Get Your Digital Welcome Mat Out
Due to local shelter-in-place orders, instead of buying their work wardrobes and practicing their commutes to the office, many of this year's college graduates are figuring out their work-from-home workspace, be it in the apartment they are sharing with friends or their parents' home.
While not ideal, they all are grateful to be starting their professional careers. They know plenty of other graduates whose job offers have been rescinded during this uncertain time.
As leaders, you should know for these young workers, starting their careers during a pandemic reinforces a belief that many of their generation have...the belief that they need to be constantly developing their skills in order to be ready for anything.
First impressions are everything. A virtual first impression is new territory for most employers, and it's important to get it right. Be sure that in their first weeks with your company, you send them the message that they will continue to develop skills to better themselves and better your organization. This will make them more likely to engage and bring their whole brilliant selves to work, rather than holding back.
Your Digital Welcome Mat
Typical onboarding activities need to be modified to accommodate the remote worker. Resist the temptation to have their onboarding only focus only on the technical parts of the jobs which can more easily be accommodated. Be sure to keep on the onboarding checklist the essential activities that speed up the new employee's integration into your culture and send the message that you what them to develop both their business acumen and interpersonal skills.
Leaders, in my book Disconnected, I summarize what employers need to know about the youngest workers, including how to welcome, support and impress them. Here are some items for you to make sure remain on your onboarding checklist.
Bring them with you - since your new employee can't join you face-to-face to meet others, listen and learn, include him or her in your virtual meetings. If you aren't already using video for your calls, consider changing that. Everyone will want to put a face with the new voice and name. Be sure to introduce your new employee at the beginning of the meeting. After the meeting, plan to send 5-10 minutes debriefing with your new hire one-on-one, the way you would if you were walking to the next meeting together.
Part of the conversation - hallway conversations are being replaced with instant message (IM) conversations or group text messages. As you start one of these conversations, add your new employee so he or she can "see" you in action.
Daily digital nod - You won't be running into your new employee in the parking lot or elevator, where you can have casual friendly banter. Replace this casual exchange with a daily digital nod via a group instant message or text messages for this purpose. Keep the message light - share a laugh, provide "pats on the back" and get personal updates.
Day in the field - When you shadow team members physically, you go to their meetings with them, you hear their conversations, you even have lunch together. The end result is that you have spent time together and have a sense of one another. Challenge your team to provide these same end results to your new team member by getting creative as they each design a digital shadow day to keep things casual and closer to reality For example, organize a virtual happy hour. Also, "tour" the organization chart together and then "pop in" to those on the org chart through IM where you can give a quick casual introduction to the new hire.
Bump into them in the community - In real life, we can run into co-workers in our community, in the grocery story, at a restaurant, church or a community event. In the digital world, you can run into co-workers also. As a leader, figure out where you can go digitally regularly to bump into your team members. If you aren't sure where to go, ask your colleagues to help you figure this out. Younger workers especially are consuming lots of digital content, and chances are they are consuming publicly available digital content about your company and industry (e.g. Twitter, Instagram, Facebook, LinkedIn.) Be sure to give them a digital wave when you see them. Work to get comfortable engaging with them and others from your community there as well.
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