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Company playbook

Employee Onboarding

This is a checklist and flight plan for new employees onboarding.

The document provides both procedural tasks (such as opening accounts) and a depiction of the processes and assets that can help the decision-making phase of onboarding: assigning the employee to a team, mentoring them, setting goals, and evaluating results.

Requirements

The following steps give access to all confidential information in the company, so before proceeding, check that:

  1. The person hiring legally started (from the present day)

    OR

  2. There is a non-disclosure agreement running between the parties

Pre-flight checks

HR must check the following list 14 days before the employee joins the company:

  • If a laptop is already available or it must be ordered anew
  • The employee needs a display, mouse, keyboard, and a USB hub to complete their home office
  • All the employment documents are available to be signed by the employee
  • The employee will be available to reach the office on the first day or not
  • The team is prepared to welcome the employee and to perform the technical onboarding

Devices, tools, and other items

  • A laptop PC must be ordered in advance so that it will be available on the first day of work
  • A proper power cord and optionally a compatible power supply (depending on the power grid voltage) must be bought in advance in case of foreign employees
  • The display, mouse, and keyboard - if required - will be shipped directly to the employee during the first month of employment
  • The office keys must be provided at the end of the probation to resident employees that must have autonomous access to the office
  • The Welcome Kit must be available by the first day either shipped with the laptop or hand-delivered

Things to do on the first day

Creation of accounts

An HR representative will perform the following actions:

  • Open the @sparkfabrik.com account for the new employee
  • Add the newly created account to staff@sparkfabrik.com group
  • Add the newly created account to all relevant *-team@sparkfabrik.com project/team mail groups
  • Add the account to Slack and give a quick overview of the main channels
  • Open the Gitlab account and add it to the SparkFabrik group, plus all relevant projects if necessary
  • Add the GitHub account of the employee (or open it if not available) to the SparkFabrik organization
  • Open the Float account and make sure it can access all relevant projects
  • Invite the employee to PeopleForce, give a quick overview of the important sections, and make sure they review their profile information
  • Invite the employee to Dipendenti in Cloud and give a quick overview of the important sections
  • Make sure the employee can access all relevant calendars

General setup

The employee must, with the help of an HR representative:

  • Duly sign in and check their ability to access every service
  • If they are a developer, log into GCP using this procedure
  • Activate two-factor authentication on Gitlab
  • Generate an SSH key and add it among the available keys for their Gitlab account
  • Set their profile pictures (starting with Gravatar and checking on Gitlab, Slack, Float, etc) with an appropriate close-up
  • Set their e-mail signature in the official format (respect bolds)
  • Set the SparkFabrik branded LinkedIn banner on the Linkedin profile

Company overview

Before ending the first onboarding phase, HR must:

  • Introduce the new colleague to everyone on Slack #general channel
  • Give a quick overview of the tools we use and clarify when to use what
  • Show the company structure (functions and teams), cross-team interactions, and key contacts
  • Smoke test the local development environment (also test XCode on Mac, if it applies)
  • Introduces the new employee to their team

Team and project onboarding

During this final phase, the team welcomes the new colleague and assigns them a buddy, who will make sure at least the following is done:

  • The colleague meet each teammate and understood each one's role
  • The colleague gets an overview of:
    • the team's project(s), customer(s), and touchpoints
    • which tools and practices are in place for the project(s)
    • the team's organization (boards, events, cadences, communication channels, etc)
  • A full test of the local development environment is performed with the buddy
  • The project is built locally and understood in its broad lines

The Team Leader will also make sure that:

  • A call with the customer is planned to introduce the new colleague
  • The colleague can:
    • See all relevant projects on Float
    • Access all relevant projects on Gitlab, GitHub, or any other platform that may be relevant
    • Access all relevant slack channels (or other communication platforms) pertaining to relevant projects
    • Receive emails via relevant -team@sparkfabrik.com groups
  • The colleague understands how to track time on team's project(s)

Things to do within the first week

  • The buddy assesses the core skills with the colleague and a training plan is laid out on the topics that need upskilling
  • HR and the employee will schedule a 30 mins self-introduction to the whole company
  • HR will schedule a one-on-one meeting with the employee at the end of the second week, to check in on the onboarding goals
  • The Team Leader will schedule a one-on-one meeting with the employee at the end of the first month, to exchange feedback and set the goals for the next couple months
  • Marketing will contact the employee to choose a face wall shot (this can be used as a profile picture as well)

Things to do one month after the onboarding

  • HR will survey the employee and the Team Leader to collect feedback about the overall onboarding process, collect feedback, and address possible issues
  • If necessary, HR will arrange a meeting between the management and the employee to share general evaluations and conclude the onboarding phase
  • Marketing will publish a welcome message on our socials

Things to do two months after the onboarding

  • HR will arrange a meeting between the team leader and the employee to share feedback about the first two months in SparkFabrik

Standard formats and snippets

Standard mail signature format

SPARKFABRIK

Name Surname
Role or function

+XX YYY ZZ.ZZ.ZZZ
https://www.sparkfabrik.com

Role or function can be:

  • Software Developer
  • Lead developer
  • C-Level or other management/board function

When in doubt, ask your HR representative.

Branded LinkedIn banner

We ask every employee who joins SparkFabrik and who has a LinkedIn account to immediately add an Experience record, connected to SparkFabrik's company profile with the correct role and starting date.

In addition, we ask them to set the branded SparkFabrik's banner as a background photo of their profile and (not mandatory but welcome) to use the facewall shot as the LinkedIn and sparkfabrik.com email profile picture.

Last updated on 28 Nov 2023