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CASE STUDY   ·   #ONBOARDING   #BELONGING

From an onboarding process that informs to an experience that creates a sense of belonging

The Eco Coop team uses sticky notes to co-design the stages, content and people involved in the new onboarding journey.

CLIENT

Eco Coop

SECTOR

Facilities management

PARTICIPANTS

Cross-functional team from HR, administration, operations, marketing and sales

Objective

Rethink onboarding as an experience that does more than transfer information and help people become operational: one that helps them understand the organisation’s culture, values and ways of working. Build a shared 90-day support journey that can be repeated for future hires.

Key activities

01

Reviewing onboarding experiences and surfacing what had helped or hindered welcome, orientation and integration

02

Identifying what new starters need at different stages of the journey

03

Designing and combining two possible onboarding experiences into one shared journey, defining key moments, people, content, tools and approaches

04

Defining review and feedback points and KPIs to monitor how onboarding is progressing and how effective it is

05

Co-creating the first onboarding content, including short videos made by internal colleagues with AI support

Outcomes

A defined 90-day onboarding journey, from pre-boarding through subsequent support, review and feedback

Key moments, content, tools and people involved defined across the full journey

Roles and responsibilities clarified so that welcoming new starters becomes a shared process rather than resting with individuals

A monitoring system defined, with review points, feedback and KPIs to assess progress and onboarding success

A practical action plan for developing and implementing the new onboarding journey

Initial internal content co-created, telling the organisation’s story through the people who experience its culture every day

New capabilities

Seeing onboarding from the perspective of a new starter, recognising their needs, feelings and possible moments of uncertainty

Bringing operations, relationships and organisational culture together in one experience

Turning past experiences into design principles for future starters

Recognising that welcoming new colleagues is a shared responsibility involving different people and functions

Monitoring and improving onboarding independently over time, using feedback and measures to adapt the journey to people’s and the organisation’s needs

Onboarding is the first moment when organisational culture stops being something you say and becomes a sense of belonging.

TESTIMONIAL

The process helped us rethink onboarding by genuinely putting ourselves in the shoes of someone joining the company and turning different experiences and needs into a shared process. We now have a structured 90-day programme, with clear responsibilities, feedback points and measures of effectiveness, which we can continue to monitor and improve independently.

Valentina Brugali

HR Manager, Eco Coop

From the workshop

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