Why Onboarding and Offboarding Are Connected

First, let’s be clear that we understand onboarding and offboarding aren’t the same thing. Both the dynamic and the goals of each interaction are different. The heart of the question we’re asking is, what if we treated onboarding and offboarding as two very similar processes along the employee development lifecycle, rather than the beginning and the end of a linear process?

The Employee Lifecycle is Changing

We used to think about company loyalty and building a career inside one company as normal, but for most companies and their employees that story has changed. Companies can choose to cling to the ‘loyalty’ model and struggle to keep employees as long as possible, or they can accept the new dynamic where employees will build a career between multiple companies.

If employees change jobs more frequently and leaving a position doesn’t necessarily mean burning a bridge, perhaps companies should think more along the lines of, ‘we were a good fit in the past, maybe we’ll be a good fit in the future’, and approach onboarding and offboarding with that in mind.

Onboarding and Offboarding Data

If companies start to think of onboarding and offboarding as points along a continuum rather than the beginning and end of a relationship, they can begin to manage that cycle using data. The data companies gather during onboarding and active employment will help them retain–and perhaps–rehire employees later on.

If you’re not sure how effective the processes are in your company there are a few basic questions to ask:

• Do we have defined processes for both onboarding and offboarding, e.g. an onboarding or exit survey?
• Are those processes both anonymous and goal oriented?
• Are we following best practices for employee lifecycle management?

If the answer to any of the above questions is ‘no’, or ‘I’m not sure’, that’s fine! We know the landscape is changing, and working with clients to improve their processes is why Talivest exists.

Download our Ultimate Employee Offboarding Toolkit

How is your Offboarding going? 

For many companies offboarding gets less attention than onboarding, but investing a little time in outgoing employees can be essential to your overall success. Some of the points we help identify are:

• Are you using clear communication during the onboarding and active employment phases?
• Do you maintain organized contact with former employees?
• Can you easily reach out to former employees or their network?

To hear more about how onboarding and offboarding tools help companies streamline their HR processes, schedule a quick demo of the Talivest platform. It’s the quickest way for us to help you identify where you are on the spectrum and whether or not a lifecycle management software solution can help.