Column: Flow chart
John is standing at the reception desk to report for his first day at work. The receptionist tries to get hold of the team leader, but he seems to be in a meeting, so she points him towards the coffee corner.
In the meantime, she contacts the facilities department to check whether the welcome pack is ready, which should contain a badge, locker code, overview of lease cars, staff handbook and work clothing. “What?” asks the facilities manager. “For whom? We know of nothing!” The IT department hasn’t created a network account either, the laptop isn’t ready – not to mention a mobile phone. “But wasn’t he supposed to start next week?” Meanwhile, in the coffee corner, the new colleague is sipping his second cup of coffee and tapping his foot, waiting for what will come next.
Does this sound familiar? Maybe you had to organize everything yourself on your first day of work, or were asked to perform a last-minute installation on a laptop that had to be taken to a meeting that very afternoon? Organizing all the necessities for a new employee is a challenging task. Many parties are involved and they all require certain information and have to perform different tasks. The HR department might not realize that, from a security point of view, it is very important to set up the correct authorization on the network, while the IT department doesn’t realize that the facilities department has to place orders for everything to be ready on time – they are still waiting for the completed ‘new employee’ form that is still lying on the system administrator’s desk.
It doesn’t matter which role you play within this chain of events, you are always dependent on others and vice versa. If someone delays the process for whatever eason, it will result in the new employee having to organize his own badge, clothing and laptop. Although it might be a good way to get to know the company, it’s not the nicest. How do you solve such a problem? I have been to many organizations that have all come up with different solutions, including Excel forms, mail chains and internal memos. The best solution is to ensure that all necessary information is provided specifically and on time to the supporting departments. For organizations that work with a supporting system such as TOPdesk, it’s a relatively straight-forward process.
The first step involves getting together with all parties involved and discussing who is responsible for what and within which timeframe, but also which factors they are dependent on. Although this might seem like an obvious solution, try to draw a flow chart. Don’t make it too hard for yourself, but ensure that you cover all the essential processes. You can easily log individual actions in TOPdesk’s Change Management, which can even be supported by a special digital ‘new employee’ form in which all information is easily presented by the new team leader. It is also important that ou do not see the failure of the chain of activities as a failure of a certain department, but rather as a sign that it is vital to make specific agreements.
“Mr. Smith, welcome to our organization! I will give your new team leader a call. He will escort you to the service desk to pick up your welcome pack. Were you able to park your car in the reserved spot? Here is your badge, and your login name is jsmith.”
Would you call this utopian? I think not. You probably still have some past organizational issues, but try not to point the finger; instead, share another cup of coffee. Utopia is merely a flow chart away.
Annemarie Moeijes is a consultant at TOPdesk and has years of experience with implementations and changes within various organizations.
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