The digital transformation has shifted the way organizations are getting work done. Unfortunately, ineffective implementation of digital tool sprawl - and communication overload - has contributed to a poor employee experience. The Great Resignation has demanded new expectations of employers to get it right to attract and retain talent. That’s why businesses are focusing on collaboration, employee experience, and finding solutions for a hybrid work environment. 

So what’s the crux of the issue? Recent findings from Time is Ltd. reveal that companies are failing to onboard employees properly - and this trend is worsening in a hybrid working world. We’re seeing the high costs of getting employee onboarding wrong - disengaged employees lead to higher turnover rates, and high turnover rates drive up the cost of hiring and onboarding. That’s why measuring employee engagement is so critical to solving this problem. 

Check out our latest ebook on How to Drive a Better Employee Experience, to guide you in your mission to cultivate a healthy and thriving workplace. 

Is your onboarding strategy effective in a hybrid workplace? Internal network size can reveal the answer. 

Time is Ltd. data discovered newly hired employees are unable to build important connections with coworkers and clients at the rates they used to. According to our research, the internal network size of new employees is 50% smaller than more tenured employees. Key onboarding metrics linked to new hire success and productivity showed a steep decline over the past year. We analyzed more than 1,300 employees at tech and finance companies across the US and Europe from March 2021 - March 2022. 

3 important insights from our employee experience and engagement solution: 

• The average new hire is currently building a network within their company about half (50%) of the size of those with longer tenure — a figure that’s significantly less than before.
• Onboarding effectiveness — defined as the ability for new hires to build a network among coworkers like their more tenured peers have — saw a relative 16% decrease over the year. 
• Even after a full year at a company, new hires are still only fully collaborating with around 68% of the relevant colleagues and external partners they need to be collaborating with in order to do their job optimally.

Our research shows that one of the most important aspects of onboarding — being connected with teammates and forming your network — is what's facing the biggest threat.

Chart 1:

Onboarding effectiveness was already 40% lower than it was pre-pandemic. Our data shows that continued inefficiencies in remote and hybrid environments has led to new employees having 50% of the internal network size compared to more tenured coworkers. 

Chart 2: 

Additionally, more employees are simply never reaching the network size levels of more tenured employees. Employees that have been working for 12 months, have 30% less of a network than employees that have been there for 1+ year.

Why are companies failing to onboard employees successfully in hybrid & remote environments? 

Onboarding on-site, remote, and hybrid environments are unique in their own way. The remote and hybrid workplaces that were ushered in by the pandemic, have resulted in companies still navigating how to implement effective onboarding processes. 

Businesses are failing to equip new hires with the right guidance, technology, and agency to succeed in their jobs and build that crucial network of coworkers and collaborators. Critically, companies also aren’t tracking measurable onboarding metrics and effectively managing the processes — which means they’re unable to identify which onboarding processes are failing their new hires and intervene to improve the employee experience. 

The current data doesn’t necessarily indicate that onboarding can’t be done effectively in the hybrid working world — but it does indicate that the current onboarding processes hybrid companies are using are ineffective. 

Why is onboarding new employees effectively important in a hybrid working world? 

Onboarding issues are existential issues for companies. Poor onboarding has been proven to have a direct impact on employee productivity, job satisfaction, organizational commitment, and even retention — and therefore, companies' bottom lines. The first step to getting onboarding right is to leverage collaboration insights to measure how new employees are integrated into a company. Without this, it’s impossible for companies to understand how changes to onboarding processes impact their overall onboarding experience.

If you’d like to hear more about how to get onboarding right in a hybrid, in-office, or remote only environment, then contact solutions@timeisltd.com.

‍