- The starting point is your business strategy. Has this changed, or is it likely to?
- Once you have determined this, you will need to consider the extent to which there are gaps in the current competencies, skills and behaviours across different groups within your business. You can then start to prioritise, and work out how best to fill these gaps. Key to this is determining the cause of the performance gap.
- Filling the gaps!
- they’re self-isolating or too sick to take holiday before the end of their leave year; or
- they’ve had to continue working and could not take paid holiday.
- Equipment delivery and set-up - How will the employee receive their IT equipment and what instructions will you provide along with remote support to get them set-up on your systems?
- New employee communications - Remember this may be their first experience of working remotely, therefore, provide as much detail as possible and be explicit in your instructions.
- Virtual learning - Assess your critical learning needs for successful onboarding. It may be that you already have the right learning tools but if not, how can you modify mandatory learning?
- The first few weeks - Getting to know new colleagues and line managers is more important than ever. Make sure time is scheduled for virtual introductions and ideally, appoint a colleague as a buddy for the first few weeks. A virtual lunch or virtual welcome drinks could also be arranged.
- Provide structure - Be clear about what tasks you want the new hire to perform and by when thereby giving some structure to their early career.