Rosenverse

This video is only accessible to Gold members. Log in or register for a free Gold Trial Account to watch.

Log in Register

Most conference talks are accessible to Gold members, while community videos are generally available to all logged-in members.

Onboarding: The Ecosystem, not the Afterthought
Gold
Tuesday, November 7, 2017 • DesignOps Summit 2017
Share the love for this talk
Onboarding: The Ecosystem, not the Afterthought
Speakers: Russ Unger
Link:

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."

Ask the Rosenbot
Alnie Figueroa
The Future of Design Operations: Transforming Our Craft
2025 • DesignOps Summit 2025
Gold
Phil Hesketh
Designing Accessible Research Workflows
2021 • DesignOps Summit 2021
Gold
Sharon Banh
Reimagining research: What does the field need to grow? [Advancing Research Community Workshop Series]
2024 • Advancing Research Community
Roy Opata Olende
How Zapier Uses ‘All Hands Research’ to Increase Exposure to Users
2020 • Advancing Research Community
Amanda Kaleta-Kott
The Joys and Dilemmas of Conducting UX Research with Older Adults
2022 • Advancing Research 2022
Gold
George Zhang
UX Research Excellence Framework
2021 • Advancing Research 2021
Gold
Saara Kamppari-Miller
Inclusive Design is DesignOps
2021 • DesignOps Summit 2021
Gold
Chris Govias
Perspectives on Civic Design
2021 • Civic Design Community
Steve Portigal
Discussion
2015 • Enterprise UX 2015
Gold
Sam Proulx
Understanding Screen Readers on Mobile: How And Why to Learn from Native Users
2023 • Advancing Research 2023
Gold
Justin Entzminger
Risk and Reward: How to Diversify the Field of Civic Innovators and Designers
2022 • Civic Design 2022
Gold
Sam Proulx
Mobile Accessibility: Why Moving Accessibility Beyond the Desktop is Critical in a Mobile-first World
2022 • DesignOps Summit 2022
Gold
Saara Kamppari-Miller
Key Metrics: Comparing Three Letter Acronym Metrics That Include the Word “Key”
2024 • DesignOps Community
Robin Beers
Beyond Insights: Researchers as Organizational Change Catalysts
2024 • Advancing Research 2024
Gold
Kevin Bethune
Gatekeepers and Servant Leadership
2020 • DesignOps Community
Briana Thomas
When Design Ops Comes in H.O.T. : A Tale of a Transformed Design Org
2021 • DesignOps Summit 2021
Gold

More Videos

Uday Gajendar

"Sponsor sessions are not just salesy sessions; they’re actually really fantastic sessions put on by your peers."

Uday Gajendar Louis Rosenfeld

Day 1 Welcome

June 4, 2024

Cheryl Platz

"Transitions will make or break your cross-device multimodal experiences."

Cheryl Platz

Demystifying Multimodal Design: The Design Practice You Didn't Know You're Doing

April 4, 2024

Yolanda Rankin

"Self-definition in virtual representation is crucial so players can control how they are portrayed, avoiding stereotypes."

Yolanda Rankin

Black Feminist Epistemology as a Critical Framework for Equitable Design

March 11, 2021

Patrick Boehler

"Journalists like me are in the business of interrogating reality to get at the truth."

Patrick Boehler

Fishing for Real Needs: Reimagining Journalism Needs with AI

June 10, 2025

Luke Roberts

"You can't show up with humility unless you have confidence in the value you bring."

Luke Roberts Christian Bason, Ph.D. Amanda Woolley Ben Reason

Panel Discussion

December 4, 2024

Alla Weinberg

"When we’re not safe, our thinking brain — the neocortex — shuts down and operating IQ drops by half."

Alla Weinberg

Design Teams Need Psychological Safety: Here’s How to Create It

September 9, 2022

Ariel Kennan

"We want regular monthly meetings to keep conversations alive while being doable for everyone’s schedules."

Ariel Kennan

Civic Design in 2022

January 13, 2022

Shipra Kayan

"We pivoted big parts of our weekly all-hands to just personal connection because work stuff can happen anytime."

Shipra Kayan Tess Dixon

How Tess Dixon Facilitates Team Engagement and Collaboration at Condé Nast Using Miro 

October 1, 2021

Bram Wessel

"Organizational information models need to grow and be managed, not treated as static deliverables."

Bram Wessel

Enterprise Information Architecture

January 10, 2020