Exit Interview Questions: Valuable Employee Insights

When an employee leaves an organization, they can provide valuable information that can benefit the company. This is because they are no longer pressured to provide the "right" answer and are not concerned about how their answers may affect their career advancement within the company. 

In addition, collecting employee feedback will show that you value their opinions, making them feel important. Even though we are talking about exit interviews, this will positively impact the company's reputation as a whole, as the person will have nice things to say about you among their new colleagues.

To help you collect this valuable information correctly, we have compiled this short guide to show you how to conduct exit interviews effectively. You will also find the best exit interview questions you can use as templates and will explain how Plai can help you in this part of the performance management cycle. Stay tuned!

Prepare for the exit interview

Besides preparing the actual exit questions, which we will get to later, here are a few steps you can take to ensure the exit interview goes smoothly:

• Review the employee file: While some questions will be the same, looking into the experience of the person who is leaving can give you some insights that will help you ask better exit interview questions.
• Choose the interview method: Modern HR performance software such as Plai lets you easily collect information online at the employee's convenience. While in-person exit interviews have some benefits (you can see how a person reacts while answering), they are far less convenient and can make the departing employee more uncomfortable.
• Show gratitude and provide feedback: Lastly, when everything is done, thank the participant and let them know how much their honest feedback helps the company. That is good for improving employee morale and will leave a positive impact, making them more likely to recommend the company to their future colleagues. But also remind them that the information they give will be used anonymously.

Sample exit interview questions

While you should make exit interview questions unique not only for the person leaving and their particular situation but also for the role and the company itself, these templates will help you get started in the right direction:

General questions

1. How would you describe the overall experience you had working at the company?
2. How would you describe the company as a workplace to someone who has never heard about us?
3. Do you feel the company provided adequate professional and personal growth opportunities?
4. How do you think being at the company affected your further career trajectory?
5. Do you have any suggestions on how the company can improve?

Questions about the role

1. What parts of the role did you find the most and the least satisfying?
2. Do you feel the company has provided you with adequate resources on a daily level to do your job correctly?
3. Did the company provide the necessary training to excel in your role?
4. Do you feel you had a well-defined role with clear expectations and responsibilities?
5. If you were in charge, what would you change to improve the working conditions for other colleagues in your position?

Questions about the team

1. How well could you work with other colleagues to achieve team and company goals?
2. How supporting and collaborative was the overall team environment?
3. Did you feel that you could trust your colleagues to do their part of the job?
4. Were there any particular challenges you faced when working in teams?
5. What would you change to improve team dynamics at the company?

Questions about management

1. How well do you feel your managers provided adequate guidance to help you fulfill your role?
2. How would you rate their ability to delegate tasks properly to ensure their subordinates can complete everything during working hours?
3. How would you describe the level of open communication and trust you had with your managers?
4. How would you rate the feedback and recognition you received from your managers?
5. How well did the managers resolve intra-team conflicts?

Questions about company culture

1. Can you share examples of the company's values and the workplace culture being put into action on a day-to-day basis?
2. How would you rate the company culture in terms of divisiveness and the level of inclusivity?
3. Do you think the company respects work-life balance and employee well-being?
4. Did you find company events beneficial for establishing values?
5. What would you improve to make the company culture even more inclusive?

Improving the work environment

1. How well did the overall work environment support you in your role?
2. How would you rate the company's offices and facilities regarding accessibility, comfort, and productiveness?
3. Does the overall work environment support employee initiatives and ideas?
4. How would you evaluate the level of job-related stress within the work environment?
5. Would you change anything in the work environment to positively impact employee experience?

Strengthening training and development programs

1. Does the company encourage employees to grow through training and mentorship?
2. What could the company improve in the onboarding process of new employees?
3. How effective was the ongoing training you received every year in helping you to perform your job better?
4. How often did you use the company's training materials, and did you find them helpful?
5. How would you improve the company's training and development programs?

Reducing employee turnover

1. What was the main reason for you to decide to leave the company?
2. Is there anything you feel the company could have done differently to improve job satisfaction and keep you?
3. Are there any other incentives that the company could offer to increase employee engagement and keep the current employees?
4. How do you think the company's work-life balance compares to other companies in the industry?
5. What would you recommend us to change that would help employee retention and reduce employee turnover?

Tools for analyzing exit interview data

While performance management software can help you speed up the process of creating questions and conducting the exit surveys, its real strength is in the analysis. Plai has an integrated dashboard that will help you easily compare the answers with the previous employee performance reviews and other reports in the database. 

But you can also compare them to other people working in their role and their reports and former employees in the database, which will all help you draw data-driven conclusions. That way, you will be able to learn from exiting employees' feedback and take steps that can prevent other employees from leaving the company for the same reason.

Conclusion

Exit interview questions are an excellent way to gather valuable employee insights and improve your organization. Moreover, if done right, the valuable feedback collected and the following changes can keep the employees from leaving the company, making exit interviews indispensable.

Plai helps all your people and performance management activities throughout the employee life cycle, from the job description to the exit interviews. With the simple-to-use interface, plenty of survey templates, various question modalities and detailed analytics, Plai has all it takes to help companies conduct exit interviews that will make an impact. 

Try Plai today, completely free, and see why our clients trust us to be the focal point of their people management processes.

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