Welcoming a new employee to your team is an opportunity to start that relationship on a phenomenal note. With the right onboarding experience, your employee won’t just be ready to do a great job—they’ll feel like a part of the team. But how do you create positive virtual onboarding experiences for remote employees?

During the onboarding process, your newest hires are acclimated to your company. They learn what the expectations are for their role, how the team works, and what the company culture is like!

But an amazing onboarding experience—especially for virtual onboarding—is about so much more than organization and paperwork. It should immerse employees in the culture of the team and promote bonding amongst team members.

Onboarding should also humanize both the team and the new employee! Onboarding experiences are the first chance your new employee and current employees will have to get to know each other on a personal level. Your onboarding can set people up for success and make it much easier for them to feel comfortable and like a real part of the team.

When you’re crafting virtual onboarding experiences, don’t forget to prioritize the personal touches that welcome someone to your team. You can get creative and personal while checking off all of the standard onboarding to-dos.

5 Virtual Onboarding Tips To Welcome New Team Members

If you’re in charge of cultivating virtual onboarding processes for your team, this guide will help you do it right. Aside from efficiently communicating expectations and important information, your onboarding process should help your new hires acclimate.

Want to know a secret?

An outstanding virtual onboarding experience can help boost long-term employee retention. When someone feels welcomed, included, and excited right from the start, they’re going to want to give their all to the role.

1. Give Each New Team Member A Mentor

One thing that most of us don’t consider with a virtual onboarding process is mentorship. Sure, in-person, we might connect different team members.

But this is incredibly important when it comes to virtual teams, too. Starting any new role is a little anxiety-inducing (and can feel overwhelming). There’s so much to learn.

That’s why assigning new employees to a mentor is a great solution! It fosters a sense of community and supportiveness among your team. The new team member and mentor should have weekly check-ins, and the mentor should always be available to answer questions or provide support.

This is especially important if you’re new to virtual onboarding. Everything might not be 100% clear the first few times you onboard an employee virtually. But with a mentor, you know that there’s a clear support system for that team member, even if something was left out during onboarding.

2. Consider Sending Out Welcome Packages

This isn’t a necessary part of the virtual onboarding process, but it’s certainly a good idea! Sending out welcome packages to new hires helps create a more immersive experience.

Sometimes, starting a job with a remote team feels very lonely. After lots of training, onboarding materials to process, and things to learn, your new employee might be feeling overwhelmed. Having something fun arrive in the mail provides a physical spark of excitement and creates that true “first day” feeling.

If your team members are local, you can hand-deliver a little surprise for new hires. Or, if your team is spread across the country or around the globe, send something in the mail!

Wondering what you could actually send to new hires during virtual onboarding?

Here are some ideas:

• Company-branded stationery and pens
• Wireless headphones
• Self-care items
• Apparel for the company

You don’t have to spend tons of money to build welcome packages into your onboarding process. Even a handwritten welcome note in the mail makes a huge impact in letting a new hire feel welcome, appreciated, and included.

3. Integrate Culture & Team-Building Into The Onboarding Process

Part of virtual onboarding is bringing your team members together to feel connected, even remotely.

How do you actually plan events that are engaging? Focus on community! What types of activities would your employees enjoy? How can you connect in unique, fun ways?

Here are some ideas for virtual onboarding events that focus on team building:

• Watch parties on Netflix
• Virtual cooking classes
• Virtual wine, whiskey, or bartending experiences

These bigger events offer an opportunity to engage employees, build relationships, and create shared experiences. And all of those things help boost employee happiness, productivity, and retention!

4. Be Super Organized And Clear

A huge factor in effective virtual onboarding is to be as organized and clear as possible.

First, document EVERYTHING in your onboarding process. This way, you can edit it and even give access to team members to contribute their thoughts on certain policies or tasks. Create SOPs (standard operating procedures) to help guide people through unfamiliar tasks.

We recommend creating an onboarding checklist, too. Once you’ve hired a new team member and they accept the role, it’s time to start the virtual onboarding process.

Create and send over the following:

• A welcome email with an overview of the virtual onboarding process
• Any relevant documents that need to be completed
• A cheat sheet featuring other team members, their roles, and who to contact and when
• Outlines of consistent meetings, both for the whole company and their specific team

The most important thing to communicate is actually how future communication will work. Unlike in a traditional office setting, you can’t just run to the next office over with questions. What types of questions should be addressed over Slack, email, or even a Zoom meeting?

5. Schedule Consistent Opportunities For Social Integration

We’ve already established how important it is to focus on social interaction, team-building, and culture in your virtual onboarding initially.

But it’s also incredibly important to continue creating those opportunities and events throughout the year! Scheduling virtual events focused solely on relationship building helps create a strong company culture.

Aside from regularly scheduling meetings, make sure your team has an open space to connect about non-work-related topics. A group text or Slack channel would work great for this.

Make sure that whenever you bring in a new team member, you introduce them virtually and make them feel welcome! Starting a new role is nerve-wracking and exciting, so it’s important to foster connection immediately.

Planning social events doesn’t have to be stressful. Even small moments of connection during the week make a huge difference in cultivating a sense of community in your company.

But if you DO want to plan incredible team-building events, Delicious Experiences is here to help!

We create Delicious Experiences (literally) tailored to food and beverages. These hands-on Experiences are fully customizable to your team’s specific needs.

From there, we take care of everything, from tech to sending out groceries for recipes. These events create memorable experiences your team and new hires alike will always cherish! And shared experiences really are the foundation of amazing relationships.

Virtual onboarding can be just as (and sometimes, more!) engaging as in-person onboarding. With these tips and tricks, you’re going to create personalized, amazing experiences for every new hire on your team.

Even better? You’ll experience lasting benefits by continuing to prioritize the values established during the virtual onboarding process!

Learn more about how Delicious Experiences can play a role in your virtual onboarding process and beyond.