What is offboarding?

What is and what does offboarding an employee involve

Employee offboarding is the whole process of leaving, when an employee or employer terminates the employment and the employee leaves the organization. The offboarding includes everything from job transfer, knowledge transfer to formal termination of employment.

• Completion of the work and tasks assigned
• Handing over the work and tasks to successors or other employees
• Handing over functions and responsibilities, authority to successors or other employees
• Return of work equipment, property, tools, or other items 
• Passing on or changing passwords, keys, access cards
• Changing access to company systems, email, etc.
• Exit interview upon the termination of employment
• Exit questionnaire  
• Resolution of leave, severance
• Formal documents (exit letter, income certificate - pink slip/P45, etc.) 

Transfer of work

• Knowledge transfer is incremental or one-off, remember that some knowledge cannot be transferred in units of hours or days
• Transfer of agenda, processes, tasks
• Completion and handover of work - assumption of duties, responsibilities and authority 
• Onboarding training 

Changing passwords, handing over access cards and keys

• Security issues
• All IT systems where the employee had access, especially cloud services, VPN, access to shared storage
• Returning keys, access cards, PINs, etc.

Why is employee offboarding important?

Managed employee offboarding is key to maintaining the continuity of your organization's operations, it is important from a security perspective and it is important to maintain your organization's reputation. It's a complete process, not just a completed checklist at the front desk. The role of the senior manager and mutual cooperation is important. Good communication prevents the spread of half-truths and speculation.