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BY Ashley Herd

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It’s Friday afternoon—and your favorite team member’s last day before they move on to a new organization. You wanted to work through their final handoffs, but they’re in HR’s office. And in that meeting, for the first time in three years, someone asks them: “What made you decide to leave, and what could we have done differently?”

They answer, in full detail. They joined because the company’s careers page promised “development opportunities,” but they got turned down for every leadership program they asked to attend. They were told more than once that a promotion was coming. It never came. And they never got the chance to really push on either one, because their one-on-ones happened so rarely that there were 28 other things they needed to cover first.

An exit interview is often the most candid conversation someone has at work.…