Improve Your Onboarding Checklist: 3 Tips to Engage New Hires

Even when they’ve signed on the dotted line, new hires may not be locked in yet. In their first months of work, new employees are only dipping their toes in the water—unsure if they want to dive in. In fact, according to our 2023 survey, 70% of new hires decide whether a job is the right fit within the first month.

Because new hires aren’t fully invested yet, companies have a lot more to lose than they do. Some estimates place the cost of a vacant position at 90% to 200% of its annual salary. Add the time and effort managers and HR put into looking through resumes and interviewing applicants, any impact on morale, and you’ve got a costly problem.

Suddenly, staff turnover becomes an expensive thought. And worst of all? You’re back to recruiting before any meaningful work can get done.

It’s important to start things off with a bang—and not overlook anything—so new employees can feel they’re off to a great start and happy with the job they chose. Here are 3 tips for your onboarding checklist that’ll help you get—and keep—new hires right away. Get the definitive guide to onboarding with BambooHR.

Got a Plan? Engage New Hires with an Onboarding Checklist

You’ve got to have a plan—or onboarding program or new-hire orientation, whatever you want to call it. An engaging onboarding agenda is essential for the new employee experience. We found that employees who had effective onboarding felt 18x more committed to their employer.

With a good onboarding process, you won’t just be training new hires. Done right, new employees can start the job feeling valued and special from day one. That means they’re more likely to stick around and reach their potential.

Preparing for your new hires’ onboarding needs to start before day one, though. Try to consider the following as a minimum to comfortably introduce your new hire:

• Their workspace. Having an area to get to grips with things can help new hires feel comfortable, welcome and involved. Plus, you don’t want to be rushing to look for a place for them to set down. Try to consider where they’re seated, and who is around them. Otherwise, they may feel left out or like there is not a place for them.
• A computer. Ensure that your employee can access their computer from day one, by getting it ready on day zero. Needing to hunt for and set up a PC in the first days can stifle momentum. Likewise, if they need a phone for their job, ensure they have this too.
• Paperwork. Try to send digital/electronic paperwork ahead of the first day, so you don’t have to bother with that stuff when the new hire arrives. That means more time to get to grips with the job and meet the team.

What to Include in an Onboarding Checklist

Before a new employee joins, you’ll need to tackle an onboarding checklist to ensure you’ve got everything covered. There are a few areas you’ll want to be sure to touch on:

• Employee Information: name, title, email, and manager.
• Employee Announcements: announcement emails to staff, welcome notes, employee photos, work contact information.
• Company Overview: company mission and vision, culture, goals, history, organizational structure and more.
• Office Tour: show restrooms, breakrooms, meeting rooms, fire exits, and other important locations.
• Social Time: guided tours, a buddy, team introductions and a team lunch.
• Permissions: logins, internet access, building access and work folder permissions, etc.
• Technology: computer set up, keyboard and mouse, necessary software, monitors, an office phone, and any other requirements.
• Office: Photo ID Cards, furniture, swag, keys or cards, access codes, parking space details, uniforms and office supplies.
• Policies and Procedures: employee handbook, admin procedures, training (ethics, anti-harassment, conduct, etc.), holidays, expenses, overtime, working hours, etc.
• New Employee Forms: W-4, I-9, veteran status information, personal information, benefits applications.
• Compensation: payroll, benefits, rate of pay, pay schedule.
• Job Overview: position information, job role and duties, goal setting, expectations and resources.
• Training and Development: training plan, new employee training, software training, etc.
• HR System: benefit enrolment forms, company policies, job information, directory picture, logins.

Onboarding checklists can vary from industry to industry, but wherever you work, you can be sure onboarding is helpful for new hires and your business. Some of these checklist goals can be handled by employee self-onboarding too.

With set-up and paperwork out of the way, the employee experience can focus on specific on-the-job training, goal setting and meet-and-greets. It’s also a great time to explain the vision of your company. Let your new employee know how their job affects the overall goal and give them a sense of belonging.

Get everything you need to know about creating your new hire onboarding checklist.

Onboarding Roadmaps & Goals

When you’re creating an onboarding checklist, this can be a great time to set personal goals too. By doing so, you can tie KPIs into the company’s vision.

As part of the onboarding roadmap, you can set deadlines for goals that range from next week to six months on. While this might seem like a lot, it can allow new joiners to dive into work and become productive quickly with a sense of direction.

Try to consider where the new hire sees themselves in the long run, too. Are they starting in an entry-level position but would like to do something else in the future? If so, why not consider these aspirations when setting goals and even draw up a long-term career path?

You could even consider ‘possible’ interests and other strong suits at this time to make sure the long-term path includes options.

New Hire Orientation: What Makes Your Company Special?

Once your new employee arrives, you need to reaffirm how awesome your company is—isn’t that what you said at the interview? Practice what you preach so your new employee will be as excited for the first day as that initial ‘You’re hired!’ moment.

• It’s a team effort. Everyone in the company should be welcoming and inviting, which should become part of your culture. For smaller companies, a formal welcome and introduction is helpful to let the new employee know who does what and how they will work with them.
• Provide resources to take away. If you have a cool culture video or a brand book, share it. If there are other unique and awesome things your company does, try to do them early and make sure your new employee is a part of them.
• Get them involved from the start. If your company plays video games or does board games together or heads down to the cafe for lunch, be sure new employees are included. You want your new hires to maximize employee bonding with co-workers right away so they will feel a part of the team and comfortable working together.
• Make an occasion of it. It’s not a bad idea for HR or a manager or coworker—especially if it’s someone they will be working with a lot—to take the new hire out to lunch so they can feel invested from day one. This gives them a chance to connect with someone at the company in a less formal setting.

Onboarding for Remote Workers

Making your employees feel at home in their job role when they’re working from home may feel a bit tricky. Your onboarding checklists might not be quite as practical if your employee is remote—but whatever happens, don’t skip on your itinerary. Try to consider new processes that can help to engage your new employee and give them a taste of your company culture.

Try to think about how you might tailor your onboarding practices to someone who is remote. Some things to consider would be:

• Package all the important information and links into a “starter package” PDF.
• Use multimedia to share important information and make the links easily accessible.
• Plan teams time to chat with different team members, and schedule regular time with their buddies.
• Utilize employee onboarding software.
• Take time to address some common concerns of remote working (such as overworking, isolation, managing paperwork alone, lack of immediate assistance).

Employee Activities: Team Onboarding

There’s one essential way to immerse a new employee—always make time for your new hire to meet the team. Helping your new hires build relationships can be a great tool for support and learning on a wider scale.

Introducing your team to the onboarding process means employees can get their questions answered by people with their boots on the ground in the role.

According to our 2023 onboarding survey, one in five workers said their company didn’t do anything specific to help employees nurture relationships or find support with their co-workers.

Buddy Schemes

One way you can do this is by assigning each new hire a seasoned employee (a “buddy” or mentor) who can make sure to be available to field any questions and take special interest in the new hire for an extended period. It’s important to note that this person should be a good personality fit, have leadership potential and be someone who’ll encourage behaviors that are in sync with your company’s culture.

Collective Goal Setting

Another idea is to make sure to set your new employees up in a team with common goals so that they will feel part of the group immediately. Those team members should be invested in the new hire’s success as that person will be contributing to their team goals as well. This means they can start contributing from an early stage and feel as though their efforts are having an impact.

Connecting Online

The new hire might want to connect with co-workers and team members on social networks, such as LinkedIn and X, and stay updated on your company’s social media pages, like Facebook or Instagram. This way, they are getting a constant stream of communication and news, like product updates, announcements and blogs. More importantly, it’s a way to foster connections between colleagues beyond work.

BambooHR Employee Community is a great way to foster collaboration and keep employees engaged from wherever they are. That means employees are kept involved and new hires are looped in on important updates and casual chatter.

Prompt Feedback

One last thing to consider is feedback. Of course, we all know that employees like positive recognition. It’s no different with a new hire. They want to feel valued and appreciated even from the beginning (when they might be feeling a little nervous and overwhelmed anyway). Positive feedback will help them know what they’re doing well. But be sure to try to keep criticism positive to steer them gently in the right direction.

Feedback doesn’t go one way either—with an onboarding survey, you can get answers to questions to better your onboarding practices.

Knowing Me, Knowing You: Fun Onboarding Questions for New Hires

People crave connection, and a friendly chat and a sense of belonging to your team can bring so much to a role. Onboarding questions are an easy fit into your agenda. They’re the perfect opportunity to bring the team together, and it’s a fun way to integrate your new hires.

Questions don’t need to be deep, and it’s understandable if your new employee is feeling a bit shy. Start easy, with some icebreakers:

• What’s your most obscure interest?
• What’s the most interesting food combination you’ve come up with?
• Do you have any pet peeves?
• What was your worst haircut?
• Do you have any interests or hobbies outside of work?
• What’s your most important goal for this year?
• Do you have any unique traditions?

These questions are about bringing your new hire’s personality out to give them talking points with the team. It’s about relationship-building and easing them into the team.

Then, you could introduce some more work-related questions:

• Name one thing you’d like to learn about in or outside of your role.
• What’s one thing you’ve got passion for that you don’t get to do enough?
• What’s the most important lesson you’ve learned in another role?

These onboarding sessions can help to share your new hire’s previous experience with the team—something they might be able to leverage. It also lets you determine their interests and maybe even specialties you weren’t aware of.

Learning about employee skills and passions can help with engagement and development in the future, setting them off on the right path.

Job Onboarding Tips for an Ideal Employee Start

Onboarding programs may not be identical between companies and job roles—each comes with its own priorities and challenges. One thing that remains consistent, though, is the importance of integrating and immersing new hires in the work and culture early. You’ve got every reason to plan for a new employee’s success.

Onboarding isn’t just about getting your employees up and running—it’s about helping them thrive. And not just in their job role. By securing them as a central part of the team and enabling them to build relationships, your team can become exponentially stronger.

So remember: always plan for your new hire’s success, communicate often, and live your company culture.

With a strong onboarding checklist, your new hires won’t be dipping their toes in—they’ll be taking the plunge. Make your onboarding plans count with BambooHR.