I first encountered the deep, dark voice of Johnny Cash as a kid of thirteen, listening to AM radio while I did my homework.

Today I'm still listening. I may be pushing the Repeat button on a Bose music system, but I'm no less moved by the stories he told, the struggles he sang about, and the boom, chica, boom rhythm of his band.

Johnny Cash was among the first country music stars to attract a mainstream, international audience. The recent film Walk The Line told the story: his musical success, failures with drugs, empathy for the underdog, and marriage to singer June Carter.

Walking The Line

I'm convinced that one of the reasons Johnny Cash still connects with so many people is that his songs struggle with truth, fidelity, and infidelity.

"I keep a close watch on this heart of mine....Because you're mine, I walk the line."

They tap into a basic human yearning, to commit ourselves. To find our own line, and walk it straight.

It's a longing that transcends love affairs. It attaches us to communities, causes, even employers.

Playing The Field

But the same desire can also lead people into fear: that when they commit, the other will prove untrue.

"You're gonna break another heart, you're gonna tell another lie."

Many organizations dilute their workers' commitment by playing the field. We take our loyal long-term people for granted, while we chase after the "brightest and best".

We sanitize infidelity, saying it's all part of the "churn".

But it's highly unsanitary.

Churn replaces known people with unknown. It costs us many thousands per employee. It dilutes our knowledge capital. It slows us down while we train new hires.

And it keeps our good people on edge.

Most of our workers want to keep faith with us. Reducing churn requires something of us as employers: showing respect, creating a reasonably comfortable workplace, offering meaningful challenges, making a commitment.

Johnny Cash wasn't necessarily thinking about the workplace as he sang about broken hearts, but his struggle to walk the line resonates still.