Onboarding is an essential part of an employee’s lifecycle and can directly impact their experiences, not only during their initiation but also throughout the duration of their employment. Providing a great onboarding experience is therefore a top priority for HR Teams, however, a recent study by Gallup found that only 12% of employees thought that their organisations had delivered this.
Typically, the onboarding process for many employees, HR, and IT Support Teams involves multiple emails, forms, and calls – requiring manual data extraction, entry into business systems, and delivery of essential documents and information. All of this is costly, time-consuming and at volume can be very repetitive leading to delays in employee responses, impacting their experience and potentially leading to compliance issues.
Intelligent Automation technologies could offer HR Teams a solution to streamlining the process of onboarding new employees. Delivering not only time savings for both employees and operational Teams but also consistency and improved employee experiences from day 1.
Intelligent Automation platforms such as Conversational AI Assistants enable HR Teams to automate the process of enrolling new employees by proving one point of contact for all tasks and information. The Assistants can provide employees with on-demand support in their preferred communication channel, helping to get them set up on systems and with new devices, delivering guidance and documentation such as handbooks, as well as providing general support and assurance.
Example Employee Onboarding Experiences streamlined by Conversational Assistants.
- Contracts & policies
- Form completion, submission, and uploads
- Equipment and systems registration and set up.
- Health & safety information
- Role & responsibility information
- FAQs & general support
- Payroll set up
- Training
For example, in collaboration with RPA bots, a Conversational Assistant can guide new employees through a series of questions to gather information relating to the fields within a new starter form. These forms include questions such as name, address, financial and payroll information, eligibility to work, etc., and are usually sent to the employee via an email attachment, often requiring them to print and scan the document to return it.
During the conversation, the Assistant will also provide encouragement messages to the new employee to ensure the process is completed, provide additional information for clarity, and direct employees down personalised conversational flows based on their responses to ensure the correct information is gathered. This information is then seamlessly delivered to RPA bots through prebuilt API integrations and updated within the form. The completed form is then uploaded to the internal business system and an automated confirmation email is sent to the employee and relevant manager for approval. The combination of Conversational AI Assistant and RPA bots reduces the onboarding process to minutes, rather than days and ensures all information is compliant and up to date.
Additionally, Conversational Assistants enable HR Teams to extend the Onboarding process beyond the traditional ‘first week’. The Assistant can provide ongoing support to employee training and development schemes to ensure that they are continually engaged within their role, leading to improved satisfaction throughout their lifecycle and retention.
In conclusion, through deploying a Conversational Assistant for onboarding HR teams can ensure that they are delivering great employee experiences from the minute they step through the door and continue to support them throughout their lifecycle.
If you would like to find out more about how to get started with a Conversational Assistant for your HR processes, get in touch today.