How to onboard my employees (and make sure they stay)?

HR Generalistt

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Jul 22, 2021
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Having issues with employee retention. When I ask why they say "Not engaged".

Everyone is working from home during Covid-19, and employees are more volatile (they'll jump on any opportunities they see) during these dire times.

How do I onboard new hires and make my company more interesting for them?
 

JEREMY HAWKE

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    Pay them ! Thats the problem in the modern world . If your just paying them the going rate you will get the going return .
    One of the most successful people I know made it his aim to make sure all his employees could afford to buy a house .
    This home working idea is bad news and it is going to turn a generation into fruit cakes that wont know how to interact with people .
    In my view
    Get them back in the office , Get them in an environment where you will get the best out of them.
     
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    Pay is always a factor, but I also believe that people to feel engaged, involved and important - which is going to be one of the big challenges of a shift to work from home

    A bigger business I partner with made a huge deal of holding regular group zooms during lockdown - he also spent time online with each individual (as an antisocial bystander I just dipped in and out)

    Tiny things- like remembering their birthday - can make a disproportionate difference
     
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    Assistant Advice

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    Pay and conditions are what attracts them to your company in the first place. Make them feel valued by asking for their input. Most staff can see the same old faults when doing their job, but are they ever asked if there is a better way to do it? And they are listened too? Is there an option to have a staff rep who can act as a buffer between management and colleagues.

    Also things like having their birthday off, feel-good Fridays where you buy pizzas, or sticky buns for staff - these can also be delivered to their home if they are not based in the office (or whatever day of the week you choose). Choose a few fun things for them to do.
     
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    Home working is going to really make it difficult to keep people in "menial" jobs. At least being in the office have other people around to talk to makes the day go by easier. Home working suits introverts like myself, I've always had a home based business. But it's not for everyone.

    I did pick up early on to the debate around - if it's that easy for you to work from home, why not employ someone in India?
     
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    Ozzy

    Founder of UKBF
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    When I ask why they say "Not engaged".
    Literally, you ask someone why they are leaving and they just look at you and say "Not engaged" ?!?!
    If that's the level of communication you have, or if your HR process is as disconnected as giving them a form and asking them "Fill this on your way out the door", then I would worry it isn't the employee who isn't engaged.

    Treat your team how you would like to be respected and treated. Staff are only on loan for as long as you can keep them motivated and enthused, and if you have a high churn then it's the employer environment not the employees that is the issue.
     
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    SillyBill

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    Two types of employee, professional and hourly rate workers. Never patronise hourly rate workers. IME they don't want their birthday remembered or a quiz night (are you kidding?) or a voucher, they'll stick for a good rate and everything else is superfluous (and indeed, looked upon cynically in a lot of cases if not hard cash).

    TBH we've had the opposite at times over the years, we paid so much above the going rate for a period we effectively had zero staff turnover for many years...and as a result we became quite concerned about the lack of new ideas, a stale working environment and resistance to change. Inflation brought that into touch once we realised this.

    Then worked out it was better to pay slightly above average for most (morale) with special high performers looked after beyond this. Difficult one to get the balance right on but having zero turnover can be as damaging as high turnover IMO.
     
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    Mr D

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    Feb 12, 2017
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    If the employees are not engaged I would suggest the employer needs to up their game.
    Ok not all jobs are interesting. Not all jobs require massive supervision.

    But something involving the employee. Something giving them links to the bigger picture.

    My team work from home up to recently, still hybrid now.
    Vastly different work, considerable time we can go without getting in touch with each other. But we are engaged.
    We have different supervisors, same overall boss and part of same overall team.
    And we make it a point to interact. Team meetings to discuss what each of us is doing, bit of banter, bit of team instructions.
    Asking each other for help when needed or simply asking if anyone has capacity.

    We would occasionally arrange a team zoom call. Just to hang out together as a team, socialising with a drink and some jokes or funny hats etc. Not work related, the online version of team drinks at the local pub in the UK.

    Probably helps that we do work well with supervisors - they are working remote from us but not remote contact. A phone call multiple times a week, emails back and forth....
    So we remain engaged.
     
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    Mr D

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    I did pick up early on to the debate around - if it's that easy for you to work from home, why not employ someone in India?

    True, could employ someone in India.
    May find GMT time zone based works better for dealing with customers, suppliers and other staff.

    Or may find UK based home worker doing work for Indian business, US business etc. When working from home the potential employers grow from the distance you are willing to commute to the entire globe. Lots more employers than those within a 15 minute drive from the house....

    I saw the other day an article about how a political party would make working from home a right.
    Not sure how the fire service, the rnli, the NHS, the military or snowplow drivers will manage to do that.
    Lady across the road from me needs an ambulance 4 times a week, be a bit difficult if the crew work from home....
     
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    Karimbo

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    one bad zoom call with the boss and employee is on indeed.com looking for another position elsewhere. It works both ways.

    Offshore employees aren't the solution either. I work with freelancers offshore and they are so flaky, i work with coders, graphic designers, animaters etc. They juggle so many projects and they just focus their attention on who pays the most and they can go AWOL on you, suddenly stories of relatives being ill, dying granma etc come about.
     
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    HR Generalistt

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    Jul 22, 2021
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    How do I onboard new hires and make my company more interesting for them?


    I think one good advice I can give for this is that to make sure the onboarding process is smooth and precise as well as to prepare a checklist for them so that they're aware of what to do and won't miss out anything.[/QUOTE]

    Thank you @natashaachangg for the helpful and relevant advice. If it's not too much of a trouble, could you share some resources on Onboarding? What does a complete onboarding process look like? And how to create that checklist?
     
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    Comedy gold
    Quite!

    Onboarding??? And all the other stupid buzzwords that seem to pepper what we today call 'Human Resources and used to be called 'Employment' and/or staff is one of the best ways to alienate staff and make them assume that the employer is an idiot.
    • Read 'The One Minute Manager'. Let that be your bible.
    • Pay them properly.
    • Give them good tools. The driver should have a smart van. The machinist should have a modern lathe. The graphic designer should have a Herman Miller chair and a powerful workstation with the best software. And so on! The place of work should fill a person with joy.
    • Be open and friendly at all times.
    • Praise good work.
    • Give them responsibility.
    • Share the wealth. If you have a good month, let that extra profit be reflected in their pay packet.
    By speaking ENGLISH!
    Talking gobbledygook is the first step to ceasing to think. The woolier the words, the woolier is the thought behind those words.
     
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    D

    Deleted member 59730

    One of the most successful people I know made it his aim to make sure all his employees could afford to buy a house .
    I made sure my employees could afford decent holidays. The wages I paid funded family trips to Australia, South Africa, Brasil, Florida, California and more. For one employee it was tours of thrill rides!
     
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    mattk

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    Thank you @natashaachangg for the helpful and relevant advice. If it's not too much of a trouble, could you share some resources on Onboarding? What does a complete onboarding process look like? And how to create that checklist?

    Put yourself in the shoes of a new joiners, what would you want when you join a new company?

    A map of where to go on your first day
    A parking space booked, so they don't have to drive endlessly round looking for a space on their first day
    Someone to greet them when they turn up
    Have a desk, laptop, phone etc. waiting for them on arrival
    Set up all their accounts, email and access to software/systems so they can start working
    A checklist of mandatory compliance training they need to do
    Someone show them where the toilets, coffee and canteen are (and where to find the menu)
    A 30 minute meeting booked with senior people in the areas of the business they will be working

    And so on...
     
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    paulears

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    I'm in the business where thanks to covid, the numbers of self-employed people available in the pool are much smaller than pre-covid. As a result, my lighting guy is much in demand. He doesn't drive - so this year I have delivered him home every show we do. I don't have to, but it's nice and he appreciates it. I delivered him home at just gone midnight, at 1.15 a tour bus was taking him to Cornwall (he lives in Norfolk) and he's going to be late in tomorrow as he doesn't get back till after ou starting time. He will be paid the same as usual. I have five people at the moment. One is useless and just had a Covid-isolation period. I managed to cover him with two others who really didn't want to do it. It cost me in addition a number of tickets to other shows - which always have a cost, as tickets are never really free. When we get somebody totally new to us - usually word of mouth, we try to be extra nice and it pays off.

    PS I have never, ever heard of onboarding - My daughter-in-law, a sourcing personel person for mainly the catering industry of course has, and it features heavily in her Masters she's studying for, but the course content just overflows with crazy jargon and hyperbole. They have buzzwords for everything to impress people!
     
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    How do I onboard new hires and make my company more interesting for them?


    I think one good advice I can give for this is that to make sure the onboarding process is smooth and precise as well as to prepare a checklist for them so that they're aware of what to do and won't miss out anything.[/QUOTE]

    On the basis that this is the only 'advice' that warranted a response from the OP, we can safely assume that they are looking 'closer to home' for input - which will undoubtedly be shared with us shortly.
     
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    MikeJ

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    I'm always confused as to why people can't cope with new words, such as "onboarding". It's a good word, easily understood and fills a gap where there was previously no single word to cover the process.

    There are more things to worry about these days when employing someone, and it's not unreasonable to have a word that describes the procedure.
     
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    Aug 16, 2021
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    Empower your staff and let them lead, don't just tell them what to do and leave them to get on with it, listen to them and let them make their own decisions, if it's something massively off track you are there to lead them and guide them back onto the right track. Employees aren't machines, they're people who have their own thoughts, ideas and feelings, if they feel like their ideas are listened to and make a difference they're more likely to contribute to the future development of the business. Arrange regular team meetings and get everyone to contribute something and engage your staff, you'll soon see a major shift in attitudes towards work and a higher staff retention rate.
     
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    paulears

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    Staff have been taken on for years, new words are fine, but when they are unnecessary, what't the point. Trendyism. I sat in an exam steering meeting once and we had a 'new' words session. We had new technology words to add and some to remove. Shall we remove 'tape' and use the word 'cassette' - then in future years we went through 'elcassette' CD, MD, and then into thumb drives/USB sticks/SD cards. Thank God we didn't go with some suggestions for global words - 'data holder' was one preferred one. In the end, we just referred to media. That worked. I blame Masters Degrees in business. They seem to have been responsible for a lot of new words, and as graduates get onboarded and take over, it's no wonder they creep in. A family member uses these new words all the time - and far sillier ones too. I guess we have to live with them as the young are taking over the land of the dinosaurs. Sad really, but I'm happy being big old and lumpy and ready to die out.
     
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    I'm always confused as to why people can't cope with new words, such as "onboarding". It's a good word, easily understood and fills a gap where there was previously no single word to cover the process.
    In English - introduce.
    Empower your staff and let them lead,
    In English - give them responsibilities.
    if it's something massively off track you are there to lead them and guide them back onto the right track.
    In English - correct their mistakes.
    Arrange regular team meetings and get everyone to contribute something and engage your staff,
    In English - talk to them.

    According or Orwell, Newspeak was created “to diminish the range of thought.”

    'Onboarding' does not fill a gap - it creates a new gap - a gap in thinking.

    'Onboarding' implies a completed process. The simple English word 'introduce' leads to an open question and a very important question - introduce to what and/or whom? By changing from English into Newspeak, you avoid having to ask that very important question.

    The moment you change English into Newspeak, you lose the open question that the honest English word carries with it. Turn it back into English and the obvious and open question returns. Turn Human Resource into employee and the question 'Employed to do what?' returns.

    If an employee feels empowered, he or she no longer has to ask themselves 'Responsible for what and to whom?'

    Engaged is a word we use for a completed action, such as a telephone line or a railway coupling. Turn that back to the English word talk and we must ask "Talk to whom and about what and what did they say?"

    Imagine you are running a car dealership and you, being a keen proponent of Newspeak, engage and onboard a new Marketing Executive. Filled with empowerment, this person books media marketing presence (advertising) for the inventory of pre-owned vehicles. After a week of marketing activity, you discover that every single pre-owned and pre-loved vehicle is still clogging up your lot.

    Had you called this useless idiot a used car salesman, you could have saved yourself a great deal of money and he or she might have even sold some bloody cars!
     
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    MattRumbelow

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    So I wouldn't say that working from home is really the cause of people being more of a flight risk. My team works from home, and they all appreciate having no commute, being able to work closer to family, etc. I think the main thing employers forget is the importance of being respected. Being thanked, having check-up meetings (to listen to the employee) and some sort of acknowledgement for going above and beyond can all be done for free and can have a huge impact.
     
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