The Exit Interview
The exit interview is part survey and part sales pitch. The objectives are to find out why customers are leaving, and to prevent them from doing so. It is particularly appropriate for companies whose customers have "accounts," -- banks, brokerages, internet service providers, cable television, and mutual funds, to name a few.
The interview is administered by an employee who receives a request to close an account. The interview can be conducted either in-person or via telephone. The process is relatively simple.
Step 1 -- Diagnose the Problem
A short series of questions should be asked of the customer to determine why she is leaving.
Step 2 -- Empathize
If any of the reasons for leaving are related to issues within the control of the company, such as product or service problems, or pricing concerns, the employee should apologize for the problem, state the importance of the customer relationship, and ask if there is anything that could be done to keep the customer from leaving. "Scripts" should be written for the entire process so that the employee does not have to ad lib. Different scripts can be written for different types of problems. The employees who administer the exit interview should rehearse the scripts in advance of conducting exit interviews.
Step 3 -- Make a Counteroffer
It is possible that the customer will change her mind about leaving after receiving an apology in Step 2. If not, it is appropriate to make a counteroffer. Counteroffers should be scripted, and related to the specific problem identified in Step 1. A typical counteroffer to a pricing-related concern might be something as simple as "We really hate to lose your business. Would you stay with us if I offered you 50% off your next six months of service?"
Step 4 -- The Follow-up Letter
Whether or not the employee is successful in keeping the employee from leaving, a follow-up letter should be sent to the customer within one day. If the customer has agreed to stay, the letter should state how much the company values the customer's business. If the customer left for reasons within the control of the company, the letter should extend another counteroffer.
Step 5 -- Analyze the Data
The data collected should be entered into a database and analyzed to quantify the main reasons customers want to leave
.
Step 6 -- Make Adjustments to Business Practices
The data analysis should clearly identify areas in need of improvement. Management should address these areas, which may consist of the treatment customers receive from employees, product problems, pricing, etc.
Embellishments
Not all customers are profitable. If you keep a database on the profitability of individual customers, you may want to write more aggressive scripts for very profitable customers, and let unprofitable customers leave without a counteroffer.
You can measure the effectiveness of each counteroffer, and make adjustments to maximize customer retention.
Exit Interviews
The HR Solutions' exit interviews are a fully custom, four-part assessment system which can enable organizations to more accurately and more confidentially measure the reasons why its employees are leaving.
Results
HR Solutions' exit interviews assessment can result in:
· Improved Employee Retention/Reduced Turnover.
· Increased objectivity, both perceived and real, since the Exit Interviews Assessment would be handled by a fair and non-partisan third-party.
· Benchmarking against industry norms which HR Solutions maintains for the majority of the exit interview survey items.
· Additional benchmarking for exiting employees' scores against overall Employee Opinion Survey results to determine if employee satisfaction impacts turnover. If your organization does not currently administer an Employee Opinion Survey, HR Solutions can provide this service.
· The exit interview data can be run on a quarterly or bi-annual basis. This on-going feedback will allow you to determine and quantify where improvements have had a positive impact, as well as identify where other improvements are needed. In addition, this comparison will exhibit any trends which have formed regarding employee dissatisfaction.
· The multiple sources of data gathered throughout the process can provide your organization with a richer foundation of information.
· A savings of time for your Human Resources department, since the Exit Interviews Assessment can now be outsourced.
Dimensions
Each item in the survey is combined with other related survey items to produce dimensions. The exit interviews Assessment can solidly measure reasons employees are leaving your organization in the following key areas:
· Supervision and Management
· Work Satisfaction
· Workload Distribution and Schedule Flexibility
· Salary
· Benefits
· Training and Development
· Career Advancement Opportunities
· Organizational Culture
· Organizational and Work Group Communication
Assessment Process
The assessment process can include up to four major components: the Exit Interview, a Comparison of Jobs Questionnaire, Employee Interviews, and the HR Solutions Exit Analysis Report (HEARTM). HR Solutions gives you the option of selecting any or all of these components, dependent upon your organization's specific information needs. The HR Solutions Exit Analysis Report (HEARTM) component is included with each option. A description of the four major components are as follows:
A. The Exit Interview
The survey will be fully customized based upon your organization's specifications. Typically, the Exit Interview will ask the exiting employees about themselves, their reasons for leaving, their satisfaction on several aspects of the organization, and if any changes would have enticed them to remain at your organization.
B. Comparison of Jobs Questionnaire
Ninety days after the exiting employees complete the Exit Interview, they are mailed a Comparison of Jobs Questionnaire. This questionnaire asks the employees to compare their new job to their previous job with your organization, examining whether the "grass truly is greener."
C. Employee Interviews
This is a critical step in completing the Exit Interview process. It requires a sample of exiting employees to be contacted by an HR Solutions consultant for an exit interview. Typically, the interviews are conducted by phone. During the interview, the exiting employees will be probed for more detailed and specific information regarding their employment experience at your organization. HR Solutions recommends a minimum sample size (dependant upon the size of your organization) of exiting employees be interviewed to collect valid data.
D. HR Solutions Exit Analysis Report (HEARTM)
The HR Solutions Exit Analysis Report (HEARTM) contains the tabulated survey data in statistical and bar graph format. This report is included with each option and will allow your organization to identify the necessary steps to take in order to prevent future employee turnover. The report can be designed to include any number of demographic or work group breakdowns, which gives your organization the luxury of identifying which work groups may be more vulnerable to future employee turnover. Most clients order their HEARTM report on a quarterly basis.
Getting to the truth in exit interviews
"Someday when I leave this place, I'm really going to tell them what I think!" If you've ever had a boss you disliked or a job you hated, these words probably sound familiar.
When you finally had that exit interview, did you tell the whole truth about why you were leaving? Probably not.
Interestingly, many departing employees don't take the chance when they get it. In fact, a recent study by Joseph Zarandona and Michael Camuso, found that employees have no real incentive to be honest during their exit interviews. Since they are on their way out, they feel that they will not directly benefit from any action taken as a result of their honesty.
Also, many employees follow the "golden rule" of organizational exiting: "Leave on good terms."
Exit interviews may encourage an employee to provide false information for other reasons. They may fear that negative comments will be made to their new employer or that they'll get a poor reference. If they hope to be reemployed by the original organization, they will guard their comments closely.
In addition, exit interviews often give employees the impression that the organization is not really interested in why they are leaving. The interview seems merely another mandatory procedure that must be completed before a final paycheck is issued.
In these cases, exiting employees usually provide professionally acceptable responses for their action: "They made me an offer with substantially more money," not "Career advancement here is limited."
To find out how truthful exiting employees are, Zarandona and Camuso studied 99 randomly selected employees who had voluntarily resigned 18 months earlier from a major engineering, construction, and consulting firm.
All 99 had been through exit interviews and stated their reasons for leaving. These former employees were then contacted by telephone and led to believe that they had been randomly selected by an independent research company for a general quality-of-work-life study. They were given the same five reasons for leaving-work environment, position responsibilities, career advancement, salary and benefits, and supervision-and asked to select the one that weighed most heavily in their decision to leave their company.
What do you suppose they found? You guessed it. They revised their reasons for leaving. At the time they left, for example, 38 percent pointed to salary and benefits as the primary reason; 18 months later only 12 percent responded the same way. Four percent had originally said they were leaving for supervisory reasons, yet this percentage increased to 24 percent 18 months later.
In the article, "The Exit Interview: Effective Tool or Meaningless Gesture?" (by Pamela Garretson and Kenneth Teel, Personnel Magazine, August, 1982) 18 major organizations were sampled to determine their exit interview procedures.
The authors were surprised to find that just slightly over half make any use of the information obtained in the interviews. Perhaps the data isn't used because it isn't reliable. So why bother collecting the data if it won't be used?
The following ideas will help organizations collect useful information to help them make needed changes in their policies, supervision and culture:
1. Develop a standard interview format. Ensure that personnel representatives ask the same questions during each interview in a structured sequence.
2. Conduct the exit interview anonymously. Companies can employ outside firms to hold discussions and later submit raw data. They can also schedule discussions after employees have separated. Under these conditions, employees will not be afraid to tell the truth, since they will have no fear of retribution from their employer.
3. During the interview, convey to exiting employees that management is concerned with the actual reasons for their leaving and will use this information in a constructive, not retaliatory, manner.
4. As a part of the procedure, have the personnel representative speak with the exiting employee’s supervisor and co-workers to help determine the actual reasons for termination. The company will then have a global picture of the reasons surrounding the employee’s decision to leave.
5. Conduct studies like the one described above to analyze internal exit information.
Many companies are paying big bucks to hire corporate culture gurus who interview and survey employees. It seems to me, that these companies are missing a golden opportunity to get honest input on a regular basis by simply using a smarter exit interview procedure.
From India, New Delhi
22The exit interview is part survey and part sales pitch. The objectives are to find out why customers are leaving, and to prevent them from doing so. It is particularly appropriate for companies whose customers have "accounts," -- banks, brokerages, internet service providers, cable television, and mutual funds, to name a few.
The interview is administered by an employee who receives a request to close an account. The interview can be conducted either in-person or via telephone. The process is relatively simple.
Step 1 -- Diagnose the Problem
A short series of questions should be asked of the customer to determine why she is leaving.
Step 2 -- Empathize
If any of the reasons for leaving are related to issues within the control of the company, such as product or service problems, or pricing concerns, the employee should apologize for the problem, state the importance of the customer relationship, and ask if there is anything that could be done to keep the customer from leaving. "Scripts" should be written for the entire process so that the employee does not have to ad lib. Different scripts can be written for different types of problems. The employees who administer the exit interview should rehearse the scripts in advance of conducting exit interviews.
Step 3 -- Make a Counteroffer
It is possible that the customer will change her mind about leaving after receiving an apology in Step 2. If not, it is appropriate to make a counteroffer. Counteroffers should be scripted, and related to the specific problem identified in Step 1. A typical counteroffer to a pricing-related concern might be something as simple as "We really hate to lose your business. Would you stay with us if I offered you 50% off your next six months of service?"
Step 4 -- The Follow-up Letter
Whether or not the employee is successful in keeping the employee from leaving, a follow-up letter should be sent to the customer within one day. If the customer has agreed to stay, the letter should state how much the company values the customer's business. If the customer left for reasons within the control of the company, the letter should extend another counteroffer.
Step 5 -- Analyze the Data
The data collected should be entered into a database and analyzed to quantify the main reasons customers want to leave
.
Step 6 -- Make Adjustments to Business Practices
The data analysis should clearly identify areas in need of improvement. Management should address these areas, which may consist of the treatment customers receive from employees, product problems, pricing, etc.
Embellishments
Not all customers are profitable. If you keep a database on the profitability of individual customers, you may want to write more aggressive scripts for very profitable customers, and let unprofitable customers leave without a counteroffer.
You can measure the effectiveness of each counteroffer, and make adjustments to maximize customer retention.
Exit Interviews
The HR Solutions' exit interviews are a fully custom, four-part assessment system which can enable organizations to more accurately and more confidentially measure the reasons why its employees are leaving.
Results
HR Solutions' exit interviews assessment can result in:
· Improved Employee Retention/Reduced Turnover.
· Increased objectivity, both perceived and real, since the Exit Interviews Assessment would be handled by a fair and non-partisan third-party.
· Benchmarking against industry norms which HR Solutions maintains for the majority of the exit interview survey items.
· Additional benchmarking for exiting employees' scores against overall Employee Opinion Survey results to determine if employee satisfaction impacts turnover. If your organization does not currently administer an Employee Opinion Survey, HR Solutions can provide this service.
· The exit interview data can be run on a quarterly or bi-annual basis. This on-going feedback will allow you to determine and quantify where improvements have had a positive impact, as well as identify where other improvements are needed. In addition, this comparison will exhibit any trends which have formed regarding employee dissatisfaction.
· The multiple sources of data gathered throughout the process can provide your organization with a richer foundation of information.
· A savings of time for your Human Resources department, since the Exit Interviews Assessment can now be outsourced.
Dimensions
Each item in the survey is combined with other related survey items to produce dimensions. The exit interviews Assessment can solidly measure reasons employees are leaving your organization in the following key areas:
· Supervision and Management
· Work Satisfaction
· Workload Distribution and Schedule Flexibility
· Salary
· Benefits
· Training and Development
· Career Advancement Opportunities
· Organizational Culture
· Organizational and Work Group Communication
Assessment Process
The assessment process can include up to four major components: the Exit Interview, a Comparison of Jobs Questionnaire, Employee Interviews, and the HR Solutions Exit Analysis Report (HEARTM). HR Solutions gives you the option of selecting any or all of these components, dependent upon your organization's specific information needs. The HR Solutions Exit Analysis Report (HEARTM) component is included with each option. A description of the four major components are as follows:
A. The Exit Interview
The survey will be fully customized based upon your organization's specifications. Typically, the Exit Interview will ask the exiting employees about themselves, their reasons for leaving, their satisfaction on several aspects of the organization, and if any changes would have enticed them to remain at your organization.
B. Comparison of Jobs Questionnaire
Ninety days after the exiting employees complete the Exit Interview, they are mailed a Comparison of Jobs Questionnaire. This questionnaire asks the employees to compare their new job to their previous job with your organization, examining whether the "grass truly is greener."
C. Employee Interviews
This is a critical step in completing the Exit Interview process. It requires a sample of exiting employees to be contacted by an HR Solutions consultant for an exit interview. Typically, the interviews are conducted by phone. During the interview, the exiting employees will be probed for more detailed and specific information regarding their employment experience at your organization. HR Solutions recommends a minimum sample size (dependant upon the size of your organization) of exiting employees be interviewed to collect valid data.
D. HR Solutions Exit Analysis Report (HEARTM)
The HR Solutions Exit Analysis Report (HEARTM) contains the tabulated survey data in statistical and bar graph format. This report is included with each option and will allow your organization to identify the necessary steps to take in order to prevent future employee turnover. The report can be designed to include any number of demographic or work group breakdowns, which gives your organization the luxury of identifying which work groups may be more vulnerable to future employee turnover. Most clients order their HEARTM report on a quarterly basis.
Getting to the truth in exit interviews
"Someday when I leave this place, I'm really going to tell them what I think!" If you've ever had a boss you disliked or a job you hated, these words probably sound familiar.
When you finally had that exit interview, did you tell the whole truth about why you were leaving? Probably not.
Interestingly, many departing employees don't take the chance when they get it. In fact, a recent study by Joseph Zarandona and Michael Camuso, found that employees have no real incentive to be honest during their exit interviews. Since they are on their way out, they feel that they will not directly benefit from any action taken as a result of their honesty.
Also, many employees follow the "golden rule" of organizational exiting: "Leave on good terms."
Exit interviews may encourage an employee to provide false information for other reasons. They may fear that negative comments will be made to their new employer or that they'll get a poor reference. If they hope to be reemployed by the original organization, they will guard their comments closely.
In addition, exit interviews often give employees the impression that the organization is not really interested in why they are leaving. The interview seems merely another mandatory procedure that must be completed before a final paycheck is issued.
In these cases, exiting employees usually provide professionally acceptable responses for their action: "They made me an offer with substantially more money," not "Career advancement here is limited."
To find out how truthful exiting employees are, Zarandona and Camuso studied 99 randomly selected employees who had voluntarily resigned 18 months earlier from a major engineering, construction, and consulting firm.
All 99 had been through exit interviews and stated their reasons for leaving. These former employees were then contacted by telephone and led to believe that they had been randomly selected by an independent research company for a general quality-of-work-life study. They were given the same five reasons for leaving-work environment, position responsibilities, career advancement, salary and benefits, and supervision-and asked to select the one that weighed most heavily in their decision to leave their company.
What do you suppose they found? You guessed it. They revised their reasons for leaving. At the time they left, for example, 38 percent pointed to salary and benefits as the primary reason; 18 months later only 12 percent responded the same way. Four percent had originally said they were leaving for supervisory reasons, yet this percentage increased to 24 percent 18 months later.
In the article, "The Exit Interview: Effective Tool or Meaningless Gesture?" (by Pamela Garretson and Kenneth Teel, Personnel Magazine, August, 1982) 18 major organizations were sampled to determine their exit interview procedures.
The authors were surprised to find that just slightly over half make any use of the information obtained in the interviews. Perhaps the data isn't used because it isn't reliable. So why bother collecting the data if it won't be used?
The following ideas will help organizations collect useful information to help them make needed changes in their policies, supervision and culture:
1. Develop a standard interview format. Ensure that personnel representatives ask the same questions during each interview in a structured sequence.
2. Conduct the exit interview anonymously. Companies can employ outside firms to hold discussions and later submit raw data. They can also schedule discussions after employees have separated. Under these conditions, employees will not be afraid to tell the truth, since they will have no fear of retribution from their employer.
3. During the interview, convey to exiting employees that management is concerned with the actual reasons for their leaving and will use this information in a constructive, not retaliatory, manner.
4. As a part of the procedure, have the personnel representative speak with the exiting employee’s supervisor and co-workers to help determine the actual reasons for termination. The company will then have a global picture of the reasons surrounding the employee’s decision to leave.
5. Conduct studies like the one described above to analyze internal exit information.
Many companies are paying big bucks to hire corporate culture gurus who interview and survey employees. It seems to me, that these companies are missing a golden opportunity to get honest input on a regular basis by simply using a smarter exit interview procedure.
From India, New Delhi
thank you hari sir for this information.
i wanted to ask that as i am doing a project on attrition, so can you help me with the ways as to how should be incorporate the relevance of exit interivews which really do not happen in every orgn and how to proceed.
anticipating your valuable comments.
regards
pinkii
From India, New Delhi
i wanted to ask that as i am doing a project on attrition, so can you help me with the ways as to how should be incorporate the relevance of exit interivews which really do not happen in every orgn and how to proceed.
anticipating your valuable comments.
regards
pinkii
From India, New Delhi
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Exit Interview - Purpose, Process and Format.doc