A Sample Onboarding Plan for New Employees

 

A sample onboarding plan for new employees is a starting point to build an impactful onboarding process. According to recruiting data, 1 in 4 hires usually leave their job within 6 months due to a poor employee onboarding process. 

This article discusses a sample onboarding plan for new employees and its features. We will talk about how to prepare an employee onboarding process that extends beyond logistics and paperwork.

Additionally, we included different plan templates, such as the 30 60 90 day onboarding plan template:

 

If you are also interested in additional tools for managing the new hire onboarding process, we have also drafted examples of onboarding flowcharts. You can find them here: onboarding flow chart.

Sample Onboarding Plan for New Employees

 

First and foremost, a well-planned onboarding process enables new hires to feel welcome into their new company. This is due to the fact that it facilitates their integration into the new workplace.

An onboarding plan is a key component for your staff onboarding process. The goal is to introduce new hires to their companies’ expectations, skills, knowledge, and culture.

The onboarding plan examples or templates from multiple organisations show a clear focus on impacting their employees. This is possible by providing all new hires with the necessary skills and information to perform effectively in their roles. For example, new employee training is a crucial component of any onboarding agenda template and any sample onboarding plan for new employees.

Furthermore, some onboarding objectives examples that are employee-specific include: attaining peak performance and delivering key expectations in the shortest possible time frame. This is essential for embarking on a successful employee lifecycle.

Employee-Centric

The self doubt and the anxiety will continue for some months.


—Brad Desmond, Psychologist and Coach.

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The Nine Key Elements of a Sample Onboarding Plan for New Employees

 

A well-drafted sample onboarding plan for new employees can provide an HR professional or a line manager  with a step-by-step planning. This will ensure that new hires receive all the essential information at the start of their employment. This will enable them to perform in their roles as soon as possible.

A sample onboarding plan for new employees should aim to increase the teamwork among the employees and improve office culture. Moreover, it should also aim at recouping the costs of recruiting and the costs of onboarding a new employee. This is possible when you attain fast productivity and contribute to the team efforts.

The following are the key features that we decided to include in our onboarding plan template.

 

This is one of our onboarding plan examples and is based on the strategic onboarding framework and essential moments of your employee journey map.

 

Be Ahead of Day 1 and Build the Preboarding Phase

Any activity and interaction that occurs prior to day one belongs to the preboarding stage. This phase includes activities such as sending a welcome email from your new manager, and the logistical set-up that would enable you to do your job as early as day one.

 

Implement Gamification in your Onboarding Plan Template

Another feature of an onboarding plan template for new employees is gamification. Onboarding gamification introduces game-based elements like competition, scores, and rewards to boost their morale as they experience Pre & Onboarding. It aids new hires in building engagement with their new company. 

 

Provide a Successful Day 1 Orientation to your New Hires

The activities included in your Day 1 orientation are crucial for setting the tone for the overall onboarding process and its success. A sample onboarding schedule for the first day at work would include a personal introduction to the other team members. Team integration is crucial for a successful first day on the job. Social connections make the difference in many cases.

 

Use Onboarding Agendas Templates

During the onboarding process new hires will have multiple meetings. An onboarding agenda template is a ready-to-use onboarding tool or task manager. By using it, organisations leverage to communicate to new hires the key objectives and talking points for each meeting. In this way, they feel prepared for every single one.

 

Schedule the First Week Activities Strategically

One of the first week’s activities includes, for example, participating in a social activity with the whole department or team. These actions will enable new hires to gain a better understanding of the organisational structure and will help them to get to know their new coworkers.

Here, you find some first-week activities examples:

  • Make an onboarding agenda and involved the people required in advance.
  • Build structured timelines in your onboarding platform to train your new hires as soon as possible.
  • Craft quizzes and videos which will increase the new employee’s engagement from the first week.
  • Use the task manager to inform the key stakeholders about their responsibilities when new employees start on the job.
  • Start preparing for the first meetings between new hires and coworkers.
  • Send the first onboarding survey.

If you implement this strategic onboarding in your company, your new employees will benefit from:

  • Getting an onboarding agenda, so they won’t feel lost.
  • Receiving all the training needed in a structured and fun way, so we keep our retention rate high.
  • Meeting the key stakeholders involved in their role, so new hires will improve their time-to-performance.
  • Getting to know the new team much better, so they will be more integrated into the company.
  • Sharing their feedback, so you will be able to optimise your employee onboarding processes.
  • Have a first idea of how the employee onboarding process will shape out for the following weeks.

You can also set some of employee onboarding process metrics. KPIs are a necessary part of such a complex process as onboarding. Having clear objectives will also help you track the progress of their journey. For example, by using the employee onboarding software introdus, you will be able to track how your new employees’ onboarding is going.

 

Schedule The First 3 Months

The first 3 months onboarding schedule includes the necessary on-the-job training to be provided for equipping new hires and fellow them with the skills they need to perform effectively on the job.

Furthermore, organisations often start tracking their performance early to that you fulfill their onboarding goals. They can expect the allocation of smaller tasks and projects at first. New employees will eventually transition into taking more ownership of projects, as their onboarding process progresses.

Again, you can expect some progress tracking meetings and surveys along the way. That will ensure that they are on track, meeting the milestones of their onboarding journey.

 

Check the First 12 Months

After the first 12 months, it is important to review their journey to date. This meeting would not only survey their performance, but also their feelings for being a part of the team. At that point in time they can consider themselves integrated in the team. (You can discover here a sample of onboarding survey questions.)

Additionally, new employees start thinking about their development within the organisation. They can decide together with their manager or mentor what their development goals would be. Furthermore, they will decide on the timeline for achieving those goals.

 

Keep a Continuous Feedback

Feedback collection is crucial feature for our sample onboarding plan for employees. This is because it allows to have a progress and status report. It is also providing a platform for learning and adjusting.

Company and new employees benefit from feedback and surveying. They express their needs and receive additional support in any “problematic” areas. At the same time, the company has an opportunity to gain insights that can shape future onboarding efforts.

 

Use Onboarding Tools and Software Solutions

The trend of automating processes is also apparent in the way multiple organisations carry out their onboarding. This is especially the case for employers with large volumes of new hires and a global distribution.

More precisely, multiple employee onboarding solutions have emerged on the market. Their aim is to make onboarding more seamless, less error-prone, more engaging, and more resource efficient.

introdus, another example of an employee onboarding software solution, leverage multimedia content and pre-made timelines. The company combines the available timelines to match new hires specific department. In addition, they can implement add-ons so as to ensure a smooth journey.

A classic example of such tools is a well-structured onboarding checklist. You can use it to build these journeys on your onboarding platform. A sample onboarding plan for new employees should be supported by checklist of activities.

 

New hires will undertake every stage of their onboarding process. You also can use an offboarding checklist template, when your employees require it.

You can also consult a more specialised onboarding planning, with our software developer onboarding article. The article also includes a checklist and a list of best practices.

Onboarding Insights

 92% of new hires think that a structured Onboarding process & plan are crucial for them to get a great start at their new job.


—According to ‘Your Pre & Onboarding Buddy’ eBook.

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The 30 60 90 Day Onboarding Plan Template

 

The 30 60 90 day onboarding plan template is a tool for helping new employees to get onboard in their new company. It ensures a structured and comprehensive start new hire experience.

A new employee 30 60 90 day onboarding plan offers a structured and transparent roadmap for their onboarding. It will set them up for the first 90 days on the job. Thus, it guides them when beginning the employee lifecycle, while focusing on learning, planning and execution.

Moreover, the onboarding 30 60 90 day plan for new hires is tailored to the new role, qualifications and prospects. It also helps them connect with the company’s culture and values.

 

The Four Key Elements of The 30 60 90 Day Onboarding Plan

 

The onboarding plan with 30 60 90 structure will be specific with regards to the design of each stage. Each stage will be clear on the onboarding checklist. There are some key elements that your plan will contain:

1. DEFINE OVERALL GOALS

What should new employees achieve by the 30th day? How about by the 60th day? And finally, what have they achieved by the 90th day? The new hires have to know the expectations associated with the new role from the very beginning.

2. BUILD TIMELINES AND MILESTONES ACROSS THE 30 60 90 ONBOARDING PLAN

Obviously, the 30 60 90 days represent important milestones in the onboarding process. But are there any other intermediary milestones? Are there other check-in dates?

3. START A COLLABORATION PROCESS

Your plan has to contain the answers to the following questions:

  • Who will help new employees reach their objectives?
  • What is the role of the team leader?
  • Are any other co-workers involved?
  • Is there a mentor that will train new hires in this period?

They will get to know right off the bat who will guide them in this process.

4. DETERMINE THE 30 60 90 DAY ONBOARDING PLAN’S METRICS FOR SUCCESS

Your plan will detail all the relevant onboarding metrics that you use to assess their performance. For example, a metric for success can be completing all the necessary learning and training. Learning is a key component of a 30 60 90 day planning, as highlighted by The Future of Customer Engagement and Experience.

 

The Four Reasons to Use a 30 60 90 Onboarding Plan

 

What will you gain by using a structured onboarding plan? We have identified four reasons to start using a new employee 30 60 90 onboarding plan.

1. Improve retention

Organisations with a strong onboarding process improve new hire retention by 82%, according to Glassdoor. Moreover, when employees experience a good onboarding process, they are likely to preserve the employment relationship for 3 years. In fact 69% of the total employees experienced this, according to SHRM.

2. Achieve a smoother transition

When using an 30 60 90 onboarding plan, new hires will gain familiarity with the company tools, an increased understanding of the company processes, and clarified work expectations.

3. Align expectations from the beginning

Many new employees feel a mixed bag of emotions when starting a new job. They can be excited and sometimes overshadowed by stress of doing the right things. Hence, it is extremely important to fully grasp the expectations of your 30 60 90 plan for new hires into the new role.

4. Provide structured information and keep new hires updated

When new hires miss clearly defined targets, milestones and deadlines, they can only guess what is actually going on. The same applies for having a process for monitoring and feedback. This places substantial pressure on them. It could also hinder their overall performance, or they feel dissatisfied with their onboarding experience.

 

30 60 90 Day New Hire Plan Template

 

We know that it is crucial to ensure a positive employee experience from the very start. So, in order to help you, we have drafted a 30 60 90 Day new hire plan template. Moreover, it can provide you with the blueprints for building a specific onboarding plan template within the framework of the 30 60 90 onboarding structure.

It is easy to start with onboarding planning when using a 30 60 90 Day new hire plan template. You can download this template for free:

 

A Sample Onboarding Plan for New Employees

New Hire Training Plan Template

 

A new hire training plan template is an easy-to-use tool that employers can use to monitor the efforts invested in training new employees. A well-thought out training plan can shorten the time it takes from onboarding to full productivity. On average, new hires should attain full productivity after 8 months.

The new hire training plan template constitutes a tool that employers have at their disposal for designing a training process. It meets specific goals and is integrated with their overall onboarding strategy.

Often, onboarding training plan might cover various training topics, necessary for improving the competence of the new hires and reduce the time to peak performance.

We have included an onboarding plan example of a new hire training template.

Manager Onboarding: Key Considerations

 

Although managers need onboarding as much as any other fellow new hire, there are some key considerations when onboarding new managers.

An onboarding plan for a new manager is key in aiding the new manager of a firm come to speed. The manager is the face of an organisation and, therefore, vital to the company future and development.

Thus, the integration process of a new manager requires proper planning to boost his integration and ease of performance. As such, the onboarding plan for a new manager should include training on leadership and management of human and other resources. 

The use of an employee onboarding schedule template assists companies in maximising their onboarding process in terms of achieving optimal time to performance results. In addition, a clear schedule aids employers ensure that nothing is left out of the onboarding process of new employees.

Onboarding Plan Sample for New Employees Insights

Manager roles require more time and dedication until accomplishing a full integration into a company.


—The Guide for Pre & Onboarding Managers.

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A Sample Onboarding Plan for New Employees

What is the Best Onboarding Program for New Employees?

 

The best onboarding program for new employees is the program that ensures the fastest time to full role proficiency, and that optimises resource use. Additionally, the best onboarding program has a strategic dimension, ensuring new hire retention.

In short, the best program is the one that is easy for the new employee to learn from and engage with. It’s that one that also supports the learning progression set by the company. introdus, one of the best new hire onboarding programs, will help your company onboard new hires smoothly and efficiently. Click here and see how it works here:

See how introdus works

introdus also has available a preboarding programme. Companies use it to increase retention and reduce new employees’ time-to-performance.

Thus, organizations need to make sure that their investment is recovered. Thus drafting the best onboarding program for employers will pay close attention to the costs of recruiting and the employee onboarding metrics.

Companies with the Best Onboarding Programs

 

We have identified two of the companies with the best onboarding programs. Find the following examples from different industries working from locations across the globe.

 

Google’s Team Approach to Onboarding

We are going to focus on a key aspect of Google’s approach to onboarding. It’s bottom-up approach.

Rather than having the HR leadership design the onboarding process for new hires, Google takes a different approach. It is the teams that welcome new hires who are fully in charge. Thus, Google takes a bottom-up approach to onboarding. The company once famously explained that it “lets the inmates run the asylum,” in a nod to their bottom-up approach to just about everything they do.

 

PNO’s Focus on Preboarding

One of the main goals of PNO has been to engage and empower new employees regardless of their physical location.

As such, there has been a focus on Preboarding activities meant to help new hires feel confident when starting their new job. PNO focuses on both the role-specific and the social dimensions of their onboarding process. This company uses a platform specialised in welcoming new employees, introdus.

In addition, we highly recommend that you also read the article about buddy programs at work. There, we have devoted a section to a real-life implementation example of a work buddy program from a social media management firm, Buffer.

CLIENT EXPERIENCE

I’ve heard from everyone (i.e. co-workers); everyone has benefited from Preboarding. It gives you that kind of awareness before you start.


—Nikolai Willer Svendsen, Fleet & Commercial Support at PNO.

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Sample Onboarding Plan for New Employees: Concluding Remarks

 

In conclusion, our sample onboarding plan for new employees was designed to create the right impression in any new hire’s mind. It is thereby aiding them in building the right engagement with the job, resulting in a long-term commitment to the employer.

Onboarding has to engage you and to ensure effective collaboration between with your new team and overall organisation.

An effective employee onboarding software will bring the best out of onboarding new employees, because every feature is designed to improve the competence of the new workers from Day 1.

introdus, employee onboarding software, regards the onboarding plan for new employees as a vital tool that establishes a long-term partnership between the employer and employees. When your employer does their homework and researches industry accepted best practices, and utilises a specialist drafted sample onboarding plan for new employees, you can be assured that they are taking the time and consideration to welcome you into the organisation. They are providing you with the learning, and social benefits of a good onboarding programme. And they are setting you up for success.

introdus simplifies the process of executing the onboarding plan of every organisation by providing a streamlined platform that promotes optimum integration of new hires. The introdus platform is embedded with useful multimedia content that will in still the new hires with the confidence they need to attain job mastery.

Reap the benefits of a successful onboarding plan.

 

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