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Asana Onboarding: The Ultimate Guide for HR Teams

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Welcome to the second part of our playbook, the Asana for HR series! In the first part, we tackled how to streamline your recruitment process in Asana. Now that you’ve attracted top talent, it’s time to roll out the red carpet and set them up for success with stellar onboarding experience.

First impressions matter. The well-structured onboarding process helps new hires feel welcome and prepared and significantly impacts employee management, productivity, and retention. But let’s face it, onboarding can be a whirlwind of paperwork and a checklist. How can you ensure every new employee’s smooth, organized, and engaging experience? The answer lies in harnessing the power of Asana as your employee onboarding software.

This playbook will guide you through leveraging Asana, a powerful user-friendly work management tool, to transform your onboarding process. Whether you’re an Asana novice or a seasoned pro, we’ll equip you with the knowledge and tools to create a seamless and engaging boarding journey for every new hire.

Setting Up Your Onboarding Project in Asana

Think of your Asana project as the central hub for all things onboarding. Here’s how to build a structured and efficient system.

The Asana project template for HR onboarding process.

  1. Create an Onboarding Template:

  • Start with a project: In Asana, create a new project titled “Employee Onboarding Template.” Choose the “List” layout for a clear overview of tasks. This layout provides a straightforward checklist format, perfect for outlining steps in the onboarding process. But you can use board view in case you want to have a sticky notes-like setup.
  • Add Sections: Organize tasks into logical sections like “Pre-boarding,” “First Day,” “Week 1,” “Month 1,” and “Ongoing.” This keeps your project tidy and easy to navigate.
  • Populate Tasks: Add tasks for each stage of onboarding, such as:
    • Pre-boarding: Send a welcome email, collect employee information, prepare the workstation, and grant system access.
      • General: Send a welcome email, collect employee information (using Asana forms – more on this later!), prepare a workstation, grant system access, and send a welcome package.
      • Software Engineer: Set up GitHub access, assign initial reading on coding standards, and send company-specific software development guides.
      • Marketing Specialist: Grant access to marketing platforms (e.g., Google Analytics, social media management tools), share brand guidelines and recent marketing campaigns.
    • First Day: Welcome meeting with HR, team introductions, office tour, IT setup, review company policies.
    • Week 1: Departmental introductions, assign buddy/mentor, schedule training sessions, set initial goals.
    • Month 1: Check-in meeting with manager, performance review, benefits enrollment follow-up.
    • Ongoing: Performance goals review, professional development opportunities, employee satisfaction surveys.
  • Assign Task Owners: Clearly define who is responsible for each task (HR, IT, manager, buddy, etc.). This ensures accountability and prevents tasks from slipping through the cracks.
  • Set Due Dates: Establish realistic deadlines for each task to keep the process on track. Use relative due dates (e.g., “1 day before start date) to automatically adjust deadlines based on the new hire’s start date.
  1. Use Custom Fields for Easy Tracking:

  • Add custom fields to your project to track key information for each new hire, such as:
    • Start date
    • Department
    • Location
    • Manager
    • Job title
    • Onboarding status (e.g., “Pre-boarding,” “Week 1,” “Complete

This are the example of custom fields in Asana project.

This allows you to easily filter and sort your onboarding projects to see which new hires are starting soon, who is responsible for them, and their progress. For example, you could filter by “Start date” to see all new hires starting in the next week or by “Department” to view all onboarding tasks for the marketing team.

  1. Leverage Different Project Views:

  • Calendar View: Visualize tasks on a calendar to see deadlines and potential scheduling conflicts.
  • List View: Ideal for a checklist-style overview of tasks, as described above.
  • Board View: Organize tasks by stage (e.g., “To Do,” “In Progress,” “Completed”). This Kanban-style view provides a visual representation of the workflow and allows for easy drag-and-drop task management.

Views you use for better project viewing.

  1. Establish Task Dependencies:

  • Use dependencies to ensure tasks are completed in the correct order. For example, the task “Grant system access” should be marked as a dependency for “Schedule IT training,” as the new hire needs system access before they can begin training.
  • This prevents confusion and ensures a smooth onboarding flow.

Check how tasks depended to one another.

Automating Onboarding Workflows

One of the greatest benefits of employee software like Asana is the ability to automate repetitive tasks, freeing up your HR team to focus on more strategic initiatives. Here’s how:

  1. Welcome Emails

Use Asana’s Rules features to automatically send a personalized welcome email to new hires when their start date is changed.

  1. Open your Employee Onboarding Template” project.
  2. Click on “Customize” in the top right corner.
  3. Select “Rules’ from the dropdown menu.
  4. Click “+Add rule.”
  5. Choose the trigger “Started Date is changed.”
  6. Choose a condition “Onboarding status is set to Pre-onboarding.”
  7. Select the action “Send email.”
  8. Customize the email template with a welcome message, the new hire’s name (using the custom field you created), their start date, and any relevant information.
  9. Save the rule.

Asana rules automation for welcoming new hires.

This automation ensures every new hire receives a timely and personalized welcome message.

  1. Task Assignments

Automatically assign tasks to the relevant team manager based on the new hire’s role or department.

Example:

  1. Create a rule with the trigger “When the department is changed.”
  2. Choose the condition “is set to” and select “Marketing.”
  3. Select the action “Assign a task” or “Change Manager to”
  4. Assign the task to the Marketing Manager.
  5. Save the rule.

This is an automation to instantly assign specific person.

This is to ensure everyone knows their responsibilities and nothing falls through the cracks.

  1. Forms for Employee Information:

Create Asana forms to collect necessary information from new hires before their start date, such as:

  • Emergency contact details
  • Tax information
  • Bank account details for payroll
  • Direct deposit forms
  • Employee handbook acknowledgments

Step-by-step instructions (since we already discussed this in the first part of the playbook series, we’re just going to give you basic instructions about form creation):

  1. In your “Employee Onboarding Template” project, create a new task titled “Complete Employee Information Form.”
  2. Click on the task to open it.
  3. Click on “Forms” in the task details pane.
  4. Click “+Add form.”
  5. Customize the form with the required fields. You can use different field types like text fields, dropdown menus, and file uploads.
  6. Save the form.

Asana forms that you can copy the link to the task.

Attach the form to a task in the “Pre-boarding” section and assign it to the new hire. This eliminates manual data entry and ensures all necessary information is gathered in a standardized format.

  1. Integrating with Other HR Tools

Explore Asana’s integrations with other HR tools to further automate your workflows.

Example: Integrate with your payroll system to automatically trigger payroll setup when a new hire’s onboarding project is created.

Another Example: Integrate with your benefits platform to automatically assign tasks to new hires to enroll in benefits.

This streamlines your HR processes and reduces manual effort.

Tracking Onboarding Progress and Feedback

Asana provides powerful tools to monitor the onboarding process and gather valuable feedback from new hires.

  1. Progress Tracking

Use the project timeline or calendar view to visualize the onboarding process and track progress.

  • Timeline view: Provides a Gantt chart-like view of tasks with their deadlines, dependencies, and assigned owners. This helps you identify any potential bottlenecks in the process.
  • Calendar view: Visualize tasks on a calendar to see deadlines and potential schedule conflicts. This is particularly useful for scheduling meetings and training sessions.
    • Quickly identify any bottlenecks or delays and take corrective action. For example, if you see that a new hire hasn’t completed their “Employee Information Form” by the deadline, you can send them a friendly reminder.
    • Use the “Progress” tab in the project to update stakeholders on the overall onboarding status. You can post updates, share key milestones achieved, and highlight any challenges.
  1. Feedback Mechanisms

Create tasks specifically for collecting feedback at various stages of onboarding (e.g., after the first day, first week, first month).

  • Example: Create a task called “Week 1 Check-in” and assign it to the new hire’s manager. In the task description, include prompts for feedback, such as: “How was your first week? Do you have any questions or concerns? Is there anything we can do to improve your onboarding experience?”

Use Asana’s comment feature to encourage open communication and address any questions or concerns. New hires, managers, and HR team members, and HR team members can use comments to ask questions, provide updates, and offer support.

Consider using Asana forms to gather structured feedback through surveys. This allows you to collect standardized data and easily analyze responses.

  • Example: Create an Asana form with questions like: “On a scale of 1 to 5, how many would you rate your onboarding experience so far? What did you find most helpful? What could be improved?”

This feedback is invaluable for continuously improving your onboarding process.

Beyond the Basics: Advanced Onboarding with Asana

Ready to take your new hire onboarding to the next level? Asan offers even more advanced features to create a truly engaging and effective experience.

  1. Engaging Content:

    • Attach welcome videos, presentations, or interactive quizzes for tasks in Asana. This helps deliver information in a more engaging and digestible format.
    • Create a dedicated “Resources” section within the project to store essential documents and links, such as the employee handbook. Company policies, and training materials. You can also use the file view feature in Asana to store these documents.
    • Use Asana’s description field to provide context and instructions for each task. You can also use formatting options to make the information more visually appealing.
  2. Buddy/Mentor Programs:

    • Use Asana to facilitate connections between new hire and their assigned buddies or mentors.
    • Create tasks for introductory meetings, check-ins, and feedback sessions.
    • Use Asana’s comment feature to encourage communication and collaboration between new hires and their buddies/mentors.
    • This fosters a sense of community and provides new hires with valuable support.
  3. Performance Management During Onboarding:

    • Use Asana to set clear goals and expectations for new hires during onboarding period.
    • Track progress towards these goals and provide regular feedback.
    • Use Asana’s comment features to document performance reservations and provide constructive feedback.
  4. Measuring Onboarding Effectiveness:

    • Track the completion rate of onboarding tasks and identify any recurring issues. Are there any tasks that are consistently being delayed or missed? This could indicate a need for improvements in the area of the onboarding process.
    • Analyze feedback data to pinpoint areas for improvement in your onboarding process. Look for patterns in the feedback you receive from new hires. Are there any common themes or suggestions for improvements?
    • Use Asana’s reporting features to gain insights into onboarding efficiency and identify trends. You can generate reports on task completion rates, project timelines, and other key metrics.
    • By continuously monitoring and optimizing your process, you can ensure a positive and impactful experience for every new hire.

Conclusion

Streamlining your onboarding process with Asana can significantly impact your new hire’s experience and, ultimately, your organization’s success. By automating tasks, centralizing information, and fostering clear communication, you can create a welcoming and efficient onboarding journey that sets the stage for long-term employee satisfaction and productivity. Remember, a well-structured onboarding process is an investment in your employees and your company’s future.

Ready to take your employee management to the next level? Stay tuned for the third part of our Asana for HR playbook series: Asana for Employee Management. This guide will delve into how to use Asana to streamline performance reviews, track employee goals, facilitate professional development, and cultivate a thriving workplace culture.

ASANA
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