Exit interviews: all you need to know

Interviewing an employee who is leaving the business is good practice, particularly if you are regularly losing good people or an employee’s resignation has come out of the blue. 

If you don’t, you miss the opportunity to learn not only why the person is leaving (so you can look at changes to avoid further employee churn) but also gain practical insight into what it’s like to work for you and the way things work on the ground.

In this article, we take a good look at exit interviews, who should do them and when, the technical aspects of setting them up, and reporting recommendations associated with exiting.

Why should we conduct exit interviews?

Exit interviews are crucial for retaining the good people you have and attracting new ones. It gives you an opportunity to identify and improve areas that may be causing employees to leave, e.g. salary and benefits, flexible work arrangements, or corporate culture.

As well as providing evidence of where you might be going wrong, effective exit interviews can give you insight into what you’re doing right. You can then use this information - both why your employees love working for you and how you’re committed to making your workplace better - in recruitment and promotion.

For departing employees, exit interviews provide a chance to share their views and reasons for their decision, which can help them leave on good terms. You never know, they may return to work for you one day and if they are talking to others about your organisation, you want to be known as a good place to work.

Who should conduct an exit interview?

To get the most from an exit interview, a neutral person who is not in the departing employee’s chain of command should conduct it, so you can gain open and honest feedback.

Of course, this will depend on your size. An HR person is ideal if you have one, or a manager or senior person from another area of the business, but a direct manager will also work in a pinch.

You could also look at engaging an external company to conduct your interviews.

We don’t recommend getting someone on the same organisational level as the person leaving to conduct the interview.

What about using online tools, like surveys?

Running exit interviews via surveys is fine if you only want to get the basic details about the person’s departure, e.g. if they are leaving for more pay or better conditions so you can work on employee retention.

But if you are looking to analyse it more deeply from an organisational-culture perspective, it’s best to run interviews in person, so you can ask questions and dig further into what has caused the person to leave.

Using simple online tools can also appear like a lack of commitment to getting and constructively using employee feedback.

Who do I interview?

Not all departing employees are created equal. We usually advise against interviewing someone who’s had their employment terminated, which could be after failing their trial or probation period, following disciplinary action, or after a restructure.

Other than that, offer exit interviews to all your departing employees – this will make sure that you get meaningful data rather than picking and choosing who to speak with.

When should I conduct the exit interview?

It’s best to conduct the interview in the period between the person handing in their notice, and their last day of work.

We recommend doing it before their last week of work, as there are often farewell events and handover activities to deal with immediately before they leave.

Some organisations conduct interviews after employees have left, because the employee requests it or there are other circumstances, e.g. leave, that prevents it happening during the notice period.

Interviews can happen post-employment, but you should keep in mind the likelihood of them giving useful answers declines the longer they are away, and you may not get as many people wanting to participate once they have moved on and have other commitments.

How do I approach someone about doing an interview?

Ideally, you should ask the person when you receive and accept their resignation. Thank the person, and ask if they’d be happy to participate in an exit conversation.

Explain that it’s standard practice to conduct an exit interview, so that you can understand their reasons for leaving. Explain how the results are used, and that they will remain confidential.

Are exit interviews compulsory?

No. There is no legal obligation for an employee to attend an exit interview.

If an employee declines to be interviewed, we recommend respecting this, but you can ask for clarity on why they are refusing. It could be a personal issue or a personality clash, which you may be able to resolve by having another person conduct the interview.

Otherwise, respect their decision and let them know of any alternative methods for giving feedback about their experience, e.g. via a survey or by providing it in writing.

How do I conduct an exit interview?

First off you need to be prepared, so sort out your questions before the interview. We recommend developing a set of basic questions to use across your workforce and to then customise them for each departing employee.

Once you’re happy with the questions, schedule in time with your exiting employee.

During the meeting, go through the questions, ask for clarity where needed, and take thorough notes.

It’s important to let the employee do the bulk of the talking and be allowed to ask questions.

Be willing to hear some bad news. Someone leaving your organisation could be critical about aspects of their role, management, or the company’s services or culture, so you need to be prepared for negative comments. Approach them objectively by thinking about how the information could help improve your business and the way things are done.

At the end of the interview, thank the person for their time and input.

Examples of good questions

In general, here are some key things you want to know:

• What is the main reason(s) for leaving?
• Overall, how would they rate their satisfaction working for the company?
• What did they enjoy most?
• What did they enjoy least?
• What would they like to see done differently?
• How would they rate their ability to access learning and development?
• Do they identify with the strategy and culture of the company?
• Would they work for you again?
• Would they recommend you to others as a place to work?

Less is often more, you want to identify what key information you want from your employees when they leave and hone in on that.

As we mentioned, make sure you allow space for the employee to talk and ask questions. Don’t just run through your questions as fast as possible.

How long should an interview be?

We recommend keeping interviews to an hour or less.

The longer an interview goes on, the higher the risk of people getting bored, off track or antagonistic. If the employee asks for more time, that’s fine, but if not keep the interview to 30-60 minutes.

What should I do with the results?

We recommend aggregating the results in reports, rather than using specific comments or insights from an identifiable person.

For smaller organisations, it can be hard to keep results anonymous but they should be viewed that way. One of the main reasons to conduct exit interviews is to gain an understanding of common themes and trends, e.g. people are leaving because of pay or leadership. Share the results with the senior team and discuss any changes you may need to make.

If it’s a larger organisation, you may want to create an annual exit report that looks at turnover rates and key trends from the exit interviews.

When are exit interviews not appropriate?

There are times when an exit interview is not appropriate, in most cases of termination by the employer i.e. redundancy, dismissals etc.