Imagine this scenario: It’s your first day on the job and you are hoping that you might have an easy day of orientation training and finding your feet. Unfortunately, your new employer has not taken the time to organize training for you as they are going through a busy patch. You are thrown straight into the job and are expected to get a handle on things right away. You have not been introduced to any of your work colleagues, what you will be doing throughout the day, and how you will be using your safety equipment. Every day, several new hires may be having horrible first day experiences that do untold damage to the employer brand and jeopardize employee retention. However, there are some simple orientation tips that employers can implement to avoid these difficulties and ensure the employer-employee relationship gets off on the right foot. Employee orientations introduces employees and/or contractors to their new jobs and work environments. They provide an opportunity for new employees to become acclimatized to their new company, colleagues and work expectations. They are also an ideal time in which to go over health and safety training. Effective companies always provide great orientation training as they see the benefits that accrue from them in terms of employee retention, productivity and improved safety on site. Orientations can be provided through either face-to-face or online and should also include an opportunity to gain all the new starter’s registration data such as payroll details, certifications and ID photos. Here we cover some elements of employee orientations that will help your company and give your staff the best possible start: 1. Do the basics right A lot of what must be covered in an employee orientation may not be all that exciting. Company policy on annual leave, entitlements to sick days, parking arrangements, etc. are dull but need to be covered; this is information is important and the employee may need to know this later in the future. Make sure you have a checklist in place to cover all essential information. Don’t forget to cover remuneration and the ‘when and how’ of salary payment. It might not be essential to you as an employer or manager, but to your employee, these details are some of the most important in their average month so it’s important to take this seriously. 2. Productivity It is proven that the more effort an employer or manager puts into their employee orientations the more productive their employees are from day 1. The benefits of a clear, customized orientation for employees become obvious only when you start to do them. The company benefits from factors such as reduced turnover and improved productivity, while the employee benefits from feeling valued and fitting in to the new job more easily. Great orientations involve building site-specific or job description specific orientations that speak directly to the employee. There is nothing worse than a general orientation without any information that is usable for the new hire. It is up to you to make sure productivity is enhanced by what you say in your orientation. 3. Testable course Something that is often overlooked with staff training is testing. The advantages of testing new employees on what they are presented with are simple:- New employees learn the information better
- The company has a record of candidates having received the training
- Implications for insurance premiums
- Implications in the event of an on-site accident
One of the benefits to effective orientations is in acclimating the employee to the company culture. This is not an opportunity to brainwash employees but rather to let them get to know the company ethos and give an honest account of what the company expects of its employees. If a new employee can be assigned a mentor or partner for the first few weeks on the job then all the better. Often times the location of toilets and whether staff ‘really’ take 45 minutes of their 1 hour lunch break can be the most important information to know to the new employee. Companies that take the time to see the employment from the new hire’s viewpoint come out consistently on top in retaining those staff. 5. Orientations are about the individual Now we don’t want to say that staff should be given a free rein in every sense, you are the employer after all and you set the rules. However, research has shown that orientations that focused on the employees’ individuality and the value of their input do show much greater success in the long run. Higher customer satisfaction scores and lower staff turnover rates were seen in groups with an ‘individuality’ component to orientation training. It is important to have a strong company culture but it is also important to cultivate a strong individual outlook in employees. 6. Secure Information On-boarding is the place where our clients tell us is the easiest to gain staff details. Allowing weeks to go by before payroll information, employee certificates and ID photos are captured is inefficient and unnecessary. Take the time to gain all this information at the orientation and then secure it. If your orientations are face-to-face you may want to send new employees to the administration office directly after orientation. If your orientations are online then you can secure all this information in the cloud very easily. 7. Safety First Health and safety training is a must in all organizations and it is often best to train people before they get in to any bad habits. It is essential to cover elements such as fire protocol, manual handling and working at heights among others. By testing the understanding of this section of employee orientations is critical as it ensures employer compliance with legislation is met. Of course, when training contractors and staff in dangerous industries such as construction or manufacturing, then health and safety training will form the center piece of the orientation. This overview of what employee orientation should look like is only a small part of the entire orientation process. To on-board your new employees successfully, you must go above and beyond what an ordinary company does when orientating new hires. This can be different in every company and industry, such as interactive and engaging training content to doing training through a blended approach. 
