Onboarding And Offboarding: Best Practices And Benefits

Every organization from a small cafe to bigger IT companies, to work efficiently and effectively needs to delegate its work to others, right? That may range from trainees, employees, assistants, etc, literally anyone who works for the company. So, what is the first requirement to do this? Yes, recruiting people for the designated posts.

This process is called Onboarding. Similarly, there is this Offboarding process, if an employee wants or needs to resign or leave the company.

People with this resigning or changing their company for some matter know how long the process is. Both onboarding and offboarding staff needed to be done in an orderly, organized manner. Or else it will result in clumsiness. There is no exemption for healthcare organizations.

Best Onboarding Practices For General And Specific Medical Staff

Onboarding does not include recruiting alone. It also includes the process of helping the recruits or hires to understand their role and responsibilities, the organization’s rules and regulations, and guaranteeing a productive and successful works experience for employees.

It not only covers the new hires but also the employees who move between departments or jobs of the same organization. This ensures smooth adaption and transformation by the team member to the new role.

While there are many best onboarding practices available, healthcare has its uniqueness. 

“A pressing issue in healthcare onboarding is the need to comply with federal and state regulations,” says Riley Woodward, Customer Success Manager at Smartsheet.

Let us see the best practices in onboarding below.

1. Pre-hire period: 

• The First step begins before recruitment. It starts with the submission of a job requisition document to the Human Resource department or the practice’s office manager for their approval.
• This stage mandates the requirement of a background check and medical examination of the candidate from the side of the practice.
• The practice must let the candidate know that they are officially hired and send them a welcome/offer letter. These can be done before the joining date and a digital mode is preferred.
• After posting, the open position or any other associated position may be removed.
• The documents the new employee needs to submit and fill must be given to them prior the joining.

2. First impression: 

• The employee should have a formal orientation regarding the nature of their work and what is expected from them, during the first days on the job.
• Have to provide the employee, with a handbook and make them learn about the goals, mission, internal processes, and compliance requirements of the practice.
• The practice should also make them learn how to use the employee onboarding tool.
• Provide required training for the employee. Assign a trainer if needed.
• Must provide the required specific medical equipment and clothing, depending on the posts.

3. Blending: 

• During 2 months, a leader should be appointed to evaluate the progress of the new hire. 
• The leader should communicate and engage with them to understand the progress and listen to their doubts, questions, and concerns.
• The hire should also complete the assigned tasks during this period.
• At the end of the first 3 months of joining, the leader should hold an evaluation process.

4. Incorporation and commitment:

• The staff should be involved in rounding between 4 and 6 months of joining. Rounding is a process or practice in which the leader makes rounds with their team members and discusses what is and is not working with their team.
• This practice lets them know the areas which are needed to be concentrated more, to be improved, and this helps in building relationships.
• If needed, the new hire may need to attend certification courses.
• And at the one-year mark, the employees should be moving forward, working on internal networking and professional development.
• They will also have their annual performance review.

Benefits Of Healthcare Onboarding

The benefits which can be derived from a strong healthcare onboarding are,

• It helps commit to ongoing improvement. Onboarding is a complex, integral, and continuous process which requires changes at times.
• Each provider changes their method according to the designation, nature of work, and duration of training. It’s important to stay up-to-date.

• Should provide innovative training programs for employees to manage organizational change. This helps in addressing the need for higher quality healthcare for lower costs, and improved patient experience.
• A source in 2016 found that onboarding improves new hire retention by 82% and productivity by more than 70%. In the same report, retention after three years was 58 percent more likely when new employees went through a structured onboarding program.

Points To Be Noted While Adding Or Removing Staff

• The protection of your patient, practice, and Electronic Health Record (EHR) must be ensured while adding or removing employees.
• Should inform the IT team about the new hire, so that they would provide access to the required and necessary software based on the new employee’s role in the organization.
• This includes EHR, email, Practice Management System (PMS), check-in software, and/or other platforms.

READ OUR Advanced EHR Security: Major Threats & Solutions FOR A SAFER EHR SYSTEM.

Offboarding Best Practice

This process is as much as important as the onboarding process. This reflects in the practice’s or the organization’s reputation.

It is done during the last two weeks of employment.

This step is important to encourage goodwill and to build an organization’s reputation.

To complete required official forms, to return materials if any, an official process should be followed.

Also should get an understanding of the employees’ experience and the reason for their leaving.

This information can be used to improve the organization’s future onboarding process.

Let’s Conclude

The talent competition is increasing steadily in today’s candidate-driven market. Organizations need to go beyond and above to captivate high-quality employees.

Advancing and optimizing the onboarding process is one of the key features in recruiting better candidates.

There are many platforms available to make onboarding and offboarding experiences easy. It is important to design the onboarding and offboarding processes based on your organization’s needs, goals, priorities, and culture. Some software such as ATS and HRIS helps to simplify these processes.

Some provide the mobile-first experience their candidates expect. Choose the best product for your practice to make it more effective. Schedule a free demo with Vozo today to get hold of our products which surely increases your organization’s performance.

“Let’s make your practice’s performance better, together”