Making Your Virtual “Welcome!” Experience Count
Welcome to your new workplace!
Welcome to your new workplace!Whether you’ve been through this before or you are a newcomer into the workforce, embarking on a new journey with a new company can be exhilarating and nerve-wracking at the same time. In the pre-pandemic world, your first day (more than likely) would have included showing up at a physical location, shaking hands with bosses and spending time with the team you would be joining. Fast-forward to a world of work that has embraced the remote work model and the traditional handshake, office tour and lunches in the office cafeteria or a local spot have become a distant memory for many of us.
In transitioning to a digitally-enabled workplace, we all have had our struggles with getting our virtual onboarding right. And one of the lessons we have learned in our practice is that, while you cannot fully replicate the connections an onsite experience affords, you definitely don’t have to make it a disconnected experience.
Making virtual onboarding meaningful and impactful: Lessons Learned
While we may not have a physical lobby experience, flesh-and-bones handshakes, or actual watercoolers to gather around, the fundamental goals of onboarding a new hire remain the same, regardless of how that experience is delivered. Onsite or virtually, we want to make sure that new hires:
- Feel welcomed to their new workplace
- Understand our company culture, mission, visions, values and business goals
- Are clear on their roles, responsibilities, and expectations
- Have the resources they need to succeed in their roles
- Are smoothly integrated to the team
So, how do we make a virtual welcome onboarding of our new hires not a check-the-box activity but a memorable and genuinely enriching experience for them?
- Send personalized welcome packets, in advance of their onboarding to start building their sense of belonging and feeling of welcome. We can include things such as company swag, a handwritten note from their manager and their future team members and any resources or materials they’ll need to hit the ground running.
- Parse content across several days – so our new hires are not bombarded with overwhelming amounts of information and are given an opportunity to digest and assimilate what is being shared.
- Make the sessions as interactive as possible, by incorporating polls, quizzes, and breakout discussions, if we are onboarding more than one new hire at a time. This will keep them engaged and allow them to actively participate, ask questions as well as build connections with others in their cohort.
- Use a buddy system – by pairing our new hires with experienced employees who are solid performers and passionate about their work, team and company, as a whole. They can serve as ambassadors and mentors to our new hires and provide them with a go-to person for questions, advice, and insider tips, further fostering a sense of belonging.
- Provide virtual networking opportunities – to break things up a bit, especially on content-heavy orientation days. We can schedule short informal virtual coffee chats or lunches during which our new hires can get to know their colleagues and start building rapport.
- Establish clear communication channels – for new hires so they know who to reach out to for support on what topics.
- Remain flexible – recognizing that each new hire is unique and may have different learning styles, preferences, and needs. We need to remain open to making adjustments as necessary to accommodate individual differences.
While this list is not exclusive, it is a good start for shaping our virtual onboarding into a meaningful new hire experience.
Takeaway
While virtual onboarding may present some unique challenges, if we carefully plan what will be shared, when it will be shared and the best way to share it, and then follow that with a thoughtful and flawless execution, it can be just as engaging and effective as traditional in-person onboarding. By prioritizing personalization, engaging delivery, and clear and transparent communications, we can ensure that new employees feel welcomed, supported, and integrated into the team even before their Day One begins.
To learn more about what it takes to put in place effective onsite and virtual onboarding programs, join our free March 2024 virtual training session. Just click the button below to register!
