A chaotic first day for new employees is likely to leave negative impressions in their minds about your company. Such a day will not just create negative impressions, their journey onward with you will be full of hiccups. They will feel disconnected & demoralized in the workplace, resulting in lack of interest, low productivity, and eventually quit the job.
That’s why you have to ensure a smooth first day experience for new hires. From welcoming to workspace introduction, every phase of onboarding has to be well-organized to maximize their satisfaction.
In this write-up, I have created a checklist of 10 essential first-day onboarding activities to help you understand & manage your onboarding duties towards new hires on their joining day.
Table of Contents
First Day Onboarding Checklist
Extend Warm Welcome
Once new employees show up at the office the first day, receive them cordially & enthusiastically. To show a professional gesture, hand them gifts like bouquets, chocolates, diaries, pens, and more.
Ask your team members to show an amicable approach towards the new hires, making them feel the office like their own place. Also, don’t forget to take shots of the entry moments, including the new hires’ receptions and presentations.
Assist in Setting up a Workspace
If the new employees come for physical office, guide them to their workstations, familiarize them with the tools they’ll be working with, and co-workers they will be sharing space with. Make sure to share company rules concerning workspace design and customization.
As for remote employees, if your company has a budget for assisting your new hires in creating a comfy and futuristic home office, make sure to share guidelines for that on day one.
Ensure All Employee Logins & Access Function Properly
New employees may or may not be familiar with all the platforms and tools they are given to work with. Whatever the case, make sure they get accurate links of all the tools with separate messages so they can access their accounts smoothly.
Let’s say you want to give them access to Slack, Jira, and webmail (Official email). Make sure to send “Sign up page links” of each tool with different emails or messages to avoid clutter and confuse them.
Once they receive all the essentials, ask them to create their accounts on each platform, followed by logging into their accounts successively. If they encounter any issues or technical glitches, help them get over them as soon as possible to give them pleasant software experiences.
Give an Office Tour
Let’s speculate the new hires are employed to work physically from office. Give them a guided tour of the entire office and introduce them to their colleagues to make them feel comfotable.
Show them every important place they should be familiar with, from meeting rooms to washrooms. If your workplace consists of facilities like an indoor game zone, relaxation zone, gym center, etc., let them visit these facilities. These extra amenities will create positive vibes in their minds and make them eager to come to work every day.
Ask them to Read & Fill up Necessary HR documents
After the office tour, once they are back in their desks, hand the new hires the HR forms required to complete their documentation for pay, benefits, taxes, and more. If required, help them complete the forms.
Introduce them to Managers & Executives
Meeting with co-workers and workspace adjustments are done. It’s time fore the new hires to meet the executives & superiors. Managers & executives can meet the new recruits at once or separately.
But the efficient approach would be to arrange an open orientation session where managers and executives will introduce themselves to the new hires and share some motivational words. However, if your company is small with a smaller office size, meeting the managers and executives can be one–one.
Assign them Training Materials
Give your new employees access to the resources they need to carry out their jobs and achieve desired outcomes. You can use Gusto to share training materials and track the progress of your employees’ onboarding. Gusto makes it easy for employees to pick up things at their own pace and allows you to track what they’ve already completed.
Let them Share their Job Expectations
Employees join at a company with a number of expectations in their minds, including on-time salary credit, periodic growth, learning opportunties, positive workplace culture, and so on. However, the job expectations vary form an employee to employee.
Ask each of the new hires about their job expectation. Are they here for earning only or they want to achieve something from their jobs. Whatever job expectations they share, make notes of them. Check if there is anything that your company can work on to create a better workplace for employees.
Introduce the Company Culture
A company culture can make or break its future with new employees. A positive company culture not only hooks the best candidates but also helps you retain employees longer time.
Communicating your company’s culture during onboarding helps employees perceive the company’s values & practices, along with their roles and also how these points overlap. Employees love a strong & inclusive company culture which also impacts their productivity, performance, and engagement.
Set a Mentor or Buddy
A study found by Harvard Business Review, assigning an onboarding buddy ensures that a new hire is productive within the first 90 days at a new job.
Also, mentoring programs are a fantastic way for new hires to learn on-the-job skills from senior professionals. Mentoring aligns organizational goals with an employee’s career goals and provides them the feeling of engagement, leading to enhanced job satisfaction.
Take them out for Lunch, Snacks, and Coffee
Taking new hires for a lunch on their first day can be a morale-booster for them and also create a positive impression in their mind about your company. However, not every company can afford a fancy lunch for all their new hires.
If your organization is one of them, don’t sweat on it! There are always alternatives! Arrange snacks & coffee to entertain them as it’s a cost-effective option. This arrangement is meant to appreciate their joining and give them a feeling that you are ecstatic to have them on board..
Implement the Best First Day Onboarding Checklist
Professional employee treatment on the first day sets the tone how the new hires will perceive about your company. That’s why the first-day onboarding activities carry a lot of weight for employees’ successful journey with you.
To ensure a smooth, efficient, and automated first-day oboarding experience, make use of the best onboarding software at hand. They will help you document, track, and automate the entire first-day onboaridng process precisely & sophisticatedly.
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