While the term “onboarding” isn’t new, it’s a critical step in the employee life cycle which is more important than ever as organizations continue to focus heavily on the retention and development of their current workforce.

A well-designed, fun and engaging onboarding process has a significantly greater effect on employee engagement and in-turn retention when compared to the mentality of one-day “orientation.”The Human Resources Corporate Leadership Council found that companies could increase an employee’s level of engagement and potentially improve performance by 20 percent as well as reduce the employee’s probability of departure by 87 percent.

Working to foster great working relationships now ensures a more motivated workforce in the future, regardless of economic uncertainties. You may be thinking that developing an onboarding program is a daunting task but it doesn’t have to be. We have provided a simple framework to get you started.Make sure you tailor your process to meet your organization’s specific needs.

According to research conducted by the SHRM Foundation in 2010, the building blocks of onboarding have four distinct levels, the Four C’s.

1. Compliance is the lowest level and includes teaching employees basic legal and policy related rules and regulations.
2. Clarification refers to ensuring that employees understand their new jobs and all related expectations.
3. Culture is a broad category that includes providing employees with a sense of organizational norms – both formal and informal.

4. Connection refers to the interpersonal relationships and information networks that employees must establish.

The study goes on to note that the degree to which each organization leverages these four building blocks determines its overall strategy, with most firms falling into one of three levels.

1. Passive Onboarding provides mostly a checklist and brief overview of the organization and the person’s role. These come mostly from the compliance and clarification building blocks of onboarding.
2. High Potential Onboarding includes the compliance and clarification building blocks but includes more of the culture piece. At this point the organization still hasn’t completely integrated all of the onboarding parts.
3. Proactive Onboarding is an organization wide human resource management systematic approach to your onboarding process.

According to the survey only 20% of organizations ever achieve this level of onboarding.

Take a little time to develop an onboarding process using some of the tips we have provided. If you do your new employees will start their career at your organization more engaged and enthusiastic. They may even decide to stay for the long term!