Onboarding - Your Secret Weapon for Preschool, Play Cafe, Enrichment Program Team Members That Will Stay With You
During a time when businesses are struggling to retain talent, creating a strong onboarding process for new team members is imperative. By implementing a strategic onboarding program, you can build new team members’ confidence, increase engagement, and create an environment that retains talent for years to come.
A good onboarding experience can also increase a new team member's job satisfaction, commitment, and productivity as it improves their retention rates. Studies have shown that organizations with strong onboarding programs retain new hires at a much higher rate than those with weak programs.
You can demonstrate leadership and inspire team members to contribute, furthering their commitment to each other and your business. When people feel like they belong, they stay. Your goal is to make sure they stay with you!
In today’s ECBME podcast episode, I am sharing some real insights on the following:
1. Why is a Great Onboarding Experience Important?
2. The 4 Keys to Onboarding Success
3. Common Onboarding Challenges and How to Address Them
Change and Turnover
People move, teachers get pregnant, play cafe baristas go back to college, things happen and that is just the way it is. It is a part of operating any business, but it can seem especially true for our industry. The worst part? It is super disruptive to providing high-quality experiences for your families. So, what can you do? How can you “stop that revolving door” and retain your wonderful team members?
After many years of personal experience and in connecting with fellow Early Childhood business owners and managers, I truly believe that one of the most challenging aspects of any early childhood business is retaining our team members.
A thoughtful, strategic, and inclusive onboarding process is your secret weapon for team members that will stay with you.
It is important to be thoughtful in your onboarding process and most importantly, be present. Treat them how you would like them to treat your students and families. Make sure they understand that they are pivotal in the success of the preschool, play cafe or enrichment program. We work best when we're invited to contribute solutions for our day-to-day struggles, which gives us the ability to reach our company's goals. Creating an environment that believes in connecting the team and building understanding is pivotal from the very beginning.
Why is a great onboarding experience important?
When you invest your time and efforts into your onboarding experience you will retain key team members. The purpose of onboarding should be setting new hires up for success and decreasing the time it takes for them to become comfortable in their new roles. This only works if onboarding processes are designed strategically with the end goal in mind.
Onboarding doesn’t have to be challenging when the right operational processes are in place. Having a structured onboarding process and not underestimating how long it takes a new team member to be proficient in their role can set your new team member up for success from the very beginning.
In most businesses, the average onboarding program lasts 90 days, and according to Gallup’s “Creating an Exceptional Onboarding Journey for New Employees” report, it can take new employees up to 12 months to reach their full performance potential.
Strong relationships are not built on poor foundations. If you want to improve your team member retention, you need to improve your team members’ onboarding experience. Gallup reports that only 12% of employees feel their company does a good job onboarding new team members, leaving 88% of workers with lackluster onboarding experiences.
We have included a free resource at the bottom of this page, a sample New Member Orientation Checklist to help you think about what you would want to include in your own New Member Orientation Checklist.
The 4 Keys to Onboarding Success
Given that how you onboard your team members will determine their experience, you can take the following steps to ensure you set your new team members up for success:
Set clear goals and share your passion and purpose
Create an inclusive on boarding team, and
Provide support throughout the onboarding journey.
Create an onboarding process to follow over and over again.
Set clear goals and share your passion/purpose.
Before establishing a new onboarding process, you should start by reviewing your onboarding goals. And when you’re reviewing goals, make sure they encapsulate the four Cs: compliance, clarification, culture, and connection. Here are a few questions you should ask:
Have you clearly identified and explained the regulations, policies, and procedures team members need to comply with?
Have you clearly shared your passion and purpose for your business?
Have you clearly set team member job expectations and linked them to concrete, time-bound measures?
After completing the program, will team members have a full understanding of your company culture and be supported to establish all the relationships vital to their success?
Where do your organization’s capabilities need to be improved upon to execute this new program?
After completion of the onboarding program, how will you improve and maintain the work-life balance of team members on an ongoing basis?
Create an inclusive onboarding team.
If you want to improve the employee experience in the workplace, you need to create an onboarding process that goes beyond you.
The sooner you can introduce new team members to their team, the better. Before making the introduction, ensure the team knows why the team member has been hired and what roles they will play in the team or across your business. Although facilitating strong team relationships can be a larger initial time investment, it can help boost team member productivity and performance.
Provide support throughout the onboarding journey.
During onboarding, you should focus on cutting down the time spent on new team members’ administrative duties and increasing time spent on performance coaching and creating connections.
Before a new team member starts, have them fill out all necessary paperwork and ensure all team members know who is joining the team and when.
On day one, have a schedule to share with them so they know what to expect and introduce them to your team. If able, introduce them to their peer mentor (someone - in addition to you, that they can turn to with questions). Ask them for feedback at the end of their first day to ensure that their expectations were met and if there is anything you can address immediately.
For the remainder of the onboarding program, STAY CONNECTED and continually support, improve and pivot as needed.
Create an onboarding process to follow over and over again.
That might look something like this,
Pre-Onboarding Preparation
Gathering necessary information
Creating an orientation plan
Orientation Day
Introduction to the organization and culture
Tour of the facility
Meeting with key personnel
Ongoing Training and Support
Explanation of ongoing training opportunities
Introduction to mentoring and support systems
Common Challenges and How to Address Them
Common challenges during onboarding can include:
New team members feeling overwhelmed by the amount of information they need to absorb in a short period of time
Difficulty adjusting to the new work environment and culture
Difficulty understanding or navigating organizational policies and procedures
Difficulty building relationships with colleagues
Difficulty understanding the expectations for their role
To address these challenges, it is important to have a well-structured onboarding program in place. Here are some tips for addressing these common challenges:
Break down the information into manageable chunks and provide resources for new team members to refer to as they need.
Provide opportunities for new team members to ask questions and get clarification on any information they are unsure about.
Introduce new team members to their colleagues and facilitate team-building activities to help them feel more comfortable and connected to the team.
Allow new team members to observe experienced colleagues in their roles and provide opportunities for them to shadow and practice their new skills.
Provide ongoing training and support to help new team members understand and navigate organizational policies and procedures, and address any issues they may encounter in the future.
Regularly check in with new team members to gauge their understanding of the expectations for their role and to provide any additional support they may need.
Final Thoughts
Onboarding is crucial for new team members because it sets the foundation for their success in their new role. It helps them understand the expectations, culture, and policies of the organization. It also helps them become familiar with the facility, the team, and the daily routines.
A good onboarding experience can increase new team members’ job satisfaction, commitment, and productivity. It can also improve their retention rates. Studies have shown that organizations with strong onboarding programs retain new hires at a much higher rate than those with weak programs.
Overall, onboarding is crucial for new team members as it helps them adjust to their new role, feel more comfortable and confident in their abilities, and provide the best service to the children and families in the center.
We discuss this in detail so be sure to listen to learn more!
Resources
To help you brainstorm your very own New Team Member Onboarding Plan we have created a resource to help you. It is page 1 of your New Team Member Onboarding Guide. Use this page 1 to get started and continue creating the rest of your guide.
Work + Life Planning Bundle
This Work+Life Planning Strategy Bundle helps you Reduce Chaos, Break Free From Overwhelm & Take Back Hours Of Your Time every single week!