Following on from their excellent session at the recent Annual Review of Employment Law, Karl O’Connor, OCN Coaching Champions Ltd and Ashling O’Connor, Sales Enablement Program Manager at Zendesk provides some tips and advice to get the most from your remote onboarding programme.

Q. Could you provide any ideas for welcome gifts for organisations with very little budget? Working in the public sector means resources are limited and gifts aren’t allowed, what are ways around this in terms of welcome gifts for onboarding?

A: To help promote the employee experience and the employer brand, consider  a ‘Welcome Pack’ with useful items that can be sent out to new employees when they are working remotely.  It’s the thought that counts and a small gesture for new people could for example include receiving a company branded coffee mug, hat or clothing such as a face mask that will make them feel welcome and part of the company. The branded coffee mug idea could also have the organisation’s purpose and values displayed on the side.

Having a warm welcome for the new hire is a big opportunity to show you care about them which doesn't have to cost much money, just time.in 2020 owing to the pandemic, some organisations with wellbeing in mind, issue branded face masks. Even sending out a welcome card to the person’s home signed in biro by the CEO or their new line manager can have significant positive impact on the new hire. With regard to the civil service, as set out in the Code of Standards and Behaviours the receipt of gifts by civil servants from those with whom they have official dealings must be governed by the highest standards. Departments are required to apply the rules contained in the Code on the receipt of gifts. Little things like the welcome card or face mask can give people the same, if not more excitement to join the organisation as monetary gifts and often it means more.

Q. What guidance / support would you advise to employers to ensure that new colleagues feel part of a team or encourage relationship building in other teams in the organisation?

A. Involve the new employee’s line manager very early in the onboarding process and if needed help them to prepare along with the team for the arrival of the new person. For example, you could ask the team to be part of the warm welcome and invite them to sit in for a limited time on the new person’s onboarding which is made easier as they can join virtually. Share an organisation chart with pictures and names of ‘who’s who’ from their own team and teams who they are likely to interact with after joining the organisation. Also, consider allocating a Buddy or Mentor to help the new person navigate the organisation. This is one of the eight top tips from Morgan McKinlay regarding successful onboarding in a remote world. It also works well in Zendesk and many other organisations.

In Zendesk for example the buddy relationship works in multiple ways. The Buddy or Mentor allocated is someone beyond the manager and hosts weekly 1-1 meetings during the first 1-2 months. This person adds a wealth of value to the new hire. For example, the Buddy gives the new hire the special feeling of knowing someone is looking out for them or having a friend in the team that they can ask questions without feeling embarrassed. The Buddy is a proven asset to the manager in Zendesk.  S/he is often involved in supporting post- onboarding assignments for the new-hire where they have to interview their Buddy, shadow the Buddy and receive feedback which saves time for the manager. Their line manager also gets involved later in the process, but this method works really well and the Buddy gets an opportunity to take on a more senior role.

Another simple but effective thing to do is for the new hire to present at multiple team meetings. Although this might be daunting for the new hire, you can make it more fun by giving them a format of questions they have to present on e.g. "what was the worst job you ever had?" "what are you passionate about outside of work?" what do you find yourself binge-watching on Netflix". This gives the new hire the opportunity to show their human side and gives everyone else a chance to get to know and relate to this person which helps breaks down barriers.

Q. How frequently do you survey the new starters?  After what periods?  I week/ 1 month etc?

 In Zendesk, new hires are surveyed after they complete the onboarding program. The survey covers 3 areas: overall experience, speakers and content. Questions asked are both quantitative and qualitative and enables easy, quick analysis to spot any trends and gain important insights. By separating the survey into 3 parts it helps to ensure clear feedback is gained on the key parts of the onboarding experience.

Zendesk is also pilot surveying the same people after 3 months. Survey questions relate to what the most beneficial part of their onboarding experience was and what else could have been covered that would have helped the new hires to ramp up faster.  A roundtable or focus group discussion with a mix of new hires from different months is another way to gain valuable feedback. The focus is on ‘what worked well, what could have been better, what was most useful’. Learnings are then actioned in an enhanced onboarding programme.

Q. How do you measure what timeframe employees take to get settled in and bring value?

Every role is different so in Zendesk one measure doesn’t work for all areas. For example, technical roles have a longer ramp up time of about 6 months of training. Sales members participate in a 3-month development programme.

Zendesk focuses on the output expected from a new hire which they have to achieve consistently when they are fully ramped up (e.g. in Sales it's hitting a target, in customer support it's answering X number of tickets per day and in technical role it's supporting Y number of deals/projects). Milestones are also set that need to be hit in order for the new hire to achieve their end goal.

Zendesk works back from the end goal and tries to ensure that the journey towards success is easy to understand and can be measured. This helps the line manager to measure success when the probation period is coming to an end.

Q. What is covered in the 8-day boot camp?

The Zendesk initial 3 -day bootcamp is all about providing general key information that applies to most roles.  The subsequent 5- days are for customer facing roles i.e. customer success, professional services & sales.

This second part of the programme goes into a lot more detail focusing on key tools and strategy. Role-based breakouts delve deeper into how these relate to their roles. Each day entails both group and individual assignments.