AIBU to think my handover should actually be a handover, not me being snapped at?

Depends on the nature of the role. If it’s highly processed driven and repetitive then you need a good handover and it can be documented. But senior jobs are rarely like that - they require judgment and experience which can’t be put into a handover document.
I have never received a handover document and barely ever had a handover meeting, and I’ve done well in my career. Similarly there’s no way I’d spend 15 hours either someone taking over from me. I’ll document the boring process stuff and brief on any important nuances and then over to you.
Sounds like you need to manage your expectations significantly.

Of course she can😂 she has to physically turn up for her notice period to get paid, she really doesn’t have to do anything else, what are they going to do- sack her? She’s already gone!

She doesn’t owe you a thing, or the business.

Do you have a team that report to you? If not you’re on a hiding to nothing - sorry.

It sounds very much like my previous workplace where either your face fitted or not.

It sounds like your predecessor was incredibly productive, but less polished on the social skills side and she has created a large amount of bespoke reporting ( possibly) which she then interprets and presents to senior management. Only now are people appreciating how much she actually did.

Instead of continuing to hound her for information, I would take a step back. How much of her role is reasonable for one person to do, which areas provide the most value to the leadership team and put in a case for focusing on those and either dropping, or getting in additional staff to carry out the less urgent stuff.

Do not whatever you do, tattle on her to your bosses. What did you expect? Sounds like she has effectively been managed out to give you a job.

Agree with this !
Often departing employees do the square root of eff all.
Her job is not actually to handover to you. That's probably not in her JD. Her job is to do her job.
Sounds like she did a good job because she held a lot in her head. You're clearly rubbing her up the wrong way with your questions so why dont you take a different approach?
Rather than handover. Could you work shadow? So have her produce the report and then sit next to her watching what she does? Or try asking her different questions... maybe discuss specific situations rather than theory? So ask her last month when you did xx, what was your thought process ? Or reverse shadow where you start doing the job and then give her your work for a review.

But right now I don’t feel I’ve been given the tools to come close to either. It’s not about wanting every tiny detail spoon-fed, it’s about having enough of a foundation to replicate her daily work so the department output doesn’t suffer during the transition

If it’s a senior position, you should already have the tools in your personal tool kit though, and you should already be able to spring from a solid enough foundation you create yourself the minute your bum hits the seat. The rest is just icing, and if you need 15 solid hours or more then you are lacking in both, which really shouldn’t be her problem, and I’d very careful about pointing this out to more senior management.

You sound like you want spoon feeding to do a job you can’t do

I think your expectations appear to be that the woman you're replacing should be training you rather than just giving a handover. If she thinks that she is supposed to be handing over rather than training, I can understand how there is a mismatch in expectations.

I supervise newly qualified workers and have regular supervision sessions with them but if they were asking me the basics of HOW to do the job, I'd be very worried about their capacity and competence. Even in relation to system quirks, I'd expect to point them in the direction of where to find the info rather than tell them what to do. I appreciate it is a different scenario but this woman isn't even your line manager so I think you are expecting way too much from her.

Are there coaching opportunities within the organisation where even more senior managers take newer managers under their wing? Could you speak to your manager about your training requirements?

Fifteen hours is a lot, I have never have more than a few pages and a staff handbook, including very senior positions.

A handover isn’t there to train you at all, a handover is to make sure you know the company HR, where files are kept, what systems are used etc. A handover is a small induction, it is not on the job training. A lot of places I have worked at put leaving staff on gardening leave so they aren’t expected to baby an incoming employee, as they often flounder when the employee’s notice period is over.

If she had left already you'd get no handover. You're being massively unreasonable- just jump in a learn as you go, as anyone would for any office-based job.
Leave her alone and start flying with your own wings.

You don’t seem to be considering your impact on her. 15 hours is a huge amount of time and she doesn’t owe you or the company anything. The fact that things started well and now she’s getting snappy with you suggests to me that you are expecting her to tell you every minute detail and being tedious in asking her to tell you how she did the job. She doesn’t owe you her years of experience, you have to build up your own experience, that’s why the first few months of a new job can be so stressful, not knowing anything or anyone and having to work it out as you go along. I think you are being unreasonable.

15 HOURS???? I would be pulling my hair out at this. Are you just shadowing her or are you having separate meetings to do this? I hope you're writing notes, nothing more annoying than someone training and not writing any notes, then asking questions you have already given answers to.

I mean this kindly, but 15 hours is such a long time to be handing over and it sounds like she is fully over it. In a different situation, she would leave and the new person would start when she had gone. She may also feel that all of the questions seem to highlight her flaws or what she hadn’t done ‘right’ at work of that makes sense. I’m sure that’s not your intention but do you think that could be a bit of what’s going on?

In general the person is gone by the time you start and there's no physical handover @Fimofriend . Surely the joy of a senior role is making it your own? If it's just following someone else's template, what's the point?

I don't know what you are all talking about. For academic positions or management positions it is common to spend a week doing handover.

You can't expect someone to take over such a complex role with just a day or two for handover.

I expect like most jobs it's a variation of pushing buttons on a keyboard. When does this lady finish? You only learn by being chucked in

What sort of job is it? Is it actual processes you need to know about?

I think you need to look at what you want to bring to the role, what additional skills you have, how can you make your mark. Taking on a senior role means you need to know the bigger picture and that is where judgement comes in.

If it’s a particular system you need to know about use your own time to research or practice with it.

In your position I would start now doing roughly half of the role. Choose distinct areas which you feel most confident with and just get stuck in. Make a list of questions as you go, try to answer as many as possible yourself as you try things.

At the end of 2/3 days send her the list of remaining questions and also ask her to hand across passwords etc etc.

Then take on doing the rest for a few more days and send a list of questions.

In terms of resource for finding out how to do things I would ask your new team. In my experience team members love working for a manager who is honest about what they don’t know and upfront enough to ask experienced people for advice.

Do you feel like you're capable of doing this job independently, OP? If she just didn't come back and there were no more handover sessions, would you be able to just get on with things or are you worried you would flounder?

15 hours doesn't "sound like a lot", it is a significant amount of time, considerably more than most would receive, and I'd be concerned that even with that you still don't have a handle on things yet.

This is not the job for you.

For multiple reasons.

None of these reasons are to do with her or are her concern.

This is not the job for you.

For multiple reasons.

None of these reasons are to do with her or are her concern.

I started a new senior role at the beginning of the year, I had a one day handover and he was gone the next day. Remember you know the subject matter and start to do things your way instead. If there’s no processes in place, it’s time to make your own.

With all kindness, @Slightlymalted, you don't sound ready for this job. And by the way your posts have gone, you don't sound ready for any senior job.

You don't have the people's skills to realise that this woman is leaving her job. She owes you nothing. She's looking forward to not having to continue in this position. And still, she's given you 15 hours of explanations about her role.

"It’s not optional. She doesn’t just get to decide she’s “had enough” and start giving me one-line brush-offs while I’m trying to get up to speed"

This is, frankly, laughable. You have no leg to stand. She absolutely gets to decide, and she has done, and if you push her a bit harder she'll tell you to fuck off and go on stress leave. To be honest, if I were her, I would have done that already.

On top of not having the people skills to understand her situation (and how vulnerable yours is), you also don't seem to have the professional skills to figure out how to even start on this position, let alone get up to scratch, without her holding your hand and taking you through all the middle steps from A to B.

Time for some introspection and some hard decisions, OP. You either pull up your big girl pants and get working, or perhaps it is time to admit this is not the job for you, and let someone more competent take over.

I run a small antiques business. If I wanted to employ an admin assistant I could explain my routines and payment processes no problem. But I could not explain to someone how I go about the practical business of buying and selling antiques because the accrued knowledge and experience is all in my head. Its a quirky thing that I just DO and have done since I was young. So I do have some sympathy with the job leaver in this example. How do you propose to gouge that knowledge and skill from her skull because thats what it sounds like you are trying to do. I think you are probably causing her a lot of stress. In her position I would probably go off sick.

Why not take a step back and treat this woman to a coffee and kindly say, “I wanted to say thanks very much for all your time. I know I’m asking a lot of questions, can we please just go over X, Y and Z and I think I should be right.” Then after that last handover session with her, write down everything you know and any gaps can be filled in as you learn on the job.