young businesswoman sitting in office smiling

Managing Transition in the Workplace: 11 Tips for Supporting Employees

Every growing organization will experience role transitions at some point. Whether a project is changing hands, an employee is moving into a promotion, or you're hiring someone to take on a new position, you will want the transitions to go smoothly.

For the best ways to ensure successful transitions, a panel of Young Entrepreneur Council members share their best advice.

Whether you're handing off a project to someone else or preparing someone to take on a new position in the company, what's one tip you'd give to successfully prepare for a transition of roles, and why?

1. Understand the new person's skills and work style

Get a good feel for the new person's background, skills, and style of work. A person's personal background, values, goals, and style are important in determining whether a working relationship can be mutually beneficial. Doing this makes you aware that the person will probably have different preferences for their work, dress, and the way they relate to people. —Candice Georgiadis, Digital Day

2. Provide resources and support

Share more than just the details. As important as it is to relay all of the small details of a project or position, there is so much more you can do to ensure the transition is successful. Go above and beyond in providing helpful resources. Provide support as you gradually hand over the reins. Then act as a mentor for any questions, challenges, and unexpected conflicts they encounter down the road. —Blair Thomas, eMerchantBroker

3. Share what you know

Make sure you focus on sharing your tacit knowledge. Explicit knowledge is the nuts and bolts of operations, typically already captured and easily accessed through standard operating procedures and training. Tacit knowledge is the insight and intuition you've gained through experience, but find difficult to codify or put into words. When you leave a position, you'll take that valuable wisdom with you unless you pass it on. —Andrew Powell, Learn to Win

4. Provide documentation

Make sure you provide the new person with thorough documentation. This can be done by meticulously notating your day-to-day activities and then converting those notes into general task lists and comments on how they’ve been completed in the past. —Jordan Edelson, Appetizer Mobile LLC

5. Go through hypothetical decisions

Walk them through some hypothetical decisions they will have to make. Take everything from ordinary situations to worst-case scenarios. Let them answer first. Correct anything you feel needs correcting ahead of time. The second part of this is to abide by their decision-making. Stand up for whatever choice they make, and work together to solve problems as necessary. —Tyler Bray, TK Trailer Parts

6. Have the new person shadow their predecessor

The one thing I would always implement in such a transition is allowing the transitioning person to shadow the person already working in the role. If possible, allow them to work alongside the person who is leaving the role they are being promoted to. —Baruch Labunski, Rank Secure

More articles from AllBusiness.com:

7. Make training videos

I've found it useful to have the person leaving that position make training videos for the incoming employee. One-on-one training, of course, happens during the transition, but it can be a lot of information to absorb in a short amount of time. Taking notes is great, too, but can be cumbersome. We use Loom and have found it extremely helpful for new hires. —Leila Lewis, Be Inspired PR

8. Summarize information in one page

Write it down in one page or less, and focus on key aspects of the role at a summary level. You can always add more detail, notes, etc. in a separate report, but the one-page summary forces you to pick out the most relevant information that you want to pass on. —JT Allen, myFootpath LLC

9. Create leaving and onboarding checklists

Checklists, checklists, checklists. You need to have a leaving checklist and an onboarding checklist for every role. Make sure everything is followed and documented well. This makes training easier and helps you not miss anything when a person transitions to a new role. —Peter Boyd, PaperStreet Web Design

10. Build a framework for success in the role

Build a framework for success that's oriented around the job description. Instead of drafting a long list of job requirements, break it down to recurring activities—daily, weekly, monthly goals and tasks that the hire requires (or the project needs). Then, set corresponding milestones and develop a "heartbeat" communication approach to keep things on track. —Mario Peshev, DevriX

11. Get the rest of the team involved

Preparing someone for a new position can seem like a daunting task. There's often a ton of information transferred between team leaders, and data can get lost along the way. If you're training someone to take over a project, get the rest of the team involved through Slack, Zoom, or your choice of collaboration software so the new lead can feel confident and comfortable in their new role. —John Turner, SeedProd LLC