Taking on a new employee is always exciting. But making sure the onboarding process is smooth, productive, and goal-oriented can be a little tricky.
Thankfully, an Onboarding Checklist can help you keep things on track. Our Onboarding Checklist template has been specially designed for HR teams & officials to help them make sure that all key onboarding steps are completed, enabling new hires to acclimate faster and with less confusion.
The most unique feature of our template is that we put a time frame to the entire onboarding process; dividing our checklist into four components: first day, first week, first month, and the first ninety days. This allows HR departments to not only determine how well a new employee is adapting to their role & environment over time, but it also helps them review the progress of their performance and identify specific areas where additional training may be needed.
In this post, we go over each time component of our Checklist in a bit more detail:
Employee Details
But before we do that, we must first identify the newly onboarded employee (Name and Contact Details), their date of joining, as well as their position within the overall organizational hierarchy, such as the names of the relevant Head of Department or the person they will be reporting to (say, a line manager or supervisor).
In this section, you will also need to add an Employee ID – a unique identification number usually assigned to employees by an organization at the time of joining.
First Day
The first day at a new job can be nerve-wracking for a new hire. But it can be equally challenging for HR staff who need to make sure that everything is in order for the new employee.
In this part of our checklist, we identify the most important tasks that HR must get on with to ensure a new employee is well-settled into their new position.
We start by making sure that the new employee knows what the company does, and how it is run. This includes providing them with materials such as policy handbooks that provide information about the organization’s policies, Standard Operating Procedures (SOPs), and core value posters. These help a new employee gain confidence and feel valued as they know the company’s system, people, and expectations.
We follow this up by encouraging HR to give them a guided tour of the workplace. This includes any recreational areas (such as a kitchen or a common room) as well as useful spots like the photocopying or printing station. Doing this ensures that the new employee knows their way around the office space.
We also make sure that HR introduces the new hire to the rest of the team and relevant departments, and vice versa. This may be done through a welcome email announcement or one-on-one meetings as deemed appropriate by HR.
The first day is also the perfect time for HR to explain the specific duties and responsibilities that the job entails, as well as how the employee’s performance will be tracked and assessed over time.
Lastly, we include special sections to ensure new employees have access to all the tools and gadgets they need to get on with their work. To this end, HR should make sure they have access to any systems or networks relevant to their work. These may include cloud-based team communication platforms such as Slack, Chanty, or ZOOM as well as any digital devices such as laptops or smartphones.
First Week
Now that a new employee is all settled in, it’s time to get to work. The first working week is a crucial time for HR managers who need to make sure that an employee is ready to take on their professional duties for the months and years to come.
Check-in and orientation
We start by making sure the new employee is well-oriented – that is, they have all the necessary information they need to perform their jobs. This may include sharing a directory of team members and departments who they may need to contact (electronically, telephonically, or otherwise) for coordination. For example, a new Content Specialist at a marketing firm will need the contact details of both content writers and graphic designers before they can start working.
We also include specific tasks that guide the new employees on what they need to do. This may include setting short-term goals or a schedule of the meetings they are expected to be a part of during their first week. Ideally, these two items should be checked on the first working day of the week.
Mentorship and social integration
Teamwork is key to creating a positive work environment. We develop this part of our checklist to ensure new hires are well integrated into the existing team and work culture.
First up, we encourage the HR department to formally assign a person they can count on to explain how to get started with their new role. This could be a mentor (say, a senior coordinator or supervisor) or a buddy (say, a person working in a similar position to the new hire) who is willing to help them out.
We then go a step further by encouraging HR to schedule an informal team-building activity to break the ice. For example, it may be a good idea to organize a team lunch where new hires can interact with the rest of the team in person in a more casual way.
The HR can also take some time to explain the ‘ways’ of the company to the employee. This may include company traditions, such as birthday celebrations or after-work-specials where employees get together to have a good time.
In the end, we include a review of the employee’s first-week performance. HR will check this box after discussing the new employee’s performance with relevant team members, such as a line manager or a fellow team member who worked with them on a specific task or project.
First Month
Safe to say, at the end of the first month, both the employee and the rest of the team have had ample chance to explore each other’s strengths & weaknesses.
Progress review and development
In this part of our Checklist, we seek to particularly focus on any feedback that the HR or other team managers may have about the employee’s performance and work ethic.
We also ask the employees for their feedback on how smooth the onboarding process was for them, and what the organization could have done better. This insight can be useful for HR when hiring and orienting new employees in the future.
Training and development
Here, we focus on practical ways for HR to help new hires polish their skills to the best of their potential.
This may include role-specific training customized to the specific position of the new employee in the team: for instance, if a company uses a specific design software, they may want their new employee to be trained in that specific software.
Alternatively, we use this section to check if the new employee needs access to any learning platforms (such as MasterClass or Skillshare) to develop their technical skills. Alternatively, you can use this section to check if the employee needs any in-house training sessions (such as shadowing a senior team member) to teach them how a specific job or task is done.
First 90 Days
For most organizations, the first 90 days are deemed enough to determine if a new employee should become a permanent member of the team. Here’s a list of tasks you might want to complete during this period:
Performance and engagement review
Let’s start by scheduling check-ins with the new employee’s manager or the head of HR. Check-ins are a great way for a team leader to review the progress of a project or task, and discuss any priorities, challenges, and progress related to the new employee’s work.
We also add a special provision for a formal 90-day review of the employee’s progress and performance. This review must ideally be conducted by an official of the HR department and the head of the department the employee is working in.
Once this is done, the HR and relevant HoDs or managers must come together to create a future development plan for the employee, say, if the employee should be allocated any additional responsibilities better suited to their technical skills or be given charge of any specific project or team in light of their leadership skills.
Cultural and professional integration
In this part of our checklist, we take a more futuristic approach to the employee’s position at the organization. For instance, we discuss their long-term goals within their department such as project targets for a whole year.
We also specifically include a section where the employee and relevant HR officials can discuss opportunities for the employee’s future career growth and development. This may include discussions about promotion to a higher position or an increment in salary, etc.
We also use this section to follow up on any team-building activities that the employee has partaken in to foster greater cultural assimilation, as well as compile any constructive feedback from HoD, managers, and team members the employee may find helpful in the future.
Review: Continued Engagement and Development
In this last section of our checklist, we try to get to the crux of the onboarding process by conducting a final 3-month review on the basis of which the goals and duties of the employee may be adjusted.
We also conclude (based on the feedback from both the employee and their HoD/managers) if a new employee needs any additional training to perform their duties productively.
In the end, we want to determine whether the new employee’s transition from onboarding to full team integration has been successful or not. This may also denote if an employee who was on their probation period has been given a permanent position at the organization – depending on their performance over the first ninety days.
Wrapping Up
Our template is a great way to streamline the process of integrating new employees into a company. Using our template can help you overcome the challenge of inconsistent and inefficient onboarding processes, which can lead to gaps in knowledge, delays in productivity, and a lack of clarity for new employees.
Feel free to use our fillable and editable Onboarding Checklist, available in PDF and WORD formats!
