How Important is a Smooth Exit Process?
The Great Resignation, as the media call it, has seen 4.3M people leaving their jobs in Jan’22, just grazing November’s record-setting numbers according to CNBC and this revolution in the world of work appears to be continuing apace. While experts suggest the shift is a much-needed reshuffling of talent, this employment change-up is viewing more employees walking away than ever before, underscoring the importance of a well-organized offboarding strategy.
No matter why an employee departs, offboarding should be handled professionally so as to preserve a positive brand image, avoid damaging relationships, maintain a strong culture and ensure continuity of operations. A positive and smoother offboarding experience shows the departing employee that their time at the company was valued and makes the transition in a way that helps you retain their expertise.
Value Drivers of Employee Alumni — Optimizing your offboarding process needs more notice and to be done in the right way, for your former employees can be the source of your Business Development, rehires, and Brand Image -
When you take the time to design a better offboarding process, you and your employee can part ways with additional opportunities for networking, development, growth, and thus more Revenue and referrals as Alumni may not become your potential customers but they sure, refer customers. They often have niche domain expertise and potential clients seek out their opinions and reviews while choosing the company. Beyond client referrals, corporate alumni can also refer candidates for your talent needs.
To covet your ex-employees' abilities once more, Rehiring is an excellent opportunity. According to research, rehiring costs half as much as hiring a new one; rehires are 40 percent more productive and tend to stay on the job longer. In addition, an effective offboarding process helps reduce the chance that misunderstandings will persist after the employee moves on and turn them into your advocate, who will speak highly of you and can send potential new employees your way. With this new level of transparency job seekers have, every step in offboarding has a ripple effect on your employer's brand.
Offboarding the Right Way — Smart employee offboarding isn’t just about efficiency and recordkeeping, it has significant financial and security consequences too. Easy-button your employee offboarding process with these simple steps -
Plan Interviews — Exit interviews are used to gather feedback from the employee about their overall experience while working with the company, in identifying and addressing critical issues and knowing important clues about work culture, processes, ethics, and morale. Information from these interviews can help employers improve the company’s culture and workflow. These interviews also induce the sense that their voices are being heard even after their departure.
One stop Exit Helpdesk — Proper documentation is much critical. The direct access to reach out for all the post-exit queries and download crucial papers like FnF, Visa Letters, etc. is much appreciated by your ex-employees. Provide a one-stop helpdesk and a dedicated platform for your Alumni that lowers the chances of waiting or delay, thus leaving a positive note. Not only does this make the offboarding process official, but it also ensures a smooth and clean break.
Focus on the relationship — Set the tone of a long-lasting relationship during the off-boarding process because parting ways is never an end, it’s just the beginning of the next phase. Keeping in touch fulfills two purposes — emphasizes the employee’s value to the company and demonstrates the importance of employee well-being for the organization, an important differentiator in today’s job market. Design an Alumni program that helps to stay in touch, attend Reunions, maintain relationships, engage meaningfully, celebrate their wins, and take home lots of networking opportunities.
Offboarding an employee is never easy. While it is a bitter pill that every employer must swallow at some point or the other, turn it into the greater good of your organization. Reserve time to design an effective offboarding process showing your current and prospective employees that your organization values them for more than their contribution to the bottom line.
Keeping the same excitement as onboarding while offboarding enables you to validate yourself to be a great workplace and approaching their exit with empathy is the key to ensuring better company relationships.
Departing employees are the people who have so much tribal knowledge and are so valuable that they become almost irreplaceable. Make sure that you don’t fail to capture their organizational-specific know-how because of your short-sighted offboarding process.
