Inspire Fresh Starts with Your Onboarding Learner Journey 

It turns out that a great time to make a change is when things are already changing. That used to strike me as counterintuitive—because it seems logical to manage change through focus and prioritization. Let’s not make things harder than they need to be, right? Katy Milkman, in How to Change: The Science of Getting from Where You Are to Where You Want to Be, demonstrates that new beginnings and other changes offer us an opportunity to start again. She calls this the “fresh start effect” and describes how milestones, life changes, etc., can be great opportunities to make change.  

One of the more significant changes that we make in our lives as adults is the fresh start of starting a new job. It’s a fantastic opportunity for personal change, but it’s also one of our best opportunities to make professional change. I moved into a new role early this year, and I was intentional about making a few changes. I realize as I’m writing this that some of it has worked, not perfectly, but I’m a lot further along than I was 10 months ago. I think I may be getting better at change, and the fresh start definitely helped me to break my old patterns. 

Something to Consider 

But here’s the question that I think we should consider as L&D professionals: if fresh starts are a great time to make changes, why is that missing from our onboarding training? Speaking generally, it’s hard to argue that our onboarding learning journeys might not be missing a big opportunity. In our efforts to simplify and streamline, we focus on readiness outcomes but not change or development outcomes. It’s worth challenging this notion.  

One Example 

This week, I’ve been listening to Lowenbraun and Stephens’Adaptive Listening: How to Cultivate Trust and Traction at Work during my commute. Near the end, they talk about how they have built a listener culture at the agency where they work—Duarte, Inc. Could there be a better opportunity to shape the culture than when new hires are ready to make a fresh start? What better time to teach listening and interpersonal skills than when people are already forming new relationships? I know some would argue that new hires are already overwhelmed with everything new, but I think it’s possible to think of this type of change—the improvement of listening skills—as a fantastic enabler when it comes to shaping the learner experience over their first several months in the organization. I’m not saying that it’s always listening—it should probably depend on the culture that the organization is building. It could be almost any skill or capability that is highly valued by the organization.  

Making the Case 

Here’s a quick case for change (pun intended):  

• We’ve already seen that onboarding learning journeys are more effective when they are aligned and supportive of the overall employee experience.  
• Instruction that covers the goals and values of a company’s culture will be less likely to change behavior than helping learners to practice those values.  
• Learners crave professional and social connection at work. Providing them with some tools to build their interpersonal skills helps learners meet this need and accelerates their contribution to the company culture. 
• You may already have some of what you need. Professional development programs that exist on an LMS without any connection to the context or to learner experiences at work can be reimagined and integrated into onboarding learner journeys with clear change objectives.     
• Change can be inspiring. We focus too often on countering the inevitable resistance without presenting change as a motivator.  

One Simple Takeaway 

Think of this as your invitation to make a change to and with your onboarding program. If an overhaul is unrealistic, try to think of a single change in learner behavior that would motivate and inspire. I’m in love with adaptive listening at the moment (because I just finished the book), but I can see collaboration, communication, leadership, critical thinking, and many other possibilities.