When onboarding new employees doesn't go as expected

Be clear about what the company needs

A few years ago, I started working at a company that had increased the number of highly qualified (read: expensive) consultants from 16 to 32 within a few months because of a large, prestigious order. They had a strong list of applicants to choose from, and everything looked very promising.

After one year, only one of the 16 newly hired consultants was still working at the company.

Gradually it became clear to us that none of them recognised the picture that had been painted during the interviews. Everyone had only looked backwards, and no one had thought about how the new contract would affect the working day. And it did. Among other things, the delivery involved far more travel and time away from family than they had been led to expect. Nor were we particularly good at following up and helping the new employees in the initial phase. It was busy, and they were so highly qualified that surely they should be able to figure things out for themselves?

• Download: Guide to onboarding new employees

I think this trap is becoming ever easier to fall into, especially when companies are changing rapidly.

We are challenged by new technology that brings new opportunities, competence that becomes outdated ever faster, employees who change jobs more often, and so on. All this leads to more new hires, more frequent reorganisations and new management line-ups. As a result, it is even more important than before to create the conditions for a new employee to feel welcome and get started quickly. Good onboarding is needed.

• Read: Achieve success with people-oriented change management

A good routine for onboarding new employees must be clear and easy for managers to follow up, and it must be anchored all the way to the top.

There are entire conferences on onboarding these days, and that makes me a little nervous. Are we once again getting an area that will be dominated by external consultants, extensive routines and complicated tools that take a huge effort to implement? I hope not. This is just common sense put into a system.

The most important success factor is that trust is quickly built between the new employee and their immediate manager.

With trust, the new employee will feel safe sharing their observations and how they experience their new work situation. This requires dialogue. Not of the controlling kind, but clear and supportive, with a focus on clarifying expectations.

• Read: Supportive leadership as a preventive tool against sickness absence

My recommendation is to create simple, clear routines for what should happen in the first weeks and months, and there should be scheduled follow-up conversations with the manager. The relationship with the immediate manager is the most important factor in whether an employee wants to stay or not. Research has shown that we only have 90 days to anchor a new hire, so there is no time to lose. Get them up and running and into the ordinary development cycle (development conversations + follow-up) as soon as possible.

Then routines must be created that ensure the process is carried out and make it easy for the manager to do so. This includes making sure the new employee's expectations are met as far as possible.

Tips for recruitment and structured onboarding:

1. Be honest about what can be expected – broken expectations are costly.
2. Are there factors that will affect the company culture or the way you work that the candidate needs to know about before being hired?
3. Be careful not to make job descriptions too rigid. Focus more on role, responsibility and authority than on specific tasks. This gives greater flexibility.
4. Make a simple plan for what follow-up new employees can expect in the initial phase.
5. Let the new employee assess whether they feel they are getting what the plan sets out. Short surveys are good preparation for conversations with the manager.
6. Give managers a “nudge” to remind them to follow up.
7. Consider whether you could benefit from a digital tool, but make sure it is easy to use and implement, and that it increases the likelihood of the routines being followed.