Know before they quit: Spot employee attrition risks early

As someone who works in the People department, I've seen first-hand how costly and disruptive unexpected attrition can be.

You don't always get a heads-up to intervene before someone quits. Disengagement, team instability, or low sentiment are often scattered across systems or buried in day-to-day noise. And by the time a resignation hits your inbox, it's often too late to try and support that person or help resolve any professional issues. 

The solution is automation. Using Zapier's powerful AI orchestration platform, I built a fully automated system that aggregates signals from team data, Slack conversations, and team survey responses. It analyzes those signals and identifies when someone might be at risk of departing. Once someone is flagged, it sends a proactive alert to HR or the employee's manager so they can offer early support. 

Watch my video below to see how it works, or keep reading for step-by-step instructions.

How to set up an early warning system for attrition risk

This template is a coordinated system made up of Zaps (Zapier's automated workflows) and automation-first databases (powered by Zapier Tables). 

Click on the template below, then click Try it on the template page.

Employee Attrition Risk Prediction and Mitigation

Predict employee turnover and boost retention with automated risk analysis and alerts.

Try it

You'll be taken to a details page in Zapier Canvas that shows you information about your early warning system with all the building blocks laid out for you. Here's how it works at a glance:

1. Zapier Tables acts as your data backbone

It includes three different tables to store employee data:

• A Slack sentiment table with logged messages

• An attrition risk table with employee data

• A survey engagement table with team results

These tables keep everything organized so data flows automatically as your team changes.

2. Zaps handle the automation

Several Zaps send data to those tables by:

• adding new hires,

• logging team updates,

• recording departures, and

• saving Slack conversations.

These run automatically whenever relevant data updates happen.

3. AI-powered analysis spots attrition risk

Each week, a final Zap:

• reviews all the incoming data

• uses AI logic to flag any potential risk patterns (like low sentiment or team turnover)

• sends proactive alerts to HR or managers

Step 1: Set up the Slack sentiment Zap

This first Zap is designed to monitor Slack messages and log weekly sentiment data for each team member.

Click the View asset button on the first Zap on your template Canvas page. In the window that opens, click Go to Zap to open your Zap in the editor. 

Most steps are fully set up for you, and you just need to click through and test each one to ensure your Zap runs correctly. But you will need to add some personalization to make sure you're collecting Slack messages from the right channel. 

• In the first step, connect your Slack account and choose which Slack channel you want to collect team messages from. 

• In the next step, Delay by Zapier waits a set amount of time so the Zap can gather enough context before running sentiment analysis. You can adjust the time delay to minutes, hours, weeks, or months.

The remaining steps use a variety of built-in Zapier tools to group, analyze, and store the Slack data automatically.

• Digest by Zapier collects all those messages into a single digest, scheduled to run weekly.

• AI by Zapier analyzes the digest and returns a short summary describing the team's overall sentiment.

• Zapier Tables searches your Slack sentiment table for a record that matches the Slack channel ID.

• Zapier Tables then updates that record with the new sentiment analysis.

These should work as is and won't need any customization (unless you'd like to make changes to the AI prompt or how the Zap is set up). Once you've clicked through and tested those steps, your Zap is ready to use. This gives you a consistent, weekly pulse on how your team is doing.

Step 2: Set up the employee data Zaps

The following three Zaps help keep your employee records accurate and relevant as people join, switch teams, or leave your company. 

Let's start with the Zap that logs new hires and checks the team's most recent engagement survey results. This is the second Zap workflow shown on your template Canvas page.

Click the View asset button, then click Go to Zap to open your Zap in the editor. 

Like before, most steps will be fully set up for you, and you just need to click through and test each one.

• In the first step, connect your BambooHR account. It's set up to trigger whenever a new employee is added to your account.  

• Test the second step, where Zapier Tables creates a new record for that employee in your attrition risk table.

• Test the third step, where Zapier Tables then looks up the most recent engagement survey score for the team they're joining.

• Test the final step, where Zapier Tables updates the new employee's record to include that survey score.

When you're done, remember to turn on your Zap. 

Now let's move onto the Zap that logs team member updates, which is the third Zap shown on your template Canvas page.

• In the first step, your BambooHR account should already be connected if you've done so before. It will be set up to trigger whenever an employee is updated in your system. 

• Zapier Tables searches for their existing record in your attrition risk table.

• Zapier Tables then updates that record with the employee's new team, ensuring their data stays accurate if they move across departments or roles. This is important because their risk profile may change depending on the new team's engagement levels or recent turnover. 

Click through and test each step to make sure everything's working, then turn it on. 

Finally, let's go ahead and configure the Zap that logs departures and flags potential risk for remaining team members. This is the fourth Zap workflow shown on your template Canvas page. 

• The first step will trigger whenever an employee is marked as departed in BambooHR. 

• A Filter by Zapier step checks that the update qualifies as an actual departure. You can customize the filter logic but it's already set  to continue only if a team member is marked as "unemployed." 

• Zapier Tables then finds and deletes that employee's record from your attrition risk table.

• Looping by Zapier runs through each remaining teammate individually, so later steps in the Zap can act on one person at a time.

• Zapier Tables then updates each team record to include the date of the most recent team departure. That recent turnover signal is an important factor in assessing ongoing attrition risk for the rest of the team.

Once you've clicked through and tested every step, turn on your Zap. 

Step 3: Set up your AI Zap

This final Zap pulls everything together. Every week, it identifies potential attrition risks and alerts the right stakeholders, so your team can take timely, proactive action.

Click on and open the final Zap workflow shown on your template Canvas page. 

Like the others, most of the steps are already configured. All you need to do is test each step and customize who should receive alerts.

• The first step is set to trigger every Monday at 9:30 a.m with Schedule by Zapier. You can customize this to whichever day and time of the week you prefer.

• Zapier Tables then pulls all current records from your attrition risk and Slack sentiment tables.

• AI by Zapier then compares signals (like low engagement scores or recent departures) across both datasets. It does this to identify employees who may be at risk of leaving. You shouldn't need to customize this step but you can, of course, personalize or change your AI prompt based on your company needs. 

• In the final step, Slack sends a direct message to HR or team leaders, flagging those risks and offering support options. You'll need to configure this step to specify who on your team should be receiving these direct messages. You can also customize the text by typing out a custom message in the Message Text field.

Once you've tested the steps, your Zap is ready to use. Now, you have a recurring, AI-powered view of where support might be needed—before attrition happens. 

Stay ahead of attrition with automation and AI

Before this, spotting attrition risk felt like guesswork. Now, you don't have to rely on hunches. This system gives you a clear, data-backed view of team health every week. That way, you have time and scope back to do the most important work: meaningfully connecting with other humans.

And if you're excited by the idea of using automation and AI to support your teams, know this: this is just the start of what you can do with Zapier. See what else you can build today to power your teams and processes.