New hire onboarding checklist
How to prepare for someone's first day: equipment and access, a week plan, a buddy, a first task, stated expectations and feedback in the first week.

[ ] Order the equipment in advance
    Laptop, network access, phone, desk, pass. Delivery and setup take days rather than hours.
[ ] Create accounts and access before the start date
    Email, chats, task tracker, repositories, internal systems. Build the list from the role rather than from memory.
[ ] Write a day-by-day plan for week one
    Who to meet, what to read, what to do. \u201cRead the documentation\u201d is not a plan.
[ ] Name a buddy or mentor
    Someone they can ask anything without feeling they are interrupting a manager. Agree it with that person in advance.
[ ] Prepare a small first task
    Useful and finishable within days. An early result gives more confidence than any welcome speech.
[ ] Introduce them and explain who does what
    Not just names: who owns what and who to ask about what. A simple team map saves weeks.
[ ] State the probation expectations
    What a good result looks like, how it is checked and when. Unstated expectations are the main cause of a bad start.
[ ] Add them to the right meetings and channels
    And explain what each meeting is for. A calendar without context looks like someone else's life.
[ ] Give a short list of what to read
    Five documents rather than the whole knowledge base. An unprioritised list reads as \u201cfigure it out yourself\u201d.
[ ] Schedule short check-ins in the first days
    Fifteen minutes at the end of the day: what worked, what is unclear, what is blocking. Cheaper than a week of quiet floundering.
[ ] Show them the mundane things
    Where the food is, how to book a room, how holiday works, who fixes laptops, when it is fine not to reply.
[ ] Plan remote onboarding separately
    Equipment delivery, video introductions, written instructions. Remotely nobody absorbs context from corridor conversations.
[ ] Give feedback after a week and after a month
    Early correction is cheaper and kinder than a late conclusion. And ask for feedback about the onboarding itself.
[ ] Note what to improve for the next hire
    While you remember. Onboarding improves only this way: small fixes after each new starter.

Checklist from Unload: https://unloads.me/c/onboarding-new-employee