BloomBoardA good handover means you can switch off on vacation and come back to no surprises. This checklist covers what to hand over, how to write the note, and who needs to know.
Two weeks before
- Put your vacation dates on the team calendar.
- Agree who covers each part of your work. Big projects may need different people.
- Tell clients or partners who will be their contact while you are away.
- Move deadlines that land during your vacation, or hand them over now.
One week before
- List every open task and project, with its status and next step.
- Finish or close anything small rather than handing it over.
- Share access to files, folders and accounts your cover will need.
- Walk your cover through anything complicated, ideally with a shared screen.
How to write a handover note
For each piece of work, your cover needs to know four things. Keep it short; a few lines per item is enough.
- What it is and why it matters.
- Where it stands today.
- The next step and its deadline.
- Who to ask if something goes wrong.
BloomBoard's Handover lets you pick your open tasks, add a note to each and hand them to a teammate in one go. When you come back, everything returns to you with what changed.
The day before
- Set your out-of-office reply with the dates and your cover's name.
- Set your status to on leave so the team knows not to wait for you.
- Send a short message to the team: dates, who covers what, and where the notes are.
- Check that nothing urgent is due in your first two days back.
While you are away
Agree in advance whether, and how, you want to be contacted for a true emergency. Then trust the handover and switch off.
When you come back
- Read the notes from your cover before your inbox.
- Take back your tasks and check what changed.
- Thank the people who covered for you.