No company has 100% employee retention rate. Some may get close, but in today’s business landscape, employees come and go regularly. It’s become part of the natural cycle for companies and people’s careers. Parting doesn’t mean you’re on bad terms with this person, of course. People part ways for many reasons, but even if you do part with an employee on good terms, it’s important to have your offboarding procedures finely tuned. The fact of the matter is, these ex-employees can pose a threat to you and your business. It’s a matter of security.
When an employee leaves, it’s quite possible that they have access to your data if you don’t have the right security protocols in order, such as removing old passwords. Your company information may or may not be sensitive, but in the wrong hands, it’s all dangerous. Your sales database could be shared with a competitor or your ex-employee could mess with files on your network. Either of these scenarios could leave you crippled.
According to IT managers surveyed in a recent study, 20% of businesses that fail to do a proper offboarding or deprovisioning of ex-employees are hacked. With ransomware and phishing attacks on the rise, securing your data has never been more important.
Create an employee offboarding checklist that makes sense for your organization. We suggest starting with these four action items:
- Secure Physical Assets – for more than security reasons, we are sure you wouldn’t let an employee walk off with company-issued equipment or devices. Gather all laptops, cell phones, tablets, or other devices and wipe them clean. Don’t forget to collect their key to the office, as well.
- Passwords – Any system this user has access to will need a password reset. This is where password managers really come in handy. They keep track of all the passwords a users has so you can easily determine which applications and systems need to be secured. This could include shared passwords used by more than just one user and third-party services such as courier services that a user could access from the web.
- Building Security – Your physical building needs to have some kind of security system in place, just in case. You shouldn’t need to change the locks every time someone leaves, but having other measures in place is smart.
- Personal Devices – If you allowed your employees to use their personal devices for company purposes, they could walk out with access to everything. Make sure you remote wipe all company data from their device. If you don’t have some kind of Mobile Device Management in place, we highly suggest you do so.
Manual deprovisioning creates some room for human error and can be cumbersome, so to make sure your offboarding checklist is completed in a timely manner, you can look into automated deprovisioning platforms or outsourcing your deprovisioning to a Managed Service Provider. A platform will ensure all steps are executed immediately, eliminating any security holes. You are also able to modify the offboarding checklist for different roles. A Managed Service Provider with experience in security will be able to take care of the offboarding for you and advise you on what steps should be taken for your organization.
If you have any questions about offboarding, security, or mobile device management, reach out to us here at GadellNet.
