Digital onboarding: how to receive employees online

The coronavirus pandemic consolidated, once and for all, a trend that was already proving irreversible: digital onboarding. Through it, it is possible to provide training and integrate employees appropriately and completely online.

The increase in the home office and online recruitment obliges organizations to adopt digital onboarding processes overnight, which represents a great challenge, since the reception of new employees was always planned to work with face-to-face interactions.

In this post, we will show that it is indeed possible to implement digital onboarding efficiently, as well as we will detail this market and provide tips for receiving new employees on the right foot.

Importance of onboarding

Digital onboarding was a very rare practice in companies recently. Developed by Doodle, a company for scheduling virtual meetings with more than 30 million users worldwide, the survey “Recruiting and Onboarding Employees From a Distance”Pointed out that until April 2020, only 12% of North American companies received their employees by digital means. For 44% of companies in the country, there were only face-to-face meetings, while 44% promoted the combination of the two worlds.

The study covered more than 300 organizations in the United States and analyzed more than 30 million interactions in professional groups.

Also according to the data, the companies were surprised by the full-time remote work system. Only 16% said they were fully prepared to adopt digital onboarding processes.

However, there is a consensus that this practice is important. Failures in the integration of employees are the perfect recipe for demotivation and consequent turnover.

In the study, 17% of HR leaders stated that the biggest challenge is to make new hires feel part of the team, in addition to providing clarity about information about career growth. Another 15% said that the difficulty lies in integrating them into the organizational culture, while 13% struggle to establish communication standards.

How to do digital onboarding?

In traditional onboarding, the professional meets in person with the HR manager, his teammates and leaders from other departments. There is also a tour of the organization’s facilities. But how to act when it is not possible to promote visits to the workplace or face-to-face meetings?

In order to make a good impression and motivate the employee to integrate with the culture, it is worth paying attention to the following tips:

Plan

Define how many and what are the onboarding activities. This planning is essential so that the process does not give the impression of disorganization and neglect.

Be creative

For some professionals, interacting in person is one of the great reasons to be part of a team and create bonds. If the virtual sessions are too long, boring or uninspired, new hires may become newly laid off.

Therefore, replace the lectures with natural dialogues with the contractors, always in a light and engaging way.

Emails

Do not send long e-mails with HR policies to newcomers. Communicate first by video and then send links to the organization’s materials.

turn on the camera

Make eye contact, use your hands and be expressive as if you were in a face-to-face meeting. In addition, instead of looking at the computer screen, always be staring at the camera. This will help the person to feel welcomed.

Democracy

Democratize the scheduling process and let all participants vote on the best day and time.

Preparation

Send materials to the participating people days before or on the eve of the meeting so that they arrive at the meeting prepared and engaged.

Few participants

If you can, prioritize meetings with few participants. A study by Robert Sutton, professor of organizational behavior at Stanford University, found that the most productive groups are those with between five and eight people.

Focal point

Delegate the function of godmother or godfather to a friendly employee who has a good time with the company. As a focal point for the novice person, this mentor will be responsible for answering questions and presenting teams.

Technology for digital onboarding

Successful digital onboarding is essential for maintaining talent in the organization, as well as maintaining the dissemination of company culture. For this reason, it is worth investing in specific software for integration, such as Botnicks, for example.

Digital forms, training and development platforms, internal communication tools, videos and resources for scheduling meetings and videoconferences are good options.

After digital onboarding, remember to continue engaging your team. For this, bet on the content we have prepared on remote work management.