Automating Onboarding & Exit Surveys

We want your experience with Prosper to remain seamless and efficient. Automating your Onboarding and Exit surveys means the right survey reaches each employee at exactly the right moment in their journey — triggered automatically by their start and end dates.

Who this is for: Administrators and approved Managers with survey access

Read time: 6 minutes

How automation works

Employee Lifecycle surveys are triggered by dates in each employee's profile:

Onboarding surveys are scheduled relative to the employee's employment start date.
Exit surveys are scheduled relative to the employee's employment end date.

Once automation is configured and the survey is published, Prosper handles the timing for you — sending each survey at the measure you've set relative to those dates.

Important: To receive an automated Onboarding or Exit survey, members must have a company start date (for Onboarding) or a company end date (for Exit) in their member profile. These can be found and set within the member's profile in the People & Skills Finder.

Prerequisites

You must be an Administrator or approved Manager with survey access.
The Surveys & Happiness module must be enabled for your organisation.
Employee profiles must have accurate start and/or end dates for automation to trigger.

Part 1 — Automation settings

Step 1 — Open ready-made surveys

From the Prosper main menu, navigate to Surveys & Happiness, select Ready-Made Surveys, and select Get Started.

Step 2 — Select an Employee Lifecycle survey

Navigate to Employee Lifecycle and select a survey for automation (for example, the Onboarding or Exit survey).

Step 3 — Save and publish

Scroll to the bottom of the survey and select Save and Publish.

Step 4 — Configure automation settings

Find the survey in Active surveys and select Automation Settings.
The Automation Settings modal will appear.
Select your preferred measures — either by activating the dropdown menu or typing a preferred value into the field.
- For the Onboarding survey, measures are relative to the employee's employment start date.
- For the Exit survey, measures are relative to the employee's employment end date.
Click Save.

Please note: All notifications default to the nearest working day of the preferred automation setting. If your configured trigger lands on a weekend, the survey will send on the closest business day instead.

Ensuring employees are eligible

Automation only triggers when the relevant date exists in the employee's profile. Set or check these dates in the People & Skills Finder:

Onboarding: the member needs a company start date.
Exit: the member needs a company end date.

Using a HRIS/payroll integration? If you have an integration with payroll, the employee's termination date flows from the integration.

Reviewing or editing automation in a live survey

To review or edit automation settings for a survey that's already live:

Navigate to Surveys & Happiness.
Open Active surveys.
Select Automation.
Adjust the settings following Step 4 above.

Part 2 — Survey notifications and reminders

All Prosper surveys follow the same cadence for notifications, ensuring consistent and timely communication.

Activation: When a survey is activated, an initial notification is sent via email — and SMS as well, if the recipient has opted in.
First reminder: Sent three days after the activation date.
Second and final reminder: Sent five days after activation.

Weekend deferral: If any reminder is scheduled to fall on a weekend, it will automatically be deferred to the next business day to maintain optimal delivery and visibility.

Tips and best practices

Keep employee dates accurate. Automation is only as reliable as the start and end dates in your member profiles. If you're managing dates manually, build a habit of setting them as part of your onboarding and offboarding process.
Let the integration do the work. If you use foundU, terminating an employee correctly there sets the end date that triggers the Exit survey — far more reliable than manual entry.
Choose meaningful measures. A common pattern is sending the Onboarding survey 30 days after start (long enough for a genuine first impression) and the Exit survey on or shortly before the end date. Pick measures that give honest, useful feedback.
Set and forget — but check periodically. Automation runs in the background, but a quarterly check of your Active surveys and their automation settings ensures everything is still configured as intended.
Mind the weekend default. Because notifications default to the nearest working day, the actual send date may differ slightly from your exact configured measure. This is by design, for better visibility.

Troubleshooting

An employee didn't receive their automated survey.
The most common cause is a missing start or end date in the member's profile. Check the profile in People & Skills Finder. If you use a HRIS/payroll integration, confirm the employee was terminated or archived correctly so the end date flowed through.

The survey sent on a different day than I configured.
Notifications default to the nearest working day. If your configured trigger fell on a weekend, the survey sent on the closest business day instead.

I can't find the Automation Settings option.
Automation is available on Employee Lifecycle surveys (Onboarding and Exit). Confirm you've selected a Lifecycle survey, and that you have the right access.

I edited automation on a live survey but nothing changed.
Changes apply to future triggers, not to surveys that have already been sent. Confirm you saved the updated settings, and check that affected employees haven't already passed their trigger point.

An exit survey went out before I'd finished offboarding.
The Exit survey triggers based on the end date relative to your configured measure. If you need it to send later, adjust the measure in Automation Settings, or set the end date once offboarding is confirmed.

Can I automate a survey that isn't an Employee Lifecycle survey?
Automation by start/end date is designed specifically for Employee Lifecycle surveys. Other surveys are sent on demand to chosen recipients.

Activating Ready-Made Surveys in Surveys & Happiness
Exporting Survey Recipients and Results in Surveys & Happiness
Managing Member Profiles in People & Skills Finder