The Three Easy-to-Spot Features of an Ineffective Onboarding Process

For quite a while now, businesses have recognized how important a role their onboarding process has in the ultimate success of each new employee. Research on the subject has confirmed it, indicating that companies with strong onboarding processes see an increase of up to 82% in retention rates and a 70% boost in productivity. With benefits like that, it's no wonder companies all over the globe are beefing up their spending and the time dedicated to their onboarding processes.

At the same time, though, more doesn't always equal better. In the rush to embrace the latest and greatest in onboarding techniques, it's completely possible for the average business to create a process that's both bloated and ineffective. In some extreme cases, such programs can even be counterproductive.

The trick is in being able to spot when you may be going too far or focusing on the wrong things in the onboarding process. To help, here's a guide on three things to look for to make that determination.

All Style, Little Substance

The first sign to look for in an onboarding process that's not accomplishing what it should is if it seems to have become focused on style over substance. By that, I mean a process that's too heavy on gamification and feel-good giveaways and not focused enough on providing useful information to the new employee. It's the kind of thing that's become common in recent years, as companies try their hardest to communicate their values to new hires over and above giving them the tools they'll really need to succeed in their new role. If there isn't a real purpose to every phase of your company's onboarding programme, it may be time to re-evaluate its goals and make some changes.

Lengthy, Unfocused Skills Training

Another thing you'll want to avoid in your company's onboarding process is excessive skills training that isn't essential to the new employee's role. That tends to happen as companies take a much-too-broad view of secondary and tertiary skills each employee might need and tries to cram additional training into the onboarding period. It's already hard enough to keep employees engaged in necessary training sessions, so it's critical to limit those sessions to skills the employee is likely to need in their first six months on the job. Wherever possible, focus on streamlining onboarding training by using the most effective training methods, with an eye toward additional training for the employee after they've gotten past the onboarding period.

Creating an Artificial Work Environment

Last, it's a good idea to make sure that your company's onboarding process isn't setting new employees up for a rude awakening once the process ends. This is an all-too-common outcome when businesses try to paint the rosiest picture possible of what the new employee's day-to-day work will be like. To guard against that problem, make sure to keep the whole process rooted in reality by putting the employee in real-world situations throughout. Place the greatest possible emphasis on features such as job shadowing, which will help them to acclimate to the actual work environment they'll need to navigate. That way, the new employee will be able to hit the ground running with no unwelcome surprises.

Comprehensive and Effective

Guarding against the three features of a poorly-developed onboarding process laid out here will help to keep your business's new hires engaged and in a good position to succeed. They will have the skills they need and know how they'll be expected to use them when the time comes. In many cases, eliminating these onboarding performance-killers will lead to a process that is even more effective without the need for additional spending and time investments. At the end of the day, that will help each new hire get to work faster without sacrificing the retention and productivity benefits that onboarding yields – and that's the best possible outcome for all involved.

This article does not necessarily reflect the opinions of the editors or management of EconoTimes.