Onboarding new staff is more than showing a new employee their desk, assigning tasks, and introducing them to the manager. It’s all about making a new hire feel welcomed, valued, supported, and part of the team.
On-boarding is the process of familiarising a new hire with the organisation. The actual onboarding process should begin before the employee starts at their new role, for instance, after they accept the offer letter.
A strong onboarding process may improve new hire attention by up to 82% (Glassdoor). It boosts worker morale, enhances confidence, and increases engagement. Now, if you're puzzled about how to onboard new staff, the following seven tips can help:
Don’t overwhelm your new hire with loads of information on day one. Instead, share any helpful information before they walk in the door. You stand to make the learning process more manageable and less stressful.
Create a starter kit that you can send well in advance. It may include a brief on the company’s mission, goals, values, and organizational structure. You can supply any related information about future projects.
Be reasonable with the information you supply. Ideally, they should go through this information within one hour. Transitioning to a new workplace is often a busy time, so be considerate.
New-hire socialisation builds on the power of human relationships. You may plan to introduce your new hire to their colleagues ahead of time. It’s not necessary to host a video call or webinar meeting. Team members can drop a friendly email introducing themselves. You may share team profiles.
On the first day, you can host an informal coffee date or lunch. If you want to go big or go home, you can have a welcome party —not thing too fancy of course. As a side note and challenge, make sure the employee meets at least one senior executive.
You may start preparing for the new employee’s first day, up to a week earlier before they arrive. Picture them at their role, and consider which tools, resources, and equipment they may need. For instance, you have the IT department assign their email address, logins, and passwords. You can source office supplies and set up their workstation.
On day one, greet them as they walk into the office and give them a general layout of the space, including the location of critical facilities such as the washroom. You also need to pre-plan their itinerary for the first week, including appointments, meetings, tasks, or client meetings.
Standardise your onboarding process by documenting it and creating systematic procedures. You need to have supporting learning materials. One person should also take on the role of coordinating the onboarding. For most companies, it’s someone from the HR department.
Are you looking for ways to improve how you train new staff? Not everyone enjoys learning from 100-page training manuals. Doing things manually also makes it harder to track the training process. So, upgrade your onboarding by using various online training platforms such as WorkPilot to build and launch corporate education programs.
You now have a rough idea as to how to onboard new team members. When in doubt, place yourself in your new hire’s shoes and ask: “What would I want my first day to look like, or Who would I want to meet?” Ask for feedback after the new hire settles in to improve your onboarding process continuously.
