As many teams continue to take a hybrid approach, managers face a new challenge: how to onboard new starters remotely.

Today, millions of people across the world have a least some element of remote working in their lives. Because of this, many new starters will not be in offices with their managers, team members or HR when they start a new job. They may work remotely full time or might not work in the office on the same days as the rest of their team.

So how do businesses tackle onboarding in different settings? Onboarding can be an overwhelming and stressful time for new employees under normal circumstances, but especially when they start during an unpredictable time, like the pandemic

This means that organisations need to take steps to ensure that new starters are getting a consistently great onboarding process, whether they are in a work place, at home, or somewhere in-between.

Using performance management in onboarding

Using a strong performance management system is a good way to ensure all new employees get a great onboarding experience. Line managers should have weekly one on one meetings with new starters, which check how they are settling in, answer questions and record performance and engagement levels – these should be recorded on a performance management system for easy reference.

These meetings can be face to face or virtual, but it’s important that managers and new starters have dedicated time set aside each week.

Performance management has slipped down the priority list for many HR teams – according to our latest research, Performance Management 2022. Almost half (48%) of employees told us that they don’t feel their employer takes steps to address burnout, while 89% of managers said they did. The drop in performance management goes some way to explaining the discrepancy – making it vital across all levels of employment, not just new starters.

Setting goals

Set new starters short term, simple and agile goals. By setting goals that can be achieved quickly, the new starter can hit the ground running. These goals are a great way to get them familiar with the organisation, their new team, and their role.

Managers can check progress against these goals, enabling them to check the employee’s productivity and ability, even if they aren’t sat in an office with them.

People managers should establish a development plan with new starters. This doesn’t need to map out their next five years at the organisation, but showing a new starter how they can progress in their role, and showing you support their growth is a great way to get new staff invested in their role early.

A great onboarding process is about making sure new employees feel seen, supported and engaged no matter where they work from, and you can do this by using great performance management in your organisation.

By Nick Gallimore, director of innovation at Advanced