New hires are eager to become productive team members who can actively contribute from day one. However, it takes time to learn a code base and its nuances, while simultaneously navigating how team’s prioritize, resolve conflict, make decisions, and handle setbacks. It’s our job as their new teammates to design an onboarding process that gets them over the hump and sets them up for success in their first 100 days. In this talk, Poornima Vijayashanker will cover: - What to consider when designing your onboarding process - Balancing product versus people within it And how to avoid the all-too-common worst practices that de-motivate new hires

1. How To Onboard New Hires Into
Happy and Productive Employees
Embrace The Best and Avoid The Worst Practices
When It Comes To Onboarding New Employees
Poornima Vijayashanker
@poornima
#AgileTD

2. Your first job…

3. Image source: http://www.wocintechchat.com/ #WOCinTech

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7. Reality…

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11. Think it’s gotta be YOU.

12. The Absent Boss
Photo by Farrel Nobel on Unsplash

13. The Absent-Minded Boss

14. The Unaware Boss

15. #work

16. Why does this happen?

17. You fall prey…

18. #1 Tactic of Recruiting

19. Tell them what they want to hear.

20. Justify behavior after the fact…

21. “We’re a startup we move fast!”

22. “We’re a BIG company, we can’t
control what each team does to
onboard new hires!”

23. “We’re a remote company, new hires
need to learn to do things on their own!”

24. “We’re a local in-house team, new
hires should feel comfortable pinging
people they sit next to!”

25. Feel lost.

26. Image source: http://webtechfixall.com/services/personal-computer/windows/

27. • Missed deadlines
• Burnout
• High turnover
• Toxic culture

28. • 91% of employees stick around for at least a year
• 69% of them stick around for at least three years
Source: http://mkt.talentwise.com/TalentCultureCandidateExperience_LandingPageForm.html

29. Top down.

30. “Will this really work for my company?”

31. “This really won’t work at my company!”

32. • R&D Engineer at Synopsys
• Founding engineer at Mint.com
• Founder of BizeeBee
• Founder of Femgineer
• CTO & Co-Founder of Opear
• EIR at 500 Startups & Techstars
• Wrote & self-published two books
My street cred:

33. Test.

34. • Next hackathon
• Side project
• Something else

35. What does the 1st day, week, and month look like?

36. What do they need to accomplish?
Photo by Bram Naus on Unsplash

37. People signed up to work!

38. People

39. • Have them meet EVERYONE on the team!
• Who does what?
• How do people operate?

40. Product

41. Architecture Review
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42. Product Roadmap
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43. Make Setting Up a Cinch
Photo by Ilya Pavlov on Unsplash

44. First Project
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45. First Project
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Set Expectations

46. Process

47. • Get the ball rolling
• Priorities
• Conflicting priorities

48. Policies

49. Why do we do things the way we do…

50. • Live chat
• Unified experience
• Product + customers

51. • Technology is set up
• A dedicated mentor
• A real project
• Meet Netflix’s top execs
Source: https://www.tinypulse.com/blog/companies-with-the-most-unique-employee-onboarding-practices

52. Problems

53. What did they see in their first 100 days?

54. What is ONE thing they want to change?

55. What happens when you do this?

56. • You can identify who is truly vested
• You retain those people
• Like attracts like

57. Audit.

58. “We already do ALL of this.”

59. Keep doing it!

60. “This won’t work for my company.”

61. Create a small test.

62. “Why is this important again?”

63. Because it’s hard to find and keep good people!