Employee Turnover; an IT Perspective

Losing an employee is rarely a pleasant experience. Be it a termination or a resignation, there are many things that need to be considered when an employee moves on from your company. From the point of view of your IT department, we focus on protecting one of your company’s most valuable assets. Your data.

Any employee leaving the company can turn into a liability risk, so timing is everything. The termination procedure will vary from company to company and even from employee to employee. Tenure, position held and system access levels will make every termination unique. However, some actions should be universal, and timing is key. You do not want your employee to find out they are terminated because their email access was turned off too early. Not only because it makes the process more awkward, it also gives them time to compromise your network or steal data. Below is a list to consider while preparing for an employee’s departure.

• Involve your IT department as soon as possible

• Plan ahead. Be ready to disable access when appropriate

• When ready, disable access to the network, email and third-party applications

• Disable and change all system passwords and Windows Domain accounts

• Remove Remote/VPN access

• Collect anything related to building access. Keys, keycards and consider changing door codes

• Collect all company owned tech assets. Cell phones, laptops and removable storage devices

• Collect all intellectual property. Such as physical files that could contain sales or customer info

• Consider anything unique to their position. For example, if the employee worked in the marketing department, remove access to your company’s LinkedIn or Facebook pages 

Involving you IT department early is paramount for a successful transition. This will give ample time for IT and the employee’s manager to discuss how to handle such a delicate situation. This collaboration between IT and Management will help to ensure protection of company data.