Exit interviews are a useful way of getting valuable insights into how your staff feel about working in a business.
Often, when employees hand in their notice, they can be pretty coy about what motivated them to find another job. Some of the most common reasons staff leave is for a better salary, a promotion, more training, or perhaps they want to work closer to home.
But, whatever their reason, it’s good for employers to get meaningful feedback from them before they depart. Their insights and experience can help you head off problems and hopefully retain your staff in future.
There are a variety of ways to conduct an exit interview. The standard method is that the departing employee will first complete a survey that produces quantitative results. This is followed by a short face-to-face meeting where the employee can expand on specific points to give qualitative information.
Exit interview checklist
- Ask the employee if they’d be willing to participate (even if exit interviews are part of your company policy, they’re entirely voluntary)
- Offer the employee a variety of ways to feed back: in writing / a phone call / face-to-face
- Schedule the meeting in the diary (no longer than 1 hour)
- Ask the employee to complete an exit survey beforehand
- Produce a structured list of questions for the face-to-face meeting
- Give the employee the opportunity to view / complete the questions prior to the exit interview so they’re not caught off-guard
- Conduct the exit interview in a private room
- Store and record the feedback confidentially
- Share the feedback with appropriate members of staff
- Use the feedback to determine action points for the business
Who should conduct an exit interview?
Employers should be conscious of choosing the right person to conduct an exit interview. Typically, this should be someone from a neutral position in relation to the employee. For example, the employee’s direct manager wouldn’t be a neutral choice. It may result in the employee not being fully transparent, particularly if their reason for leaving is linked to their manager.
In most cases, HR representatives can be a more neutral option so long as they’re not interviewing somebody from their own team. If you don’t have an HR department, then a manager from a separate department is also a good choice. The most important thing is that the employee needs to feel free to express themselves in confidence. They also need to trust that the interviewers will relay their feedback accurately and constructively.
Keeping exit interview feedback confidential can be tricky, but it should be a priority for employers if you want candid feedback. The employee’s identity should be kept anonymous when delivering feedback. Clearly, this may be more difficult in smaller organisations where it’s obvious who would have given the feedback.
As a workaround for smaller businesses, exit interview feedback could be delivered in ‘aggregate form,’ i.e., in conjunction with other feedback such as 360-degree surveys. Another option would be to collate the insights and assess them quarterly, biannually or annually. It would remove the personal from the process and allow you to focus on the information presented. It could then form part of your ongoing HR planning and strategy.
Exit interview do’s and don’ts
- Do stay neutral
- Do ask open-ended questions
- Do express confidentiality
- Do keep the conversation relaxed
- Don’t engage in unconstructive feedback
- Don’t dwell on the specifics of an event
- Don’t give your own opinions
- Don’t force questions employees aren’t comfortable answering
- Don’t use exit interviews as a method for retaining a specific member of staff
