The first impression you make on a new hire plays a pivotal role not just in how quickly they settle, but also how quickly they begin to thrive.
The support you offer and the way you present your organization goes a long way in determining how long (if at all) it takes a new hire to embrace your company culture and embracing your mission.
Don’t underestimate just how important this can be, from reducing your cost-to-hire by supporting hires to achieve full productivity quicker, to bolstering your talent attraction and retention by enhancing your employer brand.
But surprise, surprise—it isn’t quite as easy as that.
Onboarding challenges are nothing new, of course, but there are several new considerations that employers must now make to ensure that tech professionals can hit the ground running.
And of course, it’s equally important to ensure the structure is in place for talent to keep running on an upward career path throughout their time with you (metaphorically of course—we’re tired just thinking about it!).
Remote working, for example, has presented a series of new obstacles to what used to be a fairly settled onboarding processes—and with over half of Salesforce professionals in the Mason Frank Careers and Hiring Guide stating a desire to work entirely remotely, it’s clear that these obstacles aren’t going anywhere.
Remember that onboarding requires you not just to integrate new hires into your processes and practicalities, but also your culture, ethos and brand. But how can this be successfully translated during onboarding to ensure talent is resonating with your values, embracing your message, and buying into your mission?
There’s perhaps nobody better to ask than Angela Murray, who heads up the delivery team and is the Director responsible for HR and wellbeing at Hyphen8.
Hyphen8 was named the Best Salesforce Partner to Work For (UK) in 2024 by the Digital Revolution Awards—so it’s safe to say, the team knows a thing or two about creating a positive work environment.
We caught up with Angela to find out how her team creates this positive culture and leverages it to onboard new hires in a way that not only ensures they settle quickly, but also empowers them to grow from day one.
Mason Frank's Salesforce
Careers and Hiring Guide
Having been ahead of the remote working curve for over a decade, how does Hyphen8’s onboarding ensure remote employees feel welcomed from day one?
Before someone joins, we put together a comprehensive onboarding plan that allows them plenty of time to get to know their new teammates. We make it clear that in the first couple of weeks, their focus is on settling in and not delivering billable work. This gives them the freedom to catch up on recent company updates, chat with colleagues, and learn about what we do. We also send them a welcome box, which includes a branded t-shirt and hoodie!
Brand values can often feel like empty words—how can they be communicated meaningfully in a way that resonates?
We are intentional about discussing our values regularly. We refer to them in all company meetings and discuss the practical ways we embrace them in our day-to-day work. Our values are always included in our first conversations with people new to Hyphen8—whether that’s new hires or potential new clients. They shape what we do, so we like to shout about them!
For each value, we have practical examples of what they mean in action, and we hold quarterly internal ‘STAR’ awards to celebrate those who have demonstrated them particularly well.
Inclusive hiring is about considering how a candidate can enhance your culture instead of looking for a ‘cultural fit’. How does Hyphen8 create the space for new employees to add to your workplace culture?
We aim to create space for all employees, from new starters to those who have been with us since our first day, to contribute to our culture!
We encourage everyone to suggest new things we can do and proactively include people from across the team in shaping new initiatives. As Directors, we make sure we create opportunities for the team to develop and run their own groups without us being involved.
This includes social and work-related groups where they can have fun or come up with new business ideas. Not everything suggested is possible due to finances or time commitments, but we support the team in trying new things where we can.
What frameworks do you have in order to set each employee up for success, and how do you manage what this success looks like for each team member?
We nurture personal development through companywide initiatives and personalized plans.
One of our values is sharing knowledge, and we hold regular all-team sessions to help this happen. These include weekly enablement sessions, where the team shares knowledge on a specific topic, and show-and-tell sessions, where people give insights into the projects they’re working on.
Alongside this, each person has access to our mentoring program and meets regularly with their line manager to discuss career plans and aspirations. We have a career framework that helps people see progression routes, and provide quarterly training days that can be used flexibly to study for a course or learn something new of interest.
What advice would you give to employers struggling to enable communication and collaboration across remote teams?
One of the most important things we have learned as a leadership team is to over-communicate! When working remotely, it’s easy for people to miss things, so repeating information or providing it in more than one format is really valuable.
We’ve also learned that it’s essential to manage your communication channels well. It’s easy to descend into a mess of Teams channels where no one can find anything, which leads to frustration and people missing information. Thinking about your communication structure and keeping it tidy is time well spent!
Finally, remote working is great—but it’s also important to get face-to-face time every now and again. We find that when people get together in ‘real life’, their collaboration when they return is so much better than before.
You can find out more about Hyphen8 on their website and LinkedIn, and don’t forget to check out Angela’s comments in Mason Frank’s Careers and Hiring Guide.
