Whenever a business hires a new employee, it should be making an effort to provide a complete onboarding process for them. Onboarding – or, as it is sometimes known, an induction – is designed to help a new employee acclimate to their role. It is vital to ensure that the employee feels welcome, and it provides them with the support they need as they embark on this phase of their career journey. The efficacy of your onboarding process can directly impact your business’s ability to retain staff and keep them engaged. Let’s dive in.
An Overview of Onboarding
Onboarding, as outlined above, is simply the introduction process for new employees. It usually involves a few different activities designed to welcome the employee to the company culture, their role and the team, and provide them with any training that they might need. The length of the process itself can vary from between a couple of weeks to a couple of months; it often depends on the needs of the employee and, of course, the intricacies of the job and the business too. In addition to the length of the process varying, the actual content can vary too, but for the most part, it tends to include the following:
An informal/formal welcome to the business, an overview of its values and missionAn introduction to the team they will be working with and the other employeesAny training that they will needAn overview of the business’s working practices, policies and the systems usedOngoing support
The Importance of Onboarding
Onboarding serves a number of purposes for a business, and it is incredibly important. These purposes have all been outlined above; for new hires, it helps to ensure that they feel welcomed and supported by the business and that they are aware of all of the resources that they might need. When you have a solid onboarding process, you are more likely to keep your employees because of the support that they feel. It also helps to ensure the smoothest transition possible, and this, in turn, ensures the continuity and efficacy of workplace processes.
Whose Responsibility is Onboarding?
For the most part, the onboarding process will represent a collaborative effort between the HR department and whoever the new hire will be working directly under. The HR department tends to create, coordinate, schedule, and oversee the process, and the new employee’s manager tends to keep them company as they move through the process providing specific support, resources, and guidance. In some instances, the process might need to be a little more tailored and customised to the individual hire. The onboarding process is often pretty heavy on the paperwork side, although most businesses today are going digital in an effort to minimise their paper usage. The accessibility of your digital documentation is important, and businesses like AbleDocs can help; they specialise in helping to produce accessible and compliant pdfs and documents.
Onboarding Models to Consider
As mentioned above, the actual onboarding process can range for a couple of reasons. The best approach to the process will largely depend on its content. There are a few different models that you might want to consider. First is, of course, the tried and true buddy system. New hires are paired up with a buddy who is meant to mentor and support them throughout the process. You could also choose shadowing, which is somewhat like the buddy system, except the new hire is asked to shadow workers during their day to get an example, they can direct their questions to the person they are shadowing, but there is often less consistency. Rotational programmes, on the other hand, are designed to expose the new hire to all areas of the business one at a time. Lastly, you could also choose to let your new hire take control of their learning and participate more actively in their own onboarding process.
Assessing Your Current Onboarding Process
Most businesses will have some form of an onboarding process in place already; even a lack thereof counts to an extent. Whatever your approach to inducting new employees is, the efficacy of it will be apparent in other areas of the business. Think about the retention rates of the business. Do new hires stick around, or are they quick to leave? If the rates of retention are low, then this could point to problems in the onboarding process. Are the new hires quick to fit in? Is their performance and productivity measurably where they should be? Of course, they can sometimes be slow on the uptake because it is a big transition. However, if the new hires routinely take a long time to get to grips with their role, then this could be because the onboarding process is lacking.
Other Elements to Consider
Again, the way that your business approaches onboarding is going to be specific to it. Obviously, a lot of elements have already been outlined, but there are a few other ones that you might want to consider. You could pre-emptively provide resources or information that the new hire will need in advance of their start date to allow them to begin to get to grips with things. If they are only waiting for a start date, but they have committed to joining the business, then you could also invite them to any and all team-building or network events being held in the interim. A lot of workers also value the opportunity to have a mentor or receive coaching. Remember to schedule check-ins with the new hire during their first few weeks or even months at the business. Lastly, if you want to know whether your onboarding process works or not, it makes sense to ask the new hires for feedback after they have passed through the process.
To Conclude
Developing the best onboarding process is key to providing new hires with the best impression of your business, in addition to ensuring that they have all of the tools that they need to succeed. Obviously, this is great for the new hires, but it is also great for the business too when an employee succeeds, the business succeeds. Investing time and resources into your business onboarding approach makes financial sense. Think about how successful your current process is and where you improve using the metrics and suggestions listed above.
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