Worcester Business Journal

www.wbjournal.com August 3, 2015 • Worcester Business Journal 17 E mployers today realize that onboarding workers, or integrating them within the organization, is key to attracting and retaining top talent, boosting productivity and driving business growth. The first step to effective onboarding is to establish a formal employer- employee relationship, based on mutual understanding. This phase of the hiring process is often the most neglected, yet crucial by all measures. Essentially, onboarding is much like the first day of school. You meet the principal and teachers, learn the rules, and become familiar with the school. Your goal is to create an onboarding program that drives employee engagement and business growth by providing information and creating a smooth, successful transition process that can build a strong foundation for an employee success. A systematic onboarding program has multiple long-term benefits that go beyond simply staying competitive. Here are five benefits: 1. Engagement. Employees who are emotionally linked to their jobs tend to exhibit an overall sense of connection to their organizations. The catalyst for this is usually a close relationship with a direct manager who focuses on building the employee's unique strengths. 2. Commitment. Most engaged employees have a clear sense of commitment to their organization and are less likely to be tempted to leave for higher pay elsewhere. 3. Progress. Demonstrating progress toward goals is the easiest way to boost engagement. Managers must track employee progress and encourage direct reports by setting attainable and realistic goals. 4. Contribution. Engaged employees are contributors; they know exactly what's expected of them. 5. Expectation. It's crucial to set clear expectations for your new hires and show them exactly how to succeed. Here are the 10 key components of onboarding: 1. Ensure the employee understands his or her job. 2. Provide a plan that details objectives and expectations. 3. Conduct the onboarding process in an organized, uninterrupted manner. 4. Have all the employee's paperwork ready on the first day. 5. Introduce the employee to co-workers and assign a mentor. 6. Ensure that the employee's new work area is set up. 7. Set up regular performance checkpoints at 30, 60 and 90 days. 8. Balance paperwork with informal staff meetings and lunch with co-workers. 9. Provide company information and policies. 10. Think beyond the first few days! And here are six ways to prevent a less-than-positive first day: 1. Assign a staff person who has a career-impacting deadline to meet. 2. Avoid the assignment of "busy work" that has nothing to do with the new person's core job description. 3. Don't have the new employee watch video presentations all day. 4. Make sure the employee has an assigned or created work space. 5. Don't have the employee start while his or her supervisor is on vacation. 6. Don't leave the employee in a noisy area to complete paperwork and read the 100-page employee handbook. Effective onboarding will decrease the time a new employee needs to become fully engaged and productive. It will also maximize engagement and productivity, and establish a foundation for success. n Nancy L. Dube is principal of Dube Consulting in Worcester, which provides human resources outsourcing services and LinkedIn expertise. Contact her at nancy@dubeconsulting.com. By Trave Harmon Trave Harmon is CEO of Triton Technologies, a managed IT services firm in Worcester. Contact him at tharmon@ TritonCompterCorp.com. 10 Things I Know About... VoIP for Business Integrate new employees effectively KNOW HOW 10. It's cost effective. Since most VoIP providers don't need to maintain the lines over which they deliver service, they keep their prices low, saving you money. 9. Changes are easy. Making changes to your phone system used to be complex. With most PBX systems, they're a simple web page login, where you make changes and press "submit." 8. Lots of features Caller ID? Conference calls? Voice mail to email? They're all included with most VoIP PBX providers. What had been separate charges are now standard options. 7. Its dynamic. Most on-premise systems rarely change unless they're under contract or maintenance agreement. With VoIP PBX, they're maintained constantly, with added features, security patches and integration all included. 6. Unified messaging With such tools as Outlook, Gmail and Skype for Business, most providers will allow you to connect your contacts to your PBX, giving you more marketing control. 5. You can take it with you. Cell phones can now be a part of most systems if you have their extensions. 4. It uses existing infrastructure. Most VoIP providers use your network. With business-grade switches and firewalls, you can reduce your costs by not having to run another set of wires. 3. It's scalable. Need more phones? No problem! One, 10, 50 or 1,000 handset systems are now commonplace without having to purchase secondary hardware. 2. It's location-independent. Moving? No problem! Just unpack your phone, plug it in and you have phone service instantly at your new location. 1. It's power-independent. Just because your location loses power doesn't mean your system is dead. Most PBX providers have multiple data centers worldwide, so being out of power doesn't mean you're out of business. With cell phone routing, you're always available for a call, even in the dark. n I f you're a manager who's on the fence about whether to hire from outside or promote from within, there are definite pros to promoting someone. In this make-or-buy decision, going with an employee with whom you're already familiar may be an appropriate choice for your company, and you should give it careful consideration. Here are three things to keep in mind when weighing the benefits: First, remember a team member's readiness for promotion begins with you. If you don't have candidates to advance, analyze why. It takes time to create a manager, as Doug and Polly White point out in an article at Entrepreneur.com. To have suitable candidates for promotion, you must give employees opportunities to show their value. "A pet products company we worked with put a high-potential employee in charge of a task force. She had the opportunity to lead a group and practice management skills," the Whites said. Helping employees to advance also means giving feedback, offering coaching and steering employees toward networking opportunities. Promotions help retain employees and save money. "If you aren't offering promotions to your top talent, someone else in another company, such as your competitor, just might," Chris Milksen writes in an article at SmallBusinessChron.com. "Once that happens, you are very likely to lose that employee." Additionally, with turnover a costly proposition, promotions save your company money as opposed to hiring someone new. Do you need a shakeup? And is that all it's cracked up to be? Outsiders can be disruptive, which is not always a negative, says Chuck Leddy at MiddleMarketCenter.org. But, he writes, some research shows external hires get lower performance evaluations as compared with employees who were promoted. Managers need to weigh the importance of their needs (change vs. a potentially challenging transition) to establish which option better serves the company. n 101: PROMOTING FROM WITHIN >> BY SUSAN SHALHOUB Special to the Worcester Business Journal BY NANCY L. DUBE Special to the Worcester Business Journal 'Onboarding' your new hires can keep good talent and advance the business

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