Onboarding goes virtual for ServiceNow across EMEA

The coronavirus pandemic has put the employee experience in the spotlight for organisations worldwide. At ServiceNow, we’re actively working to mitigate the impact on our employees across EMEA — and that includes our new hires, who are joining us at an unprecedented time.

At any time, creating a seamless experience from offer letter to day one can feel like an insurmountable task.

New hire data needs to be inputted into different systems in a secure and compliant manner, IT and telephony equipment ordered, security badges created, forms filled out, policies shared and signed, desks assigned and much more.

It takes a huge effort bringing together multiple people, teams, departments and systems. And the reality is that the only things holding this process together are manual tasks and spreadsheets.

Yet at the heart of this process is an important new hire who wants to be enabled and get productive.

Recognising this, we started running our entire “offer letter to day one” process in EMEA on the Now platform. Two start dates per month, with up to 50 new hires on each day one who travel in-person to one of our key EMEA hubs. 

It transformed the new hire onboarding experience everyone involved. But little did we know that our truest test of our approach was right around the corner.

As COVID-19 broke out and accelerated, ServiceNow pivoted overnight from a 100% in-person experience on day one to a 100% virtual experience. There was no need to unpick parts of our process or struggle with a looming deadline. 

That was a month ago. Since then, we’ve welcomed over 100 new hires into the EMEA region and the entire experience is anchored to the ServiceNow platform.

I’m proud of what we’ve achieved so quickly, but it’s the words of those working in ServiceNow EMEA that speak volumes about its success. Here are a few highlights:

Sally Sourbron, Senior Director, Global Talent EMEA

"Last year we completely overhauled our new hire day one experience. What I really wanted us to focus on was just that: the experience. The feedback I've heard from new hires since we went virtual the last few weeks has exceeded my expectations. This really has changed the game."

Liran Daniel, Senior Manager EMEA, Tech Lounge team 

“Before we implemented our own technology, hiring managers would need to email, SMS or call me with requests for equipment for their new hires. Since we implemented ServiceNow, new hires can choose their equipment in an app, so when we shifted to virtual on-boarding, all we had to change was shipping the equipment to our new hires directly.”

Chloe Wooldridge, Manager, EMEA Talent Acquisition Operations

“My team is so happy that we made the switch last year to our own platform. In the past we were relying on a checklist of tasks, each of which was highly manual. Now it’s all centralised in the app. When the pandemic broke out, all we had to change was content relating to where new hires would have to travel to in-person. It really was that simple.”

Jade Duffin, Senior Manager, Global Talent Care

“My team is the core point of contact for any employee in ServiceNow who has an employee experience query. Having all the information in one place in our Servicenow portal means we are perfectly positioned to take any queries from new hires online, all in the same place. Since we went virtual, hearing the feedback from new hires and managers has made me feel very proud of what we are doing and I'm really excited about new developments to help with new hire talent care.”

 Rob Reynolds, Manager, Global Sales Development (Hiring Manager)

“My responsibilities as a hiring manager have reduced from having multiple manual tasks, down to just a few that I am prompted for in the app. I’ve heard nothing but praise for how the experience is. I’m a happy camper!” 

Nerys Mutlow (New hire in EMEA, March 2020)

“From the offer being turned around in a matter of hours and digitally sent to me, the entire onboarding process was a delight and I didn’t see a single piece of paper!”