Article
3 min read
Author
Anja Simic
Published
February 01, 2023
Last Update
July 24, 2024
Table of Contents
How is onboarding new remote employees different from traditional onboarding?
10 remote onboarding best practices
Remote employee onboarding checklist
Build your remote workforce with Deel
Your employee onboarding process can heavily influence your employee retention, productivity, and overall success. 20% of employee turnover occurs within the first 45 days of employment, meaning many new hires leave a new job before they officially complete onboarding.
Remote employee onboarding can be even more challenging, as we at Deel know all too well. Deel’s Senior People Development Program Manager, Danica Ristic, has onboarded over 1200 remote workers from over 85 countries and has some insights on how to onboard new employees remotely.
In this post, you’ll read:
Whether remote or in person, the goals of any onboarding program are the same. By the end of the process, you want the new hire to feel welcomed to the team, excited about joining the company, and confident in their new role.
Both remote and on-site hiring managers have to guide new employees through unfamiliar tech and processes, but remote hiring managers (and their teams) have to do it all through a screen, which adds some complications that are unique to remote onboarding.
When onboarding and training remote employees, you must rely heavily on technology and coordinate with a global workforce, which isn’t easy. Common challenges to onboarding remotely include:
Remote onboarding isn’t reserved for hiring globally dispersed teams. Localized teams can reap the benefits too, and there are many. They include:
Complimentary reading
Learn more about the benefits of remote work.
An effective remote onboarding experience will fit the unique specificities of the new hire’s role and of the company’s culture. Here are ten actions to help supercharge remote employee onboarding for your team.
Danica suggests booking a consultation with your Knowledge and Learning, People Operations, and Onboarding teams before onboarding your first new employee. Their experience will be invaluable in defining a smooth and effective process.
In your meetings, discuss topics like:
Help your new hires feel part of the team even before their first day starts. Some companies send their new hires physical welcome packages with their printed employee handbook and company swag like stickers, mugs, and sweaters.
A cheaper and easier option can be to send them a digital welcome package instead. In your digital welcome package (which could be as simple as an email), you should include:
The week before a new hire joins the team, create their work email address and invite them to log in to their new account and join or set up all of the platforms and tools they’ll use.
Make sure to include a link to a video tutorial for each platform, program, or tool so they know how to get started. Ideally, someone on their immediate team should lead this, so the new hire can learn how the tools they will use apply to their specific role.
A waterfall check-in schedule is front-loaded with meetings between the new hire and their manager. As each week passes, the frequency of meetings gradually decreases until you reach your standard check-in schedule.
Danica has led Deel’s onboarding process for several hundred people (and counting), but she doesn’t do it alone. “The best thing you can do for onboarding is to connect it with everyone and not work on it in isolation,” she says.
At Deel, candidates meet several team members before their start date, including hiring staff, direct managers, and leadership. Then, during their first few days at Deel, they meet more People team members, receive training from their team members, and meet other new hires in their onboarding cohort.
Danica believes this helps new hires find their place in the company with more ease.
Provide new hires with an onboarding plan that lists the tasks, role-specific training, and meetings scheduled for each day of the process. You can follow the 30/60/90-day framework if it aligns with your team’s workflow, or choose a different one that works for you.
At Deel, we use our product, Deel Engage, to build and share collaborative onboarding journeys. In these plans, new hires can find information like:
“Ask your current hires for feedback on how to improve the onboarding,” recommends Danica.
Approximately three months after an employee joins the company, send them a survey or interview them about their experience over a video call. If you send a written survey, combine sliding scales, multiple-choice questions, and comment sections to simplify the feedback process.
Ask open-ended questions, like:
The beauty of remote onboarding is that the process is malleable. If you want to revise your onboarding documents or welcome package, editing a PDF or email is easy.
Virtual onboarding can feel lonely (and dull) for new remote workers. In addition to self-led learning, consider expanding your plan with these activities and media:
At Deel, every new hire is partnered with another newbie so that they can learn and grow together. They also get partnered with a more senior employee who can provide guidance and company insights.
If possible, onboard remote employees in groups (or cohorts) so they have a built-in support system and people they can contact if they have questions or want to socialize outside their immediate team.
Give new hires the opportunity and support system to make connections naturally.
Schedule one-to-one video calls or phone calls between the new hires and other immediate team members, then branch out and have them schedule their own meetings with extended team members from different departments.
Encourage your virtual employees to use Slack channels, Zoom, or other remote tools to foster collaboration and promote communication throughout the company.
If you don’t set a clear and international onboarding schedule, technical training and paperwork can monopolize a new hire’s experience.
Communicate your workplace culture, communication, and behavior expectations verbally or through written documentation. Then, take it one step further by actively demonstrating those expectations throughout the onboarding process.
Make sure you are explaining culture, proper communication, and expected behavior as much as you are explaining tools and procedure
—Danica Ristic,
Senior People Development Program Manager, Deel
Demonstrate culture wherever possible. If your culture is social, schedule introduction calls, happy hours, or lunch-and-learns with new hires and employees from across departments.
Demonstrate communication style, too. If your team solves problems and communicates over Slack (instead of email or video meetings), initiate conversations on the app and redirect new hires if they send an email or request a call with you incorrectly.
Lastly, demonstrate expected behaviors. If you expect a new employee to be online and available for specific hours each day, do the same. Update your Slack status regularly to make expectations clear.
By the end of a virtual employee’s onboarding experience, they should feel comfortable with their entire team, knowledgeable about their tools and tech, and excited to settle into their role.
The following template will walk you through the tasks you should complete during the six phases of employee onboarding.
These tasks (and their order) may change depending on your company, timeline, and the new hire’s role, so adapt them to your specific needs.
Complete these tasks one to two weeks before the new hire’s start date. This phase prepares the new hire (and their team) for their new role and gets them excited about joining the company.
Day one should ease the new hire into their new work environment. They will spend most of this day completing paperwork, learning about the company, and meeting colleagues.
At this point, the employee should be focusing on completing the necessary training and onboarding materials while getting used to their new environment.
During their first month, the new hire will ease into their role by diving into their first project and meeting more of their peers.
This three-month period is about guiding the new employees as they take on projects and settle in.
Complete the following tasks and activities on an ongoing basis after the three-month mark. From this point onward, tasks bolster employee engagement, development, and performance.
Remote employee onboarding is an involved process that must be done well if you want to keep your new hire around for more than 45 days.
It’s a lot, we know, but you can hand the technical elements over to us.
With Deel, you don’t have to worry about gathering tax information from your new employees or generating their employment contracts. The employment process gets handled by remote hiring experts, so you can focus on building your best business.
Read more about how Deel works or book a demo to see how we can help you and your team grow.
Onboarding refers to the overarching experience of a new employee joining a company. It includes orientation and training.
Orientation is a session in the onboarding process in which new hires are welcomed to the team and walked through the company’s mission and background. Orientation will also cover what to expect during general onboarding.
Training refers to specific courses or modules dedicated to the new hire’s learning and development. Training could focus on behaviors, tools, products, compliance, and security.
Onboarding can take anywhere from three weeks to three months, on average. There’s no right or wrong answer here, though. The length of your remote employee onboarding will depend on the complexity of the role, your timeline, and the size of your company.
Before employees start working from home, they should gather the documentation required for the onboarding process, like their social insurance number, valid government ID, or direct deposit information for payroll.
Most remote roles also require a strong internet connection, so new employees may have to upgrade their internet package. (Run an “internet speed test” online to determine your internet’s download speed.)
Solutions
© Copyright 2024. All Rights Reserved.