Trust: The Key to Making New Employees Feel Welcome

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Trust: The Key to Making New Employees Feel Welcome

Starting a new job often generates feelings of excitement coupled with anxiety. Add to that starting a new job in a new location, and it is easy to imagine why employees who relocate may have a challenging time acclimating to their new community and workplace.

Employers use a variety of services to ease the transition for their relocating hires and families. These services help employees navigate the most challenging aspects of a move, such as finding housing, schools, and childcare, so employees can focus on bringing their best selves to work.

Yet, feeling a sense of community outside work is not enough to keep workers engaged. What if the same driver of community connection also fuels employee engagement? We think it does. That driver is trust.

The importance of establishing trust in workplaces is not new. A 2017 issue of Harvard Business Review reported that people at “high-trust companies” had higher levels of engagement, productivity, energy, and satisfaction than their peers at “low-trust companies” (Zak).

So, how can leaders quickly establish trust with new employees?

Get to Know the Person

The foundation of trust is establishing a human connection with your new hire. During the interview and onboarding process, you might not know much about your employees’ personal lives. As they start, create opportunities for employees to open up about their interests, family life, and experiences. Model this by sharing information about yourself.

At the same time, I understand that not everyone wants to talk about their personal life at work. The reasons for this might be rooted in cultural norms and expectations or previous experiences of harassment or discrimination in the workplace.

Have these conversations from a place of empathy and curiosity. By seeking to better understand who your employee is as a person, not just as a producer of results, you are laying the bedrock of trust in your organization.

Listen to Your Employees’ Needs, Spoken and Unspoken

Take time to understand and validate your new employees’ emotions when they are feeling positive, as well as when they are feeling anxious or overwhelmed. In Daring to Lead, Brene Brown writes, “Trust is, in fact, earned in the smallest of moments. It is earned not through heroic deeds or even highly visible actions, but through paying attention, listening, and gestures of genuine care and connection.”

At LINC, we are in the position to help employees navigate multiple major life transitions. Often, they are moving to a new place, with a new company, for a new job. They may even be getting married, moving in with a partner for the first time, or have plans to grow their family. When asked what they need, our clients may respond with broad generalizations or simply say, “I don’t know” or “I’m fine.” Of course, we know better than to always take these responses at face value.

Asking thoughtful follow-up questions and finding tangible, appropriate ways to show your support builds a trusting environment that reduces stress and enables your employees to bring their best selves to work. For example, instead of asking, “How are you doing?” ask, “How is your family adjusting to the move?” Or “What aspects of our workplace culture have been easier or harder to adjust to so far?”

Understanding what your employees care about, their values, and their goals enables you to take a more nuanced, holistic approach to their career development and personal growth.

The Result: Connection and Community

Building trust involves a feeling of connection. By getting to know your new hires, listening to their needs, and treating them with dignity, kindness, and respect you are setting yourself and your team up for supporting a culture of inclusion and belonging where your new employees will be engaged and thrive.