Regardless of the reason someone leaves your business, how you communicate the situation with your clients and the remaining team can have a huge impact.
The procedure around a departing team member can essentially be broken down into three main processes – how you communicate the news to staff, how you communicate the news to clients and the recruitment process.
1 COMMUNICATION TO THE TEAM
It’s important at this point to be as inclusive as possible. A departing team member can more often than not dent staff morale. By being transparent with the remaining team, you are reminding them that you are in it together. This is the time to build up camaraderie and, at the same time, not allow any gossip to spread through the office.
Be as open with the other team members as possible, whilst respecting the departing staff member’s privacy. It’s a really great idea to include the departing team member in this meeting. Sometimes circumstances do not allow this – say if someone has been let go or has been walked – but the team’s morale will be least affected if you and the departing member of staff both appear to be happy and supportive with no ill blood.
Remember, the entire team is affected when someone leaves. It generally means that you will be calling on the team to pull together, which will include taking on additional duties and potentially increasing their workload. It’s important to manage this process carefully. A good idea would be to include the team in deciding how they would like to move forward. Using a property management example, perhaps one person loves maintenance and someone else loves routine inspections, meaning they will be more willing to help in these areas. You will get a much better reception if the team is included in the decision on how to share responsibilities. Collaborate and ask – don’t tell.
Your next step is to consider when the person is leaving. Put a time frame in place to help the remaining team re-prioritise and reschedule their workload to accommodate the new tasks. A farewell is a great idea as a thanks to the departing employee, but more so as a team exercise for the remaining staff to thank them in advance for the hard work they will be putting in until the new recruit starts. It’s really important throughout this process to keep any personal feelings aside.
2 COMMUNICATION TO CLIENTELE
If your leaving team member is in any form of account management or client facing role, such as sales, property manager or BDM, it’s important to ensure you communicate directly with your key clients. It’s a tricky exercise that needs to be handled diplomatically and with sensitivity. The most important thing you must always do when informing a client is to be positive. In most cases, the departing employee has built a relationship with the client so you never want to say anything negative about the team member. It’s important to be honest without giving away too much information about why the person didn’t work out, or where they are going. Clients will push for more information but it’s important to not give in to this pressure.
It might also be important to remind the client why they signed with your business in the first place. This is an opportunity to reiterate the reasons why they are your client and what you have done for them. It’s also a great opportunity to ask how you could be servicing them better. Take this moment to explain how the transition is going to be managed and who will be managing the process. This is where you can introduce the new contact and explain what is happening moving forward.
3 THE RECRUITMENT PROCESS
When someone leaves, take this as a great opportunity to have a good look at your business and see how it’s operating. Do you require someone with the same skill set? Could the role be changed? It’s important to reflect and see how improvements can be made. Once you have decided what position you need to fill, start the hiring process immediately.
