Inefficient employee onboarding leads not only to a waste of talent, but also to a waste of time. And money. And productivity. And…
Let’s dive a bit deeper into this issue to finally overcome it.
Why is it so important to hire and onboard quickly? (Spoiler – it’s all about the money)
- According to LinkedIn, the average time it takes to hire a new employee is 49 days
- The Society for Human Resource Management suggests that the average cost per hire is nearly $4,700. According to employers, the total recruitment cost for a new employee can be 3x to 4x times the position’s salary
- Automated onboarding process is one of the factors that impacts employees decision to stay with the company. An efficient employee onboarding plan can improve employee retention by 82% and incentivize around 69% of employees to stay for at least three years. As opposed, a negative experience increases the chance of employees looking for a new opportunity by 200%.
And yes, this is just too outdated: spending about two hours customizing and printing employee onboarding paperwork, initiating the completion process, and double checking and reentering all that information into company databases and systems.
Now, it’s time to hire Gen Z newbies, and these guys will never wait until such a tiresome hiring process comes to an end. They’re used to automation. With onboarding workflow automation, that same worker could spend just 15 minutes onboarding new hires with templates, automations, and smart technology that enables auto-filling, conditional formatting, and routing data straight from forms to databases—no manual data (re)entry required.
At an estimated savings of 1.75 hours per each 100 new hires, automated employee onboarding can save your HR team 175 hours of labor per year!
Speed up and automate the hiring process with the following components
Usually the hiring process involves too many steps and too much red tape.
Don’t add steps – compress them.
- Organize your interviews by two components: Establish a set (but limited) number of interviews per a particular period of time, and schedule interviews on the same day/days of every week/month.
- Eliminate scheduling pitfalls by digitally conducting interviews. Let’s face it – your potential employees may not live on the same street corner of your business, and travel issues may cause interview delays. If distance is an issue, embrace mobility in order to manage interviews (or at least partially) from your Android or iOS devices.
- Reduce the mess by ditching the paperwork. Collecting all of the necessary documents, waiting for the candidate to scan/print them and then meeting in-person – this is a colossal waste of time. Opt for a fully-digital, mobile-friendly workflow that fits seamlessly into your talent acquisition process. One effective way to achieve this is to streamline the recruitment process with an ATS (Applicant Tracking System).
- Speed up the onboarding process with the right digital tools. Integrating a new employee into an organization may take days and even weeks. Make it short and sweet by switching from manual to digital document processing.
How signNow can help you with hiring and onboarding automation
Using signNow’s eSignature along with electronic I-9 and W-4 forms speeds up the onboarding process and increases protection – even when offline, and from remote locations.
signNow provides users with plenty of features, such as sending documents for e-signature, creating documents and templates, and adding fillable fields with advanced options. signNow also offers team collaboration features, high-level security options and many others.
With signNow, new employees can confirm consent by providing eSignatures and quickly completing necessary paperwork before their official start date.
By going paperless, HR departments will have all required documents and forms saved electronically, and quickly available for archiving or review.
Watch the video below to learn how HR departments can simplify employee onboarding and offboarding using signNow:
With signNow’s eSignature software, you only need to sign once. Organizations can keep moving with a one-time entry solution – signNow allows users to enter their electronic signature once, and then be guided to automatically add that signature to any required signing fields.
signNow ensures eSignature validity. signNow is backed by SOC 2 Type II Certification, which ensures the security and validity of e-signatures globally. Learn more about signNow’s security features.
Make your hiring smooth and efficient. Create customized templates, digitally sign documents and obtain necessary signatures, go mobile, protect sensitive data and stay organized on all levels of the recruitment process.
Originally published in March 2019, updated in May 2023 for comprehensiveness and accuracy
