How to create a successful onboarding experience

“I truly believe that onboarding is an art. Each new employee brings with them a potential to achieve and succeed. To lose the energy of a new hire through poor onboarding is an opportunity lost.”

As part of my CIPD studies, I recently wrote a piece about the importance of the onboarding process and how crucial it is to get it right.

Have you ever started a role full of excitement and potential, only to find a few weeks or months later the spark just wears off? Well research suggests that without adequate support or a comprehensive induction, employees often don’t end up staying with the company past four months if the onboarding process isn’t thoroughly carried out.

For employers, a failed onboarding process can be equally frustrating, time consuming and not to mention expensive!

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July reflections

“We do not learn from experience, we learn from reflecting upon our experiences”

John Dewey

What a month July has been! We’ve seen plenty of sunshine and despite the soaring temperatures, I am continuing to focus upon my development both in my personal and professional life.

Sometimes it is easy to give advice rather than taking your own, and often I don’t reflect as much as I feel I should. So after reflecting on all of my goings on over the past month, it has really helped me to hit the refresh button as I begin to prepare for my CIPD exam in September so August is already looking pretty hectic but I now realise that saying no can sometimes be a good thing!

Reflection is not about beating yourself up or being overly critical, it is about identifying how we can improve things. If we remain static, we are not learning anything and those vital experiences can get lost amongst the busyness of our daily lives, so after a rocky few months, I am finally feeling much more focused and keen to improve in all areas of my life.

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How can HR support those struggling with mental health?

“People are scared to talk about it, but they should be scared about not talking about it.”

Prince Harry

There is currently a lot of buzz around the subject of mental health, but whilst we debate about it, how can we really get to grips with managing mental health within our organisations?

This post is just a simple outline of how you can start to structure those trickier conversations and allow people to speak openly about their mental health at work. It is important to remember that the steps towards positive mental health cultures begin with creating a safe space within our organisations.

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Working Danishly, how to bring some hygge to your workspace

“Happiness consists more in small conveniences or pleasures that occur every day, than in great pieces of good fortune that happen but seldom.”

Benjamin Franklin

For as long as I can remember, I have always loved the Danish concept of Hygge (pronounced “hoo-gah”), I have included it as part of my life for around four years now and I think I have it all down to a T!

In his book, The Little Book of Hygge: The Danish Way to Live Well Meik Wiking, CEO of the Happiness Research Institute, defines hygge in varying ways: “Hygge is about an atmosphere and an experience, rather than about things. It is about being with the people we love. A feeling of home. A feeling that we are safe, that we are shielded from the world and allow ourselves to let our guard down.”

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Can we truly achieve happiness at work?

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“Life moves pretty fast, if you don’t stop and look around once in a while, you could miss it” Ferris Bueller

A recent research report published by Gallup suggests that the worlds happiness levels are at their lowest level in over a decade. Well that’s a depressing concept to start this blog post off with but unfortunately that is a reality. Gallup surveyed 154,000 people across 146 different countries, proving that happiness is a worldwide issue.

Recently, I was fortunate to discuss this very topic at the Natural HR Conference at Monkey World in Dorset, and the session centred around trying to get people to realise where true happiness came from and if we keep looking for it (at work or otherwise!) then we simply won’t find it.

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