Boomerangs...very popular in Australia...and Redmond

On Jobsblog, Jenna posted about a Microsoft employee that left and came back. Last week, at our Silicon Valley Networking event, two of the hiring managers from the BMO team talked about how they left Microsoft and came back too. Mostly, I think that people tried some dot com stuff and decided they like what they had. We don't have an adversarial relationship with people that leave and try something and want to come back. If they were a great performer, I say welcome!

Comments

• Anonymous
  March 31, 2006
  The comment has been removed
• Anonymous
  April 03, 2006
  I think if it's something that someone really needs to do, they should do it. There are entrepreneurial opportunities here (lots of start-up groups), but it's still working at Microsoft. If someone wants to be their own boss, try something different, and assume the financial risk, they should go for it. Each person has to judge what works for them personally. I don't like the idea of trying to keep people from leaving other than by being an awesome place to work.
  
  We do reward innovation where it's part of a job and employee's contribution; just as we reward other competencies that lead to success in performance. There are an abundance of opportunities to be innovative in many roles (mine included), but that's really a function of our culture versus trying to keep people from leaving to start up their own companies. A certain amount of turn-over is good as it gives other people an opportunity to move up and try something new. Our turn-over rate is very low compared to the market (I don't want to quote an exact number as I'm not sure what it is right now), so I don't perceive any kind of "crisis mode" here.