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Week #2 Journal Entry

This week we learned about the importance of employee onboarding, employee engagement, and performance reviews. It became evident that engagement begins even before an employee walks through the door on their first day.


To help visualize the onboarding process, we were tasked with creating a list of activities that should be completed prior to a new hire's first day, then what should be done on their first day, and what should be done within their first week. It was refreshing to see that a lot of the ideas shared have already been implemented at my company. I take a lot of pride in the onboarding program and have dedicated a lot of time to ensuring an employee's experience is comfortable, inviting, and informative. As a member of the HR team, I have several touchpoints with a new hire over their first six months of employment. We check in regularly to ensure they have the tools and resources needed to complete their job, that they are receiving guidance and support from their manager, and that they are still happy with their decision to join our organization. It is disheartening to see the disconnect happen once they enter their branch or department. As we talked about in our discussions this week, managers often lack the time and direction to provide effective feedback and coaching to their staff.

We also discussed the concept of employee engagement and read The Future of Work by Bill Jensen. I was energized when I read this white paper as it described so many facets of why investing in people is so important. I could not believe when Professor Marrapodi mentioned Mr. Jensen would be joining us to provide input on our discussion! I look forward to hearing the thoughts and ideas that are generated from this dialogue and am grateful for the opportunity to confer with such a dynamic leader in the field. Training seems to play a key role in preparing employees for the demands of the workforce. As an HR leader, I understand how engagement drives retention. Previously we did not track metrics like we should. Attrition rates, time-to-hire ratios, and turnover are items that I know I will need to pay attention to as they are key indicators of the temperature of our culture.

Performance management was also a discussion topic this week. Classmates shared their experiences with performance appraisals and thoughts on how the process can be better. Communication was a hot topic as it seemed like a lot of people are not receiving continuous feedback on their performance. Feedback should not be received only once a year. Employees want active interactions with their supervisors where two-way dialogue is shared on what is going right, what could be improved, and career aspirations discussed. Janice mentioned SMART goals as a response to my post, and this is an aspect of goal-setting that could also be improved. Most managers do not understand how to create clear goals and objectives that are relevant to business needs. Another training opportunity, YEAH!

Our assignment this week was to create and deliver a survey to provide insight into how engaged our peers are in the workplace. A series of ten questions was drafted and shared with ten employees in my organization. The results were aggregated and summarized in a paper which outlined industry trends and recommendations on how to improve the engagement scores. The results were within my expectations and nothing was a surprise. There are some items that I feel I have the capability of enforcing and improving, where others I feel I am limited in my current position to offer solutions. I am looking forward to discussing succession planning as I feel this is an area that needs some attention in my company. Our senior management, and even middle management team have limited potential of being filled internally.

I added quite a bit to my PLN this week and it is shaping up nicely. I love having all of that information and all of those resources available right at my fingertips!

I have also been diligently working on my final project. I am utilizing Camtasia and Doodly which I have never used before. I am enjoying the process and cannot wait to see the final product.

Here's to another week down and more knowledge gained!

See you next week!

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