Onboarding is a universal term used by HR professionals to describe the critical process of integrating a new starter into a business. While many businesses might think of this as part of the induction process, it actually begins before the employee’s first day on the job.

Onboarding is at best, under-regarded, and at worst, invisible. That means thousands of businesses risk delays and problems getting new starters into their company. And they could be storing up longer term issues due to mistakes made during the onboarding process.

Offers and contracts

According to a recent survey, more than two thirds (69%) of HR professionals say that the process of issuing offer letters and contracts of employment in a timely way has caused them problems. Almost half (47%) said delays issuing the offer meant they’d lost their preferred candidate to a counter offer.

Even more worrying, is that nearly the same number again (45%) said inaccuracies included in contract clauses or offer details have created future issues for their organisation. That can mean anything from disgruntled employees, to possible legal disputes, and more unexpected business costs.

The challenge of a traditional process

Even in the most organised HR team, providing paper offer letters and employer contracts takes time. And with information going back and forth between a business and prospective employees, there’s a high risk of errors creeping in during the onboarding process.

In fact, the accuracy or completeness of information provided by prospective employees was cited as the most common problem of holding up the onboarding process (63%).

Then there’s the issue of manually transferring information onto HR or Payroll systems. This is also an area where costly errors can occur, and yet 58% of HR managers still manually transfer information.

Getting employee onboarding right saves time and money

There’s no doubt that there’s an appetite for getting onboarding right, with 80% of HR decision makers saying that they enable or encourage successful candidates to engage with their organisation before their first day.

But there’s also recognition that onboarding can be a demand on resources. HR decision makers say they spend almost a quarter (24%) of their time on the onboarding – a significant amount which could be reduced through streamlining the process.

Technology to tackle onboarding

Businesses are already familiar with technology that helps make managing finance and business performance more efficient. Now that technology is being applied to help HR managers onboard employees more effectively and accurately.

Webonboarding is the very latest in onboarding technology designed and developed as part of the webexpenses suite of cloud-based solutions. Using cloud technology, the software presents solutions to the problems facing HR decision makers.

By automating and standardising many of the administrative tasks involved, it reduces the need for HR teams to chase paperwork, helping businesses save time and money.

Melanie Guy, HR Manager of webexpenses, says: “HR managers tell us, and our research clearly shows, that traditional onboarding can be inefficient and costly. Tackling those inefficiencies not only makes sense in terms of saving money and resources, but it can also help businesses attract and retain the best candidates.”

“HR decision makers want to engage employees with their organisation before they start, but they are spending almost a quarter of their time on the onboarding process. Webonboarding helps businesses manage onboarding more efficiently, and reduces the number of errors that can often lead to costly issues later down the line.”

The research conducted by webonboarding shows how many businesses run into problems during the onboarding process, and how these can continue to cause issues once employees are working for the company.

Traditional onboarding processes have been identified as being inaccurate and putting a strain on HR resources. Cloud-based software, such as webonboarding, can help HR decision makers work more efficiently, and ensure that businesses get the right talent onboard with fewer mistakes and far less hassle.