Onboarding in 2020

When we hear the word “Onboarding”, we usually think of it in terms of office or service employees. Onboarding is equally important for manufacturing and industrial employees, although you need to consider what specific needs your employees have in your industry. Right now we recommend that onboarding concentrate on three things; Leadership, Social and One thing.

First onboarding should include a leadership touchpoint. Having a leader in your company take a few minutes to make the new hire feel welcome can have a huge ROI when it is combined with delivering mission and values. If a leader cannot spare 15 minutes, a 1 minute personalized recorded video is easy to deliver using screencastify or similar free tools.

Second, an email sent two days before the start date introducing the social norms of what to wear, what happens at lunchtime and parking/transportation and introducing a mentor co-worker to do introductions is huge.

Finally, One thing! Getting the new employee started with a productive and working on One important task the first day is important. It may take weeks to do a full onboarding or months to get people up to a producing level but getting them set up the first day to do at least one thing productive is very crucial. Top performers want to contribute and nothing is more demoralizing then thinking I won’t be able to contribute until….

These three, of course, do not replace safety training and onboarding checklists and getting paperwork done, they are just key elements that often get missed and result in a mishire as most people know on their first day if they will stay with an organization or leave. What do you think? Will these three things improve your retention rates?

Kael Campbell is President and Lead Recruiter of Red Seal Recruiting Solutions, a company providing recruitment services in mining, equipment and plant maintenance, utilities, manufacturing, construction, and transportation. When he is not recruiting, Kael spends as much time as possible with family in the great outdoors and on the water. He volunteers his time as a Board Member of the Entrepreneurs Organization of Vancouver Island. We have a wide variety of services to help you find the best employees. See how we can help on our Recruiting Solutions page.