As your business grows, you will have to hire more help to meet the demands of your growing company. You will have more products and services to market and you can’t do it all yourself. You can hire help, either part-time, full-time, or work with temp staffing agency who can work on a per-project or ongoing basis.
Once you start to bring on new workers in your business, you should consider creating an onboarding process. Unfortunately, not all business owners pay as much attention to onboarding as they should, and it can lead to workers who aren’t able to effectively work right away once they start at the company. Let’s look at what onboarding is and how to develop a strategy that will ensure growth.
What Is Onboarding?
Onboarding is defined as “the action or process of integrating a new employee into an organization” or “familiarizing a new customer or client with one’s products or services”.
Both definitions are important in business. You need to hire talented people and train them your way of doing business because it is impossible to do everything yourself. As you grow, you will need help. If workers get frustrated and don’t stay with your company, the training time will have been lost and you will have to start over again.
Providing information about your company, mission statement, policies and so on in easy-to-find locations, can lead to much happier workers who will stick with your business in the long term.
When you onboard new staff, if they are going to be working with customers in any way, you need to be sure that everyone is on the same page about company policies and expectations.
So, what can you do to onboard people efficiently so you can grow your business?
Know Who Will Onboard New Staff
If you are the only person in the company, it will have to be you. Create handouts with lists of duties and requirements for each position you plan to fill. Give details about your company’s mission statement – why you are in business and how you are unique.
As you grow and hire more staff, choose a “people person” who will be good at training people and accessible enough so new employees will be able to ask them questions without feeling awkward or put off because the person is always too busy.
What Does Onboarding Involve?
What type of training will be required? Is it on the job, or virtual learning? Will it be one on one, or in a group? Will they be paired up with a senior staff member as a mentor, or buddied up with another new hire?
Know The Tasks
Will they tackle the tasks expected of them right away, or will they be eased into their role by becoming familiar with day-to-day operations?
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Prepare The Paperwork
Once the person is hired, what paperwork should they receive? This could be:
- Roles, responsibilities and priorities
- The written rules of the company
- An overview of the company culture, such as the mission statement
- A list of all staff and their roles
- A list of who to go to with particular questions about their work
- Goals for the current quarter
What Technology Will You Use?
You can put all your paperwork into Google Drive and invite new workers to access the appropriate files. You can also create a shared Google Calendar so newcomers are on the same page about important deadlines.
Answer all these questions and write accurate job descriptions, and you should not only get the right staff to work for you, but you will also have happier customers impressed with how your business is growing to better serve their needs.
