Get 'em Ready
Graduation is hitting soon for high school and college students and many of them will be showing up on your doorstep ready for work. Many of them will have worked before but often in a different field and typically not on any sort of career path. So their concept of the workplace is more likely to be based on The Office or Ugly Betty than on reality. What can you do to help them get started?
Teach Them What's Important
When you get to college, professors don't care what you got on your SATs, they only care if you can explain why Shakespeare had so many plays about cross-dressing. By the same token, the days of Dean's List or winning the Pep Band Chug-a-Thon really mattering have passed once you've taken off the cap and gown. Your new employees need to start focusing on the things that matter at work and understand that what made them successful in school might not be the same as what makes them successful here (it might be, but it might not). You need to change their mindset and make them realize that blowing off a project for four months and doing it all the night before is no longer acceptable. Until they're in senior management.
Introduce them Around
In a small company they're likely to meet everyone in your office. In a large company they could go years before meeting people face to face that they deal with via e-mail. Take the time to walk them around and introduce them to people, don't just leave it up to them to do it on their own. They probably need to meet people outside their day-to-day group, and if you walk them around, people will associate them with you and remember where they work.
Have a Sponsor for Them
Designate one of their co-workers -- preferably a volunteer -- to "sponsor' them. The military does this when new people come into a unit, and it's especially helpful when those new people are coming from around the world. the sponsor helps with things at work but can also help with other issues like checking out neighborhoods where the newbie might rent or putting together a little city guide cobbled together from all the city guides available online. They can also help explain company benefits, with which your hew hires might be unfamiliar, seeing as they've probably been on mom and dad's health insurance and always had their vacations defined for them by their school. Giving someone a definitive contact point can relieve a lot of anxiety.
Set Objectives...and Follow Up!
They're going to need some guidance about what to do...the things you and your existing employees take for granted are unknown to the newbies. Sit them down early and explain what is expected of them, and b e sure to follow up with them soon and see if they're doing it and if they have any questions. Letting them know they're on the right track keeps them from guessing and maybe wasting a lot of time. this kind of feedback is especially important for today's new grads, who in many cases are used to get a lot of regular feedback and really want to know how they're doing.
Save the Politics for the Democratic Primaries
It's tempting to explain the internal power struggles because in many cases you can make yourself look like the king of the hill. Don't. let them figure out the bureaucratic politics on their own. Such dynamics are stupid enough as it is, and who knows, if you get a bunch of new grads at once they'll just ignore the office politics and focus on doing good work and then BOOM you've got a culture change. That's not going to happen, of course, but it sure would be nice.
Cut the Cord Early
Having said all of this, it's important to let them go on their own soon. Give them the information to succeed but then let them succeed. You can't baby people and you don't want to give them the idea you're always going to take care of every detail for them. Let them build networks among their peers and figure out their own relationships.
It's exciting to get new hires because you can really mess with their heads and mold them into images of you. But if you can just give them a start, you've done enough.
Teach Them What's Important
When you get to college, professors don't care what you got on your SATs, they only care if you can explain why Shakespeare had so many plays about cross-dressing. By the same token, the days of Dean's List or winning the Pep Band Chug-a-Thon really mattering have passed once you've taken off the cap and gown. Your new employees need to start focusing on the things that matter at work and understand that what made them successful in school might not be the same as what makes them successful here (it might be, but it might not). You need to change their mindset and make them realize that blowing off a project for four months and doing it all the night before is no longer acceptable. Until they're in senior management.
Introduce them Around
In a small company they're likely to meet everyone in your office. In a large company they could go years before meeting people face to face that they deal with via e-mail. Take the time to walk them around and introduce them to people, don't just leave it up to them to do it on their own. They probably need to meet people outside their day-to-day group, and if you walk them around, people will associate them with you and remember where they work.
Have a Sponsor for Them
Designate one of their co-workers -- preferably a volunteer -- to "sponsor' them. The military does this when new people come into a unit, and it's especially helpful when those new people are coming from around the world. the sponsor helps with things at work but can also help with other issues like checking out neighborhoods where the newbie might rent or putting together a little city guide cobbled together from all the city guides available online. They can also help explain company benefits, with which your hew hires might be unfamiliar, seeing as they've probably been on mom and dad's health insurance and always had their vacations defined for them by their school. Giving someone a definitive contact point can relieve a lot of anxiety.
Set Objectives...and Follow Up!
They're going to need some guidance about what to do...the things you and your existing employees take for granted are unknown to the newbies. Sit them down early and explain what is expected of them, and b e sure to follow up with them soon and see if they're doing it and if they have any questions. Letting them know they're on the right track keeps them from guessing and maybe wasting a lot of time. this kind of feedback is especially important for today's new grads, who in many cases are used to get a lot of regular feedback and really want to know how they're doing.
Save the Politics for the Democratic Primaries
It's tempting to explain the internal power struggles because in many cases you can make yourself look like the king of the hill. Don't. let them figure out the bureaucratic politics on their own. Such dynamics are stupid enough as it is, and who knows, if you get a bunch of new grads at once they'll just ignore the office politics and focus on doing good work and then BOOM you've got a culture change. That's not going to happen, of course, but it sure would be nice.
Cut the Cord Early
Having said all of this, it's important to let them go on their own soon. Give them the information to succeed but then let them succeed. You can't baby people and you don't want to give them the idea you're always going to take care of every detail for them. Let them build networks among their peers and figure out their own relationships.
It's exciting to get new hires because you can really mess with their heads and mold them into images of you. But if you can just give them a start, you've done enough.
Labels: Leading
posted by Will at
7:00 AM
3 Comments:
Although it might seem obvious, I'd make certain the new employee is entrusted with responsibilities and learns the work process quickly. Often, the company simply does not have a plan in place to introduce the employee to the work process and the employee either doesn't do anything or is forced to learn about the process on his own.
This is interesting because when I interned at UNDP, I had to restructure the orientation program for new employees. While I agree with Stan that they should learn the rope through specific responsibilities, this should be a gradual process that takes place over a certain period of time in which you introduce and transfer more and more responsibilities depending on the new employee;s level of confidence with these responsibilities. Your last phrase is very critical: a strong start has major influence on the performance.
Stan and Linhzito: I've seen too many places, often in the government, where there's no plan for introducing a new employee to the job. They might learn their little piece of it but not understand how they fit into the larger organization. I agree with Stan that there needs to be an explanation up front about what the organization does, what they do, and how they contribute. Linhzito, I agree that after this introductory process there needs to be an initial development of the employee that occurs over time as they can observe the work environment and really understand all the things they've been told, so they can assume more responsibility.
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