Ever break up with a spouse or lover? You ask "Why?" The answers may come in shouts, lies, tortured letters, or broken furniture. But you learn from it, either to salvage this relationship or to do better next time.

Nobscot makes WebExit, an exit interview management system. Asks "Why?" and "What should we have done differently?" when workers leave.

I'm tickled pink.

Pinpoint attention to a realworld problem at an affordable price. They've done a fine job of making it easy for managers to set up and easy for departing folk to complete.

As software engineering goes, this is a no brainer, easy to build tool (low barrier to entry). I can't imagine too many folks trying to get into this space.

Each undesired departure costs your firm the hard cash of recruiting and the bigger impact of not having that person doing their work. I'm not sure if the smallest businesses need such a formal system. With larger ones (Adecco US hires more than a million people a year, for example), reduced recruiting and training costs add up quickly. If employee retention is important to your business, give it a look. They also have a version for teacher retention.

A bonus to Nobscot's hosting model: their reports also let you benchmark your results against the other Nobscot customers.

I can also see applying tools like this to communities of practice, mailing lists, etc.

Feedback without the broken furniture.