Human Resources

Exit Interview (I)

What is the purpose of the exit interview? What is the valuable information that the company can obtain with the exit interview? 

Posted: Mar 2010

The Exit Interview if the Human Resource survey tool that is done with leaving employees. The purpose of the exit interview is to determine the reasons of leaving. Pool of employees within the company is in the constant motion. People come and go. Regardless of the department and level of position, there is always possibility for employee to leave his position. Of course certain employee turnover is desirable. 

Organization with no turnover and with same people, at same positions for long period of time, create environment where processes and activities can become too routine, without innovation and improvement. On the other side, an organization with too high turnover rate tends to have too inexperienced people that cannot reach the maturity on their position and cannot reach their full performance.

Turnover is something that needs to be managed. This is the responsibility of managers and Human Resources department. In order to understand the reason why are the employees leaving, it is necessary to understand their motivation.

Most of the modern companies are conducting Exit interviews with employees who leave, in order to understand their motivation for their decision.

Information gathered by the Exit interview may not be of significant relevance for individual employee that leaves, but can give more clear information to management.

This information can be compiled in a statistical manner, in order to bring the answer to employer why their employees are leaving.

Information gathered can give the chance to the employer to adjust the working environment and compensation policy in order to manage the turnover rate, in accordance to actual business needs.

Usual questions at exit interview are:

• Why are you leaving – the main reason?

• Any additional reasons?

• Who is your new employer?

• What is your future position ( comparison of grade of a new position versus current )?

• What is your future position compensation package ( comparison with current role )?

• How did you find your new position?

• What changes the company might introduce in order to increase employee retention?

• What did you liked with the company?

• What do you think about the management and your immediate supervisor?

• What is your overall feeling about leaving the company?
  

The list of the questions is not the final. The sequence of the questions may vary. The interview with the departing employee should be done by experienced Human Resource officer. The interview should be recorded in the formal way.

The exit interview is valuable tool for improvement of working environment. Some employees may not be willing to be honest. Still, the exit interview gives the important information to management.