New Hires, New Skills: How Digital Adoption Platforms Streamline Onboarding

Great leaders know that the first few weeks at a new company are crucial. New hires are completely bombarded with information and introductions, simultaneously trying to learn the ropes while also proving that they deserve to be there. Talk about overwhelming. 

Traditionally, new employee onboarding has included in-person training sessions, online videos, or written documentation packets. Hours upon hours of training, left to their own devices, with absolutely no direction or context on what is actually important. 

No wonder 90% of what they learned is forgotten within a few weeks. 

But today’s workforce varies greatly from even the workforce five years ago. Due to remote work, flexible work hours, and the ever-growing prioritization of digital transformation efforts in the workplace, it’s clear that the needs of today’s workforce cannot be met by the traditional onboarding approach.  

In order for your organization to thrive in today’s digital workplace, your employees need access to support where and when they need it.  

Here’s where digital adoption platforms (DAPs) come in. DAPs are innovative tools revolutionizing employee onboarding, ensuring your new hires get up to speed quickly and confidently by providing guidance within the applications they are using in real time. 

What are Digital Adoption Platforms?

Imagine a GPS for your company’s software. DAPs provide interactive walkthroughs, tutorials, and in-context guidance layered directly on top of your existing applications. This allows new employees to learn by doing, as they receive step-by-step instructions while navigating the tools they’ll use every day. 

How DAPs Benefit New Employee Onboarding

Forward-thinking HR leaders recognize that using a DAP for their onboarding efforts has many benefits, not just for their new hires, but also for themselves, other business leaders, and their organization. Several key benefits of using a DAP for onboarding are listed below: 

• Faster Learning: DAPs eliminate the need for lengthy training sessions. New hires can comfortably learn at their own pace, within the actual workflow, reducing the time it takes to become proficient in your tools and software applications.

• Improved Knowledge Retention: A DAP’s hands-on nature reinforces learning and reduces the forgetting curve often seen with traditional onboarding methods. Studies show that 70% of training content is forgotten within the first 24 hours after a training session.

• Remote-Ready Onboarding: DAPs are perfect for remote or hybrid workplaces. New hires can access all the training materials they need, regardless of location.

• Personalized Training: Great leaders understand that not all employees will learn at the same pace or way. DAPs can be used to host various types and formats of training content, such as step-by-step walkthroughs, how-to videos, and contextual field-specific popups. By providing more than one way to access training content, you are directly showing your employees that you are investing in their training and development.

• Increased Productivity: The sooner new hires become proficient in essential tools, the sooner they can start contributing to your organization’s success.

• Reduced Costs: Onboarding and training efforts can be extremely time-consuming and expensive for organizations. A recent Forbes study found that it can take up to 6 months for a company to break even on a new hire, with onboarding costs for a new employee reaching $1400. By streamlining onboarding and decreasing reliance on in-person training, DAPs can save your company significant time and resources.

Beyond New Employee Onboarding

The benefits of DAPs extend far beyond the onboarding process. These platforms can be used to: 

• Provide ongoing training and support: While the content that employees receive during the initial onboarding process is crucial, it is essential for employees to have easy access to information whenever needed. Leveraging a DAP to host an in-app resource hub, that includes instruction guides, FAQs, checklist tasks, and key walkthroughs, can greatly reduce the number of support tickets and empower employees.

• Drive user adoption of new technologies (user onboarding for a new application): Onboarding users to a brand-new software application can be difficult, especially for employees that are resistant to change. A DAP combats this and ensures your workforce is using your new software tool to its fullest, by providing tailored guidance inside of the application in real time, as well as ongoing in-application training to continuously introduce additional functionality.

• Enhance insight into employee analytics: In addition to guidance within the application itself, DAPs can also collect and analyze employee data and feedback to help you better understand employee pain points. This information can then be leveraged to create additional training content for common workflows or fields where employees are getting stuck.

Invest in Your People

In today’s competitive job market, a smooth and efficient onboarding process is critical to attracting and retaining top talent.  

A digital adoption platform’s on-demand, in-application guidance proves to be the most effective way to deliver onboarding, by empowering new hires to become productive members of your team from day one. A DAP serves as an invaluable tool for onboarding new employees seamlessly into your workforce, whether they are physically in the office or remote.  

By investing in a DAP, you’re investing in the future of your company. 

Maverick’s ENGAGE Live is a Digital Adoption Platform that is backed by a team of content creators to customize and continuously update your training. See for yourself and request a demo today!