We’ve heard there’s a new term making the rounds in human resource circles: regrettable retention.
It’s what happens when employees who should leave because they’ve mentally checked out or no longer believe in what you’re building, stay anyway.
It’s always happened and it always will, but when markets are uncertain, the ‘wrong’ employees may choose to hang around.
And while you may be quietly relieved they didn’t go, or cause you the hassle of going through redundancy, by staying put they’re potentially eroding the culture you’ve spent years trying to build.
Gartner’s Top Future of Work Trends for CHROs in 2026 calls this “culture dissonance”—the gap between what your employee value proposition (EVP) promises and what people actually experience, or deliver.
It’s when the reality of your workplace or team no longer reflects the story you tell candidates, investors, or yourselves.
And increasingly, we’re seeing some companies expect higher output, more hours, more presence from their people, but not offering more in return.
And they’re turning to team building and culture experts like SongDivision for a fix. Trouble is, this issue goes far deeper than any service or expertise any of us in this space can provide.
The cost of regrettable retention isn’t just to morale, it’s to credibility and your employer brand and, understandably, to relationships with your direct reports.
What this clever phrase fails to explain is that disengaged people don’t stay silent. They tend to stay busy, and occasionally noisy about their dissatisfaction. They keep attending meetings and responding to emails. They look – and sound – like they’re contributing but they’re not only undermining your cultural capital but sometimes doing so out of spite, disgruntlement or for the sheer fun of it when they’re bored.
And so they make it harder for everyone else to care about and trust your culture or team dynamic too.
What CAN we do?
Where team building, and especially team building through music excels is by deepening cultural ties; by reinforcing the mission, vision and values; by adding energy, neuroscience and focus when sales teams need a kick-off or when engagement programs have grown tired and an injection of measurable originality and memorability.
In a world dominated by fakery, we’re now trusting our personal experience more than ever. Shared, honest, human experiences that prove the gap between what you say and what you do is closing, not widening.
The organizations getting this right aren’t running away from the pressure. They’re creating space for their people to connect or reconnect, not through forced fun or surface-level performative theater, but through carefully co-created experiences that engender trust, and spark genuine collaboration.
This work doesn’t solve for those who’ve decided to stay for the wrong reasons, but it does reinforce the cultural positives of your teams and builds reinforcements against the apathy that might otherwise win.
What do you think? Is regrettable retention something you’ve encountered, or overcome?
