Offboarding is an often neglected stage in the employee experience, but it's a real opportunity to offer employees an unforgettable experience. Here's how.
At a time when many situations are creating turnover within companies (resignations, maternity leave replacements, rotation of students on internships/ternships...), the desire to welcome talent through a unique employee experience is at the heart of today's HR strategies. Numerous solutions are proposed to integrate and retain new employees. Conversely, few resources are allocated to managing their departure. And yet, the last impression is decisive in satisfying the employee experience and making a positive impression. Let's take a look at how to remedy the situation!
Onboarding is a key stage in the employee experience. It enables employees to be integrated, trained and retained: an issue of vital importance, all the more so when it concerns young talent. Managers and HR directors know that the new generations want to have a real impact on the company, and want to be involved in a meaningful project in which they can flourish. The onboarding phase is the perfect way to meet these new expectations. By preparing an employee's arrival in the best possible way, the company can optimize the new recruit's loyalty and commitment.
Changing attitudes have put onboarding at the heart of HR issues, and more and more resources are being allocated to it to ensure an outstanding employee experience from the very first days, if not before (#preboarding). Onboarding has therefore become "trendy". It's a very positive period, both for the new employee, who is optimistic about his or her future with the company, and for HR and operational managers, who are integrating a motivated and committed new member into their teams.
New onboarding tools have emerged on the HR solutions market. These allow you to pull out all the stops when integrating a new employee, and create a "wow" effect even before they've started at the job. Managers can provide their recruits with platforms where they can find out about the company, their induction schedule, and so on.
However, onboarding is not the miracle solution to all the ills of the Employee Experience. While it's essential to take care of an employee's arrival, it's even more important to prepare and anticipate his or her departure. Managing departures is less exciting than managing arrivals, and offboarding is often left out of HR strategies. For lack of method, time or inclination, offboarding falls by the ways ide when an employee is replaced. Yet this last impression left by the company seems essential for an optimal end-to-end employee experience.
Separation is rarely a happy occasion, either for the employee or the manager; it's the signal thatan adventure is coming to an end. At best, the departure is anticipated and prepared. Both parties agree on what will happen in the last few weeks to bring the employee's career to a close: return of equipment, deletion of accounts or an exit interview for final feedback. In the worst-case scenario, off-boarding is an unpleasant experience , as nothing is allocated to managing departures and everything is done at the last minute: the employee leaves with a bad last impression, his or her career path has not been valued, and he or she will make it known.
It's a fact that, in most cases, employee offboarding is feared rather than prepared for. Yet it is during this very period that all the experience and knowledge acquired by an employee during his or her time in the job can be gathered and passed on to his or her successor. Why not take advantage of this period to prepare for the handover right now? A common fear is: why should offboardees play the game when their minds are already elsewhere?
First of all, it 's always in an employee's interest to leave a good impression. If off-boarding gives them a final opportunity to leave their mark on the company and to play a part in the development of their position, they're likely to take it. If a relationship of mutual trust is established between him and his manager right from the onboarding stage, then why not maintain it right to the end?
The new generations will undoubtedly speed things up. They know the importance of recommendations and references. "Playing the game" will enable them to get some from their managers and even their colleagues. What's more, they want to make their mark on the company and feel that they're not "just another employee": passing on their experience and knowledge to their successor is a strong mark of recognition on the part of the company, with the employee's career path playing a direct part in moving the position forward.
Permittingthe transition between offboardee and onboardee benefits everyone:
theoffboardee values his or her career path and gains recognition, the onboardee gains skills more quickly and the manager ensures a complete employee experience while boosting team productivity and saving time during these transitions.
To deliver a remarkable employee experience, you can't separateonboarding fromoffboarding. That would be a mistake. The first impression is decisive in integrating and hiring a new employee, but it also carries with it expectations: if the first days in a company go wonderfully well, it is implicitly expected that the rest of the career path will unfold in the same way. If offboarding remains on the sidelines, the expectations created during onboarding are not met, and the employee ends his or her career frustrated by these unfulfilled promises. It's like a roller-coaster ride: onboarding raises our expectations, boosts our commitment and our productivity, then suddenly... it's time for offboarding, and there's the free fall. The employee may leave the company with a bad last impression, and the initial onboarding efforts will have been in vain.
Conversely, if the separation is based on the same values and commitments as for onboarding, then the employee experience is complete, and the last good impression is retained: the circle is complete. A virtuous circle emerges: good offboarding leads to good onboarding, and good onboarding leads to good offboarding. The handover from one employee to another can and must be seamless: it's the end of a first cycle and the start of a new one.
It is therefore essential to have a transition between the two (and not a rupture).
Taking care of onboarding, as well as offboarding, is a real opportunity for companies to offer their employees an unforgettable collaborative experience. New generations are increasingly sensitive to corporate reputation. Offering such an employee experience boosts a company's employer brand, a variable that has become fundamental in attracting young talent. What's more, these same generations are highly communicative, and will easily let you know if their experience with the company lived up to their expectations: the virtuous circle extends even further "when the employee becomes an ambassador". The end of a cycle does not mean the end of an adventure. A former employee can still make the company shine in future experiences, and also return as a customer, service provider, partner or even employee (the case of boomerang recruitment is becoming increasingly common with the new generations). The employee experience is therefore not a short-term issue; on the contrary, it directly serves a company's future.
To sum up: Although essential, onboarding is not enough on its own to achieve an optimal employee experience. Onboarding must always go hand in hand with offboarding, so as to create an employee cycle and avoid a break every time an employee is replaced. Making this link, this transition, is an excellent way of controlling turnover, because it enables you to :
We are committed to bringing offboarding to the forefront, so that it becomes, like onboarding, an essential part of the employee experience. Combining the virtuous circle of onboarding and offboarding is all the more of a challenge when the main HR challenges are to retain talent through a unique employer brand.
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