Handover is your legacy.

We will all leave the company we work for, and inevitably one of our co-workers will too.

When someone leaves, no matter how they go, the work that they manage is immediately transferred to someone else. Even if you show them how to do the job, the mere fact that that person has left leaves a lot more work to do. You’re starting again if there is no guide on performing those tasks or enough evidence to show the complexity of relationships or history. That’s why having a solid handover, in my opinion, is like your legacy.

The purpose of a handover:

A handover transfers knowledge, skills, and responsibilities from one person to another. It ensures that the work continues without interruption and that the new person clearly understands their role and responsibilities.

Why is handover necessary?

If you can document the work you did in an easy-to-understand way, you have confirmed your efforts at the company and made them clear to whoever reads it. Not to be dramatic, but it almost immortalises your efforts for some time and leaves a lasting impression anytime anyone reads it. Moreover, whoever takes over or has to cover for you will have their experience of the role shaped by the person leaving.

If they have to start trying to get context from every client or account from the beginning, this will look bad for the business and the former colleague.

Consequences of a lousy handover:

It’s hard not to leave a poor handover when you are dismissed due to recession, poor performance, or through professional disagreement. It’s also a challenging task when you are more excited about your new job than the one you are leaving. The net result is a paper-thin handover which is so hard to action that it’s more beneficial for the person filling that role to start from zero.

I have seen so many examples of this where a former colleague provides data that is easily found without asking. Things like simple revenue numbers, current projects, or even a simple sentence of what the account is like. It’s almost as if a Google search and 5 minutes on the internal CRM would be better. The net takeaway is that internally the perception is that the team member was easily replaceable anyway and that there is no loss to the company now that they have gone.

More frustrating is the stagnation of accounts due to someone leaving. Usually, there is a period of time before someone leaves their role. Their last weeks provide lower output and thus less work. When someone new comes in, they not only familiarise themselves with the new accounts but also play catchup on the lag provided by the outgoing individual.

Overall, whoever takes over must work harder to restore the accounts to their former glory (if there was any), and the person who has left is painted a bad picture.

A good handover has the following elements:

• Structure of the account and who the decision makers are, from phone numbers to their characteristics.
• Account revenue history and what was done to grow or slow it done
• Customer habits (response times, report preferences, call times etc).
• Customer likes and dislikes of your product.
• Revenue history that is both seasonal and consistent
• Anything the customer is waiting on (product updates, tickets etc.)
• Overall, a strategy to win the account and what to do to make magic happen.
• For extra merit (and this is what I am going to do), a recorded video per account on how you perceive them would be great too.

The above is either stored on the CRM level per account or on an easy-to-navigate document that anyone can reference and access.

Here is a link to a template for you too!

In closing

By creating a solid handover, you leave the company with a document of what you achieved and allow them to remember you too. This has huge implications for someone who takes over for you and in the future when you might need a reference, get a job with someone you used to work with, or even in a networking situation when someone refers to how well you know their industry.