What is the value of strategic onboarding?

A carefully thought out onboarding process will ensure that every new employee is aware of the firm’s values, purpose and aims from the beginning.

Establishing a consistent approach to welcoming individuals into the firm is essential to help them understand what daily life is like.

It is important that firms view onboarding as a valuable investment of time that helps to build your culture and retain the very best talent. In some cases, accountancy firms under value onboarding and we see that candidates become disengaged in their new firm or begin to have issues with using new systems and ways of working.

This not only leads to poor staff retention which becomes expensive; it can tarnish the reputation of a firm leading to candidates not wanting to move there.

Getting buy-in from senior members of staff helps to make new members joining your team feel valued – spending a small amount of time with a partner is something that people will privilege.

Company culture is a big thing in professional services – cultures tend to be hard to create and even harder to maintain as the headcount grows. By creating a welcoming environment people will settle in faster, improve productivity and aid staff retention.

When did you last revise your onboarding process?

Taking the time to review the way you onboard new members of staff is essential to ensure that your process still has a purpose and that employees are gaining value from it.

Have you have ever considered how your onboarding process stacks up against other industries outside of professional services?

How do you assess performance of your onboarding against staff retention?
It is reported that the majority of new employees make a decision in the first 45 days of a new job if the company is a long term fit for them. At the same time, one of the main benefits of a successful onboarding process is retaining top talent.

Are you of the opinion that onboarding is a one-off experience or is this something that your firm foster over a long period of time?

This isn’t something that should be over in the first week, successfully integrating people into your team could be over a period of a few months. Thus, the need to review the impact of your process as it needs to be personal and memorable throughout to have any long-lasting benefit.

Are you delivering something that today’s workforce desire and demand?

Onboarding should aim to make career transitions as smooth as possible – adjusting to different social and performance culture of a business and contributing to the collective mission.

What makes a successful onboarding strategy?

Striking the balance between a formal onboarding process and a creating a welcoming environment is essential. The big things matter as much as the little things.

Creating a memorable experience could be combining seminars and presentations with going for a coffee regularly or being taken out for lunch.

Monitoring the process over key milestones will help to ensure a new employee is happy and keeps them on track. Creating a checklist can be really helpful to track progress.

When should the onboarding start? First day or when the offer is accepted?

Before the first day, arranging a coffee could be a nice way of easing people into the process to make them feel involved immediately.

Considering the type of resources you need could not only help to improve the impact on the strategy but also streamline the process for you. This could be in the form of videos which fits in the increasing popularity of this type of content online.

Creating engaging content in the form of videos and online resources can be released to new members of staff as soon as the offer has been accepted. This starts the onboarding process before their first day at the office allowing you to begin to create the right impression and integrate them into their new firm.

It is essential not to confuse training and onboarding – they are two separate areas of a new employee’s life with your company. Training will help to them to understand your systems and tools. Onboarding is aimed integrating an individual into the team and teaches them HOW you work.