A Familiar Story
One thing we like to do as a team is share our subpar onboarding experiences… sometimes they’re good for a laugh, but they’re always good for insight, and unearthing pain points for us to explore further as we continuously improve the Welcomary experience. I wanted to break one down in particular, and where the missteps might have been corrected… and hopefully will be in the future.
We will remove the company name here, because the main beats of this story are what matter… and they’re all too familiar. Suffice it to say this was a large company in a complex industry that was new to her.
Our teammate only lasted a few weeks here, and it’s certainly understandable.
Day 1: Filled out paperwork for a few hours.
Paperwork is unavoidable. But it also doesn’t take very long, and, as first impressions go, isn’t too impressive. See if the new hire’s future team members can spare even just 15 or 30 minutes to sincerely introduce themselves and learn a bit about this person. They don’t need to be fully onboarding to share some info about their background, what they enjoy doing outside of work, and so forth. The paperwork won’t last forever, so create a day-one experience that at least begins to bring them into the circle where they’ll be working.
Day 2: Was introduced to my desk. I had to find supplies and, undirected, introduced myself to people on my floor wherever I could find someone who wasn’t in the middle of something. Some of them were people I’d never be in a meeting with again.
In the pre-COVID days, one’s office desk was a second home. For most office employees out there, it still is. Urge a new hire’s desk- or floor-mates to be good neighbors… introduce themselves, give them a tour, ask them to lunch. HR probably sits on another floor entirely, so why not have a local show them around instead?
Day 3: I attended my first meetings outside of HR sessions. Though I caught a word here and there, most of the content went right over my head. I knew I’d figure it out eventually, but eventually felt like a long, long time away… especially considering the other two roles I turned down to come here.
Let’s try a different analogy: international travel. When you don’t know the roads, the language, the people or the places, you get a guidebook of some kind (or a guide-person). You may have an Employee Handbook, but does it tell a new hire the definition of an acronym or term? Provide organizational information? Give the employee a roadmap for their first 90 days? Knowledge management takes some initial effort - and motivation - but it really, truly does pay off.
Day 4 - 21. More of the same. The confusion and frustration ebbed and flowed but it was always there… and I had no desire to continue bugging co-workers about definitions, meanings, and where to go. Almost everyone was cordial to me when I asked for help, but it didn’t make me feel much better.
Everyone’s got their own work to do, and unfortunately most managers have limited tolerance for an employee taking time out to help a new person… and that means the employee does, as well, whether they say so or not. With that same effort toward knowledge management we just mentioned, you’re less likely to have to test that tolerance.
Day 22: I had a meet-and-greet with an SVP who had been at the company for 20 years. Friendly enough, but he treated it as an obligation to meet me, and clearly wanted to get back to whatever else he was doing. The main thing I remember from that chat was a warning - a warning about the politics at the company, and how their forced-ranking system led to team “resizing” after each review cycle. This person seemed very different when I interviewed with him a month before…
It’s great for busy leaders to take time out of their day to extend a warm welcome to someone new… even if it takes a few weeks to get around to it. But if you don’t put your best foot forward, be fully present and focus on this new person, how will they feel? How would you feel? Remember that working at one company for many years (and continuing to work there) gives you a very, very different perspective than that of someone who has just started. They’re still evaluating whether they made the right choice by accepting this role, among other things.
Day 23: I’d had enough. Thankfully, one of those two job offers I turned down was still open, and I took it. Their onboarding was far from perfect, but much better than my last experience…. and I enjoyed my four and a half years there.
There’s a sense that you need to give a job at least 3, or 6, or 12 months before making a judgment call on whether you want to be there. But, as we said above, that’s a very different time horizon for a manager who’s been at the company through multiple presidential administrations, than it is someone who probably just took a significant step, leap, or stride in their career. The more your onboarding program, guidelines and overall mindset reflects a sense of empathy for the new hire - and all of their hopes, aspirations and anxieties - the less something like this story will unfold at your organization.
