Stop Drowning in Ex’s Emails

No matter what the reason for turnover is — resignation, termination, downsizing — a succession plan is necessary to ensure the continuity of your business. Having a policy in place to handle former employees’ e-mails can play a key role in keeping up that continuity and keeping your business afloat.

When an employee leaves, point people have to be designated to handle the departed employee’s tasks. Most e-mail programs offer four main sections that these appointed employees would need access to: e-mail, calendar, contacts and tasks. The information below contains examples for Outlook. In addition to thoroughly reviewing the desktop, calendar, e-mail and tasks within a week of an employee’s departure, also check CRM or other relevant programs if applicable.

Granting access rights can be accomplished through a variety of methods, but one of the simplest ways is to move the departed employee’s PST file (the file Outlook creates for each person) to a shared network location and add access rights to the appointed recipients on their computers. When you move the file, it’s considered best practice to change the password on the old account to prevent the former employee from gaining access to his or her file, and place an auto-response message for any incoming e-mail with a notification of alternate contacts. Once you move the PST file to the shared drive, new e-mails will then route to that shared drive.

Another consideration is to determine the length of time the account should remain active. Company policies generally range from 30 days to 3 years depending on retention requirements. Choosing a retention time is dependent on a number of factors, including how long you need to sort through the employee’s existing Outlook file, how long you want to keep the notification for incoming e-mails active, and the length of time it might take to notify the former employee’s contacts. It is important to notify whomever you have covering the account of the time frame for reviewing the former employee’s Outlook file.

Reviewing e-mail in the Inbox, Outbox and Tasks is crucial to ensure that projects don’t slip and that follow-ups are handled in a timely matter. Any e-mails and file attachments relating to a customer should also be moved to an alternate shared network location to be easily accessed in the future if needed. A quick way to review e-mail, if you have Outlook 2003 or 2007, is to activate the reading pane on the right side of the screen so you can quickly scroll through and alleviate the overwhelming feeling of having to review so many e-mails.

Calendar items will need to be reviewed for upcoming customer appointments and tasks. People often use their calendars for keeping track of their to-do items.

If your employees’ contacts are not centrally stored, checking their e-mail contacts is a critical source for understanding whom the former employee had relationships with at various companies and their roles within their companies. For example, if this employee was in charge of marketing campaigns and received direct inquiries for business opportunities, you might want to reach out to his contacts and let them know how to reach the replacement employee within the organization. This also maintains their rapport with your company and reminds them to continue to conduct business with you.

Once all items have been reviewed and moved to appropriate shared locations, it will be necessary to disable the former employee’s account access. Contact an IT professional if you need assistance. For more information on the tools available with Outlook, visit office.microsoft.com/en-us/outlook/FX100647191033.aspx. For step by step instructions on how to implement any of the Outlook tips provided above, click here.

Implementing a policy and creating an organized system on a shared network can promote communication within the organization, maintain control of the Outlook account access and prevent business interruption or loss of sales revenue.