Exit Interview Form

What is an exit interview?

An exit interview form is a simple form that gathers feedback from an employee leaving the company. It's usually filled on the last days of employment and should be as honest and straightforward as possible.

An employee exit interview template shouldn't be too long, even though there are many things you'll want to know. However, you don't want to annoy the employee and make them lose interest in the form. Limit the exit interview to relevant information such as the reason for leaving, scores for different work-related aspects, and feedback.

When to use the exit interview form?

Use an exit interview form to determine why your employees are leaving the company. Find out whether they're satisfied with the company's policy and work conditions. We answer the most frequent questions about exit interview forms and help you create a customized one for your company. If you want a faster solution or some inspiration, download our free exit interview form template.

Who should fill it?

Any employee leaving the company should fill an exit interview form. It doesn't matter what job they had, the number of years of experience, or whether they held a managing position or not. All types of employees should fill the form. If you consider, you can create separate sections in the form for different situations (e.g., include where it's the case a section for managing positions, safety issues, relations with managers, etc.).

You can give the form in advance and just discuss it over the interview or ask employees to fill it.

Tip: We provide also termination letters examples with a cause and without a cause.

Why do you need an exit interview form?

Employee observations and feedback represent valuable data for HR analysis. You can use them to improve employee turnover, increase performance, and provide better HR processes. Furthermore, an exit interview form allows you to keep data well-structured and easy to store and search. There are other short-term and long term benefits you should consider, such as:

• Designing a comprehensive set of questions that covers everything you need to know provides relevant data easy to compare and use in reports and statistics.
• Following the same exit procedure and using the same form ensures data consistency, impartiality, and high-quality standards.
• Using a form and a standard procedure helps you avoid mistakes, remain focused, and stick to the subject instead of allowing emotions to get in the way.
• A written form allows employees to prepare, focus on insightful feedback, and give accurate answers.
• Well-organized data is critical for future improvements, trend analysis, and decreasing turnover.

What should you ask in an exit interview form?

The first thing you need to ask is the reason for leaving. If the employee has accepted a position in another company, you should try to determine why the employee took the new offer. In some cases, a better offer is the decisive factor for leaving the company. However, you should still try to find out if the employee was unsatisfied, had conflicts with co-workers or managers, or felt unprepared for the job.

You can ask for scores for salary and benefits, leave policy, management, communication within the company, and an evaluation of general job satisfaction. It's also helpful to know if the employee considers working for the company in the future and what could have changed their decision. Also, you might be interested in a termination checklist to ensure you didn't forget any specific task regarding the employee's departure.

Don't forget to ask for feedback regarding the company's culture and how it can be improved. You may want to know if the employee complained about something and didn't receive an answer, if he/she had clear career goals that weren't achieved, or if she/he mentioned to the direct manager the decision to leave and no action was taken.

Key Exit Interview Questions

When employees leave the company, the exit interview can be an excellent tool to gain valuable know-how on how you can improve retention, and also how your business be better, support management decisions, support training strategies, aspects related to compensation and benefits, and also ways to improve the overall company culture.

Download the free exit interview form

Start to organize employee feedback right now and download our free exit interview form. It's easy to use, and you can customize it any way you like. Remember that each company is different, and you should develop a set of questions that fits your company.

Download the exit interview template

If you would like to be more rigurous in your analysis of why certain employee left the organization, we have a exit interview template that has multiple questions and covers multiple section: reason for leaving, details on the job, Remuneration and benefits, Organization, Manager and Management.

Frequently asked questions

What should you do with the results?

Use employees' answers to make the workplace a better place for your workforce, improve responsiveness, and promote impartiality and equality. The exit interview form gathers honest answers that can reveal serious issues, conflicts, and dysfunctions that affect productivity and create a toxic work environment. Moreover, by collecting data in a standardized manner, you can quickly generate reports and statistics that help you spot trends and better understand your workforce.

Exit interview forms also help you improve your perspective over a particular team or position. By understanding what challenges an employee faces in a specific position, you can improve your hiring methods and choose a different employee typology for that position. It may also help you design more flexible work policies, prevent absenteeism, and adapt the perks offered by the company to employees' real needs. Thus, the results aren't just an insight into the company but also support future human resource management.

Are there any other solutions than a paper form?

If you want a paperless office and well-organized records of your employees, we recommend you to consider LeaveBoard. You will have access to an employee database to centralize employee records and have access to up-to-date information.

Employee records include employment date, leave history, professional details, allowances, birthday, direct manager, team, office, contact information, and emergency contacts. Sounds good? That's more! LeaveBoard is entirely free for businesses with less than nine employees.

What are you waiting for? Please register for an account and boost your team's efficiency and performance with our web-based HR app.