Tips for a   Better New Employee Orientation

“People don’t care about how much you know until they know how much you care.”  Linden Wood

Orientation Vs. Integration

Your new employee orientation is a make ’em or break ’em experience, for a new employee. At its best, the process of new employee orientation solidifies the new employee’s relationship with your organization. It fuels their enthusiasm and guides their steps into a long term positive relationship with you. Done poorly, your new employee orientation will leave your new employees wondering why on earth they walked through your door.

Picture this scenario, which plays out every day in organizations. Your company’s new employee orientation program has slick, pre-printed handouts. The program’s savvy, friendly presenter uses good visuals such as overhead transparencies and a white marker board. Participants receive a guided tour of the facility.

The hundred page employee handbook is safely tucked under their arms. Yet the average employee feels bewildered, overwhelmed, and far from welcomed. Not your intention at all! What’s missing? How can you take your program from simply orienting to integrating your new hire?

Many new hires question their decision to change companies by the end of their first day. Their anxieties are fueled by mistakes that companies often make during that first-day new employee orientation program. These common mistakes include:

• overwhelming the new hire with facts, figures, names and faces packed into one eight hour day;
• showing boring orientation videos;
• providing lengthy front-of-the-room lectures; and
• failing to prepare for the new hire; ­ providing no phone, no e-mail, no computer, and no work.

Before you completely revamp your present new employee orientation process, ask yourself the following question: “What do we want to achieve during new employee orientation? What first impression do we want to make?” There is no doubt that a company’s positive first impressions can cement the deal for a newly recruited employee. Those positive strokes can also speed integration and productivity. Research shows that good orientation programs can improve employee retention by 25 percent.

Dr. John Sullivan, head of the Human Resource Management Program at San Francisco State University, concludes that several elements contribute to a World Class new employee orientation program. The best new employee orientation:

• has targeted goals and meets them,
• makes the first day a celebration,
• involves family as well as coworkers,
• makes new hires productive on the first day,
• is not boring, rushed or ineffective, and
• uses feedback to continuously improve.

Make Them Say During New Employee Orientation: “I Am Welcomed, Therefore I Belong”

Most organizations are great at celebrating the departure of a beloved coworker. Why are we often so awful at welcoming a new one? Think about arranging a party to welcome the new employee. Celebrations produce enthusiasm. Have you experienced starting a new job only to have your coworkers and supervisor ignore you during the first week?

If so, you understand the effectiveness of even a little enthusiasm! Some simple celebration methods might include: a letter of welcome signed by the CEO, a company t-shirt signed by all department members, and a cake with candles on the employee’s first day. Involve families in the celebration. Schedule a welcome luncheon or dinner for spouses and families during the employee’s first month.

Old-fashioned welcome wagons were once used to deliver goodies to new members of a community. You can establish your own “welcome wagon.” Freebies that aid the new hire in his job will reinforce the belief that company employees are glad he is there and want him to succeed.

As an example, a map showing nearby eateries is helpful and appreciated. (An invitation to lunch from coworkers each day during the employee’s first week is even more welcoming.) Go one step further than providing a map of the facility and the parking lot. Provide your new person with a photo of him/her self in the parking lot, in front of the company sign. Visuals have great impact.

With a good new employee orientation, employees can even be productive on their first day of work .

Related articles

• How to Start New Hires on the Right Track (beckersbest.wordpress.com)
• Introducing Our Employee of the Month (ohiolottery.wordpress.com)
• Putting New Hires on a Path to Success (georgepapalexandratos.wordpress.com)
• How to Retain Your Startup Workforce (mashable.com)

Masters in Success Dynamics

An effective manager pays attention to many facets of management, leadership and learning within organizations. So, it’s difficult to take the topic of “management success” and say that the following items are the most important for management success. However, the following suggested seven management success skills are the core characteristics to be a successful manager.

The most important issue in management success is being a person that others want to follow. Every action you take during your career in an organization helps determine whether people will one day want to follow you.

A successful manager, one whom others want to follow:

• Builds effective and responsive interpersonal relationships. Reporting staff members, colleagues and executives respect his or her ability to demonstrate caring, collaboration, respect, trust and attentiveness.
• Communicates effectively in person, print and email. Listening and two-way feedback characterize his or her interaction with others.
• Builds the team and enables other staff to collaborate more effectively with each other. People feel they have become more – more effective, more creative, more productive – in the presence of a team builder.
• Understands the financial aspects of the business and sets goals and measures and documents staff progress and success.
• Knows how to create an environment in which people experience positive morale and recognition and employees are motivated to work hard for the success of the business.
• Leads by example and provides recognition when others do the same.
• Helps people grow and develop their skills and capabilities through education and on-the-job learning.

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Masters in Success Dynamics

Plan= Focus= Believability= Success

If you are an entrepreneur there are a few critical tasks that you need to turn into a daily habit in order for your business to keep moving in a positive direction and   to make you money. Read on to find out those key items and how you can add them to your daily routine.

Entrepreneurs have to wear many hats when a business is just starting. Many things need to be delegated to others in order for the business to run smoothly and there are a few things that you must do yourself. If you can create a habit of performing these 5 things every day, some for just a few minutes, then you will see your business grow right alongside your dreams:

1. Plan for the future a few minutes each day. Assume that your product has stopped selling all of a sudden. What direction will you take your company next? What new income stream can you add? This is a time for day dreaming and recording notes in preparation for the future. You don’t necessarily have to take action on these items, but you need to think about them daily in order to bring out the golden ideas.

2. Work on your marketing in some aspect every day to get new customers. If your prospective customers don’t know about you they won’t buy from you. Work on getting your message out every day even if it is just for a few minutes.

3. Work on closing a sale every single day. whether you are doing this on-line, on the phone, through the mail, or face-to-face you need to be selling every day. Without the close of a sale there is no business. This is not something that you can delegate all the way. even if you have a sales force you need to be out there looking for deals.

4. Develop or strengthen your business network. You need to join or create a business network where you can help others and they can help you back. This is a great place to get free customers through referrals and an excellent mentoring opportunity using the mastermind principle.

5. Contact your current customers. Don’t ever forget about the people that have already purchased from you. These are your best customers. They already like what you have to sell and they don’t cost anything to acquire. Contact your current customers frequently, even if you are just saying hello. They need to know what you have to offer and they need to know you are still breathing. They won’t seek you out. You must go to them.

Related articles

• Top tips for delegating effectively (simplybusiness.co.uk)