The effective onboarding of employees is a crucial part of any organisation’s talent retention strategy. Failing to create the right impression can lead to higher than expected attrition, not to mention the costs involved of replacing someone who leaves.

We look at 5 key areas to consider:

Setting up

The first thing you need to do is make sure that the individual is set up to work from home. Will they be using their own personal laptop or will you be providing a company one? Clearly, you need to plan ahead so that the new joiner is ready to go on their start date.  

Meet key people

Just as you would do in an office, it is vital to ensure that you schedule in one-to-one meetings with team members as early as possible. V-meets with HR and IT for example are also important to build that support network. If you’re the line manager, make sure you revisit KPIs and objectives regularly – video conferencing tools such as Microsoft Teams will facilitate this.

Access all areas

Does the employee know where to find all relevant company information and business documentation? Whether it’s on your corporate intranet or online hub, there must be a dedicated place that stores all relevant information. Think about creating a glossary of company terms. Any paperwork that needs to be signed can be done so through DocuSign or other e-signature platforms.

Assign a mentor

Have you thought about a mentor or ‘buddy’ system? This is especially important when working remotely, as it’s very easy to feel isolated. Assign a person on your team with the responsibility of looking after your newest team member, so that they have a point of contact, someone to turn to if they require help or assistance. You might want to also allocate a colleague from operations, such as HR or IT.

Ongoing process

The more focus on providing a thorough onboarding experience early on, the less time will need to be taken on meetings later on. It’s worth noting that a good onboarding programme can last as long as a year, so it has to be a gradual process allowing the individual to become fully attuned to the company’s culture, mission, values and working environment.  

Finally, it’s important to allow for mistakes as inevitably employees will need more handholding. And just as you should with all your staff, you must show them that you care, especially in challenging and very different times like these. 

If you'd like advice about remote onboarding or to discuss your HR recruitment needs,  please email bev.parekh@fyte.com