What is the onboarding process?
In order to understand how effective your onboarding process can be on employee retention, it is a good idea to familiarise yourself with what the onboarding process entails. Employee onboarding can involve the following:
- Adequate training to employees
- Familiarisation with workplace culture, values and policies
- Offering perks and other incentives to keep new employees interested from the beginning
- Orientation and introduction to other team members, line manager and other departments if necessary
These are the basics of an onboarding process, and you may find that you continue with the onboarding process for several months before an employee is sufficiently oriented in your company. Onboarding is different to orientation in that it focuses more on familiarising your employees with your company’s culture, goals, and hierarchical structure. During this time, they can get to know their team and how their workflow fits in with your overall business strategy.
Why do employees leave?
In order to work out how to create an effective employee retention scheme as part of your overall HR strategy, you may first consider the primary causes for employees leaving following the onboarding process. Here are a few suggestions that could help explain why employees may be leaving your company:
- They feel unsupported
- Their role and workflow are unclear
- Their efforts and role in the team aren’t recognised
- They are unhappy about your company’s culture
- They don’t feel included in the company
- They can’t see clear possibilities for career development
- Lack of structure makes them unsure as to what is expected of them
- Poor work-life balance
- Few perks
Your onboarding process is an opportune time to address any concerns that your new employee has. Make sure that they are completely familiar with your business’s culture and the policies and processes relevant to their job description. It gives you an opportunity to introduce your employee to their new colleagues and other departments, making them feel welcome and included from the get-go.
Important onboarding factors for employees
One survey showed that a great onboarding process can improve employee retention by 83%. Onboarding can help your employees quickly settle in at your business and prevent them from looking elsewhere for better or more secure opportunities. Onboarding should therefore be part of your overall employee retention strategy. You can also help retain employees by offering perks, employee compensation, wellness opportunities and mentorship programmes. Make sure you advertise these perks during onboarding, as your new employees may not be familiar with all the benefits you offer. It is also a good time to help new employees become familiar with how your reward systems work. This is so they can better take advantage of the perks you offer.
Buddy programmes
When your new employees are paired with a buddy through a buddy programme, they can learn new skills and learn about your company’s values more quickly. Your employee’s buddy can be any other employee, though you may prefer a senior, experienced team member. A buddy is not a mentor or coach. Instead, they are there to help your employees become familiar with the basics of their new job. They can show employees new skills and workflows; they do not need to conduct any advanced training. Having a senior team member as a buddy also helps employees feel more involved in your company culture, as they can help them feel more socially included in your business’s social activities.
Your employee can also give their buddy feedback on the onboarding process so far, which is a great way to help ensure it runs smoothly and efficiently. Your new employee’s feedback can help inspire new ideas for your onboarding process in the future. Consider your onboarding strategy a fluid process which you can adapt to each employee’s strengths and weaknesses, or changes within your company. If you are considering creating a formal buddy programme as part of your onboarding strategy, here are some factors to think about:
Consider what your employee’s buddy is responsible for
It is worth considering whether the assigned buddy has the knowledge to guide your employee through challenging tasks that they are unfamiliar with. It is also important that this buddy is familiar with the company. They should ideally also be well versed in your company’s policy, such as the dress code, calling in sick and how to take breaks.
Does your employee’s buddy have the right personality for the job?
Another important consideration to make is the personality of your new employee’s assigned buddy. You should also make sure that your new employee is the right fit for the buddy that you have in mind for them. Personality characteristics you could look out for in an optimum employee buddy include:
- Willingness to help
- Good emotional intelligence
- Problem-solving skills
- Is hard-working and has demonstrated great performance
- Has previous mentoring experience
- Has a good reputation among colleagues
A buddy does not have to be a senior member of staff. They can be a peer of your new employee. This may work to your advantage, as if they are working in the same department as your employee, they will have a good understanding of the team already, as well as their workflow. Make sure that your employee’s buddy has the right temperament for the role. They should want to take on the role in a dedicated fashion and be encouraging throughout your employee’s entire onboarding process.
What is employment proficiency?
To adequately train your employees, it is helpful to understand their strengths and weaknesses. A good way to learn more about your employee’s skill set is to have them complete an employment proficiency test. You could conduct an employment proficiency test during the onboarding process to find out what skills the employee needs to develop and what soft skills they have already.
An employment proficiency test may be especially useful if your employee is working in a specialised field. The results of this test will show you what aspects of an employee’s skill set need to be developed before they take on responsibilities and more advanced tasks. You could address your employee’s weaknesses during their onboarding training, making sure to praise their strengths and giving them clear and encouraging feedback on their test. After all, you want your employees to feel empowered and ready to take on new challenges.
With these tips, you probably now have a good idea of how to improve employee retention by making the onboarding process as smooth as possible. Onboarding gives you the chance to help employees assimilate your company culture. After all, you want them to feel like a useful member of your team from day one. Not only does a great onboarding process help improve employee productivity, but it can also make your business more competitive and enticing to potential candidates. You can discuss some aspects of your onboarding process, such as buddy programmes, with potential employees. This could help your employee retention in the long term.
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