How To Onboard A New Remote Employee

Onboarding a new employee for your remote business?

It can be daunting when you’ve never done it before, that’s why I’ve created this step-by-step guide on how to do it.

Before we dive into it, here are a few things to prepare:

1. Your employee contract You definitely would need professional legal advice for this one, but you’ll need a contract so everyone is on the same page when it comes to the technical side of the employment.
2. Their tasks I’ve already created a video on How To Delegate Tasks, which dives further into how to know which tasks you can give to your employee. This is an essential step long before hiring, as you’ll need to have clarity on what tasks the employee will be doing and who you’re hiring for.
3. The tools From their work email to their time tracker, to a task or project management tool, you’ll need to start onboarding the employee on these tools. I’ve also created a video on Tools For Remote Employees, which talks more about the different tools to consider for remote employees. Create a tools checklist based on what you need them to have so you don’t miss a thing!

Now that you have the basics, here’s the step by step process for onboarding:

Their First Week:

1. Schedule The Onboarding Call While doing it through chat or having them do it independently is possible, for the first few employees it’s always better to schedule a call for the onboarding. This way you can answer any questions they have, and for every onboarding call that you do, you will find different things to tweak and upgrade.
2. Give Them An Overview Of The Company To give them a sense of being a part of something bigger, you can walk the new employee through the company’s history and its goals. This way they’re more aware of what else is going in the company and be able to align themselves to the different milestones.
3. Set Their Routine As you’ve set their first task list, you can start introducing those tasks with your employee, as well as their routine. What are their daily, weekly, and monthly tasks? This will help set their path, as they’ll be able to pick up on the different tasks and projects they’ll be working on.

Their First Month:

1. Introduce Them To The Team Whether you introduce them to the team they’ll be working closely with or with the rest of the company, giving your new assistant or employee the opportunity to know more about the company is priceless. As they start going through the first few tasks and training, you can either set up a meeting with the rest of the company so they can get to know each other. Inside of 2xYou, we have our new assistants meet everyone else in the company first, then they actually get to meet the employees from our two other sister companies!
2. Schedule Check-Ins It can be easy to get overwhelmed when you're starting out at a new job. Thus, scheduling weekly or monthly check-ins which is a 15-30 minute call with your new employee will help untangle that overwhelm. Ask them how they're doing so far, ask them for feedback on what can be done better, or see if they have any suggestions on the projects or tasks they're working on. Doing a team check-in usually isn't enough, as a newbie might be too shy to bring anything up during those meetings.
3. Creating Standard Operating Procedures One of our key principles in 2xYou is creating Bulletproof Systems – a documentation process where you make sure that all of the tasks and projects in your business are written up and updated regularly. With your new employee, teach them how documentation is created in your company and encourage them to create one within their first month. This way, it's creating a habit that anything that is added or changed needs to be documented so things don't fall through the cracks.

The First 90 Days

1. Evaluate Their Growth Create documentation of your new employee's growth through either a self-evaluation or a scorecard that they can take that will show them their progress. One mistake I often see with managers and employers is once they see a new hire be able to adjust, they tend to let things fall through the cracks and fail to follow up. Ensure that the new employee can see and understand their growth so far and check in with their own goals.
2. Share Expectations Try to map out their journey now that they have a bird's eye view of the company and what their role is. Give them something to further look forward to as they keep moving inside of the company, and what opportunities await them.
3. Celebrate Wins Remind your new employee to celebrate milestones, no matter how small. Finished their top priorities of the day? Celebrate it! Saved the company money by finding a small hack? Give them a bonus. Give the employees space to grow and learn. Celebrate wins or help them process the failures.

After all of that, your new employee should be onboarded and ready to go!

Let me know in the comments what you usually do when onboarding new employees. I'd love to learn from you too.