When a new direct report joins your team, how do you approach their onboarding?

Our reader poll today asks: When a new direct report joins your team, how do you approach their onboarding?

• I spend as much time as necessary training them and getting them up to speed – 31%
• I spend substantial time training them, but move on when I feel they’re comfortable – 41%
• I spend some time training them, but rely on them to educate themselves mostly – 19%
• I spend little time training them and hope they’ll figure it out quickly – 5%
• I spend no time training them — they have to get themselves up to speed – 4%

Setting people up for success. 72% of you report spending substantial amounts of time with new team members getting them up to speed on their role. This is a worthwhile investment. The shorter their “time to competence” is, the sooner they’ll be delivering value and taking work off your plate. While that initial time investment can feel overwhelming, it’s almost always a high return activity. For those of you who don’t invest time in the initial training, you are saving time up front but could be causing problems down the road. If your team members aren’t properly trained, they’ll make mistakes you have to fix, they’ll be less efficient, and they’ll feel more challenged in their role than they need to be. That can lead to low morale and attrition. Spend time setting your people up to succeed. It’s an investment in them that pays off for both of you.

– Mike Figliuolo at thoughtLEADERS, LLC

Did you enjoy this post?  If so, I highly encourage you to take about 30 seconds to become a regular subscriber to this blog.  It’s free, fun, practical, and only a few emails a week (I promise!).  SIGN UP HERE to get the thoughtLEADERS blog conveniently delivered right to your inbox!

These results were originally a SmartPulse poll in SmartBrief on Leadership which tracks feedback from more than 240,000 business leaders. Get smarter on leadership and sign up for the SmartBrief on Leadership e-newsletter.