Offboarding: Why it’s important and how to get it right
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An area in the employment lifecycle that can be overlooked is the offboarding process. While onboarding is often seen as an essential ‘welcome to the company’ procedure, many aren’t treated with the same warmness when exiting an organisation.
Callie Corcoran said in an article for Rally Recruitment Marketing: “Why is offboarding so important to your employer brand? Because if done right, you can turn former employees into advocates. If done wrong, and [sic] you risk damage to your talent brand.”
Indeed released a report in August which can help employers nail the transition period. The benefits of getting it right, as outlined by Indeed, include:
- It improves security
- It improves employee confidence
- It can boost productivity
- It makes complying with regulations easier
- It helps organisations learn and improve
These are some of the most important reasons to make sure employees leave a company amicably and satisfied. To assist employers, hronboard created a 10-step checklist to guide businesses through the process and ensure the transition goes as smoothly as possible:
- Communicate the departure
- Transfer the employee’s knowledge to their successor
- Recover company assets
- Update your org charts and company directory
- Revoke systems access
- Complete final pay process
- Perform an exit survey or interview
- Provide letters of reference and exiting documentation
- Thank the exiting employee
- Engage the former employee in an alumni group
The process of offboarding is crucial to cementing good impressions and can help keep a healthy work culture. There are resources online that will help the transition be as streamlined and drama free as possible.
The National Archives in the United States has an offboarding process available. The 24-page guide is a great resource for those struggling with the procedure and creates a basis for implementing an offboarding process.
Australia seems to be lacking in government-released material to assist in this area. While there is a release from business.gov.au on the onboarding process, there isn’t an offboarding one that is easy to find.
Companies ignoring offboarding was discussed in an article by careerminds. They noted the reason for this is because many believe it is the end of the relationship. This should not be the attitude to have. The goal should be to solidify a happy connection, as employment draws to a close and after an employee has moved on, to create more talent-sourcing opportunities in the future and help keep a positive brand.
RELATED TERMS
Onboarding is the process of integrating new hires into the company, guiding them through the offer and acceptance stages, induction, and activities including payroll, tax and superannuation compliance, as well as other basic training. Companies with efficient onboarding processes benefit from new workers integrating seamlessly into the workforce and spending less time on administrative tasks.
The practice of actively seeking, locating, and employing people for a certain position or career in a corporation is known as recruitment.
Jack Campbell
Jack is the editor at HR Leader.