With so many different apps, processes, and cultures to learn when changing jobs, employee onboarding tools have never been more important. By investing in a coherent, effective pathway to learning the ins and outs of your company, you put new recruits in the best position to thrive.
Now, with remote and hybrid formats, employee onboarding software has become even more essential to the unity of your team. If individuals feel part of something greater, they reach a sense of satisfaction and motivation that is often lacking when people work from home.
In this article, we will go through ten essential HR tools to make your onboarding process smoother and more impactful. From onboarding portals and document management systems to social collaboration and mobile training, you’ll have a start-to-finish overview of what makes new employee orientation successful.
To get the most out of your workforce integration tools, you have to remove any roadblocks stopping new hires from getting the materials they need. A single platform allows people to access all necessary documents, company policies, and training materials, which makes for better engagement and more effective onboarding processes.
On the portal, structure your onboarding tasks in a step-by-step manner to avoid missing crucial objectives. You can even customize pathways depending on the role, department, or location of the new employee.
As they work through tasks, a progress bar ensures recruits stay on track and gives a sense of achievement without a manager needing to review and approve every step before assigning the next one. However, active notifications keep superiors in the loop so they can intervene if the participant struggles with a certain module.
Beyond new hire integration tools, this portal also stores training materials for refresher courses once your employees are settled in. With FAQs, contact directories, and how-to guides, portals allow people to quickly find the information they need without occupying managers’ time.
Bitrix24 is a place where you can manage and automate HR processes. Professional collaboration solutions for every member of your team!
Get StartedSigning contracts, NDAs, tax forms, and more is a necessary step, but it is never important enough to spend an excessive amount of time on. If you resort to a pen-and-paper process, you will waste time on printing, signing, and scanning, not to mention the delays if the printer is broken.
Nowadays, businesses simply must integrate e-signature tools with their document creation systems to get files signed and saved in a matter of minutes. To simplify workflows, use templates for frequently used documents so HR teams can quickly generate and send them with the right details in place. Update the master documents when circumstances change, rather than making a new document. This will avoid cluttered folders and ensure that all of your new employees stay compliant.
Tracking and notification options will monitor the status of each document. The most complex employee onboarding tools will send automated reminders and notifications to make sure you stay compliant with all of your documents.
With many moving parts, it can be difficult to keep a handle on every element of your onboarding process. To stay in control, you have to use employee onboarding tools that actively remove those blockers and help you get where you need to be.
Task management systems do this in various ways:
Automated reminders point out which tasks are still pending so you don’t have to manually search through each individual’s journey.
Task assignment HR tools can leverage dependencies — when one task is completed, the next is launched automatically, maintaining momentum.
Template workflows include all the tasks you need for each onboarding workflow, allowing you to start immediately and not waste time building a roadmap for every process.
Calendar integrations allow you to schedule training around other events and deadlines while pinpointing when new employees can reach a minimum level of competence in their roles.
Task analytics give you a clear idea of completion rates and bottlenecks to refine the onboarding process.
Onboarding and employee training software are incredibly similar, and the same systems used for new employee orientation can be applied to structured learning materials.
Experiment with different content formats and see what works best. Interactive materials, such as videos and quizzes, help to enhance learning and retention while keeping participants engaged. As employees complete modules, they can check them off and receive a certificate of completion.
So who is this training for?
Firstly, it is for new employees who need to be onboarded efficiently. For instance, a new marketing hire can access onboarding modules that include company policies, marketing strategies, and tools used by the team. This ensures that they quickly get up to speed with the company’s processes and expectations.
Secondly, it is for existing employees who need to stay updated with new processes and systems. For example, if the company implements a new project management tool, employees can go through a dedicated onboarding module for this tool to ensure everyone is proficient and consistent in its use.
This dual approach not only helps new employees integrate seamlessly into the company but also keeps existing employees current with any new developments.
One of the most important (if frustrating and time-consuming) jobs for employee onboarding tools is staying compliant. Depending on local bylaws, you need to confirm if your employee is eligible to work, if they have a criminal record, what their employment history is, and whether their certificates are legitimate.
As you sift through documents and check their veracity, compliance tracking software will save an audit trail in your drive and restrict access for data security so only those involved in auditing can access them. Here, you can also store signed documents where your employees agree to abide by your terms and conditions, which defends you in case of legal action.
Although compliance tracking software may not be among the most exciting new hire integration tools, it’s impossible to overestimate its importance. Making the effort to keep everything above board can save serious expenses and reputational damage further down the line if you haven’t maintained these simple best practices from the beginning.
It’s impossible to achieve perfection, but that doesn’t mean you shouldn’t strive for it anyway. As you run your employee onboarding workflows, define metrics for success — not just in terms of assessment, but also in speed of completion and engagement rates.
With the right onboarding solutions, you can track the time taken to do each task to uncover quantitative data on the success of your new recruits. Then, use follow-up feedback forms for a more qualitative assessment, asking questions about how clear instructions are, how engaging the format is, and what suggestions participants have for improvement. To get more accurate information, prioritize anonymous responses where possible and uncover ideas that new employees may be unlikely to say publicly.
Combining your workforce integration tools with HR systems, all the data in one place, drawing out actionable insights to enhance the onboarding experience.
Just as removing unnecessary steps makes training more efficient, automating employee onboarding tools behind the scenes helps to reduce busy work and eliminate errors that plague less efficient systems. As we've seen throughout this article, you need a lot of apps for smooth onboarding, which is why many companies go for an all-in-one system like Bitrix24.
Bitrix24 natively integrates every element of your onboarding software for smooth data transfer across one recognizable interface. What's more, you stop the runaway costs that come with purchasing multiple different apps and awkwardly attaching them together.
Automating task assignments, pinning events to a new recruit’s calendar, and gathering performance data are all possible with very little manual effort so you can leave much of the boring, repetitive work to the algorithms and concentrate on the human side.
Continuing in the spirit of removing blockers to productivity, don't neglect the importance of multi-device accessibility across your employee onboarding tools. Accessing onboarding software from a smartphone means new hires can learn the ropes without the distractions of an office. Instead, they can take their materials to a cafe or a more relaxing area of the office.
It also favors those who want to go the extra mile. For example, if a current employee wants to level up their skills without affecting their daily duties, they can follow training schedules in their own time, at their own pace, on a commute, or at home.
Another advantage of mobile compatibility is that notifications send reminders wherever you are. Not only do they give users a guiding hand on what to do and when but they can also add an extra level of motivation to keep people engaged.
Whether you’re a remote team or an in-office setup, new arrivals need a warm welcome to start on the right foot. That’s why one of the more unusual employee onboarding tools is an internal social network that helps people get acquainted with their colleagues. And there are plenty of ways to do it:
Group chats, whether based around a specific department, workgroup, or even a common interest outside of work allow employees to make connections on a personal level.
Recognition and feedback are great for giving new recruits a boost in motivation which can avoid imposter syndrome or feelings of isolation.
Mentorship programs connect new hires with more experienced employees for guidance and support, even if they’re not in the same office.
Collaboration spaces, such as brainstorming, whiteboards, video calls, and collaborative documents are the perfect way to give colleagues in the onboarding stage the confidence to contribute.
To get the most out of your employee onboarding tools, you need to take a data-driven approach to employee performance and task efficiency. This starts with a clear definition of the metrics that are important to you.
Typical onboarding metrics include time-to-productivity, task completion rates, and new hire retention rates. With a fully integrated suite of business apps, this key data is easy to gather and display with a variety of visualizations.
However, the real work starts after you’ve got your data. If you find your task completion rates are low, dig further into the details and find out why. Is there a specific question that is tripping people up? Do they have all the resources they need? Once you have a solution, run a comparative analysis to measure the difference in performance, and stick with the winning strategy. These small, frequent iterations will take you ever closer to an ideal onboarding process that is an advantage rather than a burden.
Now you know what employee onboarding tools are available, where do you go to find them?
As we mentioned earlier, you can only achieve the most efficient onboarding processes when all of those tools are natively integrated.
Bitrix24 gives you everything you need on one platform, keeping your productivity high and your expenses low:
Fully integrated document management and e-signature technology
Task management workflows with replicable templates
Feedback forms and detailed analytics for constant improvement
Full mobile compatibility for ease of use wherever you are
Social intranet to welcome new employees on a personal level
So if you want to make onboarding a competitive advantage, sign up for Bitrix24 today.
Bitrix24 is a place where you can manage and automate HR processes. Professional collaboration solutions for every member of your team!
Get StartedThe best employee onboarding tools include:
Onboarding portals
Electronic document management systems
Task management tools
Employee training platforms
Compliance tracking software
Feedback and survey options
Fully integrated systems
Mobile onboarding apps
Social collaboration tools
Analytics and reporting tools
Onboarding tools facilitate new hire integration by providing structured access to essential resources, automating administrative tasks, delivering targeted training, ensuring compliance, and creating social connections. They help new employees adapt quickly, improving their productivity and satisfaction while reducing the administrative burden on HR teams.
When choosing employee onboarding software, look for features like:
Centralized document management
Task automation
Learning management systems (LMS)
Multiple feedback collection methods
Mobile access for flexible learning
A company intranet for social connections
Visualizations for data analysis