How to create the perfect employee onboarding checklist

Pete Huang -

For some of us, everything is exciting and new — and a little overwhelming.

We’ve created a handy checklist to use before your new employee’s arrival. This template will help you ensure that a new employee’s onboarding process goes off without a hitch.

We crafted this checklist from a startup’s perspective because, after all, we’re a startup. But the beauty of this checklist is that any company can customize it for their own needs — just add or remove steps to your own liking.

This onboarding checklist is comprised of three tables:

  1. Tasks to complete before the employee starts (mainly paperwork)

  2. Services or accounts to set up (like adding them to your company email)

  3. A list of books to buy as reading materials for the new employee

Prepare ahead of time

To use this template for each new employee, keep one master copy of it without any specific employee info filled in. Then, duplicate it for each new employee.

Collaborate easily with your team

When you share the checklist with your team, everyone can add to-do items and insert any relevant training documents or publications that they found useful when they first started.

In addition, any team member can insert a comment to discuss the status of a particular step. For example, in the “Get signed W-4 form” record, type @ and the name of the person in charge of payroll, and you can find out whether the form was received — or ask if any other action is needed.

You can also customize a field to assign onboarding tasks to the team — or individual members can sign up to take ownership of particular tasks (like training). Some project management apps, for instance, have a bit of a learning curve — and a new employeee would probably appreciate a run-through from a veteran user!

Keep onboarding documents at your fingertips

You can attach HR and training documents into the database to keep the onboarding process organized. Best of all, when updates like signatures are added to a form, integrating the latest version of the file is a snap.

Our customizable checklist is a terrific way to streamline your company’s distinctive onboarding process — and we hope that your newly-minted employee will hit the ground running on Day One!