Since 2020, we’ve gotten familiar with remote work. We’ve accomplished incredible feats with people we’ve never met in person, built teams spanning the globe, and forgotten about the fluorescent lighting of the office or the commute needed to get there.

Now, our workspaces are everywhere: spare rooms, coffee shops, coworking spaces, and satellite offices. Remote work means a lot of different experiences to a lot of different people, making the few shared experiences even more important.

WFHomie and Helm are both fully remote companies, and we’re collaborating to help you understand those critical shared experiences—and make them count. Many companies are still figuring out how to navigate remote work without losing momentum, morale, or talent. With our shared expertise in engagement, retention, inclusion, and belonging, we’re here to help you nail the most crucial parts of the employee experience.

Why Employee Experience Matters in Remote Work

Generally speaking, employees who work remotely are just as—or more—productive, communicative, and happy as their in-office counterparts. But things that happen organically in person, like casual watercooler conversations, serendipitous collaboration, or ‘good mornings,’ aren’t happening over Slack or Zoom.

There are tons of exceptional remote work tools that enable seamless collaboration and good work, but it’s all the stuff that happen around work that ends up paying dividends in employee happiness, retention, and engagement. These small but mighty components of the employee experience are extremely important to building trust, empathy, and joy at work.

Part 1: Onboarding and Documentation

The employee experience starts with the onboarding process. Because it’s the first step, it’s also one of the biggest contributor to long-term success—or premature turnover. Onboarding is where expectations are set, introductions are made, and plans are laid. Most importantly, it’s where a new hire goes from wanted to welcomed.

Let’s unpack the onboarding experience and figure out where to place small wins that go the distance. Ultimately, onboarding is composed of two parts: process and people. The process component includes paperwork, compliance, and technology. The people component is what we’ll be focusing on—what it takes to make a new hire feel that they belong to a greater community.

Why onboarding matters

• It’s where cultures/behaviors are learned and formalized.

• It marks the transition between being an outsider and becoming an insider.

• It’s the biggest leverage point for onboarding to retention, engagement, and productivity.

• Only 12% of employees think that their orgs do a great job with onboarding.

• SHRM estimates that it costs 6-9 months of an employee’s salary to bring on a replacement.

• 1 in 6 new hires leave within the first 90 days, and 1 in 3 leave within the first 6 months.

1. Pre-boarding

Most think that onboarding—and by extension, the employee experience—starts on day one. But in reality, it starts far earlier. The first meaningful touchpoint in the employee experience is when a new hire receives and confirms their offer. The couple-week period between the offer and day one is a fantastic opportunity to make the employee feel welcome. Here’s what you can do to win the pre-boarding experience:

• Affirmation: it’s only natural to feel like an impostor when you start a new position. Make sure to remind your new hires why they’re a fit and why this is a place they’ll grow. Offer yourself as a resource and go the extra step of offering to help instead of waiting to be asked.

• ‍Momentum: after the initial rush of getting an offer, it’s natural that the following weeks become a waiting period. Use this time to build hype around the start date. Share information about company history, big-picture mission, and big things to expect on day one.

• Pre-work: The worst way to spend day one is by filling out paperwork that could’ve been done beforehand. This takes away from one-on-one time, team introductions, and orientation. Get this paperwork in and accounted for beforehand.

• Document: new hires want to make a good impression. Supply an employee playbook that helps them navigate the idiosyncrasies of your organization. Help them identify the unwritten rules, cultural expectations, and acronyms that only insiders know.

2. Day one

Day one is where it all officially starts. It’s where new hires make their entrance, get oriented to their new role, and crucially, it’s where they meet the people they’ll be working with. It’s completely normal for new hires to feel a little confused and nervous on their first day—especially in a remote setting, which can feel isolating. It’s your job as a leader to do some handholding, ice breaking, introducing, and assuring.

The worst day one experiences never acknowledge the gravity of day one and don’t do anything to break the ice. In short, bad first days are isolating, confusing, and unplanned, and good ones are welcoming, structured, and intentional. Here’s what you can do to win the day one experience:

• Make it a big deal: day one is an occasion to be celebrated. Make an introduction in a team meeting, organize a team lunch call, and send an announcement in Slack to show how much you value your new hire. After all, first impressions matter most.

• Make it personal: take the time to get to know your new hires—set up a meet and greet call and get to know their stories. Remember—this is a two-way street! Just a couple of minutes spent getting to truly know someone pays dividends.

• Encourage connection: finish the paperwork prior to day one so you have time to make introductions. This is the most important function of day one: establishing connections to make the new hire feel welcome. Especially in a remote setting, it’s critical to put extra effort into making new hires feel at home.

• Document: make sure that the new hire comes out of their first day with clear expectations around who to talk to for help (this could be an onboarding buddy or a manager), which meetings to attend, and what’s expected of them during the first week.

3. First month and beyond

This is where behavior and culture starts to settle. During the first month, new hires remain fairly moldable, but they quickly start to form a cadence. Even as they get more comfortable with their role and their teammates, they’re likely still feeling the effects of impostor syndrome.

• Continuous onboarding: no matter the first impression, employee experience is something to keep nurturing. Continuously onboard your new hires with work anniversary gifts, swag drops, and employee lifecycle analytics.

• Relationship development: schedule recurring 1-on-1 meetings, warm intros, and work reviews. Encourage new hires to reach out to people around the organization, not just on their teams. You can make this easy by putting together warm intros or using an employee connection tool.‍

• Virtual events: make space for serendipity by putting people together that wouldn’t have otherwise come across one another. Organize a virtual team-building event, happy hour, or holiday parties. WFHomie's Social Pass helps facilitate this without the hassle.

• ‍Celebrate little wins: share highlights, give kudos, and celebrate those who deserve to be celebrated. It’s the little wins within each team that keep momentum going.

Remote work for everyone

Your team is unique—so should be your remote policy. Don’t feel like you have to follow what other companies are doing. Instead, figure out what works best for your team, your company, and the work you do.

On the other hand, try not to repeat other companies’ mistakes as you build remote work readiness. We’re sharing broad guidelines—there’s lots of room to put your own spin on them.