Why an efficient Offboarding experience is good for business

Few companies have adopted an offboarding process to optimise employees lifecycle. Yet, well-executed offboarding helps you maintain a positive employer brand by supplying employees one last good experience to remember you by. And it is particularly valuable in a world where descriptions of employee experience on websites or where people speak in their networks can directly influence prospective hires or clients.

Providing consistent experience throughout the employee lifecycle

We all want to deliver a great employee experience. Case in point: we build a great onboarding programme into the beginning of the active employee lifecycle. But what about the experience we create for those who have approached the end of their employee lifecycle?

Whereas onboarding can set employees up for success in a new role, offboarding can set the organisation up for success during an employee departure. Designing a formal process to transition employees out of your company is important for future recruitment, company reputation, and business performance. Whether an employee is made redundant or resigns, you need to take appropriate measures to ensure that your offboarding process is conducted in a positive and constructive atmosphere.

When offboarding goes wrong, everybody knows it

Surprisingly, many organisations are still underestimating the value of an efficient offboarding process. Too often, when an employee quits, some managers feel betrayed. The biggest thing to keep is mind is that employees don’t owe you lifelong loyalty. That’s not what the relationship is. It’s business.  These are people who are working for you in exchange for money. They might really like you, but this is still a business transaction. And part of this relationship is that either side gets to terminate it. Just as you might lay off or fire someone, your staff members might leave. That’s part of the deal. So, don’t take it too personal and take this as an opportunity to understand what was good and what can be improved.

After all, your former employees are likely to operate in a similar sector, and to talk about you on the market, so make sure you provide a good off boarding experience. In the end, it will have an impact on both the company’s reputation and on the rest of your team. Poorly executed offboarding doesn’t only affect your reputation and potential future employees. If your current employees see how unorganised your offboarding process is, or overall just appalled to see how you treat employees that are leaving, they might contemplate parting ways themselves.

Your company should be doing everything possible to avoid a negative review for an employee, and the offboarding process will be your last effort.  Even if employees are leaving on their own terms feeling okay about their time at your company, they can still leave with a bitter taste in their mouth if their final days were a disaster.

Offboarding is an investment for the future

One thing is certain, declining job loyalty has become the norm in the workplace. In this context, developing an efficient offboarding experience is a way to make things flawless. On top of the traditional procedures, such as security and equipment return, make sure you:

• inform all of the stakeholders of your employee’s departure in a formal way before people start gossiping;
• organise a proper “handover” to secure a project, a mission or the team;
• recognise the employees for their positive impact on the company;
• conduct an exit interview to understand how the company is perceived and take actions to improve the environment;
• organise a “leaving drink” to allow employees to say goodbye;
• Create a community of alumni, feed it with news, information and bring them together. Some alumni return to their former employer after a few years.

Offboarding is a time to reflect and make improvements

Whatever the reason for the departure might be, make sure you are in friendly mindset. Offboarding is the time to make a positive assessment of an exiting employee. Showing emotion and authenticity, you’ll be able to create a collaborative experience. So put your company’s values into practice and show consideration for your employees by supporting them. A former employee is also an ambassador, a potential future customer or a boomerang rehire.

In the end, welcoming new employees is no longer enough, you need to think about the time when they quit and support them. Designing a “healthy out” policy is necessary. Whether your employee is moving to your competitor, to a client or to any other company, an efficient off boarding process will pay off.