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You probably already know someone who left. Someone who was good at their job. Someone who took years to hire, months to onboard, and no small amount of trust to develop. Someone who sat in a meeting one day, smiled politely, and had already decided. And when they handed in their notice, the reason they gave was not really the reason. It never is.
This is the quiet crisis running through organizations right now. Not a dramatic exodus, but a steady, expensive bleed of good people who felt like they had run out of road.
The good news is that most of it is preventable. The research going into 2026 is clearer than it has ever been. And the companies doing it well already know the answer. It is mentoring.
HR leaders have spent years assuming pay is the main driver of turnover. The 2025 data continues to disagree with that assumption, strongly.
Gallup's State of the Global Workplace 2025 Report found that only 21% of employees globally are engaged at work, the lowest level in a decade, costing the global economy $438 billion in lost productivity annually.
Engagement and culture account for 69% of the reasons employees leave, while pay and benefits account for a fraction of that. What people are actually leaving is the feeling of being unseen, unsupported, and stuck.
According to HR.com's State of Employee Retention 2025 to 2026 report, 58% of organizations say their voluntary turnover rate is above the industry average. More than half of all employees, 51%, say they are watching for or actively seeking a new job right now. That self-reported "I might leave" rate is the highest it has been in nearly a decade.
The cost of that is significant. Replacing an employee costs anywhere from 30% to 400% of their annual salary. For organizations losing mid-level and senior women specifically, that cost is rarely just a number on a spreadsheet.
The same research that documents the retention crisis also documents what works. And the numbers around mentoring are remarkable.
Employees involved in structured mentoring programs have a 50% higher retention rate than those without one. Retention rates are 72% for mentees and 69% for mentors, compared to just 49% for employees not participating in any mentoring program. More than 40% of workers without a mentor have considered quitting in the past three months, compared to just 25% of those with one.
Companies with strong learning cultures, where mentoring is a core component, show a 57% retention rate compared to 27% for companies with moderate learning investment. That is more than double the outcome for roughly the same workforce. And 94% of employees say they would stay longer at a company that genuinely invested in their learning and growth.
Mentoring is now ranked the number four L&D strategy globally, up from number six in 2021, the largest single jump of any strategy on that list. The direction of travel is clear. And 91% of companies with mentoring programs report improved retention as a direct outcome.
If your organization is losing women at the mid-level and senior stages, you are not alone. But you are also not powerless.
The data on mentoring and gender is some of the most compelling in this space. Promotion and retention rates for women in structured mentoring programs improve from 15% to 38% compared to non-mentored peers. Companies with formal mentoring programs have 20% higher representation of diverse employees in leadership roles. And 63% of companies with diversity-focused mentoring programs see measurable positive impact on gender diversity.
Yet 63% of women have never had a formal mentor. And only 24% of women in leadership roles report having had access to one.
This is not a pipeline problem. It is a support problem. Women are in your organization. What is often missing is the relationship, the guidance, and the visibility that mentoring provides.
If you want to understand how to start building that support infrastructure, our free ERG Guide is a practical starting point. It covers how to set up or strengthen women's employee resource groups in a way that creates real community rather than just another calendar invite. And if you are thinking about the broader leadership picture, our Guide to Leadership and Guide to Talent Development are both free and built specifically for HR and People teams navigating exactly this.
What good mentoring actually looks like in practice
Most mentoring initiatives fail not because the idea is wrong but because the execution is too thin. A company-wide email, a Slack channel, a list of willing volunteers, and then silence.
Good mentoring is structured. It involves proper matching, clear goals, check-ins, and genuine accountability on both sides. It is not a manager giving advice to their direct report. It is a relationship with someone outside the immediate hierarchy who can offer honest perspective, real experience, and the kind of guidance that does not come with a performance review attached.
When it is done well, the impact is visible fast. People show up differently. They are more confident in meetings, more willing to take on stretch projects, more invested in staying because they can finally see where they are going.
The Gen Z numbers are particularly striking here. 31% of Gen Z workers plan to switch jobs within the next six months, up from 25% in 2024, and their confidence in their ability to succeed has dropped from 59% to 39% in the past year alone. These are people who need support urgently, and mentoring is one of the most direct ways to provide it.
There is a version of this conversation that ends with a decision to revisit it next quarter. And next quarter becomes next year. Meanwhile, the people you most want to keep are quietly updating their CVs.
U.S. businesses lose nearly $1 trillion annually due to turnover. The voluntary turnover rate, while declining, remains at 13% on average, and for the industries and roles where talented women are most concentrated, it is often significantly higher.
Approximately 42% of all employee turnover is preventable. Not fixed by a pay rise. Not solved by a new benefits package. Prevented by doing the thing that makes people feel like their future is here rather than somewhere else.
Femme Palette works with companies across Europe to bring structured, expert-led mentoring to their teams. With over 1,200 mentors spanning industries, seniority levels, and cities including Prague, Berlin, Amsterdam, Barcelona, Paris, and Copenhagen, we match your employees with mentors who have genuinely relevant experience and the ability to make a measurable difference.
We also run leadership programs, workshops, and educational sessions for companies that want to develop talent, improve retention, and build more inclusive workplaces. Our corporate clients see real outcomes: stronger engagement, higher retention, and women moving into leadership roles who might otherwise have moved out the door.
One in four Femme Palette mentees receives a promotion. Nearly one in three lands a better role. These are people who stayed in the game and grew, because someone invested in them.
The question is whether that someone is you.
If you are not sure where to begin, our free resources are a good first step. The ERG Guide covers how to build or strengthen women's networks inside your company. The Guide to Talent Development helps HR teams think about development infrastructure more strategically. And the Ultimate Guide to Mentoring for Talent Development is exactly what it sounds like.
When you are ready to move from reading to doing, the Femme Palette team is ready to talk.
Book a free consultation and find out what a mentoring program could look like for your company
Femme Palette is a professional mentoring and community platform with over 1,200 mentors and 5,000 members globally. We partner with companies to retain talent, develop leaders, and build workplaces where ambitious people choose to stay.
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