Getting onboarding right: How to set up new recruits for success

It’s getting to the time of year where organisations ramp up recruiting new staff. Training providers and AAT’s experienced team talk about the best way to approach onboarding them.

The September Recruiting Rush is on! With summer holidays ending and end-of-year budgets clearer, September usually sees businesses launching drives to hire.

But onboarding fresh talent – particularly inexperienced recruits – comes with challenges. In the past few years, many businesses have reported young hires lacking core workplace skills such as time management and communication, or even abandoning their roles before day one.

“Whether you’re a large or small business, the goal of onboarding is to help that trainee move from becoming a newcomer to a confident, productive member of the team, who knows how to do their job and feels like they belong too,” says Jordan Osborn, business development manager at the AAT. “To avoid a high fall-off rate, it’s important to get onboarding right.”

Here’s how to make that experience as seamless as possible.

Pre-boarding: Setting up success before day one

Onboarding should start days – or even weeks – before the new hire starts. Some candidates might have accepted the job offer but may be weighing up other roles at the same time. How your business engages with them during this period could be crucial.  

Some pre-boarding strategies suggested by Osborn include:

• Online activities to build rapport, such as quizzes or virtual escape rooms.
• Arranging an informal coffee meet-up, lunch or dinner with the hiring manager or future teammates outside the workplace.
• Goody bags containing free swag such as branded notepads, water bottles, pens and sweets. This could also include some info on company culture, an employee handbook, an agenda for their first day/week, plus a friendly start-date reminder.
• Invitations to team days and social gatherings.

The first day

“The worst thing that can happen is the new recruit turns up on day one and never comes back!” says Osborn. “You want to build confidence and make them feel they’ve made the right choice.”

A well-planned first day should include:

• A workplace tour and introductions.
• An overview of the company’s virtual tools for hybrid and remote employees.
• IT set-up and essential policies.
• A simple outline for their first week.
• A casual coffee or lunch with their line manager or new colleagues.

Don’t dump a stack of forms on their desk the second they arrive or leave them looking helpless while IT sets up their equipment.

The first week

“The ideal first week should be a blend of orientation with a few small confidence-building tasks, such as shadowing a client call or meeting, processing a basic transaction or data-checking under supervision,” says Osborn. “This lets them feel they’re contributing and starting to grow, but without the pressure to perform.”

For recruits studying professional qualifications such as apprentices, Osborn suggests sharing a “clear pathway, along with a study planner and resources to access in their own time.”

Enlist the help of your training provider

Training providers don’t just deliver skills. They can also handle much of the more onerous onboarding tasks too, such as HR or admin functions.

“Think of training providers as partners or consultants,” says Matt Edwards, account director at EMA Training. “We can take away much of that admin headache for employers, such as filing information for government gateways, friendship/learning agreements and national insurance tax category advice.”

Edwards recommends meeting with a training provider before the employee’s start date, to ensure contracts, compliance and training plans are ready.

Probation without pressure

Probation is a scary word for new recruits. Osborn’s advice? Don’t present it as an anxiety-inducing binary pass/fail process. “Instead, be clear about how long probation lasts, what success looks like and how that individual will be supported. This could be as simple as setting goals for each week/month. Also, be transparent about how their progress will be reviewed: informal weekly catch-ups, or once every 30/60/90 days”.

Mentoring and buddy schemes

Pairing trainees with a ‘buddy’ – usually somebody who has gone through the same apprenticeship a year or two earlier – can be hugely beneficial in helping them navigate the workplace culture, as well as boosting their learning.

“Buddy schemes are great for helping starters understand the unwritten rules of the business, such as ‘What happens if I make a mistake?’ or software questions,” says Osborn. “Ideally, the buddy should reach out beforehand by sending a quick message or email to ease first-day nerves.”

Mentoring, on the other hand, tends to focus on professional development. Businesses may wish to assign a mentor from within their organisation, but training providers such as EMA Training also allocate mentors too.

“If the company or practice is struggling with workloads, then the training provider’s mentor will offer additional support for the trainee,” says Edwards.

Allocating managers

“It’s important to have just one main point-of-contact,” says Osborn. “Typically, this would be the manager, but it could be a ‘buddy’ too. It just needs to be somebody who’s approachable and patient. It might also be an opportunity to upskill an existing member of staff into a managerial position.”

Culture club

For many young people, workplace happiness isn’t just about salary and pension benefits, but company culture such as wellbeing, hybrid working and team spirit.

“In my view, culture has to be experienced, rather than businesses showing recruits a PowerPoint slide on ‘company culture’ and values’,” says Osborn.

How long should onboarding take?

Osborn suggests:

Week 1: Focus on orientation.

Weeks 2-4: Provide hands-on learning with close support.

Months 2-3/weeks 5-11: Set trainees bite-sized goals to keep them motivated. These tasks shouldn’t make them feel as if they’ve been thrown in at the deep end.

“Make sure you check in with the individual, but also review their progress by checking in with other staff as well,” adds Osborn.

End of month 3/12 weeks: “By now the trainee should be hitting their stride with the right mix of supervision and autonomy,” says Osborn. “They should also have a basic understanding of compliance, how to work to deadlines, communicate with clients/internal teams plus also contribute some meaningful work.”

Above all, preparation is essential. Says Edwards, “The businesses that get this right give learners a thorough précis of what to expect before they even walk in the door. These companies ensure learners receive their contract before they start, alongside the offer letter, details of dress code, what to expect in their first week and a full training/development plan. Outlining these expectations from the get-go makes things go much smoother for both the business and trainee.”

Christian Koch is an award-winning journalist/editor who has written for the Evening Standard, Sunday Times, Guardian, Telegraph, The Independent, Q, The Face and Metro. He's also written about business for Accounting Technician, 20 and Director, where he is contributing editor.