The most important new ideas coming out of last week’s Conference Board Onboarding Lab include 1) Deploying a systemic integrated approach to onboarding, 2) Personalizing onboarding efforts and 3) Not leading until you’ve earned the right to lead.
I helped lead last week’s session along with authors Ed Betof, Michael Watkins, Mark Stein and Lilith Christiansen (the authors’ books are listed below). Participants in the lab included the heads of talent management, recruiting and onboarding from a number of blue chip companies (also listed below).
Here are the three main takeaways for organizations and leaders:
- Deploy a systemic integrated approach to onboarding – Get key stakeholders aligned before starting to recruit, and then integrate recruiting, hiring, operational, assimilation and management practices;
- Personalize onboarding efforts – Match the level of support to the risks and complexity inherent in the organizational and personal transition;
- Leaders must earn the right to lead – Even with onboarding support, leaders moving into new roles must remember, and must be helped to remember, not to lead until they have earned that right.
The business case for onboarding is proven. Reducing the 40 percent failure rate for new leaders and accelerating their time to productivity are doable. Thus, shame on organizations that are not using at least some of the available tools to do so.
Follow this link to read the full article on Forbes.
