Onboarding Increases Employee Retention and Confidence

New Hire Training to Increase Retention

It’s no secret that an effective onboarding process increases employee retention, and it’s a top priority for L&D leaders. Effective onboarding really improves the chances of employees staying and succeeding in their jobs in the long term. It also builds strong teams that know how to work together—and do it well.

Unfortunately, many employees do not see their onboarding experience succeeding. In a recent Gallup survey, only 12% of employees strongly agreed that their organization is doing a good job at onboarding new employees. As a result, new hires may fail to form an emotional bond with the company early on—a connection that is critical to retaining top talent.

The onboarding process can be challenging, for sure. Some organizations may not be ready to welcome new employees and start onboarding quickly. Or they may have a set plan but unclear communication about what is expected and when.

In addition, many leaders can miss the mark on what actually creates an effective onboarding experience. Due to time constraints and other work priorities, they may not be looking for opportunities to improve or change their approach to better connect students with the organization, its people, and the work they will actually be doing—while supporting their career growth.

They may also miss opportunities to communicate with employees early in the process, before the first day, on the day the employment contract is signed.

Take a moment to think about your riding plan. What does it do well? What do you want to do differently? Keep these answers at the top of your mind and read on for more details on how you can improve your organization’s onboarding process and enrich the overall employee learning experience.

Start with an Idea

Many leaders have a perception of their “good” riding experience. This vision is not always fully achievable, but it helps define areas of focus and investment going forward. It also plays an important role in building the employee retention framework.

Successful L&D leaders understand the importance of building employee confidence from the start and ensuring that every new hire is well-rounded and able to build relationships within the organization. By doing so, the employee will feel like they belong, which can improve overall job satisfaction and performance.

While HR often takes care of basic employee orientation, it may be up to you to close the onboarding to ensure that the new hire is prepared for the job. To achieve this, look closely at the work experience (EX) and overcome potential problems or doubts that may differ from department to department. Develop strategies to ensure your onboarding addresses common challenges, such as remote/hybrid work or creating a welcoming and encouraging environment for a new generation of team members.

View Riding Through Four Lenses

To guide retention through improved employee satisfaction and confidence, it is helpful to consider the EX onboarding and student experience (LX) through four lenses:

1. How employees relate to the organization and envision their place/work within it
2. How employees feel about social aspects and other people and can communicate freely and effectively
3. How they relate to the work itself and their ability to do a good job in their role
4. And how it meets them in their place of need as an individual

If you dig deeper into how your current ride is working (or not) in relation to each of these lenses, you can better understand what you should keep and what you can improve as you make changes going forward.

Match Your Vision to What’s Really Possible

What makes sense and impact to you may differ from what another department leader thinks is necessary, and that’s okay. Or your available resources, timeline, and budget can make implementing your full vision right away difficult, if not impossible. But there are areas where you can compromise to meet the needs of students and the organization without giving up what is important to your vision.

For example, sometimes you may be able to focus on strengthening an existing system rather than starting from scratch. Then, your plan can change as different teams’ needs change and the workforce changes over time. When you incorporate measurement techniques as part of your onboarding process, you can also create benchmarks to analyze student engagement, readiness, and performance to see what’s working and what needs to be changed as more resources become available.

With any compromise, try to think about it through four lenses, and think about the following important things:

• Improving engagement. Help employees feel welcome as they learn more about the company, their team, their responsibilities, and the skills they will need to succeed. When they feel that their growth is important, they are more likely to stay.
• Providing a strong foundation for culture and collaboration. Then, extend the baseline over the next three months, six months, and one year to define skill development and career path based on each individual’s unique needs and goals. Encourage students to envision a future where they give directly to the organization.
• Create clear and transparent expectations. Employees should know what their responsibilities are and who they can go to with questions. If they know what is expected of them, they are more likely to feel confident that they are on the right track. On the other hand, insecure employees may worry about wasting time on the wrong job or making a good impression.
• Accelerating speed to professionalism. Ideally, employees should be more confident early on and even want to own their learning experience and be accountable for taking each next step on their development path.

While Discipline Designers and other members of the L&D team can all play a role in implementing these strategies, L&D leaders have a unique role in onboarding results. To be sure, it is not easy to balance the expectations of stakeholders and other groups while managing resources. But if done right, it can add tangible value to your leadership role and set you apart as an expert in your field.

Use Practical Tips To Improve Riding Performance

Since employee retention is a major goal, here are some suggestions on how to streamline the onboarding process:

• Meet with other teams to define audience and business impact.
• Consider how the current onboarding process is targeting the four lenses now and how it should be improved to better target each in the future.
• Decide on benchmarks to capture performance before, during, and after the program.
• Revise or redesign the onboarding program to include high-impact activities through web-based training, Instructor-Led Training, performance support resources, and training opportunities.
• Provide on-the-job feedback with supervisor observation, following a rubric-based or matrix-based input guide to help assess student skills.
• Train managers to provide effective feedback.
• Help students set goals for their future professional development, or set expectations for self-assessments that allow students to assess their confidence and ability to complete tasks appropriately.
• Create a communication plan, if any, to guide the rollout of new programs or changes in the curriculum across departments.

Meet the Ride Challenge

To be truly effective, internal training must be clear, transparent, consistent, and personalized. New hires must be able to see personal value and envision their future with the organization, enjoy the social aspects of working with others, and find meaning in the work itself or build confidence in being able to do the job well.

Entry itself can be an evolutionary process—not necessarily erasing the existing system but rather introducing new activities and learning experiences incrementally to build culture and connections over time. As you continue to align your vision with what is possible for your future onboarding, commit to the greater goal of fostering an environment where employees feel welcome, included, and supported in their personal and professional growth as they contribute to the shared success of the organization.