Suggested solutions for current HR challenges using technology : #1 Onboarding

In discussions with various HR professionals and line managers, we often talk about our challenges with onboarding.  

It’s frustrating when there is never enough time to make improvements as we are frequently bogged down in operational matters, more so over the last year! Yet, if we took the time to automate those administrative tasks that take up the time, this would leave us to focus on the things that matter most and ultimately provide a much better onboarding service to new joiners.

For sure there is always improvements to be made but surely it's better to get started and continue to improve?

Here's my rundown of the current problems and provide solutions using technology:

Which of these onboarding headaches sound familiar to you?

• You rely too much on manual administration which results in late submissions, incomplete information, or even missed steps in your processes
• Last-minute recruits causing unnecessary pressure to various departments but in particular to HR and IT
• Inconsistency of onboarding experience
• Manual liaison between HR, IT, onboarding buddy, Payroll, manager, teams, etc
• Technology challenges, especially with increased remote working since the pandemic
• Long, complex, or disparate processes
• Remote workers (yes, I have said it twice!)
• Policies that need to be understood and read – just a tick box exercise?

I am sure you have other things you could add to the list – let me know in the comments some of the issues you have seen during your career.

Opportunity or solution? You decide

You can create tech-based solutions yourself, speak to your IT team and ask for help or talk to me about implementing automation in your organisation. If you use Microsoft Office 365 then the chances are you already have the technology to make it happen.

If you are considering automation:

• Involve other departments and managers in your design (what works for HR may not work so well for them – trust me, I know this first hand!)
• Take the opportunity to streamline your processes
• Enable a consistent approach that is tailored to specific departmental needs – create your core sequence and then think about branching out and making it more personalised
• Implement a minimum viable automation sequence to test it works, then build on it from there (although if you have very complex processes thinking about it as a whole, rather than small sections may be better)

Typical current onboarding processes

1.     Go to the intranet/HRIS system and find new starter form

2.     Download, print, and complete the form

3.     Scan it to yourself

4.     Email it to IT, Payroll, Finance, etc

5.     Go to intranet/HRIS system and find new equipment form

6.     Download, print and complete

7.     Once received into HR, they log it into a tracking spreadsheet

8.     You get the idea…….

The process is long-winded and frequently results in very long, complex spreadsheets and manual checking. How many spreadsheets do you use in your organisation? Do they even work properly any longer?

Your new process: Streamline and automate your manual onboarding process

Using appropriate technology is not difficult or time-consuming. You don’t need expensive systems that promise the earth and look far too complex.

Taking the time to streamline, map and automate your new starter process will save so much time in the long run and address those cumbersome issues!  More importantly, if you get your automation sequences right, the impact you have on your new starter’s experience can be all the difference to them in their first few weeks and months with you.

In all likelihood, if you use Office 365 you may already have all the tools you need to automate your onboarding process.  By the end of this technology series, hopefully you will understand how easy the tech side is – or appreciate it enough to start learning with HR Digital Academy.

Briefly, here is what you need to do to set up a very simple notification process:

1.     Map and streamline your process – draw it out on paper – you don’t have to be too technical about it at this stage - Who needs to know about a new starter and what action do they need to take?

2.     Identify from your process map who needs to receive which email notification

3.     Create your new starter form using Microsoft Forms – Name, start date, Department, Job title, who they are reporting to, equipment required checklist, etc.

4.     Create your flow based on your process map using Microsoft Power Automate and Microsoft Forms  – Using the form, once completed, will send an email notification to IT about the new starter as well as request the appropriate equipment that is required; Email payroll to assign a new employee number, request Finance to issue a cost centre, etc

5.     Keep it simple and create your first automation using a simple Form and Outlook for emails and test it for yourself. 

6.     Review your new starter form to ensure it has all the details required for you to create your automation flow using Power Automate

7.     Seek feedback from your key stakeholders involved in the back end creation – what works, what doesn’t work and whether they have any suggestions.

8.     Seek feedback from your hiring managers before implementing – remember, this form helps them, not hinders. 

9.     Finally, has the process achieved what you need it to and addressed all those challenges you originally had with your onboarding process? If not, what’s the point?

Technology that is involved:

Microsoft forms: Your Recruitment Advisor/Hiring Manager completes a simple online form that looks something like this:

This form is then linked to your ‘automation’ piece – which can simply be automatic emails going out to relevant people with specific information contained in the form. 

Yes, it can be so, so, so much more than that but remember, start small, test, review, and add to it.

This is Power Automate, which creates each step of your process that requires an action:

 It can send emails, link to different documents, create an excel sheet, create quizzes, and many, many things but for this article, it will send email notifications out to relevant departments for them to take action.

For example, it could create an email to your new starter asking them to read the staff handbook and click on a button to confirm they have read and understood it. The system can then send a quiz to complete based on the content of the handbook. Once they have passed the quiz, the system will email the manager to let them know or you could create an automatic post onto your onboarding internal site to let everyone know they have passed the quiz.

Dedicated onboarding site for new starters

By creating a dedicated onboarding site for new starters, using Microsoft Sharepoint, you could automate some of your new starter process to point them to certain pages, tasks, or activities within their onboarding journey:

So many opportunities to start to create some wonderful experiences. From this one form, you could:

o  Create user accounts through your IT system (Azure AD) – your IT team may love this (or not!)

o  Build automatic reminder for managers to complete monthly probation reviews (or move it all online)

o  Send your new team member a welcome video from your CEO

o  Depending on which department they are joining, send a more personalised welcome from the relevant Head of department on day 2 or whatever your onboarding journey looks like.

o  Produce quizzes on your values and behaviours 

o  Develop a completely automated onboarding training programme through this one flow – that could change depending on job role, department, manager, location, etc.

o  Send a link to a specific page on your Sharepoint site at particular times of the new starter journey

If you were to automate your onboarding, what would you do with the time it would give you back to focus on what matters?

Why not start with assessing how much time your manual onboarding process takes and identify how many issues/problems have arisen in 2020. Then think about what you would do with that time instead.

Get in touch if you have any questions or want to talk about your specific onboarding process and how this could be automated by either you, your team, or HR Digital Academy. 

Why not join my Facebook group where I will be answering any Q&As on this article live on Thursday at 6pm? Click here to join.

The best part of using Microsoft? You can create apps available on your Manager or employee’s phone! Employee checklist, on their phone? Yup! How exciting is that?

The services HR Digital Academy can provide to you:

o  Customised workshops for HR teams in defining your requirements, mapping your processes or defining a full implementation plan – your workshop, your call. Whether that is a general overview of the Microsoft products available and how these could be utilised in HR or developing your complete end to end process.

o  Coaching you and your team through your implementation.

o  Do it for you service:

o  Developing an employee and employer checklist

o  Developing a pre-onboarding and/or onboarding site

o  Developing relevant new starter forms and automation flows