Onboarding: A Secret Weapon for Hiring and Retaining Talent

Let’s start with a famous onboarding story…

There's a famous story in the recruiting circles that goes something like this:

A young woman named Sally died accidentally and appeared at the gates of heaven.

“Welcome to heaven,” said Saint Peter.
“Before you get settled in though, as with everyone, we’d like to give you the opportunity to experience both heaven and hell.  We’ll let you have a day in each before you decide where you wish to spend eternity.”
“Fair enough, although I’m sure I want to be in heaven”, said Sally.
“But you’ve never been to hell so how would you possibly know?”, Saint Peter insisted.

And with that Sally found herself on a seemingly endless escalator descending to hell.

To her surprise, she ended up having three of the most exotic and wonderful days she could ever imagine. After the three days were over, she went back to Saint Peter and pleaded with him to let her go to hell.

He agreed and in the next instance, she was back in hell.
But this time, she was forced to exist in unbearable conditions. After describing her three-day visit, she asked what had happened.  

The devil looked at her and smiled, “Yesterday we were recruiting you; today you're staff.”

Don't let that happen in your company!

➡️ Download The Ultimate Candidate Interview & Employee Onboarding Checklist! 

Onboarding: A secret weapon for retaining talent

The last thing you want is for your new employees to have a similar experience as Sally.
Unfortunately, it seems that many employees do.
As a result: 

• Companies lose 25% of all new employees within a year (Source: Allied Workforce Mobility Survey)
• Up to 20% of employee turnover happens in the first 45 days (Source: O.C. Tanner)
• 32% of global executives rate the onboarding they experienced as poor (Source: Harvard Business Review)
• Replacing each failed executive can cost a business up to 213% of his or her salary (Source: Center for American Progress)

These statistics are quite shocking, don’t you think? 😲

They really are.
The bad news is - they’re not even the worse case scenario!  

A bad onboarding can cause you to lose your best candidates... even before their start date!

Onboarding: A secret weapon for hiring talent

In this time of war for talent, don’t be surprised if you face a total hiring fail even before your new employee comes in for their first day.

Unfortunately, the fact that your best candidate has accepted your offer is no longer a guarantee that they will actually show up on their first day.

This is because:

• They could still be interviewing and receive a better offer.
• They may receive a better offer from another company with whom they interviewed before, but who has a slower recruiting process.
• They may receive a counteroffer from their current employer.

This is why your onboarding process should start at the moment your candidate accepts your offer.

That way, your onboarding program will do more than just help you retain new employees.

It will also become your secret weapon for ensuring the successful outcome of your hiring process.

Onboarding statistics: Your secret weapon to get a buy-in from the C-suite

OK, so you may be well aware or by now convinced (you’re welcome😁) just how important it is to invest time, effort and resources into creating an awesome onboarding program.

A successful employee onboarding program ensures that your best candidate actually shows up on their first day at the job. It also helps to improve retention, engagement, satisfaction, and productivity of your new employees. 

However, you might have some trouble explaining that to your company’s C-suite. 

This is why we compiled the list of the most important onboarding benefits.
Here are the 3 most important benefits of a successful employee onboarding programs: 

Onboarding benefit #1: Better retention

According to the Society For Human Resources Management (SHRM):

• 69% of employees are more likely to stay with a company for three years if they experienced great onboarding.

Onboarding benefit #2: Higher productivity

According to the Society For Human Resources Management (SHRM):

• Organizations with a standard onboarding process experience 50% greater new-hire productivity.

Onboarding benefit #3: Higher engagement

According to the Society For Human Resources Management (SHRM):

• 54% of companies with onboarding programs reported higher employee engagement.

Use these statistics to back up your case for onboarding and prove why onboarding new employees matters (more than they think!).

How to turn onboarding into your secret weapon in the war for talent?

Here are the top 3 tips that will help get the most out of your onboarding program and turn it into a powerful weapon in the war for talent:

Tip #1: Plan and organize

If you want to maximize the power of your onboarding process, you need to carefully structure it.
To learn how, check out our step-by-step Guide on how to successfully onboard new employees.  

Tip #2: Automate

Automating your employee onboarding process will help you save time and your nerves.
There are many different employee onboarding tools you can use to easily automate your onboarding process.

Tip#3: Be creative

To make your new employees’ onboarding experience truly unique, you need to get creative!
Luckily for you, we compiled the best and the most innovative employee onboarding ideas and examples from experts to inspire you! 

Learn more about employee onboarding!