Playbook
A key person is leaving
Someone only they understand has handed in notice or gone off sick.
First 24 hours
- List what only they know.
- Use the time left for hand-over, not for delivery.
- Move their open work.
Then
- Pair a colleague with them immediately.
- Record decisions and how-to steps.
- Replan with reduced capacity.
- Fix the single point of failure for good.
Message you can adapt
Marc leaves on the 28th. For the next two weeks he’ll focus on hand-over to Lea. This reduces delivery by about 6 days, and I’ve updated the plan.
Avoid
Don’t treat this as bad luck. Add single-person dependencies to the risk register.
Tools for this
Last reviewed 2026-11-02 · Practitioner review pending