Onboarding: The Ecosystem, not the Afterthought
Summary
Onboarding new employees to your team is all too often treated as an afterthought, or best case, as an at-the-moment-thought. Employees deserve a well-thought out experience that includes them from the very beginning–from the creation of the position description—to that time after they’ve become integrated into our teams and organizations. We can trace some of these imperfect scenarios all the way back to the creation our performance profiles or position descriptions, and how they were created. When we understand the entire journey from candidate to employee we see the value of treating onboarding as an ending of a particular process instead of a solitary event in time.
Key Insights
-
•
Traditional job descriptions focus on tasks rather than measurable performance outcomes, limiting effective hiring.
-
•
Performance profiles clarify what success looks like and help teams agree on hiring criteria, leading to better candidate matches.
-
•
Structured interview guides aligned with performance profiles ensure consistent, fair, and relevant candidate assessments.
-
•
Unpaid design exercises or take-home tasks can exclude qualified candidates with caregiving or other external responsibilities.
-
•
The candidate experience after the interview and before the start date is often neglected, causing anxiety and disengagement.
-
•
Maintaining personal contact with candidates post-offer fosters comfort and commitment before they begin.
-
•
First day onboarding should be treated as a commencement event, not a paperwork marathon, reducing overwhelm.
-
•
Buddy systems provide critical social and informational support, improving new hire adjustment and retention.
-
•
Assigning safe internal projects early helps new hires gain practical familiarity without pressure.
-
•
Onboarding should be considered a multi-touch ecosystem involving ongoing feedback, communication, and adaptation.
Notable Quotes
"If you really care about success, you define it first and hire against performance, not just experience."
"Manhole cover questions belong in the past. Focus on real skills and relevant experience instead."
"Unpaid design exercises are unfair because they don’t take into account people's real-life constraints."
"Waiting and vague communication during hiring is a painful guessing game for candidates."
"The post-offer period isn’t HR’s alone; hiring teams must stay in touch and keep the candidate engaged."
"Day one is a commencement, a graduation from candidate to employee, not a paperwork slog."
"Buddy systems create leadership opportunities and a support network without changing org charts."
"Internal projects give new hires a safe place to learn how the organization functions without fear of breaking things."
"Hiring managers should facilitate hiring decisions but truly rely on the team members who work daily with the candidate."
"Onboarding isn’t a single event or process, it’s an ecosystem with many touchpoints impacting the new employee experience."
Or choose a question:
More Videos
"Building strong relationships ensures every team member understands how content strategy impacts their work."
Natalie DunbarDesignOps and Content Strategy: Envisioning the Future Together
October 1, 2021
"We are a B2D company – business to dog – making technology so dogs can speak English to people and each other."
Kevin M. HoffmanTheme 2: Enterprise Team Journey
June 3, 2019
"Operations tends to be something companies only think about when they are scaling rapidly, but investing early is essential."
Lada Gorlenko Sharbani Dhar Sébastien Malo Rob Mitzel Ivana Ng Michal Anne RogondinoTheme 1: Discussion
January 8, 2024
"The Gender Shades project exposed how facial recognition algorithms had up to a 33% error rate disparity between demographic groups."
Joel BranchHumanizing AI: Filling the Gaps with Multi-faceted Research
March 11, 2021
"If you’re not okay as a researcher, the interview won’t be okay."
Jane Reid Janice HannawaySelf-care in User Research
April 2, 2020
"If you’re managing over 100 design practitioners, it makes sense to start looking at a chief of staff role."
Isaac HeyveldExpand DesignOps Leadership as a Chief of Staff
September 8, 2022
"Design permeates everything as a lens through which you see the world; philosophy is just a different shaped lens."
Cennydd BowlesExit Interview #2: Rediscovering the ethical heart of design
November 6, 2025
"We created separate tracks so people can self-organize, leverage the right skills, and grow their careers in focused ways."
Rachel Posman John CalhounA Closer Look at Team Ops and Product Ops (Two Sides of the DesignOps Coin)
November 19, 2020
"In physical design, edge cases are more visible and testing immediately shows you problems you might have missed in software."
Kritika SonyMoving AI offscreen: Exploring failures, constraints, and recovery in physical game design
June 10, 2026
