Top 5 Best Practices for Employee Offboarding

The employee offboarding process isn’t considered as important as the employee onboarding process by most organizations. The HR teams spend 8 times more time on the employee onboarding process than on the offboarding process.

Employee offboarding focuses on the exit procedures to be followed when an employee leaves the organization. It isn’t as easy as bidding farewell to the employee through a hurried exit interview; employee onboarding ought to be handled more responsibly by the organization. When done right the employee offboarding process could offer key management insights and uncover hidden internal issues. Read on to know more about employee offboarding best practices that offer key strategic business insights.

Employee Offboarding Strategy

The management in any company focuses on issues at an organizational level. On the other hand, employees are exposed to small issues that aren’t noticed by department heads or general management. Focusing on the offboarding process offers key insights into small and recurring issues that might grow into huge issues that hamper the productivity of the business.

Here are a few pointers for an effective onboarding strategy:

Create a comprehensive offboarding checklist:
The checklist must be created as soon as the project team updates the employee’s resignation. Keep in mind the leaving date while preparing the checklist to ensure that there is enough time to execute the complete offboarding process.

Include all compliance and regulatory issues:
Assets issued by the organization need to be handed over before leaving the organization. Having a complete list of compliance and regulatory aspects of employee exit is very important to prevent the misuse of resources.

Choose a good offboarding software:
Automating the employee offboarding process ensures streamlined execution and leaves zero scopes for the overlook.

Assign offboarding responsibility to an individual or a team:
Appoint the concerned HR person handling end-to-end offboarding.

Ensure offboarding is mandatory for all roles and designations:
Employee offboarding must be followed for all employees irrespective of how small or big their role in the organization may be.

Document the proceedings for future re-evaluation:
Complete documentation at each step of the offboarding process is mandatory.

Implementing and maintaining transparent employee offboarding practices has multiple benefits. It not only makes the employee feel appreciated but also benefits the company branding.

Why is Employee Offboarding Important?

An employee could resign for a myriad of reasons. Employee offboarding is not given the importance it deserves. In most organizations’ employee offboarding is a loose, manual process that is executed through emails, phone calls, or personal conversations. Even in organizations with a formal offboarding process, very little focus is given to completing all the steps.

According to a study by the Aberdeen Group, organizations that executed a formal boarding process reported a higher percentage of highly engaged employees. The study also reveals that a dedicated offboarding process can improve key business metrics.

Here are 3 reasons why formal employee offboarding is important:

• Provides key management insights: Exit interviews could reveal key insights that can be used to improve the company’s productivity. Recurrent issues that employees face daily are revealed in an exit interview. These issues go unnoticed by the management. Exit interviews can also be used to mitigate any ill perceptions that the employee might have against the company.
• Shows appreciation: Whether employees leave voluntarily or involuntarily, the offboarding process must be conducted with the same zest. When you conduct an offboarding process irrespective of the reason for departure, it creates a holistic feedback loop.
• Helps engage with formal employees: Former employees are valuable assets to the organization. A formal offboarding process helps the organization stay in touch with former employees.

Top 5 Employee Offboarding Best Practices

Here are the top 5 employees offboarding best practices you could use in your organization.

1. Manage the resignation:

When HR is intimated about the resignation of an employee, the resignation must be managed systematically. The first step would be the termination of the contract. The second would be scheduling the exit interview. Communicate to the team and the clients about the employee’s resignation.

2. Manage the paperwork:

The contracts and NDAs of the employee must be duly terminated. The compensation, benefits, and tax documents must be reviewed and any outstanding amount must be settled.

3. Hand-off process:

The exit of an employee creates a vacuum in the team that needs to be proactively addressed. Determining the replacement, knowledge transfer program, documentation hand-off, and skill gaps need to be planned and executed before the employee’s last day at the organization.

4. Asset checklist:

A checklist of the assets issued to the employee must be created. Before leaving the organization, the employee has to return all the assets. The desk and drawer must be cleared of any personal belongings.

5. Reset and revoke access:

Access to company emails and other systems, project accounts, and work areas must be revoked once the offboarding process is completed.

Leveraging technology for a smooth and transparent employee offboarding process is a great relief for the HR department. Automation of the employee offboarding process streamlines the process and eliminates redundancies.

Cflow workflow software can automate the employee offboarding process quickly and efficiently. The offboarding workflow can be easily digitized using our visual form builder.

Key takeaways

Ensuring a graceful exit process holds the key to improving existing employee retention and the company’s branding. Among the employee offboarding best practices, automation is the most important one. Sign up for a free trial of Cflow to streamline your employee exit process.