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How you onboard a new manager can make or break the team they are expected to lead. Bringing on a new leader means teaching them the ropes, helping them assimilate within an existing team, and creating a satisfying work experience.
When done right, successful onboarding leads to high retention rates and employee engagement.
In fact, 51% of employees say they’d go beyond their requirements if given a good onboarding, while 22% say they’d look for another job if they didn’t receive good onboarding.
So, what does onboarding a new manager entail and how do you create a successful onboarding program?
This article will answer that question! Let’s start with clarifying what onboarding a new manager entails.
What is manager onboarding and what’s included?
Onboarding a new manager is the process of prepping and integrating a newly promoted or hired manager into your organization. The goal is to help them settle in, get up to speed on their responsibilities, and connect with their team.
New manager onboarding is similar to onboarding a new employee; the process often includes:
- An orientation
- Completing necessary paperwork
- Discussions about the organization and its mission
- Product or service demonstrations
- Introduction to other teams and departments
- Overview of responsibilities, and so on.
Management onboarding can be done through a series of activities and/or one-on-one sessions. It’s helpful to develop a new manager onboarding template or checklist to help you keep the process consistent for everyone.
Why is it important to have a process for onboarding new managers?
There are many benefits to management onboarding that integrates new leaders into an organization.
Learning how to onboard a new manager effectively can help you:
- Provide a structured learning and integration process,
- Clarify short-term, long-term, and priority objectives and goals,
- Offer training and mentorship, if needed,
- Increase productivity and retention
- Facilitate knowledge-sharing
- Maintain consistency within the company culture, and more.
Additionally, it is a good idea to decide beforehand what type of onboarding process would help new leaders start their jobs more effectively. Depending on your organization and team size, you may include your new manager in an onboarding buddy program or employee mentorship program.
Buddies and mentors can help orient new hires, build connections, assist in learning new technology and systems, and more. The quicker they onboard, the sooner they can start doing what you hired them to do.
Key components for onboarding new managers
While there are many ways to introduce a new hire to the company and vice versa, here’s a new leader onboarding checklist to help you out:
1. Introduce new managers to their team ahead of time
As soon as you hire a new manager, introduce them to their team during an employee orientation.
This is a good place to start integrating them into the organization. They can share experiences, set expectations, and get to know the people they are about to work with.
Doing so will help them understand what projects are active or need to be prioritized. Also, introduce them to other teams and departments they may need to work with.
Building these connections early on will ensure good communication between your new hire and existing employees.
2. Provide clear expectations for new managers
As they meet with their teams and understand their roles better, it is important to clarify expectations and goals from the very beginning when onboarding new managers.
Help them understand the value of each responsibility and how it contributes to overall business objectives.
- As managers, what are they expected to do?
- Who answers to them, and who do they answer to?
- How should they track productivity and KPIs?
- And so on.
3. Provide them with mentors who have been where they are now
Managers will need some support during the new leader onboarding process. That is why it is a great idea to pair your new hire with a mentor who has been in their position before.
This mentor can answer your new hire’s questions, help them navigate company policies, and also provide support through experience.
Mentorship can reduce your turnover rate and improve engagement within your organization.
4. Introduce other new managers for peer learning and accountability
When onboarding a new manager, you may even run a peer mentor program, connecting all your new managers together.
This way, your new manager has onboarding buddies. And you give them a space to share knowledge, learn from each other, and build a community.
Within the peer mentoring community, they can receive support and training and even keep each other accountable.
5. Offer opportunities for job shadowing
The best way for new managers to learn how things are done in your organization is to watch someone do it.
That’s where a job shadowing program can prove handy. Have new managers shadow others who have been in similar positions as part of your new manager onboarding checklist.
New managers can observe and learn first-hand what is expected and how to navigate potential issues and conflicts. They can even have debriefing sessions after a day or week of shadowing to go over what they’ve learned.
6. Share resources to help them be new managers
It’s also helpful to gather resources that can help new managers integrate better. These individuals should be provided with access to the onboarding documentation, as it serves as an invaluable guide. This may include:
- History and purpose of the company
- Product or service information
- Industry news and trends
- Tools and technology for project management
- Training and L&D materials, and more.
If your managers are part of a mentorship program, then you can even provide mentorship resources such as meeting agendas, career and skill development, and more.
7. Offer practice work
Depending on the employee’s experience, you may want to offer practice work or tutorials as part of new manager onboarding to evaluate their skill level.
These should be practical samples of what they may encounter as part of their job.
Here, again, having a mentor comes in handy. The mentor can go over the practice work and discuss the employee’s strengths and weaknesses.
8. Touch base regularly with new managers while they onboard
Remember to check in with your new hire throughout the manager onboarding process. Find out how they are getting along with other members. Add these questions to your new leader onboarding checklist:
- Are the resources helpful?
- Are there any information gaps they’d like filled?
- Do they know where to start?
- Are the goals and expectations clear?
This will not only help you identify and fix potential issues but also help you improve the new manager onboarding process to be more effective for the next hire.
9. Collect feedback
Managers should also be able to offer feedback about the onboarding process, including their victories and frustrations. Survey new managers to gain this insight.
This information could be valuable when it comes to improving new manager orientation, the onboarding process, or helping managers deal with issues that arise during the onboarding process.
10. Use development programs software for seamless new manager onboarding
Using the right technology in your new manager onboarding process can go a long way in making sure the process is effective and improves the digital employee experience. Development programs software provides an organized and efficient way to deliver necessary training, track progress, and make sure the onboarding process is consistent for all new leaders.
Streamlining management onboarding with software makes the process far less overwhelming for new managers, making sure they have everything they need in one place.
Build your new manager onboarding program with Together
Onboarding a new manager is an important step in the hiring process. How well you bring on a new leader and help them integrate with the company directly impacts how long they stay and how well they perform. A great first step in creating your new manager onboarding program is finding development programs software to streamline the process.
Together’s development programs software makes it easy to gather all onboarding documents, training content, communications, and a mentorship program in one place, making it easy for new hires to participate fully in the onboarding process and for you to manage and monitor your programs.
Ready to get started? Reach out to learn more about our suite of tools and resources!
