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Can they do the work?
Skills, experience and qualifications help answer whether someone can perform the job.
Employee Retention & Engagement
Understand what motivates employees. Improve the fit. Give them a reason to stay.
MAPP® helps organizations understand the motivational patterns, work preferences and role characteristics that may influence employee engagement. Assessment.com then adds RoleMatch AI, internal mobility, 100+ assessments, custom assessment building and AI-powered development tools to help employers create a more personalized retention strategy.
MAPP does not predict who will quit. It helps organizations explore whether the employee's
underlying motivations and work preferences appear aligned with the work and environment.
Employee Motivational Fit Profile
Engagement Insight
Illustrative retention intelligence view
AchievementMeasurable progress and outcomes
IndependenceOwnership and appropriate autonomy
VarietyNew challenges and changing work
ResponsibilityMeaningful accountability and trust
Motivational CommonalityStronger overlap between employee motivations and core role demands can create a better
foundation for engagement.
RoleMatch AI Internal Mobility
Compare the employee with proven performers in other internal roles to identify
opportunities worth exploring.
Motivational FitUnderstand what naturally engages the employee
Multifaceted MAPP ProfileLook beyond one trait or personality label
RoleMatch AIExplore similarity to proven performers
AI Development ToolsTurn insight into personalized action
Retention Starts Earlier
Before asking why an employee is leaving, ask whether the work ever fit them in the first place.
Compensation, management, culture and opportunity all matter. But one important source of disengagement can be a mismatch between what a person is naturally motivated to do and what the job asks them to do every day.
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Do they want to keep doing it?
MAPP adds insight into the activities, environments and responsibilities that may be naturally motivating.
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Does the role support those motivations?
Retention can be strengthened when important elements of the role overlap with what the employee naturally prefers.
Skills vs. Motivation
Being good at a job does not always mean someone wants to keep doing it.
Employees become proficient for many reasons: training, education, repetition, necessity and experience. But capability and motivation are different questions.
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Skill can be learnedAn employee may become excellent at work that is not intrinsically
satisfying.
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Motivation influences sustained interestCore work that aligns with strong preferences can create a stronger foundation
for engagement.
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Fit is more than qualificationA technically qualified employee can still experience chronic motivational
misalignment.
The critical question is not only:
“Can this employee do the job?”
It is also:
“Is this work naturally motivating enough that they will want to keep doing it?”
The MAPP® Retention Advantage
A multifaceted view of the employee and the work they are motivated to perform.
Employee engagement is rarely explained by one trait. MAPP examines several interrelated work-preference and motivational dimensions that can help organizations understand fit more completely.
Interest
What work do they want to do?
Explore job content involving people, creativity, routine, tools, systems, analysis and more.
Temperament
How do they prefer to work?
Consider independence, collaboration, persuasion, change, variety, structure, analysis and responsibility.
Aptitude Orientation
How may preferences express themselves?
Look at broader mental, interpersonal, practical, technical, sensory and mechanical orientations.
People
How much interaction is motivating?
Understand whether helping, influencing, coaching and relationships energize the employee, or whether more independent work is preferred.
Things
Do tangible systems matter?
Explore preference for tools, equipment, processes, materials and technical activity.
Data
How do they prefer to work with information?
Consider analytical, scientific, mathematical, financial, technical and information-intensive work.
Reasoning
How do they prefer to solve problems?
Explore logic, evaluation, strategy, sequential thinking and problem-solving preferences.
Mathematical
How motivating is applied math?
Understand preference toward different forms of mathematical activity, separate from direct skills testing.
Language
How do they prefer to use words?
Add context around communication, explanation, persuasion, writing and verbal activity.
Motivational Commonality
The more the person and the role naturally overlap, the stronger the potential foundation for engagement.
MAPP helps organizations explore where an employee's strongest motivations align with actual responsibilities and the work environment.
Example Role Demands
- Influencing customers
- Independent responsibility
- Problem-solving
- Frequent change
- Competitive goals
- Measurable outcomes
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Employee Motivations
- Persuasion
- Independence
- Analytical problem-solving
- Variety
- Competition
- Achievement
Commitment-Related Motivators
Responsibility, devotion, loyalty and commitment can add important context.
MAPP can also provide insight into motivational characteristics involving responsibility, dependability, devotion, loyalty, commitment, stability, service to others and persistence. These are not guarantees that someone will stay, but they can help managers understand what the employee may value in the work relationship.
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ResponsibilityMay value meaningful ownership, accountability and trust.
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Devotion and commitmentMay place importance on fulfilling obligations and being part of something
meaningful.
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LoyaltyMay value long-term relationships and reciprocal commitment.
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StabilityMay be more affected by uncertainty or unclear expectations.
A retention mistake:
Assuming every employee stays for the same
reason.
A better question:
“What appears to matter most to
this person?”
Personalized Retention
Different employees stay engaged for different reasons.
A one-size-fits-all retention strategy assumes everyone is motivated the same way. MAPP helps managers consider individual differences.
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Achievement
Clear goals, progress, ownership and measurable outcomes.
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Recognition
Acknowledgement, visibility, responsibility and advancement.
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Independence
Autonomy, trust and appropriate decision authority.
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People
Collaboration, coaching, customers and team responsibility.
D
Data & Analysis
Complex problems, strategy, evaluation and intellectual challenge.
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Variety
Changing assignments, projects and new challenges.
S
Stability
Predictable expectations, consistency and a stable environment.
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Ownership
Meaningful responsibility, trust and clear accountability.
RoleMatch AI + Retention
When the current role is a poor fit, find where the employee may fit better.
RoleMatch AI can compare an employee's MAPP profile with one proven performer or a five-person cohort in the same or similar role, helping HR identify internal opportunities worth exploring.
1. Understand the Employee
Use MAPP to identify motivations and potential areas of misalignment.
2. Explore Internal Roles
Identify positions whose responsibilities and environment may better align.
3. Use RoleMatch AI
Compare with one proven performer or a five-person cohort.
4. Build the Path
Identify skill gaps, development needs and an internal mobility plan.
Better Stay Interviews
Turn assessment insight into more personalized retention conversations.
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Independence
Ask: “Your profile suggests autonomy is important. Do you feel you have
enough ownership in your current role?”
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Variety
Ask: “You appear strongly motivated by challenge and variety. Has your
work become too repetitive?”
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People
Ask: “Relationship-oriented work appears important. Are you getting
enough opportunity to collaborate or work with customers?”
A
Achievement
Ask: “Are your goals and success measures clear enough for you to see
progress?”
R
Recognition
Ask: “Do you feel your contributions are visible and appropriately
recognized?”
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Stability
Ask: “Has uncertainty or frequent organizational change become a source
of frustration?”
The Assessment.com Platform
Turn MAPP insight into a complete employee retention and development environment.
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MAPP®
Understand motivation, interests, temperament, work preferences and occupational alignment.
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RoleMatch AI
Compare employees and candidates with one proven performer or a five-person cohort.
100+
Assessment Marketplace
Add complementary assessments for personality, leadership, EI, communication, teams and development.
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AI Assessment Builder
Create custom engagement, stay interview, employee experience and retention assessments.
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Unified Assessment Intelligence
Bring MAPP, Marketplace assessments, custom tools and outside results together around the employee.
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AI Assistants & Coaches
Turn results into interactive questions, development plans, career exploration and ongoing coaching.
Retain the Person, Not Necessarily the Position
Sometimes the best retention strategy is a better internal fit.
If someone is fundamentally poorly aligned with the motivational demands of their role, more incentives may not solve the underlying problem.
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Redesign responsibilitiesIncrease work that aligns and reduce chronic sources of motivational friction
where practical.
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Add developmentGive the employee challenge, ownership, variety or leadership
opportunities.
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Explore another teamA strong employee may fit better in a different operating environment.
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Move to another roleUse MAPP and RoleMatch AI to explore stronger internal alignment before losing
the employee.
The retention question does not always have to be:
“How do we keep
this employee in this job?”
Sometimes it should be:
“Where
inside our organization might this person be more naturally engaged?”
Responsible use: MAPP should not be positioned as a turnover prediction test
and cannot guarantee that an employee will stay. Retention can be influenced by compensation,
management, workplace culture, personal circumstances, career opportunity, workload, benefits,
organizational change, job security, leadership and labor-market conditions. MAPP adds a
different source of insight: whether the individual's motivations and work preferences appear
aligned with the role and environment.
Frequently Asked Questions
Employee retention with MAPP® + Assessment.com
How can MAPP help improve employee retention?
MAPP helps organizations understand what types of work, environments and responsibilities naturally motivate an employee. That information can support better hiring, management, development and internal mobility decisions.
Does MAPP predict whether an employee will stay?
No. MAPP is not a turnover prediction assessment. It provides insight into motivations and work preferences that may be relevant to engagement and fit.
What is motivational fit?
Motivational fit refers to the degree to which important elements of a job and work environment align with the activities, responsibilities and conditions the individual naturally prefers.
Is motivational fit the same as skills fit?
No. Skills fit concerns whether someone possesses the capabilities required to perform the work. Motivational fit concerns whether the person is naturally inclined toward the activities and environment involved.
Can MAPP be used during stay interviews?
Yes. MAPP results can help managers create more individualized stay-interview questions around the employee's motivations, role fit and development needs.
How does RoleMatch AI support retention?
RoleMatch AI can compare an employee's MAPP profile with one proven performer or five proven performers in the same or similar role, helping organizations explore internal mobility opportunities.
Can MAPP identify loyalty?
MAPP can provide information about motivational characteristics involving commitment, responsibility, devotion, loyalty and related work orientations where reflected in the individual's profile. These should not be treated as guarantees of future behavior.
Can organizations create their own retention or engagement assessments?
Yes. Assessment.com's AI Assessment Builder can support custom assessments related to engagement, career aspirations, management, culture, employee experience and organization-specific retention topics.
Understand the employee. Improve the fit. Create a reason to stay.
Use MAPP® to understand motivation, RoleMatch AI to explore proven-fit internal opportunities, and the Assessment.com Platform to support personalized development, management and retention.