How to Better Adjust to a New Job

This post was co-authored with Elizabeth Campbell, Ph.D., of the University of Minnesota

Like other in-person workplace traditions, orientations for new hires were turned into virtual events in many workplaces due to the pandemic. Some new hires may prefer virtual orientations. Staying muted may bring greater ease. Convening remotely may enable new hires to stay in their comfort zones—and perhaps even their pajamas. Joining via Zoom may minimize how compelled they feel to initiate conversations with unknown colleagues.

In contrast, other new hires may be thrilled when they hear their orientations would be in person. Meeting face to face with other new hires may enable stronger bonds. Chit-chatting informally may spark a host of new friendships. If you are not a fan of awkward icebreakers with a group of strangers, you may want to challenge yourself to build connections with at least a few fellow new hires. If you are already planning on asking everyone at your orientation to coffee in your first few months, you may want to keep your connections to a smaller size at first and save some energy for learning about your new tasks.

Many organizations are wrestling with decisions about the format of their orientations. Whether the format is in-person or online, our research on new hire adjustment has highlighted the need to focus on programming that nudges new hires toward forming connections with peers in their core group.

Starting a new job is often a stressful experience for new hires. On the one hand, it is imperative that they quickly grasp their new roles so they can start to deliver what they are hired to do. On the other hand, they need to develop their professional networks within their new organization so they have the right contacts for critical information and opportunities. With an ever-increasing emphasis on collaboration and teamwork, it’s difficult to get one’s job done without exchanging information and ideas with other coworkers in today’s workplace.

How can new hires network to support their adjustment?

While prior work has emphasized reliance on seasoned employees as critical to the new hires’ experience, our studies showed that making connections with fellow new hires seems to be an important place to start. “Old-timers” can get entrenched in workplace rituals, fail to recognize norms that warrant explanation, or run on autopilot in work situations that are still ambiguous to newcomers.

However, the solidarity of shared “newness” can allow fellow newcomers to make sense of what they experience for the first time together, such as figuring out the meaning of supervisors’ instructions or navigating how to interface with another department. Personally, the two co-authors of this article were fortunate to start their faculty jobs in the same university at the same time. The almost daily “debriefs” we had over coffee breaks in the first year helped us gain our footing as faculty members, better interpret faculty norms, and verify planned approaches to our work. In hindsight, this would have been a much more daunting task if we had to navigate and make sense of the new university alone—or bring our questions to more seasoned colleagues.

Building off our personal experience, we sought to understand the unique benefits of new hire peer-to-peer connections. With several colleagues, we examined how and why connections with fellow newcomers impacted new hires. To do so, we tracked cohorts of new hires of a large organization during their first months on the job. Employees who cultivated peer relationships during their early onboarding indeed reaped positive long-lasting benefits: they reported being happier four months into their jobs, were rated higher in job performance by supervisors at the end of their first year, and were more likely to stay with the organization during the first three years.

Networking takes time and energy. In the early days on the job, the more may not be the merrier.

Newcomers have two time-sensitive missions to accomplish in their early days at work: learning their own new roles and establishing a new professional network that can support, enable, and advise them. Both missions are critical. Overemphasizing one vis-à-vis the other can impair new hires’ productivity and well-being. Some new hires may err toward staying laser-focused on their new tasks, lacking motivation or social skills to meet and connect with their coworkers. Some newcomers, in contrast, may err toward floating around as social butterflies, engaging in extensive networking at the cost of mastering and delivering their assigned tasks.

Striking a balance between these two missions is key to successful adjustment. Our evidence indicated that new hires can start from getting to know a few peers in their core group and later broadening their connections after they have gained a clear understanding of their role.

What does this mean for organizations?

Our study provided some good news for employers, considering the amount of money and manpower spent on new hire onboarding every year, including running orientation programs. Organizations expect such investments to bring new hires more work-relevant knowledge, stronger identification with the organization’s mission, and, notably, more connections among the new hires themselves.

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Are these investments worthwhile? Some studies, including ours, have offered evidence that indeed orientation programs benefit new hires and employers. However, our data also pointed to a critical caveat: a well-crafted onboarding program requires guiding new hires to balance the right mix of connections. Namely, first build a handful of connections with colleagues who are navigating similar experiences so you can help one another make sense of your new organization and role. But also, stay mindful that too numerous connections may distract from work or provide redundant insights about your role and workplace.

As we enter this new phase of the pandemic, there is value for new hires to build connections with their fellow new hires regardless of the format of their orientations—whether by engaging in breakout room discussions or a conversation face to face following public health best practices. Such efforts can make their first few months through the uncharted water smoother sailing.