Attracting early-career talent is one challenge. Keeping it is another. Organisations invest considerable time and resources in recruitment, onboarding and development. Yet when employees leave within their first few years, organisations lose not only that investment, but also the knowledge, relationships and future contribution those employees were beginning to build.
The first years of a career are formative in ways that go beyond technical development. Professionals are beginning to understand how organisations work, build relationships outside their immediate role, develop confidence in their own contribution and make choices about where they want to go next. They are also forming an impression of whether they can see a future inside the organisation.
Retention challenges also arise early in employment. Work Institute research has found that close to two-thirds of departures occurred within the first three years of employment, while SHRM identifies the one-to-three-year period as particularly difficult for retaining office-based employees.
The cost adds up quickly. Consider a 5,000-employee organisation hiring 100 graduates a year. ISE’s 2023 research suggests around 30% of each intake would leave within three years. Using a university-graduate salary benchmark of €45,000 and published replacement-cost estimates of six to nine months’ pay, that represents €675,000–€1 million per intake. Even a small reduction of 10% in departures—from 30 to 27—could avoid €68,000–€101,000 of those costs.
Belonging becomes a retention issue
Belonging is often treated as an employee-experience measure. But the evidence suggests it also has implications for retention. According to McKinsey research, 51% of employees who left their organisation said they did not feel a sense of belonging at work. BCG research similarly links stronger workplace inclusion — including a sense of belonging — with materially lower attrition risk.
That turns belonging from a cultural question into a strategic one.
For early-career employees, that question is shaped in practical ways: through whether they understand how the organisation works, build relationships beyond their immediate role and can see credible routes to develop and progress. When those conditions are missing, the issue is not only how people experience work, but whether they can see enough of a future there to stay.
If belonging affects whether people stay, what is the organisational exposure when they do not?
The relationship is particularly relevant when organisations are trying to build stronger and more diverse talent pipelines. If some employees are less likely to experience belonging, and belonging is connected to retention, then the issue can eventually show up not only in employee sentiment but in who remains available for future progression. In that sense, belonging can become an early signal of whether emerging talent is becoming more deeply anchored in the organisation — or beginning to detach before its potential is fully realised.
The relationship between belonging and retention is not experienced equally across employee groups. McKinsey also found that non-White and multiracial employees were more likely than White employees to cite a lack of belonging as a reason for leaving. This raises an important question: how early can organisations begin addressing the conditions that influence whether employees feel they belong and see a future within the organisation?
Why early career is a sensible intervention point
Early-career development cannot, on its own, create belonging or resolve retention challenges. Organisational culture, management, opportunity, recognition and many other factors matter. Early career is nevertheless a meaningful point at which to strengthen some of the conditions that help people find their place and navigate what comes next: career direction, organisational understanding, relationships and professional voice.
Waiting until differences become visible in promotion rates, high-potential pools or senior representation means intervening considerably later in the journey.
Strengthening early-career retention
For the past six years, Roots Inspire has worked with professionals at more advanced stages of their careers, supporting their development and progression within organisations. That experience has reinforced the importance of addressing career development earlier, while professionals are still learning to navigate organisational dynamics, build relationships and establish their direction.
Building on this experience, Roots Inspire is introducing Emerging Professionals, a career development programme designed for professionals in their first three years of work. It combines practical learning, peer exchange and guidance from experienced professionals to help participants build the clarity and confidence to succeed with authenticity.
For organisations, the opportunity is not simply to provide more development. It is to help emerging talent build the understanding, relationships and confidence that make it easier to navigate a career — and, over time, to see a future within the organisation. That is where the employee experience and the business case meet: in creating the conditions for talent to stay, develop and progress from within.
If you are exploring how to strengthen the early-career experience in your organisation, you can learn more about Emerging Professionals here.
