We published a blog post a while back called “8 Onboarding Tips for the Next Month.” This can be viewed here: https://bartellbartell.com/blog/8-onboarding-tips-for-the-first-month/. Onboarding is an area that can have immense value and often not fully taken advantage of. The article above is a great read on how to recapture some of that value, and I’d like to take some time to do a deeper dive on the eighth tip mentioned in the article, which is “Focus on Development from the Outset” in the upcoming Part 2 of this series. However, I’d like to first lay out the case for why onboarding is so important and why it should be done well.
It’s worth noting that onboarding is what’s called an organizational competency. This is different than what we would call an individual leadership competency. An individual competency is something that a leader needs to do well to be effective in their role. An example of this is conflict management. An organizational competency, on the other hand, is something that the organization needs to do well to set up its people (and therefore the organization) for success.
Since onboarding is an organizational competency, this implies that the organization will be doing this better if there is a consistent approach that focuses on best practices and training people to do the process effectively. In other words, if leaders are ‘winging’ the onboarding process, and there is no consistency in how it is done, the organization is losing a lot of value.
But before we discuss how to recapture value through development during onboarding, I’d like to list a few reasons why onboarding is so important.
1) It creates a strong first impression of the organization. I had a discussion one time with an individual who left a job after three weeks, because the onboarding process was an absolute disaster. He worked in IT, and the organization couldn’t get their act together enough to even get him a computer. He knew after three weeks that this was not the organization he wanted to work in, so he moved on.
2) It sets your people up for success – or failure. Onboarding is the time when the organization gives you its first real handshake. Are you set adrift? Are you intentionally connected with people? Are you given clarity on what exactly you’re supposed to be doing in your job? People who are onboarded effectively are light years ahead of the folks who aren’t onboarded well in terms of being effective quickly.
3) Onboarding can serve as a gauge for your organization’s attention to detail and its orientation toward process improvement. Organizations are always changing, which means that how you onboard people should be changing too. I’ve seen too many organizations that drop the ball on important aspects of this process (like not getting payroll right), where the left-hand doesn’t know what the right-hand is doing, and where people recognize issues in the process, but the issues never really seem to get fixed. If this is going on in the onboarding process, similar issues are likely showing up elsewhere.
4) Effective onboarding helps reduce the level of stress in new employees. One area of workplace stress that isn’t often discussed is what I call ‘ignorance stress.’ This is the stress we feel when we take on a new position and/or start work with a new company. We don’t know who the players are. We don’t know what we’re doing or how to do it. We don’t know what the procedures are. We’re unfamiliar with the norms. And we often don’t know exactly where to go to help with the problems we have. A strong onboarding program creates clarity and works to reduce this kind of stress.
5) Effective onboarding accelerates the usefulness of employees after they’re hired. A strong onboarding process reduces dead time, creates clarity, and surrounds the employee with resources and people to help them succeed. Lack of clarity creates confusion, and confusion leads to inefficiency. If you want your new hires up and running quickly, a strong onboarding process it the best way to do that.
I once worked with a financial planning company to very intentionally develop the onboarding process for its new internship program. The first two interns were introduced to the organization with this onboarding process, and it created a fantastic first impression. One of the interns was hired. The other one wasn’t, but he’s in a job now where he goes to colleges and talks about his experience in the financial services industry. We’ve heard from other internship applicants that they decided to apply to this internship largely based on the immensely positive experience this former intern had. The next intern that was brought on board was two weeks in and said that he couldn’t imagine having a better experience than the one he was having. The word-of-mouth reputation of this company’s internship is growing, and the springboard for its success is the onboarding process.
While it takes some time to create a good onboarding process, it is well worth the effort. It’s true that not everything is within your control with this process (like how long it takes to get a computer); you should focus on what is in your control. Additionally, you may find it challenging to get a lot of buy-in from the organization as a whole (and even if they do buy in, it will likely take a lot longer than you’d like to get the process set up). No matter what the reception is by the organization, it’s important that you set something up that represents a quality, consistent process for bringing people on board to your part of the organization. You just might be the example the rest of the organization needs to buy into this competency. Now that I’ve made a case for embracing this organizational competency, Part 2 will spell out a very practical way to focus on development in your onboarding process that you can repeat for everyone who comes through your doors.