Onboarding and training new employees is an important part of the hiring process. It’s what ensures new hires have the tools they need in order to be successful, and happy, in their new role. In fact, a study conducted by Careerbuilder revealed that when a company has a great onboarding process 69% of their employees are likely to stay for at least 3 years.
The primary purpose of onboarding, training, and employee development is to help new hires get acclimated to their new work environment, even if said environment is remote. Getting remote employees set up with processes and policies, technology, responsibilities— all while connecting to their colleagues— can be a daunting feat but it’s just as important as onboarding in an office. While it’s harder to drum up excitement and keep them engaged from afar, it’s not impossible.
Don’t sleep on remote employee training and development— it can be just as effective as onboarding in the office. These five tips will help you nail great employee training and development, and set your team up for success.
Use technology
You’re at a slight disadvantage when organizing remote employee training or development because you can’t be there in person to connect, explain things to them, or gauge their interest and understanding. Luckily, it’s 2021 and technology can bridge the gap between you and your remote employees. You’ll likely do your training through some sort of video call, which can help employees— old and new— feel like they’re all in the room together. Don’t underestimate the power of face-time, even if it’s from behind the screen.
But how else can technology help your remote onboarding? A virtual presentation can help keep your trainees engaged and focused on the information you’re sharing with them. With a presentation template— like our pre-built onboarding presentation— you can customize it to fit your training and development needs.
Leverage microlearning
Let’s leave the sleepy lectures in 2020. Your employee training should leverage microlearning, and deliver everything in bite-size bits of information. Think smaller, more concise pieces of information that still pack a punch. This makes it easier for your employees to comprehend and retain what you’re telling them. Plus, they’re a lot less likely to doze off mid-presentation.
A great tool for microlearning is infographics. The right graphs, or charts, can help display your information in a more visually appealing way. It controls the narrative for you, so you can tell your audience exactly what they need to know and what to pay attention to. Using subtle animations for infographics can help re-engage your audience that you may have lost to boredom in the previous slides.
Focus on goals
Any onboarding or training should be goal-oriented. If you’re onboarding a new employee, what are the expectations of their new role? How can you help them meet those goals? If you’re hosting an employee training, you’re likely introducing new policies or processes to your team. Is the goal for them to adopt and apply these new policies to their role, or simply make note of the overarching compliance changes? Whatever the goal is, make it clear. This will help make your trainees feel more aligned to company efforts and motivated when they leave.
Create a fun culture
At the end of the day, onboarding and training should be fun. You want your employees to feel excited about the company, their colleagues, and the things they’re learning. After all, culture is the backbone of your company, so make sure that is represented properly in any training and development exercises. If you’re training new employees, they should leave the meeting feeling good about the company culture, personality, mission, and values.
Include icebreaker questions, games, or prizes to help get your remote employees engaged. You might include hidden images or words within your training presentation deck and give prizes to the first people who find them, or end the training with a virtual team happy hour. It doesn’t have to be all work and no play.
Document everything
Your human resources department will need documentation of everything (literally, everything). When you’re onboarding or training a remote employee, it may require them to sign documents electronically. Make sure both parties are able to save a copy of any paperwork from the onboarding for their records, in case they need to reference them later on.
With a great onboarding or training presentation, it’s easy to send the deck out following the training session so that new hires can review the company handbook and training materials on their own time. With beautiful.ai, it’s easy to send out a shareable link following the meeting. Everything is saved in the cloud so you know your team is viewing the most updated version at all times.
