An Onboarding Mindset

In previous posts, I have talked about how an onboarding process can be created – a process that meets both aims of organization and onboarding individual.

But there’s an important piece in entire jigsaw – what ‘mindset’ should onboarding individual approach onboarding process with?  Crack this piece- and you might have set up lever that will ensure onboarding process stays on track.

Here are a few pointers on ‘an onboarding mindset’:

·         Its OK not to be OK: There will be extended periods of uncertainty/learning anxiety. You need to live with it. If you are relocating cities/countries, then add in the entire personal transition piece. Uncertainty might last for months – and even for a year. There’s no way out. You need to get comfortable with being ‘NOT OK’.

·         Student Mindset: 

o   Be curious to learn. Don’t let your past experience color your experience of new environment. Different is not necessarily bad. When you find something different, ask yourself ‘Why might it be this way? How might it make sense in current environment?’. You may not get answer immediately but stay at it.

o   At same time, keep on questioning what doesn’t make sense.

Essence basically is to keep a balance.

·         Professional mindset:

o   Figure out what are expectations from your job. Focus on identifying what uniquely you can bring to job that can create maximum impact for organization. Think of what are least ‘nuts and bolts’ you need to know to start performing on your job.

o   You are not alone. Identify and contract with those who will help you in onboarding process. A professional is not necessarily an ‘expert’. S/he’s focus is on effective outcomes. S/he’s not worried about being known as SME/expert – who should have all answers – or should have necessarily ‘owned’ entire piece.   A professional say ‘Thank You’, ‘I Need Help’, and ‘I am Sorry’ – when required.

o   Focus on building trust in important partnerships/relationships. That’s lubricant which will later ensure speed in these partnerships/relationships.

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Sourav

Transitions

Currently I am in midst of a ‘transition’ at work.  I have been thinking about ‘how do I ready myself for next role while keeping focus on current role’.

Then I realize we face a related challenge throughout our work lives and possibly our lives itself - ‘How do you manage current while preparing base for future?’. There might be some additional elements involved in a role transition – building up new relationship networks, understanding a new context, etc. But more or less approach should be similar.  It also with right focus should be doable.

Here are few thoughts on how to approach a significant role transition at work:

·         Build a short term plan – 30/60 day plan – with milestones.

·         Focus on how you could ready yourself better even before landing in role. So an element of pre-work might be necessary.

·         Keep aside time periodically (possibly every week in the first month) to reflect on what you achieved against milestones and where you need to course correct.

·         Remember 3 quadrants of onboarding – networks (trust and working partnership with stakeholders), contribution (early successes), and learning (nuts and bolts of job).

·         Prepare for being uncomfortable. In first few months, you may be passing through zones of Unconscious Incompetence (you don’t know what you don’t know) to Conscious Incompetence (you know what you don’t know) to Conscious Competence. Be intentional, stick to your efforts, and don’t let uncertainty impact you too much. It should pay off.

·         As for current role, contract with your current stakeholders on what you will achieve in your remaining few weeks/months in current role. It is important that you leave still feeling on a high.

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Sourav

Onboarding

Is it an employee’s responsibility to onboard himself/herself on to the role or is the company’s responsibility to ensure that an employee onboards to a role?

 

I will contend both. But I do think that organization has a role to play in ensuring the employee is set up for success.

 

First, both external and internal hires have a need for onboarding.

 

Second, an onboarding plan needs to have defined objectives and a structure.

 

Objectives of onboarding primarily are a) establishing relationships with key stakeholders in/outside organization, b) understanding organization eco-system, c) learning the nuts and bolts to do the job independently, and d) starting to contribute in the role (with quick feedback loops) that in turn leads to increased confidence.

 

How do you want to go about building a structure around these 3 pronged objectives?

First, set a time limit for plan– a fortnight/1 month/2 months.

Second, create a week wise plan with defined objectives.

Third, have a review/check-in mechanism in place with employee’s manager.

 

Finally, a plan is only as good as its execution. So ensure that onboarding plan is executed well.

 

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Sourav

Effectiveness of Work Relationships

What is the unit of performance in organizations today –Individuals or Teams? ‘Teams’ would be the answer at most places.

What do we mean by teams? What is the nature of teams? Is a team a self contained unit with a boss and a set of subordinates or a complex network of independent individuals/team collaborating on a project?

The visual I have in mind when I think of a business organization is this vast criss-crosses and interconnections of various teams, with different kinds of working relationships between them.

So there are individual and multiple teams and nature of interaction/relationships between them varies.

How would you measure effectiveness of working relationships in teams? e.g. - How would you measure levels of partnership between a line and staff (HR) function, or levels of service orientation shown by a service team towards customers?

The building blocks of relationships are ‘interactions’. If there are no interactions, there can be no relationship. If there are interactions, it is not necessary that an effective relationship exists. Presence of interactions is a necessary but not a sufficient condition.

So the first thing to do would obviously to list out what are the interactions (as mandated by process) that two people/teams would need to have.

But does just the presence of minimum number of interactions ensure effectiveness of relationships?

We would also have to look at quality of interactions too. How does one figure out quality of interactions?

This is an area I am still exploring but I think the answer would be both generic and context specific. Let me illustrate through an example.

How do we measure the effectiveness of interactions in a partnership relationship? A few things that can be observed are:

• Is there collaboration in:

o goal setting

o work planning

o implementation

o review

• Are successes and failures owned/attributed equally?

• Are all stakeholders involved in celebration of successes?

• Are interactions between two/multiple teams limited to only the process or is there discretion shown in interacting more number of times than as mandated by the process?

I do feel that i am still scratching the surface when it comes to measuring ‘effectiveness of relationships’. How would you go about measuring the same? Do you know of research in this area?

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Sourav