Once recruited and hired, how does an employee who just walked through your company’s doors become “one of us”?
Why does early attention – onboarding – fail to result in lasting impact as people progress through their tenure?
by Jim Clifton , Jim Harter for Industry Week
Excerpted from It’s the Manager by Jim Clifton and Jim Harter, Ph.D. Copyright 2019 Gallup, Inc. Reprinted with permission from Gallup Press. All rights reserved.
You can take a variety of approaches to onboarding new workers based on your organization’s culture. Some companies focus on building social bonds, while others leave people to figure things out on their own. Some follow a set process for orientation, while others have a “sink or swim” approach.
The goal of onboarding should be to introduce foundational elements that employees can build on throughout their career — those that influence their performance over decades, not quarters.
First impressions matter. They set the tone for the employee’s career, and it’s never easier to influence employee behavior than when they are a blank slate and eager to learn and change.
Yet while organizations have paid great attention to improving onboarding processes, only about 1 in 10 employees, managers, and leaders strongly agree that their organization does a good job of onboarding. And roughly 4 in 10 employees are engaged in their first six months of employment — when engagement is typically at its peak.
Why does early attention fail to result in lasting impact as people progress through their tenure? Do you and your new employees have a clear view of your organization’s purpose, desired brand and desired culture? Here are five questions you must answer for every new employee to have a successful onboarding program:
1. “What do we believe in around here?”
The first thing new employees need to know is your organization’s stated purpose — your shared beliefs. Then, you can frame everything else as an expression of what the organization stands for and is trying to achieve.
How leaders practice and reinforce details like safety, family leave and reporting ethics violations says a lot about your culture as a whole. For example, if you have a stated policy of flextime and send messages that you value employee wellbeing, can employees really leave their desk to go to the gym or leave the office early to attend a child’s event? Do your benefits, rules, ethical boundaries and culture align with your organization’s stated purpose and brand?