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New Employee Onboarding: Best Practices

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Under the new paradigms of human resources, employees are assets and the hiring process leans towards social onboarding. Today’s best practices understand that an employee will spend a third or more of their weekday at the office. It will be a source of friendship and self-esteem, as well as income.

For the best onboarding practices, be sure to hit all of the domains of the employee’s work life.

Create A Thorough Job Description

The ability to do their job properly is one of the biggest factors in your employee’s job satisfaction. This means that the first domain that needs to be addressed is the job description. A good job description should be written by the person that truly understands all aspects of the job. This way it is robust, specifically addressing all of the functions required by the employee. The job description should be written for the job and not the person. This is a common mistake when attempting to include the social aspect of the occupation.

Lay Out The Salary Structure

Once they know what the job entails, an engaged employee is going to want to know the pay scale and any other associated benefits. Unlike the job description, where it is useful to be nearby while the employee absorbs the information, salary and benefit data is best given in private. Try making use of software that allows you to create and print paperwork such as W-2 forms and outlines of salary structure and benefits. Then send them home so that they can think, consult with family and generally take in the fiscal impact of their new positions. Make sure that the salary information includes opportunity for raises, advancement potential and vacation and sick time reimbursement.

Include Communication

A newcomer to the best onboarding practices is communication. If we look at onboarding as an invitation for the employee to enter the company’s social environment, then you will need to give them all of the possible ways to communicate with their peers and administration. Typically a telephone and email directory come first, but many companies have embraced social media as a blended communication tool as well as a marketing method. The company may have a monitored Facebook group where the employees can interact on positive aspects of company life and the general public can gain insight into the workings of the company. Make sure that the onboarding process includes all of the rules for social media communication.

Introduce The Culture

You are now including a new member into your business family. Like any family, it is your job to give the employee the lowdown on the beliefs and the passions of the organization. According to the Harvard Business Review, there are six domains to a company’s culture. To truly bring your new employees on board, you need to introduce to them the vision, value, practices and the place in general, as well as give them the narrative of the organization and an introduction to the key people that support the culture.

Everything Else

Each company is unique, so be sure that your onboarding process has a portion that covers all of the things that your employees need to know. This can be anything from bathroom locations to charitable activities. At the end of the day, a best practice onboarding procedure will bring the new employee into the organization on all of the levels of engagement that it has to offer.

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