> What you need to know to create a more effective new-hire strategy in financial services

Improved Best Practices for Onboarding

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The onboarding opportunityOnboarding can be overwhelming in financial services, where it’s common to have attrition rates as high

as 40 percent. With these sky-high rates, perhaps it’s time to re-examine the onboarding process at

your organization.

A constant onslaught of new hires can make it challenging for management to pause and look for ways

to improve their process. The good news is, you’ve taken the first step by downloading this ebook we’ve

developed for financial services organizations. Read on for tips and best practices to help simplify the

onboarding process for your HR team while delighting your new hires with a more positive experience.

1 Society for Human Resource Management, Onboarding New Employees: Maximizing Success (2011), at 6.

2 Forbes, First Minutes Are Critical in New-Employee Orientation (2013), found at https://www.forbes.com/sites/hbsworkingknowledge/2013/04/01/first-minutes-of-new-employee-orientation-are-critical/#61dae94c4830.

3 Human Capital Institute and Kronos Incorporated, New Hire Momentum: Driving the Onboarding Experience (2017), at 26.

Research shows that having a more effective approach to onboarding can lead to better new-employee retention,1 reduced turnover,2 and getting new hires ramped up and productive more quickly.3

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The new employee experience As the financial services industry strives to rebuild its image, win customer loyalty, and fuel continued growth, implementing effective people strategies is more important than ever. Because the workforce is a key differentiator in this service-oriented industry, business leaders need to take a proactive approach to engaging and retaining talent — an initiative that starts with onboarding. Prospective hires want choices. They no longer want to work for a company — they prefer to work with a company.4 Capitalizing on this means you as an HR pro must find ways to set your organization apart so that new talent chooses you. And that’s where the experience you deliver comes in.

4 Lori Sylvia, Generation Why: The Attitudinal Shift Uniting Today’s Workforce (2017), found at: http://blog.smashfly.com/2017/03/01/generation-why-the-attitudinal-shift-uniting-todays-workforce/.

It can be the typical new employee experience ...

✘ Talent accepts your offer, BUT …

✘ They don’t hear from your recruiting or hiring manager for weeks

✘ They have to follow up before their start date to get important first-day details

✘ They arrive on their first day and spend hours completing forms and paperwork and watching policy videos, THEN …

✘ They’re shown to a work area that lacks the technology or equipment they need to start work, AND …

✘ Their manager or supervisor can’t be reached for questions until the end of the day

Or a great experience!

✔ Talent accepts your offer

✔ Within days, they get an email from your recruiter with a link to their first-day agenda, AND …

✔ Links to all the necessary forms and documentation to complete online at their convenience BEFORE day one!

✔ Your new hire spends their first day learning more about your organization, meeting teammates, and getting familiar with their new work environment!

Why good onboarding matters in financial servicesIf your new hires leave after six months, whatever you’ve put into finding them and ramping them up has been wasted. The Financial Industry Survey5 has revealed that employees value opportunities to learn, grow, and make an impact. In fact, 76 percent of employees say that they are driven by more than money when looking for a job and 36 percent say they want support for their personal and professional goals.

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5 *Poll of over 800 financial services employees from April 2017.

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Single software solution

Single web-based service

In-house developed technology

Blended multiple web-based and/or software solutions

No technology solution but planning to implement in the next 3 years

No technology solution and no plans to implement

90-day turnover rate

Quality of hire

Enroll benefits electronically

Track completion of onboarding tasks and activities

Personalize suggestions and recommendations

Over-tasked managers / lack of time for onboarding

Inconsistent application across the organization

Lack of manager buy-in accountability

6%

6%

36%

29%

40%

49%

49%

66%

60%

13%

26%

16%

9%

4%

56%

30%

32%

15%

47%

51%

41%

22%

27%

15%

0%

11%

11%

11%

Figure 1

Figure 4

Figure 2

Figure 3

Financial Sector Other Industries

A look at the onboarding experience in the financial sectorFinancial services companies emphasize a few metrics more than others to evaluate their onboarding programs, including the quality of the hire and their ability to avoid a 90-day turnover rate (Fig.1)6. While there aren’t significant differences in the onboarding programs, process, or outcomes between organizations in the financial sector and those in other industries, those in the financial sector are more likely to have direct goals that include:

• Integrating employees into their culture

• Using a technology solution in their onboarding efforts (Figs. 2 and 3)7

• Reporting challenges with over-tasked managers who don’t follow up to ensure onboarding tasks are completed or who don’t “buy in” to the onboarding process, and program inconsistency (Fig. 4)8

6 NEED NAME AND URL FOR INFOGRAPHIC.

7 Ibid.

8 Ibid.

In the following section, we’ll show you how to shape your own successful onboarding approach.

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The average cost

per hire is $4,129,

and the average time

to fill a position is

42 days.6

Preboarding: Making progress before day oneSpending a lot of time, energy, and resources on recruiting new talent is an old story. A 2016 SHRM survey showed that the average cost per hire is $4,129, and the average time to fill a position is 42 days.9

We’ve already established that an onboarding program focused on new-hire retention and success should be job one. But once someone is hired, preboarding is the best way to take them from the candidate experience to the employee experience.

The time between offer acceptance and the employee’s first day is the perfect opportunity to leverage the new hire’s excitement until they’re fully on board — and a great way to streamline processes and save HR a ton of time.

Here are some things to include in your preboarding process:

• A leadership welcome message on your new-talent online portal or linked in your welcome email

• A day one agenda: What time to arrive, whom to ask for, what to bring (e.g., a valid ID), and their upcoming schedule if applicable

• Electronic availability of critical information: Having new hires fill out tax forms, review your employee handbook, and make decisions on benefits in advance is the ultimate efficiency

• Determine the new hire’s preferences for technology, equipment, and/or schedule

• A personal touch: Collect fun information and use it to craft a “welcome the new employee” email for the team so they can have good conservation starters, helping them connect with the new employee on a more personal level right away

9 Society for Human Resource Management, Average Cost-per-Hire for Companies Is $4,129, SHRM Survey Finds (2016).

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Onboarding: The essentialsHere are some suggested actions to take you from your new employees’ first day through their first six months.

Hold a new-hire orientation:

• Review what your organization does and its structure

• Provide a “whom to call” list; e.g., HR contacts, IT, payroll

• Give a tour of work areas and also point out break rooms, printers, and where teammates sit

• Have a lunch plan, such as inviting the new hire to a favorite restaurant—because nobody wants to eat alone at the start of a job

• Assign and issue equipment

• Issue facility access badge

Help new hires build relationships and share key learnings with other new hires by:

• Scheduling informal meet-and-greets

• Assigning them a buddy or mentor

• Introducing them to senior leaders

Start aligning onboarding to the new hire’s role. HR and cross-functional teams should partner to support the onboarding experience by having new hires:

• Attend key trainings and/or gain certifications

• Meet with relevant stakeholders

• Job shadow teammates

• Access necessary tools and systems

• Chat with HR so they can monitor progress and answer questions

By now, managers and peers have become the main sources of information. Here’s where HR should:

• Clarify company culture and management philosophy

• Set professional goals and milestones

• Check in to monitor ongoing progress

Prepare for new hire’s formal 90-day review by:

• Ensuring they’re on track with performance expectations

• Proactively addressing any outstanding questions or concerns

Maintain cross-functional support:

• Managers should be providing ongoing new-hire coaching and feedback

• A final HR check-in to ensure all is well

30first days1week1day 60first days 90first days 6first months

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What managers need to effectively integrate new hires into their teams:

• Knowledge of what’s covered in new-hire preboarding and orientation

• Understanding of the overall onboarding plan and their role in it

• Communication with current employee(s) about expectations for helping onboard new hires

• Visibility into new-hire milestones and their progress

• The tools to manage all tasks for which they’re responsible

What HR should focus on throughout the process:

• Administering preboarding

• Running orientation sessions

• Handling benefits enrollment and form completion

• Managing timelines and holding new hires and managers accountable

• Communicating onboarding expectations to managers

• Checking in with the new hires at the 60- and 90-day marks

Sharing the onboarding burdenThe most effective onboarding processes are shared among different stakeholders. This way, no one person is overburdened with managing the entire process — and more importantly, it allows the new hire to engage with different teams and departments throughout your organization.

HR and individual managers play the largest roles in onboarding. Here are a few areas for each to consider when creating a shared onboarding approach that ensures roles, responsibilities, and expectations are clear.

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Measuring your onboarding program’s success Okay, you’ve developed your awesome onboarding plan and it’s in full swing. So how will you know if it’s working? You’ll need to monitor and evaluate.

A 2017 survey showed that more than half of organizations don’t track the efficacy of their onboarding programs10 — even though those that do have more favorable talent and business outcomes.11 Why would you do all that work and then throw the game in the final seconds?

Build an evaluation plan into your onboarding that includes: :

• Watching for peaking turnover rates

• Ongoing contact with managers to make sure new hires understand their role, critical processes, and who’s who in the organization and to find out if they’re completing assignments on time

• Automated surveys that measure employee engagement, especially shorter “pulse” surveys that offer staff regular opportunities to share their views on their work environment. (See Figure 1.)

10 New Hire Momentum: Driving the Onboarding Experience, at 25.

11 Ibid., at 26.

12 Ibid.

Dropping the ball: One of the hidden perks of an onboarding program is its potential to boost new-hire time to productivity. But while 33 percent of organizations in a recent survey said they consider shortening time to proficiency an onboarding goal, only seven percent actually measure it.12

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Customer Onboarding Success Story: Union Bank and Trust (UBT)

Based out of Lincoln, Nebraska, UBT has 30 branches and approximately 900 employees.

About a year ago, UBT decided to make the onboarding of new employees more of an experience and less of a paperwork-completion process. These are some of the new protocols the bank put in place:

• All new employee paperwork has been placed into DocuSign so new employees can receive and complete their paperwork ahead of their first day, then simply review it when they come to the office. A PowerPoint Presentation was also created to drive the document review.

• New employees receive a wrapped and personalized gift bag on their first day, with a branded pen, tumbler and tee shirt included.

• At Orientation, new employees are shown a video created to commemorate the bank’s 100-year anniversary. This gives them the opportunity to learn more about UBT’s culture and become familiar with the CEO.

• Last, UBT has created a New Employee Checklist for managers to keep new employees on track. One item on the list is to make sure the new employee isn’t eating lunch by themselves on their first day or during their first week.

“ Our new hires have real ly enjoyed the onboarding processes we’ve put in place. Having paperwork completed beforehand real ly takes the pressure off new hires. We can al l be a lot more ‘in the moment.’”

Katie Davis, HRIS Benefits Coordinator

Union Bank and Trust

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Contact Kronos at +1 800 225 1561 or visit kronos.com/onboarding.

Hassle-free onboarding is critical in financial servicesDon’t let confusing, inconsistent processes, stacks of paper forms, and limited resources make your new hire’s first day not the best day. Use this eBook as a guide to creating an exceptional onboarding program for both your new hires and your organization.

It’s so important to reduce the traditionally high attrition rates in financial services — even a 10 percent decline can make a big impact. As you now know, a more effective approach to onboarding can lead to better new-employee retention, reduced turnover, and faster time to productivity. And with the right tools, it can be a hassle-free process that will allow you to focus on the human part of human resources.