Your company’s biggest cyber security vulnerability has nothing to do with your network or your equipment — it’s your own employees.

No, we’re not talking about a member of your team purposefully doing something malicious to undermine your IT security. But employees don’t always show up knowing how to defend your business from outside cyber attacks. Your team is your business’s last line of defense, and yet many people don’t have the cyber security skills they need. From phishing scams to social engineering to web browsing, employees need to be trained on cyber security best practices to protect your company.

Having a remote workforce has become more of a necessity and less of an option for growing organizations. Whether hiring outsourced professionals or providing more flexibility to in-house employees, enabling remote access to business systems and applications can significantly increase productivity to benefit your business.

When an employee leaves or is let go from your company, your first priority may be hiring their replacement or delegating their day-to-day workload. But protecting your company should be at the very top of your to-do list when an employee leaves.    

It’s essential that companies adopt a series of protocols to ensure best business security practices. Most employees have varying levels of networked access to relevant company documentation. Being able to control these access points during an employee's exit will keep your company protected from any form of disgruntled retaliation or loss of competitive information.

Here are five critical aspects of an effective cybersecurity protocol that should be followed when addressing employee turnover.