The offboarding process is a crucial part of creating a seamless employee experience. It shows how much you value your departed employees and directly impacts your reputation. When someone leaves a company, it can be difficult to decide how to best approach the subject with stakeholders.
A well-written employee departure announcement can soften the disruption of an employee leaving and help you maintain employee engagement. We examine how you can effectively notify employees when a member of staff leaves their role.
What is an employee departure announcement?
An employee departure announcement is a message that notifies people at your company that one of your employees is leaving. The announcement contains a brief but lucid message to inform your employees of the news.
Employee departure announcements can be written by the employee or by a senior manager and can often be widely distributed by the internal communications team. Ideally, you want to make sure you have enough time to adjust and prepare for any questions you may face.
You may be asked questions around the replacement plans of the departing employee, whether there will be a handover period, and immediate plans to fulfil the workload being vacated.
It is all a balancing act. Information can spread quickly around a workplace, so you ideally do not want to wait too long and allow for a spread of rumours and unease.
How to make the announcement
Keep things brief and matter of fact. You do not need to divulge the reason someone is leaving unless it is appropriate to do so, or they want you to. Talk to your leaver to see what they would like to say – it is vital you do not give information that puts them in an embarrassing position.
Calling a face-to-face meeting with your team is best, and if they are happy to, allow the employee to be there when you make the announcement. Regardless of the circumstances of their resignation, it is customary and courteous to let the rest of the team know that you wish them well and express appreciation for their service.
Schedule the meeting for the middle of the afternoon. If you schedule it for the morning, this leaves employees wondering and speculating all day. And if you schedule it too late, no time will be left for employees to raise their professional concerns.
Sometimes it is not always possible to have a face-to-face meeting – perhaps your team is scattered across multiple offices, adopting a hybrid working model or stakeholders are unavailable. In these instances, you may need to draft an announcement email.
Employee turnover is an inevitable part of any company and breaking the news to other employees is a fundamental part of the employee lifecycle.
How to announce the departure via email
Emails about an employee leaving are an essential part of the overall offboarding process. A timely and efficient offboarding procedure not only provides employees with the information they need, but also helps your remaining employees understand and digest the news.
Your employee departure announcement should be a brief but impactful statement. Remember, there are two objectives when creating the leaving email:
Sending off your departing employee in a professional manner, no matter the circumstance of their resignation or departure.
Making sure your remaining employees understand that even though their colleague is leaving, business will continue as usual.
Email announcement template
Struggling to figure out how to structure your employee departure announcement email? Download our email template here and let it guide your messaging. Make sure you are prepared for different varieties of announcements. Our template includes:
Good terms resignation
Involuntary resignation
Retirement
Start by including the reason for the email and announce that the person is leaving the company. If appropriate, include a brief description of the reason for the move. It is imperative not to go into too many specific details in your email surrounding the exact details of why your employee is leaving. Focus on wishing the employee well in their future endeavours, thanking them for their time at the company.
If the employee has made a significant contribution or has been involved with your company for a prolonged period, you might want to recap some of the employee’s achievements and highlight the positive impact they have had on the business, the vision, and other employees.
When and how you announce it is of utmost importance, as the rest of the team looks for you to help guide them through what can be a stressful time. Stay calm, keep it brief and professional, and wish your departing employee well – parting ways on good terms could mean you now have a lifelong advocate, and you will also maintain positive team morale.
Make sure you are ready to deal with offboarding employees by downloading our email announcement template.
