Since the start of the Great Resignation, you’ve probably been knee-deep in prospecting, recruiting, and hiring.
But now that you have a wave of new talent joining your organization, it’s time to shift your focus to an equally important part of the employee experience: onboarding.
This is one of the more underrated processes at most organizations, but it shouldn’t be. Research shows that the onboarding experience can impact everything from retention rates to how new hires feel about your company to productivity levels.
Despite its importance, only 12% of employees feel that their employer does a great job with onboarding. This might make you pause and wonder: how does my organization’s onboarding strategy stack up?
Take the quiz to learn:
- How your onboarding strategy compares to others
- Where your employees are getting confused when it comes to benefits
- Tools and data that will help you take your engagement strategy from good to great
You're not alone!
If you haven't had the bandwidth or resources to create a structured onboarding program, that's OK!
1 in 5
companies don't have a formal onboarding program
Now is the best time to start thinking about how you want to craft an awesome experience for all your new hires.
As a first step, do some research to understand what your employees want from their onboarding experience. What distinguishes a good process from a subpar one? How can you make your program stand out from others during the Great Resignation?
Get answers to these onboarding-related questions here.
You're on the right track!
Great job! It sounds like you already have a pretty good onboarding program in place.
Your next step is to fine-tune your existing process for remote employees. The goal is to make sure these new hires feel just as welcomed, excited, and ready to hit the ground running as they would if they were in the office.
Here are some best practices for remote onboarding.
Congratulations!
It sounds like you have a well-structured onboarding program, which means you probably have super satisfied employees who are excited about their new roles. In fact, 70% of those with exceptional onboarding experiences say they have "the best possible job."
Employees are
2.6X
more likely to be satisfied with their workplace when they have an exceptional onboarding experience
Just like with any other program, make sure to re-evaluate your onboarding experience from time to time. Our world of work is constantly changing, which means that our processes have to continuously evolve as well.
For instance, have you re-visited your virtual onboarding process recently? Now that so many employees are being hired for remote roles, it's critical to make sure your onboarding program aligns with these new circumstances.
Make sure you're checking all the right boxes with your virtual onboarding program.
There's room for improvement!
There's a huge learning curve when employees first start their jobs.
Not only do they have to learn the ins and outs of their new role, but they also have to integrate into the culture, familiarize themselves with the existing processes, and meet tons of new people. It can be really overwhelming.
Only
29%
of new hires feel fully prepared after their onboarding experience
That's why it's critical to start the onboarding process as early as possible. This gives people enough time to start tackling administrative tasks, while also mentally preparing themselves for the first day.
Break up your process into multiple phases so that you know exactly when each one starts and ends. This will help you create a consistent onboarding experience.
Understand the key three phases of the onboarding process.
There's room for improvement!
We love that you have a structured onboarding program that starts right around your new hire's first day. But did you know that you can start even earlier? From sending a congratulatory email to shipping out a care package, there's a ton that you can do as soon as a candidate accepts your offer.
This is an especially good practice for your remote employees, who may feel nervous about not getting to meet their team in person or spending time in the office. You can put their minds at ease by starting the onboarding process ASAP.
Check out our remote onboarding best practices.
You're ahead of the curve!
*High five* Top-notch companies start their onboarding process right when a candidate accepts their offers—and that's exactly what you're doing.
Now it's about finding engaging, creative ways to make those days or weeks leading up to their first day even more exciting—especially for remote employees, who won’t get the warm, in-person welcome that others do.
World-class organizations are
53%
more likely to offer pre-boarding activities
Get more ideas for every stage of your onboarding experience.
Oops…
Yup, a critical part of onboarding is communicating your benefits to employees!
Here's the thing: your new hires are excited about the job, but they also want reassurance that they made the right choice. A great way to give employees peace of mind is by educating them about the benefits that are available to them.
54%
of employees say their company's benefits package was very important to them during onboarding
By doing this, you're saying “hey, thanks for taking a chance on us. Here’s how we’re going to take care of you as an employee.”
If you have no idea where to begin, don't worry! We've surveyed employees to understand where their onboarding experiences are falling short and what companies can do to improve their benefits communications. Use this as a starting point.
Here's the benefits information your employees want to learn during onboarding.
Let's take it one step further!
As nice as it would be to hand employees a guide and have them fully understand their benefits, this is just a pipe dream.
The truth is that benefits are complicated. And without taking your communication efforts a step further, your employees won't engage with your offerings and, as a result, may end up leaving your organization.
Only
1 in 3
employees felt confident in their understanding of their employer's benefits package during their most recent onboarding
After all, 85% of employees say their company's benefits package was important to them when deciding to accept a job offer.
So what do you need to do to get employees to understand and utilize their benefits? Provide them with one-on-one support. With this approach, people can choose the benefits that work for them
Of course, this is easier said than done. You're just one HR team, and providing personalized benefits guidance is no lightweight task. That's where a benefits communication platform can help.
Guide employees towards benefits choices that work for them.
You're on the right track!
Keep going! It's fantastic that you're already tapping into a diverse range of benefits communication tactics.
Now, it's just about taking that extra step and giving your employees some more personalized guidance to help them understand which benefits are right for them.
If you need support providing personalized guidance to your workforce, we're here to help.
46%
of employees didn't receive any one-on-one benefits guidance during onboarding
Let us help you take your onboarding experience to the next level.
You rock!
OK, you seriously deserve a standing ovation 👏👏👏
We love that you're creating a personalized benefits experience for employees in your onboarding program.
If you're personally carving out time and space to provide 1:1 guidance to employees, we tip our hats to you. But we also want to help make your life a bit easier. You could be saving yourself hundreds of hours of time by using a benefits engagement platform. The best part? You don't have to sacrifice the personalization.
We want to save you (and your employees) time when it comes to benefits.
That's ok! Now is better than never.
Employee onboarding software helps you automate tasks for new hires, such as having them fill out paperwork or enroll in health insurance. And it's a must-have for any onboarding program!
One of the best cases for onboarding software is the time savings. Take benefits enrollment, as an example. This is a task that typically takes employees hours to complete—between researching their options and reading through the provided materials.
But with the right software, it only takes about 15 minutes for employees to do the same task—a far cry from the 7+ hours employees spend doing research on their own.
1 in 4
employees spend more than seven hours researching their benefits before making selections
Find answers to your questions about employee onboarding software.
That's a great start!
Vetting employee onboarding software options is a great first step. If you're not sure what to look for, here are a few tips:
- Have a budget in mind and ask yourself whether you want a subscription-based solution or pay per use, monthly, or annually.
- Think about the type of first impression you want to make on new hires. Then use this as a starting point to look for specific software features.
- Consider what types of integrations you need. Which other HR software does it need to connect with?
Have additional questions about employee onboarding software?
You win 🙌
Ding, ding, ding! Congrats on successfully integrating onboarding software into your program.
This is a great way to create a seamless experience for your employees, saving them (and yourself) a ton of time in the process.
Have additional questions about your employee onboarding software?
Now's the time to start!
If you haven't been collecting employee feedback about your onboarding experience, now is the time to start!
How did your employee feel coming out of the process? Did they feel set up for success? What did they like, and what did they think could use improvement?
Understanding the answers to these questions can help your strategy moving forward.
Download our onboarding checklist for guidance on how to collect employee feedback.
Well done!
Its awesome that you're formally collecting employee feedback about your onboarding process. This type of data is gold.
It seems like where you're getting stuck is translating the data into action. We get it—this is one of the toughest parts of surveying your workforce.
We've done some research and have found that employees frequently point to benefits education as the weakest part of their company's onboarding program.
Luckily, this is an area where we can help out.
53%
of employees aren't confident in their benefits understanding even after onboarding is over
Let us help you with your benefits communications.
Woohoo!
Seriously, could you be a better HR leader?
We love that you're not only surveying your employees about their onboarding experience, but that you're also acting on their feedback. This isn't easy to do, so major kudos to you.
We're guessing—based on some of our own research—that one of your areas for improvement is around benefits communication. If that's the case, we have good news. This is something we can help you with.
Want a helping hand with your benefits communications?
