The Measurement Challenge

Measuring the success of a new employee’s social onboarding is difficult. On the surface, it may seem straightforward - send out a survey, or ask the employee as part of a 30 or 90 day check-in how socially integrated they feel in their new team. But in practice, most new hires will not feel comfortable sharing that they are lonely at work, or feel socially disconnected from their teams - at least not so early in their tenure.

Because of this, the success of your social onboarding program must be measured observationally at first, and can only move to more direct measurement after the new hire spends more time at the company. 

Here is a simple guide for how to measure the social connectedness of a new hire throughout the onboarding process:

The Phases of Measurement

Weeks 1 - 2: Output-based measurement

In the first two weeks, the new hire will have multiple social onboarding tasks, including completing an Employee Blog, setting up manager-guided and self-guided 1-1s, and meeting with their onboarding buddy.

In this early phase, the most important thing for the manager to watch is whether the new hire is actually completing these activities, or skipping them in order to “get down to work.” Review the state of their onboarding checklist closely, and flag any social onboarding tasks that were not completed. 

If there is a clear trend of multiple skipped social onboarding activities, gently inquire as to why this is. Is the new hire shy, or concerned new employees will not want to be interrupted? Or does the new hire think the activities are optional or unimportant? Work with the new hire to understand what is holding them back, and emphasize the importance of social onboarding as a critical ingredient for trust building, which itself is a prerequisite for a productive and positive work environment. 

Weeks 3 - 8: Observational measurement

Over the next six weeks, there are some early signs which signal whether the new hire is trending towards integrating socially with their team or whether they are struggling to connect. Look out for:

• Break behaviour. If your team works in a hybrid or in-office model, observe how your new hire unwinds on a break or at lunch. Is she engaging with coworkers, or always taking time alone? Of course, many people - especially those who are more introverted - need alone time to recharge, so taking solo breaks is not necessarily a red flag. But abstaining from all social engagement during down time - especially when it happens early in a new hire’s tenure - may be a flag that social integration isn’t working well. 
• Group dynamics. How does the new hire interact in group discussions and problem solving? Low engagement in group discussions can often be a sign of social disconnection, as weak social ties erode the trust and psychological safety required to interact effectively in groups. 
• Informal communications. How does the new hire engage in informal team interactions, like joining in group jokes or celebrating team wins? If the new hire is seldom visible in these discussions - even in lightweight ways like adding a comment or emoji reaction to a lighthearted message thread - it is a possible sign that the foundational social bonds have not been built yet. 

As a manager, it is an important part of your job during this phase of onboarding to monitor team spaces and evaluate the social integration of the new hire, including whether you need to do anything to intervene. 

Week 4: Qualitative check-in using “scale questions”

Midway through your observational evaluation, week 4 is generally a good touchpoint to check in and give the new hire the opportunity to surface how they feel their social integration is going.

Importantly, know that the responses you get here are often unreliable - many employees will simply not feel comfortable surfacing problems this early in their tenure, even if the pain is acute. Regardless, it is still important to ask - especially if you are seeing any of the red flags described above. 

One tool to get more accurate answers is asking “scale questions”, or questions where the answers come in the form of a placement on a 1 - 10 scale. Scale questions work because they trigger Intensity Matching, a cognitive process coined by Nobel-prize winning psychologist Dr. Daniel Kahneman in his landmark 2011 book Thinking Fast and Slow. In describing the function of “System 1”, or the part of our minds that manages fast, intuitive thinking, Kahneman explains [emphasis added]:

Questions about your happiness, the president’s popularity, the proper punishment of financial evildoers, and the future prospects of a politician share an important characteristic: they all refer to an underlying dimension of intensity or amount… a candidate’s political future can range from the low of “She will be defeated in the primary” to a high of “She will someday be president of the United States.” Here we encounter a new aptitude of System 1… An underlying scale of intensity allows matching across diverse dimensions.”

In other words, the human mind has an intuitive ability to translate how we feel about a subject to a scale. In difficult conversations, this ability can help us capture feelings that might be difficult or uncomfortable to describe in words.

Here are some sample scale questions that you might ask to evaluate how a new hire is feeling about their social integration so far:

• How is your integration with the team going? I know it’s super early on, but if 1 is “I feel pretty disconnected right now” and 10 is “I feel super integrated and bonded”, where do you think you stand?
• How is the social aspect so far? It’s only been a month and these things take time, but if 1 is “I haven’t really built many work friendships yet” and 10 is “I have a ton of work friends here”, where do you think you fall? 

Here are a few best practices in increasing the success of your scale questions when checking in on a new hire’s social onboarding:

• Keep it verbal. Importantly, only ask these scale questions in a synchronous 1-1 meeting; do not translate them into a written survey. Capturing this sentiment via a survey signals to the new hire that they are being evaluated, and that data is being recorded and may be shared (and have consequences). If the new hire feels evaluated, it will significantly decrease the likelihood that they honestly disclose how they are feeling.
• Soften the “1”. If you phrase whatever is at the low end of the scale as clearly bad or unacceptable, people are naturally going to shy away from it, even if it is accurate. Instead, try softening the low end by describing it as not ideal, but acceptable for the time being. For example, instead of 1 being “I have no friends here” or “I feel totally alone”, try “I haven’t connected with too many people yet” or “I’m finding my social integration a bit slow.” Softening the language in this way increases the likelihood that people will fess up to the fact that things haven’t been going well.
• Apply a positivity discount rate. Most people in their first month on the job will do their best to stay positive, and resist the urge to condemn or complain. So whatever response you get back, discount it by at least 15%, or even more if you feel you are still developing rapport with your report. For example, if someone reports their social connection is about a 7/10, assume it is a 5.5/10.

Weeks 9+: Rinse and repeat (+ engagement survey integration)

By week 9, formal onboarding activities begin to wind down, and the new hire moves into their role more fully. But social onboarding typically takes longer than company or functional onboarding, so it is important to continue monitoring for red flags on an ongoing basis, and checking in regularly on how the new hire is feeling regarding their social integration.   

This is also a good opportunity to make sure that the new hire has been added to the team engagement survey, if your organization uses one. While engagement surveys generally aggregate and anonymize their results, limiting your ability to understand how your new hire is doing, that new team member is now an important data point for the social connection of the team and should be included in your overall evaluation of team health.

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