The importance of effective new hire training can not be underestimated. When properly executed, a training process facilitates the successful onboarding of new employees by outlining training goals and desired learning outcomes, and sets them up for success in the weeks and months ahead.
When new employees aren’t equipped with the knowledge and skills they need to perform well in their new role, there can be lasting effects resulting in low job satisfaction, the perception of poor performance, and can even lead to higher employee churn rates in some instances.
On the other hand, providing an effective training checklist on day one that includes elements such as training manuals, a detailed training outline, and a comprehensive onboarding training checklist can do wonders to both welcome a new hire, and get them off on the right foot with colleagues and internal systems.
Table of Contents
- New Employee Training: The Concept
- Key Elements of an Employee Training Checklist
- Best Practices for Effective Training
- Preview: New Employee Training Checklist Template
TL/DR Download a PDF of this article to read when you are ready!
Introduction
Having a well-designed training checklist is a simple, clear way to increase the effectiveness of your training program. According to a Gallup survey, employees with a better onboarding experience are 2.6x more likely to feel satisfied at work. This small—but critical—addition to your organization’s approach to training can quickly advance a person from “new hire” to becoming a well-equipped employee, who in turn has a higher likelihood of increased productivity, motivation, and satisfaction in their work.i
That’s not to say training new employees doesn’t come with its own set of challenges. Both employers and employees have to adjust to changes and embrace the fact that proper training takes time. While this is frequently considered a universal pain-point, it doesn’t have to be! With a structured approach and ready-to-go training checklists on hand, the process is simplified and will ultimately shorten the time to productivity. Having a deeper level of accountability within training programs benefits all parties involved, including strengthening corporate connection by taking simple steps towards developing a culture of learning. Everybody wins!
So now that you know how important new employee training is, we can dive into the what. We’ll discuss everything you need to know to create your own effective new employee training, including a downloadable step-by-step employee training checklist template and the following ‘must know’ topics:
- The basics of new employee training (benefits and challenges)
- Key elements of an employee training checklist
- Best practices for effectively training new employees
Let’s get started with the basics: what is new employee training?
1. New Employee Training: The Concept
There are two primary training requirements that make up an effective onboarding experience: an employee onboarding program and new employee training. Both are necessary elements of corporate training that are all about setting employees up for early—and long-term—success.
An employee onboarding program focuses on the process of integrating new hires into the organization. Often standard training checklists and training materials are leveraged, such as an employee handbook or a new hire training checklist, which highlight essential tasks like establishing corporate accounts or becoming familiar with internal systems.
Related but distinct, is new employee training. This is the process of equipping new hires with the skills and knowledge they need to be successful in their new roles and environments. While this may take on the familiar form of an employee onboarding checklist, often it is a longer process that includes training goals, performance metrics, as well as interactive elements like training activities or simulations.
A systematic training program for new hires can offer the following benefits:
Smoother integration
A well-structured training program helps new hires get comfortable faster, reducing stress and making it easier to integrate into the team.
Enhances productivity
New hires who receive proper training become effective employees faster, contributing sooner and more effectively.
Fewer mistakes
Effective, clear training reduces errors and leads to better quality work early on.
Higher engagement
When employees feel supported, they’re more likely to stay motivated and engaged.
Stronger company culture
An effective program offers an opportunity to communicate a company’s values and culture, creating a sense of belonging and shared purpose.
First impressions matter
The way employees experience their first days and weeks can shape their overall impression of a company. A great training program leaves a positive impression, making new hires more likely to stay long-term. In fact, companies with structured onboarding see 82% higher retention rates than those without.
Common Challenges in New Employee Training
Despite these benefits, the training experience isn’t always easy and can come with a number of challenges.
- For employers: Finding the right balance between getting your new hires up-to-speed without disrupting regular operations, avoiding information overload, and keeping training consistent across teams—particularly for organizations with multiple departments and teams— can be tough.
- For employees: Adjusting to a new environment full of new faces, processes, and responsibilities can be a highly stimulating, and sometimes daunting, experience. Managing expectations of their new role while remembering all the new details, and then tacking on retaining the newly acquired skills or knowledge, and you have a recipe for feeling quite overwhelmed.
The solution? A thoughtful approach
The key to a successful onboarding experience is a structured, yet flexible, training program that balances essential information with hands-on learning. In the new hire training checklist below, we’ll cover practical steps to make onboarding smooth, effective, and engaging.
2. Key Elements of an Employee Training Checklist
Having a well-structured employee training program ensures new hires feel supported and confident in their early days and weeks. A comprehensive employee training checklist should be tailored to the role or department, and also review company policies and procedures more broadly. Here are our key takeaways and actionable steps to apply to your own structured documents, and share with your training teams:
Employee Training Checklist Table
| Basic information | Employer name, start/end date of hire and training, trainer/mentor name, any additional relevant information and details. |
| Company overview | Introduce new hires to the company’s mission, values, and culture. Employees who feel aligned with company values are 30% more likely to stay long-term. |
| Role-specific training | Tailor the training to the position, covering required skills and responsibilities, company-specific processes and systems, product or services they’ll be working with, and relevant topics or critical industry-related knowledge. |
| Policies and procedures | Make expectations clear from day one, reviewing key policies on dress code, workplace conduct, security, data protection, schedule, time-off, etc. |
| Safety and compliance | For industries that require compliance training, be sure to include a safety training checklist to cover regulatory requirements, safety protocols, and emergency procedures in your training sessions. |
| Technical skills | If the role involves technical requirements, specific tools or software, provide interactive training for technical equipment and highlight practical applications. |
| Soft skills | Beyond technical know-how, common types of soft skill developmental training often include communication skills, conflict resolution, time management, active listening—to name a few. |
| Regular evaluations & feedback | Schedule check-ins and encourage feedback sessions. These are crucial for employee growth and establishing a culture of learning. For team leaders, it’s a method to assess a new hire’s progress and address any questions/concerns. For employees, it’s a critical step in customized learning paths for ongoing skill/career development. |
Tips on Customizing the Employee Training Checklist
When leveraged to its full potential, developing a library of training checklists can become an essential tool for workforce development, as well as a vital support tool for your training teams. The new employee training checklist we’ve shared is designed to be fully customizable, so you can easily incorporate skills-specific learning and key learning topics to suit your organization’s—or new employee’s—specific needs.
Here are some tips you can use to create a tailored new employee training checklist aligned to your company’s specific needs:
🔲 Identify role-specific requirements
🔲 Consult relevant stakeholders
🔲 Prioritize training modules
🔲 Define clear objectives
🔲 Adapt to your company culture
🔲 Include compliance and safety training
🔲 Create a clear timeline
🔲 Diversify training methods
🔲 Tailor checkpoints and assessments
🔲 Seek continuous feedback
Remember that customizing your new employee training checklist should be a continuous process and include ongoing feedback. Each checklist should be a dynamic, future-ready tool according to the changing company needs, business offering, and industry standards for each role.
Encourage additional feedback from new employees who have gone through the training process, as well as team leaders who oversee the training. Based on their input and ongoing feedback, regularly review and update the employee training methods and checklists, providing additional training opportunities as necessary.
3. Best Practices for Effective Training
Now that we’ve covered what new employee training programs should include, and how to develop your own powerful, comprehensive training checklist to accompany them, we can focus in on our recommended best practices aimed to improve the effectiveness of training programs.
When these essential steps are integrated into the overall training system, or training platform, they contribute to an improved, productive work environment for team leaders and employees alike. So, how should you use this employee training checklist to maximize the results of your new employee training?
Here are some practical tips and best practices you can incorporate as “standards for training” at the organizational level:
Tailor the training program to the individual employee’s needs
Assessment
Before you begin training, evaluate the new hire’s existing knowledge and skill levels. Tailor the training program and the standard training checklist with key learning topics and skills-specific learning goals with the aim of filling skill gaps, while strengthening existing skills and knowledge.
Personalization
Incorporate tailored content and learning paths for new employees. Ensure the content is focused on areas where improvements or new skills/knowledge are needed. If possible, allow employees to progress at their own pace and convenience by providing simple steps and an employee checklist.
Embrace technology and streamline training
Use the right platforms
Utilize a learning platform with features that include e-learning components, ready-made courses, and the ability to customize learning paths. This type of platform, or tool for workforce development, is designed to make your training programs more accessible and flexible. Leveraging built in business-critical courses along with the ability to progress through courses on-demand, allow you to effectively manage training and onboarding teams that are both in the office and on the frontline.
Gamification
Building engagement with your employees leads to higher productivity and job satisfaction. Learning platforms can support and incorporate gamification elements like leaderboards, quizzes, simulations, or competitions to make your training more inviting. This is also a great way to incorporate pre-training assessments, post-training assessments, quality benchmarks, quality control, as well as ensuring trainings are conducted—and completed— within an identified time frame.
Leverage videos
Incorporating various communication techniques, like videos, can be an important tool for businesses. Videos can often deliver complex tasks and concepts better than other forms of content. This is especially true for employees who are visual learners. You can use both short and long informative videos to enhance your training content, plugging in ready-made courses on-demand to meet your new employee where they are.
Use interactive training methods
Hands-on practice
When possible, encourage and facilitate employees to do hands-on practice in real-world settings. You can, for example, incorporate simulations, practical exercises, or role-playing activities which can be applied to both mandatory and job-specific training.
Group workshops
When possible conduct relevant training activities and group workshops to provide an environment where more experienced employees can share their experiences and knowledge with new hires. Learning management platforms are a great way to bridge in-office and virtual training opportunities.
Continuous evaluation and feedback
Regular assessments
Build a training schedule and conduct regular assessments in multiple forms (quizzes, written assignments, practical tasks, etc.) to evaluate the employees’ progress. Use these insights to evaluate your training program and adjust accordingly.
Feedback loops
It’s critical to establish a feedback mechanism so employees can share their thoughts about the new employee training program, the challenges they face, and their concerns. Use this feedback to improve the training program. You can gather employee feedback through an employee experience management platform.
Mentorship and peer learning
Mentorship programs
On top of the training program, try to pair new employees with more experienced ones, as mentors. Mentors can support the new hires throughout the training program, answer questions, and provide guidance. Mentorship developed in this way can also further the organization’s commitment to training, providing a training to leadership development path for engaged employees.
Peer-to-peer learning
Encourage new employees to learn from their peers who joined the company earlier, while also putting to practice active listening and two-way communication skills. Some employees prefer engaging in learning experiences with peers, who share their knowledge and best practices, and find them to be more effective.
Real-world practice and application
Present case studies
Incorporate case studies in the training program to show how concepts and topics being taught can be applied in real-life workplace settings. Case studies can also be useful for illustrating complex or sensitive concepts like anti-harassment policies, navigating high-stakes environments, or identifying workplace hazards.
Ensure relevance to daily work
Make sure the content includes relevant training activities and is directly applicable to the employees’ day-to-day tasks and responsibilities. When employees feel the key components of the training are relevant, they are more likely to stay engaged and retain the knowledge and skills presented.
Update and evolve the training program
Stay up-to-date
Your training content should be considered a living document. Keep your materials current with the evolving industry trends, best practices, and new technologies. Provide additional training when needed, particularly for mandatory and job-specific trainings known for having increased risk of potential hazards.
Regular evaluation
Regularly review and adjust the training program based on the evolving needs of the organization, new goals or objectives, and ongoing feedback from employees and stakeholders. These actions together demonstrate your organization’s commitment to training, and importantly establish high standards for training that create a productive work environment.
An effective training program shouldn’t be a one-time event, but rather an ongoing and continuously evolving process. By adopting these tips and best practices you’ll create an agile, dynamic, and effective training program for your new hires, as well as existing employees, to enhance their knowledge, boost productivity, and develop a culture of learning that supports long-term employee satisfaction and retention.
Preview: New Employee Training Checklist Template
Employee Info:
🔲 Employee Name:
🔲 Position/Job Title:
🔲 Start Date:
🔲 Trainer/Mentor/Supervisor Name:
Training Modules:
1. Company Overview
🔲 History and Background
🔲 Mission and Values
🔲 Organizational Structure
🔲 Areas of responsibility (who does what)
🔲 Organization chart
🔲 Unit/department section functions
🔲 Company Culture and Expectations
2. Role-Specific Training
🔲 Job Responsibilities
🔲 Key Tasks and Duties
🔲 Job-specific Tools and Equipment
🔲 Company-Specific Software or Systems
3. Policies and Procedures
🔲 Code of Conduct
🔲 Dress Code
🔲 Confidentiality Policies
🔲 Timekeeping and Attendance
🔲 Previous State Employment Verification and Explanation of Longevity Pay
🔲 Payroll, Benefits, and Retirement Information
🔲 Rate of Pay
🔲 Timesheets (How To Access, How to Complete, Due Dates)
🔲 Time Off Request Policies (i.e., Done in Workdays, How to Access, Entries for Sick Leave, Annual Leave, etc.)
🔲 Request for Leave Procedures
🔲 Holidays Policies
🔲 Housekeeping and sanitation Policies
🔲 Where to Get Information and Help
🔲 Business Card and Charge Card When Appropriate
🔲 Travel and Leave Form Policies
4. Safety and Compliance
🔲 Workplace Safety Guidelines
🔲 Emergency Procedures
🔲 Regulatory Compliance (if applicable)
🔲 Health and Safety Protocols
5. Technical Skills (if applicable)
🔲 Technical Training Modules
🔲 Hands-on Practice
🔲 Troubleshooting and Maintenance
6. Soft Skills
🔲 Effective Communication
🔲 Teamwork and Collaboration
🔲 Customer Service Skills
🔲 Problem-Solving Skills
7. Information System….
You can download a complete employee training checklist with the link below:
Conclusion
The new employee training checklist we’ve shared above is a powerful tool for any organization. Developing a proper training program won’t only help ensure new hires are adequately equipped with the required skills and knowledge they need to be successful in their new role, but will also ensure a smoother integration overall.
Investing in a clear, engaging, and well-structured training process leads to more productive and satisfied employees. Leveraging this employee training checklist template will quickly help your company:
- Streamline the new employee training program and the onboarding process
- Reduce the time needed for new employees to be ready for their new roles
- Improve the quality of work performed by new hires while reducing mistakes/errors
- Ensure complete compliance training is provided for all employees and new hires
- Increase employee engagement and job satisfaction
- Improve employee loyalty and retention
If your company is not yet using an employee training checklist, or if you want to improve your new hire training, we encourage you to start by downloading our checklist today!
Ready for more? Our team is standing by to share a free demo of our ATS & onboarding software, providing digital coordination from hiring to onboarding, and beyond.
