Clear Path step · Business · A team that's hard to fool
Offboard the same day, including AI tools and app connections
Why it matters: Former staff and the apps they connected keep working until someone turns them off. Same-day offboarding closes access before it's misused or forgotten.
Left off your path if you picked “Just me” for “How many people work here, including you?”.
Best after: Name an owner and map what you'd lose, Move the team onto a business password manager
Do it
- Disable the user's account and sign them out of all sessions.
- Transfer ownership of their files, mailbox and shared links.
- Remove them from password manager vaults and change shared passwords they knew.
- Revoke app passwords, connected apps, AI tools and API keys they created.
- Check bank, payroll, registrar and social media admin lists.
- Collect or wipe company devices and remove company data from their personal phone.
Check it worked: When someone leaves, their accounts are disabled that day, shared passwords they knew are changed, devices are collected or wiped, and their AI tools, app connections and tokens are revoked.
If an outside IT company handles your IT, send them this:
Hi, [name] leaves on [date]. Could you please disable their account that day, sign them out of all sessions and transfer their files, mailbox and shared links to [manager]? Please revoke their app passwords, connected apps, AI tools and API keys, collect or wipe company devices, and remove company data from their personal phone without wiping it. We'll change shared passwords and check bank and payroll admins.
Simply put
It's like collecting someone's keys and changing the alarm code on their last day. Their accounts, the apps they connected and the passwords they knew keep working until someone turns them off.
In detail
Signing out sessions matters as much as disabling the account: a stolen session token can outlive a password change. AI agents and automations set up by the person often run under their identity and stop or misbehave when it's disabled, so inventory them first.
Points toward the Long View: no access, human or software, that outlives the job it was for.