Maximizing The Onboarding Process

Not too long ago, ERE.net ran an article by David Lee on organization onboarding and outlined thirteen questions that could drastical improve an employee's onboarding. I thought the article was incredible and definitely something I should bring to your attention. Please find the article below, and as always, your comments and feedback are welcome. Enjoy -

13 Questions to Maximize Your Onboarding Efforts
Common-sense steps you can't afford to ignore
9/12/2007 by David Lee
president
www.HumanNatureAtWork.com
email bio

If you're serious about upgrading your new-hire orientation program and onboarding process as a whole, here are 13 questions you need to ask. Ask them of yourself, your HR department, your management team, your frontline supervisors, and most important, your new employees.

1. 
   Do we make our new hires feel welcome? Analyze step by step the first few days on the job that your new employees experience. Do you do things that communicate "We're glad you're here" or is it more "All right get to work, we've got things to do here?" Ask new hires who've been on the job a month or two how welcome they felt the first day, the first week, the first month. Ask them what you did that made them feel welcome and what you could do to create a more welcoming experience. In overhauling a call center orientation program, we had all the team leaders sign a welcome poster and put a sign in the lobby welcoming our new crop of call-center reps. In our evaluations, new hires reported that they never felt so welcomed in any of their other jobs.
2. 
   Do we inspire pride? The first application of this question requires brutal honesty. Look at how well-run both your orientation program and the onboarding process as a whole are. Are they thorough, organized, compelling, and state of the art, or are they a slipshod, haphazard mess? Most organizations tolerate a level of professionalism and efficacy in their onboarding process they would never tolerate in their overall operations. The other aspect of inspiring pride relates to the next three questions. If you want to inspire your new hires, rather than leave them with buyer's remorse, make sure your orientation program lets them know they joined a great company. The next three points explain how.
3. 
   Do we connect them with the big picture? The more new hires understand the mission, vision, goals, and uniqueness of your organization, the more engaged they will be from the outset. If the centerpiece of your orientation program is rules, regulations, and logistical minutiae, you can guarantee they will have second thoughts about their job choice. Orientation programs that don't emphasize the big picture rob the organization of perhaps the greatest value new hires bring to their new employer: enthusiasm and the desire to make a difference.
4. 
   Do we show them how much they matter? Engaging employees from the outset requires more than just communicating "This is what we're about and why we're a great company." It must also include "This is how you help make it all happen." Communicating this is especially important if you want to attract and retain Gen Y employees, who place an extremely high priority on work that matters and being able to make a difference. At the call center I worked in, the original orientation and training focused on the technical side of the call center reps' jobs for the first couple of weeks. The message? "Your jobs are about processing transactions. In this company, you're a worker bee." Mindful that what we emphasize communicates a message to employees about what's important, we changed the order of topics. Day one was devoted to how important their jobs were and how, to our customers, they were Acme Insurance (obviously not the real name of the company.) Think orientation programs you've attended and what difference it would have made for you if you heard how vital your role was from day one, rather than hour after hour of transactional, technical information.
5. 
   Do we collect and share stories? Great companies communicate their greatness through great stories. Whether it's Nordstrom's legendary customer service stories (remember the one about the customer returning the tires?) or Southwest Airline's legendary customer service and work environment, greatness is communicated not through PowerPoint lectures, charts, and graphs, but through stories that touch the heart and capture the imagination. One of the best things you can do to upgrade your orientation program is collect stories from your employees about experiences they've had that embody the unique personality of your company; convey what it's like to work at your company; illustrate the great things your company does; and demonstrate how employees make a difference. Share these with your new hires. Better still, have the people who told you these stories come in and share them. Doing so accomplishes several useful objectives. First, it creates a more engaging, inspiring orientation programs. Second, it communicates to current employees they are an important part of helping new hires come onboard. Third, it gives frontline employees the chance to be a star and informal leader.
6. 
   Do we make our orientation program interesting and interactive? Many, if not most, orientation programs are about as interesting as watching cement solidify. Besides being boring, such programs send a disturbing message to your new employees. Such programs say "You just joined a company that doesn't know how to do things right." Think of boring orientation programs you've attended and what you thought about your new employer. There's too much information available on how to make learning fun and interactive to excuse old-fashioned, boring data dumps.
7. 
   Do we make our process employee-centric or employer-centric? Borrow from the playbook of great customer-service companies: design the customer experience from the customer's perspective. In this case, analyze your onboarding process from the new hire's perspective. When you've been with the same company for awhile, it's easy to forget what it's like to not know what's going on, who to go to for help, and the desire to not be seen as a high-maintenance employee. To design your process from the new hire's perspective, ask them for their perspective. Smart companies, like Northeast Delta Dental, awarded the Fourth Best Small Company to Work For in the U.S., do this. They continually ask new employees for feedback on how to make their onboarding process more user-friendly and how to more effectively address the needs of their new employees.
8. 
   Have we broken our orientation program down into bite-sized chunks? Think of times you've endured orientation programs that were info-dump ultra-marathons. How much did you retain? How impressed were you with your new employer? You knew that was a stupid, ineffective way to impart information. Your new hires will have the same opinion. As one manager I interviewed wisely noted, "With today's employees, just as you're rating them, they're rating you." By breaking your orientation program into digestible chunks, you not only communicate, "We're a company that does things right," you also communicate, "We care about you and respect you enough to spare you a lousy, nonsensical training experience."
9. 
   Are we offloading as much information as we can onto our intranet (or non-digital equivalent if you don't have an intranet)? Have you ever had someone give you detailed, step-by-step instructions days, weeks, or months before you would actually need them? How helpful was that? By offloading as much information as you can so it's available in an "as-needed" basis, you are being more efficient and effective. You're also once again communicating to new hires that you know how to do things right.
10. 
    Do we make it easy for new hires to get the information they need? Having a comprehensive intranet gives your new hires a greater sense of security that they can find the information they need when they need it. This, combined with a culture that makes it ok to ask for help, reduces the anxiety of being in a new environment, not knowing the ropes, but not wanting to be considered a pain in the neck. Do you have both a comprehensive knowledge base and a friendly, "glad to help you" culture? If you do, your new employees don't waste valuable time and energy fretting about how they are going to find the information they need.
11. 
    Do we make it easy for new hires to tell us how they're doing?and how we're doing? In companies that have a "suck it up" and "sink or swim" mentality, new hires learn quickly that it's best to keep their mouths shut. Their employer never hears about what they do that alienates their new hires (until the exit interview, and often not even then). Designer Blinds, an Omaha-based company, reduced turnover from 200% to 8%, in part by instituting what they call the "Entrance Interview." After analyzing its turnover statistics, it discovered that most of its new hires were leaving between 90 and 180 days into their employee experience. So rather than wait to find out why they were leaving in the exit interview, the company decided to prevent them from leaving in the first place. It did this by instituting the Entrance Interview. These are now held prior to the 90-day "witching hour," so they could find out what their new hires needed, how they could help them be successful, and so on. At Northeast Delta Dental, at 90 days, new hires get to have their "20 Questions with Connie" meeting. At this meeting, new hires sit down with Connie Roy-Czychowski, VP of HR, and give her feedback on every aspect of the onboarding process and their work experience.
12. 
    Do we have an effective mentoring program? A good program also lets the person doing the mentoring win, since recognition plays a major role in employee engagement. Mentoring also provides tremendous value to current employees because it gives them a chance to develop coaching, supervisory, and leadership skills. Given that professional development and skill portfolio expansion are especially high priorities for today's workers, a mentoring program also aids your efforts at retaining and engaging your current employees.
13. 
    Do we help our managers do their part well? As Gallup's research has shown, when it comes to employee engagement and performance, it's all about the boss. More than any other factor influencing employee engagement and performance, an employee's supervisor plays the most important role. Helping supervisors understand how to create a positive, productive, inspiring work experience is not only the foundation of a high-performance workplace, it's a "must" if you want an effective onboarding process. If HR simply asks supervisors to help their new hires get started without helping them do it right, they won't. Make sure your supervisors receive training, support, checklists, and so on, so they cover all the bases. Companies like Bensonwood Homes, a New Hampshire-based company, and Northeast Delta Dental have detailed checklists for supervisors that outline what they should do the first day, first week, etc.

One Final Point
Business sage Jim Rohn has a simple saying that conveys much wisdom: "It's not what you know, it's what you do with what you know that makes a difference in your life."
My hope is that as you read through these questions, you didn't simply ask yourself if you knew these factors were important. They're pretty common sense (yet despite this, rarely done). Ask yourself, your HR department, your management team, your frontline supervisors, and most important, your new hires whether you are actually doing these. Then involve all to make sure you can answer each with a confident "absolutely."

Employees as Internal Candidates

Today, ERE.net had an article by Kevin Wheeler, regarding how we value employees. I thought Kevin's article was insightful and right on target. As such, I wanted to share it with you. To read more articles by Kevin, please visit ERE.net or reach out to Kevin via his email at the end of the article.

Enjoy today's posting and have a great Labor Day weekend -



Employees Are Not Assets: The value of internal candidates
Thursday, August 30, 2007 by Kevin Wheeler
Kevin Wheeler(110)
send Kevin an email
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I am still amazed at how many organizations do not allow their current employees to apply for internal positions until they meet a whole bunch of conditions. Typically, they have to have been in a position for a certain amount of time, may have to meet performance requirements, may have to fill out an application, and then go through the same interview process as an external candidate.

Most HR people think this is fine, and in fact, often put these rules in place. Their thinking is understandable from one perspective. After all, shouldn't a boss be aware that an employee is looking? And if a person has only been in a job for a few months, isn't it only fair they give their boss their services for a few months?

My answer is that yes, it would be fair, if we were not in the midst of a talent shortage where "fair" has little meaning. Is it fair any employee can simply tell her boss she won't be back tomorrow because she has another job? Is it fair that employees can often get a salary increase of 10% or more simply by moving to another company? Is it fair that we have a labor shortage?

There is little in life that is fair, and the days of stability and loyalty in our corporations are over. We could argue about why these traits have gone by the wayside, but the truth is that they have. The shortage of talent in some areas such as engineering, IT, medicine, and finance are so severe that almost anything has become "fair" in the pursuit of talented people with these skills.
I have started to notice "For Hire" signs hanging in front of lots of stores and restaurants I have been in over the past three months seeking hourly help. This underlines the growing shortage of talent and the growing need for people with key skills. To place obstacles in the way of anyone with a motivation to raise their hand to move into a needed position is plainly just dumb.
Let's face the truth: whether employees are allowed to transfer freely inside or not affects no one but the employer. They lose a good employee to another company for no good or value-added reason.

Employees As Investors
One of our problems is that we think of employees as assets, or things we control and dispose of as we see fit. Unfortunately, this characterization leads to behaviors that are incompatible with reality. Employees cannot be owned, taxed, depreciated, or disposed of as machines or other tangible assets.

They are investors in our organizations and they freely choose to share their expertise and skills with us or not. Each employee has a built-in return on investment meter that is constantly sampling the atmosphere and deciding if she is gaining or losing from a continuing association with the firm. As long as employees feel they are gaining, they don't look for different jobs.
But in this job market, whenever the balance shifts even slightly, employees become vulnerable to any offer that may present itself. That is why having managers who have a history of good employee loyalty and low turnover are so valuable.

Usually when an employee wants to apply for another position inside the firm it is because they are looking for a new challenge, are unhappy with their current assignment of boss, or feel that the new position will offer more of a return on their investment. To deny them the opportunity and to place some HR policy in their way is not only a sure way to lose them to someone else, it is also just plain dumb. Happy employees who are being treated as investors will be unlikely to leave.

Here are four things every organization and HR group should be doing or should have in place today:

All policies should be abolished that limit or control how or when employees apply for positions within an organization. Every employee should have the same employment at-will opportunities inside the company as exist in the open marketplace.

Companies should make it a policy to encourage employees to share expertise and skills broadly. After all, it is the networking interconnectedness of our employees that add value and allow us to develop new products and generate new ideas. Creativity does not arise in stable, rigid, and change-adverse organizations. The most exciting new concepts and ideas come from small firms where people wear many hats and move between responsibilities such as the dot-com companies of Silicon Valley.

Let recruiters work just as freely inside as outside the organization and let them work on back-filling positions that may be vacated by an employee who is moving on to something else. If a recruiter knows an employee is leaving for a new position, they can help the manager find someone else for the old position at almost the same time.

Create policies that allow employees to try out new jobs for a short time to see whether they like it and can do it well. Let employees share their job with someone else so they can sample more than one kind of work or more than one project. Foster a spirit of sharing expertise and skills, not of owning the mind and body of someone.

The policies that restrict or limit transfers and change within an organization are leftovers of the 20th-century organizations that are hierarchical, paternalistic, and slowly fading away. A 21st-century organization removes barriers and builds networks that power creativity and growth.

Kevin Wheeler (kwheeler@glresources.com), the President and Founder of Global Learning Resources, Inc., is a globally-known speaker, author, columnist, and consultant in human capital acquisition and development. His extensive career, global client base, and research affiliations make GLR a leading provider of both strategy and process. GLR focuses on assisting firms architect human capital strategies. GLR guides firms thorough comprehensive talent acquisition processes and procedures as well as the development of talent within organizations of all sizes. GLR can be explored at http://www.glresources.com.

Time Management

Today's feature article is from Vince Thompson, and brought to you by TheLadders.com. I cannot reiterate enough how great a resource TheLadders is, so please take a few minutes and click on the link on the right side of the blog and take a look at their site. You'll be impressed with all the resources and tools they provide - but now on to the article.

Time Management: It's About Your Boss!By Vince Thompson

For years, we’ve heard that time management is about quadrants, action items, and prioritizing tasks. In fact, go to just about any time management seminar, and I can pretty much guarantee that the trainer will spend a lot of time showing you how to analyze your calendar, log your time spent in activities, plan your workweek, etc. You'll likely realize that you do indeed spend too much time on e–mail, on the phone, and on seemingly urgent activities.

Initially, you’ll plan your calendar better, define your activities in quadrants, and prioritize your workload. But then the trainer leaves, and within a week you fall right back into your old habits.
Why does this happen? Because no matter what your actual job is, you likely end up doing the things that you think your boss expects you to do. So, even though an important part of your job may be to write business plans, you know that your boss also expects you to answer her emails within 15 minutes or to be available on Instant Messenger. Very often, these expectations come before the important tasks you need to do. While communication is important, if you’re truly going to have the time to spend on tasks that move the company forward, then you need to gain more power over your schedule and apply it to your day.

Have a conversation with your boss about the various activities you are expected to do, and reach an agreement about what defines success. From here, it’s your responsibility to constantly manage expectations.

Manage Your Manager, Not Your Time

To take back your time, your life, and your career, you need to step into the realm of managing your manager to alter their expectations related to your time. The goal is to achieve complete alignment between what your boss wants and needs you to do, and what you believe you really should do.

Here's how you do it:

1. Analyze your bosses’ needs

You need to know what your boss expects of himself and what your boss's boss expects of him. What goals do your bosses have? What can you do to help them be more successful?
Unfortunately, a lot of people in business assume that "meeting the boss’s needs" means doing exactly what the boss wants them to do – – accepting the boss’s vision and direction wholesale. Wrong! This assumption sets the stage for meeting the status quo rather than meeting the needs that’ll actually make a difference.

2. Adopt a Management Value Added mindset

One way to start using the concept of Management Value Added (MVA) to figure out the ways you can provide the most value to your company is by sitting down with your boss to discuss his or her needs. Then ask your boss, "How do you feel I can add the most value?" If your boss responds, "Huh?" you can flesh out the question with additional questions like these:
"What are the activities I’m engaged in where I contribute the most?"
"What are the activities that you and the company most need me to do?"
"What do you consider to be the best and most productive use of my time?"
"What do you think is the special contribution that I am best positioned to offer to you and the company?"
"Of all the things that I’m engaged in on behalf of this company, what are the three areas where you believe that I can contribute the most?"

Listen carefully to your boss’s answers. Using them as a guide, you can begin to understand exactly how your boss views your contributions. It’s likely that the way he or she measures your value is different from the way you might measure it.

3. Implement what you learn

You can use the information your boss shares with you to help you determine how to spend your time, which projects to support, and which meetings to attend.

For example, if your boss replies that your most important areas of contribution are your ability to guide talent, build capacity; and stay close to the customers, then before committing to any new activity, you can ask yourself, "Will this activity help me achieve my priorities? Will it help me put the right people in the right jobs? Will it help me build capability? Will it help me know and connect with our customers?" If the answer is no, avoid the activity – – even if it sounds otherwise interesting, appealing, or fun.

Abiding by the MVA concept helps you maintain a focus on the things that matter while earning the support of those you serve. Then, when your boss or someone else in the organization asks you to commit time or energy to an area that falls outside of the MVA priorities you’ve established, you can talk to your boss about how the new commitment may affect your main goals and reach a joint decision as to whether a shift in priorities is warranted. Each time you and your boss are out of alignment, you have an opportunity to further understand your boss’s needs and goals.

Manage Your Future for Success

When you follow this process and gain agreement, you’ll have a clearer understanding of where your focus should be each day. With clear focus comes a renewed sense of purpose, because you're now spending your time on what truly matters – – both to you and to your boss. And when everyone’s needs are being met in a way that supports the company’s vision, the result is a more productive and happier work environment.

Vince Thompson is a Manager. Over the course of his career he has spent 15 years leading teams in a variety of hotbeds for learning: First in restaurants, then in television stations then for seven years as Regional Vice President of Sales for America Online. He is the author of Ignited: Managers, Light up Your Career for More Power, More Purpose, and More Success.

Current Positions

Good Morning -

With the Labor Day long weekend rapidly approaching, I thought I would take a moment to update you all on the current positions on my desk. As of this morning, the current portfolio is:

• Area Manager (Multiple positions in multiple locations)
• Key Account Manager/Product Manager
• Human Resources Director
• Product Manager
• Manufacturing Manager
• Sales Manager
• Safety Coordinator

As always, please do not hesitate to reach out to me if I can be of any assistance in your career search. Have a great holiday weekend!!