Wow your new recruits with a thoughtfully structured remote onboarding program that sets them up for success. Read on to learn how to make your new hires feel welcomed, empowered, and included right from the very start – even when you can’t do it in person.

Why is remote onboarding important?

Great onboarding should be a key part of every company’s employer branding, retention, and strategic recruitment strategies. Successful remote onboarding can turbo-charge employee engagement right from the get-go, help new staff be productive more quickly, and minimize the risk of employee churn. With a growing number of Delta variant COVID-19 cases across the country, it has never been more important for employers to reimagine onboarding programs for the virtual or hybrid future.

What does great remote onboarding look like?

Remote onboarding is about making your new hire feel informed, connected, and cared for while giving them the tools and support they need to do their job. Getting it right is a team effort, with a structured strategy for HR, IT, line managers, and team members working seamlessly to deliver a great experience.

Start early

A good onboarding process starts well before the first day. This is especially true in today’s compressed labor market, where an oversupply of jobs means candidates are increasingly ghosting employers. Why not let them know you can’t wait to have them by sending a branded goodie bag before their first day? And have your CEO, department head, or your new start’s immediate team record a video message that makes them feel a part of things from the get-go. New hires starting remotely will be missing out on all those off-the-cuff interactions and in-person lunches that usually help break the ice. You’ll need to get creative and leverage technology to simulate in-person experiences if you’re to set the right tone for your distributed team to hit it off from the start.

Keep it human

All too often, onboarding programs – whether remote or in-person – focus on ramping people up to start delivering, rather than making them feel like a valued new team member. What workplace communities do you have that might interest them? Perhaps a sports club, a women’s chapter, or an ally network for LGBTQ+ employees or people of color? Make it clear that your workplace is somewhere they can be themselves. Be careful to acknowledge that some workers, like parents or people in different time zones, might face additional hurdles around remote working. Like most aspects of finding, recruiting, and retaining employees, a great onboarding program starts with getting to know America’s workers.

Make ‘Day 1’ matter

Ensure that the all-important first day is well-structured, with video conferences scheduled to get to know their manager and new team. A virtual tour of head office, introducing the people they’ll be working with, can help too. Include space for informal, more personal chat, while ensuring that expectations are clear around their job role, working hours, and managing their workload. At the same time, it’s important not to overwhelm them. New hires can quickly feel lost because they’re uncomfortable about bombarding their manager with questions while they’re trying to create a good impression. It’s a good idea to assign a ‘buddy’ who can help with the practical realities, which can be hard to grasp remotely. At the end of the first day, check in on how they’re doing.

Get the technology right

This one should be obvious, but it’s hard to overstate the importance of making sure new hires have the right tech, and are set up with all the software, access rights, and accessories they need. Send out equipment, including detailed how-to-guides, early (remember that deliveries can take longer during the pandemic). Arrange training for your employees around all the apps and systems your teams use. Pay special attention to employees who may need a bit of extra help – especially those who may have been left out of the workforce during the pandemic. As many as 25% of US workers will be using collaboration tools for the first time. Don’t let technology slow them down in contributing their unique strengths.

Up the communication ante

Don’t assume that the communication cadence you designed for in-person onboarding will work virtually. Remote new hires will miss out on so many informal conversations and observations around the office that would have helped them feel their way in those vital first few weeks. You’ll need to communicate more regularly, at carefully planned out milestones, and on a spontaneous, ongoing basis. This way, your new hire will have the interaction they need to keep from blowing off course. Encourage distributed communication by asking other team members to include your new hire in virtual coffee breaks, lunches, or even after-work drinks.

Remote onboarding can be tricky, but with the right strategy and great teamwork you can create an outstanding experience for your new recruits.

Learn more about managing your remote workforce, from keeping your employees engaged to supporting younger employees who may be struggling to start their careers remotely. And you can find more top tips on retaining top talent with our 6 Retention Strategies.

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COVID-19 has upended many of the barriers to remote work. A recent Gallup survey found that seven in 10 US white-collar workers are still working remotely over a year into the pandemic. Most of them say they would like to stay remote, or adopt a hybrid working model, and would consider switching jobs if they were forced to come back to the office full-time.

Delivering an outstanding employee experience that keeps your distributed workforce engaged has never been more crucial. And that means establishing the right guardrails and supports for every employee.

Here are our top tips on managing happy, productive, and successful remote teams:

Don’t let physical distance turn into emotional distance

Successful long-term remote or hybrid working requires effective leadership. Up to 70% of employee engagement can be attributed to managers, while feelings of isolation can reduce performance by up to 20%. The fix can be as simple as making sure your team meets more often. A morning stand-up might be enough when you’re all co-located, but remote workers can easily get out of sync. Incorporating a second brief stand-up in the afternoon can help.

Get creative with technology

These days, great leaders use technology to set the scene for serendipitous encounters between colleagues online. Keep spirits up with innovative new engagement hacks like virtual water coolers, camera filters for virtual party hats, or randomly selected lunch buddies. They can also help promote inclusion, especially for newer or younger team members who haven’t built strong networks yet. Digital awards and certificates and Kudos channels are great ways to celebrate wins and recognize good work virtually. Explore new video messaging and other tools that can offer a more personal method of communication for when calendars won’t line up across distributed geographies.

Share a compelling remote working vision

Most companies haven’t communicated a vision for post-pandemic work to their employees. This lack of clarity about what the future might hold can leave employees feeling stressed, anxious, and even more burnt out. Build a remote/hybrid work playbook, with troubleshooting guidance and direction around future company strategy. If you don’t know something yet, then say you don’t. But don’t leave it to chance, or your employee experience will suffer.

Humanize the remote employee experience

Days spent staring at a screen at home can be exhausting and isolating. Managers can keep up energy levels by injecting a bit of fun into the working day. How about a team stretch during the daily stand-up? Or why not kick-off meetings by introducing potential interrupters, like children, pets, and partners? And, at the end of each busy week, a Friday unplugging ritual can help employees know it’s time to switch off and focus on their away-from-work passions. You can even introduce gamification into your remote workforce.

Reframe the office as the new offsite

The past year’s great work from home experiment taught us that it doesn’t always make sense for workers to travel to the office. Forward-thinking leaders will use this time as an opportunity to strengthen employee culture. This might involve reimagining offices as spaces for increased collaboration, where workers can safely come together to collaborate, learn, socialize, and grow. Providing catering to encourage chance interactions is another proven technique. When the time is right to welcome your people back to the office, read our overview of safe working practices.

Since the beginning of the pandemic, we have worked with customers to navigate remote workforce solutions, including how to onboard new hires remotely.

For more insights on delivering a great remote employee experience, download the recent whitepaper on How to make remote work, work for everyone from our parent company, The Adecco Group. And join us for ‘Resetting Normal,’ an online panel discussion on how our working world is changing, on September the 2nd at 8:30 ET? Register here to attend.

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With the jobs market tighter than ever, it’s no secret that workers are demanding ever-higher salaries and benefits. Employers are tripping over themselves to sweeten incentives to lure new employees and retain existing ones. From McDonald’s paying candidates $50 just to show up for an interview, to JBC paying for college degrees for workers and their children.

After a year of financial turmoil, it’s not hard to see why. According to PwC’s employee financial wellness survey, 63% of American employees say that their financial stress has increased since the pandemic. Their household incomes have dropped, they struggle to pay monthly expenses, and they’re twice as likely to have used a payday loan or advance in the past year. Moreover, Bankrate’s Financial Security Index found that fewer than 4 in 10 US adults have enough savings to cover a four-figure emergency room visit or car repair. This struggle to make ends meet leaves employees stressed, distracted, or even absent from work. And – unsurprisingly – more prone to leaving.

Many employers face a limit on the financial perks they can offer, so we are stepping up to help them provide something that closely aligns with the realities of how employees spend their money: earned wage access.

On-demand pay benefits for workers

This innovative new payment tool, now offered by Adecco, allows employees to withdraw their tax-adjusted pay as they earn it. It helps us do right by workers: safeguarding them from predatory lenders and supporting their all-round financial well-being.

On-demand pay empowers workers, especially hourly or low income workers, with the tools to control their finances when emergencies or unexpected bills come up. Crucially, it isn’t a loan with interest rates for the employee. It just allows them to access a part of their wages before their official payday, which, for many workers, can be the difference between financial peace of mind and financial meltdown. Funds can be delivered by cash, card, or into a bank account with full transparency over real-time balances (Employees can even automatically direct money to rent and savings).

In this tough labor market, on-demand pay is a great differentiator for attraction and retention, enhancing the employer brand and culture. At Adecco, employees using our on-demand payroll solution have 14% better retention figures than the rest. Absenteeism stats have improved, too. And it’s all taken care of simply and cheaply, with our partner DailyPay managing all the processing and administration, ensuring compliance with payroll and taxation laws, across the US.

The bottom line? As the jobs market gets more competitive, making employers wait around until the end of the month to access money they’ve already earned just won’t cut it anymore. On-demand pay is one simple, low-cost, high yield solution that delivers for your business – and your employees.

Learn more about the staffing tools and solutions we offer employers, and see how we can make them work for your business, too.

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