Abstract
This article presents the evidence from a small study of the strategies used by hotel managers to retain their employees. The focus of attention is on exactly what managers do when confronted with an employee who is voluntarily leaving their employment. Two aspects are of particular interest; the role of increasing pay and the effect of increasing merit on strategies. The background to the study is the well-documented high level of labour turnover [Johnson, 1980 and 1985] and the evidence that managers appear to have chosen a dependence on the external labour market as a means of regulating labour [Simms et al., 1988].