*As originally seen on Forbes.com

Is your onboarding optimal?

Do new hires get powerfully connected to your tribe in record time?

Thanks to the team at SilkRoad for a terrific template onboarding plan [you can find their graphic here]. We think it’s brilliant and you’ll note that in italics we’ve added our own items to their list below to boost SBM (safety, belonging, mattering). Because when we increase SBM, we honor our goal of:

Onboarding goal = to boost safety/belonging/mattering = increase engagement, retention, performance, clarity, potent culture

You can propel the success of a new hire’s onboarding experience with our checklist below. This will help you to ensure your employee onboarding experience starts early and remains consistent!

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Employee Onboarding Best Practice Goals

We want to ensure that the new hire feels emotional engagement, and understands the culture and how to be compliant with the policies. We want to set them up for success! To do this you’ll want to navigate the below Emotional Engagement Touch Points:

When Placing The Help Wanted Post:

• Be sure to use our Recruiting Process to ensure Value Alignment and save you 60+ hours per new hire 

At Interview:

• Align with Values and interview for values – see STP Culture Playbook: “Recruiting for Values and Accountability”
• Go over your Cultural GAME Plan – see high level summary below

• Growth: Show a Sample IDP, show Learning and Dev plan/program (LMS), Leadership Lunch group
• Appreciation: High 5s, acknowledging each other
• Measurement: all of us have needle movers, here are examples and self-evals (performance reviews)
• Engagement: SBM Index (you have a voice here, we want to hear it!)
• Show sample Benefits Summary
• Role-specific questions/etc

At Offer:

• Provide their own personal Benefits Summary

At Offer Acceptance:

• Welcome aboard letter from owners and SBM welcome/so glad you’re on our team
• Send basket of goodies/logo wear/Starbucks card to their home
• Set up access to all company systems/tools

Before Employee Starts:

• Add employee to onboarding system to trigger auto-alerts to key departments for support
• Begin engagement: send electronic offer letter through link to new hire portal
• Share company mission, values and other key information through new hire portal
• Send a personalized, helpful company welcome (company intranet, new hire portal, parking, etc.)
• Give link to pre-populated forms for completion before first day
• Monitor progress on workspace, desk, phone, computing device and security as appropriate
• Help manager prepare with online planner and agenda

Day 1:

• Help employee with lay of land – facility tour, voicemail, introduction to peers
• Announce new employee arrival in email
• Discuss culture, mission, policies and benefits shared on portal
• Review onboarding plan in new hire portal with employee
• Host a “culture welcome” focused on people (President/CEO, breakfast, peer lunch)
• Balloons, welcome sign in their office•
• Share standard story via Powerpoint of mission, vision, values; some fun company stories to illustrate culture; bubble chart of each department and how they support each other
• More info: storytelling about the company, company overview, mission/vision/values, our services/offerings, depts and how all support one another, 90 day buddy, needle movers/accountability, we are all about Talent Optimization
• Review Impact Description (and be sure to add Decision Spaces)
• HR policies and procedures explained
• Intro to buddy, outside of their area, peer/they can ask questions of/code of confidentiality, emotional/moral support if there’s a challenge, helps new hire navigate mental/emotional/physical, buddy lunch meetings: weekly for first 30 days, then every other week for next 30, then monthly for next 90, then they decide thereafter. Goal = boost SBM
• Company-specific tools training
• Lay of the land, how the coming weeks will unfold

Week 1:

• Enroll employee in internal special interest groups
• Introduce into buddy program
• Meet periodically to review first week agenda progress and questions
• Set job scope & performance expectations
• Discuss company resources and train on networks
• Ensure access to tools, inclusion on email distribution lists, etc.
• Review ramp-up plan, initial projects and using onboarding system for tracking
• Role-specific tools training
• Talent checks in with new hire to see how going
• Leader refreshes their memory re: GAME Plan:
• Growth: Show a Sample IDP, show Learning and Dev plan/program (LMS), Leadership Lunch group – you’ll co-create IDP at 90 days and can join Leadership Lunch now if you like!
• Appreciation: High 5s, acknowledging each other – here’s how to do a high 5
• Measurement: all of us have needle movers, here are examples, self evals – share dept needle movers and how they contribute and when they’ll do their self-eval
• Engagement: SBM Index (you have a voice here, we want to hear it!) – what we learned in last one and when our next SBM Index is
• Leader explains LMS (L&D Plan – need to create – see STP Culture Playbook “Learning and Development Plan” template)
• Leader sets one-on-one schedule and explains monthly Feedback Frame (“What’s Working Is ________ and What I’d Like To See More of Is _____________”, equal amounts of each, bi-directional) and we’ll do additional as needed

First 30-90 Days:

• Honor monthly anniversaries and achievements
• Survey new hire about experience
• Monitor progress and performance in onboarding program
• Allow for job shadowing, Q&A w/ peers
• Allow for customer field and product experiences
• Make time for periodic one-on-one sessions, peer feedback
• Introduce to key business partners/leaders
• Ongoing buddy interaction
• Talent checks in on progress, answers questions, sees how GAME Plan is going
• Celebrate monthly anniversaries
• SBM Index for new hire – give to Talent/HR

At 90 Days:

• Co-create IDP with leader
• Co-create individual needle movers with leader
• Leader to ensure giving/getting high 5s
• Formal buddy check in with new hire – how is their overall experience? Do Feedback Frame

After 90 Days ongoing:

• Remind about cool company programs/volunteering/Leadership Lunch/etc
• Remind about co benefits and how to leverage them

First Year and ongoing:

• Stay connected with two-way feedback, formally and informally
• Integrate employee into formal learning and development program
• Recognize those achievements
• Communicate ongoing learning/training opportunities
• Encourage participation in voluntary company activities (social)
• Remind about cool benefits and programs
• Celebrate anniversary
• Continue to monitor and extend IDP
• Continue self-evals

Ok! Now that you have a powerful onboarding process that we’ve proven is effective with many clients, see how it works for you. Customize the above to make it yours, and let us know how your retention soars.