Employee onboarding is the process of setting up new hires within your organization. It can sound fairly straightforward – and is, when in expert hands.
But don’t mistake straightforward for unimportant. Again and again, studies show that strong onboarding is one of the most certain ways to ensure not only an employee’s job satisfaction, but their job performance during their time with your organization. Consider these powerful numbers that illustrate employee onboarding benefits:
Effective onboarding can improve employee retention and productivity by an astounding 52% and 60%, respectively.[1]
69% of employees are more likely to stay with a company for three years if they have a positive onboarding experience.[2]
70% of employees who like their jobs had a streamlined onboarding experience.[3]
While only 12% of employees feel their company did a great job with onboarding, those employees were nearly three times as likely to say they have the best possible job.[4]
Leading brands such as Zappos, Netflix, and Square are known for their robust onboarding. However, strong onboarding isn’t exclusive to multimillion-dollar companies. In fact, we see onboarding as a relatively economical way to level up and poise your business for success, no matter your size or current market share.
Of course, creating a strong employee onboarding process starts by understanding exactly what new employee onboarding entails.
Onboarding typically starts when a candidate returns a signed offer letter. Most job offers are contingent upon the successful completion of applicable pre-employment screenings, which are timely and therefore need to be kicked off right away. Pre-employment screenings can include background and credit checks, child abuse clearances, FBI fingerprinting, drug screening, and physicals.
Next comes onboarding paperwork, which is ideally organized, accessible, and completed within a company’s human resources information system (HRIS). Contents and processes can include:
While many onboarding checklist items are relatively objective, how they’re executed is where companies can miss the mark. Remember, onboarding is your new hire’s first sense of life as an employee of your organization. You don’t get a second chance to make this first impression. Outside of a smooth process that demonstrates organization and professionalism (the bare minimum), onboarding is your chance to show a level of care, compassion, and support that makes new hires feel valued and confident in their decision to accept a job with your organization. One recent survey found that only 52% of new hires feel satisfied with their onboarding process; 32% found it confusing and 22% said it was disorganized. This sobering fact is the perfect transition to common mistakes to avoid when onboarding new hires:
Orientation is the process of formally acclimating a new hire to the culture, community, and expectations of the organization and their new role. It is typically viewed as a separate process from onboarding; however, a strong and clear handoff between onboarding and orientation is critical.
During the onboarding process, be sure to let a new employee know what’s to come. Communicate with all necessary internal contacts to confidently explain to your new hire:
Keep in mind, too: Orientation is a great opportunity for HR to spearhead interdepartmental collaboration among human resources, high-level management and ownership, the employee’s direct supervisor, and other employees – those who have been identified as standouts and those who will work closely with the new hire. When these individuals convene, a new hire gets a much broader sense of names and faces as well as expectations, and can see more clearly how their role factors into larger operations and objectives. New hire buy-in is especially boosted when top-level leadership takes the time to participate in their orientation.
Ready to ensure compliance and professionalism across all aspects of your employee onboarding, setting up your new hires for success? Experience the power of myHR Partner. Our expert team goes to great lengths and takes great pride in creating a fully compliant onboarding process that is authentic to your organization, just like we did for our longtime client, Keystone Precision Solutions.
Using your systems of choice and aligning with your unique culture and objectives, we infuse your new hire onboarding process with compliance, expertise, and consistency – items crucial not only to onboarding, but to larger company success.
Reach out today for a complimentary myHR Partner consultation.
[4] https://www.gallup.com/workplace/247172/problems-onboarding-program.aspx