6 Ways to Build an Inclusive Onboarding Experience
“Hiring and onboarding employees is all about compassion. It’s about care, alignment, and empowerment. ” – Mitch Gray
Onboarding is one of the most important parts of hiring and welcoming new talent. Making an inclusive work environment is a necessity to compete in today’s market. However, recent studies reveal that 69% of companies cite onboarding as quite a challenge during employee management. And as per the Potentialpark Rankings 2022 report, 45% of candidates prefer a mixed onboarding experience, including remote and in-house.
While there is an immense focus on delivering a great candidate experience, onboarding is often overlooked. This results in new employees feeling unsafe and unwelcomed from the start, resulting in higher attrition rates and lower employee retention levels.
If you like to hire employees the right way and convert them into the best performers, then offer them an inclusive onboarding experience that promotes self-awareness, safety, and diversity. Moreover, building an inclusive onboarding process is a two-way thing, occupied by both your team and the new employees that are about to get on board.
Here are the top six ways to build a strong onboarding environment and improve the employee experience for new hires:
1. Pay Attention to Pre-boarding
Pre-employee onboarding is the first and most crucial phase of the onboarding process. Employers need to pay attention to pre-boarding to make the whole process smooth. When the newcomers feel valued, their chances of having a positive first impression increase. As soon as the employee enters the organization, they should be involved and included. Preparing the checklist for all the procedures will help to result in the smooth execution of the process. The time between offer letter confirmation and the day of joining is a game-changer between joining and dropping off.
Therefore, the pre-joining period needs special attention from recruiters and HR managers. Ideally, you should be using recruiting automation to automate most of the engagement from the offer acceptance to the day of joining. To seal the deal of new hires is dependent on how well the recruiter can showcase the company culture and perks to the new joiners.
Check out how you can perfectly chart a pre-onboarding plan to make a great employee onboarding strategy:
Share a roadmap of what happens after accepting the offer:
You can use social intranet software or your website to showcase all that a new hire may experience before his/her joining day.
Start Data Collection Before Day One:
Data collection prior to onboarding reduces the documentation on the first day, and the new hire also gets familiar with a few of your onboarding steps.
2. Make Employees Feel Like a Part of the Company
It’s important to make new hires feel like they are a part of a team. Do not just waste all the onboarding time in a training room or on meetings (if you are doing it remotely). Take your new talents on a company visit and introduce them to other employees with whom they will be going to work. Also, make sure to include sharing of the company’s diversity and inclusion programs and statements as a part of the onboarding. Further, discuss all the inclusion programs that are active for employees to assist them in connecting with their colleagues at work so they feel like they belong to a particular employee resource group.
You can also share a company chart with the fresh joiners to let them know who is in what job role in the company. This will help your employees to know whom to report to and who is going to be their manager, and it will also assist them to become more familiar with everyone at the company.
For this purpose, you can use the Potentialpark database to build your employer brand by understanding your candidates’ needs. You can keep tabs on the candidate's behavior and provide an excellent onboarding experience with an actionable database.
3. Incorporate Different Perspectives
If all your recruiters are men and smart-looking people, it may not establish the best first impression on the new employee. It can be a little disturbing and alienating as the new employee may feel that the company is biased in terms of its recruitment method. On the other hand, a diverse workforce with a nearly equal male-to-female ratio can make the onboarding experience inclusive. Show your new employees that everyone in your company is not only welcomed but also feels welcomed and empowered.
4. Set an Attainable Onboarding Time Frame
The maximum time period in which an onboard can last is 1 year. Within the first 90 days, you can set goals for the employees so that they take on more challenges and responsibilities in their job roles. Furthermore, one of the best practices for setting goals for new hires is to use the SMART method. The goals can be:
S: Specific
M: Measurable
A: Attainable
R: Relevant
T: Time-bound
Crosscheck their results after a month to ensure they are working properly. Also, help them with any issues that they may have. Furthermore, for tech employees, you can conduct monthly tests to check their growth within your company.
5. Mentoring Company Culture & Language
Effective mentoring offers support to newcomers and helps them enjoy an inviting company culture that encourages all employees to share their ideas for business growth. In fact, recent company culture stats reveal that 40% of employees find corporate culture highly important. Further, mentoring in the company is a popular way for a business to onboard its employees into the workplace as effortlessly as possible.
Moreover, new hires feel equal when they know how to communicate in your company's language. The employees feel more confident during business discussions and meetings when they are familiar with your company's language.
There are a few unique terms and slang that most companies use in their everyday conversations. So, it’s important to mentor the new joiners with your company language to help them speed up with the company-specific jargon. Further, to make them familiar with the company's unique phrases, you can share a business vocabulary on the day of joining.
6. Frequent Follow-Ups With New Employees
Following up with new hires offers you a chance to know what your employees actually think about their newly acquired job roles. Furthermore, it demonstrates your close interest in your new hire’s progress and success.
It is ideal to follow up with new employees weekly during their first month of joining. You can simply share a checklist to ensure new hires have finished their assigned tasks. Or, you can share a quick company quiz on your business ethics and rules to check their knowledge. Furthermore, to ease the feedback or follow-up process, you can use employee survey tools. The most commonly used follow-up (YES/NO) checklist includes:
I feel like I belong to the company.
If I make a mistake in a team project, it is not held against me.
The company is dedicated to inclusion and diversity.
Employees from all genders and backgrounds have the same opportunity to grow here.
The company values the opinions of every employee here.
Your manager is supportive in letting you participate in DE&I (diversity, equity, and inclusion) activities.
Conclusion
Day one of a new job is quite hard for everyone. However, an excellent and inclusive onboarding experience can make any new hire settle in with ease. Foster your onboarding process so new hires are not just welcomed but celebrated.
Source:https://www.greenthumbs.in/