With all the pandemic effects and the spin-off requirements for the majority of the businesses and organizations, to shift to a partial or to complete deployment of workforce from onsite to remote staffing, the executives and employees have to come up with more creative and improved onboarding techniques to welcome their virtual workers/remote team. Recruiting remote employees or onboarding for the virtual work profile can be different in comparison to the regular in-person orientation. There might be some constraints and challenges that the enterprise has to cater to. One should not avoid these challenges and overlook the process as it might lead to loss of productivity and a complete loss of opportunity for the department associated with it.
- Creating a smooth virtual onboarding process for the new hires
Creating a virtual onboarding process and work profile sometimes proves to be more challenging than regular-direct face-to-face recruiting. The foremost challenge will come for the candidates who are working virtually from their home or any other working space, as they will not be able to interact with their colleagues or build the relationship organically in person or even come across and experience the office culture. This all comes to a single point, as a recruiter you have to create a smooth onboarding process, support them to set up their work, fulfill all the technical assistance they need and also make them comfortable and connected to the team and the company cultures well. Through all this support and help to the employees to orient them to the new work profile, one should make sure they have all the tools and information they need to be more productive and successful in their job and integrated with the team.
- Provide the new hire with a mentor/buddy for better orientation
Look forward to creating some activities that can help to forge the relationship between the new hires and the experienced team members, and build the required trust for more productive and high performance. To achieve this, start implementing individual goals to create a sense of accountability across the team for the newly recruited team members. Appoint a buddy role-well it should be valued as an important part or role of the team. One should always make sure that the expectations are clearly explained for the processes to follow. Consider each employee’s responsibilities to ensure that buddies have time in their schedules to assist with onboarding every week. Otherwise, you risk inconsistency, if not complete absence, of “onboarding.” Also, try to create self-paced training videos and learning modules that employees may complete on their own while keeping track of their progress. Managers will save time by being able to recognize which areas of the training the employee may require more clarification or coaching on. Keep all onboarding materials, such as these, in one easily accessible spot wherever possible so that your workers (both new and old) can quickly discover the information they require.
- The better onboard process with an SME-Focused Approach
Furthermore, a quick onboard process is what all organizations want to happen. It is important to create an onboarding program that can speed up the process, which depends on the organization’s culture and leadership using an SME-focused approach. SMEs can also have a progressive lead through friendly talks and regular conversations with the new hires, which renews the motivation and energy from the process so that they can move forward at the next orientation session. This is the best opportunity for the recruits and the managers to make the first best impression about the company and validate it to be the right choice.
- Better Focus on Team dynamics and requirements
There are some constraints when there is no working physical interaction between the teams and one cannot avoid the challenges that may come during the communication in a virtual/remote environment. It becomes one of the most important parts of the team’s efficiency to find the solution in the long run. It is fundamental and crucial for managers to understand the new hires and the candidate, and what they expect out of them, by providing them sufficient time to blend in and understand their responsibilities, especially in a virtual/remote setup. The focus on strong team dynamics and carrying out the responsibilities will help to achieve the most efficient results for the team.
- Creating stress-free work culture and setting boundaries for better productivity
During the lockdown, there was an avalanche to regular check-ins and virtual gatherings, which proved to be a bit overdone at a certain level, as soon as enough employees started having “Zoom fatigue”, that’s what it’s called, a fancy name, but it’s true! It is very clear when office setup comes home there will be some turbulence in your routine life, it will create some challenges as well as affect one’s personal life. The employees who are working remotely are found always struggling and tangled between emails, video calls, and constant notifications. Now one has to find a way to make this routine more comfortable and efficient for the employees, by setting some required boundaries and proper work time for better productivity and efficient outcomes.
Organizations and companies should make sure that employees who are working remotely should have a dedicated support system at all times from interns to senior executives. One has to work out for the best of the remote IT staffing by listening and understanding them.