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Carolyn B. Thompson Reprint Rights
Training Systems, Inc. 526 Words
221 Vermont Road
Frankfort, IL 60423
815-469-1162
First Days of Employment - Make Them Want To Stay!
by: Carolyn B. Thompson
Would you invite people to your home without preparing? That's what lots
of us do to our employees on their first day of employment. Put yourself
in their place: it's your first day, you walk in the door, you're a little
anxious, you don't know what the day will hold - other employees know what
they'll be doing today because it's on their calendar - your calendar says
"start new job". Other employees are greeted by the receptionist as they
come in with "Good morning, John...Good morning, Barbara... How was your
weekend?" - you're greeted with "Good morning, may I help you?"
How much more unwelcoming can we make their first day! You'd never invite
people for dinner and once they arrived find out their names. You'd never
invite people for dinner and once they arrived ask them to clean the
house. You'd never invite them and once they arrive say, "Let's go to the
store and pick out what you want for dinner, then we'll cook it together."
Yet that's what we do to new staff if we don't prepare! Follow these 10
easy and inexpensive steps to new employee orientation.
1. Prepare for their arrival by telling other staff, cleaning their work
space, ordering supplies they'll need, making a schedule.
2. Give them an introduction to the organization. Many companies have used
scavenger hunts, bingo cards and other ways to get them to learn about the
organization in a more fun way than lectures or reading.
3. Introduce them to co-workers, vendors, supervisors, and other people
they'll be working with.
4. Provide training on basic job duties. This is best done by a coworker.
It doubles as a retention benefit to that coworker by giving them the
opportunity to train others, and help other people learn.
5. Review all policies and practices. The employee handbook is a great
recruitment and training tool, as long as it's current and relevant. Use
the employee handbook, work process manuals, training manuals, and policy
and procedure manuals for written reinforcement and as a resource manual.
6. Provide an overview of benefits and services. They can read a good
amount of this, but you want to get them excited about the really great
things. Then they can ask questions later.
7. Discuss career/life goals and needs and how the organization can help
meet them. Find out early what motivates them so that you can provide
positive reinforcement that's meaningful to them.
8. Discuss your expectations and those of the organization. Most often
when employees leave sooner than you wanted them to, they say things like
"I just didn't understand what was expected of me."
9. Provide a tour of all facilities where they'll be working, which
includes vendors and customers, if their job causes them to be in other
locations.
10. Include them in the organization's activities as soon as possible.
It's those things like employee baseball games, birthday parties and baby
showers that make an employee really feel a part of the group and welcome.
The first few days are their first impression, so make them want to stay -
keep quality employees with new employee orientation!
Carolyn B. Thompson is the President of Training Systems, Inc., a
customized training and HR consulting company that helps small and medium
sized organizations enhance their ability to recruit, inspire and retain
quality employees and improve performance through training. Training
Systems, Inc. also provides training design and delivery services to
training companies and the training departments of large companies, and
professional and trade associations. Carolyn B. Thompson is an experienced
trainer and consultant knowledgeable in the challenging area of employee
recruitment, inspiration and retention. She is an exciting, inspirational
trainer who leads people to learn. She has written articles for prominent
magazines, has been interviewed for Chicago's TV Channel 26, the "You're
Hired" radio show, Safety & Health, Small Business Computing, Business
Week, Working Woman, Redbook and Inc. magazines, been the subject of
articles in the Daily Southtown and Star newspapers, as well as written
chapters in several books. Carolyn produced a two-tape audio cassette set
entitled "Straight Talk for Employers" , wrote the book entitled "Creating
Highly Interactive Training Quickly and Effectively" and is writing a book
about on-the-job training for Crisp Publications.
(c) Training Systems, Inc. 1999 |
