Whether you are about to hire your first employee or you are expanding your organization, consider redesigning your onboarding process. A few tiny changes could dramatically increase your staff’s optimism, commitment, and engagement, decreasing absenteeism and improving employee retention.
Reports Show Today’s Employees Are Disengaged
Employee engagement is declining. Gallup’s State of the Global Workplace report revealed engagement fell to around 21% globally in 2024, marking the second decline in the past 12 years. Manager engagement dropped from 30% to 27%. This is a significant change, given that attitude determines 70% of team engagement.
Historically, unfulfilling work, inadequate compensation, and insufficient career growth have been the primary causes. Rampant inflation and social polarization are contributing factors. Paychecks do not go as far, and some people are more hesitant to make small talk with colleagues, leading to general dissatisfaction with work.
However, everything starts with onboarding—it is the make-or-break moment because it is people’s first impression of the business. If they are unsatisfied right from the start, workforce attrition is more likely. Studies show employees who have a poor onboarding experience are many times more likely to be disengaged at work.
The silver lining is that the opposite is equally possible. If business owners design an effective onboarding process, they can maximize workers’ commitment, enthusiasm, and job satisfaction from the start, leading to better business outcomes later on.
How to Tell Whether Your Employees Are Engaged
Signs of a disengaged employee include low productivity, increased absenteeism, no interest in professional development, a lack of initiative, and social withdrawal. These indicators may manifest as people repeatedly checking social media on the clock, taking the day off without notice, or consistently extending deadlines.
Even the best employees have bad days, so don’t worry if you recognize some of these behaviors in your own staff. If they last for an extended period or multiple people exhibit them, then you should address the issue.
Redesigning your onboarding process can help you prevent your team from becoming apathetic in the first place. The sooner you take an active role, the faster you can establish a bond between them and your company.
How to Design an Engaging Onboarding Process
A well-designed onboarding process encourages employee engagement during their first few months at the company and throughout their careers. Whether you are creating a process from scratch or revisiting an existing one, you must first establish a baseline.
Feedback is crucial at this stage. What do workers wish they knew on their first day? Did they have a positive onboarding experience? How engaged are they at work currently compared to when they first started? Gather this data to establish a baseline and identify areas of improvement.
Conducting entry interviews can help you understand how to better cater to candidates. You will learn who to pair them with, how they prefer feedback, and what their interests are, guiding decision-making. Whether you want to get them a personalized welcome gift or make small talk, going beyond surface-level details can help.
A purely professional connection is standard during the interview stage, but you want to genuinely get to know the people who will work for you. The more positively they feel about their boss and job, the happier they will be to come to work every day.
Onboarding Plans That Encourage Engagement
While there are numerous ways you can make onboarding more engaging, some approaches are more effective than others. Here are four influential methods to consider.
Mentorships and the Buddy System
Mentor new hires to show them the ropes and integrate them into the company culture. Research shows that nine in 10 employees with a career mentor are happy with their jobs. If you do not have time to do so, consider assigning them a “buddy”—a peer that can provide insider tips, answer questions, and introduce them to others. Establishing camaraderie early on will help them feel more at home in the workplace.
An Open House for the Workplace
Set a specific window for the new hire to get acquainted with the workplace and their colleagues outside of regular working hours. You can provide a guided tour while discussing their day-to-day duties. This “open house” social event is held in a relaxed setting, allowing participants to explore the space and engage in small talk without worrying about interrupting others’ schedules.
Onboarding Kits With Branded Swag
An onboarding kit is a tangible “welcome to the team” that you can put together with little time and money. Company-branded water bottles, tote bags, lanyards, stress balls, and apparel are great. You could also include a company playlist, nice stationery, or snacks. If you get to know people during interviews or preboarding, you can personalize the items accordingly.
A binder containing login information and standard workflows is a practical addition. New hires can reference this information later, saving time and helping them become more independent. They will get the hang of things quickly and feel welcome.
A Gamified Onboarding Process
Many people want to feel competent, connect with their colleagues, and demonstrate their skills. Gamification gives them the perfect opportunity to do so. It applies aspects of board games and video games—such as levels, challenges, leaderboards, and rewards—to nongame contexts. You can use it to make onboarding feel more fun and memorable, increasing engagement.
Tips for Redesigning the New Hire’s First Few Months
Depending on your workflow, you may have to rethink what training and meetings look like during the first few months of the job. Remote work, hot-desk arrangements, and contract work can make it challenging for staff to get to know each other. Virtual happy hours and highly encouraged coffee breaks can help them ease into the culture.
If your onboarding process involves projects, quizzes, or assessments, consider providing written support. People want to feel good about their progress, and you want them to feel excited about their future at your company. Remind them of why they love working for you by providing kind, enthusiastic feedback early on.
To expand it to the rest of your workforce, you could set up a celebration system that allows anyone to leave supportive feedback about a colleague. While covering action items during your weekly meeting, you can read those positive comments.
Remember to model the behaviors you want to see in others. ADP Research found that 65% of workers are only fully engaged if the team leader is. If their direct superior is disengaged, just 0.04% will be engaged. You can make a massive difference just by showing up and demonstrating enthusiasm. Your positivity will positively impact your employees, regardless of how long they have been with the company.
However you redesign your process, remember to take things slow. According to the Harvard Business Review, effective learning takes place over multiple weeks, not a single session. Rapid-fire tasks, meetings, and quizzes may seem helpful, but much of that information is lost because the learner doesn’t have time to absorb and retain it.
The Secret to Fostering Long-Term Engagement
The secret to fostering long-term engagement within the first few months of a new hire’s employment is to focus on their social and emotional needs as well as their professional ones. Full-time workers often spend nearly as many waking hours at work as they do at home, so they want a sense of fulfillment.
Put yourself in an employee’s position for a moment—would you rather receive a warm welcome, have plenty of opportunities to talk to your new colleagues, and have a great relationship with your manager, or be given a binder of tasks to complete by the end of the day in the silence of your cubicle?
A worker’s commitment to your business goes beyond their job duties and pay—they want to feel included, recognized, and important. Once you understand the importance of socialization, emotional support, and cultural integration, you can redesign your onboarding process to keep workers productive and engaged for years to come.
Do not be afraid to break the mold if you sense that candidates are more receptive to unconventional approaches. Straying from tradition can be a powerful tool for growth, especially among disruptive startups.
Employee Engagement Impacts Business Success
Think of a new hire’s first few months as an opportunity to establish a lasting connection, not complete a checklist. Whether you run a startup or an enterprise, fostering a sense of belonging helps ensure they remain committed to your company for years to come. You can drive rapid growth and long-term business success by engaging them early on.
Eleanor Hecks is a small business writer and researcher with more than five years of experience in the industry as Editor-in-Chief of Designerly Magazine. Her work has been featured in a range of business and marketing publications, including Fast Company, HubSpot, and Clutch.co.
Photo courtesy RDNE Stock Project via pexels
