Six Not-So-Obvious Mistakes in Replacing a Departed Employee
Executive Insights Digest #33: Replacing a Departed Employee
Gaming companies often run with tightly knit teams and specialized roles, meaning the loss of one key person can significantly impact productivity, morale, and even game success. Leaders try to provide their best to keep their employees, but unfortunately, despite the best efforts, sometimes people depart, and a gap needs to be filled, and the replacement cost can soar to 100–200% of the employee’s annual salary. Beyond direct costs, there are hidden losses in the form of lost productivity, knowledge, and team cohesion.
For company leaders, these numbers underscore that replacing an employee isn't just an administrative task; it’s a strategic inflection point. Yet, many executives approach a backfill very differently from a new hire requisition, often in ways that undermine long-term success. There’s a tendency to treat the departure as a vacancy that must be urgently filled with an identical cog, rather than an opportunity to rethink needs and strengthen the team. This mindset can lead to “backfilling” the role in the narrowest sense, simply plugging a new person into the old job description, without stepping back to consider if the role or requirements should evolve. Such an approach may maintain short-term continuity, but it can also entrench outdated workflows or skill sets and fail to address deeper team needs.
Why do leaders often approach replacing a departed employee differently than hiring for a brand-new position? Internal assumptions and inertia play a big role. When a beloved or long-serving employee leaves, it’s comforting to assume “we just need another person with the same skills and title”. In contrast, a brand-new role naturally forces deliberation about duties, qualifications, and strategic fit. Headcount constraints also drive this behavior: in small companies, every position is vital and often budgeted from outside. If someone leaves, there is pressure to refill the slot quickly to keep headcount and output constant; managers may worry that if they don’t backfill immediately, work will grind to a halt or the position could be eliminated. This sense of urgency (sometimes even panic) can short-circuit the careful analysis that ought to accompany any hire. Without taking the time to evaluate the vacant position strategically, you miss a chance to improve the role.
It’s ironic because replacing an employee actually provides more information and an opportunity that you don’t have with brand-new roles. You have the benefit of hindsight: what worked well in the role, what didn’t, and how the company’s needs have changed since the last hire. Savvy leaders can leverage that knowledge to make a better hiring decision the second time around. In practice, however, many companies fail to capitalize on this.
This article will examine the common but not-so-obvious mistakes executives and founders in gaming and tech often make when replacing a departed employee. These are subtle errors of strategy and mindset that can turn a well-intentioned hiring process into a long-term setback. Specifically, we will delve into:
Recreating a Job Description Instead of Redefining the Role – copy-pasting the old role profile without rethinking it.
Neglecting Future-Proof Skills – hiring for yesterday’s needs and ignoring the skills needed tomorrow.
Rushing the Process to Keep Headcount Flat – making speed a priority over finding the right fit due to pressure to fill the seat.
Failing to Involve Stakeholders – keeping the hiring process siloed and missing critical input from the team and other departments.
Overestimating the Transferability of “Similar” Experience – assuming a candidate from a similar background will automatically thrive in your environment.
Neglecting Knowledge Transfer from the Departing Employee – letting institutional knowledge walk out the door unrecorded.
For each of these, we’ll explore how the mistake typically manifests, why it can be harmful, and actionable advice to mitigate it.
1. Recreating the Job Instead of Redefining the Role
One of the most pervasive mistakes is simply trying to clone the departed employee’s role without reconsidering its scope or relevance. When an employee leaves, especially a long-tenured or high-performing one, the instinct is often to dig out the same job description used to hire them and post it verbatim to find an identical replacement. The title, responsibilities, and qualifications all remain unchanged, as if the goal is to rewind time and plug in a carbon copy of the former employee. This “just refill the job” approach is understandable; it feels safe and efficient. However, it overlooks the fact that businesses and environments evolve. Recreating the past role can mean hiring for yesterday’s needs and missing the opportunity to better align the position with the company’s current and future strategy. The not-so-obvious mistake is assuming the job should remain exactly the same. In reality, a vacancy is a strategic juncture: it’s a chance to assess whether the role’s responsibilities, required skills, and even its title should be adjusted to better serve the company’s mission going forward.