Problem:

The old offboarding process involved a digital form and a paper form, which frequently led to confusion about which form managers were required to complete. This lead to a need to create one digital form that could replace both. The existing offboarding process had a few issues:

  • During lockdowns and the shift to remote work, filling out the paper form became particularly challenging, resulting in many employees skipping this step altogether.

  • The lack of clarity and completion contributed to discrepancies in understanding what IT equipment needed to be returned, complicating the offboarding process and causing delays in reclaiming company assets

The original form was found on the intranet and was for IT and system access questions whilst the paper form had a physical checklist of what equipment has been returned the manager

My approach:

  • Collaborated with all affected stakeholders to understand their current process and pain points

  • Interviewed managers to understand and identify key themes and paint points

  • ·Created a new process that met all the needs of our stakeholders and our customers through the data we gathered

  • Utilised working existing personal offboarding processes from managers and recruiters as a framework for the new process

  • Ensured two-way communication with all business units affected by running through the new processes and ensuring that it meets their needs

  • Provided an opportunity to identify any gaps in that could create delays and reduce uptake of the form

  • Performed testing on the new process and form to ensure it operates effectively

  • ·Managed technical limitations of OpenForms (our forms software) and its ability to automate, ensuring all staff members involved in the process isn’t doing too much manual processing

  • Collaborated with P&C to write instructions that aim to provide clarity over the offboarding process and guide staff to offboard correctly.

Research & Preparation:

A one digital form solution was proposed that combined the paper form and digital intranet form. I then performed usability testing and found that:

  • Managers aren’t aware they need to fill out the IT offboarding form at least 5 days in advance

  • There was a lack of consistent processes or instructions on which/how many forms to fill out by the manager

  • Each team that is involved in the offboarding process had their own process and weren’t always informed of when a staff offboards

  • There was confusion on how to return equipment/Council asset if they were at depo or at other offices. Managers who collect equipment off the departing staff member aren’t sure if they’re responsible for returning equipment

  • Managers do not know what IT equipment a staff member possesses to tick off on the physical form – although there was a legal obligation for a manager to put this down

  • It created security issues, sometimes access wasn’t disabled till sometime after a team member has already left

  • There was no process on how to follow up Council assets that hasn’t been returned

This lead to a reassessment of the offboarding process as well as the form, looking at an overall process improvement and how this could be streamline to work better with the new digital form.

A process map was created in order to map out where each business unit would be impacted by the new digital form.

Improvements made:

Form

  • One responsive and user-friendly digital form that kick starts the offboarding process and collects all required information

Process

  • Streamlined multiple fragmented processes into one easy offboarding process for IT, records management, access card team, payroll, people and culture and building maintenance

Communication

  • Organisation wide communication of the updated process and increase awareness of the new offboarding form

  • New intranet page called “How to offboard an employee” that details all steps of the process. Including:

    • what to prepare for offboarding

    • what to expect next

    • clear outline of responsibilities of who needs to return Council assets and

    • processes for follow up if assets are not returned

Impact

·        Post launch, we measured the benefits from our stakeholders and found:

  • Reduced follow ups and researching by various business units to understand if the staff has Council assets, with a time saving of 2-3 minutes per offboarding submission or 96 hours per year

  • Ability to refer to offboarding notification to check relevant information about departing staff

  • Improved likelihood of managers completing all offboarding requirements, resulting in less follow up and a secure offboarding for organisational asset and system access

  • Clearer and transparent process communicated, leading to less confusion and improved uptake of the correct offboarding by staff members

  • Increased clarity over responsibilities of managers and staff members for the return of Council assets

Due to this being an internal form, there is no live form to view. Want to learn more about this piece of work in more detail? Reach out for a chat.