Onboarding a new hire is a concept that most employers are familiar with. What about onboarding current employees into new roles? Cross-boarding is something that every leader should consider, especially with the increasing number of companies investing in internal mobility programs. It is crucial to ensure that someone can successfully adapt to their new role, whether they have been promoted or made a lateral move.
Employees who are promoted to new positions enjoy many benefits, including high retention rates and engagement. Hiring employees who are more cross-functionally minded can also be beneficial. It’s important that companies adapt their onboarding process accordingly.
In this article, we will discuss the basics of Cross-Boarding.
- What is the Difference Between Onboarding and Cross-boarding?
- What are the advantages of cross-boarding?
- What should cross-boarding include?
What is the Difference Between Onboarding and Cross-boarding?
We’ve previously covered the basics of onboarding, and how to engage new hires from their first day. Cross-boarding is similar to onboarding, but you are dealing with current employees. And just like good onboarding leads to long-term employee retention, proper cross-boarding can help reduce your turnover rate, too.
Cross-boarding involves the transition of an employee to a new role. It is a way to make sure that the employee is supported, ready to take on new responsibilities and productive.
Cross-boarding is when you hire within your own staff to fill a vacant position. Cross-boarding is helpful when preparing a new employee or an employee who is changing departments or expertise.
Cross-boarding Examples
After a year of working as a coordinator, John has been promoted to become a manager. Even if it is the same team and projects, he might have to learn about new responsibilities and tasks. He may also need to master some new tools.
Lana works as a planner in her firm, but her passion is graphic design. She applied for the new graphic designer job within the company when she heard of it. Lana is familiarized with the tools, processes and procedures of her company. However, she will still have to learn how to perform her new role.
Blake is team leader of the Telecom Account. He jumped at his chance to become team leader for Airline. While his title remains the same, the Airline account is different in terms of its nature, team and tools.
What are the advantages of cross-boarding?
Cross-boarding can be beneficial to both parties. Employees get to experience new, positive challenges, and employers benefit from its time and cost saving nature—and then some.
- Cost-effective: Onboarding can be costly. Deloitte estimates hiring a new employee costs an average of $4,000 and takes 24 days. This includes sourcing, interviews, and integrating an employee into the business. Cross-boarding allows for the filling of a vacant position by an internal hire that has already gone through screening. Sometimes the solution is right in front of you.
- Productivity: It can take up to two years for a new hire to reach his or her peak productivity. It takes time to adapt to a new corporate environment and master the tools. Cross-boarding enables the person who is taking on a role to become more productive much faster. They are already well integrated, familiar with company processes and comfortable with tools.
- Reinforce employee commitment Onboarding done right can set the tone for employee engagement and lower turnover in the future. Cross-boarding works the same way. Cross-boarding is the same. It allows employees to grow their careers, gain new skills and feel recognized, resulting in higher job satisfaction and motivation.
- Better long-term retention: Better engagement equals better retention. Cross-boarding shows employees that they can grow within the company. When you consider that 82% of people leave their job due to no career progression, it’s a real competitive advantage to make room for cross-boarding.
- Strengthening the company culture Structure and decision-making reflect the values and culture of a company. Cross-boarding shows that a company values and supports its employees. Employees will be proud of this company.
What should cross-boarding include?
Cross-boarding is often overlooked. Many employers believe existing employees do not need structured support to transition into a different position because they have already had an onboarding experience when they were hired. We are confident in the fact that cross-boarding is a necessity.
Good news! You don’t need to reinvent the wheel. If you already have an onboarding template, you can adapt it to meet the needs of your current employees. You may wish to skip some aspects, like activities integrating company culture. You should keep activities that are associated with the new tasks, teams, and responsibilities.
Cross-boarding checklist:
- A checklist with items that their new manager must complete and the previous manager must complete will ensure a smoother transition for the employee. Some examples include preparing the handover of an employee’s former position or a supervised shadowing experience in order to learn about new tasks.
- New professional milestones or goals related to your role. This lets the employee know what is expected of them and how they can grow.
- The schedule should include regular meetings and check-ins between the new manager and employee. This is a great opportunity to get employee feedback. Make sure the employee is satisfied and ask them if anything needs to be improved.
- Regular progress evaluations to measure performance in their new roles and responsibilities. They can meet with their new manager for a 30-day performance review, 60-day review, and 90-day review.
- The employee will receive a new buddy or mentor who can help them integrate into their new department and team.
It is important for existing employees to feel confident in their new roles. A structured program can help.
With managers already fans of Softstart’s onboarding templates for new hires, we also offer cross-boarding templates with a set of suggested pre-designed, customizable activities!
Cross-boarding is just as important (if not more so) than onboarding
Cross-boarding works similarly to onboarding. The difference is that you’ve already invested a great deal of time and money in your employees. It would be a waste not to maximize engagement with staff that are already profitable. Plus, a cross-boarded employee reaches peak productivity faster in their new role—so you’ll see a return on investment quicker than you would, had you invested in an external hire for a role.