Page 82 - Successful Onboarding

The State of the Art: Essentials of Strategic Onboarding • 71

Program branding is also great because it can deliver some easy wins.
Most firms today have existing processes that have never been tied to
onboarding but help in new hire integration. An onboarding designer can
carve out new value at very little expense just by identifying these programs
and putting them under a common umbrella. Your firm likely has train-
ing programs in place that are available to all employees. By assessing
these, identifying which are most relevant for new hires and/or specific
new hire segments, and integrating them into a branded onboarding pro-
gram, you create value for new hires—and by extension, the firm. You are
granting new hires better access to existing resources in one place, as one
system. You are also creating value by helping current employees see the
deeper strategic connection between these existing programs, in turn lead-
ing them to become more enthusiastic participants.

Diverse participants

If onboarding affects the experiences of new hires across the four pillars,
and we give it pride of place as a key strategic initiative, whom exactly
should we hold accountable for its success? Our answer: Nearly everyone.
In a state-of-the-art strategic approach, onboarding ceases to be solely HR’s
responsibility. Rather, everyone in the organization understands that they
have some responsibility for integrating new hires properly.
A systemic approach will identify all the business processes that affect
the new hire so they can be coordinated to produce one tailored experi-
ence. To get laptops to all new hires on Day One, you have to work with
IT. To ensure a great first assignment for the new hire, you need to work
with hiring managers. To capture an understanding of product strategy
you need to work with Product Management within the Marketing func-
tion. Facilities management will have roles. Each of these and many other
departments and participants in these departments need to know that they
will bear specific responsibilities for new hires’ successful integration, as
determined by certain agreed-upon metrics.
Mid and upper level leaders have critical roles to play and formal
responsibility to shoulder, up to and including the CEO. Top brass needs
to convey the importance of new hire integration to the organization.