Why Onboarding is so Important

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Think of onboarding as protecting your recruitment investment. So much effort goes into recruiting, but often the dedication that is made in finding employees falls short as soon as the person has signed the final offer. Facilitating engagement and relaying information to the candidate for longer than a one-day process, will kick start a successful onboarding. You only get one chance to make a first impression, so set a new hire up for success. There are a range of approaches you can take as an HR professional. This can include the little things like giving them a coffee mug, t-shirt, or any extra items with the company name on them. The goal in this: to make them feel like part of the family. According to the SHRM Foundation, the idea of “passive onboarding” is used in 30% of organizations and is onboarding that focuses mainly on compliance with little to no focus on clarification, culture, and making connections. Also, we want to understand the new generation in the work force. Today’s generations that are entering the workforce are more accustomed to speed and automation, so relying on a one-day HR orientation, completing a checklist of unrelated administrative tasks and a file of forms will not work.

Welcoming a new employee into a long-term and lasting positive relationship with their organization requires an effective onboarding. Proper onboarding is important because training and turnover is expensive. While the overall goal and reason for the process is to educate new employees about their place within the larger culture, what leads a candidate to prosper from the get-go? According to SHRM Foundation’s Effective Practice Guidelines Series, onboarding consist of four distinct levels; these levels are referred to as the Four C’s. Compliance is most basic level and includes teaching employees surface level legal and policy-related rules and regulations. Clarification is about guaranteeing that employees understand their new jobs and its related expectations. Culture can be broad, but really sets a successful onboarding apart. This category includes providing employees with a sense of both formal and informal organizational norms. Connection makes clear the essential interpersonal relationships and information networks that new employees must establish.

So what will following the Four C’s achieve? Reduced time-to-productivity, reduced stress, reduced turnover rates, and faster developed job knowledge. Time-to-productivity is the time required for new employees to have all of the information, skills, and equipment necessary to perform their jobs at a proficient level. We all know that a little bit of stress is good, but we always want to minimize the amount. Telling new hires what they need to know before they need to know it will reduce anxiety that naturally occurs when entering a new situation while simultaneously allowing them to concentrate more on their new position. From the beginning, you want to show your employees that they are valued and have all the necessary tools to succeed. The goal is to make new employees fully understand how they contribute to the big picture; making it far less likely that they will look elsewhere. The overall goal is to master your organization’s mission, vision, and values. There is no better time then to revisit these during the process of onboarding because it is the beginning of a new employees experience with the company. In conclusion, effective hiring will possess the qualities of strong organizational socialization allowing for maximum success. Efficient onboarding leads to increased retention rates and therefore increasing your company’s return on investment.

Information was sourced from:

https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/20141110053210-112837408-why-is-onboarding-so-important

https://www.shrm.org/foundation/ourwork/initiatives/resources-from-past-initiatives/Documents/Onboarding%20New%20Employees.pdf

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