Modernizing the Exit Interview: What are the Options?

Exit procedures are increasingly among the processes that companies are choosing to outsource and standardize, with outsourcing usually being the proposed change that receives the quickest buy-in from leaders and employees alike.  

More than anything else, putting the responsibility for data collection and reporting on the shoulders of a 3^rd party promises far better confidentiality for a departing employee. Decreasing the fear of burning bridges or stirring up trouble for remaining employees, outsourced data collection methods demonstrate to a departing employee that his or her company is truly committed to confidentiality; internal interview processes simply don’t demonstrate that same commitment – no matter how distant an interviewer may be from a departing employee’s role in the company. 

Standardizing, on the other hand, can imply a number of possible changes to a company’s exit protocol, and is more likely to invite mixed reactions. The less radical of these changes includes automating how an employee is contacted about participating in exit procedures. By integrating with a company’s HRIS, an automated exit process can instantly invite departing employees to schedule an exit interview or survey immediately after the employee is tagged by the system as a voluntary termination. This automation alone can save substantial amount of HR time (which would otherwise be spent tracking down and scheduling departing employees). So it’s generally an easy change to swallow.

But more substantial process changes – such as those that standardize the actual data collection method and content for the exit process –are often met with resistance. And this is when a careful examination of a company’s goals (and budget) for exit procedures need take place.

If an organization ultimately wants the ability to document and act upon trends, the questions that are posed to departing employees must be consistent and the responses that are elicited must be appropriately categorized. While this is easily achieved for some questions by providing pre-set response options (e.g., yes/no; agree/disagree, etc.), it is more difficult for open-ended questions. 

So what options exist for companies wanting to outsource their exit process and act upon information that can only be posed to employees in an open-ended format?

A first option is employ a third party to administer standardized, open-ended interview questions in an online survey. For example, Reliant’s survey program clients are given the option to receive qualitative reports of the responses to open-ended survey items, summarizing responses by themes. Depending upon the nature of the question (and so, the variety of responses) themes that persist year over year can then be make into standardized response options, further enhancing reporting capabilities.

A second option is to employ a third party to administer an online survey that includes both open-ended and closed questions (with standardized response options; e.g., a Likert agreement scale; strongly agree to strongly disagree). Using this combination of questions in an online survey allows for probing – such that individuals who respond to a particular closed-ended question in a specific way can be prompted to then answer a standardized open-ended question.  Because individuals are branched into standardized questions, their responses can be coded and examined for trend data over time. 

A third option is of course to engage a third party to administer open-ended questions in real-time interviews either online or over the phone.  Those conducting the interviews are often trained in interview procedures and can dig deeper into individual responses by offering unique probing questions. However, the risk of this method is that while it allows for probing questions, and so can provide a potentially richer set of information, responses that are provided to unique probes cannot be compared. Thus, trend information will only be captured by those items that have fairly consistent responses between departing employees, which to some extent negates the value of probing in the first place.

So, as is the case with most important decisions, choosing which option to go with ultimately boils down to what is trying to be accomplished by outsourcing your exit process, and how much you’re willing to spend in the name of that accomplishment. If the primary goal is to examine changes in responses over time, you need to consider options that allow you to compare responses in some meaningful way. But if the primary goal is to elicit detailed information on potentially highly unique reasons for why employees leave your organization, then you’ll want to look into options that best facilitate probing during live interviews.  

Setting Your Organization to be Left out in the Cold

From our Director of Consulting services, Dr. Katie Packell

The conversations happened decades ago and they still go on today. Especially right now, with flu shot reminders and winter forecasts popping up. Somewhere in the world, someone is telling their spouse, or child, or colleague, “bundle up – you’ll catch a cold!” 

Unfortunately, while it’s thoughtful advice and has undoubtedly prevented more than a few children from shivering on the school playground, the advice is also flawed. Because you can bundle yourself up all you like – but catching a virus has nothing to do with how cold you are. It has to do with how careful you are about minimizing your exposure to viruses, which – in no small way – is dependent on how diligent you are about washing your hands. So where did the bundle-up advice come from? Most people tend to wash their hands less frequently when the temperature drops.

When it comes to preventing poor employee performance, it seems that many companies choose to take an approach that I would offer is akin to simply bundling up. Rather than analyzing their selection process – the root of all future employee performance – companies narrowly focus on ways to better train, develop, or incentivize their workers. They try to keep their workers up to date in their skills through training courses, they offer internal company career paths, they initiate recognition and rewards programs, and they invest in employee engagement initiatives. 

Certainly there is no harm in instituting any or all of these processes. In fact, when well crafted and executed, they can drive monumental positive change. Yet when it comes to optimizing employee performance, virtually all of the time and effort that a company spends on these post-hire initiatives is futile if it can’t be assumed that every worker hired is actually well-suited for their job. And when I say well-suited, I do not mean simply in terms of their work experience or skill set. I’m talking about the match between an individual’s personality – their values, preferences, and behavioral tendencies – and the nature of the job for which they’re applying. 

The arguments for including personality assessments in the hiring process are vast and well-substantiated by research. Foremost, meta-analyses have shown repeatedly that personality measures can predict job performance fairly well under certain conditions (e.g., Barrick & Mount, 1991; Hough, 1992; Salgado, 1997; Tett, Jackson, & Rothstein, 1991). Personality measures have also been shown to predict performance above and beyond cognitive ability tests, which are widely considered to be the single best predictors of performance. And perhaps even more importantly, personality assessments do not carry the same risk for adverse impact as cognitive ability tests. 

Further, unlike cognitive ability tests – which generally capture ‘maximal’ performance under timed conditions – personality assessments capture ‘typical’ on the job behavior, providing a more enduring measurement of an individual’s propensity to learn and develop. And there is strong evidence to suggest that organizations should be concerned with how well they’re tracking the learning and development of their workforce. Recent work by Development Dimensions International (DDI) found that only 32% of the 14,000 line executives and 18% of HR executives felt their organizations had a sufficient leadership pipeline to meet their future business needs. Half of the organizations recently surveyed by The Conference Board reported lacking the leadership talent needed to execute strategies. 

Ultimately, by considering the degree to which a particular applicant’s personality is well-suited for a job, organizations stack the deck in their own favor. They heighten the odds that the individuals they select will actually be motivated by their work and satisfied with their job – core attitudes that can drive an employee’s decision to remain with their employer.

Boiled down to a few points, well-validated personality assessments help improve organizations in three ways:

1. They facilitate better hiring decisions. Taking up relatively little time during the application process, personality measures provide more valid and reliable insight into how well the individual is likely to perform on the job than any hiring manager could possibly ascertain from a typical (unstructured) interview. Better matching of applicants to positions reduces the propensity for turnover – which ultimately means cost savings.
2. They improve the hiring process by objectifying applicant comparisons. By steering hiring managers to behaviorally-based interview questions that stem directly from an applicant’s results, assessments allow organizations to craft more efficient and useful interview procedures. Using behaviorally based interview questions to organize and standardize hiring procedures also provides a strong layer of protection against future legal action.
3. They improve new-hire productivity. With assessment results in-hand, organizations can identify a new-hire’s potential training or coaching needs before they set foot in the office – shortening the time it takes for a new hire to reach his or her potential in the company. Future leaders can be identified from day 1 – strengthening the leadership pipeline.

The winter season seems to inevitably be accompanied by two phenomena: individuals trying to steer clear of viruses and organizations trying to prepare themselves for the launch of important projects slated for the New Year. For those who avoid walking outside with wet hair for fear of catching a cold, I would suggest a quick Google search that includes the words cold, virus, and myths. (Note: you may also come to find out that a number of other behaviors you have done since childhood are actually pointless. So prepare yourself accordingly.) For organizations looking to reduce turnover, strengthen the legal defensibility of their hiring practice, or enhance their leadership pipeline, I would suggest a focused investigation into personality assessments.   

About Dr. Packell:

Katie regularly provides research and analytic support for client projects, delivering evidence-based recommendations for business decisions.

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Katie Packell is a Consultant at Reliant. Working with clients in a variety of industries and job functions, she has designed and implemented job analyses, selection-based assessment systems, survey initiatives, and other talent management activities across a number of different organizational applications. Katie regularly provides research and analytic support for client projects, delivering evidence-based recommendations for clients’ business decisions. Katie currently manages relationships between Reliant and its clients to build and deliver solutions that meet each client’s unique business needs.

Katie received her B.A. from Rollins College and her M.A. and Ph.D. from the University of Tulsa, where she conducted research in the areas of work-family conflict, workplace emotional regulation, and organizational culture and climate assessment. She has published her work in such outlets as The Journal of Managerial Psychology and The Journal of Psychological Issues in Organizational Culture.

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