I just started a new job, and thus I’m reflecting on onboarding experiences I’ve had!

Starting off on the right foot

Starting a new job is risky. You leave one employer, where you were familiar with the people, the support systems available, and the expectations, and go somewhere where you know none of that.

Employers can help smooth that transition by having a great onboarding experience.

Do it live

Starting day 1 with a live interaction immediately makes the employee/employer relationship feel more personal. Someone taking time out of their day to individually meet with you and answer any questions creates a welcoming feeling.

It also allows for live personal introductions with coworkers so you can meet the people you need to meet, and have someone tell you something something about them. Without this, you have to do your own investigation to find out who you need to know, and then have to work to figure out how and when you can meet them.

A live discussion has a lot more impact than documentation that someone may skim over. Documentation often doesn’t focus on the important things, or be correct, which can cause employees to focus on the wrong things, and generally just be overwhelmed. You generally also can’t document sensitive-but-important context, like spicy customer relationships.

Starting your first day with documentation, and no live sync, puts you off-kilter. You don’t know when others start their day, so you don’t know when it would be appropriate to reach out to your coworkers. Organizations also usually have enough documentation to be overwhelming, and it can be hard for a new employee to know when they’ve gotten far enough through the documentation to be able to start contributing.

Explain the expectations

It’s quite difficult to meet an invisible bar, so employees need to know what the expectations are! The employer can be more candid on day 1 with parts of the expectations that may have not been shareable during the interview process, and may need to share things that have changed since interviewing, such as team and customer dynamics.

Have something to get done on day 1

Creating value for the company on day 1 lets you start building a reputation, and lets you and the team immediately feel like you’ve had a positive impact. The sooner the impact, the sooner you and the company can think you were a great hire!

Explain the benefits - don’t just make a list

When I have had documentation about my benefits, and no one explaining them to me, the documentation was incorrect and badly out of date. No one had ever gone back to update it to reflect benefits that had been changed, expanded, or added since the documentation was first written.

By having a benefits explanation during onboarding, instead of just documentation, the employer has more chances to ensure that employees have the correct information. It also allows the employee to ask questions about things that are unique to them.

In general, do the little things matter?

When I think back on the times that an employer has made me feel valued to them, the first examples that pop into mind haven’t been the bonuses, or pay raises.

  • When my mother’s mother passed away, my employer sent my mom flowers
  • One employer kept us regularly supplied with soft t-shirts that many employees still wear, over 5 years later
    • Quality swag, in general, that I want to use
  • Annual birthday gifts, which would be different every year
  • Having my birthday off, in addition to my normal PTO
  • Getting to spend a personal development budget however I saw fit

These small moments certainly haven’t kept me at previous employers when I did decide to leave, but I do still look back quite fondly on those moments. I’d always look forward to the small benefits that I knew were coming.

I definitely remember it when an employer drops the ball on small things. Promised lunches, reimbursements, and work anniversary gifts, those little things an employer would promise (or even brag about offering) would leave a sour taste when forgotten.

I did not appreciate small gestures when they were in lieu of larger expected things. I’d also get annoyed when an employer would ask for a big thing, and refuse to pay for small things I needed to do the big thing.

I’d say that, overall, little tokens of appreciation from an employer raise my satisfaction with my employer. They don’t change how I feel overall about my job.

Your compensation is a measure of how much an employer values you, which does include the small things!