Turning the Spotlight on the Consequences of Individual IT Turnover

Abstract

Among the many aspects of IT personnel studied by the information systems (IS) research community, individual voluntary IT turnover is one of the most-examined phenomena. However, research into this phenomenon concentrates mainly on antecedents and cognitive precursors such as turnover intention. Antecedents are essential to understanding the turnover behavior of IT personnel, but they do not represent the complete IT turnover research. The consequences of individual voluntary IT turnover behavior, an important topic, have faded from the spotlight of the IS community. We investigate this by conducting a multidisciplinary scoping literature review of individual voluntary IT turnover behavior, with the focus on the consequences. The purpose of this review is to determine what is known about voluntary IT turnover behavior consequences and what research gaps exist in this research context. To make our review as rigorous as possible, we followed a systematic review approach, accompanied with transparent reporting of all steps of the review process. Our search strategy yielded 153 IT turnover studies, 14 of which consider IT turnover behavior consequences, concentrated primarily on IT project management. Drawing on the scoping review, our study also specifies a research agenda for future IT turnover behavior consequences research by highlighting knowledge gaps for potentially fruitful research directions.