Many workers say that the new employee orientation and onboarding process is more awkward than a first date. Employee onboarding needs to be more than a day of setting up their workstations and filling numerous forms.
People want to be welcomed warmly and shown how essential they are and the colleagues they will get paired with to find the right mentors. The organize the most positive onboarding experience that will keep workers happy, here are 5 tips.
Decorate Employee Desks
It is always lonely for a new employee to walk into an office or workspace and see that theirs is unimpressive. In line with your work culture, you should celebrate someone’s arrival with signs, company merchandise, and some balloons.
Employee engagement will skyrocket from that point if you prove that you care about their presence and genuinely appreciate them joining the company.
New Employee Orientation Packets
Your new hires will receive orientation packets during the new job onboarding process. However, you should always include more than a basic handbook.
Although the handbook is necessary to go over on a new employee’s first day, you should still add some extra items to make people feel special. For instance, you should also include a local map, train schedule, lists of coffee shops and restaurants, and anything else the person can find helpful to adjust to the new environment.
Instead of increasing paperwork and intimidating people with large files, you should digitize this process with WorkBright employee onboarding software. This way, your new employees can be greeted with everyone’s smiles instead of huge packets of forms.
Give Good Gifts
Most companies give swag bags so employees can enjoy free merchandise. However, you should think outside the box to personalize employee gifts for special occasions.
Instead of giving someone the same office stationery and t-shirts, you should ask new employees about the gifts they would like to receive. You can play a game called “things that make me happy.” This is where a new hire can state on a form the types of gifts they want.
Flexible Start Time
Flexible timings should be an essential part of employee onboarding practices. The person you hired is learning something new. This requires a lot of energy and effort. You should give people time to adjust to their surroundings.
This makes a significant difference because new employees are typically overwhelmed and anxious. This way, you can let them have a moment to breathe as they start meeting new people and learning the ropes.
Assign Seats
Being new is a tough process, especially if the person does not have an assigned seat or cubicle. Making space and creating name tags during the onboarding process can go a long way to make people feel part of your team. You can also color code for different seats to create a welcoming theme.
Inspire New Employees
Having an effective new employee orientation process is necessary to inspire people. You do not want a new employee telling everyone that the company did not care about making them feel welcomed.
People are typically nervous on their first day, which is why you need to go all out to enhance their experience. If you enjoyed reading these onboarding tips, check out some of our other posts for more information.
The New Jersey Digest is a new jersey magazine that has chronicled daily life in the Garden State for over 10 years.