New jobs are stressful. Nowadays companies are doing more to smooth out the process, but are we doing enough? Instead of the usual skills and technique training, what if we told you, there’s actually more that you can do to get your new hires ready and committed to the company?

In a recent Ted article by Daniel Cable, a professor of organisational behaviour at London Business School talked about supercharging new employees. How by activating people’s “best selves” on the first day of work they’re able to increase staff retention by up to 32 percent.

The study was conducted on over 600 new hires at Wipro. Each new hire was assigned at random to one of three of the following conditions.

Group 1 : “Best Self”

• New employees in the first condition were asked to write a personal account of when they demonstrated one of their best characteristics. After they were done, they were asked to share the account with others.

Group 2

• In the second condition, new hires were asked to reflect for 15 minutes on the senior leader’s remarks, after which they would discuss their answers with the group.

Group 3

• People in group three were simply given the regular Wipro orientation, where they focused on skills and training of the new hires.

What they found 6 months after the fact was quite interesting. While both people from group 1 (“best self” condition) and group 2 showed a higher retention rate, 32% and 14% respectively, when compared with the people in the regular orientation condition, only those in the “best self” condition led to a significantly higher customer satisfaction, 11% higher than found in the other conditions.

By using small interventions, like in this case the sharing a personal success story in an otherwise stressful environment, people are able to draw attention to areas that their good at and defuse the stress that comes with starting a new job.

2 Easy On-boarding Tips to Boost Your Employee Engagement

As demonstrated, these simple gestures can be a solution to greater challenges faced by HR professionals. An effective on-boarding process, is one that looks out for the newcomer. Breaking possible tensions that may arise on the first day and providing a way for newcomers to feel acquainted to the company securing future business progress.

With this in mind, here’s two easy tips to help companies on-board their new hires more effectively.

1. Focus on the People and Building Long-term Connections

A pitfall of the common on-boarding process is the sole focus on skills and training. No doubt, having a skillfully trained employee can do wonders to building a business, however that only applies if they are willing to stay and commit to the company.

If on the other hand, companies begin the on-boarding process with a focus first on the people, and in helping new hires bond and identify with others in the company, you speed up the familiarising process motivating people to take more initiative in the business. This can be as simple as setting up a lunch on the first day for the team to get to know each other, where they can bond outside of work, promoting a more collaborative culture.

2. Get the Paperwork out of the Way

Not many people can say they’re truly passionate about paperwork, so it’s probably best not to throw a bulk load of paperwork at the newcomer the second they sit down. Understandably, there are things that need to be filled out from a legal standpoint.

A good way to approach this is to organise all the necessary documents ahead of time and set a designated time for the newcomer to fill this out. If possible, it may be good to send resources like employee handbooks and other documents to the newcomer beforehand so you limit the tedious paperwork that needs to be completed on the first day.

Bottom-line : Making it about the people

At the end of the day, the best way to engage staff whether it’s in the beginning or later down the line is only achieved through thinking about the people. By outsourcing administratively heavy tasks like payroll and recruitment to HR outsourcing services, HR professionals are able to dedicate more time in carrying out value adding strategies like improving the orientation process to increase retention and boost customer satisfaction.

Looking for talents to build your company presence in Asia? Links International is an award-winning industry leader in innovative HR outsourcing and recruitment agency. Contact us and learn how HR outsourcing can help elevate your business.

Related Articles:

• Here is Why Your Business Can’t Find Great Talent
• Success doesn’t come from salary alone
• Scaling Your Business? What You Need to Know When Hiring
• Marcomms Leaders in Asia – Digital Transformation

Links International is an industry leader in innovative HR outsourcing with services such as payroll outsourcing, visa application, Employer of Record (EOR), recruitment and more! Contact us for more information on how we can help leverage your HR function.