When your head of HR leaves or drops out: what keeps running in the first weeks and how to cover the gap in Germany

Which deadlines and duties keep running when nobody leads HR?

All that are tied to a date. The law does not distinguish by whether the head of HR post is filled. The wage tax return is due by the tenth day after the reporting period ends (section 41a Income Tax Act). Social security contributions, in their expected amount, fall due on the third-to-last banking day of the month (section 23 Social Code IV). You must report the start and end of every employment subject to social security (section 28a Social Code IV).

Annual dates come on top. The report on the employment of severely disabled people goes to the Employment Agency once a year, by 31 March at the latest, for the previous year (section 163 Social Code IX). The duty arises at an annual average of at least 20 jobs, of which at least 5 percent must be filled by severely disabled people (section 154 Social Code IX). The payroll account must be kept until the end of the sixth calendar year following the last entry (section 41(1) sentence 9 Income Tax Act), and the pension insurance bodies audit employers at least every four years (section 28p Social Code IV). A gap during the vacancy can therefore come to light years later.

If you hire during the vacancy, keep an eye on the written statement of contract terms as well. Under section 2 of the Verification Act (Nachweisgesetz), names and addresses of the parties, pay and working time must be handed over by the first working day at the latest, further terms such as start date, fixed term, workplace, duties and probation by the seventh calendar day, and the rest within one month of the start. A breach is an administrative offence with a fine of up to EUR 2,000 (section 4). New hires during a vacancy therefore need a responsible person from day one.

Responsibility stays with the managing director. Your head of HR carried these duties out, but they never rested on that person alone. If nobody takes them on, they are not lost. They fall back on you.

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What applies when the head of HR resigns or is dismissed?

Notice needs written form, and the notice period depends first on the contract. Termination and termination agreements are only effective in written form, and electronic form is excluded (section 623 Civil Code). An email, a chat message or a scanned PDF is therefore not enough. This applies in both directions: your head of HR's own resignation must also exist on paper before you base succession planning on a date.

Without a different agreement, the basic notice period is four weeks to the 15th or to the end of a calendar month (section 622(1) Civil Code). When the employer gives notice, the period grows with the length of service to up to seven months to the end of a month (section 622(2) Civil Code). The bars below show the scale. The contract can provide for longer periods, so read it before you calculate.

Two things hang on the notice period. First, the handover: the period is the time in which knowledge can move from the person into documents and processes. Use it for that and do not cut it short with immediate garden leave if nobody else knows the processes. Second, the farewell: employees are entitled to a written reference on leaving, a qualified one on request (section 109 Trade Regulation Code). For a head of HR it is often the last document the person would normally write, so settle early who drafts it and who signs it off.

A post-contractual non-compete applies only if it was agreed and provides compensation of at least half of the last contractual remuneration for each year of the restriction (section 74 Commercial Code). It may last two years at most after the end of the engagement (section 74a Commercial Code). Check before the conversation whether such a clause exists. Without it, the person may move to a competitor. With it, you take on payment duties that you should budget for.

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How do you secure the access and signing authority of the departing person?

On the first day you learn of the departure, not on the last working day. A head of HR usually has the widest access in the house: personnel files, salary data, payroll system, applicant tracking, bank authority for salary runs. Under Article 32(1) GDPR, controllers must take appropriate technical and organisational measures to ensure a level of security appropriate to the risk. Article 29 GDPR requires that persons with access to data process it only on the controller's instructions, and Article 5(2) GDPR obliges you to be able to demonstrate compliance.

In practice: keep a list of all systems in which the person has accounts or rights, and work through it on the day you learn of the departure, in order of risk. The person does not have to be cut off from everything on day one. Restrict first the rights that allow data to be exported or payments to be triggered, and replace shared passwords. Which access external cover may later receive is covered in the article on access to personnel data for interim HR managers.

My review shows how much easier this gets when rights are managed centrally. I evaluated 166 HR tools in personnel administration, recruiting, selection and employee experience. For 41 of them, a statement on single sign-on is recorded on the vendor sites: for 21 in all plans, for 12 only in the enterprise plan, for 7 as an add-on and for one in a paid plan. For 125 tools I found no statement. That does not mean they lack single sign-on. It means you should know before a vacancy whether you can block an account centrally or have to act in each system separately.

This includes what does not sit in an IT system: authority to sign. A Prokura can be revoked at any time and cannot be transferred (section 52 Commercial Code). The revocation takes effect internally at once. Towards third parties, section 15 Commercial Code applies: as long as a fact that must be registered has not been registered and published, it cannot be held against third parties unless they knew of it. If the departing person is listed as Prokurist in the commercial register, the register extract belongs in the first week. The same goes for bank authority, signing rights with the tax adviser and powers of attorney towards social security bodies.

Misuse is a special case. If a data breach comes to light, for example because login data was used after the person left, it must be reported to the supervisory authority without undue delay and where feasible within 72 hours of becoming aware of it, unless the breach is unlikely to result in a risk to the persons affected (Article 33(1) GDPR). If you kept a list of access rights beforehand, you can meet that deadline. If you assemble it only during the incident, you lose days.

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Which duties do not leave with the person?

Those of the management. A duty that the law places on the employer does not leave the house with the head of HR. Four places show this, and they tend to be left lying in a vacancy.

First, occupational health and safety. The employer must take the necessary measures and ensure a suitable organisation (section 3 Occupational Safety and Health Act) and determine through an assessment of working conditions which measures are needed, including mental stress (section 5). Duties may be assigned in writing to reliable and competent persons (section 13(2)). Once that person has left, the assignment needs renewing. If it does not happen, the employer carries the task itself.

Second, working time recording. In its decision of 13 September 2022 (1 ABR 22/21), the Federal Labour Court held that employers must set up a system to record the start and end of working time. Whoever maintained the system in the HR function needs a new owner now.

Third, the complaints office. Employees have the right to complain to the competent bodies of the company if they feel discriminated against (section 13 General Equal Treatment Act, AGG). In many companies that is the head of HR. If the post is vacant, another person must be named for the task and announced to the workforce.

Fourth, supervision. Anyone who, as the owner of a business, intentionally or negligently omits the supervisory measures required to prevent breaches of business-related duties commits an administrative offence if such a breach occurs (section 130(1) Administrative Offences Act). Where the breach carries a criminal penalty, the fine can reach EUR 1 million (section 130(3)). Supervisory measures include appointing, carefully selecting and monitoring supervisors. An empty head-of-HR post without a named deputy is therefore not a state to leave running.

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How long does it take to fill the post again?

Longer than planning usually assumes. The Federal Employment Agency reports an average completed vacancy duration for reported jobs. In September 2026 it was 152 days, and in the rolling twelve months from October 2025 to September 2026 it was 156 days. That is 13 days fewer than a year earlier and about 70 days more than ten years before. 47 percent of the deregistered vacancies had been open for more than three months.

The figure covers all reported jobs, not heads of HR. I cannot give you a sourced figure for how long it takes to fill an HR lead post. The Agency also notes that an operational change in how it handles vacancies raised the vacancy duration noticeably in August and that it fell noticeably again in September. The monthly value therefore fluctuates, and the twelve-month figure is the more reliable guide.

On top of the 156 days comes the notice period of the new person. Anyone who plans the vacancy in weeks only plans it too short.

So it is worth testing your own estimate. How long did a job reported to the Federal Employment Agency stay open on average?

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How is the works council involved when cover arrives?

That depends on the role in which the cover arrives. Whether you have a works council is the first question. According to the 2025 IAB Establishment Panel, 6 percent of all establishments have a works council or staff council, 9 percent of those with five or more employees, and 42 percent of employees work in such an establishment. For a mid-sized company this means: if you have one, it is almost always one of the first parties to talk to about covering the head of HR.

The role determines the rule. If the cover is hired on a fixed-term employment contract, the works council must be informed before every hire in companies that regularly have more than twenty employees entitled to vote, and it can refuse consent within one week of being informed (section 99 Works Constitution Act, BetrVG). If the post belongs to the senior executives under section 5(3) BetrVG, for example because the holder is authorised to hire and dismiss independently or holds Prokura, the hire only has to be notified to the works council in good time (section 105 BetrVG). There is no right of consent in that case.

If the cover comes as an external specialist under a service contract, the works council's right to information under section 80(2) sentence 1 BetrVG also extends to persons who are not in an employment relationship with the employer, including the underlying contracts (section 80(2) sentence 3). Whether the assignment must still be treated like a hire depends on how it is set up. Clear that with your employment lawyer before the person starts.

The practical sequence is short: talk to the works council as soon as the departure is certain, and tell it the role, duration, powers and contact person of the cover. That costs one meeting and prevents the stopgap from getting stuck in a refused consent. The selection below leads in four questions to the relevant rule. It is orientation, not legal advice.

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Which cover fits which trigger?

That depends on the reason and the duration. Usually what is open is the form in which the post is covered. There are four routes, and each fits a different situation.

Cover for maternity protection, parental leave or time off for childcare is the clearest. A fixed-term employment contract with the objective reason of cover is permitted for it (section 21 Parental Allowance and Parental Leave Act, BEEG). The term must be fixed by calendar or determinable, an extension for the necessary induction is possible, and if parental leave ends early the contract can be terminated with three weeks' notice. More generally, section 14(1) sentence 2 no. 3 of the Part-Time and Fixed-Term Employment Act allows a fixed term where the employee is hired to cover another employee.

When the head of HR resigns and no successor is set, cover through temporary agency work is conceivable but limited: the agency may not assign the same temporary worker to the same client for more than 18 consecutive months (section 1(1b) Temporary Agency Work Act), with exceptions by collective agreement. For an HR lead who takes decisions and leads the works council, it is rarely the right form, because assigned workers are integrated into the client's work organisation and bound by the client's instructions.

The alternative is an experienced external person under a service contract. For a drop-out of the lead with a clear end date, that is the interim HR manager, who takes over full time or at high utilisation, sets things up and hands over. For ongoing need below a full-time post it is the fractional lead on fixed days. Both forms need clean contract design so that the service contract does not turn into a disguised employment relationship.

The fourth route is internal cover. It works when someone in the house can judge the specialist questions and gets a clear mandate. It fails when the cover runs on the side, without relief elsewhere and without decision-making authority. Then the gap is formally closed and practically open.

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What should you do in the first 30 days?

In week one the deadlines and access, in week two the responsible persons, in the first month the decision on cover. This order follows urgency: a missed date costs at once, a postponed structural decision costs later.

Week one belongs to the dates. Decide who files the wage tax return and releases the contributions, and put the cover in the calendar. Remove rights and signing authority in order of risk, obtain the commercial register extract and write down which tasks the person has so far done alone. That is awkward while the person is still in the house, but it is the only time they can answer the questions.

In weeks two and three, approach the parties that are waiting for you. Talk to the works council about the role and duration of the cover. Name new contacts for complaints and new persons responsible for occupational safety. Check whether hires are in preparation that trigger the written statement of terms and social security reports.

In the first month, decide on the form of cover. Anyone who starts only after the person has gone searches without a handover. Anyone who starts before can let induction and handover overlap. The model question between interim, fractional and permanent hire is covered in more detail on the page about interim, fractional or permanent hire.

The list below sums it up. Tick what is settled in your company. The state stays saved in your browser, and the button below copies it as text.

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When you do not need me for the cover

I start by asking about the trigger and the duration. If your head of HR returns from parental leave in nine months and there is an experienced deputy in the house, a fixed-term cover at administrator level is often enough, and I am the wrong route. If the deadlines and access are settled and the successor is certain within a few weeks, you do not need cover at all, just a clean handover.

It is different when the gap is larger than the task it leaves behind. If works council leadership, decisions on separations, building structures or steering service providers are missing, and a successor is not in sight for months, a lead with a mandate is the better lever. That is what I do as an interim or fractional HR manager. I then take over the running dates, set up processes and hand over so that the successor can work without me.

My most important advice applies whoever you bring in: have the list of tasks that only one person knows written down while that person is still in the house. After that, any form of cover can be inducted.

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