“Developer & employee onboarding best practices” is a structured summary of the best practices in the employee onboarding process. The document is designed to serve human resource professionals and hiring managers as a compact guideline for designing the onboarding program for their organizations. The best practices were collected from numerous surveys of professional Human Resource consulting firms and from the case studies on the onboarding topic. The deeper coverage of each part of the onboarding process can be specific for each organization and was intentionally left out of the scope of the best practices summary. If you would like to contribute the best practices that will make the document more comprehensive, please write to me.

1. Developer onboarding
best practices
by Mykola Komarevskyy

2. Onboarding best practices: overview
1. Define the objective: reach productivity fast
2. Focus on people, knowledge, and performance
3. Follow a structured process
4. Assign a mentor
5. Facilitate with tools
6. Measure the impact
7. Get new referrals
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3. 1. Define the objective: reach productivity fast
Reach productivity
in minimum days
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4. 2. Focus on people, knowledge, and performance
Contacts
I
People
Organization
Culture
Domains
II
Knowledge
Resources
Trainings
Ramp-up
III Performance
KPIs
Career map
•
•
•
•
Team
Client
Stakeholders
Admin & support
•
•
•
•
•
Business domain
Systems
Technology
Process & standards
Tools
•
•
•
•
•
Targets with deadlines
Expectations
Pace setting
Milestones
Weekly status meetings
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5. 3. Follow a structured process
Pre-entry
• Complete HR
paperwork
• Prepare workplace
• Prepare
infrastructure
• Share company
info, e.g. profile,
clients, benefits
etc.
First day:
-Meet people
-Get to work
-No paperwork
Complete
paperwork before
First day
• Meet at the door
• Introduce to:
-the boss
-the mentor
-the team (lunch)
-the company in
Welcome email
• Provide
infrastructure:
-Computer
-Phone
-Email etc.
• Tour facilities
• Walk through first
steps: check out,
build, commit
First month
• Meet important
stakeholders
Follow through
• Review
performance
regularly
• Gain expertise
-Identify
• Collect feedback
knowledge gaps
after 90 days
-Commit to a
learning plan
• Measure
onboarding success
-Attend trainings
-Master the most
critical knowledge
• Get productive
-Easy tasks on the
first week
-Growing
complexity after
• Review progress
with the mentor
weekly
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6. 4. Assign a mentor
1. Set the pace
Mentor
responsibilities
2. Ensure the onboarding process
3. Introduce to & help to meet people
4. Identify knowledge gaps & help to build learning plan
5. Identify professional development needs & coach
6. Help to get up to speed on the most critical knowledge,
e.g. processes, standards, tools & systems
7. Assign the tasks of increasing complexity
8. Review the code and provide feedback initially
9. Track the progress weekly during the first 30-60 days
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7. 5. Facilitate with tools
1. First day agenda
Useful tools
2. Organization chart with key stakeholders, incl. client
a. Photos
b. Contacts & the preferred way of interaction
c. How they can help
3. Schedule of meetings & sessions for the first week
a. HR meetings
b. Meeting with the boss
c. Meeting with the mentor
d. Training sessions
e. Other meetings, e.g. networking happy hour
4. Knowledge map – to identify gaps
5. Onboarding milestones
6. Career map
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8. 6. Measure the impact of onboarding
1. Progress milestones
Metrics
2. Time to productivity (days)
3. Calls to helpdesk
30, 60, 90, 180,
360 days
4. Churn (in 90 days or 6 months, in 1st year, annual)
5. Employee referrals within the 1st year (or 6 months)
6. Employee satisfaction
a. Do they feel satisfied?
b. Would they recommend the company?
7. Total cost of a new hire
Establish a baseline with the current 1st year employees
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9. 7. Get new referrals on the first day
1. When: first meeting
Referrals
2. Who: the boss (direct manager)
3. How:
a. Tell about roles & skill profiles that the team is looking
for
b. Tell about the referral program, i.e. the referral bonus
c. Ask who the new hire knows
d. Suggest to contact/introduce them immediately –
great first day contribution!
e. If the new hire feels uncomfortable, suggest to write
down the names and contact them later – when the
new hire gets more familiar with the company and the
project
f. Follow up
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10. Operate the onboarding process well…
© Dilbert.com
Source: http://dilbert.com/strips/comic/2006-10-22/
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11. Thank you!
Mykola Komarevskyy
http://www.linkedin.com/in/mkomarev
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