10 Ways To WOW Your New Hire

10. MAKE ORIENTATION ROCK!

Make sure you have an orientation and onboarding process. But don’t stick to the usual boring orientation routines. Those are for boring companies with boring people.

Find fun and exciting ways to show them around the office and introduce your company. You can even throw in riddles and quizzes at the end of the orientation and of course, don’t forget to reward them for paying attention.

9. MAKE THEM PART OF THE FAMILY

Make sure they are introduced to every member of the family on the first day.

Better still, get every single employee (or division head if you are in a big company) to explain to them what they do in their jobs and how that contributes to the company’s goals.

That’s like killing two birds with one stone – the new employee gets to know everything in the company (and everyone) and the old employees have a constant reminder (everytime a new employee comes) of the job that they do and how it aligns to the company goals.

Make sure you include them in lunches, company email lists and other company gatherings.

8. ENCOURAGE FREQUENT FEEDBACK

Ask for constant feedback from your new hires. Getting feedback is one of the best ways to stay connected to your employees.

Get to know what motivates them and keep them encouraged. Your new hires will feel like they are part of the organisation if their feedback is taken seriously.

7. ASSIGN A MENTOR

Sometimes it can be tricky for new hires to integrate comfortably with the rest of the employees who have been there before them.

Assigning them someone to guide them helps them feel more in place and provides them someone to approach if they need something.

This is way better than them having unanswered questions just because they are too afraid of asking the wrong questions.

Better still, make sure the mentor takes the new employee out for lunch during the first week of work.

6. BENEFITS, BENEFITS, BENEFITS

Let your new hires in on the perks and benefits of the job. Make sure they are well aware of all the good things the company has to offer them. This would also give them something to be excited about and to look forward to.

Tell them about the amazing secrets including the weekly badminton games and other “side benefits” that the new office provides.

They will be pleased and this may inspire them to work harder and play harder…

5. GET EVERYTHING PREPARED ON DAY ONE

Make sure your new hires have everything they need when they come in on the first day.

Notify the people who are involved in the onboarding process so they can have everything ready by day one, such as the email account, business card, desk, direct telephone extension and so on.

Don’t let them go through one month of working at your company before they get their namecards.

4. CREATE AN ONBOARDING SCHEDULE

It would be good to prepare a schedule for your new hires for their first few days.

Arrange the tasks they need to do and people they need to meet, so you don’t have them sitting around on their first day not knowing what to do when their mentor or supervisor is held up by something else.

3. INTRODUCE NEW TECHNOLOGY UPFRONT

Get your new hires familiarised with the technologies used in your company, even the basics like the company’s dropbox system, email, or online pages and software within the first three days of their job, so they can get up and running as fast as possible.

And yes, do introduce your IT folks to the new employee (regardless how geekish and unsociable your IT folks may be).

IT people can be life-savers especially to new hires who may have no idea where the company’s dropbox system is.

2. BEGIN NOW!

There are many things for the new hires to learn when they first join a new job, and it may require a lot of training.

Start the training process immediately upon hire. Don’t give them any time to meander at the office.

Plan before the new hire arrives what their training schedule should be.

1. HAVE SOME FUN!

The best way to integrate new employees in is to have some fun together. If, and only if, your culture permits, you could even try a prank! Sometimes, once people laugh with them (and at them!), they feel right at home.

Remember, if they get pranked today, they will know this is part of the company culture. The moment another new employee joins, they will now get to prank the new person and the fun continues!