Finding and recruiting new qualified employees is always a challenge but during the recent pandemic, it has become even more so. Making new employees feel at home and part of your corporate culture can be especially difficult in a remote working environment. You need to hire, install, onboard and engage your new hires to help shape the culture, reinforce it or even push it in a new direction. Unless the new recruits fit into the culture, it will be difficult to maintain company values over time. Training and incorporating a Team mentality can be particularly challenging when co-workers may only be reached remotely.
We are fortunate that current technologies allow us all while working remotely to still interact on a continuing basis. Imagine trying to do this ten + years ago without our online high-speed access, video messaging, or screen sharing softwares. Onboarding new employees can now be streamlined with virtual face-to-face team-building making it easier for new staff to feel like part of the team even when they haven’t met in person.
Hiring While Working Remotely
New hires must be ready to work and be productive from the start. Personalized hand-holding and in-person demonstration of procedures can no longer be the norm. New staff must already be well versed in the latest technology allowing them to connect with existing workers and with their work assignments as quickly as possible.
Past orientation programs may no longer work for new employees, especially the ones that are working fully remote. Luckily with all the advances in technology, Employee handbooks, documentation, and onboarding forms can all be delivered and signed electronically. Even negotiation of salary and benefits can also be processed digitally. All HR staff should be current on the latest software and technology so that interviewing, job offers, hiring documentation as well as new hire orientation can be a smooth process for new hires even while working in a remote setting.
Interactive connecting platforms such as Zoom, Webex, Google Workshop, etc, help to make new hires become part of the organization and allow corroboration. Giving new starters a means to connect with co-workers on a social level will go a long way to maximize cohesiveness in your group and allow new staff to ask questions of their peers without involving the management network.
Assigning a specific employee to be a partner or buddy can go a long way to ease the transition into a new corporate culture. It has been shown that a mentor relationship can be a great help in learning company-specific procedures as well as speeding up on-the-job-training. We have seen that companies can enhance the hiring experience by underscoring organization values and arranging solid mentoring programs.
Company core values should be clearly defined and communicated to the employees during the interviewing and hiring process, in the course of the onboarding, and continuing through the employee’s full entrance into the company. In a case where companies grow so fast involving new employees, it is beneficial to clearly communicate core values right from the start. Sharing these values is not just about incorporating them in the onboarding package or placing them on a wall plaque. It is about leaders or mentors acting as role models for these values. They need to emphasize the culture even in a remote conversation and reward people who also act as role models for those values.
When starting a position with a new company, a new hire expects a blast of introductions and meetings with their team members. The goal of this is to have them experience the company culture and process the flow of the business. Inter-departmental understanding is crucial. As an example, a new employee in the finance department needs to know how his or her activities affect the marketing department and vice versa. Departments within most businesses are connected to each other. Accomplishing this task in a remote environment may seem difficult but with guidance can be much more easily attainable.
Let Klein HR Solutions help you develop and organize a comprehensive onboarding plan to hire and incorporate new employees and help them easily embrace your company, employees, and corporate culture…remotely or in-person.
Contact Klein HR Solutions:
Call (305) 775-5640 or e-mail: [email protected]
References:
https://www.fenews.co.uk/press-releases/63980-remote-recruiting-the-future-of-onboarding
https://www.openaccessgovernment.org/how-to-onboard-new-starters-when-working-remotely/104378/