(Adapted from the article by Brian Platz, for About.com)
Understand Your KUMC TIMELINES
When you compose your first faculty "offer letter" begin by discussing the process and exaclty what to expect with Jo Halverson in the Office of Professional Development and Faculty Affairs (PDFA). Guidelines followed from the beginning will prevent this process from lengthy delays over several weeks or the need to for you to rewrite the letter numerous times. You should completely understand:
Be - Simple and Interesting
Prevent the on-boarding experience from being complex and uncertain for the new hire. When the experience from the employee’s perspective is streamlined and made fun, interesting, exciting, painless, and as simple as possible, you will make your new team member feel valued, wanted, interested and excited. By engendering these positive emotions from the word go, the new hire will feel connected and eager to do great work and add great value to your organization.
Provide the Welcome flyer with their offer letter so your new hire will know exactly what to expect of our on-boarding process and provide a better chance for them to start off on the right foot.
Don’t Make New Employees Learn “The Hard Way”
Every workplace comes with its own set of guidelines, rules and regulations, benefits, programs for faculty members, nuances and traditions. Do not make your new hire learn these things the hard way because you are short of time or forgot about something critical to their ability to perform their duties. Do not assume residents who trained here, no matter what they tell you, know the details of their new faculty membership responsibilities. Do not be the reason your new hire begins to say "nobody told me."
Every academic institution or business offers a range of benefits and perks which will seem even more valuable if you make sure your new hire is aware of them from the onset. The On-Boarding Checklist will help them know how they can take advantage of these benefits. Verbal mentions of policies and procedures during a new employee orientation marathon session can easily go unheard, especially on a new hire’s first day. Similarly, a stack of papers and reminders can easily get lost in the shuffle. An online database resource that is regularly updated and always accessible is the best practice when it comes to information sharing.
For everything else, you need to preview the online New Faculty Directory to know the types of materials available on-line. By knowing what is in this directory you can save yourself a lot of time trying to explain what can be accessed 24/7 by the new hire. Once your new hire has settled into their new job, send a reminder email that certain materials are available online, and encourage them to frequently visit the New Faculty Directory for information.
Make New Employee Orientation Personal
Do not make day one all about paperwork. Instead, prioritize interpersonal relationships with key colleagues. Assign an On-Boarding Ambassador to each new hire to give them an immediate feel for the personality of your department and our academic community as one that cares about their success. This day of first impressions will have an enormous impact on the new hire experience. Try to schedule a lunch with some of their new colleagues to help make it a great day and so he/she will have something more exciting to report to their family than, “I filled out over 30 forms.” You might even consider inviting the new hire's family to join them for lunch so they may be introduced too.
New hire anxieties are fueled by mistakes that companies often make during that first-day new employee orientation program. These common mistakes include:
overwhelming the new hire with facts, figures, names and faces packed into one eight-hour day;
showing boring orientation videos;
providing lengthy front-of-the-room lectures; and
failing to prepare for the new hire can cause the management within a department the loss of the new hire’s respect from day one.
Dr. John Sullivan, head of the Human Resource Management Program at San Francisco State University, concludes that several elements contribute to a World Class new employee orientation program. The best new employee orientation:
has targeted goals and meets them,
makes the first day a celebration,
involves family as well as coworkers,
makes new hires productive on the first day,
is not boring, rushed or ineffective, and
uses feedback to continuously improve.
With a good new employee orientation which begins before they arrive, new faculty can even be productive on their first day of work. At some point during the new hire's first week, include an overview of key faculty member functions especially as they relate to your new hire's responsibilities.
These are the top eight ways to guarantee your new faculty member will start off on the wrong foot - possibly forever.
Procrastinate or forget to respond to the new hire by not providing them with information or answers to their questions before they arrive because your schedule is so full.
Make sure a work area has not been created or assigned. (Let him/her use the conference room until their office is ready.)
Schedule the new employee to start work while his/her chair/division director or department administrator is on vacation. One or more of these individuals should be present when the new hire begins.
Leave the new employee standing in the company reception area for a half hour while someone tries to figure out where their On-Boarding Ambassador or the chair may be.
Leave the new hire at her work station, to manage on his/her own for lunch. Instead, schedule faculty colleagues to join them for lunch during the first week.
Show the new employee his/her office and don’t introduce hm/her to coworkers or assign a mentor.
Assign the new hire to a administrative assistant who has a major, career-impacting deadline for another faculty member in three days.
Start the new employee with a one or two day new faculty orientation during which you make presentation after presentation after presentation.
GOOD LUCK!
©
The University of Kansas Medical Center