Let’s say one of your best employees walks through your door. They seem nervous and fidgety. Then, they utter that dreaded phrase: “Hey boss, can I talk to you?”

Those words are usually code for “hey boss, I’m about to quit.” On one hand, it’s great to see an employee grow and spread their wings. But on the other hand, it’s a tough loss.

Employee turnover happens. Even if you have a great company culture, provide plenty of opportunities for career growth, and show your employees how much you care about them every single day (though, if you’re looking for the opportunity for a grand gesture, Employee Appreciation Day is coming up on March 4).

But at the end of the day, you can’t be everything to everyone. Maybe your employees are exploring a different career opportunity or they’re looking to start their own business.

Whatever their reason, turnover opens up a new challenge for you. Because once an employee quits, that leaves you with two weeks to find a replacement. So now, you’re on the wire to hire and train someone just as skilled as your old employee.

So, how do you prepare for when that day comes? Here’s how you can get ready for the day an employee leaves your business.

Create a solid offboarding process

Offboarding your former employee followed by onboarding a new one can be an overwhelming time. Especially when you only have two weeks to do it. But take heart: a tight turnaround doesn’t have to equal a bad experience.

Having a standard offboarding process saves you from going into panic mode. Instead of scrambling around trying to find a replacement and communicating the news to your team, you will have a process to follow. That’ll make the transition period much smoother for everyone involved.

The offboarding process begins as soon as your employee walks through your door and gives their two weeks notice. You’ll want to start with an offboarding checklist that will span the employee’s final two weeks. The checklist will outline all the final duties your employee has, from finishing up any final projects to documenting their responsibilities for the next person in their role.

During the first week of your employee’s offboarding, you’ll want to communicate the transition to your team and your clients. You might want to consider letting the departing employee share the news themselves. Talk to the team first, then work your way to people outside of the organization. This includes reaching out to all of their clients (if they have any) and letting them know that their account will be moved to someone else. The transfer of accounts, knowledge, and processes will be easier if everyone is on the same page the entire time.

Week two will include meeting with people operations/human resources for an exit interview, returning company property, and other last day logistics. Your departing employee should be delegating any current projects that they couldn’t finish. And if your hiring process for a replacement is taking longer than expected, your employee can cross-train another to fill the gap.

Document knowledge

As part of the offboarding process, you’ll want to document any process knowledge your employee has before they leave. In a perfect world, they’ll have written everything down in a document. But in the event that there are some responsibilities that haven’t been captured, you’ll want to prioritize getting that knowledge saved.

If you don’t get those processes documented before they leave, you’re letting a lot of well-earned experience walk out the door. So whether you have a paper manual, a Google Docs drive, or a business playbook, make sure your employee doesn’t leave without writing down the processes that make up their role.

The more information on everything they do, the better. Your new hire will have to learn from this documentation, so you want to be sure it covers all the processes that the role requires. That way, they’ll have somewhere to look when they have questions.

Your employee should document everything from how to respond to emails to what their specific job duties look like. Have them outline their daily, monthly, and quarterly responsibilities and the steps they take to reach those goals.

Onboarding after offboarding

Offboarding your old employee leads right into onboarding a new one. And much like the offboarding process, you want to start new employee onboarding with a checklist. This will cover the entire process from start to finish, giving your new employee a guideline for what to expect during their first few weeks.

Create a job scorecards that clearly outlines job expectations for your new hire. Tell them what they should focus on and what their key responsibilities are.

If your previous employee documented their processes, it should be fairly easy to outline responsibilities and expectations for your new hire — most of the legwork is already there.

Thanks to a solid offboarding and documentation process, your team will be ready for onboarding as soon as you find the right person.

Bottom line: When an employee quits, you shouldn’t have to worry about how you’re going to manage without them. Because while your team is invaluable, not everyone will stay at your business forever. It’s good to be prepared for the day that turnover happens.

Hiring the right people for your team is a challenge in itself, but the transition process from old to new shouldn’t be.