What Are Joiners, Movers, and Leavers? (Importance and Role)

Managing user access across your organization is among the most important responsibilities for IT teams.

When a new employee joins, changes roles, or leaves your company, you should decide what systems they can access, how long they need permissions, and when they should be removed.

This process is commonly known as joiners, movers, and leavers (JML). A clear JML process protects company data, reduces security risks, and ensures regulatory compliance.

In this article, we’ll define joiners, movers, and leavers, and explain why they matter. We’ll also discuss how JML ties into identity and access management (IAM).

Understanding Joiners, Movers, and Leavers

Joiners, movers, and leavers are entities in the process of managing access permissions across the employee lifecycle. It describes three groups of people your IT team handles daily.

• Joiners: New employees who need user accounts, devices, and access to start working.
• Movers: Existing employees who change roles, departments, or projects. Their access rights should be updated to match new responsibilities.
• Leavers: People who exit the company (either due to resignation or termination) and need all access immediately revoked.

These three stages define how you create, update, and close digital identities. Without a clear JML process, security gaps form that leave your systems exposed, your compliance audits harder, and your IT workload heavier.

ezOnboard helps you manage JML by connecting your HR system to Active Directory (Entra ID). It instantly grants the correct access to new hires, updates permissions, and revokes accounts when employees leave. Book a demo to learn how ezOnboard automates JML processes!

The Role of JML in Identity and Access Management

Joiners, movers, and leavers play a key role in how you manage digital identities and their respective access.

In IAM, every account and permission is part of identity lifecycle management. That lifecycle starts when an employee joins, continues as they move into different roles, and ends when they leave.

Without JML, this process breaks down. Accounts stay open for too long, or permissions don’t match job titles and responsibilities.

However, when you consistently manage joiners, movers, and leavers, you can reduce security risks, avoid non-compliance, and prevent other issues.

You also gain real-time visibility into who has access to what company resources, which can simplify identity and access management.

Importance of JML

Effective JML management matters for several reasons.

Improve Security

A strong JML process helps you build a strong security posture across your entire IT infrastructure.

Without it, new users may not get the right access, movers keep outdated permissions, and leavers may retain lingering access to sensitive data. These situations leave gaps that attackers can exploit.

By managing JML consistently, you reduce the chance of unauthorized access and security breaches. You can protect critical systems and sensitive information, which maintains trust with leadership and customers.

Mitigate Insider Threats

Employees who change roles often accumulate old permissions they no longer need, potentially leading to over-accessing.

For example, a mover might still reach confidential payroll data, or a leaver might log in to shared cloud tools if accounts remain open.

Over time, this privilege creep can expose sensitive applications or files.

Fortunately, effective JML processes mitigate insider risks by adjusting or removing permissions as soon as roles change.

This keeps employee access accurate and limits exposure to misuse, whether accidental or intentional.

Maintain Compliance

Many industries follow strict regulatory requirements and data protection regulations. Auditors often check whether companies revoke permissions quickly, control sensitive data, and record changes to user identities.

Without a structured JML process, it’s difficult to show who had access privileges to what resources and when. Poor documentation and manual errors can trigger compliance failures.

By following JML practices, you can prove that only authorized staff can reach critical systems. You can also show that permissions were automatically revoked at the right time through audit trails.

This transparency helps you avoid fines, reputational damage, and added work for your IT team during annual reviews.

Simplify Onboarding and Offboarding

Employee onboarding and offboarding often take up a large part of IT’s time.

When these tasks are handled manually, accounts and permissions may be created late or removed inconsistently. This disrupts workflows and affects operational efficiency.

With a JML framework, onboarding becomes structured. Employees immediately receive new accounts, permissions, and equipment on their first day without requesting access. This accelerates time-to-productivity and reduces onboarding tickets.

Offboarding, or the leaver process, also becomes consistent. It immediately revokes access, removes accounts, and retires IT assets to protect company data against potential threats.

Consistent onboarding and offboarding workflows lead to a smoother transition in or out of your company.

New hires have everything they need on their start date, which increases satisfaction and retention. Meanwhile, former employees avoid confusion, such as unexpected login access or leftover emails.

ezOnboard automates user onboarding and offboarding by reflecting your approved HR system changes in Active Directory. This saves hundreds of hours and money every year. Check this ROI calculator to see your cost savings with ezOnboard.

Reduce IT Workload

Without JML, IT managers spend hours fixing access issues or searching for unclosed accounts. These manual processes scale poorly in larger companies or during periods of high hiring.

A structured JML workflow reduces this pressure by creating predictable workflows and removing repetitive tasks.

You no longer need to chase down HR system updates or investigate access control inconsistencies.

Instead, the JML framework integrates with your identity lifecycle system and automates provisioning and deprovisioning tasks. This automation significantly reduces manual workload and human errors.

Common Challenges in Managing JML

While JML is important, managing it consistently is difficult for most IT teams. Here are the challenges to expect and tips on how to address them.

Handling Fast Growth and High Attrition

When your business scales quickly, IT teams must keep up with frequent onboarding and offboarding.

High attrition multiplies the number of accounts to open and close, which leads to delays. If accounts remain active after an employee leaves, security risks increase.

Tip: Automate onboarding and offboarding workflows to keep up with company growth. Instead of relying on manual cleanup, integrate HR systems with identity lifecycle management platforms.

This way, joiners gain immediate access, movers get updated permissions, and leavers are deprovisioned in real time.

Maintaining Accurate and Up-to-Date Access Records

Keeping records aligned with access changes is hard when user data is scattered across spreadsheets, tickets, and emails. Incomplete records make audits painful and introduce compliance risks.

The challenge grows when an employee moves to another department and changes roles within your company, leaving permissions inconsistent.

Tip: Adopt advanced IAM solutions that centralize all user activity. These tools record every access update and store logs for compliance. You gain real-time visibility over who has access to which resources and when.

Combine IAM tools with automated alerts to reduce manual oversight and keep records consistent across departments.

Preventing Privilege Creep

When employees assume a new role (due to a promotion or a department switch), they often keep old permissions. Over time, their access accumulates, giving some employees far more privileges than needed.

This issue, known as privilege creep, increases the chance of unauthorized access or misuse. For example, an employee who transfers from finance to marketing may still have access to payroll data while also gaining rights to customer databases.

Tip: Apply role-based access control (RBAC) and enforce the principle of least privilege. You should also review permissions regularly and revoke outdated access during each move.

When you address privilege creep early, you can ensure that permissions match responsibilities and secure your systems.

Ensuring Timely Deprovisioning

If accounts are not closed quickly when an employee leaves, the door stays open for misuse. Delayed deprovisioning or removal is one of the most common security gaps in JML.

Tip: Link HR events with IT workflows so accounts close automatically when someone exits.

Use access management software to enforce deadlines for deprovisioning and remove access across all systems at once. You should also conduct quarterly access reviews to identify accounts that slipped through.

Dealing With Shadow IT and Unsanctioned Tools

Employees often use unsanctioned apps that bypass IT approval. These tools rarely follow company policies and may store sensitive data in risky places.

Managing JML becomes harder when IT teams don’t even know which apps are in use.

Tip: IT managers should establish clear usage policies and educate employees on security risks.

Consider IAM solutions that discover shadow IT through login tracking, and then guide users to safe alternatives.

Overseeing Temporary Access

Some projects or users (like contractors and interns) require temporary access to sensitive systems.

Without strict control, this access may stay open longer than needed. Over time, forgotten accounts pile up and weaken security.

Tip: Apply just-in-time (JIT) access. With JIT, IT teams grant permissions only for the duration of the project, automatically revoking them afterward.

IAM systems can schedule these expirations without manual intervention. This means fewer lingering accounts and lower chances of misuse.

Eliminate Manual JML Tasks With ezOnboard

ezOnboard by CloudView Partners automates your joiners-movers-leavers workflow by connecting your HR system to Active Directory (Entra ID).

Once fully integrated, ezOnboard instantly reflects your approved HR changes in AD. That means new hires gain access to the necessary tools on day one, while departing employees are automatically removed from company systems.

The platform also tracks role changes within the organization. It immediately updates access rights to prevent privilege creep and ensure data security.

ezOnboard helps you save time, avoid errors, and provide positive employee experiences. Your IT team stops chasing tickets and can focus on projects that matter.

Schedule a demo today to see ezOnboard in action! You can also check this ROI calculator to learn how much money you can save.

FAQs About Joiners, Movers, and Leavers

What is the leavers and joiners process?

The leavers and joiners process describes how IT teams grant and remove access when employees enter or exit the company. A joiner needs accounts, tools, and devices to start working. Meanwhile, a leaver requires complete access removal from managed systems.

What is the joiners-leavers-movers policy?

A joiners-leavers-movers policy is a documented set of rules for handling employee access. It explains how to create, adjust, and close accounts at the right time to maintain security and reduce risks.

What is a JML process?

A JML process is the structured workflow for onboarding, role changes, and offboarding. It starts by defining birthright access for new hires. Then, it adds or removes permissions as roles change or employment ends.

What is JML in identity?

JML in identity refers to how user access is managed across the entire employment cycle. It connects HR events to IT updates, which means permissions stay current.

Joiners get the right access on time, movers receive updates when responsibilities shift, and leavers lose access the moment they exit.