Existing Problems
Research has shown that having a good employee integration program can improve employee retention by as much as 25%. Most companies deal with new employees in one of the following ways:

• Have them fill out paperwork on the first day and send them to their department with little or now formal explanations on how to be productive. This type of individual usually learns his/her job on an ad hoc basis from other workers. Quite a bit of time is spent standing or sitting around waiting for someone to tell them what to do. It usually takes new hires 2-4 weeks to be productive.
• Employees come into an organization and there is a formal orientation. This can be anywhere from 4 hours to several days. The problem with this is that new employees have no context to link the information to and immediately forget 90% of what they heard.
• Employees come into an organization and complete orientation online. The problems with this are that there is not follow up to see if the new hire understands or has even covered the material. In addition, an online orientation does not get new employees to go beyond their immediate work group to meet others in the company or to understand how their job fits into the overall picture.

Lack of Resources
Human Resource organizations have eliminated 35% of the human resource positions since 2001. This presents a potential resource problem because the responsibility for orienting new employees usually lays with human resources first and them managers second. Organizations are coping, now, because organizations have not been hiring.

Lack of Consistency
Once organizations begin hiring, they will need to find new ways to handle business methods or rehire the staff to do it. Many organizations push managers to do the department or work group orientation. This varies based on the manager's skills, time, and interest. Relying on managers provides no consistency or discipline to ensure that each new hire will have the same information. When an organization has a decentralized structure (several sites throughout the country or world), consistency becomes even more important to increasing productivity and reducing the learning curve. Human Capital is the competitive advantage of many of the best organizations that are thriving in this economy.

Lack of Documented Proof of Understanding and Proficiency
Organizations, especially large organizations, have a requirement to provide documentation of training, etc. for several compliance audits. These include EEO/AA, OSHA, and ISO. When a person files discrimination charge, the organization must provide evidence to counter that discrimination. This requires resources both time, and systems to capture and maintain that proof.

Issue of Retaining Employees
With all the downsizing of the past two years, employee loyalty is at an all-time low. Predictions say that by 2005, there will be another labor shortage where organizations will be fighting for limited resources. Each time an employee quits an organization, it costs the organization at least one to one and a half times that person's annual salary to recruit, hire and train the new employee.

According to SHRM (The Society of Human Resource Managers), the national employee turnover rate is 17% for companies with less than 500 employees and it goes up to 25% for larger companies. Some industries like the hospitality industry have employee turnover rates of as much as 300%.

A company with 1000 employees with a turnover rate of 17% loses an average of $5.1 million per year because of turnover. This directly hits the bottom line. By improving retention by only 1% will save this company $51,000 per year.

Solution
The Orientation Passport is a business method that addresses all of these problems simultaneously. The process shifts the responsibility from human resources and management to that of the new hire. New employees receive a booklet called their Orientation Passport. The passport consists of about 100 task statements that the new hire must accomplish within the first ninety days on the job. (See copy of the Orientation Passport included)

The new employee must network through the organization to acquire the information. When he/she has synthesized the information, the new hire accomplishes the task in from of a mentor who initials completion of that task. Employees can have many mentors throughout the organization. A mentor can be the person receiving the paperwork or teaching a class. It can be a manager or a co-worker.

At the end of the ninety days, the new employee reviews the accomplishments in the passport. The employee signs off in the passport. The manager signs verifying that the new hire has completed all the tasks and associated training.

The employee turns the signed passport into Human Resources. The organization has established a reward the employee receives upon completion. The employee receives the reward. Human Resources files the completed passport in the employee personnel file.

When the organization is audited or a charge is filed, the human resources department refers to the passport. The Orientation Passport is a legal document that has three levels of verification: The mentor initials stating that the employee has accomplished a task. Each task has a mentor initials. The employee and the manager have signed verifying completion.

Resources Utilization
Using the passport and accomplishing the tasks over ninety days reduces the need for taking the employees off the job for formal training. Instead of providing a data-dump during orientation, the employee absorbs the information when it is relevant. By having a reward system, support departments do not need to spend time tracking down new employees to accomplish tasks (like turning in paperwork or getting a parking decal); the new employee comes to them.

This business method/process encourages employees to be proactive from the first day of work. It shifts the responsibility from the human resource representative and manager to the employee. The manager becomes an advisor with specific task statements providing feedback loops back to the manager throughout the process. It facilitates an empowered workforce that identifies problems and searches out solutions.

Consistency and Discipline Throughout the Organization
The Orientation Passport provides consistency in terms that each employee must demonstrate understanding and proficiency in the same tasks. The tasks are written in a way to accommodate various diverse functions within the organization. No longer do organizations rely on the manager to have a checklist of items to cover and actually accomplish them.

The Orientation Passport is unique in that it records completion once a new hire can synthesize the information in the task and demonstrate that the can or have performed the task themselves. Currently, orientation checklists track what human resources or the manager tells to the employee – not what the employee does.

The Orientation Passport provides a disciplined approach to ensure consistency. The Orientation Passport includes tasks that facilitate goal alignment looking at the organization and seeing how the employee's job and function adds value to the overall organization. Organizations may customize the passport task statements to include the items that are critical to their company or industry.

The Orientation Passport includes statements to capitalize on the new prospective coming from the new hire. These include such things as innovation, streamlining products and processes, and uncovering customer service opportunities for the new hire's department or workgroup.

Documented Proof of Understanding and Proficiency
The Orientation Passport includes categories such as Health & Safety and Human Resources EEO where new hires accomplish tasks required for those compliance audits. The Orientation Passport also focuses on understanding processes, policies and procedures necessary for ISO and the Malcolm Baldridge assessments. The Orientation Passport being a self-contained booklet the booklet proves valuable as a defense strategy documenting the new employee's understanding.

Retaining Employees
Research has shown that integrating new employees into an organization socially provides connections that retain employees. Using the Orientation Passport business method pushes new hires to get to know others in the organization beyond their immediate workgroup. SHRM has stated that it can increase retention by as much as 25%.

Employees want to feel that they are providing value to the organization. The Orientation Passport includes task statements to help them determine that value and link their work to the organization's business strategies.

Planning for the Implementation
When your organization decides to implement the Orientation Passport, there are several things to be decided prior to implementation:

1. Generic or customized passports
2. Reward mechanism
3. Mentor assignment or list of contact people who can provide information and/or verify that the new hire has completed the task.
4. How you will brief managers and mentors

Do the generic passports fit your needs? We have conducted numerous focus groups of HR leaders from all industries to determine the tasks included in the generic passports. We have three versions of generic passports: Employee, Manager, and English-Spanish.

The Employee and English-Spanish versions have the same tasks, but one is printed in both languages. The Manager version has many of the same tasks as the employee to orient his/herself to the organization; but also included are several task statements designed to ensure the manager understands his/her role and the steps to consistently lead direct reports.

Customization of the tasks may include eliminating some of the tasks or adding tasks unique to that organization. We work with you to analyze, write and publish the changes. Once this decision is made, the passports should be ordered while the rest of the planning is completed.

Reward Mechanism. We recommend that the organization show the new employees that completing the passport is important by determining some reward new employees receive upon completion of the passport. The reward provides the incentive for each employee to complete the passport within the ninety days. We have found that by doing this, it saves significant time in follow-up of managers and HR personnel. The reward should be something that encourages everyone from directors to non-exempt to complete it on time.

Rewards could be a gift certificate or smart card with a monetary value; a pay bump (if you normally give a pay increase after the probationary period – you could now link to passport completion), or some other special gift.

As an extra service, we work with you to provide “smart cards” or credit card type rewards with the amount of money you choose to reward people. This type of reward is easy to distribute and of value to the employee.

You need to determine what is right for your organization's culture, its employees, and your financial limitations. Remember, loosing these people will cost you approximately $30,000 per person, so make it of value to the employee.

Mentor Assignments. The people who sign under mentor initials can be anyone. Some organizations assign a specific person to be a mentor to another, while other organizations encourage everyone to be mentors. If you do not assign mentors, you will need a listing of “Go to” people or departments to get specific information. Online resources may be used as one source; but you want new hires to network throughout the organization and talk to people outside of their workgroup. You might want to provide a “Yellow Pages” with phone numbers (and office locations) for such areas as Payroll, EAP, Finance, Travel, Health & Safety, etc.

Briefing Managers & Mentors. The process itself is quite simple once it is implemented, but managers and mentors need to understand that new employees will be networking to acquire and then synthesize the information. In order to get a sign-off, the new hire must demonstrate proficiency in that task statement. Some are easy such as get a parking decal. Others take a little bit of work such as coming up with one step that can be streamlined in a process and sharing it with the manager. Managers must understand the benefits of this tool, while understanding their role in the experience.

These briefings may be done in town halls or department meetings. We encourage organizations to share the new process personally and encourage questions. This culture shift will encourage employees to be proactive and find solutions to problems.

On the first day of employment, the new employee is given a passport even before orientation begins. The process is explained that they have ninety days to accomplish all the tasks in the passport. They must network throughout the organization and find the information. When they are ready to accomplish the task, they find a mentor how can verify that they have accomplished the task. The mentor will initial the passport.

The person welcoming them briefly goes through the pages highlighting the Welcome page, and the Table of Contents. Highlight Page 4. At the end of the ninety days, they are to have completed all the tasks and met with their manager to verify completion. Both the new employee and his manager sign on this page verifying completion.

Tell the new hire to place his name and the date of hire in the passport. Encourage new hires to complete the remainder of the information on that page such as their department number, phone number, mail drop, email address, manager's name as soon as possible. Finally, they should determine when the ninety-day date is and place that date on the page.

If they have completed all the tasks and had the passport validated by their manager and turned into Human Resources, they will receive a reward. Specify the reward. Tell them where they go to turn in the passport and receive the reward.

New hires accomplish some tasks during orientation or on the first day of work, so they should go to “Beginning the Journey” and find those tasks.

Once the new employee turns the verified passport into human resources, HR files the orientation passport booklet in the employee's personnel file. Punch a hole through it to keep it in place in the folder.

When it is time for an audit, show the auditors a completed orientation passport. Explain the organization gives employees an orientation passport booklet at orientation, and HR files completed passports in the personnel folders.

It has been our experience that this simple form of documentation covers all the audits and legal requirements typically associated with new employees.

This is a simple, yet elegant business method that accomplishes several things at one time. It:

• Integrates employees effectively & consistently throughout the organization
• Facilitates productivity quickly eliminating 2-4 weeks lost time
• Captures compliance documentation
• Encourages an empowered proactive workforce.
• Ends awkwardness for new hires not knowing what to do
• Creates networks and connections that improve your retention rate

Employees like it because it gives them permission to meet others, ask questions, and provide suggested solutions. Managers like it because employees become proactive Human Resources like it because it provides auditable documentation for compliance issues. The Organization likes it because it provides discipline and consistency in orienting all employees throughout the company.

It is a new way of bringing new employees into the organization.