When an employee leaves the company, the date of their departure can vary depending on the perspective adopted. This difference can cause discrepancies in your headcount or turnover calculations.
HR perspective: last working day
Definition: The departure is dated on the last working day, that is, the contract end date (for example: March 31).
Note: On that day, the employee still counts in the headcount, since they are under contract. Yet their departure is already included in the turnover indicators.
Finance perspective: day after the last working day
Definition: The employee is considered departed on the day after their contract ends (for example: April 1). On that day, they no longer count in the headcount.
Benefit: The end-of-period headcount equals the start-of-period headcount, plus arrivals, minus departures.
⚠️ This only holds when back-to-back contracts count as departures. By default, an employee who signs a new contract 20 days or less after the previous one ends counts as neither a departure nor an arrival. See Definition of Arrivals and Departures: final departure vs back-to-back contracts.
Why this difference and how to handle it?
HR teams often need to reflect the on-the-ground reality as of the employee's last day present, whereas Finance teams seek arithmetic consistency in their budget and headcount tracking tables.
To avoid any confusion:
Clarify internally the definition adopted.
Specify in your reports which method is used (HR or Finance).
Choose the matching measure in Reflect, to stay consistent across departments.
In the data explorer, choose "Departure (last day worked) count" for the HR perspective, or "Departure (day after last day) count" for the Finance perspective:
