Also known as High-Skill Migration or Human Capital Flight, Brain Drain is generally defined as an event where "educated, professional workers leave a place or company in order to move elsewhere where they can benefit from better pay, working conditions, lifestyle and sometimes work-life balance" (HRZone).
Typically, Brain Drain comes at an economical cost to the place or country, that the skilled individual leaves and has a major impact on the availability of talent for hiring companies in those areas seeing an exodus. This can lead to a decrease in innovation, advancement, and competition and so the further study of high-skill migration (ie. what causes it and what its full effects are) is vital.
City/State Brain Drain
A city or State can at one point in time be the place of promise and opportunity, and then at another point in time, see a mass exodus of its population. This coming and going of high-skill workers is based on the perceived opportunity of economic success and improved quality of life in a given area.
A prime example of this is the State of Michigan. Largely thanks to the automotive manufacturing industry, the State of Michigan has mostly been viewed as a destination for economic prosperity and opportunity. While the population has seen an ebb and flow closely linked to the state of the economy, January 2020 saw a substantially slowed down population growth rate - even with a robust economy.
Among the reasons for this (fewer births, more deaths, and falling immigration) is that people are leaving Michigan for other States. The most alarming part is that the median age of people leaving the State is just under 30 years of age and more than 45% of them have a College degree (Bridge). This suggests that Michigan is losing many of its high-skilled workers to other States. Reasons for this and where these people are going is yet to be conclusively defined.
International Human Capital Flight
There is a lot of ongoing research being done on the international migration of skilled workers and the negative/positive impacts for the receiving country, the sending country, and the individual skilled worker. Typically, what is being seen is the educated individuals from less developed countries are moving to countries with more opportunities for better pay, better working conditions and a better way of life.
This complex issue demands more research so that countries and companies can implement policies to safeguard against the economic, political and even cultural consequences. This discussion is beyond the scope of this article but we have included several resources to refer to on this subject in our "Sources and Further Reading" section below.
Corporate/Industrial Brain Drain
Geographic regions are not the only ways we can see a brain drain. Corporations, or even industry sectors can also see a depletion in their human capital due to a variety of reasons including:
▪ Leaders leaving a company without sharing their expertise
▪ Mass retirements and fewer available replacements with same knowledge
▪ Poor Leadership
▪ Negative company culture
▪ Perceived instability and therefore insecurity in the company or industry
| ▪ | Leaders leaving a company without sharing their expertise |
| ▪ | Mass retirements and fewer available replacements with same knowledge |
| ▪ | Negative company culture |
| ▪ | Perceived instability and therefore insecurity in the company or industry |
What Employers Can Do About It
The "pushes and pulls" behind high-talent migration and brain drain is continuously evolving. Some of these "pushes and pulls" are outside of the control of a company but there are still actions that can be made to avoid a large-scale brain drain. Employers who focus their attentions on employee retention, invest in proper knowledge transfer and foster strong leadership might be less likely to see the consequences of a brain drain.
