Commenting on Utility of Exit Surveys
HRM Today featured an article about some limitations of exit interviews. It was great and I think everyone should read it.
The basic gist is that exit interviews are not a magic bullet. They provide a very specific type of information and even then they focus on what has already happened.
I should caution that after reading that article you might be forgiven if you walk away with the impression that exit interviews are useless. They are not. In fact, they can be a very useful source of information about your employees. However it has inherent limitations and is most useful as part of a more comprehensive system of employee feedback. As Lance Huan of HRM Today mentions, it is vital for organizations to have open, healthy channels of communication between employees and their supervisors. But even that is not sufficient. To really understand what your employees are thinking and feeling, you need dialogue, exit surveys, 360 surveys and comprehensive employee surveys. Individually, each of these has important limitations; but they complement each other very well.
To some, a comprehensive employee feedback system like this may seem like overkill. I can’t say I agree. We spend a huge amount of resources finding out what consumers are thinking, what are competitors are doing, what regulators are planning, etc. Each of these sources of intelligence (should) shape our business strategy. Skimping on one makes as much sense as skimping on the other.
