Integrating new team members: All aboard!

Do you remember the first day of your last or current job? The mixture of anxietyUnruhe, Besorgnisanxiety and excitement on your way to your new workplace to meet your colleagues for the first time? It’s not only the first days on the job, but also the days just beforehand that are important for new employees. This period is often referred to as “pre-boardingZeit vor der eigentlichen Einarbeitungpre-boarding”. It can decide whether a new employee feels welcome and motivated or begins to wonder if this career move might have been a mistake.

Today, most companies are aware of the importance of onboardingEinarbeitung und Integrationonboarding. They make sure the new employee’s essential hardware and logins are ready for them. Thoughtful managers may provide a mentor or “buddy (ifml.)Kumpel; hier: Mitarbeiter(in), der/die als Ansprechpartner(in) fungiertbuddy”, who offers help navigate sth.sich in etw. zurechtfindennavigating the building(s) as well as the organizational structure. Meetings in the first few weeks allow the new person to learn who’s who in the company. At regular intervals, the team leader will usually check in (with sb.)sich (bei jmdm.) meldencheck in to see how things are going.

However companies do onboarding, most new hire (US)neue(r) Mitarbeiter(in)new hires are simply overwhelmedüberfordertoverwhelmed. From the question of who to ask for what to unfamiliar abbreviationAbkürzungabbreviations of products, services, departmentAbteilungdepartments, etc. — even in midsize organizations, there’s a mass of new information. While it’s great that the new employee gets a warm welcome and everything they need to start work, there’s often just too much information and too little time to absorb it all and immerse oneself in sth.in etw. hineinfindenimmerse oneself in the company’s or team’s culture.

Most new hires are simply overwhelmed

Is there a better way?

How do you work together? How do you communicate? How do you talk to each other, to your partners? You might say these questions have to do with the company’s values and mission statementLeitbild, Unternehmensphilosophiemission statement. That’s right, but those are just written words. However, there is a way to ensure sth.etw. sicherstellenensure effective cultural onboarding for new additions to the team.

I suggest that you have a cultural onboarding workshop with a group of new hires and veteranhier: länger im Unternehmen tätige(r) Mitarbeiter(in)veterans, including mentors if your company has them. A group of ten at the most should be fine. Maybe you are a mentor yourself or you are only the moderator of the workshop. You don’t have to be a team leader to moderate and organize this workshop.

Begin the workshop by explaining what its goal is:

• dive into sth.in etw. eintauchenDive into the company or team culture and learn first-hand how an organization tickshier: welche Unternehmenskultur vorherrschthow the organization ticks.
• Strengthen the connection between newbie (ifml.)Neulingnewbies and veterans.

The next thing is to agree, as a group, on ways of working. What’s important to each of you when working with others? What is important today? This step will set the tone for the workshop.

What’s important when working with others?

After a quick, informal introduction, begin with the hearthier: Kernheart of the workshop. Start with a promptStichwort; hier auch: Äußerung, die zum Nachdenken anregtprompt like this: “Think of a moment when you felt most proud of the company you work (or worked) for. What did you or others do to make you feel that way?”

This little prompt always produces some nice results. People think of a happy moment in their lives, which creates a good atmosphere, and you get a better understanding of what makes the company special in the eyes of the new and veteran employees. You get to know how they experience the company’s culture.

The answers are very wide-ranging. Some tell a story of a team’s success and how they worked together to find creative solutions. Others talk about how their boss supported them during a personal crisis at home.

In the next step, distil sth.etw. herausarbeitendistil the values behind the stories you just heard. Don’t be too strict about the defining values. You’re really just looking for things that offer guidance for behaviour and determine what’s important to the people who work for the organization. People might mention trust, openness, honesty and reliabilityZuverlässigkeitreliability. The words are important, but it’s even more important to have the participants discuss what they actually mean by “trust”, etc.

At this stage, you are at the heart of cultural onboarding. The next step is related to the company’s values:

• Tell the participants to find similarities and differences between the values of their stories and those of the company.
• Ask what the next step would be to strengthen the company’s values in the near termkurzfristigin the near term? How can stronger values help?

At the end, agree on a date when you have a follow-upFolge-, Anschlussmeetingfollow-up to see how well the plan has been implement sth.etw. umsetzenimplemented. And don’t forget to close with a short round of feedback and have everybody mention their highlight of the day.

Good luck with the workshop! It’s always amazingerstaunlichamazing how much a half-day workshop helps both new hires and veterans to better understand and directly live the company’s culture