Onboarding and the Cone of Uncertainty

I remember a few years ago I was living in an area of the country that was in the path of a significant weather system. Several days before the storm was due to hit, the forecast called for us to be swallowed up with a tropical depression, 7 inches of rain, devastating tornadoes and perhaps a few falling frogs and locusts. Forecasters told us to expect the worst, or perhaps nothing at all, as we were currently in the "Cone of Uncertainty". According to the Weather Channel, the cone refers to the map you often see online or on air that shows the probable path of a given storm, with circles getting larger as the prediction goes from hours to days out. The cone allows for probabilities and deviations that are best guesses to help people prepare. The closer you are to an actual event, the more accurate the prediction. So several days out, things really can feel quite uncertain. Should I pack up my family and move away? Line my animals up two by two? Or just buy another umbrella? The more insecure a person feels, the more likely they are to make a decision based on fear and not on fact.

The same can be said in Human Resources as it relates to Onboarding. (See the graph posted below). Last year, nearly 25% of workers left their jobs in under a year, and that number is exponentially higher for areas where the labor market is extremely tight (think healthcare), or has an abundance of hourly, entry-level workers (retail, hospitality). This equates to billions of dollars spent each year recruiting talent just to have it walk right out the back door and start the cycle all over again. And why? Because your new hires live in a cone of uncertainty.

Generally speaking, when a new hire is brought into an organization, they are recruited and wooed into being a part of something that sounds like a great move for their career, income and family. They are shown all the shiny new offices (or better yet, they can stay on their couch) and the fabulous perks that come with being on the team. The manager smiles and tells them they hope they'll come be a part of the "Insert Company Name" Family!?

Prediction? They are in!

But almost immediately, in hundreds of organizations across the globe, that high touch, high energy communication quickly becomes a black hole of disfunction and silence. The new hire goes from being a rock star to a criminal after the offer letter is signed. "COME WORK HERE!" morphs quickly into "I'm pretty sure you've done something illegal, prove me otherwise". Meanwhile, that super helpful, super friendly recruiter has moved on to new targets, and their new manager seems MIA.

They finally get through the confusing onboarding process only to find their orientation is a group of leaders they've never heard of, who have been with the organization since it was housed in a basement, talking about things that don't resonate or even matter in the work they've been hired to do (and definitely not on their first day), but hey, there are donuts.

Then they are off to their team, unit or floor where everyone is looking harried, overworked and unhappy. They aren't sure when lunch is, where to find the bathroom or how to log into their computer, but some marginally helpful soul stuck a post-it note with IT’s number on it (along with a note that they generally only answer between 2 and 2:30 in the afternoon).

Is it any wonder that as we get farther away from the hire event, that employees are feeling a little uncertain about their future with the company??

Prediction? They are out in the next three months (average time to find a new role)

So how do we keep them? By anticipating this cycle and making sure every touch point along their onboarding and new hire journey is filled with resources and HUMAN INTERACTION.?

Communicate early and often and don’t sugar coat processes you know create stress. In other words, we are tightening our prediction of what happens next by creating "events" (remember the weather cone above, the closer to an event, the more accurate the predicted outcome)

6 out of 10 managers have reported losing a new hire due to bad onboarding, and conversely a new hire is up to 18 times more likely to remain with an organization if they have a positive onboarding experience.

I Know My Organization Needs A Better Plan, What Now?

Step 1) Hire an onboarding team.

No,

not your recruiters. It’s a different skill set. Just ask my friend and co-contributor Jennifer McCormick , who’s been designing better processes for large-scale organizations for over a decade. "The new hire doesn't need someone to 'Sell' them, they've already accepted the offer. Now they need an advocate, coach and someone who truly knows the ins and outs of how to get acclimated into the organization. This is more transactional work, but the best people for your team will have a high degree of empathy and an ability to follow processes well."

Step 2) People do things on phones.

Make your onboarding simple, mobile optimized and text based. If you ask your new hire to fax their tax documents, their next move will be to jump on LinkedIn and update their "open to work" status.

Likewise, if you send them a 25 page PDF with all the steps of the onboarding process, and you're not the CIA, your document needs a rework. This is where an onboarding technology stack might be helpful. You may have one hidden in your ATS, or you may need to purchase a plug-in.

Step 3) Give them an actual human being to talk to if they run into problems (refer to step one) This is not the time to create another call center. Assign people to assist your new talent. You're looking to keep them, not just resolve an issue.

Step 4) This one makes people grouchy: You need a Role-Specific Orientation.

In today's labor market, orientation is not for you or your organization: it's for your employees. Different roles have different questions and different needs. Orientation is not your opportunity to indoctrinate them to your culture. It won’t work. People are going to experience your culture through the actions of everyone they encounter in the first 90 days and beyond, so hammering it home in an 8 hour day is time, donuts, promotional pens and balloons wasted. Orient online to their role...and send them a promotional pen if you really need to. (This could be done in person in a smaller organization, but for larger companies with a huge variety of roles, it may be not be cost effective to try and do everything in person. If the COVID era has taught us anything, it's that we can absolutely leverage the power of online learning when needed)

Onboarding expert Randi McSpadden , has this to say "Consider all of the people vying for those first 8 hours of the first day (Leadership, HR, Culture, Manager, Building Operations). What is the content you're trying to get to them and does the associate truly need it within that time frame? Consider just-in-time messaging to unpack the information based on analyzing current new associate behavior." Use your people data wisely and let your people tell you what they need and when. They probably don’t need your vision statement memorized on day one.

They do, however, need information about things that effect their lives: benefits, PTO, time clock, who to call when there is a pay issue. Managers probably don’t have all of this information. "Instead get your subject matter experts involved”, says McSpadden, “freeing up leaders to focus on training and team integration.”

Step 5) Welcoming is different than orientation.

This should be done by team members and their leader on the first day on their unit (team, floor, etc). Don’t overthink this, just make it happen. And know who has a natural knack for this. Hint: it’s not always the new employee's direct manager. Not that they shouldn’t be involved, but maybe not responsible for the details.?

Step 6) Schedule very regular check-ins through the first year.

Set reminders and check in with new hires often. McSpadden says that ideally you'll want these to be a blend of leader and third party check-ins. Sometimes new hires are nervous to give direct feedback to their leaders, so ensure there is some ability to give thoughts a bit more anonymously.

It's possible they will mention some things you knew nothing about and some things you can do nothing about. That might be okay as long as you can use the feedback to help employees prepare for the rain. Remember, we are creating more "events" so we can predict new hire patterns with more certainty. So if you know your organization routinely sees issues with a certain project timeframe, system log-in, or event: prepare the new hire for it. If they know it's coming, it will reduce any anxiety since they knew in advance it was a possibility.

Step 7) And I can’t stress this one enough:

Let. Them. Transfer.? If you have a transfer policy based on time in role and not performance (you probably also still use fax machines). Stop. This is your talent! You paid a team to get them in here, if the employee starts and then thinks they’re in the wrong seat but wants to stay on the bus…you win! Let them transfer. The time-in-role transfer policy is outdated. Personally, I don't believe it ever should have been there to begin with, but go ahead and make the argument that it made sense at one time. That time is not now, when we have more open roles than employees to fill them. This would be a great time to talk about #internalmobility, but we can save that for another soapbox

In Summary:

Stop the cone of uncertainty by creating more “events” with new hires during their first year; a Path of Assurance. These don’t have to be high touch or high cost, just frequent and personalized. The earlier you gain feedback on each event, the better chance you have of predicting their pattern.?

Prediction: They’re here to stay.

Editors: Lauren King, Jennifer McCormick, Randi McSpadden

Need an onboarding overhaul? Contact: [email protected] to schedule a consultation