A new company, an unfamiliar environment, new people and building relationships from scratch. A newcomer often comes to an established team, which has its own traditions, value systems, principles of behaviour and so on. Of course, it is difficult to be in such conditions — it is always stressful.
And it is doubly scary for the head and HR-manager, because a lot of resources and time are spent on finding each new employee: interviews, questionnaires, advertising on profile sites, and much more. And if the newcomer does not get to grips with it, all these procedures will have to be started all over again.
That is why one of the most important tasks of any supervisor and HR-manager is proper adaptation for newcomers.
Of course, all employees (especially those who have recently joined the company) have their own peculiarities. And you will definitely not be able to treat them all in the same way. Nevertheless, you should develop a general adaptation program, and it should take into account maximum nuances.
Below is one of the best adaptation methods — the Buddy Program.
Buddy Program Principles
The Buddy program is a new employee onboarding program where a mentor combines the role of a friend or buddy, with whom you can share not only work but also personal problems. In this format of communication, the newcomer is liberated and becomes more open. The risk of hidden grudges, misunderstandings and other things that often become an obstacle to adequate adaptation in a new team is reduced.
The same program is often called Budding. It can be used not only for adaptation, but also in times of major changes in the company (e.g., radical transformations), to increase team spirit or to improve communication skills of employees (if there are problems in information exchange).
So, the role of a mentor (buddy) is assigned to an experienced member of staff who knows the job and is willing to be part of the newcomer’s adjustment. But this may not be enough to establish communication. It is very important that the mentor and the newcomer have something in common: interests, hobbies, some topics for communication, behavioural patterns, etc. This is often the decisive factor.
Otherwise, everything else is standard for any mentoring system:
- The mentor shows good results in his work.
- They enjoy working in the company or team.
- They are open to communication and willing to be contacted.
- They are trustworthy.
Basic principles of the budding program:
- The mentor does not need to develop any professional qualities in the newcomer or otherwise improve their qualifications. The main task is to bring them up to speed, tell them how everything works in the company, what to pay attention to and so on. All these are organizational issues.
- There is no compulsion. Participation in budding should be completely voluntary. If a mentor has no desire to communicate with a newcomer, they will only aggravate the situation in an already difficult period.
- It has to be a two-way exchange. That is why budding cannot be called full-fledged mentoring. It is inadmissible when a more experienced employee only shows and tells a newcomer ‘how to do things’. A buddy must be able to listen and understand the newcomer. Maybe freshman just wants to talk, or share rational ideas, which will only benefit the team and the company as a whole.
- There is no need to try to make a template worker out of newcomers. They will pick out the best model of behaviour and join the team themselves. The main thing is not to interfere with them and to support them during their adaptation.
- The mentor does not have to be an expert. But they must be well versed in working (i.e., every day) matters. They should be able to easily orientate the newcomer: on what issues and with whom they should/can interact, where and what is located, how to behave and what are the overt/unspoken rules, etc.
- Buddy should be prepared for freshman’s mistakes. In general, even professionals can make mistakes, they just do it less often than everyone else.
- Note that a company can have two independent programs in parallel: full-fledged mentoring (with the exchange of professional skills and rewards for successful certification) and buddying. The buddy and the mentor are not necessarily the same person.
Budding questionnaire/checklist
The mentor can be given a kind of memo, according to which they can check the most important points affecting the adaptation of the newcomer.
Example of items in the questionnaire:
- Personal introduction of a new employee to the team.
- Connection to corporate systems (receiving logins, accounts, electronic keys, passes, etc.).
- Office or company tour
- Talking about the structure of the company and the department. Who to contact and what questions to ask. What tasks other employees are responsible for. To whom the department reports, how management communications are organized (e.g., who is the superior boss, which departments will have to interact with which representatives).
- Outlining the newcomer’s areas of responsibility. What they are responsible for, what can be the consequences of mistakes, what to do in case of problems, etc.
- Explain how to receive new tasks, how to report on them, and what criteria are used to evaluate the results of work.
- Ensure that the newcomer receives their own pool of tasks for the reporting period (usually a week).
- Familiarize the freshman with the working schedule, the rules of shift formation, the principles of holiday scheduling — when to come to work, who to warn in case of lateness, how and who opens the office, what equipment should be switched on at the beginning of the working day, where the switches are for this, and much more.
- Show report forms, if they are used.
- To explain how salaries are formed, what affects them, and when payments are made.
- Familiarize the newcomer with internal traditions: lunch break, birthdays, corporate events, team building, general meetings, summing up, etc.
To ensure that a buddy does not forget their responsibilities, the memo can include places to make marks — ticks, dates of interviews, personal signatures to signify that the item has been completed.
Instead of paper media, it is logical to use specialized corporate software such as Projecto. It also can be programs for project managers, BPM systems, internet portals and much more. It is ideal if such software systems have their own mobile applications, so as not to occupy a limited number of work computers (not everywhere each employee has a separate workplace) and always have a checklist at hand.
