6 Onboarding Mistakes Smart People Make

Top 6 Onboarding Mistakes Smart People Make and how to avoid them…

Hiring the wrong people

I’m not a selection expert but I’m smart enough to know this. If you hire a person that showed up 20 minutes late for the interview and 15 minutes late for the first day you have a pattern.

There is no good reason to hire a person that you know is not a good fit and is going to fail.

Just because a person can fog a mirror doesn’t mean you should hire them.

Not cutting your losses fast enough

Often times I hear about a 30 day probationary period. During that time the company wants to see if the person is a good fit.

My view is simple...after 5 days if you don’t think they will be a good fit...cut your losses and start over.

Every day that you wait just creates more problems.

10 lbs of stuff in a 5 lb sack

I share this on a rather consistent basis because I see it all too frequently. People think of new team members as empty balloons that need to be expanded and stuffed full of information.

Seriously, think about the number of items a person hears during onboarding and is expected to remember.  It starts with “where to park” and “how to clock in” and it overwhelms quickly after that.

Remember that in 1956 George Miller wrote, "The Magical Number Seven, Plus or Minus Two: Some Limits on Our Capacity for Processing Information".

When we try to expand and stuff and cram we’re reducing retention and moving from onboarding to torture.

Deadly Orientation

If you would please re-read what I shared above. Orientation shouldn’t be about how much can be shared it should be focused on what’s important, valuable and can be shared effectively.

If orientation starts from the new team members perspective it won’t be about forms and data. It will be about “what do I need to know to be successful today”.

This is a great time for less is more and letting new team members learn through exploration and not be forced into hours of lecture and thousands of PowerPoint slides.

Poor management onboarding

All too often management looks at new team members as a distraction from getting work done and someone else's problem to be taken care of.

It’s HR’s responsibility or it’s Training and Development’s!

The reality is new hires are very expensive and the best way to get a return on that investment is for management to lead and make a meaningful connection with them. Spend time interacting, asking questions and learning about them.

Set the tone of what they should expect from their time working with your organization.

Great leaders see this as an opportunity not a task or chore that they need to do each Monday.

Poor department onboarding

Wait until they make it 60 days. I have no idea if this is true or it was something that I saw in a movie but it always stuck with me.

The concept was that during the Vietnam war when new soldiers were shipped over from the US they would join their platoon, squadron or regiment and the guys that had been in the country for a while wouldn’t even try to learn the new guys names.

They wouldn’t even try to get to know them.

They did this not because they were rude or mean or didn’t care.

They did it because they knew that most guys died in the first 60 days. They were “trained” but they were not prepared for what was going to be happening to them and around them.

So it was a self defense mechanism that “why would they get to know a guy” and have the pain of loss when he’d often die in the next 20-30 days.

Logically I can understand that mentality.

Here’s the problem with onboarding… departments often do the same thing!

Think about it, if you’re the manager at a Subway sandwich shop and you know that the average kid you hire won’t last 30 days how much are you willing to invest to get to know them and make a strong and lasting connection?

If you know they are only going to be there a few weeks all you want to do is help them make the sandwiches with as few mistakes as possible.

If they make it 45-60 days now you get to know them because you could have a long term team member that’s going to show up and do what is needed.

The mistake is if you don’t get to know them and make a meaningful personal connection and recognize their successes as soon as they talk with a neighbor or friend that is making $.10 more per hour at Fried Chicken World they are GONE.

They feel no loyalty and have no connection so it’s very easy to keep looking and hope to find a better fit even it only pays pennies more.

This is the time to invest in getting to know them and make them part of the family so they feel a loyalty and responsibility to the manager as well the company.

Making a connection can be the difference between a long term team member and a never ending hiring and onboarding process.

Creating that connection could be just the solution you need to get off the hamster wheel of always hiring, training and hiring some more.

Lather, rinse, repeat is not a successful business concept unless you’re in the shampoo business.

If you’ve read this far, thank you for your attention. It goes without saying that it means the absolute world to me. I hope this piece helped you in even the slightest bit and if it did, please share it with a friend that could also benefit from this.

Thanks for reading.

P.S. What do you think? Please comment below...or share it on LinkedIn

3 Super Simple Tools To Increase Retention

Are You Just Throwing Up…?

I know this sounds a little crass and I apologize.

I just finished a campus tour with my son and that was all I could think about.

This is a highly regarded university that has famous alumni that are an astronaut and the CEO of a trillion dollar company. This is not a little school in nowhere Idaho that no one has ever heard of.

We were going to be in the area so my son asked if he could visit! I said, “sure” because I want him to see a number of schools and find out what he doesn’t want so he can start cutting down the universe of possibilities.

He went online and scheduled the visit a few weeks out! They sent great information about where to park and what to expect!

The campus is gorgeous!

We arrived at the correct office and sat quietly until the person was ready to start our visit.

That is when then non-stop spewing started!

She had slides and just went to telling and telling and telling.

At one time my younger son leaned over and gasped slightly like he needed a breath and he pointed at the women doing the pitch. She would talk so fast and so long that when she stopped she would gasp for a breath.

If you only take one thing away from this please make it this…

If you’re training and want people to learn...you should never talks so fast or so long that you gasp for a breath.

Seriously, you’re not trying to sing some impossible song…

Learning is not about how fast or how much you can spew...it’s about the other person(s) and what they are learning.

Don’t get me started on the slides… way too many words and also that said “how great they are”.

Put this away for a special day… people don’t care about you they care about themselves. Slide after slide about how great you are is like walking up to a person at a bar and giving them a compliment and than spending 60 long boring minutes telling them how amazing you are. (Please do not take this as dating advice unless you didn’t laugh when you read it.)

We did it...we survived the almost 45 minutes of listening from a fire hose.

Now they invited us to tour the campus with a senior in small groups.

I had high hopes that this would be the end of the “gasp-ly” torture…

But I was wrong!

The new person walked backwards and talked and talked and talked.

She shared things from dates and building names to fun facts about stepping in the wrong place to the best place to get lemonade. She even shared where you should take a girl to know if she’d be your right choice for marriage.

But it was monologue!  She TALKED.

In addition, she did ask the worst question EVER from time to time.

Do you know what it is?

You heard it often in school.

Here you go...

“Does anyone have any questions?”

When we deliver TTT I always point out why this is a horrible thing to ask.

For those of you that have not participated in one yet here you go…

We learned very early in school if the teacher asked “Does anyone have any questions?” there would be an overzealous grade grubber that would eagerly ask some question to show how much they knew and wanted the treacher and everyone else to know how much they knew.

This was maddening!

The other thing I learned is that if someone asked a question it would mean we’d get out later for recess, lunch or to go home! I knew that if someone asked a question it kept me away from what I really wanted.

So on this tour she’d stop and ask the question and there would be crickets!

There are 3 high school seniors that do not know each other and they don’t want to be seen as the person that kept them from something way more important.

This is the exact same mistake too many places make when it comes to training and learning.

They feel like they need to go on and on and share all the possible information that they can so everyone “learns” it all. The problem is if people are learning, at best, they are enduring and worst they just tune out.

Here are 3 super simple tools you can take away from this.

1 - When you do a PowerPoint stop the “Word Fest”.  Make it one or two key points and use large images and maybe a couple of words!  No long sentences or paragraphs that no one will read or remember.

People will remember a picture and a couple of words!  Think Nike - Just Do It!

They didn’t put word soup that said “Please enjoy our shoes, clothing and equipment when you exercise, play your favorite sports or enjoy an evening out with family or friends.”

2 - Less is more. This ties to the previous one. If you feel like you’re struggling to breath and might pass out while talking...your talking too much! You want to engage with people so they make meaningful connections.

Talk less and ask more. You can always guide the conversation but let the learners do most of the talking and sharing.

3 - Ask, ask and ask some more. The key to learning and connecting and retention is asking meaningful questions.

Instead of doing slide after slide and reading, they could have asked…

Does anyone know the first company to be valued at $1 trillion dollars?

Does anyone know who the CEO is?

If you had to guess where do you think he went to school?

Three simple questions that would have created a potential long term memory and made it so when trying to decide between a couple of schools, who wouldn’t want to go to the school that helped mold that CEO?

Before you resist and say we don’t have time to ask questions…

The answer is you don’t have time NOT to ask questions.

Look at your current training and see how you did with my 3 Super Simple Tools?

Do you ask more than tell?

Do you practice less is more?

Thank you for taking the time to read this!

Please let me know in the comments below.

If you’ve read this far, thank you for your attention. It goes without saying that it means the absolute world to me. I hope this piece helped you in even the slightest bit and if it did, please share it with a friend that could also benefit from this.

Thanks for reading.

P.S. What do you think? Please comment below...the more discussion the more learning happens! Don't be a chicken...share. :)

Engage Participants and Have Them Eating Out of Your Hands for Better Training Results

Thinking back a few years ago, I remember this remarkable lesson I learned about getting better training results.

After all isn’t that what we all want? Training participants learning and retaining more???

I was on vacation and I was watching people feed the birds.

I couldn't help but remember how the children chased after all the birds trying to catch them.

Almost every kid between age 3 and 7 eventually started to run and stress and chase the birds. It was quite amusing because *the birds always ran away*! But, then I recall watching the adults interacting with the birds and noticed something fascinating…

The adults did not chase the birds. They would toss a few seeds or small pieces of bread and the birds would “magically” come to them. And, in some cases, they would hop up into their hand and eat right out of their hand! (IMPORTANT LESSON: That is what you want from your training participants,right?)

Here are 3 insights from what I watched for you to apply to improve your training:

#1) When you chase anyone, their instinctive reaction is to run away. Even when you chase them with something they want! The kids had bags of food in their hands and the birds still ran. Just like you have the solutions to so many challenges and problem your participants are facing, you can still make them run away. The more we chase, the less we catch! True for birds. True for training participants.

Think of it like magnets for a moment… you need to make it so you magically attract them and not violently repel them.

Instead…

#2) When you toss out a few tasty bits, you start attracting to the point of having them eating out of the palm of your hand. As trainers we can offer many “tasty bits”: W.I.I.F.M.

• Reduce stress (if done correctly)
• Make more money
• Have more FUN
• More personal satisfaction

This isn’t some trick. If you have something of value to offer and your training participants see this, they’ll move closer to you because they want more. This isn’t manipulation, it’s human nature! (Or animal nature, because it’s just as true for the birds 🙂)

Here's the kicker…

#3) When the kids watched the adults making this strategy work, they tried to do the same thing… only better. Instead of offering a few “tasty bits”, they dumped out a huge handful of food all over the ground.

What happened was very surprising! The birds were overwhelmed. They moved on to other people to try to get food from someone else even though there was “all you can eat” right in front of them!

You can overwhelm people and get few, if any, to jump into your palm.

Think about “micro learning” and ways to provide content rich nuggets so they learn but are not overwhelmed.

Remember…

Don't chase away the learners.

Don't overwhelm them.

And, only give out a few tasty “tidbits” at a time.

Follow these steps and learners will more happily flock to you.

Now, say it with me — “Let's make learning engaging & FUN again!”

If you’ve read this far, thank you for your attention. It goes without saying that it means the absolute world to me. I hope this piece helped you in even the slightest bit and if it did, please share it with a friend that could also benefit from this.

Thanks for reading.

P.S. What do you think? Please comment below...the more discussion the more learning happens!

P.P.S.  The results are in from the question I asked last week and the winner is..."5 Proven Ways to Increase Retention, End Boring and Make Training FUN!"

Top 10 Reasons Team Members HATE Training! (Part 2 of 2)

I get asked this ALL the time… “Why do our team members HATE training?”

In part 1 of this 2 part post I shared the first 5 reasons why team members hate training… if you missed it please check it out here LINK.

Here’s a reminder of the first 5...

10 - Wrong time of day

9 - Too much PPT

8 - Lecture, Lecture and more Lecture

7 - Not relevant

6 - 10 lbs of stuff in 5 lb sock

Here we go the Top 5 reasons team members HATE training…

5 - Seen as punishment

In the olden days a dog would chase the newspaper delivery person…

Why did they do that?

Because they didn’t like the newspaper? Because they didn’t like the deliver person?

The answer is simple…

The dog’s owner would roll up the newspaper and smack the dog on the nose when it made a mistake.

So the dog sees the newspaper as bad or punishment...

Many team members see training as punishment.

In the past they were told that if they didn’t do something or they made a mistake they would need to go to “training”.

It was held over team members head as a stick to be used if they didn’t perform at the correct level or in the best way.

The bad part about this is it will take a serious investment in time, energy, marketing and money to change this.

It’s like creating a new habit or changing a culture, it’s a slow process that takes consistent effort. 

The belief that training is a punishment didn’t happen overnight and correcting it won’t happen overnight either.

4 - No WIIFM

As we get further into the list the items are more and more important.

Back on number 6 putting too much stuff into the training creates a negative feeling or belief but not giving team members WIIFM just undermines the efforts.

Before you comment saying team members should “know” WIIFM or why this is important to them… they should, but they don’t.

To reduce the resistance and hatred you want to make WIIFM clear.

Ooops - WIIFM - What’s In It For Me

Team members need to know clearly what is in it for them to learn the material and change.

Please don’t go old school on me and say…”What’s in it for them… their job, that’s what!”

I understand people should do things out of pride and personal satisfaction but that is not the way the world is today.

You want to make it very clear as early as you can how this training benefits them personally!

Think about it…

Does it reduce stress?

Help them make more $$$?

Get promoted???

These are what the team members care about and you want to focus on how it specifically helps them.

3 - Not participant centered & engaging

Please look back at number 8 & 9 before you read this… CLICK HERE

Powerpoint and lecture our antithetical to participant centered and engaging!

Lecture is about the “teacher, trainer, lecturer”... participant centered it about the “team member, learner, participant”.

The more the team member experiences, says and does the more they learn.

The other part of this that is so valuable is that the more team members do the more they ‘enjoy” the learning. When they are active in the learning process they enjoy it more and hate it less.

Think about all the things that team members could say or do during a training session that the facilitator doesn’t really need to?

Socrates said everyone knows everything all we need to do is ask the right questions.

In our Train the Trainer sessions this is where we spend the vast majority of our time.

It’s always fun and enlightening when you see facilitators make the shift from “old school telling” to “asking and engaging”!

You can actually feel the difference in the room.

2 - It’s BORING!

Down to the final 2…

Think for a moment… you’re sitting in a movie and you think… this is so boring.

Why did you have that thought?

What caused you to, in your head, leave the movie and go to real life and say...This is boring?

The short answer is you were not engaged.

The movie didn’t provide enough engagement to keep your attention and interest.

6 Things that create boring in training…

Lecture

Death By Powerpoint

Not knowing why this matters to me

High level of repetition

Spending 30 min on a 5 min topic

Long periods of inactivity

Go back and look at your training. How long are team members sitting and inactive? If it’s over 10 min you need to shuffle things around and add some movement to keep them focused and learning.

1 - Fool me once…

We have an amazing dog her name is Rindi and we think she is the smartest dog in the world and smarter than some people I’ve met. ;)

Almost exactly 1 year ago we moved into our new home!

On day 2 of the move we were bringing boxes and furniture into the house through the garage and Rindi came over on that trip.

As she jumped out of the car and ran into the house the door into the house closed on her. (Not hard just closed…)

To this day when she comes to that door you can sense her trepidation. She’ll either sit back from it and run through when it’s open or walk up slowly with her tail down. 

She learned her lesson that the door is NOT her friend and it inflicts pain!

This is the number 1 reason team members hate training… either when they were in school, at previous employers or maybe even at your company they were “forced” to go to a training and it was painful.

Please understand they could have been promised that the training was valuable and maybe even fun but after 10 minutes they wanted to chew off their arm and run out.

It really is that simple… when training breaks a real or implied promise about what to expect they are setting all training up for failure.

I ended part one with this...If people walk out of training wanting more you’re winning the battle of “hating” training!  (It’s still true here!)

Please know that I’ll always to encourage you to take action at the end of our posts.

Pick 1 and only 1…

Strip 1 item from a training that is bloated and overloaded.

Pick 1 of your trainings and scrap it and start over so it makes team members look forward to training so they want to grow and improve.

Pluck the boring out! Take one of your trainings and identify 3-5 areas that are BORING. Yes you can look at the 6 common areas from above. Remove some of the boring and get started moving training in the right direction.

If you’ve read this far, thank you for your attention. It goes without saying that it means the absolute world to me. I hope this piece helped you in even the slightest bit and if it did, please share it with a friend that could also benefit from this.

Thanks for reading.

P.S. What do you think? Please comment below...the more discussion the more learning happens!

Top 10 Reasons Team Members HATE training! (Part 1 of 2)

10 Reasons Team Members HATE training! (Part 1 of 2)

I get asked this ALL the time… “Why do our team members HATE training?”

After the question the person that asked it will go on a rant about how training is so important and helps the team member be more successful and offers them new opportunities and provide them a path for career advancement.

At that moment my head explodes…

Think about this for a minute…

Do we all know that eating more fruits and vegetables and drinking more water is good for us?

It will help us lose weight…

Potentially live longer…

Be healthier…

Maybe reduce risk of diabetes, heart disease and stroke?

But when given the choice do we want bacon or oatmeal with fruit for breakfast?

Think about it… there are many potential benefits from going to training and learning new things but is that enough to get people past previous negative training experiences?

Think about it… do the benefits above sound more like “bacon” or “oatmeal” to a team member?

Here are what I see as the 10 Reasons Team Members Hate Training!

As a guy from Indiana I need to do them in reverse order…

10 - Wrong time of day

The Number 10 reason team members hate training is because of when it happens! It sounds like a small point but it can create a huge barrier to retention.

If you normally work from 3pm to 11pm and “training” is from 8am until 11am… that’s the middle of your night.

I’m not sure about you but if a person came to me and said Marty you need to go to training and it’s from 1 am to 4 am, I won’t be walking in the session with my happy pants on!

I’m coming in bordering between mad and looking for a new job!

If you want to reduce the resistance to coming to training you want to make it as easy for the participant as you possibly can!

9 - Too much PPT

Number 9 is the world famous death by PowerPoint. Yes it’s an amazing tool and can do some amazing things but it can be a real deal killer when it comes to learning.

We’ve all been there… the slides start, lights dim and the “trainer” starts talking and talking and talking!

I use slides to create curiosity and provide a guard rail to keep me going in the right direction.

Most slides have 1 large image and a few words or quote. That’s it!

For a 4 hour session we might have 10-15 slides…

Always remember - Less is MORE!

8 - Lecture, Lecture and more Lecture

I touched on this in the previous item on slides but the same goes for lecture!

In the olden days teaching was seen as having the intelligent and highly educated teacher at the front of the room and they would spend hours sharing wisdom and expecting the “learners” to take notes and soak it in like dry sponges.

That’s a bad model!

It reminds me of using leeches and bloodletting for healthcare.

It sounded like it was a good idea but in reality… it’s a bad idea!

If you talk for more than 8 minutes you’ve gone WAY too long.

Our attention spans are shrinking so talk less, ask more and increase activity.

Reduce the amount people despise training be making them active learners and participants.

7 - Not relevant

Make the learning relevant and valuable to the learner.

People need to understand the context and see value in the learning.

Just because something is important doesn’t mean it’s relevant to the learner.

Would you spend 8 hours educating 5 year olds about compound interest? Benjamin Franklin knew about and left money to Boston and Philadelphia that turned into millions but to a 5 year old what real value does it provide?

Before you post your comments about this… my point is maybe you start exposing a 5 year old to the concept but I would not invest 8 hours on it.

At times we need to share big concepts with team members but we don’t need to get deep into the details unless they can see the value in it!

6 - 10 lbs of stuff in 5 lb sack

This is all too common!

“Training” becomes a stuff sack and we see how much we can shove into it!

The discussion goes like this… “If we’re having the team members in for “training on X” why don’t we also tell them about Y and it will also be a good time to hand out Z and…”

What was a well designed 2 hours of learning and engagement turns into disjointed lecture, materials, powerpoints and STUFF.

I mentioned it earlier…

Less is more!

If people walk out of training wanting more you’re winning the battle of “hating” training!

Now some things for you to think about… FYI - Taking action is critical…

Look at the training you do the most often… what can you take from the 5 items shared and use it on or in that training?

What’s the number one reason team members hate training in your opinion? Share it below!

In my next post I’ll share the Top 5 and how to overcome them!  (Yes... one of them is BORING!)  (But it’s not the number 1 reason people hate training!)

If you’ve read this far, thank you for your attention. It goes without saying that it means the absolute world to me. I hope this piece helped you in even the slightest bit and if it did, please share it with a friend that could also benefit from this.

Thanks for reading...

Positively Transforming Lives and Having FUN Doing It!

P.S.  If you'd like to be notified about part 2 please click here to get invited!