One of the final steps to owning your own business is getting through the employee onboarding. There’s a lot of paperwork that your new staff members are going to have to fill out.
That doesn’t mean that your onboarding process has to be stiff and boring. That’s a good way to run your employees off before they even start their first day.
Employees want to feel some fulfillment from their job. They need to know how they can be successful and what you’re expecting out of them.
We can help you create an onboarding experience that does all of this and more. Check out this guide to get started.
What Is Onboarding?
So, what is onboarding? It’s the strange area between interviewing someone and getting them hired on as a full-fledged employee. They’ll have to fill out a mountain of paperwork.
Get them set up with a company email address. Give them access to the software and equipment that they’ll need to use to get their job done and introduce them to your other workers.
That’s the basic run-through of what the process looks like, but there’s a little more to it than that. You’re going to have to put a lot of work into your onboarding program if you want your employees to stick by you.
Why Does Onboarding Matter?
You may be asking, “why does a good onboarding process matter?” The answer is that it’s the potential employee’s first inside look at your company. You want it to be good because if it’s not, everything will unravel from there.
Better Employee Experience
There are tons of business owners out there who are in your shoes. They’re looking for star employees to work at their company. That means that you’ve got some competition.
Potential workers have plenty of jobs out there that they can apply for. If your business doesn’t fit the bill in terms of work culture and employee development, the worker will begin to submit their resume to other places.
As soon as they find a better opportunity, you’ll lose them. To avoid your turnover rate taking a nosedive, you need to create a good employee experience from the start.
Employee Engagement
If your new hire doesn’t feel a strong connection to your company, they’re not going to gain any fulfillment in what they do. When someone doesn’t feel fulfilled, they aren’t going to put their best foot forward.
A good onboarding process can increase employee engagement by introducing your new workers to your company’s culture and values. One way to create employee engagement from the start is to set the worker up with a buddy who can show them around the company.
You can also invite the employee out to lunch to talk to them about your culture and don’t forget to recognize them for a job well done. It’s the little things that can make a large difference.
Attract Better Talent
When an employee has a great onboarding process, they’re more likely to invite their friends and family members to apply to your company. It gives you access to a much larger talent pool.
On the flip side of this, employees who had a terrible onboarding process will share their opinions with others. They’ll discourage people from applying by leaving terrible reviews on job sites.
Employee Onboarding Checklist
Now that you know why you need a good onboarding program, it’s time to learn how to begin the process. The entire thing starts before you bring the potential new hire into your office for the first time.
Recruitment
Onboarding begins with your job description. The employee should know exactly what your company does before hitting that apply button. If there is any room for confusion, you’ve already set the worker up for failure.
A good way to find out if your description is clear enough is by doing a little research on job sites. Look up posts like yours to see how other business owners describe the position.
Be open and honest about your scheduling policy and how vacation days work. Give a list of what benefits you’re offering your employees.
The First Visit
After the interview is over and you’ve decided that you may send someone an offer letter, it’s a good idea to show them around your office. If there’s any disconnect between the employee and your company, this is where you’ll both find out.
Show them the space where they’ll be working. Let them hold the equipment that they’ll be using to get their job done and walk them through how it works.
Take the employee to places that maybe aren’t as glamorous such as the parking garage and bathrooms. Show them the closets where they can get all their supplies.
If you have any current employees working in the office at the time, introduce them to the potential new hire as you pass through.
Send the Offer Letter
If everything worked out during the office tour, you can send the offer letter. It should express how excited you are for the new hire to start working at your business.
Take this moment to again outline all their job responsibilities. The last thing an employee wants is a bunch of unpleasant surprises on their first day.
Welcoming employees with this letter is only step one to making them feel at home with your company. You’ve got to keep up the momentum.
Start Early Onboarding
Once the employee has signed the offer letter, it’s time to officially begin their onboarding process. There’s a lot to pack within these first few crucial weeks.
To begin, encourage all your current workers to send a welcome email to their new co-worker to get them hyped for their first day on the job. You should send out an email as well to encourage the employee to ask you any burning questions that they may have.
Come up with a list of goals for the employee’s first week and share it with them. This should include a list of assignments for them to complete.
It’s not a good idea to overwhelm them with a bunch of projects right out of the gate, though. Start with small stuff such as decorating their workspace.
The First Day
When the employee walks in on the first day, greet them with a bag of company swag. Doing so will start things off on a good note. After the new hire has gotten a chance to look through their swag bag, begin your first morning meeting with them.
Give them a rundown of how their first day is going to go without overwhelming them with a bunch of tasks that need to get done. Leave the floor open for them to ask any questions before you send them on their way.
Schedule a lunch with the new employee and some of your other staff members. Try to keep it as informal as possible, and don’t be afraid to squeeze in a few ice breakers.
As a recap, call the employee in for a late afternoon meeting. Ask them how they felt about their first day and ask them if they have any questions or concerns.
The First Few Weeks
The onboarding process doesn’t end after the employee’s first day. It’s going to take a few weeks before they get settled into their new work environment.
Consider pairing the new hire with one of your more successful employees. They can show them the ropes and get the worker going on the fast track to success.
As the weeks drag on, start giving the employee more involved tasks to do. Talk to them about the goals they should strive to meet by the end of their first year. Praise them when they do a good job, and don’t forget to keep checking in on them.
Making Your Onboarding Process Better
We’ve given you sort of the foundation toward training employees and creating a killer onboarding process. It’s never a bad idea to go the extra mile, however. Here are a few additional things that you can do to polish things up.
Automate the Process
The onboarding process is long and involves a lot of paperwork. If you don’t use HR software to automate things, you’ll find yourself tearing your own hair out. It’s way less stressful to let a program take away some of your workload.
On your employee’s end, you can set things up where they receive all their onboarding paperwork before their first day. This way, they’re not sitting in an office all day ticking boxes, signing documents, and watching those boring onboarding videos.
Do Something Special
You want your new employees to see that you feel as lucky that they got a job with you as they are. A good way to do this is to send their swag pack a little early.
Fill it with things that they’re going to want/use. Personalized coffee mugs and shirts are a good start. You can also get them a custom mouse pad and a bunch of other unique goodies.
Couple the swag pack with a personalized note telling the employee how happy you are that they’ve chosen to work with you. Doing all this shows an employee early on what they can expect out of your work culture and gets the hype going before they step through your doors on the first day.
Allow for Interaction
Gamification is a process where you make everyday tasks into a game of some kind. For example, some companies may have a sales goal for a special product.
They have all hands on deck selling this item by creating a friendly competition across the different company departments. The department that wins gets a special prize of some kind.
This process works in your onboarding process too. There are tons of neat office games you can play. Instead of filling in your new hire on all the company jargon the boring old-fashioned way, do it in the form of a scavenger hunt!
Ease Their Anxieties
As excited as most people are on their first day at a new job, there’s a certain level of nervousness there. They’re interacting with a lot of people they’ve never met before, and they’re scared of messing things up.
Easing those nerves starts at the door. Ask your receptionist to greet them warmly. The longer they have to wait to be let in, the longer they have to overthink things. Set your business up with a cloud-based access system, so the newbie doesn’t have to wait.
Introduce them to your entire team and give them contact information that they can use to get in touch with them when they need help.
Help Them Understand Company Priorities
Your new hires can’t help your company flourish if they don’t know how. Show them your promotion process. Doing so will give them a goal to shoot for.
Let them see a list of priorities for their department. Lastly, give them an example of how the decisions get made in your company.
Get Your Employee Onboarding Process Going
Your employees are the bread and butter of your entire company. You need to set your new workers off to a good start, or your business will become a revolving door.
Having a high turnover rate will cost your business a lot of money, and it will hurt your reputation. Polish up your employee onboarding process to ensure that doesn’t happen to you, and for more tips on how to keep your company going, visit the Business section of our blog.
