Five tips for embedding a team member into a newly created role

Those of us in human resources should never stop talking about improving onboarding, and how key it is to the employee experience. Each employee joins our university or higher education institution from a different place, and so we need to make sure they can contextualise their experience in their new place of work. This is especially important when you hire someone into a newly created role.

So, what are the key steps that need to happen and why are they important?

Tip 1: streamline the ‘street to seat’ process

The journey from candidate to employee starts with the first contact that a potential hire has with the university, so an understanding of how your recruitment process works is critical. If your human resources department doesn’t have a “street to seat” recruitment flowchart mapped out for your team area, it’s a good idea to start there. This will enable you (as the person who wrote the business case for the role) to see anywhere you don’t have processes in place when bringing in new hires. With a new role, you will need to think about who the hiring manager will be (if not you), who else will be in their team, whether you have a standardised onboarding in place, when this needs to happen based on notice period, and whether they can access any onboarding in advance. 

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This process flow also needs a timeline, so you have a good idea of how long your overall hiring journey takes. Address any shortfalls and share the timeline with your senior leadership team and, if working outside HR, your HR business partner, so they know how it works and can give you feedback. 

Tip 2: give new recruits a point of contact before they start

Once your job advert is up and running, you need to nominate a person to be the point of contact to keep candidates “warm” (to remind them why your university is a great place to work and support them, for example) both before and after the job has been accepted. If you have a big team, you may be able to offer one-to-one interaction to all candidates who ask for it; if not, just offer this to your shortlist. This ensures that even if your process is slow, they have an accessible contact to whom to ask questions. 

This person could be in administration or a member of your hiring team, but preferably not the hiring manager to ensure you’re guarding against biases from contact outside a formal interview process. Even if you use a recruiter, I’d still recommend doing this in-house. This person should be able to answer questions about higher-level aspects of the job or institution, such as company culture and work expectations, but also know about leave entitlements, car parking or working hours, for example. They will be a friendly face of your company. Even if you have this information on a website, it’s a good idea to do this. Stressed people don’t read emails properly; they like to ask. 

The person in the warming role needs to have enough time to respond to queries, and I’d suggest making them the person who meets the new recruit on day one, who can show them where to get coffee and help with their car pass. This person should also sort out IT before the new hire starts if possible, including organising laptop collection.

Tip 3: pair new hires with a buddy 

Get your new joiner a buddy of the same level or similar. When nominating someone to do this for a new role, ensure you pick someone who has been with your institution a while, who will be friendly and has time to help out, probably for the first month or so. Don’t ask someone who applied for the role but didn’t get it. This person should be able to answer questions such as: how does the IT system work? What meetings do I need to attend (and why)? Who prefers PowerPoint slides over Word docs? That sort of stuff. If you are in a small department, this might be their line manager, but it’s better if not (they want to be able to ask stupid questions). 

Tip 4: provide a clear list of training deadlines 

Mandatory training should be easy to navigate if it is managed through an online learning portal. If training schedules are provided in an electronic list with links, this should be given to the new hire in week one, with clear completion deadlines. Their buddy should be able to go through the list with them. If there is bespoke training for their new role, make sure it’s added to the list. 

Tip 5: actively integrate the new hire into their role 

Meet-and-greets are critical for a new person in a new role, not only so they get to know their colleagues but so their colleagues get to know them. It’s a good idea to spread meet-and-greets out; if possible, an in-person chat over a coffee in a relaxed setting is nice. They should meet all the key players in week one, though, and be in all regular meetings by about week two, if not before. 

If the new role has been much anticipated, lots of people will want to meet your new hire. Ensure this is managed so they don’t feel overwhelmed. If members of senior leadership are likely to want to meet them, make sure they first have a brief about who the person is and how they relate to the new role.

To fill their diary initially, the new hire will need responsibilities and tasks that would previously have been owned elsewhere delegated to them. Key stakeholders around the new role need to know the person has arrived; if they have waited three months for a notice period to elapse, they may have forgotten that some of their work can be delegated now. 

Reading around (on the university website or shared pages pertaining to their team, for example) can be useful to assign (depending on their level). You can use an induction pack. This gives the new hire something to do when not in meetings, so they don’t feel too lost. 

An induction pack should include background on the role (even if this was covered in the interview), contact details and org charts. If there’s a business plan or set of strategies they need to know, also put those in. This is mostly appropriate for high-level roles. 

With shortened notice periods for new hires, remember that, just as a new employer reserves the right to terminate a new employee, the new hire can also decide your institution is not for them. So, hiring managers should consider onboarding (and even the whole probation period) as formative for a new staff member in your institution and act accordingly. A robust onboarding process will go a long way towards helping new recruits to your university feel settled and looked after. 

Alexandra Head is head of talent and resourcing at the University of Southampton.

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