Practically Relevant: Reevaluating the “Relevance Problem” Through a Review of Practical Turnover Recommendations

Management research is frequently criticized for lacking practical relevance. Using voluntary turnover as a mature and managerially consequential research domain, we review 324 articles published between 2000 and 2023 and systematically extract 493 distinct practical recommendations. In advancing prior assessments of the relevance problem, we consider practical relevance at the recommendation-level of analysis, evaluating each recommendation along two core dimensions: data support (grounding in the study’s own empirical findings) and translatability (actionability for managers). We further situate recommendations within the turnover management process by coding for timing, level of action, and managerial goal of the recommendation. Our findings suggest that the relevance problem is less serious in the turnover research than commonly portrayed in the “relevance literature” regarding the management research in general. Although most studies included turnover management recommendations, only a small subset was both strongly grounded in the study’s evidence and readily actionable, with such high-quality guidance most concentrated on pre-hire interventions aimed at reducing overall turnover rates. In contrast, one of the gaps we detected was that such high-quality guidance is rarer for later-stage turnover management interventions focusing on reducing dysfunctional turnover. By contrasting high versus lower quality recommendations, we develop a five-step framework to help management scholars translate empirical findings into clear, context-sensitive, and actionable managerial guidance. Overall, we contribute to management scholarship by offering a more precise recommendation-level assessment of the relevance problem for use across areas, by identifying content-based gaps inhibiting improvement of practical relevance within the turnover research, and by improving the communication of practical recommendations in research articles.