What Is Preboarding? An Expert Guide 2024
Preboarding is the process between a new hire accepting an offer and their first day.
It’s a crucial part of the longer onboarding process and important for helping relieve those day-one jitters.
Here I’ll cover what preboarding is, why it’s important, how you can create a world-class preboarding process utilizing onboarding software solutions, and provide a 7-step process for creating a preboarding that leads to a smooth onboarding.
What Is Preboarding?
The preboarding period covers the time between a new hire accepting the job offer and the day the first step into the office (physical or virtual!).
What your organization does, or doesn’t do, during this time can make all the difference in regards to productivity, business risk (think contracts), employee experience, and retention.
Yet, when it comes to preboarding, 64% of new hires receive no preboarding experience.
With this in mind, you can leave a lot on the table if you create an onboarding program that omits preboarding.
It’s an easy win at the end of the day.
Preboarding vs. Onboarding
Employee onboarding is the process of integrating a new hire into your organization. The onboarding process usually takes around 90 days but can last up to a year in some cases.
By the end of the onboarding process, the aim is to have the new hire integrated into the company culture and clear on their role, expectations, priorities, and goals.
Preboarding is the first part of the wider employee onboarding process.
The idea is to prepare someone for their first day and give them a taste of the culture and their role.
Activities include completing necessary paperwork, reading policy manuals, setting up email accounts, and accessing portals and training materials.
| Preboarding | Onboarding |
| Before someone’s first day | 90+ days after starting |
| Supports orientation | Continues orientation |
| Light touch | Full integration |
What To Include In Your Preboarding Process
Before we get into the specifics, here are some best practices for onboarding and goals that your preboarding process should aim to achieve:
- Give the new hire information such as what their first week will look like or logistics like parking and what to wear in the office.
- Further introduce the culture, their team, and alleviate nerves.
- Ensure they have all the equipment and resources they need before their first day
- Demonstrate that they've made the right choice in accepting your job offer and agreeing to join your organization.
After all, it's likely this wasn't the only job offer they received. It’s common for them to be wondering if they should've accepted that other offer or responded to that recruiter who reached out to them on LinkedIn.
With this in mind, here’s a list of 7 things to include in your preboarding process checklist.
1. Present your new hire with an employment contract
An employment contract is a formal agreement between an employer and a new hire that outlines the terms and conditions of employment. It serves as a legally binding document that details the responsibilities, rights, and roles of both parties.
Presenting a new hire with an employment contract is a crucial step in establishing clear expectations and protecting the interests of both the employer and the employee.
Checklist for Employment Contract:
- What to include:
- Job description and title
- Start date and employment duration
- Compensation and benefits
- Work hours and vacation policy
- Confidentiality agreement
- Termination conditions
Benefits
The employment contract provides legal clarity and protection, sets clear expectations for the role and outlines the person's compensation and benefits clearly.
Something to remember
Before presenting the contract, review it to ensure all terms are fair and legally compliant. During presentation, explain each section clearly and allow the new hire ample time to read and understand the contract, encouraging them to ask questions or seek legal advice if needed.
2. Welcome the new hire with a call and email
Welcoming a new hire with a call and email is the first step in making them feel valued and part of the team.
This personalized approach helps ease any anxieties they might have and sets a positive tone for their upcoming journey with the company. It's a simple yet effective way to start building a strong employer-employee relationship.
For the welcome email, you'll want to have a well-crafted message that helps cover the pressing concerns.
Some items to cover here:
- Start date and time
- Arrival information
- Dress code
- What to bring
- First-day agenda
- Employee handbook
- Access to training materials
- Contact details for any queries they might have before starting.
Benefits
A good welcome call and email creates a warm and inviting first impression while demonstrating the company's supportive culture. Good execution of these early communications will help alleviate new job jitters.
Pro Tip: “Send a welcome email or video to the company introducing the new hire, and share a few fun facts about them. This is a great way for people in the organization to get to know their new team member.” - Lorie Corcuera
3. Send a new hire welcome package
Everyone gets excited when they receive an unexpected gift in the mail or delivered to their door.
According to Corcuera, a new hire welcome package can include things like:
- Handwritten card, signed by you and their new teammates
- Company “swag”, such as t-shirts, coffee mugs, pens, and notepads
- Employee handbook, in physical format, or (ideally) digitally on a USB stick
- Key cards/fobs, to access company facilities
- Benefits booklet, outlining medical and health insurance benefits
- New hire paperwork, such as payroll and insurance forms
Benefits
A new hire welcome package sets a positive and welcoming tone for the employee's journey, fostering a sense of belonging and appreciation from day one. It also provides essential information and resources, aiding in a smooth and informed transition into their new role.
Something to remember
Make sure that your new team member will receive the welcome package well before their first day of work, and ideally just a day or two after your welcome call.
4. Send a new hire orientation email
A new hire orientation email will contain significantly more detail about what additional information your new employee can expect to receive before their first day and what they can expect their first day and first week of work to look like.
Essentially, it summarizes the rest of the steps in our new hire checklist.
What should be in a new hire orientation email?
Following are some of the types of information you could include in this email.
- Start time and location: when and where they should be for their first day. If there are special instructions for car parking, be sure to include them.
- Key contacts: include who they will first meet with on their first day (typically human resources, managers and immediate team members) and other people they’ll likely rely on in their first week.
- Dress code: this is an often overlooked aspect of the first day. Letting them know what the dress code is, if any, can help avoid unnecessary embarrassment.
- First week agenda: give your new hire time to mentally prepare, but keep it high-level. For example: Day 1 - meet the team, building tour. Day 2 - business overview.
- Team members: provide them with an organization chart that includes your team. They can use this together with LinkedIn to familiarize themselves with their new colleagues.
- Key policies and processes: highlight 2-3 of the key ones that will impact them on day one. If you’ve sent them an employee handbook, point them to the relevant sections.
Benefits
By clearly defining what the first day and weeks look like for a new hire, the orientation email helps to alleviate any initial anxieties by setting clear expectations and providing a roadmap for their early days in the role.
Actionable Advice
The email could be quite long, depending on the information you include, so you might want to preface it with a warning to your new team member to take their time in going through it all.
For further guidance, and a handy template, check out my article: Welcome Letter To New Employees Before Their First Day [Sample]
5. Arrange for new hire paperwork to be completed
According to Sapling HR, the average new hire will be assigned 3 documents to sign, upload or acknowledge.
New hire paperwork is a necessary, but often boring, part of the onboarding process, so encourage your new team member to complete as many of the required forms as possible before their first day.
This frees the two of you up to focus on more important and exciting aspects of their new job.
What types of paperwork does a new employee need to complete?
As a general rule, any type of federal or state related paperwork concerned with identity verification such as I-9 forms or taxation (e.g. TD1 in Canada, W-4 in USA) should be completed by the end of the employee's first day.
Depending on your organization, the new employee will need to complete forms related to:
- Payroll / direct deposit
- Acceptance of Terms and Conditions for use of company property
- Medical coverage (e.g. MSP in Canada)
- Extended health insurance
- Group RRSP / 401(k) enrollment
- General employee information (e.g. date of birth, emergency contacts)
Pro Tip
Generally speaking, the sooner these forms can be filled out the better, so aiming to deliver them in a streamlined manner once the offer letter is accepted and signed is a good practice.
That way, the employee's first days aren't entirely filled with excessive administrative tasks and you can help them focus on hitting the ground running.
6. Prepare the new hire’s work tools and resources
It’s important to prepare in advance, as much as possible, everything your new team member will need to be successful in their new role.
You will probably need to have many of these things ready before their first day, while others can wait, depending on your orientation and onboarding plans.
What resources should I prepare for a new hire?
Following is a sample list of work tools and resources that you may need to have prepared, depending on where the new team member will be working (remote work from home, or in office), what they’ll be doing and what you may have already provided in the New Hire Welcome Package.
- Workstation - office, cubicle, or shared workspace; desk and chair (consider a sit / stand desk); filing cabinet; office supplies and stationary.
- Computer equipment - laptop, desktop, and / or tablet computer; monitor(s); docking station; mouse and keyboard.
- Communications - mobile phone; telephone landline; video conferencing equipment.
- Network access - shared network drives; company intranet; email address; email list access; remote network access.
- Software licenses - office productivity; project management; R&D applications.
- Office / facility access - key card or fob; building alarm codes; ID badge.
- Travel resources - business cards; product demonstration kits; company-branded clothing.
- Profile setup invites - (email, Slack account, employee portal, HRIS.)
Actionable Advice
You can run through this entire checklist of items with your new team member on their first day, but that can quickly get overwhelming.
It's better to go through the items as needed and involve managers and people responsible for managing performance of certain tools or platforms as the employee becomes more involved.
7. Prepare the orientation program agenda
Your orientation program, which is part of a much longer onboarding process, will probably last around a week but can be up to a month.
Creating a new hire orientation agenda will serve as its own checklist to ensure nothing is missed in the employee’s first days and weeks of onboarding.
What are some typical orientation program activities?
Look at the orientation program like you’re building a tower, which starts with laying a strong foundation upon which they can continually layer on new learnings.
For example, the new team member’s first few days might include some of the following activities:
Benefits
Your orientation program is a great opportunity to have a structured conversation around roles, company culture and expectations. This comprehensive introduction enhances early engagement and lays the groundwork for long-term job satisfaction and productivity.
Pro Tip
Focus on creating an engaging and informative experience. Integrate elements of fun and warmth to make new employees feel genuinely welcomed and valued and ensure the program is adaptable and regularly updated based on feedback.
Use Preboarding To Boost Productivity And Retention
It’s estimated that 20% of turnover takes place in the first 45 days. Effective preboarding helps people settle in and feel like they’ve made the right decision, boosting retention and productivity.
However, be cognizant of not overloading people too much. Your preboarding program shouldn’t amount to unpaid work.
Instead, it’s helping to prepare someone for their orientation week and getting them excited about the role.
The key is to give them everything they should know but are afraid or forget to ask during an orientation process, and help ease them in and alleviate those anxieties.
Key takeaways
- Preboarding is part of your onboarding process that takes place after someone has accepted an offer and before their first day
- Preboarding aims to help the new hire prepare for their first day and get them excited about the role and your organization
- Effective preboarding helps get new hires productive more quickly and boosts employee retention.
