3 reasons why good offboarding makes great business sense

Offboarding, or employee exit management, has historically been viewed as a reactive process designed to move an employee out of an organization with as little ‘noise’ as possible. Thankfully, this antiquated perspective is changing as HR teams the world over begin to systemize their approach to departing employees' final days on the job.

Good offboarding is not only great for your employees, it also makes a great deal of business sense. Whether you’re looking to boost long-term recruitment results, minimize cybersecurity risks, or encourage past employees to return to your organization, the right offboarding strategy can help.

We’ve got the numbers to prove it too, so sit back, relax, and tune in to our 3 (indisputable) reasons why good offboarding makes GREAT business sense.

What is GOOD offboarding?

Not all offboarding is created equal, so before we dive in, it’s important to define what we mean when we say ‘good offboarding’.

At Talmundo, we define good offboarding as “a robust offboarding process to smoothly transition a departing employee out of the business and facilitate the transfer of knowledge to other employees - ticking compliance & privacy boxes along the way.”

Good offboarding should build strategy that supports each of the 5 offboarding components (or as we call them ‘Offboarding ABCs’); Assessment, Brand, Compliance, Dignity, and Expertise.

Finally, good offboarding is supported by the right technical solution that can automate the more tedious elements of exit management, allowing HR to focus their valuable time on the things that matter.

Now, on to 3 reasons why good offboarding makes great business sense!

Reason #1: Good offboarding strengthens your organization's recruitment process

Offboarding is the final moment to WOW your employee and leave a lasting positive impression.

Get things right and your leaver will walk away with a smile on their face, ready to recommend you as an employer of choice to their friends, family, and wider network. Get things wrong and they depart with a sour taste in their mouth, poised to share a less-than-stellar account of their experience online.

While a few negative reviews might not seem like a big deal, they can have a big impact on your recruitment efforts. Approximately 83% percent of job seekers check a company’s job reviews on Glassdoor before applying for a job. That’s an enormous number of people reading and reacting to the experiences of previous employees. A low overall score could be the difference between exceptional talent applying with your organization, or wandering over to your competition - something you’ll want to avoid at all costs!

So while you can’t make everyone happy, a good offboarding program will help to ensure the majority of your leavers depart happy, healthy, and hyped to share their 5-star experience of your organization with future job applicants.

Reason #2: Good offboarding safeguards your organization's digital security

An important element of employee exit management is ensuring your departing employees no longer have access to your organization's digital infrastructure. And it’s an element that many companies aren’t getting right.

According to OneLogin research, 48% of employers are aware that former employees still have access to their corporate network. More alarmingly, 20% admitted they had experienced data breaches by ex-employees.

Now we’re not saying that departing employees are deliberately sabotaging their ex-employers, but in today’s digital world where so much of our information is cloud-based, it’s not hard to imagine how easy it would be for a former employee to accidentally share or delete important data.

Often, employees retain digital access to their former employer because of a lack of cooperation between HR and IT. HR has all of the information on an employee and their employment status. Whereas IT controls access to the digital infrastructure. When these two departments aren’t synced through a streamlined process, mistakes happen.

A good offboarding program that establishes built-in guidelines for revoking employee digital access will help safeguard your organization against (costly) digital security breaches.

Reason #3: Good offboarding increases the chance of “boomerang employees” returning to your organization

Boomerang employees are team members who leave your organization, only to return later down the track. In recent years, boomerang employees have been on the rise with nearly a third of British workers who left a job over the past two years being open to returning to their old workplace in the future.

Re-hiring an ex-employee can be a great way to reduce recruitment spend (no need to sell them your organization) and cut the new hire's learning curve (they already know their way around) in one fell swoop.

It goes without saying that an employee is only going to come back to an organization they enjoyed working for - but a good offboarding process can help to facilitate that return.

Offboarding is your chance to ascertain why your leaver has chosen to jump ship and if they’re a high performer you’d love to keep, communicate to them how they might return in the future. Whether you’re signing them up for regular job updates, or simply letting them know that there’s always a place for them with your organization, these are the seeds that will leave the door ajar - encouraging them back should their next opportunity fall short of their expectations.

So what next?

There’s no doubt that developing a strong offboarding experience is business critical.

But how can you get started…? With us!

Talmundo’s powerful offboarding platform is built to support the 5 components of good exit management with tailored, best-practice features. Our team of experts can advise you on how best to develop the right process for your unique needs and how to digitize your journey.

Get in touch today - we love talking employee offboarding.