Offboarding

Offboarding is a process triggered by an employee leaving and organisation. The triggers for this process may be positive (such as through retirement) or negative (a termination) for the employee. This means the process may or may not have high levels of employee engagement.

In the case of retirement other process such as succession planning may feed into the offboarding process where a co-operative transfer of a role can be achieved between two individuals. In other cases, a staff members exit may be more immediate.

Off boarding will also trigger events in other processes such as benefit and absence management. Offboarding also involves co-operation between multiple departments. For example, payroll must be informed of the termination data, IT must recover any outstanding assets, the employees line manager must prepare the handover of work, human resources may need to manage recruitment and on boarding as well as orchestrating the off-boarding process.

An off-boarding process can have any number of steps and contain a number of procedures. An example process could include the following steps; Notice of departure, communication of departure, reconciliation of accounts, Documentation and interview, handover and final farewell. These steps in the process may run concurrently, in a linear fashion or need to be acted on retrospectively depending on the circumstance.

The notification of departure will initiate the offboarding process. This may be in the form of a resignation letter, through redundancy or other mechanism. The correctness of each process that generate the notification of departure must be carefully checked for its correctness. The means of departure may also indicate the pace at which elements of the off boarding must be completed. In the case where a notice will be served there is no immediate need to cancel an employee’s access card for the building; the opposite will be true if they are being immediately dismissed. The notification of departure will also initiate the recruitment process.

Communication of departure is to alert relevant staff and potentially clients to the departure of employee. Different stakeholders will be informed at different times, a line manager will need to know as soon as possible, if they do not already, but may not choose to make other team members aware of the departure until nearer the time. In the similar way clients may not be informed in advance of an employee’s departure however some process must be in place to capture any future communication they may send so it is not lost.

Reconciliation of accounts can be a broad ranging step that may take some time to complete. This requires tidying up any employee benefits such as bike loans or outstanding leave entitlements within the hr department. It also expands beyond to other departments such as IT who will need to retrieve any equipment and cancel computer accounts that has been issued and to facilities managers who may need to revoke access rights. Who needs to be involved and how complex this step is will vary from organisation to organisation although payroll will always need to be aware to prevent salary payments continuing.

Documentation and interview requirements will depend on relevant policies within an organisation. Documentation such as non-disclosure agreements may nee to be prepared and completed. Exit interviews are best practice where possible and represent the final opportunity to engage with the employee before their departure. Capturing the reasons behind a departure can provide feedback for other processes, such as onboarding, which can help boost staff retention levels in the future.

Handover and final farewell are two important processes within offboarding. Handover may or may not include the departing employee and is an opportunity to provide clients with a positive continuity of service from a different team member or an explanation of a complex area of work to be passed to a colleague. Succession planning can aid the handover process as there has been an opportunity to train and mentor candidates with necessary skills in advance. At this stage final checks should also be made in order that the employee will have no access to systems or facilities after their departure.

The final farewell is an opportunity for the team and organisation to engage positively with the departing employee. Managing this step helps reduce the negative impact of the departure on the remaining staff members. The departing employee should be given a positive experience to demonstrate to them that they made a positive contribution but also as it provides an opportunity to show other staff that the organisation does value them.