[Complexicate]

"...how does an organization ensure the task still gets done?"

With something almost stupidly simple and low-tech: checklists.

(I'm reading "The Checklist Manifesto" right now, and the points it makes seem to fit perfectly with everything you mention.)

[marcosdumay]

An year is enough time for everybody that knows about the checklist to leave.

[BuckRogers]

We resolved this issue at my last company with sufficiently large mailing groups for cert renewal reminders. Once you get to 12 people on a mailing list, with new employees being added all the time, it's hard to miss. Usually a manager on that list is pinging people about it. There is the chance of the tragedy of the commons occurring, but I never saw it.

Once you do this, the only checklist that matters are procedural checklists to add a new client or new cert to the renewal notification list. When you use a standard group email for all cert purchases, that one becomes tough to miss.

In my 7 years of being involved, we never missed a cert renewal with this process for ~300 client sites with multiple or wildcard certs.

[andrewflnr]

Put "make sure someone else knows all this person's checklists" on the employee exit checklist.

[craftinator]

Put the checklist on the home page of the company website!