5 School Employee Orientation Tricks That Save Hours Of Time

Orienting new employees to your school district is a huge, yet often neglected, undertaking. Some school districts think passing out an employee handbook and a few forms is sufficient, while others force new employees to spend a full week sitting in a room listening to an HR rep drone on about benefits, policies, and safety procedures. You may not be surprised to know that neither approach works all that well when it comes to welcoming a new employee to your school district. While there are a number of things you can do to improve your new school employee orientation program, today we’re going to focus on one of the most common complaints about new school employee orientation—that it lasts way too long.

School districts with good (think concise, informative, and interesting) new employee orientation programs get people up to speed faster and have lower turnover rates down the road. Not to mention increased job satisfaction and an enhanced sense of belonging.

Have a plan and stick to it

It is critical that new school employee orientation programs are carefully constructed to educate the employee about his or her new position and the school district as a whole.

Get the busywork out of the way before day one

The new school employee orientation process can (and should) begin before the new hire’s first day of work. Once the offer of employment has been accepted, there’s a seemingly endless amount of paperwork that needs to be filled out. If you provide all those documents in advance, new employees can print them and fill them out from home and bring them on their first day of work. Getting these things out of the way in advance tells the new employees that the school district values their time and wants them to be ready (and able) to start working on day one, rather than sitting around filling out forms.

Start with the basics

People become productive sooner when they are given the basic information necessary to understand their new job. In other words, focus on the position’s why, when, where, and how before expecting them to tackle big projects or assignments.

Cut out the fluff

Along the same lines, concentrate on the vital issues, especially if your new school employee orientation is presented in person. Determine what key policies and procedures new employees need to be familiar with on their first day in order to avoid mistakes and problems on their second and third days. Stick with that information and don’t overwhelm them with too many details right away. If your orientation is presented in person, attempt, as best you can, to eliminate the common distractions that arise when a large number of people are gathered in one place.

Put your new employee orientation program online

If you’re looking for a surefire way to shorten the delivery of all the important orientation information, eliminate time spent in the copy room, and make new employee orientation something people don’t dread so much by moving it to an online platform. Transitioning from an in-person orientation to an online program can save your HR staff and orientation facilitator countless hours. Think about it: When your school district’s employee orientation is online, all the documents are stored in the learning management system so no one has to spend time in front of the copier printing hundreds of pages of materials. And no one has to attend multiple six-hour orientation sessions. In fact, when new employee orientation is done online, no staff is required while people review the orientation materials. Another benefit: Your new employees will spend less time at, and getting to, school employee orientation (and they’ll appreciate that).

Simply put, sometimes less is more, and school employee orientation may be one of those times. The best orientation programs utilize these tricks to keep new employees focused, engaged, and excited about their new jobs. Your employees will appreciate the effort you’ve made to keep the materials in check, and your HR staff will be thrilled to have more time to devote to other projects and tasks.