* First impressions drive new IT hire experience
As competition for IT talent escalates, recognize that first impressions drive your new IT hire experience. A report from Aberdeen Group finds that 90% of leaders surveyed believe that employees decide in the first six months whether or not to stay on with a company.
Written by Madeline Tarquinio, a research analyst with Aberdeen’s human capital management division, the research describes onboarding, which is the practice of acclimating and engaging new employees in a company. According to “The Onboarding Benchmark Report,” companies that do this well can help recent recruits contribute sooner and boost retention rates.
Aberdeen defines onboarding as a process involving forms management, tasks management, and socialization in the company culture. Close to 75% of companies have some type of formalized process for onboarding or plan to implement one, but the duration of the initiative varies. Only 15% focus on onboarding through the sixth month of employment; 23% extend it to the first day; 28% in the first week; and 22% in the first month.
Companies face challenges in handing off new employees from the recruiting manager to the hiring manager, as well as implementing ways to improve the new hire experience. According to the report, the best-performing companies create an onboard roadmap, emphasize strategic long-term workforce planning, and ensure new employees have a positive experience. Though this is a company-wide issue often championed by HR that can be automated through systems, IT leaders also play a role as bosses and as those who supply staffers with the computers and communications devices they need to do their jobs.
Some of the key performance indicators to measure the effectiveness of your firm’s onboarding efforts are the time to productivity, time to receiving new equipment and tools, time to completing training, first-year retention rates, and completion rate for onboarding tasks.
The complete report is available for free download from Aberdeen (registration required). And tell me, how do you get your new IT employees up to speed? Let me know at aschurr@nww.com.
