Carrying out good office inductions? Where to start
An office Induction is a structured and formal introduction and welcome to a company, site or premises. This induction should contain the important information that the inductee would need to have to keep them safe, productive, and aware of matters affecting them directly during their time with you.
Why do I need to induct my new office staff?
Your business could be a sales organisation, marketing agency or accountancy, regardless you will have a direct duty of care to the people who work on your behalf. Not only are you held to Health & Safety obligations but once you hire a member of staff, you owe it to them and yourself to give them the greatest chance of succeeding in their role. The best grounding for both situations is to provide a thorough induction process and good training.
On average recruitment and training of a new worker in your office costs on average £4000, so keeping them should be important. An informative induction and training procedure creates trust in your company, leading to better long-term staff retention.
Why should I induct visitors?
Making a good first impression matters, when people take the time to visit your office, the minimum that you can do is to provide them with the important details about where they are visiting. A visitor induction should contain information about the building’s fire procedures, welfare facilities and first aid arrangements amongst other things.
Why should I induct subcontractors?
Office-based businesses tend to use subcontractors on rare occasions, however, when you do, it’s important to remember that your induction obligations for your staff extend to contractors too. Have the freelancers working out of your office been given a suitable induction to ensure security? Also, a contractor could suffer an injury which you could have avoided, at what point did it become your issue too?
How do I induct office staff into my company and onto my premises?
Inducting people can be done in several ways, the key is to ensure that the inductee gets the necessary information to be able to be safe and productive. Also, it’s important that you get the same in return. Requesting relevant documents such as proof of identification, proof of qualifications and proof of address will be a must. Oh, you’ll probably need to get their banking details for payday too.
Traditionally, inductions have been done face-to-face by someone competent in the business with the level of knowledge relevant to the people arriving. However, with the rise in remote workingfor office roles and improving technologies, companies can improve their induction processes by moving their welcome online.
What should I contain in an office-based induction program?
Finding examples of a good induction program can be tough, after all, no two companies are the same so inductions will vary. Most inductions can take a similar structure with space for necessary industry and role-specific amendments. Some topics you may want to consider include:-
- Company history – A company culture is created through not only the people working within it but also how those people got the company to where it is now. Informing new staff of your company’s history will result in more positive engagement from new workers. What key products does the company provide? Who are the main competitors in the market to your office-based company? The same applies to providing them with organisational structures and information about other departments and key people.
- Health & Safety – Any company has legal, moral, and financial reasons to provide information and instruction to staff on safety measures. This information should be conveyed to them from day one. Upon arrival, staff should be made aware of your first aid, fire arrangements, building hazards, role-specific hazards, and welfare arrangements. When you add up the cost of an incident that could have been avoided, it pays to invest time and resources in safety inductions.
- Site security arrangements – Investing in site security equipment is worthless if staff are unaware of what they should be doing to protect your business, assets and information. Are staff given the necessary policies and procedures to follow to reduce the chance of corporate theft? Not only could you lose valuable resources, but you could also lose valuable intellectual property and client information.
- Company rules – Letting staff know what is expected from them at the earliest opportunity ensures you can maintain the standards you hold staff to. It also helps the hire too, knowing what is acceptable and what is not empowers them to be able to make good decisions quickly. The office opening hours, break times, lunch arrangements and social media policies are vital for staff to know from the get-go.
- Role requirements – Throwing a new hire into the deep end with little to no instruction or training will end poorly quickly. This sink-or-swim mentality may find you a fantastic candidate who was born to do the role, however, it is more likely to result in another round of costly recruitment. How much would it cost to replace your new Sales Director should he have a change of mind? Provide role-specific training as part of their induction and ongoing training to give them and you the best shot at being successful.
So, what are my next steps?
Creating an induction checklist including onboarding will give you a formal structure to work through. Ask yourself questions related to the above topics, what would be safety critical to know if I started here tomorrow? What information would be beneficial for me to perform well in this new job? What induction activities for new employees would I benefit from? What should I know of my colleagues to get the most use out of them?
Why should I use Easy Induction?
Our Easy Induction package allows you to create, assign and manage your inductions for all your office-based staff. Create a company-wide induction program which then can be duplicated and edited for specific roles.
The induction courses can then be assigned to any inductee to complete. They receive a notification by email with simple step-by-step instructions on how to proceed. For employing remote hires, having the ability to send your induction across the country is a huge benefit.
Within the same induction package, create a visitor induction which can be accessed in your reception via a scannable QR code. So when an unscheduled visitor arrives, one scan and a few details can be done to give you peace of mind that they will be safe and informed during their visit.
What advantages can I get by doing online inductions?
Easy Induction allows you to create, edit and duplicate inductions easily, saving you time and money. Our service allows you to create a list of inductees and assign your role-specific content, ensuring that your staff have the best grounding in their roles. With advances in cloud hosting, Easy Induction evens allows you to import your video content directly into your inductions. A welcome from the MD may not be possible for all inductees, however, having their message online front and centre will allow for staff to get excited about your company and culture.
Managing inductions online also allows you to take advantage of a wider pool of talent. Remote working is here to stay, however, not providing inductions due to locations will lead to problems. Create and host your inductions online and look further afield for the best talent with Easy induction. When the time comes to see your new remote hire face to face, have confidence they have already undertaken a building induction before their arrival.
Inductions are important to keep everyone associated with your business safe and productive, so take a look at how Easy Induction is not just a nice thing to do, but the right thing to do.