However a study recently published in the Academy of Management Journal argued that when one measures actual performance rather than observers’ perceptions of efficacy, introverts prove to be more effective than extroverts at leading the kind of actively engaged employees that most companies value.

The study offered evidence showing that introverts are more thoughtful, empathetic and better able to see other points of view. They are good listeners and prefer to use one-on-one persuasion to build commitment to ideas. They are also more likely to be self-critical and more realistic in their self-assessments. These are all desirable characteristics, the study concluded, for those proposing to lead 21st century organizations: “As organizational life becomes more dynamic and unpredictable, it has become increasingly difficult for leaders to succeed by merely developing and presenting their visions top-down to employees. Leaders who are introverted will be more receptive to bottom-up behaviors.”

Despite their many leadership advantages, however, introverts can find themselves at odds with some aspects of leading. Although introversion is not the same thing as shyness, and does not necessarily imply social reticence, the outer-directedness that leadership often requires is not the introvert’s preferred mode. As life becomes increasingly competitive and aggressive, the pressures to produce on demand, be a team player and to make snap decisions may cut introverts off from their inner power source.”

Although much management literature still sells the notion that introverted qualities are flaws in need of correction, it may be those very qualities that provide the best basis from which to enable emergent solutions. In fact, the Academy of management Journal went so far as to suggest it is the extroverted among us who may need to change a bit: “In settings and situations where proactive suggestions are important, leaders who naturally tend to be assertive may wish to adopt a more reserved, quiet style.”

1. A Failure to Research

Candidates that fail to properly research the company demonstrate one or more of the following traits;

• Too lazy to be bothered
• A lack of interest in the job role and the company
• A lack of initiative and curiosity – both important qualities in most jobs

Tip: Research does not just mean understanding the company and its products – this just shows you can use Google. It also entails a broader understanding of the company strategy and market position, as well as the challenges it is facing. Company annual reports can provide much of this sort of data.

2. Influencing and Communication Skills

All good interviewers expect that a candidate might initially be nervous in an interview.  But if 30 minutes into the interview you are speaking so quietly it’s hard to hear you, or are so hesitant what you’re saying is hard to follow, this will indicate a potential significant weakness. Influencing and communication skills are a critical competency in pretty much every management position. If you lack confidence at interview the you will place severe doubts in the interviewers mind about your ability to perform well in the job.

Tip: So prior to going to an interview practice beforehand with a friend. Get them to ask you interview questions. In this way you will feel more confident at the real thing.

3. Rambling Through Your CV

A fatal mistake at the interview is to spend 20 minutes rambling through your CV and telling the interviewer your life story. Frankly after a day of interviews this will just switch the interviewer off.  When asked to run through your CV make sure you can do it in less than 5 minutes. You should aim to highlight how your skills and experience meet the needs of the job you are there to get. By spending too much time on your CV you show a lack of ability to be concise and ‘punchy’ in your communication. It also wastes your opportunity to show what you can do. An interviewer will simply not ask you all the questions that they want to if you are likely to cause the interview time to over run.

Tip: So prior to going to interview practice running through your CV aloud within 5 minutes.

4. Rambling Answers

Rather like rambling flowers an interviewer doesn’t really know where you are going if your interview answer are rambling. You should use a clear structure to make sure your answers include everything that needs to be covered. A good structure is CAR. This means you give the context, the action that you took and most importantly the result. Again you can work out the likely questions from the job description and person specification. If you are unsure read our competencies and competence based interviews article.

Tip: Prior to your interview make sure you know the competencies required and you have identified where you have shown evidence of these.

5. Smoke and Mirrors

Skilled interviewers will ensure that the candidate does 90% of the talking. This is fine provided you are not talking yourself into a corner. Never pretend to have a level of experience that you can not back up with solid evidence. Certainly make the most of your experience, but don’t stretch it to cover things you have not done. This identifies you, at worst as lacking integrity, at best as someone who might be inclined to be evasive about the facts.

All these fatal interview errors are avoidable. If you prepare before you interview and follow the tips given here you will significantly improve your chances of getting the job that you want.

The survey is based on the results of responses from 1100 Coaches and purchasers of coaching from across the world.  Here are some of the key findings

• 9 out of 10 participants see the value of coaching as high or very high
• Over 80% see the credibility of coaching as high or very high
• 7 out of 10 respondents reported that the demand for coaching is on the increase
• The majority of coaching is designed for leadership development split between transition and problem solving

How Coaching Helps

The respondents to the survey gave 3 broad areas in which coaching is a help

• Allows leaders to reflect on themselves and their decisions
• People often avoid difficult truths and coaching brings reality to the fore
• People don’t know how to change, coaching can guide a client to find replacements for behaviour that’s not working

Preferred Methods of Delivering Coaching

In terms of how coaching is delivered the majority is done on a face to face basis, although there was a sizeable proportion done by phone. The breakdown is

• 41% face to face
• 31% by phone
• 22% by other methods such as email and webcam

These results are from both coaches and purchasers. However purchasers of coaching and clients had a strong preference for face to face coaching. Over 90% expressed a preference for face to face coaching.

1.    CV Contact Details

• All my details including name, address, email, mobile, and phone number are at the top of page 1 – 5 points
• My contact details are elsewhere in my CV – 3 points
• I have not included all my details for privacy reasons – 1 point

 2.    Profile

• I have a profile beneath my contact details that tells the recruiter in no more than 5 lines who I am and the skills and experience that I offer – 5 points
• My profile includes lots of adjectives describing me, such as; motivated, committed excellent communicator. It also details my skills and experience – 3 points
• There is no profile on my CV – 1 point

 3.    Key Skills

• Beneath my profile I have listed my 5 or 6 best examples of my skills and experience that are most relevant to the job for which I am applying – 5 points
• I have a standard list of skills that I use for all applications – 3 points
• I do not have a list of my key skills – 1 point

 4.    Career History

• For each job I have 1 or two bullet points which describe the scope of the role and the company. I have listed my achievements starting with an action verb and detailing the result of what I did – 5 points
• For each job I have listed my responsibilities and duties – 3 points
• For each job I have written a couple of paragraphs on my job description – 1 point

 5.    Qualifications

• I have highlighted my most significant qualifications and grades. I have also included professional qualifications and memberships relevant to the role – 5 points
• I have listed every exam I have taken and the grades. I have also listed every professional qualification I have taken such as First Aid Certificate – 3 points
• I have not included a section on qualifications – 0 points

 6.    CV Length

• My CV is no longer than 2 pages – 5 points
• My CV is 3 pages long – 3 points
• My CV is 4 or more pages long and tells my life story – 1 point

 7.    CV Presentation

• My CV has a businesslike font (Ariel or New Times Roman) size 11 or 12, and there is a clear margin on all sides. It uses bullet points and the layout is consistent – 5 points
• My CV uses a font size of 10 to ensure it is no longer than 2 pages – 1 point
• My CV uses an artistic font such as Gothic Copperplate and the layout of things in bold or in bullet point lists is inconsistent – 0 points

 8.    I Target my CV

• I change the profile, key skills and my achievements so that they are clearly focused on how I meet the requirements of the job for which I am applying – 5 points
• I change one of the above sections to make my CV a bit more relevant to the job for which I am applying – 3 points
• I send the same CV out for any job – 1 point

Total Scores

So how did your CV score on the health check?

• A score of 35 points or more means your CV is likely to be doing it’s job but may need some minor tidying up in parts – well done!
• A score of 24 – 34 means your CV needs an overhaul to enable you to stand the best chance of getting an interview
• A score of less than 24 means you are unlikely to get an interview and your CV requires major surgery

Want to Know More?

If you want to understand the basis of this health check and the scores please read our article on How to Write a CV that gets you Interviews . This article explains how and why you need to write your CV in a certain way. There is also an example CV at the end.

Keywords; CV, CVs, CV Profile, CV Key Skills, Key Skills, CV Career History, CV Checklist, CV Presentation

The reality is that whatever you think about business networking it is something you have to do. Here we present some tips on the subject that have been gathered by Tom Searcy (CBS News.com) and our own clients and coaches.  These will help you network effectively and perhaps see it in a different sort of way:

It’s Not All About You; Often people feel that networking is a selfish activity where you meet someone only to obtain a benefit for yourself. However, if you spend your time meeting people and trying to see if there is a way you can be of help to them, you put your mind in the right order, and it is easier. Why? Because you may not be a great networker, but you are a great problem solver. If you can help someone else with an issue, idea or contact, you are building a mutually beneficial relationship. Along the way, good things will happen for you, too. As an example one of our clients was able to help out a network contact by arranging mentoring relationships in his old company for senior employees in his network contact’s company.

Set your goals. If you attend an event identify 3 people you want to meet in advance. If they are not there, or they are completely encumbered set yourself a second objective. Set between 5-8 people who are there that you want to meet. Ask each a couple of questions and swap business cards. Once you have met your target leave the event.

Ask good questions. When you attend events avoid the dull routine questions that other people ask, for instance, ‘What do you do?’ ‘Tell me about your company’ and ‘How long have you been with your company/this industry/this association?’ Try instead questions like:

• “What has been the biggest win for you/your company in the last six months? What do you think it will be in the next six months?”

• “What is the most interesting initiative you have planned at your company this year? How will that change your company the most?”

The point is that you want to pose questions that provoke and initiate conversation out of the normal routine. These questions should help you achieve that. Once people have answered your questions, you have just one more to ask: “That’s great. Is there some way I can help you?”

After it’s Over

You should come away from every networking event with these things:

• Business cards of contacts with any commitments you made written on the back of the card for you to follow up on the next day
• A few new prospects or industry contacts

• More information about your industry, competitors and clients than you had on the way in

One to One Business Networking Advice

This article looks at business networking events and these are valuable in many ways. However one to one networking provides the most powerful relationships. You have more time with your network contact and more time to explore how you can help him or her. In order to prepare for this type of meeting please see our guide to one to one Business Networking.

Keywords: Networking, Business Networking, Networking Events, Career Coaching

When to Use MBTI in Executive Coaching?

Much of the coaching work that I do is with clients who are trying to build their relationships and influence others within an organisation. This may not always be the immediate coaching topic, but often behind say an issue about ‘being less emotional’, is a desire to exert more influence through relationships. What the MBTI offers clients is a lens to understand them self and how others might see them. Through this awareness comes the ability to better manage relationships.

It’s Not about Being Right or Wrong

With many personality profiling instruments the person doing the profile is compared with others in a norm group e.g. 16PF or OPQ. This approach has its place, but I do not find it particularly helpful in executive coaching. With this type of instrument, I have found that clients tend to feel happy if they score where they want to against the norm group and can become quite defensive where they don’t.

Whereas the MBTI does not offer any comparison with a norm group, and each of the type profiles are considered to be equally valuable. This allows a constructive exploration of my client’s type and how may be perceived by others with a different type description. It is important to highlight in the feedback that if a client has a preference say for Sensing, it does not mean that they cannot use Intuition. It’s just that Intuition will take more energy. As a result clients do not need to feel they have been categorised as four letters – they have the facility, if they so wish, to use the other preferences as well.

Easy to Understand

The majority of my executive coaching clients find the MBTI easy to understand and have a good understanding of their personality type within an hour. They are able to remember their type and preferences and relate to them in future coaching sessions. This creates a common language for us to use in the ongoing coaching sessions.

MBTI has Significant Depth

I often find clients have at some point done the MBTI and know their type letters. However that’s as far as they have got – an understanding of their own type and behaviour patterns. What the MBTI also offers is the opportunity to get a deeper understanding of:

• How others may perceive you
• Simple things that you can do to reduce potential conflict and work more effectively with those of a different type
• Obtain further personal insight through an understanding of dominant, auxiliary and inferior functions
• What might cause stress and how you might react in a stressful situation

In most cases the clients I work with find these deeper levels of understanding valuable to achieving their personal development goals. Where the coaching contract does not offer the time to do this a refresher on what the type letters mean and how others of a different type might see you is often enough.

As a result of the insights provided by the MBTI my clients are able to change the way they look at relationships and understand why they find some relationships in the organisation more difficult than others.  They also find ways which suit them to change some of the ways they work to build much stronger and fruitful relationships with others that are different to them. Overall I am not a big advocate of using psychometrics in executive coaching. However I do find that the MBTI enables clients to have a new way of understanding them self and the value of others that are different to them.

Tony Goddard

Keywords: Executive Coaching, MBTI, Myers Briggs Type Indicator, Gifts Differing, Relationships, Psychometrics, Use of Psychometrics in Coaching

This study is based on research with six clients in executive coaching. The identification of the participants and their companies is confidential. It was agreed that the research can be published as long as anonymity is maintained. The figure in brackets after the quotes is the number assigned to each research participant.

The Nature of the Executive Coaching Relationship

Participants were asked to give a metaphor that represented their experience of the executive coaching relationship.  It was noticeable that most participants took a long pause for thought, and in their responses they talked through images they rejected before reaching one with which they were happy.  In many cases these rejected metaphors served to illuminate the final meaning participants gave to the coaching relationship:

“I’m rejecting crutch, I’m rejecting support, I’m rejecting the person that makes you do stuff…it’s like going and talking to a really great friend who is going to be totally honest with you, totally honest with you…um, yeah that’s what it is , it feels equal.” (P3, 11)

This quote suggested a partnership of equals and captures the warmth of friendship, with an important emphasis on honesty.  As well as viewing the relationship as a partnership it was also seen as active, with roles for both the coach and client.  In rejecting an image of two people doing yoga together as a partnership that was too passive, Participant 1 looked for a metaphor that captured a partnership doing something enjoyable, but which required him to push himself, and which had momentum:

“…sailing, enjoying it, but achieving something together…you’ve got to do both sides of the boat to kind of work it, that probably describes it better, because there’s a little bit more, because we’re moving forward together.” (P1, 19)

The Role of the Executive Coach

The Executive Coach was also perceived as having a role in providing support, encouragement and pushing participants to meet their potential, for example, “I’m jogging along training and he’s on the, he’s kind of the sports coach on the bicycle coming along with me shouting encouragement” (P6, 14).

What was apparent in the descriptions of most participants of the nature of their relationship was the active role that they saw for themselves.

How the Executive Coaching Relationship Builds Over Time

It emerged from the accounts of some the participants that they felt that the executive coaching relationship developed quickly and that after an initial steep trajectory it appeared to continue to build at a gentler rate.  Participant 6 described the way his coaching relationship built, “I think it was very quickly established…we got to a good point fairly quickly, it probably continues to increase a bit, at a slower rate.” (P6, 24).

Participant 1 felt the same way when he described his relationship, “It’s incredibly positive.  It really has been a rapid build.  So from that initial rapport to where we are now, I feel very comfortable with him…” (P1, 4).  The development of relationship was partly attributed by Participant 1 to the momentum created from more frequent early coaching sessions, “…I think having the meetings fairly frequently helped…I think we did every two weeks for the first three and then went to every month” (P1, 13).

Summary

The experience of the majority of participants of executive coaching as collaborative work is similar to that reported in published coaching studies (Jones and Spooner, 2006; Stephens, 2005).  It also provides support, from a clients’ perspective, for the definition of the coaching alliance as reflecting ‘the quality of coachee’s and coach’s engagement in collaborative and purposive work’ (O’Broin and Palmer, 2010, p. 4).

However, the experience of the participants in this study are in contrast with the reported experience of therapy clients, who do not always seem to see therapy as an active partnership and instead assign much of the responsibility to the therapist.  This appears to support the view that executive coaching clients are likely to have higher levels of commitment and goal orientation than those in therapy (Baron and Morin, 2009).

In the experience of the participants the executive coaching relationship developed quickly and then continued to develop at a gentler rate.  This may emphasise the importance for coaches of paying attention to the relationship in the early sessions.  This seems particularly relevant, if in executive coaching, as in the therapy, the client’s assessment of early alliance (sessions 3-5) is a significant predictor of outcome (McKenna and Davis, 2009).

Tony Goddard

References

Baron, L. and Morin, L. (2009) ‘The Coach-Coachee Relationship in Executive Coaching: A Field Study’, Human Resource Development Quarterly, Vol. 20, No. 1, pp. 85-106.

Jones, G. and Spooner, K. (2006) ‘Coaching High Achievers’, Consulting Psychology Journal: Practice and Research, Vol. 58, No. 1, pp. 40-50.

McKenna, D. and Davis, S. (2009) ‘Hidden in Plain Sight: The Active Ingredients of Executive Coaching’, Industrial and Organisational Psychology, Vol. 2, No. 3, pp. 244-260.

O’Broin, A. and Palmer, S. (2010) ‘The Coaching Alliance as a Universal Concept Spanning Conceptual Approaches’, Coaching Psychology International, Vol. 3, No. 1, pp. 3-5.

Stephens, J. (2005) ‘Executive Coaching from the Executive’s Perspective’, Consulting Psychology Journal: Practice and Research, Vol. 57, No. 4, pp. 274-285.

Key words; Executive Coaching, Executive Coaching Client, Executive Coaching Relationship, Executive Coach, How the Coaching Relationship Changes

Some of the key findings in the survey are:

• Women held 16.1% of board seats in 2011, compared to 15.7% in 2010

• Less than one-fifth of companies had 25% or more women board directors

• About one in 10 companies had no women serving on their boards

• Women of color still held only 3% of corporate board seats

• Women held 14.1% of Executive Officer positions in 2011, compared with 14.4% in 2010

• Women held only 7.5% of Executive Officer top-earner positions in 2011, while men accounted for 92.5% of top earners

• Fewer than one in five companies had 25% or more women Executive Officers and more than one in four had zero.

Similar Progress in the UK

These USA figures are similar to those in the UK, although there has been some slight improvement in the UK. On FTSE 250 boards there have been 28 new female appointments since March 1st 2011, representing 18% of all new appointments. 8.9% of all board seats on FTSE 250 boards are now held by women; up from 7.8% in late 2010. For the first time it is now the minority of FTSE 250 companies that have all-male boards.

The Benefit of Women in Leadership Positions

Forget the arguments about equality for a moment, there is real evidence that companies with more women in leadership roles outperform those with less women. Catalyst has published research that shows the returns on sales, investment and equity are 40% or more better in companies with the highest number of female board directors than those with the least number.  In addition other Catalyst research shows that companies with three or more women board directors in four of five years outperformed companies with zero women board directors by 84 percent return on sales, 60 percent return on invested capital, and 46 percent return on equity.

The figures appear to show the major benefits that women can bring to business in senior leadership roles – why is it then that companies don’t seem to want to take notice?

Tony Goddard

 The Good the Bad and the Ugly

There is no doubt there are a range of different approaches to executive coaching, but this might be expected with some 10,000 executive coaches around the UK. Unfortunately because it is a largely unregulated market some people have no real qualifications in executive coaching whilst others have taken the time and trouble to get properly trained and accredited. In the case of our Executive Coaching Company all coaches are qualified either to Masters Degree, or post graduate diploma level. So the content of this article relates to our approach rather than any others out there.

 The Role of the Executive Coach

There are some clients who believe that their Executive Coach is going to effectively tell them what they should do. It seems a great relief to them when we tell them that’s not the way we work. There are so many stories about people getting advice, often good advice, and then ignoring it. So what’s the point in spending money on advice you probably won’t take anyway?

The role of the Executive Coach is to facilitate and help you find the solution to the issue you want to address. After all it’s only you that really understands your situation and all its complications. What a Coach can do, which you would find difficult to do by yourself, is to ask you questions which cause you to see your issue from new and different perspectives. As a result you are able to see fresh ways of achieving your objectives. Often just hearing yourself speak your thoughts out aloud enables you to perceive things in a different sort of way.

A great Executive Coach does not just ask any old question. They will ask you questions that metaphorically take you up in a helicopter to consider your situation and landscape in a new way. This might be as simple as asking you how you would advise someone in the same situation as yourself. The questions may also highlight some of your own contradictions that need to be resolved e.g. earlier you said that money was not an important factor for you, but just now you explained your worries about your future financial commitments.

In Executive Coaching the client and Executive Coach work in partnership to resolve the client’s issues. Someone recently likened this to two people sailing a boat across a bay. Both are sailing but they have separate responsibilities to ensure the boat gets to the other side. One may be responsible for the sails and trimming them whilst the other is responsible for steering a course.

 The Role of the Executive Coaching Client

As an Executive Coaching Client you also have a role to play in ensuring a successful outcome for your coaching. You need to be committed to coaching as a solution, so taking coaching because someone else suggested it will not work if you don’t commit yourself. You need to be able to trust your coach so make sure you have a choice of coach to work with. This enables you to be honest and open about your thoughts and feelings. Finally the work of coaching can be difficult at times so you need to be prepared to be stretched and moved outside your comfort zone.

 The Executive Coaching Payback

Having said how demanding coaching can be, most of my clients remark on the great rewards they have got from their coaching which they may not have obtained in any other way (such as a training course). Coaching offers the opportunity for personal development that is uniquely tailored to your needs. As a result of coaching I have seen clients achieve many objectives to support their aims such as; promotion, new skills, improved competencies and increased self-confidence.

Tony Goddard

Yet in their orientation programme they spend hours covering; health and safety, risk management, hygiene and the law on retailing. Finally some days later they get told about the importance of customers and the company mission. This approach sends all the wrong signals. Worse, it is unlikely to engage employees and excite them about their new company.

The majority of orientation programmes lack any thought about how to engage new staff and get them excited about what they are going to be doing. Staff are simply told about, or informed about the way things are and the way things are done. A novel way of thinking about orientation and onboarding was proposed by Diana Oreck, vice president of Ritz-Carlton’s Global Learning & Leadership Center. Diana sees their employee onboarding process as a way of welcoming and inspiring their new hires. She also talks about the mindset that informs how they design the experiences they deliver.

In some ways their mindset is more important to understand and share with your Learning and Development team than the specifics of what they do. This is because understanding the foundational principles of effective onboarding is like understanding the fundamentals of great design: once you understand them, there’s no limit to what you can create.

Think Ritz in Design

At Ritz-Carlton they take the view that “People don’t remember what you said, or what you did, but they always remember what they felt.” So in creating your own onboarding process ask yourself “What’s the emotional take away?”  This is so important when examining each step of your onboarding process.  For each step of your process ask yourself;

• “What’s the emotional take-away here?  How are we doing this right now, and what emotions would a new employee take away from this experience?”

• “Are these the emotions we want to leave them with?” If your answer is no, then ask “What emotions would we like them to experience?” and “How can we create an experience that would naturally elicit these?”

Design Your Orientation Programme To Create the Right Feeling

Examples of feelings you want to elicit in your orientation process include welcomed; comfortable and secure; proud; excited; inspired; and confident.

At Ritz-Carlton the video they play for new employees during induction talks about what it would mean if you were in the top 1% in various fields. As images of Tiger Woods and Bill Gates and people in the top 1% of their field flash across the screen, inspiring music plays in the background with the lyrics “What have you done today to make you feel proud?”

The video then transitions into letting the new employee know that being with Ritz-Carlton means they are among the top 1% in the hospitality industry. This is intended to engender a sense of pride.  New employees are told that Ritz-Carlton are blessed that new hires picked the company as their ‘second place’,” referring to the second most-important place the person inhabits each day.

The fact that Ritz Carlton achieves this gracious balance between “You’re lucky” and “We’re lucky” reflects their service philosophy of balancing elegance with warmth. Masters at creating a delightful customer experience, it recognized years ago that delivering elegance without warmth (like high-end restaurants with supercilious maitre des) projects a haughty, condescending image. By consciously blending elegance and warmth, the Ritz conveys “elite” without “elitist.”

Pride in What You Do

Texas Roadhouse is a two-time member of the Forbes List of 200 Best Small Companies. In their onboarding process they include two videos.  In the first they have excerpts from a Managing Partner Conference, where store managing partners celebrate their hard work and accomplishments.

In the second video they show clips from humanitarian projects that Texas Roadhouse employees have participated in, including seven Habitat for Humanity projects in Mexico. It includes clips from proud employees, including one memorable quote from a young man: “I’ve been working here for one year and I still eat here, so I think that says it all!”

For new employees these videos enable them to see Texas Roadhouse leaders share with pride the uniqueness of their company and how they, the new employee, will help make their guest experiences “legendary.” Their videos, and their orientation program as a whole, communicate very clearly that this is a company that loves their employees, celebrates the good work that they do, and is not your average place to work.

Southwest Airlines Approach

Southwest Airlines is another company that “gets it” about the importance of designing its employee orientation process with the goal of creating positive emotional experiences. The company is known for delivering a unique customer experience and it brings this same expertise and intentionality to their new employee experience.

The Southwest Airlines onboarding team went out and benchmarked other companies’ onboarding process; they noticed that the others seemed to focus primarily on creating logistical efficiencies that allowed the new employee to become productive more quickly.

Southwest see the difference between what they do as compared to others as;

• ·         In a lot of companies, it seems like if there are online forms to check off and documents that get passed around from HR to the hiring manager to the new employee, they think onboarding has been accomplished. While getting those kinds of logistical things automated can help you get your new employee up to speed and productive more quickly, it won’t necessarily help you with retention.

• ·         If you want new employees to stay and become engaged, you need to make sure you do the “feeling” part of the process, and you do that by showing them how they will make a difference, giving them examples of how their fellow employees make a difference, making them feel welcome to the business. It’s those kinds of things that lead to better retention and a more engaged workforce.”

In Summary

Consciously designing orientation and oboarding processes so that they lead to employees feeling welcomed respected, valued, inspired, proud, and determined doesn’t just help you with employee retention. It also directly improves employee motivation, productivity, and customer service.

That’s why the following four mantras are important for management to keep in mind when making decisions that affect employees’ orientation and onboarding;

• “Everything Matters”
• “Think Experience”
• “What’s the Emotional Take Away?”
• “What’s the Perceptual Take Away?

Last, but certainly not least, remember to ask your new employees for feedback on what you can do to create a more emotionally engaging onboarding experience.

Keywords; Induction, onboarding, orientation, employee engagement, employee retention