Welcome from Afar

“I feel like I’m drinking from a fire hose with all this training!” 

That sentence remained on a constant loop in my brain during my first six months with a global sales training and development team at Honeywell. I heard it as a distress call from frustrated new hires, and as a bewildered observation from other business partners.  In my role, my primary task is onboarding new sales teammates across six business groups from all over the globe. In a post-pandemic workplace, in-person onboarding had become almost obsolete at the company. While we knew it was likely needed, and even preferred in some cases, the resources simply were not there at that time. Yet, we were steadily hiring, and the demand for prepared and productive sales teammates was only increasing month over month. I was determined to permanently remove that statement from our feedback surveys. But how? What would it take to change the perception, and ultimately, the results of our onboarding program? The answer is quite a bit of trial and error, more ‘fire hoses’ on the surveys and eventually a process that we could count on and reinforce without imposing more responsibility on ourselves or our new hires. Read on for how my team and I rolled up our sleeves and doubled our completion rates by the end of my first year.

Communication: Say It First, Say It Often.

We’ve all been there. It’s your first day on a new job and your Outlook inbox is cluttered with what seems to be hundreds of emails – all with ‘Response Requested’ or ‘Urgent’ subject lines. You have one million to-do lists, some with similar tasks, and can’t seem to locate anyone from the IT team to answer questions about why the password you created a week ago to prepare for this moment is no longer working. What is truly required or urgent? Who determines those boundaries? While making that determination was not exactly in our pay grade, we could see to it that our messages screamed just slightly louder and more frequently than the others.

We found that a primary contributor to the moderate satisfaction scores and delayed completion rates was that communication about the onboarding process was fragmented and sparse during those first pivotal weeks. My immediate task was to determine a way to ensure that new teammates had early, easy access to what the process entailed, what tools they needed to engage with it, who they could enlist for help and what was expected of them. And we needed to deploy this information across multiple access points. The goal was that no one new hire would say they never saw, heard or interacted with this vital onboarding information. Our most successful tactics:

• An interactive Welcome to Honeywell message with an at-a-glance graphic for where their training and resources could be found, a link to their specific learning plan and a link to an eLearning that served as the official welcome to the business.
• A Microsoft Teams group just for new hires and the training managers for each business group. They could ask questions in real time and receive answers from myself or training managers, see a schedule of all upcoming virtual onboarding sessions, view a robust list of tools and resources mentioned throughout their onboarding and take product and process trainings via the learning management system.
• Timed progress updates at the 30 and 60 day mark as well intermittently for virtual sessions as needed.
• Blurbs or notifications in weekly newsletters for each business group that were typically read or discussed during team meetings.

We initiated a Sales Coach program for all new hires. These were individuals handpicked by the direct leader. They had been with the company in the same or similar role as the new hire for at least six months, regularly exceeded their KPI’s, on no steps of discipline and expressed a desire for or had a penchant for leading and coaching others. These tenured teammates took a brief, but detailed eLearning created just for this initiative and had special access to a section of the onboarding portal that housed resources and tools to help them guide and coach their new teammate. I had regular check-ins with the coaches to address any gaps in the process and the coaches met with their managers to keep them abreast of the new hire’s progress. Coaches were not obligated to participate, and we regularly promoted the opportunity in order to have a ‘bench’ of sorts when either a coach required a break or in times of increased hiring.

Collaboration & Connection

Starting a new role can be intimidating even to the most seasoned and confident new hire. The thought of engaging with the talking heads on Zoom or Microsoft Teams is terrifying for many people. Our goal was to create points of connection and collaboration that were both succinct  and meaningful. It was imperative that these moments gave respect to time while also providing access to people and resources that would ultimately grow their network and enhance their onboarding experience.

We hosted initial kickoff calls and networking events with groups of new hires who started within the same two weeks. These were teammates from all over the globe and a myriad of business groups. We introduced them to one another, and business partners from HR, Marketing, Legal, Finance, Sales Excellence and others throughout those first 60 days. We created space in these virtual meetings for shenanigans and folly. Who doesn’t love a Kahoot showdown or an interactive presentation powered by Mentimeter? Varied connection points allowed new hires to engage and reflect with their peers taking the same onboarding journey. The networking events also afforded our team the opportunity to answer questions in real time without the sting of an out of office reply or delayed response. 

Kaleidoscope Training

Remember when onboarding consisted of robust binders and stapled packets of information? Or what about when companies graduated to intricate and flamboyant PowerPoint presentations? Training material has certainly come a long way; and in the post-pandemic workplace, it is imperative that it aligns with the attention span and lifestyle of today’s learners. 

I reviewed the typical content assigned to our new hires in the first 60 days. In the six groups, almost everyone had something that was either repetitive or nonessential. While I did not have a full grasp on  every subject, it was clear that some information could be digested at a later time, in a different format or sometimes not at all. 

• I rearranged our onboarding learning plans to include a mixture of self-paced, virtual and in some cases, in-person material. I removed repetitive content and replaced it with a single, comprehensive version generalized for all. 
• In conjunction with traditional eLearning modules, I worked with our design and offering management teams to create interactive micro-learnings for the teammates who didn’t have time to retake an entire learning module or peruse a SharePoint library for product information before their first client meeting.
• The virtual sessions were facilitated by SMEs from the specified area of the business. Was my team perfectly capable of regurgitating information and updates about products, services or processes? Of course. Is it more engaging and informative if someone who interacts with that product or completes that process regularly a better option? Also yes. 
• For the teammates starting their roles in one of the company’s hubs around the globe, there were in-person walk-throughs and hands-on training sessions where they could see and touch the products and services they would eventually sell to our customers.

Adult learners  are not a monolith. They have a higher sense of self-direction, a variety of life and professional experiences that color their learning lenses, and more importantly – they want to choose how they interact with material that is deemed pertinent. With this in mind, we began brain-mapping the idea of a ‘choose your own adventure’ learning experience. Once those initial 60 days were completed, we thought it necessary to provide access to all resources available, but allow them to determine how they absorbed it. (Don’t worry, there’ll be more on this project as it unfolds 😀 )

Check-Ins & Reminders

“I just love receiving countless emails and pop-ups about my training!” – said no employee ever. Unfortunately, this is a necessary evil in my line of work, and I have the privilege of being the name new hires definitely grumble under their breath about when they see it in their Outlook. However, establishing a consistent process for check-ins and firm reminders for training completion proved to be fuel that propelled those pesky completion rates over our pledged 90 percentile mark. It helped that our reminders weren’t always in the form of an automated notification or a scathing reprimand where their leader is copied on a direct email. We also used leaderboards in our learning management system, new hire spotlights on the onboarding portal and weekly shoutouts in division meetings or newsletters. They could regularly see their progress in conjunction to other new hires around the world. In the sales business, a friendly competition is always guaranteed to liven the mood or ignite increased productivity amongst the group.

Accountability on All Sides

Sigh. Enter the bane of my existence – sales managers with mismanaged calendars, vague understanding of the process and gargantuan quotas breathing down their necks. One thing that will never change about the sales industry is the sense of urgency and need to hit the ground running as to not be left behind. As a reformed sales consultant and manager, I’m concerned that this logic leaves little to no room for growth and development in a new and grossly dynamic sales environment. Managing adults is a task I know all too well. Successful execution, in my experience, takes a very particular combination of coach, disciplinarian and at times – friend. A manager must be willing to uphold the rules, explain why they are important and provide space for error as well as ease.

The overhaul of the onboarding program started with the frontline sales managers (we’ll call them FLSMs from here out). I prepared an overview of the changes we were making and dispersed in several formats – a brief self-paced module, a one-pager with links and concise language, a playbook for future reference and of course – a good old fashioned Teams call with a PowerPoint and a round robin question and answer session. Our goal was to reacquaint the FLSMs with the onboarding process and the pivotal role they played in getting their hires to the finish line. Gone were the days of flinging new hires into a rushing river of Salesforce, customer meetings and travel and expense portals after their first few days and seeing if they would sink or swim. Because they’re so busy and spread so utterly thin (insert playful eyeroll here), we voted to not ask the FLSMs for too much. Just a few simple tasks:

• Assign your new a sales coach on day one
• Meet with that sales coach every other week to discuss any concerns or points of tension they have uncovered that may be out of their depth
• Review the sales assessment the new hire takes during week one and then, once more after 60 days to determine readiness
• Complete the survey sent by our team to provide feedback for improvements

They had to be just as committed to the development of their new hires as we were. How else would they be able to deliver a best in class customer experience from first touch to closing the deal?

Continuous Feedback Loop

“Criticism may not be agreeable, but it is necessary. It fulfills the same function as pain in the human body. It calls attention to an unhealthy state of things.” – Winston Churchill

I was proud of our progress in year one on the job. We’d done well, no doubt. Better than the last few years, including pre-pandemic. But as the person who watched the numbers daily and reviewed the overflowing inbox of requests and questions, I knew there was likely something we’d missed. The obvious next step in overhauling the onboarding program was to see just how much of an impact our changes were making.

Incorporating consistent and regular feedback into a training program enables constant improvement, eliminates ineffective practices, and allows for the incorporation of unexpected and creative inputs. When your program is as widespread and multinational as ours, feedback sessions or surveys are an integral part of its overall growth and success. After that first year, our feedback surveys indicated that a more concise overview of the program and its expectations and resources was necessary. If you recall, the first and essential element of the onboarding equation was communication. We tackled this early on and continued to implement various methods of communicating with the new hires, but it appeared that things were still either unclear or not engaging enough to catapult them into action.

So there we were, completion rates and net promoter scores up by nearly 50%, but making ourselves comfortable back at the drawing board. And we loved it. Well, at least I did. Now I could accumulate fresh ideas by reaching out to peers in the industry, chatting up my design team and even perusing my own scribbles and sticky notes from random “a-ha” moments I’d had throughout the year. Feedback, as mentioned above, had opened the door to unexpected and creative inputs we had yet to consider. We had our marching orders and the hiring lull between Thanksgiving and February to hunker down and hash it out. What would 2024 bring us? Were there tools we could repurpose?  Untapped resources we had overlooked? Perhaps a successful sales year gifted us another comma in the budget.  Only time would tell, but armed with the feedback, a cornucopia of ideas and an improved process, we rolled up our sleeves and got to work.

Collaborating with my team to ensure the success of this onboarding program has been one of the most exciting challenges of my career to date. I’ve always considered myself to be the type of employee who has a true desire to be a resource to others. I certainly experienced lackluster onboarding in the past, and always made a mental note of what I needed in those moments of frustration in hopes that I would fill the gap someday, somewhere in the future for another new hire. It is not always easy, and those in similar roles or industries can attest that it is most certainly not always fun. It is, however, always rewarding when a not so new hire circles back to let you know they appreciated the time you took or the extra mile you went to help them be as impactful and productive as they could be in their new role.