Henri Fayol, the French Management Expert who propounded fourteen principles of management has left a legacy which continues to inspire the management gurus of the modern times. Out of the fourteen principles, the 12th principle is known as the principle of stability.
Stability refers to how long employees stay with an organisation. Stability of tenure of personnel helps any organisation achieve better productivity and smart working.
An organisation must take steps to obtain as much stability as possible. Frequent change and disruption are often expensive both in terms of time and resources. If a large percentage of the workforce leaves frequently, such staff will be need to be replaced by new people. The replacement workers will then have to be trained once again. Training is expensive and time consuming. Individuals need to thoroughly know the policies and culture of the organisation. The money spent on such repetitive activity can be better utilised and spent on more productive activities.
No wonder that HR departments today spend a lot of time in devising ways and means to keep attrition to the minimum. The organisation’s esprit-de-corps needs to be maintained. It is critical that a sense of loyalty is instilled among the members of the organisation.
Thus, stability means no frequent changes and no frequent transfers. Removal from the place where an individual Is working is both distractive and disruptive. In fact, stability helps employees to know each other well and take help for solving the day-to-day problems. Thus the satisfaction of the employees is mitigated. It also leads to achievement of the organisational objectives.
The positive impacts of this principle:
- It develops a sense of belonging towards the organisation, thus improving the efficiency and minimising the wastage of resources.
- Better accountability makes team members to be more disciplined and helps them achieve work satisfaction.
Lack of stability leads to the opposite and adverse results since there is lack of employee participation resulting in general dissatisfaction and high employee turnover.
To conclude, Henri Fayol recommends that every organisation must respect the principle of stability of tenure as much as possible.
