Your Last Day of Work Checklist
Before the Last Day of Work Starts
Be graceful: Remember, no matter what your history is, you should be as graceful as possible on your last day of work. Many people will remember you by your last day so make it a positive memory!
Morning
Tying up loose ends: Go over your work to make sure you’ve completed all your tasks. It’s unlikely you’ll have a lot of work to do on your last day, so use this time to double check there’s no loose ends that need to be tied up.
Make sure your co-workers have a copy: If you have been working on important documents, spreadsheets, anything that your coworkers have a copy shared with them and they know where to find it. A good idea would be to create a folder and share it with them.
Make sure you have a copy: This may be the most important step of the day. You’ll want to save things that you might not realize are really important right now like your contacts and work files. Many people skip this step before their computer is erased and lose years worth of value. You’re going to want to save as much as you can to stay in contact with everyone and also have your work as samples even after your last day of work.
If you have a Gmail account, you’re in luck because it can be very easy with CloudGopher.com. It’s an app that saves your work Gmail account’s contacts, drive files, and emails to your personal Gmail account automatically.
If you have an Outlook account, here’s a great tutorial on how to save your contacts and emails. For OneDrive, it’s a little more difficult than CloudGopher, you should save files to a USB or download and upload them into your personal account.
The reason why I recommend saving your contacts and work into your personal account’s cloud as opposed to a hard drive is because the file types will be the same — which means you can use them just as you did before.
Lunch
Your colleagues may invite you out to lunch or may not, but either way this is a great time to round up people one last time and have fun! Remember, this is your last day of work, not theirs — so focus on this time to really have fun since doing so in their work day may be disrupting.
Afternoon
Pack & give back: It’s time to start wrapping things up. Start packing your belongings so that the rest of the day can go easier. Also, make sure and give back whatever the company owns to the appropriate person. Even if it’s that red stapler you love!
Change your voicemail and email response: For your phone, change your voicemail with the number of the correct person to contact.
For your e-mail, make sure you have an auto-reply message left so that people emailing you know that you are no longer working with the company. Be sure to include the contact information of the appropriate new point-of-contact.
If you have a work Gmail account, here’s your auto-reply guide.
If you have an Outlook account, here’s your auto-reply guide.
Send Goodbye and thank you emails: Either send a company-wide email that generally thanks people and explain what they’ve meant to you. Be light and have fun!
Or you can send individual emails with the same sentimentality, but make sure you error on the side of including people or they might feel left out when you said your goodbyes.
You can also choose to send emails to your contacts that you work with on a day-to-day basis explaining that you’re tackling a new adventure and would love to stay in contact.
Most importantly, make sure to include your new contact information in all of your emails so people know how to get a hold of you.
Drinks (optional): If this is a custom, this can be a great way to end your last day of work with coworkers — especially the one’s you’re closest with. This is still a good opportunity to bury all hatchets if you have any. Just remember, if you drink, YOU STILL NEED TO BE GRACEFUL! ;)
The Last Day of Work Last Point
References: Commit to memory everyone who goes out of their way to say that they will be happy to be a reference in the future.
If you had a poor relationship with an employer who would likely need to be a reference, don’t ask them to be one. Instead, thank them for what you learned from them and leave it at that for your last day of work.
Within the next two weeks, reach out to them and ask them candidly, as in “please be honest, would it be favorable for me to put you down as a reference? I’m okay if you’d rather I didn’t, but I thought there would be no harm in asking.”
This subtle difference between asking a person to be a reference and asking someone if it’s a good idea allows them to be honest with you and if they agree, people will more than likely give you a very positive referral.
Now that you’re ready for your last day of work, start getting ready for your first!