The Manager's Role in Onboarding.

After a week in the bright lights of the Big Apple, I sit and reflect on the Onboarding 2025 conference.

Leaders came from all geographies and industries; brands we know in Australia like Airbnb, Accenture, Autodesk, Facebook, Netflix, PwC and Uber, as well as brands less known, like ASML, Capital One and Southwest Airlines. However, we all came together for the one purpose - to discuss the future of onboarding for new employees.

Some things I learnt:

• There are a lot of great initiatives around onboarding. Organisations are really starting to care about it and business leaders have recognised the value of getting this stage right in terms of an employee’s assimilation into their workplace (and the impact this has on both engagement and performance)
• The workforce and the workplace is changing. We will see a move from permanent to more contingent workforces and agile workplaces will drive the removal of fixed desks and the introduction of more open and collaborative spaces
• Organisations are designing great programs with the aim of getting their new employees working productively and independently quickly

Interestingly, there wasn’t a huge focus on the role of the Manager and so I wanted to share how, at oOh!, we’ve captured the engagement of our Managers to understand the huge role they play and their impact within the onboarding experience.

I fundamentally believe that the employee’s success in integrating and connecting to the organisation is largely determined by their Manager. There are many facets to this, but honestly it comes down to this: do your Manager’s truly care about their new employees?

As part of our leadership development program, we give our leaders a number of tools to help them get to know their employees. This enables them to approach coaching, feedback and recognition in a more meaningful way. From an onboarding perspective, we in the People and Culture Team support this by integrating these learnings into our onboarding experience. To do this we use a technology platform, Enboarder, to help facilitate and guide the Managers so they are ahead of the game from day 1.

One of the first things we ask our new employees before they start is ‘What is your 3pm munchie”. On day 1, their Manager has this ready on their desk! Now this ‘wows’ our new employees and starts the journey of “my manager cares about me”. Then throughout the first 12 months we continue to provide the platform for our employees and Managers to get to know each other by using surveys to ensure that they’re building a good relationship.

None of what we ask our Managers to do is complicated or requires hours of time. We have focused on doing simple tasks or actions that in the end make a huge impact. Whether that be the 3pm munchie or recognising them in a way that is meaningful to them, the outcome is always focused on engaging that new employee. By focusing on facilitating communication between these two individuals, we believe it allows a couple of things to happen; they get to know each other and importantly build the openness in their relationship to be honest and have effective performance conversations.

At oOh!, we are committed to creating an environment that allows our new employees to be their best self and we know that if we get this right, we will have them performing effectively in their roles from the start and most importantly feeling connected to our organisation. 

#onboarding2025 #oohlyf #enboarder