Are You Welcoming Your Newest Team Members Properly?

The key to a successful hire might seem like it’s buried deep within the recruitment process. But actually, the onboarding process can have a huge impact on whether a new hire thrives in a new position. If you are not actively putting your best foot forward when it comes to welcoming a new team member, be warned that you may be doing more harm than you might think. Here’s what you should be doing beyond just laying out the welcome mat.

Why Onboarding Matters

1. The Importance of the Onboarding Process

Most new employees in your organization will go through some form of an onboarding process. Onboarding is their first foray into the day to day life of an employee in your organization. It is also one of the most important opportunities to make an impression on the new hires and transform them into loyal employees with the potential to make a great positive impact on the business. While the onboarding process is often tasked with the responsibility to finalize any dangling procedural requirements, its primary purpose is to be motivational. From a new hire’s perspective, it should be rich in relevant information that they would find useful. From the organizational perspective, it should also be reliable, repeatable, and most importantly flexible.

Everyone learns slightly differently. The goal of the onboarding process is not to enforce uniformity in the learning styles but instead to deliver a great first impression and provide other relevant information. You will have the most success in grabbing and retaining the attention of a large audience if the onboarding process incorporates flexibility. This could mean having multiple different delivery mediums such as in-person sessions, online information, onboarding videos, and group sessions versus a more personalized session. Different people will find different parts of the content more appealing to them. It is important that the delivery mechanism is tailored towards that and lets employees go at their own pace.

2. Provide the Right Tools and Information

 Onboarding processes provide a great opportunity to present relevant information to new employees and make them productive members of the organization. Don’t overlook this vital opportunity to provide the right tools and information that a new hire will need to be successful within the role. Whether that’s arranging for IT to get them set up properly with a connected workspace, or making sure they have all the software and devices they need to do their job, your new hires are counting on you to help them get started.

3. Connect them with a Mentor

 One of the toughest parts of figuring out a new job is just understanding who the new team is, and what everyone’s roles are. A peer mentor is a great way to move the work off your shoulders while making sure that there is someone ready to show your new hire the ropes. It’s critical to set them up for success in this way because they will rarely have the insider knowledge they need to hit the ground running. To make sure you have a positive experience all around, make sure your peer mentors are rewarded for their efforts in onboarding as well. It takes a village to bring on new staff members, so make sure your whole team knows how important the work is.

Are you building your team?

If you need assistance evaluating or building an onboarding program, one that keeps candidates engaged well past day 1, that’s something we at Ag1Source can help you with.  Contact us for more info on how to find the professionals you need.