4 Steps to Improve Onboarding

New employee onboarding is the process of getting your latest hires integrated into your organization and team. Setting them up for success is crucial to their development in becoming productive members of the team. But what makes for an efficient onboarding process? Set your new employees up for success with these four steps.

How can you improve your onboarding process?

1. Get the Paper Work Done Before
   Don't waste your new hires' first day filling out forms or going over benefits. Instead, get to the essential items sooner. For example, schedule a meeting to go over benefits before the first day with HR; doing this will also give them another friendly place when they start.

2. Make New Employees Feel Welcomed
   It can be hard to find your place within a team, so integrating a new employee is crucial. Make a welcome sign to put in their office or a bouquet of flowers. Another great idea is to order in or go out to lunch as a team so everyone can get to know each other. Birkman's Buzz Cards are also a great way to break the ice at your first team meeting. Or use the Birkman Floor Map to play a fun activity that not only allows your new team member to get to know others but is a great refresher for everyone else too!

3. Make it Engaging

   Rather than just showing your new hire how to do things, show them the process and then have them do it independently, so they can ask any questions they may have while you still have dedicated time to help them.  Walk new employees through what a typical day will look for their role and make sure to give them time to look over everything and formulate questions if they have any.

4. Help Them Understand What Will Make Them Successful

   It is crucial to set new hires up for success; this involves setting expectations for their role and performance early on. Here are some questions to answer that will help them be successful in their position:

   • What are their key priorities?

   • What is each team member's role?

   • What are the department/team's goals, and what steps are already in place to reach them?

   • How are decisions made within the organization and team?

   Answering these questions will be sure to help provide clarity within their role and the overall organizational structure.

Surviving and growing your Business in Today’s World

The word “Pivot” is well known to Startup companies but now established companies are being forced to make major changes in order to just survive.

Entrepreneurs and well-established organizations are looking for new types of customers and new market segments for their products and/or services. The most innovative companies are finding totally new ways to apply their core competencies and create value for the end-users. Other companies are changing their business models completely in order to meet the needs of today’s markets.

These types of changes require the leaders and their teams to challenge every assumption and belief they hold about their customers and what is important to them. Making dramatic changes like these is difficult for most people. On a 2020 study conducted by Deloitte in partnership with the Kellogg School of Management, 100 Chief Strategy Officers (CSO) executives were surveyed to provide important new insights into how the strategy function can evolve to meet new business challenges, and about the CSO’s own perspective on their role and career ambitions.

 The 2020 CSO Survey revealed that “while 70 percent of CSO respondents rate disruptive growth as critical for their companies’ success, only 13 percent of CSOs believe their company is capable of delivering on this strategic priority. CSOs are ideally positioned to help their organizations meet the disruptive growth challenge by architecting a systemic competence, based on a fit-for-purpose model, that promotes a more entrepreneurial mindset, novel ways of sensing emerging trends and opportunities, higher rate of experimentation, greater risk tolerance, better-calibrated expectations, well-aligned funding and incentives, and creation of an expanded ecosystem of partners.”

It is a fact that our human tendency is to continue doing those things that made us successful in the past. Continuing to operate as if the world hasn’t changed all around us… BUT doing things the “old way”, It just doesn’t work anymore.

Keep your ego in check!

Some of the best ideas can come from the newest person in your company. There is a lot to be said for having a pair of “fresh eyes” to look at a problem or situation. Markets and customers naturally change over time, and entrepreneurs and their leaders must adapt or risk becoming irrelevant.

 Does your company need to “pivot” and move in a new direction?

As the Co-Founder and Principal of The Angel Advisors, Alan Lowe has devoted his career to helping executives—from Fortune 500 companies to startups—successfully assimilate into new roles, create powerful teams and develop cultures that attract and retain the best talent.

Combining more than 30 years of experience as a partner-level management consultant and executive coach and having more than 32 clients at a point in time, Alan recognizes that no two individuals have the same goals for personal fulfillment or professional growth. He focuses on understanding each client’s goals, determining how his or her business fits into the bigger picture – and then gives them the tools they need to achieve their entrepreneurial purpose.

If you need to develop new strategies for the world we face today, please contact Alan here.

How Emotional Intelligence Fits With The Birkman Method

Emotional Intelligence is your ability to recognize and understand emotions in yourself and in others. There are four key skills that can be developed:

1.    Social Awareness- assigning meaning to what I observe in other people

2.    Self-Awareness- recognizing our own emotional reactions at the moment

3.    Social Skills- our ability to recognize the needs of other people and respond appropriately

4.    Self-Control- our ability to manage our own emotions and control our responses to external events and actions by others

The Birkman tool is uniquely designed to give us information about our perceptions of ourselves and our beliefs about what is socially acceptable behavior.

A Birkman report provides data in four major ways:

1.    What are our Interests? This directly ties to our Motivation about certain tasks or careers

2.    What is our Usual behavior?  How do we typically show up?

3.    What do we need from others in order to succeed?

4.    What are our Personality characteristics when we are under Stress?

Since our emotions are one of the primary drivers of our Behavior, knowing ourselves better is critical to be more emotionally intelligent in the workplace. For example:

If a Leader is more Goal-focused than People–focused, chances are they are not very aware of the impact they are having on others. This Blindspot can lead to hurt feelings, poor performance, and high turnover on their team or in the organization.

The Birkman Method is a powerful asset for any organization. It helps provide solutions for:

• Hiring and Talent selection

• Developing High Performing Teams

• Leadership Development

• Individual Coaching and Development

• Career Management

We are Birkman Certified Professionals (BCP) who have helped many organizations resolve internal conflicts, select the best talent and develop their people. If you want to learn how the Birkman can help your company or your organization, contact Alan Lowe Here.

Every Business is a people business

From Hiring to Team building to Employee satisfaction, if we want our people to trust us and our organizations, then we must give them a reason to do so. The Birkman Method provides a powerful tool to help you lead and engage your people in accomplishing your Mission.

The Birkman Method is a scientifically developed, multi-dimensional assessment that enables the individual to better understand oneself and others. We are all wired to seek meaningful work and experiences that connect with who we are and our unique needs and interests. As we learn more about ourselves and the others around us, it makes it easier to build relationships and feel connected to each other and the groups to which we belong.

Smarter Hiring begins with getting an accurate look at a candidate’s strengths and interests. The Birkman Method provides data that can be used to understand how a candidate would interact with those they would be working with. The interviewer can ask better questions based on the Birkman data and anticipate where and how team conflicts might occur.

During the on-boarding process, new employees can take a deeper dive into their personal profile. The information can help them better understand the work styles of others and provides them with a common language that can be used to express their needs and preferences to their co-workers. The common language reduces miscommunications and can make meetings faster and more productive.

As the new employees integrate into their new roles and relationships, many firms use the Birkman data to assist both internal and external coaches in providing feedback and guidance that help the employee perform better and navigate the culture of the company or organization they have joined. The Birkman enables the leader to match strengths and passions with the right role which results in greater job satisfaction and better performance.

Armed with an understanding of the Birkman principles, employees also have a better understanding of other people’s communication styles. This helps them to better communicate with Vendors, Clients, and Strategic partners.

In short, with this powerful tool in your toolkit, it makes growing a business or an organization easier, more productive and more fun.

We are Birkman Certified Professionals (BCP) who have helped many organizations resolve internal conflicts, select the best talent and develop their people.

Ready to get started? Request a free Birkman assessment here.