Pay Isn't the Whole Story: What CRNAs Say About Leaving a Job
By FairShare Team · · 3 min read
A national CRNA workforce retention survey published in the AANA Journal (December 2021) asked a large sample of practicing CRNAs directly: among those who had left or considered leaving a position, what was the primary reason?
"Better pay/benefits" came out on top as the single most common reason cited, statistically more common than every other reason examined, including burnout specifically (a pairwise statistical comparison in the study confirmed this difference was significant). That's worth stating plainly, because it would be easy for a workplace-culture platform to overstate the case that compensation doesn't matter — it clearly does, and any honest retention strategy has to start there.
Most common isn't the same as only
But "most common" isn't "only." Burnout still showed up as a distinct, separately identified reason CRNAs gave for leaving or considering leaving a position — meaning it's a real driver sitting right behind compensation, not a footnote to it. And unlike a compensation adjustment, which typically requires a budget cycle and administrative approval, workplace conditions tied to burnout — scheduling fairness, break reliability, day-to-day support — are levers a department can start adjusting immediately.
The practical read for department leaders: get compensation right first, because the data says that's genuinely the top reason people leave. But don't stop there — the second-tier reasons are exactly the kind of structural, fixable workplace conditions that don't require waiting for the next budget cycle to start improving. FairShare's break relief and fairness ledger target precisely that second tier.