Epic Onboarding
DRUMBEAT Onboarding
If you were managing an orchestra or rock band or jazz ensemble how would you go about welcoming or onboarding the new Lead Drummer?
I’m guessing you would walk her around and introduce the other players. You would also show her to a practice room. And then you’d hand her the sheet music for what’s going to be played next with notes from the conductor. You might ask for her opinion.
Do you hand out the sheet music with directions for how we play work in your shop, and ask for an opinion?
I’m not talking about the employee manual with all the rules that will get you fired. You didn’t hire her to fire her. You hired her to fire her up, keep the beat even when there are confusing counter melodies and a cacophony of competing volumes.
DRUMBEAT Onboarding is about the music, style, the mission, how to think like the whole orchestra, and in return share how to think with them. That’s a team.
You do that that when you onboard someone, right?
Management and Leadership are two different things. Management is the short game, today, tomorrow, next week. Leadership is the long game, dropping everything as not to miss a motivational or coaching moment, the purpose, the passion and I’m beginning to think that the real beat is “enthusiasm.”
Do you know what made the new hire enthusiastic about taking on their new roll? This is the Better Sounding Question. Ask, listen to the answer.
Let me tell you a story about an epic DRUMBEAT First Day.
I was in hospitality for most of my career. One of the historic hotel properties developed a foul odor coming from the basement. This is REALLY not a good thing with a dining room directly above. I called our plumbing contractor, and their master plumbers couldn’t find it. This was admittedly an arduous task as the crawlspace was claustrophobic.
Next I hired an engineering firm to do a study. This cost several thousand dollars and they concluded it was coming up through the dirt floor. Really? Next I called in a local General Contractor who had done extensive work on the property. No Joy. No real effort either. You really know who your friends are when they don’t stay in your corner when your back is against the ropes. Remember that next time someone asks you for help and you’re too busy. At least negotiate when and how you might be able to give serious help.
Finally, I had had enough. I called the plumbing contractor back, said we needed to get the bottom of this, NOW, bring whatever team was needed—and it was a make good. I wasn’t going to pay and would never use them again if they didn’t find the source of the odor.
They showed up with ten techs; masters, journeymen, and an apprentice on his first day, all dressed in hazmat suits. They wriggled through the crawl spaces for about an hour.
Finally, from deep in the belly of the basement, we all heard a muffled, “I found it!”
About twenty minutes later, after the apprentice wriggled his way back to us, he told us, “I looked around a corner, and there was another corner I looked around and I found an open grease pit.” A connection from the dishwasher’s station must have sprung a leak—a long time ago.
None of the other geniuses, master plumbers, engineers, or GC had bothered to look around a couple corners. It must not have been worth it to them. But an apprentice on his first day at work did. How’s that for onboarding? Think he’ll become a master plumber in record time with that story and attitude?
How cool would it be if you could engineer a first day at work like that for all your new hires? How about a situation, real or staged that allows the new hire to ask the most extraordinary “stupid question” that none of your geniuses have been able to solve like “what’s around this corner?” or “Why don’t you…?” or “Have you considered…?”
Try this exercise with your team, your band of characters: How might we make the onboarding experience totally memorable, and a total immersion into our culture? The process I’d suggest for this is silent ideation. Don’t rush it. If you have an idea wall at your show leave the question up for a week or month and have people put ideas on sticky notes up on the wall. Offer a prize for all the ideas that get tested. I call this be a BIG fan of small tests. Keep the best one in place until a new one tests better. You might even have a few that match better the style of each new hire. That would make you a master onboarder.
The goal is to win. The goal is to know what winning looks like. The goal is to empower you team to think There is no better time to get a eureka moment than to get fresh eyes on an old problem. Would Blockbuster still be around if the onboarding exercise was, “what do you like about Netflix, what do you like about Blockbuster?”
What are the truly critical exchanges that drive your business? In the hospitality industry there is a saying, “You are only as good as the last meal you served.” What if every first day was an opportunity to renew the meaning for the important work your whole team does? Your reason for being? To see the word again through fresh eyes?
“The thing that Jesus really would’ve liked would be the guy that plays the kettle drum in the orchestra.”
— J.D. Salinger, The Catcher in the Rye
What if every new hire felt the power of playing the Kettle Drum? What if every team member was totally responsible for winning?
That’s DRUMBEAT Onboarding !! You game?
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