Congratulations on filling your open position! You’ve found the best candidates, made it through the interview process, and you’re ready to sign on the dotted line. In other words, you’ve reached the hiring period. That’s the time between selecting a candidate and starting onboarding.
A lot happens during this time. You send out a job offer, negotiate an attractive benefits package, and collect signatures. But even with these standard steps in place, there’s more you can do to get off to a good start.
Here are four ways to kickstart a positive employer-employee relationship before your new hire’s first day.
1. Verify Licenses, Vaccinations, and Background Checks
Some employers only handle compliance after a new worker is signed on. Getting a jump on this work, however, will give you more time to personalize your new employee’s orientation.
Make sure your hire can legally work in your location and in their new position. If you’re using Apploi, you already have access to background checks, license verification, and vaccination tracking.
No matter how you manage compliance, you can verify your new hire’s credentials and work experience even while you wait for them to sign their offer.
2. Begin Onboarding
There’s no reason to postpone onboarding until your new hire is in your workplace. Instead, take advantage of “day 0” onboarding (also known as preboarding). This just means starting onboarding before your new worker’s first day.
How to do this? We’ve got plenty of ideas in our free onboarding ebook, but here are a few to get you started:
- Send your new hire instructions about transit, parking, and dress code
- Let them know what’s on their first-day agenda
- Make sure they’re in touch with human resources
- Make sure all paperwork is completed through Apploi
- Clarify your business’s work hours and employee schedule
- Answer any questions they already have about the new position
3. Keep in Touch
Communication can help you avoid some common reasons that lead to a new hire no-show, like oversleeping, forgetting about a shift, or running into nasty weather. Send first-day reminders so there’s no chance your new employees can forget their start date. While you’re at it, send a clear list of all onboarding items they will need for their first day, like ID and medical records, and offer any additional information about transit or how to check in on their first day.
Staying in touch is also a strong indicator that you’ve got an open, communicative company culture. Better yet, send new hires a welcome box with company swag to get them excited about starting work. Most people who leave jobs in the first month do so because they feel neglected or unsupported. In these early days, anything you can do to show new employees that you value them will pay off.
4. Get Ready for Digital Employee Management
Is your recruiting software disconnected from your onboarding software? If so, you probably spend a lot of your hiring period porting information between platforms.
That’s one of the reasons your ideal applicant tracking system should integrate with your employee management. Re-entering candidate information creates needless work for your team, drags out the hiring period, and can even delay onboarding.
You can prevent these issues in one of two ways. Either make sure your ATS and HRIS can integrate—or use a software solution like Apploi to handle your hiring process, recruiting, onboarding, and credential management from one place.
Interested in learning more about how you can recruit, hire, and onboard healthcare staff quickly? Contact us today for a free demo of our end-to-end talent management solution.
