Guide G17 Onboarding & offboarding
Joiners, movers, and leavers each need a checklist - not a bullet point.
A new hire without a working account on day one, and a departed employee whose access is quietly still active, are the same underlying gap: no one owns the joiner-mover-leaver process end to end. This guide treats onboarding, role changes, and offboarding as their own responsibility, separate from the general managed IT promise it usually hides inside.
G17 · Entry 01 Three different lifecycle jobs
Start with whether this is one event or a missing process.
One new hire or one leaver needs handling now
A start date or a last day is set. Bring the name, date, role, and what access must be granted or removed.
The process itself has no consistent owner
New hires wait days for working accounts, or leavers' access isn't reliably revoked, on a recurring basis.
Leadership wants proof departed staff have no access
A bounded review can check current and recently departed staff against active accounts, devices, and shared access.
G17 · Entry 02 Decision matrix
Match the situation to the right first route.
| Observed need | Best first route | Useful evidence | Boundary |
|---|---|---|---|
| A start date is set and accounts must be ready | Support or managed IT | Role, start date, systems needed, existing template if any | Not a hiring or HR process |
| New hires often wait days for working access | Managed IT | Current onboarding steps, time-to-productive, named gaps | Not a one-time fix |
| Leavers' accounts or devices aren't reliably deactivated | Managed IT | Offboarding checklist, a recent example, device-return record | Not a legal or HR investigation |
| Leadership wants a current access audit | Bounded review | Active-user list, recent departures, shared-access inventory | Not a certification |
G17 · Entry 03 Prepare the brief
Bring these facts to a lifecycle conversation.
- A current role-based template: what accounts, groups, and tools a typical joiner needs.
- Who is notified, and how far ahead, before a start date or last day.
- What happens to a leaver's mailbox, files, and shared access - not just their login.
- How devices are provisioned for joiners and recovered from leavers.
- Whether a "mover" - a role or department change - triggers any access review at all.
- The last time the full active-user list was checked against actual current staff.
G17 · Entry 04 What this covers
What this guide covers, and what it does not.
- In scope
- Naming the joiner-mover-leaver steps and evidence - account creation, access removal, device handling - a lifecycle process should produce.
- Out of scope
- HR policy, employment law, and performance-related account actions.
- Possible next decision
- Ongoing lifecycle ownership under managed IT, or a one-time access audit.
G17 Next
Turn a recurring gap into a named, repeatable process.
Compare ongoing ownership routes for recurring joiner-mover-leaver work, or read the fuller managed IT guide for the wider recurring-ownership picture.