digital onboarding process

It's no surprise that a thorough onboarding process is important, so new employees settles in well and swift in your company. But...

... perhaps you would be surprised, when we tell you that onboarding actually starts, when the employee applies for the job?

Have you ever thought that the elements and dynamics that makes games fun actually can be used to make your new hire settle in her new job the best way possible?

In many companies onboarding (and preboarding) is an overseen part of the recruitment process. A process that starts with a need, a hire, and hopefully a long an ever-lasting marriage between employee and company. 

It is odd how this is overseen when you think of how all of us know the feeling of being welcomed properly is so important. That applies whether it's in a new class in school, in the locker room at your new sports club or in your new workplace.

digital onboarding process

Bad onboarding processes are of course not on purpose. No one earns anything from new hires that stumbles on the way into your company. When it goes wrong it is usually because the company underestimates the need for onboarding, or that the onboard simply isn't timely and won't work as intended. Also, should your employees leave you for some reason, it's a really good idea to have a plan for offboarding.

Digital Learning Makes a Difference in Onboarding

The challenge with traditional learning methods - and here we also mean e-learning with video - is that the receivers reality has changed. Today, most people in their working age are used to well-made apps and websites, and many spent time on games and other forms of digital entertainment. On top of that, people are increasingly doing what they want to do when they want to do it. 

This means that time has past from the onboarding and educational processes where employees are reduced to simply being a passive audience who are handed new knowledge in large amounts on a one-way street.

The modern worker wants to learn when he or she has energy for it, and that could very well mean that the time HR planned Tuesday morning, to the new learning, suits worse than Thursday evening after the kids are tugged in and asleep and their lunch is made. 

The point is - the employee is more ready to learn at home in the couch with a cup of coffee. 

This is where digital learning comes into play. With the right setup, you can deliver the right package to the employee who then can unpack it the way and time they want to do it. That creates the right circumstances for the employee to become a success - because they simply learn better which is crucial for performance.

Why is Onboarding Necessary?

As described earlier most people have tried being in this new person in any given situation. But one perspective is soft values and feelings - another is hard facts: 

  • 25% of all new hires stops within a year

  • It costs a company 75.000 USD if an employee quits after 4-6 months 

  • Effective onboarding increases employee engagement with more than 20%

  • New hires are 58% more inclined to stay in a company for more than 3 years, when properly onboarded.

A premise, that is often overseen, is that people are different and learn differently. This implies that you to a higher extent than before should tailor the onboarding to process to different types of employees.

Remember also that onboarding is not only relevant when hiring new people. If an employee is promoted or get a new function it would be easy to think that this person automatically falls well into place. But if the tasks are new and different than old ones the employee will feel a bit if not quite a lot out of his or her comfort zone. Nonetheless maybe it also embarrassing to ask for a "starting package", just like new hires get, when you're an experienced employee in the company. 

The same counts for onboarding freelancers. These can easily be forgotten when focus is on new employees that gets flowers on their first day and a personal desk. If you want the optimal cooperation and result out of your freelancers you should really think of them in your learning and onboarding processes. 

Learn more about Onboarding in these insightful posts:

Virtual reality and gamification is the way forward

In Learningbank we are specialized in digital learning - simply because it works. 

Our research show that 80 % of companies that use gamification in their learning see a much higher completion rate of the learning provided. The same goes with satisfaction - when gamification is applied, 84% see a higher satisfaction among employees. Lastly, 71% see better results in tests, when employees have received gamified learning. 

The benefits with VR and gamification is that the learning path requires learners to interact instead of passively observe and that increases the ability to actually remember the learning.