Build The Best Onboarding For Your New Hires
On average, companies have 44 days to influence a new hire's long-term retention with an impactful new starter experience. This means you need a fine-tuned onboarding strategy.
The best onboarding programs aren't just constructed by Subject Matter Experts. They're built by teams who truly understand how to mix content and tools—in this case, a Learning Management System (LMS)—to make a process that's as fluid as possible.
To do this, it's smart to invest time in discovering the LMS workflows that make the onboarding program simple to deliver. In this guide, we'll share employee onboarding LMS features that will enable you to effectively onboard your new hires and how you can build an onboarding LMS ecosystem that streamlines your new hire training.
LMS Workflows For A Successful Onboarding Experience
Let's face it, onboarding new employees is a time-consuming, resource-heavy task, but with the right workflows, it can be so much easier.
Workflows can automate certain processes, like assigning new staff to appropriate learning courses and monitoring their progression.
You can also customize your workflows to work for your business, and no matter the setup, you'll find a seamless and efficient experience.
Add Your New Hires To Your LMS
It's critical that from day one your new hires have access to the learning they need to succeed. Therefore, the first step in employee onboarding is to establish how you'll be adding your employees to your LMS.
You've got several options here. Batch uploads allow you to add multiple employees via CSV to your LMS all at once. Alternatively, you can manually add each learner one by one.
However, if you want to do it in the most efficient, automated way, you should integrate your LMS with your HR system.
Connecting these two systems removes the middleman—your team—and cuts out a recurring manual task. It's simple: when a new hire is added to your HR system, their data is sent to your LMS too, and an account is created. No extra work is needed from you, there's less chance of errors, and you have peace of mind that your learners have access to the training needed.
Automate The Whole Onboarding Journey
The best learning solutions go beyond simply enrolling in a single course; they incorporate workflow engines, such as learning journeys. These engines enable you to deliver personalized, adaptive, and automated learning experiences tailored to the attributes, progression, and behavior of your new hires.
For instance, on their first day, all new hires can be enrolled in the same introductory course titled "Welcome to the Company." A few days later, their learning journeys can diverge based on their specific roles—whether they are in sales, support, or product development. Each role can follow a distinct learning path that aligns with its unique requirements.
Once these workflows are established, the entire process becomes automated, streamlining the onboarding experience for everyone involved.
Stick To Timelines With Due Dates
Having a clear timeline of your onboarding process is a necessary step. You need to ensure that your employees are learning what they need to know in a specific time frame. With each course, you can select a time period by which their courses need to be completed. Be it a week, a month, or whatever you want, due dates allow you to know your new hires are consistently meeting their onboarding goals and keeping up with their training schedule.
How To Measure The Impact Of Your Onboarding Strategy
Ok, you've built an onboarding program that streamlines the way new hires join and experience your company. Great! But the work doesn't stop there. To ensure your onboarding experience is hitting the goals you set for it and continues to evolve and improve over time, you'll need to implement a robust system for measuring performance and gathering feedback.
Tracking Onboarding Metrics And KPIs
Data is your best friend when it comes to optimizing your onboarding program. Your LMS should allow you to track key metrics and KPIs that align with the goals you set earlier, covering these main areas:
Completion rates
The first step is to see if your new hires are completing their onboarding training. Track the completion rates for all onboarding courses and activities. If you notice any drop-off points, investigate what might be causing new hires to stop or slow down their progress. Are the modules too long, too complex, or perhaps not engaging enough?
Feedback from new hires
Quantitative data will only ever tell half the story. To truly understand the impact of your onboarding program, you need to hear directly from the people who matter most—your new employees. Leverage your LMS to collect feedback at various touch points throughout the onboarding process, such as:
- Onboarding course evaluations
- Pulse surveys after key milestones
- One-on-one interviews with new hires
Time to completion
Analyze how long it takes new hires to complete their onboarding training. Compare this data against your expectations. If the training is taking too long, it might be overwhelming; if it's too short, it might be insufficient. Adjust the length and content of your training modules accordingly to strike the right balance.
Learning effectiveness
Evaluate whether new hires are learning what they need within the timeframe provided. This can be measured through assessments, quizzes, or practical tasks. Make sure that the training is not only being completed but is also effective in helping the necessary skills and knowledge land.
Post-Onboarding Performance
Finally, track the performance of new hires after they've completed their onboarding. Look at metrics like time to productivity, employee engagement and satisfaction levels, and retention rates. Are new hires meeting performance expectations? Are they staying with the company longer? This data will help you understand the long-term impact of your onboarding program.
By closely monitoring these metrics, you'll be able to identify areas of strength, pinpoint opportunities for improvement, and make data-driven decisions about your onboarding strategy.
