Onboarding: How to Get Your New Employees Up to Speed in Half the Time

CHAPTER 8

Manage the Announcement to Set Your New Employee Up for Success

Big Head Start

Managing the announcement is one of the most important things you can do to make your new employee feel welcome, valued by, and valuable to your organization.

Jethro, do you want me to bring Wally to the meeting?

“Wally?”

“You know, the new guy. . . . Hmm. . . . The look on your face says you don’t know.”

What was especially awkward about this situation was that Wally was one of Jethro’s direct reports. Jethro’s boss had hired Wally and assigned him to Jethro’s team—without bothering to mention it to Jethro. Jethro’s boss scored a twofer, managing to make both the new employee and the new employee’s boss feel bad in one fell swoop.

You are not going to fall into that trap. You are going to make sure your new employee’s stakeholders across, down, and even up are ready to make your new employee feel welcome, valued, and valuable and then help him or her and the team succeed.

The basics are straightforward:

• Map the stakeholders.

• Clarify the messages.

• Lock in the timing and wording of the official announcement.

• Determine who you’re going to talk to before the announcement, as well as when and how.

• Decide who you’re going to talk to after the announcement, but before the new employee starts.

• Implement, track, and adjust as appropriate.

Map the Stakeholders

We talked about stakeholders in ...