Onboarding Plan

You make sure a new hire is set up, welcomed, clear on what success means and connected to the right people, so that they are contributing confidently by day 90. A good plan is concrete: every task has an owner and a date, every 30/60/90 goal is an outcome someone can check, and the new hire always knows what this week is for. Onboarding research (Talya Bauer's work for the SHRM Foundation) describes four levels to cover: Compliance, Clarification, Culture and Connection. Most companies stop at the first; strong ones do all four.

When to use

• "Sam accepted, start the onboarding."
• "Build a 30/60/90 for our new account manager."
• "We keep losing people in their first three months, fix onboarding."
• "What do we need to do before Monday's starter arrives?"

What you need

• From the offer: name, role, start date, manager, location or remote, employment type, country of employment.
• The job description's outcomes (they become the 90-day goals).
• The company's existing onboarding checklist, handbook and policies, if any (search_files, read_file).
• Who provides equipment, accounts and payroll set-up.
• Access: HR system, IT admin and calendars through connected apps, or the agent's own browser signed in by the owner. You draft and track; you do not create accounts or send messages to the new hire without the owner's approval. Without access, produce the plan and checklist as files and give each task to its owner.

Method

1. Set the dates. Work back from the start date: offer accepted (day minus N), equipment shipped by day minus 5, accounts created and tested by day minus 2, welcome message by day minus 3, first day, then day 30, 60 and 90 checkpoints. Put them in the plan and, with approval, set cronjob reminders for each owner.
2. Compliance (day minus N to week 1). List what the law and the company require for this country: right-to-work verification and its deadline, tax and payroll forms, contract signature, policy acknowledgements, any mandatory training. These vary by country and change; check each with web_search on official sources and record the source. (Example: in the US, Form I-9 Section 2 must be completed within three business days of the start date.) Personal data such as bank details, ID documents and emergency contacts go only into the HR or payroll system or its secure form, never into chat or email.
3. Clarification (weeks 1 to 4). Agree with the manager three to five outcome goals for each of day 30, 60 and 90, derived from the job description.
   • Pattern: day 30 is learn and deliver a first small result; day 60 is own a defined piece of work; day 90 is perform the role's core outcomes independently.
   • Each goal must be checkable ("handles the support queue for product X alone, with under 10 per cent of tickets escalated"), not vague ("gets up to speed").
4. Culture (weeks 1 to 8). Plan how the hire learns how things really work here: the values and how decisions are made, the handbook pages to read (with a reason for each, not a reading list of 40 links), a session where the manager explains what the interviewers saw as their strengths and growth areas, and an "ask anything" session in week 2.
5. Connection (weeks 1 to 12). Assign a buddy who is not their manager, who has no leave booked in the week before and two weeks after the start, and who checks in at least weekly for the first month.
   • List 6 to 10 people the hire should meet in the first month, with why each matters.
   • Include customers or users where relevant.
6. Check-ins. Manager one-to-ones weekly for the first 90 days.
   • Formal checkpoint conversations at day 30, 60 and 90 against the goals, with written notes shared with the hire.
   • A short new-hire survey at day 30 and day 90 (template in references/plan-template.md).
7. Flag risks early. If at day 30 or 60 goals are clearly off track, the manager raises it supportively and adjusts the plan. If there is a question of whether the person will pass probation, that is an HR matter: the manager and a qualified HR person handle it, not you.
8. Hand it over. Share the plan with the manager and owner via show_card. Once approved, give each task owner their tasks (ask_teammate or the task tool the company uses) and draft the welcome message to the new hire for the owner to approve.

Judgement calls

• Remote or overseas hires: equipment can sit in customs for days. Ship earlier and confirm delivery.
• Senior hires: fewer tasks, more conversations. Their 30-day goal is often a written view of their area and a plan, agreed with their manager.
• Internal transfers: skip compliance that is already done, but still cover clarity, the new team's culture and connection.
• The manager has no time to agree goals before day 1: draft goals from the job description, mark them "proposed", and put them on the day-1 one-to-one agenda.
• Adjustment requests: record them only in the HR system, tell only the people who must set them up, and confirm they are in place before day 1.
• Interns and fixed-term staff: shorten the arc to fit the contract; keep the four Cs.
• The buddy or manager is suddenly away in week one: appoint a named stand-in, or move the start date with the owner's approval.

Output

• onboarding-<name>.md: dates, the four Cs plan, 30/60/90 goals, people to meet, buddy, check-in schedule.
• onboarding-<name>-checklist.csv: task, owner, due date, status, notes. Columns in references/plan-template.md.
• Draft welcome message (owner approves before sending).
• Reminders scheduled for task owners (with approval).

Status card layout:

Onboarding: <name>, <role>, starts <date>
Ready for day 1: equipment <status> · accounts <status> · buddy <name> · first week <drafted / sent>
Compliance: <n> items; next deadline <item, date>
30-day goals: 1) <goal> 2) <goal> 3) <goal>
Check-ins: weekly one-to-one <day, time>; checkpoints <dates>; surveys <dates>
Open risks: <list>
Waiting for approval: <welcome message, invites>

Checks before you finish

• The buddy and the manager have blocked time for the new hire in their week-one calendars.
• Reminders for every task owner and checkpoint are scheduled.
• Every task has one named owner and a due date.
• Accounts and equipment are due before day 1, not on day 1.
• 30/60/90 goals are outcomes someone can verify, agreed by the manager.
• Compliance items list their legal source and deadline for the right country.
• Personal data collection goes through the HR system, not chat or email.
• Nothing has been sent to the new hire without approval.

Pitfalls

• Paperwork-only onboarding. Forms done, laptop delivered, and the person still has no idea what good looks like. Do all four Cs.
• The firehose. Forty documents and twelve meetings on day one. Sequence it: what they need this week, this month, this quarter.
• No first win. People who ship something small in week one settle faster. Plan one.
• Absent buddy. A buddy on holiday in week one is no buddy. Check their calendar.
• Ending at day 30. Most onboarding effort happens in week one and fades. Keep the day 60 and 90 checkpoints in the calendar and hold them.
• Silent struggle. New hires rarely say they are lost. The day 30 survey and weekly one-to-ones exist to surface it.
• The same plan for everyone. A senior leader and a graduate need different plans. Start from the template, then tailor it.
• Forgetting the manager. The manager's readiness matters as much as the laptop. Check they have time, and know the goals they are agreeing.

See also: first-week-schedule for the day-by-day week one, and write-handbook-section for missing documentation you discover.