Remote Employee Onboarding – Best Practices From Industry Leaders

Your first impression is everything!

Yup! Trust us when we say, your smooth onboarding process is more like a frontline worker when it comes to hiring new employees. It renders them the first point to judge you.

Evidently, 93% of employers believe a good onboarding experience is critical in influencing a new employee’s decision whether to stay with the company.

And comparatively, a poor onboarding experience doubles the likelihood of the employee finding another position. It also indicates a pathetic employee retention rate.

So, we have curated the most crucial steps you as a CEO must take to ensure an onboarding process as smooth as a buttered cog to make your employees stick with you (like they are under a magic spell).

Here are the 6 winning steps which will guarantee a revamped experience for your company on the whole:

• Go one step ahead
• Map out an onboarding agenda
• Avoid kick starts
• Include sensei sessions
• Introduction is important
• Allot a welcome buddy

Remote businesses frequently wait until an employee’s first day before beginning the onboarding process. We believe there is a better course of action, and it begins long before your new team member reports for duty:

As soon as you have finished the hiring procedure for new employees, send out a welcome package.

Receiving free gifts in the snail mail is the most thrilling thing ever. Send a welcome package that contains the following once you offer employment and your candidate accepts the position:

• The company manual or other reading material pertaining to the company
• Onboarding schedule
• Company swag
• Contracts that have to be signed
• Something enjoyable for their home office

Receiving this package will help quell first-day jitters and build goodwill. Before each meeting, new hires can even feel a sense of belonging. And they’ll be more likely to get started right away on the first day.

Bonus:

It’s not unusual for them to post about their eccentric excitement and free swag on social media, which is a terrific way to organically promote your company and inclusive hiring policies.

We advise you to include an agenda in your welcome packet along with the swag, outlining the course of your new hire’s onboarding and first two weeks.

They get a sneak peek at what’s coming up, which calms their initial anxiety (without overwhelming them). Additionally, it’s a great method to ease them into working remotely and with your team.

In addition to including this agenda in your welcome packet, you should also communicate this information with your new hire by adding it to a Google Doc or organised board in your preferred project management (PM) application.

Instead of feeling under pressure to master these tools on the first day, this allows students the chance to get accustomed to utilising them.

But if you find it a lot to take in and keep track of, no worries. We always got your back, do reach out to the IT service desk outsourcing to share your burdens, and you cannot find a better half than them.

In order to avoid any bumpy heads up, create a few easy tasks which give only the limited exposure of all the other tasks just touching the surface. This will help the new hires to gain some confidence which will boost up their productivity when gradually introduced to the real tasks.

Just let them collide into a pillow instead of colliding head first into a hard stoned wall!

Then, have they check in using your preferred communications channel. Assign these tasks in your project management programme. You can help them practise using the software, iron out any problems, and then gradually ease them into doing real work.

Consider adding a few virtual training sessions to the itinerary for your new hire. You can share internal training films, send links to internet tutorials, or use Google Slides to present training materials. These will enable them to catch up on their own schedule.

Live one-on-one video chats can teach new hires the fundamentals of their team or department, as well as the peculiarities of proprietary software. Tell them the time and date of these training sessions and whether being on camera is required.

Do prefer using Google calendar which will wake the employees up for you.

Everyone desires and deserves the opportunity to meet their co-workers virtually in a less daunting setting. The schedule should therefore include a few video calls, starting with smaller groups of workers they will be interacting with often.

Next, arrange one-on-one meetings with the manager or with other managers with whom the employee will frequently interact. Introduce your new employee to the rest of the team during a team meeting after a few days.

Pro tip 1:

Making your new hires interact with a manager/employee with the sweetest temperament should really be considered while welcoming a new team member. But forget not, a child might puke when it is excessively exposed to sweet!

So, no staging of any unhealthy and sugar-coated welcoming practices please.

Pro tip 2:

Plan these meet-and-greets to last no more than 10 to 15 minutes for everyone present. The workday won’t be much disrupted by this time, and new employees won’t feel under pressure to “be on” for a lengthy time.

Pro tip 3:

Prepare a list of light-hearted prompts to ask your new hire on your initial call. Ask them to share any interesting or ridiculous facts about themselves that most people wouldn’t know. Or keep to simple inquiries about their preferred fruit, veggie, TV programme, pastime, etc.

Finally, we highly recommend using the buddy system to pair up one employee with your new worker. To “teach them the ropes” and be available if they run into trouble, this one person will be their designated, go-to employee.

They’ll be less perplexed about where to seek assistance and more at ease knowing that they can always chat to someone.

For this, we suggest pairing your new hire with a co-worker they will frequently collaborate with. When you do this during the onboarding process, they can immediately begin developing a close bond.

Set a time for both parties to check in and use asynchronous communication. This will assist everyone in juggling their obligations with socialising (and not overwhelm either employee).

To onboard New Work From Home Employees, here’s a snippet of the steps you’ll need to take:

1. Set expectations and create a remote onboarding procedure. Team members and new hires are kept in the loop using a uniform method. It also helps people feel more at ease with their obligations.
2. Offer virtual instruction using web videos. These might be connected to their new position, the culture of your business, your operational procedures, etc.
3. Give staff members access to tools for project management, communication, and more. You might have fewer hiccups when they actually start using things as they become more accustomed to doing so (and learn about their eccentricities).
4. Checking in regularly can help you balance reaching out with your other responsibilities (and won’t overwhelm new hires).

“The ‘purpose’ element of onboarding is where you begin to lay the foundation of success for your new team member.”

– Mitch Gray, How to Hire and Keep Great People

We have managed to curate the best 6 steps that can help you revamp your onboarding process into something which can memorably good for your new employees.

This smooth onboarding process which will be the result of following the above steps is much effective and has within itself the major benefits like pumping up top talent retention and employee retention.

As the reports have it, 25% of a company’s new hires would leave within a year if the onboarding experience was poor and Retention rates for businesses that provide formal onboarding training are estimated to be 50%. These figures demand you to think twice nevertheless.

Revamping the onboarding process from the scratch doe’s demand some pain, but it will be worth it. Going an extra mile in the business world is not that easy but when you can see the productivity it can pump up it will make your day.

Get on with it.