HR Onboarding: What Should My Hiring Plan Contain?
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Human Resource Aspects That Help You Drive Your Success Up
A successful firm is built on the staff it employs and the training and education it grants to them. This is the most effective way to ensure continuous success in your firm.
A Hiring Plan consists of several parts, each one as important as the other one:
 -Developing a plan for staff hiring and training
 -Preparing job descriptions and selection criteria
 -Don´t forget advertising for the position
 -Interview time
 -Developing personal and team policies
 -Developing staff orientation programs
 -Developing training programs for staff

Developing a plan for staff hiring and training
But let´s start from the beginning. Why do you need to develop guidelines for hiring, orientation and training?
- Joining a new firm is all about perception of new colleagues: how they are hired, welcomed, onboarded and trained are first impressions of your firm to them, this will also influence them on how they will perform their future job at your firm.
- Creating guidelines will teach you more about your needs, help you develop a philosophy and plan for your firm. The hiring and training policy should tell you exactly how you want to have the company perceived.
- Develop a clear set of guidelines to follow a simple hiring and training process: do not create complicated processes.
- By having guidelines in place, you show that you are a serious firm and did your prep work.
- Clear set of guidelines will also help you to protect yourself from accusations of discrimination.
- Staff hiring and training are two of the easiest processes to handle – if you are prepared correctly: get this automated by preparing a clear guideline to follow.
- Great guidelines will also help you to find the right future colleague.
- A training guideline will help your team to get a skilled worker that knows how division processes in your firm work, as well as motivate your future colleague by guiding him into the firm, being able to start his job with the skills they need.

Well, we learnt a lot, but now how do you develop such guidelines for hiring future colleagues?
That´s a tough one – honestly, it depends on your firm. Where are you standing right now – should you just started your business, then you will certainly have less staff power available than a large corporation. We suggest having 1 person draft your guidelines and then pass it around to different divisions and teams, to add their suggestions and later discuss in a dedicated HR team what you´d like to implement. That way you´ll integrate your team and staff to develop with you the staff of tomorrow, respecting their ideas and encourage teamwork.
Define: Who To Hire
Now let´s work on some decisions together – let´s start with who to hire:
- What skills, personal qualities do you require from them
- Commitment and Passion are important to consider
- Where will they be based
- Do you want remote workers, or have them come to the office?
- Consideration: skills vs interpersonal skills or personal qualities
(can you e.g. accept someone with less skills and train them?)
Define: Offer
Good job – we are getting there. Now what can we offer the applicant?
- Full time or part time position?
- Benefits or Bonuses?
- Are you willing to pay more for specific skills or experience?
Define: Hiring Process
Having a clear hiring process is important. At this stage, you´ll must define who will be involved, avoid involving individual persons, but divisions and decide how to use them in the hiring process!
- Decide who screens applicants
- Decide who will do interviews
- Clarify who is the best person / team to do the job!
Now let´s simplify a few things and take a step back:
- Start off with a job description and a document for selection criteria. Do decide who will be involved in drafting a job description, and who will work with you on the selection criteria.
- What format do you want to receive the application in (Europass?)?
- How should the interview process be conducted?
- How do you think your firm should be represented?
- Develop a timeline: do you know when the hiring should be done and the future colleague should be onboarded?
- Where will you publish the job post or find suitable candidates?
- How many applicants will you invite for an interview?
- Who will pre-select the applications and decide with whom to proceed?
- How many screening levels do you want to include?
- What is your criteria for the screening and interview stages for choosing or rejecting applicants? (whatever you choose, you´ll must explain easily what you´ve applied, and make sure you are not discriminating anyone)

Define: Interview Process
Dealing with an interview can be stressful. Keep things calm and friendly. Before starting your interview, these questions should be answered already:
- How much time can you spend with an interviewer (define a certain time for yourself)
- How many stages of the interview will take place, and what are these stages?
- How do you choose an applicant?
- How do you react if someone declines the job?
- How do you inform other applicants if you have chosen someone else?
- How do you have him sign the contract?
- How do you evaluate the hiring process and how can you implement feedback to incorporate into revised guidelines?

Good job, we got them on board. But now what? Maybe it would help to start developing an orientation and training program?
Developing such a program is crucial for the growth of your staff, both for personal development and improving skillsets. An orientation program will help you get someone onboard without influencing the operation of your firm too much.
There are 3 steps that should be developed in a firm:
Orientation: helps new staff members to onboard the firm and will help them do their job better, by being introduced into a team, shown the work processes and being able to therefore focus on their skills and on how the firm makes use of them.
Training: helps staff members to focus and develop on skills and teaches new technology, and in general how the firm wants to apply project lifecycles and more.
Personal Development: helps the staff members to continuously improve their skills and learn new skills.
Orientation
New staff members need to be successfully onboarded by providing them a time-limited orientation to both their position and the firm´s organization:
- How does the firm operate?
- Who are my colleagues I'll work with?
- What are our standards
- What is our firm´s structure?
- What is our firm´s organization?
- Different Divisions that the firms have, what positions cover what
- Who supervises whom
- How to properly communicate
- Organizational Policies, Procedures & Guidelines
- Special Regulations & Guidelines to follow
- Mission of the firm and how they want to achieve its goals
- Role of new staff member and expectations
- Target numbers
- How will the new staff member be supervised and by whom
- When do they need to ask for permission, when can they make decisions by herself?
- What is expected by the staff member
- What resources does she have access to, how to access these resources?
(e.g. IT, HR, VM, etc.)

- The people the new staff person will be working with, including other staff of the organization, staff from other organizations, and people in the community.
- The day-to-day routine of the organization and of the site where the staff person will be working -- where everything is; who to ask for what; the guidelines for the use of computers, copiers, and other office equipment; who answers which phones; when lunch and payday are; where to park; how to use health and other benefits; etc. This area would also include instruction in security procedures, the use of office equipment, software, phone and fax systems, etc.
- The organizational culture -- how people treat one another, and what kind of work behavior is considered "normal."
Training
Any (new) staff member should receive training, no matter how skilled or experienced. That way we can teach them how to apply their skills and experience in their new position and (new) firm.
They also may need to learn skills that are tailored to the (new) firm or learn about organizational issues.
Personal Development
A staff member is an investment of the firm – and we should keep their knowledge and skill-level as high as possible by continuously encouraging him to participate in trainings, improve skills, work and participate on workshops and webinars, learn about new technologies or procedures in the industry and advance further.
Developing Training Modules
Develop different training modules to use on an ongoing basis and improve when you see fit, like a curriculum at a university or college.
Who Will Conduct Trainings For What Position / Field Expertise
Before you can even think about developing a course program, you´ll must decide who will take care of what training. It can be your Division Leader, Inhouse Instructor, Team Leader, or anyone else with the experience. It can also be a combination of more than 1 Trainer / Instructor.
Define Training Times & When Trainings Take Place
How long will each course be, when do you want the courses to take place and how often in a month (once, weekly, biweekly). Certain times help your staff to plan better their days and make sure to be available for trainings. Courses should also not be exceeding 90 mins without a break. This time differs for Induction Programs.
Create An Induction Program
Welcoming new staff members is exciting, but try to hire more than 1, it´s easier to onboard several persons, which will also help you to create competition among them. Think about how you can onboard them. It should cover all necessary topics and help the person to get started at the firm.
Forms Of Training
Trainings can take place in many different forms – formal & informal, in classes, personal one on one, etc.
Some considerations:
• Direct instruction, where someone passes on information, procedures, etc. through lectures, slides, or other "standard" methods
• Reading materials to be digested on one's own, and/or directed research
• Apprenticeship: observing and working with one or more experienced staff for an initial period
• Attendance at regular meetings, seminars, workshops, etc.
• Learning circles (formal learning or research as part of a group of staff members which sets its own agenda and requirements)
• Directsupervisoryfeedback on work
Informal methodsoftraining:
• Conversations and informal meetings with the Director, supervisor, other staff, participants, community members, staff from other organizations, etc.
• Learning on the job
• Keeping a personal journal to reflect on
• Visiting other staff and other organizations
Evaluation
It is important to receive a written evaluation on the participations performance of each training. This should be kept on record with the HR Division and should be referred to for personal performance evaluation.
Testing
After a training, it is mandatory to test the participant after 2-3 months to enforce him understanding and learning continuously.

Wagner provides a great environment to grow your personality, teach you skills that you don´t know yet and helps you develop your existing skills further. If we one your attention and you believe we might be a good fit, then please contact our Human Resource Division and discuss how you can benefit Wagner with your skillset.
Should you want to learn more about Wagner, please visit our website and the career page.

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If you want to learn more about Wagner, please visit our website and the career page or contact our team, they will gladly assist you exploring your opportunities at Wagner Consulting!

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