Training for New Managers Improves Turnover and Performance

Training for New Managers Reduces Turnover and Improves Team Performance
Leaders routinely underestimate the damage caused by underprepared first-time managers. While the promotion itself often makes sense due to their strong individual productivity and technical expertise, the struggles occur when performance expectations change overnight and the support to effectively lead, manage, and coach their rarely follows.

For high performing teams, training for new managers is not a “nice to have” or “check the box” activity. It is a strategic lever that directly increases employee engagement, reduces unwanted turnover, mitigates employee relations risk, and drives team productivity.

What the Training for New Managers Research Says

The trends are clear.

• Gallup has consistently found that managers account for at least 70% of the variance in employee engagement, which is one of the strongest predictors of unwanted turnover.
• Our situational leadership experts found that 60% of new managers underperform during their first two years, and that 85% receive no training prior to switching into the role of manager.
• Of those that do receive management development, only 10% of respondents to a recent McKinsey survey said their companies’ frontline manager training is effective in preparing managers to lead.

Why Training for New Managers Reduces Turnover and Improves Team Performance

People manager assessment center data show that customized training for new managers works because it closes a known capability gap at the exact moment it opens.

Individual contributors succeed by doing the work themselves.

Managers succeed by getting work done through others.

That shift requires new leadership mindsets, behaviors, and decision making.

Without strong management practices and targeted coaching, most new managers default to micromanagement, conflict avoidance, or overreliance on technical expertise — all of which degrade team performance and increase employee attrition risk.

3 Key Areas of Impact
Effective management development programs focus on three high-impact capabilities.

1. Role Clarity and Performance Expectations
   New managers must understand what success looks like in their new role, how it fits into the overall company strategy, how decisions should be made, and who is accountable for what. They must also be able to create the same level of clarity with their team — hopefully using a proven team charter. Any strategic ambiguity or misalignment creates team confusion, conflict, and churn.

   Make sure your people leaders can consistently clarify team goals and accountabilities, define team roles and responsibilities, align to strategic priorities, agree upon success metrics, and ensure clear decision making rights to reduce friction and prevent avoidable performance issues.

2. Effective Performance Conversations
   The good news is that frequent employee feedback drives higher levels of both engagement and retention.  The organizational culture assessment research shows that 69% of employees who receive feedback twice a year or less say they would like more frequent feedback and coaching from their manager.  Unfortunately, the same research also finds that more than half of new people managers are uncomfortable giving difficult performance feedback.

   Effective management training creates standards and builds confidence and capabilities in goal setting, coaching, and course correction.  High functioning teams balance high performance expectations with high levels of empathy, support, and feedback. This matters because employees who receive clear, fair, and timely feedback are more likely to improve, less likely to disengage, and apt to stay for the long term.

3. Trust-Building Behaviors
   The ability to build trust is a powerful managerial practice. Research by Amy Edmondson showed that teams with higher psychological safety outperform peers because people speak up, share concerns, and learn faster. Customized new manager training that reinforces active listening, stakeholder inclusion, and transparent follow-through strengthens team trust, engagement, and performance.

The ROI of Effective Management Development
The financial implications of ineffective managers are significant. Replacing an employee typically costs between 1.5x and 2x annual salary when factoring in lost productivity, recruiting, onboarding, and ramp time. Using highly relevant, aligned, and customized manager training to ensure that new supervisors can effectively lead, manage, and coach their teams costs a fraction of that — and pays compounding returns as teams scale.

Done right, the outcome from leadership development should be higher performing teams, improved strategy execution, and the retention of top talent.

The Bottom Line
Effective training for new managers reduces turnover and improves team performance because it addresses the real drivers of employee disengagement — unclear expectations, weak feedback, and low trust. When organizations equip people managers to lead their new team, they prevent avoidable leadership failure, protect their leadership pipeline, and create conditions for high engagement and high performance.

To learn more about how training for new managers reduces turnover and improves team performance, download The Top 5 Misperceptions that Slip Up Too Many New Managers

Tristam Brown

Tristam Brown is a seasoned business consultant and organizational development expert with more than three decades of experience helping organizations accelerate performance, build high-impact teams, and turn strategy into execution. As CEO of LSA Global, he works with leaders to get and stay aligned™ through research-backed strategy, culture, and talent solutions that produce measurable, business-critical results. See full bio.