Focus on These 5 Things to Give New Hires the Greatist Onboarding Ever
Have you ever had a good onboarding? At most companies, it’s a miracle if you get a computer and all the right paperwork to fill out on day one. Expecting someone to roll out the red carpet to welcome you? That’s a pipe dream. But it doesn’t have to be.
Onboarding has always been a priority at Greatist, and as the company has grown (with 25 new hires in 2016), the experience has only gotten better. Here are the five things I focus on as our head of people operations to ensure all new hires — we like to call them grewbies — feel right at home and are set up for success in their new roles.
The Culture Interview
Culture matters just as much today (if not more) as it did when Derek Flanzraich started the company in 2011. That’s why people operations conducts a culture interview before we send anyone an offer letter. We’re not trying to suss out if this is someone we can drink a beer with — or chat about the latest episode of The Bachelor. The culture interview targets our core values. We ask questions like: What’s the most important quality you look for in the people you work with? What’s one thing you want to learn more about? What are your favorite things to do when you’re not working?
The most important question, however, is the one we ask ourselves after the interview: Will this person push us to be better? The answer has to be “yes” to move forward, though we prefer a “hell yes!”
The First Four Emails
The second new hires sign their offer letter, it’s GO TIME. I send grewbies a quick email to the congratulate them. I always sign off by saying, “I’m looking forward to working with you and making Greatist feel like home.” And I mean it!
I try to be really mindful when emailing new hires before their start date. I want to keep up the excitement, add a little curiosity, and be super productive without overwhelming them. And I’ve found that sending the following three emails (after that initial congrats note) hits the sweet spot.
Email #2: This is a quick note to let grewbies know onboarding has started. I make sure they’re cool with the email we’ve chosen for them, ask a few simple, slightly mysterious questions (What are your two favorite colors?), and let them know I’ll be sending them a couple more emails about onboarding before their start date.
Email #3: This is when we send new hires The Greatist Starter Kit. It’s a list of articles and videos talking about the company, productivity, and start-up life in general. The note isn’t homework. We see it like a choose-your-own-adventure of resources so new hires can feel prepared before day one.
Email #4: A few days before any grewbie starts, I send a final email that tries to answer the remaining questions new hires may have. Do you really have unlimited food? Yes! Our fridge is stocked and we’ve got plenty of snacks too! Can I really wear workout clothes to the office? Leggings are considered pants here. So, yes. I also let them know I’ll meet them at the start of their first day, so they can find their desk and get settled in. And I give them a list of all of their pre-scheduled meetings, plus I offer more information on how we use Slack and email.
Day One
Spoiler alert for anyone who’s just accepted a job offer at Greatist: We host a hotseat for every grewbie on their first day. They answer 10 minutes of silly rapid-fire questions (Who would win in a fight: a taco or a grilled cheese?) while wearing even sillier hats. We introduce the grewbie to the entire team and ask for them to give a quick spiel — anything from where they’re from to why they’re excited to be at Greatist.
After the hotseat, I give new hires get a quick office tour and then sit down with them for a 90-minute introduction to the Ultimate Greatist Onboarding Guide (UGOG). This hour-and-a-half meeting discusses everything from our rules for Slack to company benefits. Grewbies learn more about our gractivities (plus how we put “gr” in front of tons of words) and what we mean when we ask each employee to fill out their Tour of Duty.
Learning About the Company
From there, as a people operations team, we let the grewbie chill and soak it all in. The first two weeks are really for onboarding, learning, absorbing, and settling in.
Throughout the first ten days, each new hire has grutorials scheduled with all of our division leads, where grewbies learn more what each division does and the ways they may interact with each department in their role.
We also host a productivity grutorial and Derek leads part two of the UGOG, which gives an overview of Greatist’s history, who’s who at the company, and our core values. We cap off onboarding by having new hires complete a 30-minute exercise to help them better understand their personal core values (which then helps us create the best environment for them to work in) and the grewbie meets with their manager to go through their Tour of Duty.
Meeting Your Colleagues
At the start of week two, we kick off grauntlets, pre-scheduled social gatherings at coffee shops or bars that pair any new grewbies with five or so existing employees. The hope is grauntlets offer new hires an opportunity to learn more about their the rest of the team outside the confines of the office.
We’ve had many versions of the grauntlets as we’ve grown. Initially grewbies were asked to schedule the grauntlets themselves. Now I schedule a handful coffee grauntlets and ask existing employees to sign up for one using a Doodle. If employees aren’t able to make the coffee meetups, we also end with a grappy hour (you’re getting the hang of these names, eh?) they can attend.
Onboarding at Greatist has a lot of moving pieces, but is one of the most important processes in our effort to make Greatist the healthiest company to work for. When I see a grewbie chatting with other employees in the the bistro, asking questions to people not on their direct team, or even attending one of our weekly in-house yoga classes, I feel like we’ve succeeded and I start to get excited for the next hire. By then, it’s week three and it’s time to work!
