This case study attempts to identify the reasons for high turnover of academic staff in private higher institutions especially in small colleges. Three small colleges that shared almost the same type of background were being selected to participate in this study. The academic coordinator from these three institutions was interviewed. This case study has been adapted into qualitative method in order to discover any new elements that are able to explain the lower retention rate among academic staff in private college. The findings indicate that there are several factors that spearhead to failure in retaining academic staff in private higher institution including task and work load, conflict of role, underpaid, and other intrinsic factors. In addition, this study has drawn some suggestions to small colleges to retain academic staff and to Malaysian Quality Accreditation to monitor and regulate turnover rate of academic staff in small colleges.