress tracking.
• The persona-based approach became a repeatable model for proactive workforce risk mitigation and signalled a shift toward a more mature, data-driven HR function.