16+ Sample Employee Onboarding Checklists

What Is an Employee Onboarding Checklist?

Employee onboarding refers to the official process of helping a new employee adjust to the workplace, its culture, team members, and the job itself. And with a proper welcome and training given, the new hire may get more comfortable and productive at work. Meanwhile, the employee onboarding checklist is the detailed to-do list or checklist on how to pull off the onboarding process for new hires. Thus, you use that list as your basis in achieving onboarding properly.

Based on a survey, replacing every new employee can cost around 30–50% of a worker’s annual salary.

The Core Components of an Employee Onboarding Checklist

What should onboarding checklists have? It was reported by the Society for Human Resource Management (SHRM) that there are four Cs or components towards onboarding. And they consist of the following:

Compliance: The employee onboarding checklist should introduce the newbie to all standard legal information. This includes rules from what is allowed or prohibited in the organization and the employee forms to be signed.Culture: To further discuss what is allowed or not at work, don’t forget to clarify the work culture. Every company has different organizational norms and new employees need to learn about them so they won’t be treated as fishes out of water.Clarification: One of the important qualities of an onboarding checklist is clarification. So employee orientation should clarify the new employees’ roles, job descriptions, and obligations. Ensuring that the new hires work as expected is the goal in the first place.Connection: Onboarding is also a social process where you can enable new employees to connect with their co-workers, networks, and other business relationships. That way, newbies may feel comfortable having friends in the workplace and connecting also keep them to work as a team.

How to Make an Employee Onboarding Checklist

Are you now ready to create your own employee onboarding checklist? Not to worry because you will also be guided on how to perfect it by following these simple steps:

Step 1: Create a Formal Onboarding Plan and Review

Right from your company’s official job plan, there should also be a plan made for onboarding. That way, it would be clear how the onboarding system really works since the process is structured. And after that plan, review all the details because you will refer to such details for your employee onboarding checklist.

Step 2: Arrange the Onboarding Process into Steps

Grab the takeaways from the onboarding plan and until you can arrange the process into a series of steps. Onboarding would run smoothly when the checklist clarifies which is step one, step two, and so forth rather than checking every item randomly. Hence, apply a proper sequence to how onboarding should end up from the first to the last part of the program.

Step 3: Insert the Basic Parts of a Checklist

By the way, a standard checklist consists of a title, the itemized list of activities, checkboxes, and the new employee’s details. And you should have them to make your checklist acceptable. The title is obviously ‘Employee Onboarding Checklist.’ Next, write the steps you arranged earlier into the list of activities with a corresponding checkbox for each item. And identify the name and info of the new hire to be specific on who is undergoing preboarding.

Step 4: Produce the Checklist and Update It

Don’t forget to be creative with your checklist’s design whether you want to have additional information, organizational charts, one printed copy and another digital version, etc. How you want the onboarding checklist to look for your output must be finalized. And once you have your copy, update it regularly by putting checkmarks to every item accomplished until all checkboxes are filled; hence, onboarding is officially done.

FAQs

Why is an employee onboarding checklist important?

You need an employee onboarding checklist so you won’t forget or lose track of what to do while orienting a new employee to your organization. More so, you can experience stress reduction, improved productivity, and fewer turnovers since the checklist can guide you from start to finish.

What are the phases of an employee experience?

The main phases of an employee experience are onboarding, initial development, ongoing development, retention, and separation.

How long does an onboarding process last?

Onboarding may take a few days or a week but it varies on how big of a job or system should a new employee adjust to. The same goes for how quick or slow the employee’s progress in acclimating is. Also, some onboarding processes could last until 12 months.

Onboarding may either make or break a new employee’s experience. So put some effort into orienting and integrating new hires into the business until they can contribute well upon working. Thankfully, preboarding shouldn’t become that much of a hassle when you have prepared employee onboarding checklists ahead. Work on a sample template now!