By John Viktorin and Lee Downs
Employee onboarding and orientation is critical for organizations to execute well. New employees who feel welcomed in the beginning are more likely to stay and become committed to the organization, as well as begin contributing faster.
HRPA’s Onboarding and Orientation PD in a Box workshop focuses on the four keys to Onboarding and Orientation: planning how and when to engage and educate the employee, prepare everything you need to orient the employee; how to engage talent right from the beginning; and how to educate and integrate the employee from their first day.
Onboarding and Orientation–what’s the difference?
Onboarding is as an ongoing process of building engagement from the first contact until the employee becomes established within the organization. Orientation, on the other hand, is a stage of onboarding where new employees learn about the company and their job responsibilities. The goal of onboarding is to make the potential employee feel that they want to work here; the goal of orientation is to integrate new employees into the organization as seamlessly as possible.
Why invest in onboarding and orientation?
There are compelling reasons to do a good job on onboarding and orientation:
- There are financial reasons. It’s expensive hiring employees—
the cost of sourcing and hiring can range from a few thousand dollars for hourly employees to $75-100K for senior executives. As well, turnover costs can range anywhere from 25% to 200% of the employee’s annual salary.
- A shrinking labour pool means talent is becoming harder to find.
- A well-structured onboarding and orientation program will move new employees towards becoming a net contributor faster.
- Onboarding and orientation encourages employee engagement and engaged workers are happier and more productive than those who are not.
There are also good reasons for an onboarding and orientation process from the employee’s perspective. New employees are faced with three specific barriers: they need to learn about the organization and their new role, they’re uncertain about their new environment, and they will feel outside of the organization’s support and information networks. Onboarding and orientation can help overcome these challenges.
Onboarding and Orientation and the Employee Lifecycle
Onboarding covers the first two phases of an employee lifecycle—before employment begins and the start phase of employment. The onboarding phase starts before the new employee is hired. Planning considerations should include:
- Ensuring the team is involved.
- Focus of Day 1 activities: Welcoming the new employee!
- Getting ready to listen to the new employee.
- Quickly identifying and meeting any development needs, with these activities continuing through orientation until the new employee feels established.
Orientation also begins before the employee is hired, but with a slightly different focus: orientation is about education and integration. You can think of orientation as the “technical” side of onboarding, often highly standardized across employee categories.
Metrics
Onboarding and orientation plan success factors include:
- Senior leadership sponsorship
- HR leadership
- Onboarding and orientation policy
- Onboarding practices
- Orientation practices
- Awareness and training
It’s not sexy, but it needs to get done
A solid onboarding and orientation plan focuses on the essentials for the organization and the new employee. As you develop your program, ensure you have clarity on needs and expectations and that everyone knows their responsibilities and deadlines.
And be aware of the “little stuff” that ensures the employee feels welcomed at every step. Prepare documents, workspace and existing employees for the change. By clarifying expectations— both individual and organizational—people will get used to the idea that different people may own the various portions of the onboarding and orientation process.
Lee Downs and John Viktorin are partners in Amoeba Communications a consulting firm that creates communications that engage people and drive performance. They are the go-to team for leaders seeking high impact, high value solutions in four areas: organizational communications, change management, HR communications and leadership communications. You can reach Lee and John at www.engagecanada.com or by calling 416-535-3350.
<< Topic Descriptions
<< PD in a Box Home