Numerous surveys have been conducted inquiring about why people leave their jobs. Over the last 10 years, they consistently indicate that between 45 and 49 percent of the reason people leave their jobs is because of poor management. From this predictable finding comes the truism that people hire into a company and leave because of a manager.

How many of your staff or clients left because of your poor management decisions and skills?

Before you answer too quickly, you need to know something else about yourself. You, along with the rest of the human race, have a proclivity of viewing failure as a result of other factors other than yourself. Psychologists call this the self-serving bias. It is in play all the time.

Just listen to the reasons your staff give you for poor quality, missed deadlines, blown budgets, etc. Listen to the reasons clients give for not following through on their commitments. In fact, listen to the reasons you give people when you make a mistake, miss a commitment or otherwise underperform. The more severe or public the situation, the more you likely you are to engage your self-serving bias.

If you will suspend your natural bias, can you face the fact that you were a contributing factor as to why your staff left? If you can’t, go back to the beginning of this message and read it again.

If you can entertain the thought that maybe you had even a small contribution to make, you’re half way there. After all, you can’t fix something that’s not broken. If you are on the lookout for ways you can improve yourself as a manager of people, you will soon be a favored partner or manager indeed.

Your people and your clients are the two primary assets you have. Anything you can do to find the good ones and keep them will make your service more enjoyable, your business stronger and your life better.

So. The overall message? Suspend your bias and face the truth. Become the reason why people stay and not the reason why they leave.