Why You Need An Onboarding Plan for New Staff

Do you have an onboarding procedure for new staff? If you don’t, it is time to get one in place. Onboarding is a very important part in building great team morale, and setting the scene for the new staff member’s journey with your business. It doesn’t take much for a first impression to be tarnished. Make sure your new team member gets the right impression of your business from day one. Here are our favourite 3 tips for onboarding a new team member successfully.

Onboarding: What To Do

Be Ready

The first and biggest tip we can give you is to be ready for your new team member. From the minute they walk in the door, make sure they are comfortable and feel welcome. As an established employee, their first day is just another day at the office. But for the new employee, the success of the hire can hinge on what happens on the first day.

Here is what you need to have organised:

Their workspace: Straight away they will be able to come in, put any personal items down and instantly have a place in the team.
Their equipment: Hit the ground running on your training plan by having their computer and other equipments set up and ready to go. This includes a way for them to log on to your system.
A Welcome Party: You don’t actually have to throw a party. But make your new team member feel welcome by introducing them to their new colleagues on day one. You could even arrange to take them out for lunch on their first day to get to know them in a more social context.

Have a Formal Plan

In the week before your new team member starts, set out a formal training plan. Factor in all the areas that you want to cover, and how long you will dedicate to each aspect of the role. Include a general overview of how the rest of the team works together so that your new employee has an understanding beyond their own role.

Having a plan will ensure that you cover all aspects of training, no parts will be missed, and you will have a timeframe to complete the training within. Your new team member will get to see that you are a professional business that cares about their new staff.

Don’t be tempted to rush the process. Incomplete training, or unnecessary pressure to undertake a job they don’t understand fully can be detrimental to the hiring process. If your new team member does not feel completely comfortable, then it might affect their decision to stay with your business.

Set Your Expectations From The Beginning

Start as you mean to go on. Make your new employee aware of your expectations for the role and their behaviour. Ensure that your expectations are realistic and fair. Clear communication on these expectations will allow your employee to check their own progress, and evaluate their performance.

Set some goals in the first days so that your employee can have a target to work to. These could be goals on completing the required training program, or goals on performing the tasks of their role correctly. You should also allow your new employee to provide feedback on the process, you won’t know if there are any parts of your plan that need improving otherwise.

Set a date for a formal performance review to take place several months after their start date. You can both provide honest feedback, and it’s a great opportunity for plenty of praise if it is deserved.

Onboarding is a very relevant topic for us at in2HR, as we recently welcomed a new member to our team...

We are in growth mode at in2HR! As such, we are pleased to welcome Katherine Dowler into our in2HR family as our newest HR Consultant.

Katherine has come from an extensive HR and franchising background and has worked for global names including Komatsu and Adidas. Most recently she was the HR Consultant for a successful global Franchisor, where she was supporting a portfolio of approximately 2000 employees across New Zealand.

Katherine is passionate about HR and enjoys helping Managers to achieve the best out of their people.

Welcome on board Katherine!