New onboarding best practices research for male employees shows the levels of staff engagement, leavers and those at risk. Find out the reasons why new starters leave and problems with the onboarding process.

HR Onboarding Best Practices for Male Employees 2014

Onboarding new employees is key to preventing high early attrition rates. Whilst demographic differences are important to recruitment and retention because one size does not fit all staff.

This is true of employee engagement strategies and new hire orientation. Staff engagement improves productivity, customer service and employee retention. Therefore tailoring initiatives to your staff is key.

Male employee turnover can incur costs for organisations including recruitment, training and cover work. That’s why it’s important to use exit data to improve talent management and engagement.

This research demonstrates the specific needs of onboarding new male employees. In 2014 great{with}talent researched 3,714 new starters to test their staff engagement levels.

This chart shows the number of new employees who are actively leaving, at risk and engaged.

Read: Why Male Employees Leave and Staff Retention 2014.

Compared to the overall new employees sample of 7,490 new starters, male employees have an average amount in each group. Therefore the results show that these new staff are average for early attrition.

This also shows that there are male employees who are willing to leave within the first 12 months of employment. Whilst a significant amount are ‘at risk’.

This makes staff engagement initiatives important for employee retention. Early attrition can cost organisations due to the aforementioned reasons and through lack of productivity.

Read: How to Calculate Staff Turnover Rate with Exit Process Cost Calculator.

The top reason new starters listed for being ‘at risk’ of early attrition is potential for progression through the organisation (50%). This is the same issue as the overall group but significantly higher (46%).

Likewise the pay and benefits package (46%) had risen from 42%. This shows that male employees are more concerned about these key factors.

A work-life balance (30%), on the other hand, had decreased slightly (29%). Alongside, the nature of the work itself (28%) which is down from 29%.

Meanwhile training and development opportunities (27%) remained static. There’s more of an increase in issues than a decrease and this is a cause for concern when it comes to employee retention.

These results show that male employees have their own needs and staff engagement strategies should be adjusted to meet them.

Onboarding Best Practices

It’s clear that new hires need to be introduced to a company as seamlessly as possible. Onboarding best practices involve meeting the technical needs of new employees as well as starting immediate employee engagement initiatives.

Alongside welcome e-mails, an uninterrupted onboarding orientation and a well-stocked desk (complete with a list of responsibilities), there’s other steps to take. Firstly, this includes a one-to-one with the new employee.

This involves a frank and honest conversation about the nature of the work, the culture of the organisation and the potential for progression. This can also take place with potential employees to get the right fit during recruitment.

Similarly to staff retention strategies for male employees, new hires need to be aware of other routes to progression. This may involve a lateral move in the future.

This approach allows employees to build skills and possibly find an area better suited to them where there’s more promotion opportunities. This also ties into low cost staff training and development.

By starting mentoring, coaching and offering future shadowing opportunities during the onboarding process, staff can immediately become self-motivated towards their career goals. They can also have a clear view of what is required in the role and in the future.

Whilst low cost recognitions and flexible working can help employees feel valued and rewarded. Moreover, they can offer an increase in work-life balance and build workforce morale.

The differences between male employees and new starters as a whole shows the importance of collecting onboarding and exit data. It can easily and cheaply improve employee engagement and staff retention in 2014.

Contact great{with}talent and increase “speed to performance” of male employees with their onboarding tool:

(Main image from Bright Hub)