Beyond the Usual Suspects: Job Desperation as a Driver of Turnover Intention and Job Search Behaviour

Research overview

Why do some employees move beyond dissatisfaction to feel an urgent need to escape their jobs? This study examines job desperation across three independent samples of French-speaking employees in France and Canada. It validates a French-language measure and finds that job desperation adds substantial explanatory power for turnover intentions and job search beyond other workplace factors, including emotional exhaustion and well-being. For organizational leaders, the research offers a sharper lens for understanding withdrawal: retention efforts should attend to employees’ sense of urgency and entrapment, alongside the conditions that make leaving feel necessary.