How to Train an Employee on Their First Day

On an employee's first day of work, nervousness is going to play a large role in their reaction to almost everything. No one wants to make a mistake within their first hour on the job, so it is up to you to help explain everything in detail, give them a list of tasks they need to complete and assign someone to work with them side by side. This will not only help the understand their job quicker, but it will also help you as their manager to see from a distance how well they are adjusting.

Assigning a Trainer

Although you should be the first to greet your new employee and give them a tour of the facility, it is ideal to ask one of your senior employees to take over and show them how everything is done. If you send them in blind on their first day, they are bound to make mistakes and lose motivation due to embarrassment.

Detailed Descriptions

When you explain anything to a new employee, you must be extremely thorough and detailed with the task descriptions. By going around and just showing them the equipment without explaining to them how it runs and how to fix it if an error occurs, you are only setting you and them up for failure. So be sure to prepare yourself on what needs to be explained in depth and what can just be recognized.

Creating a List

Even after you have explained the trainee's daily schedule and duties in a very descriptive way, it is ideal to still create them a list as a daily reminder for next few days or at least until they become more familiar with it. This way whenever a question arises on where they should be or what they should be doing, they can simply just look at their list and answer the question for themselves.