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10 Onboarding Checklist Templates for New Hires (2025)

Aarushi Singh
Written by Aarushi Singh
Published at Oct 11, 2023
10 Onboarding Checklist Templates for New Hires (2025)

Want to ensure the process of folding in new hires goes smoothly? Include these onboarding checklist templates in your process and onboard new employees in a breeze.

After weeks or months of going through a barrage of applications, you’ve finally selected the ideal candidate who ticks all the boxes on your list. But before you breathe a sigh of relief and get back to your business, it’s time to prepare for the next important phase — employee onboarding.

Employee onboarding is a long yet crucial process that can make or break a new hire’s experience in the company. If you get it right, they’ll settle in quickly and become a valuable addition to your team. If you get it wrong, they’ll leave your organization in a few months because of frustration and lack of information.

Unfortunately, not many hiring managers get onboarding right. They might forget a few steps along the way, leading to low employee engagement, low morale and a lack of trust in the company. This is where an onboarding checklist comes into the picture.

In this blog post, we’ll discuss what an onboarding checklist is and what steps it includes. Plus, we’ll look into the 10 diverse, high-quality onboarding checklist templates to help you streamline the onboarding process.

Here’s a short selection of 8 easy-to-edit onboarding checklist templates you can edit, share and download with Visme. View more templates below:

 

Table of Contents

Quick Read

  • An onboarding checklist is a list of tasks and activities that need to be completed to properly onboard a new employee.
  • These checklists typically include administrative tasks, such as filling out paperwork, as well as orientation activities, such as paperwork, office tours, introductions to team members, training sessions and more.
  • Your onboarding checklist should include the following: a welcome email, notifying your team, orientation, account signups, training, mentorship, feedback and follow-ups.
  • Visme has a rich library of resources for streamlining your HR and onboarding process. You’ll find stunning templates for creating onboarding checklists, training materials, employee handbooks, ID cards and other engaging HR materials.
  • Easily create visually appealing and engaging checklists to increase productivity with Visme's checklist maker.

 

What Is an Onboarding Checklist?

An onboarding checklist is a comprehensive list of steps to guide new employees through their first days at the organization. It is a way for hiring managers to ensure that each task of the new hire onboarding process is organized and on schedule.

Successfully welcoming new employees and preparing them for the new role is not an easy task. From getting all the paperwork right to communicating the job expectations, it’s common to miss a few things in the process. But as the infographic below shows, it’s crucial for new hire retention and maintaining productivity.

Onboarding process statistics

A well-prepared onboarding checklist can help to ensure that each task is completed on time. It provides the starting point for steps specific to the job role and helps your new teammates get started as soon as you welcome them to the company.

However, completing all the tasks in the onboarding checklist doesn’t mean successful onboarding. Each checklist should be created with your company’s culture, employees’ needs and various unplanned moments in mind.

 

What To Include in an Onboarding Checklist

The items to be included in the new hire onboarding checklist depend on the company’s culture and employees’ expectations. But there are a few items that every onboarding agenda for new hires should have regardless.

1. Send a welcome email: The first few days or even weeks can be overwhelming for the new employees. From filling out the paperwork to meeting team members, there’s a lot to be done. So, before their first day in the company, send them a welcome email on behalf of the company’s founder or HR manager.

Your new member onboarding checklist should contain the first-day schedule, working hours, dress code and calendar invites to onboarding sessions, introductory meetings and more. Also, don’t forget to personalize it for each candidate. The goal is to ease their first-day jitters and make them feel appreciated and a part of your team.

2. Notify your team: Don't assume that your existing employees know about the new hire. For a warm welcome, share details about the new employee with your team members, such as name, photo, job role, work experience, background, education and skill set via Slack or email. Also, encourage your team to introduce themselves and share what they do at the organization.

Improve your HR materials and communication with visuals

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3. Office tour: Take your new hires on a guided tour around the office on their first day and introduce them to their co-workers. Show them all the important areas and facilities, such as the bathroom, meeting room, kitchen, fitness center and canteen. Furthermore, take them to their desk and give them a swag bag filled with branded notebooks, water bottles, pens, t-shirts, or a mug. The goal is to familiarize the new employees with the work environment so they feel enthusiastic about coming to the office daily.

4. Complete the paperwork: Paperwork might be boring but it’s an important part of the onboarding process. So, once you assign the new employees a desk, provide them with the necessary documentation related to pay, benefits, taxes and more. These documents should be prepared by the HR team and signed by the new hire. In the case of a remote employee, email them all the documents and help them complete the forms if required.

5. Account signups: This is the perfect time for the new employees to sign up for all the important digital tools your company uses. These may include HR, training, email, project management software, communication and many more, depending on their job role. To make it easier for candidates, create a checklist of all the accounts along with their usernames and passwords. This will save time on the first day they would otherwise spend fumbling with passwords.

6. Assign training materials: Joining a new organization is challenging, even for experienced employees. It can take days or even weeks to get familiar with all the workflows, the team's hierarchy chart and processes required to complete their tasks. So, provide them with onboarding templates, helpful resources and guides in advance to make their transition smoother right from the first day. Also, give them access to your employee handbook and internal knowledge base, if you have one.

This company culture guide template is a great example of the kind of material you should share with your new employee.

Customize this template and make it your own! Edit and Download

Read this article to learn how to create visually stunning corporate training materials.

 

10 Onboarding Checklist Templates You Can Use Right Now

No matter the size of your business, you don’t need to break the bank to make your recruitment process top-notch. Visme has a huge repository of engaging resources and materials for HR teams. With our checklist maker, you can easily turn a boring checklist into a visually appealing document

Here are onboarding checklist templates to make your onboarding process super seamless.

1. Employee Onboarding Checklist Consulting Template

The HR department is not the only team responsible for the successful onboarding of the new hire. In fact, the process requires collaboration from many teams, including IT, supervisors and managers. However, poor coordination between departments can result in a negative onboarding experience for new employees. And that's exactly where this checklist can help.

Employee Onboarding Checklist Consulting
Customize this template and make it your own! Edit and Download

This employee onboarding checklist template covers all the tasks each department needs to complete for a smooth onboarding process. For example, the HR department needs to send a welcome email, fill out tax forms, provide company swag to the new employees and invite them to team building sessions.

Responsibilities of the manager include:

Further, the IT department needs to provide the necessary digital tools along with access, answer software-related queries and provide IT support to new hires. This prevents confusion between departments as they know what they're in charge of.

You can use Visme’s online document creator to customize this new hire checklist and assign the onboarding tasks to each team. Add or remove bullet points as needed to create a comprehensive onboarding plan. You can also change the image and logo and apply custom colors to make it on-brand.

2. New Employee Onboarding Checklist Template

Bringing new employees into the existing company culture is difficult, especially without a clearly defined onboarding process flow. Therefore, it’s crucial to build an effective onboarding process flowchart. Also, highlight tasks to be completed under different onboarding stages, such as preparation, pre-boarding, training, follow-up and so on.

New Employee Onboarding Checklist
Customize this template and make it your own! Edit and Download

This onboarding checklist template for new hires mentions tasks according to three phases—preparation, onboarding and follow-up. The preparation stage starts right after the candidate accepts the job offer. It also includes preparing the employment contract, NDA and tax forms, reviewing and updating the company handbook, creating a new employee ID and more. Similarly, there are more sub-tasks for onboarding day and a follow-up process.

Since each company has its unique onboarding process, you can customize new employee checklist templates according to your onboarding program. Plus, you can also change images, company address, add your logo, website and other crucial information.

3. Remote Employee Onboarding Checklist Template

How do you make sure your remote employees have a positive onboarding experience without coming to the office? Simple. A well-designed remote onboarding checklist template ensures you don’t miss out on important steps.

Remote Employee Onboarding Checklist
Customize this template and make it your own! Edit and Download

This remote onboarding manual template breaks down the complex onboarding process into smaller, more manageable tasks according to three phases — preparation, onboarding and first week. It allows the HR teams to get more clarity on what task to perform and when to perform it. It can also be used as a timeline to measure the time needed to fully onboard an employee.

Missing out on any step might leave remote employees with incomplete, impartial information, leading to communication problems and confusion along the way.

Whether you already work with remote workers or have hired them for the first time, you can use Visme to create a similar checklist and list remote onboarding steps. You can also change colors, fonts, images and logo to suit your brand style in just a few clicks. What’s more, you can share the template directly with the remote employees via email — either as a PDF file or as a link.

4. Marketing Team Onboarding Checklist Template

Marketing teams have unique training needs. They need to have full disclosure about your product, revenue goals, financial situations, customers, competitors, processes, technology, corporate culture and so on.

Further, marketing connects with sales, product and customer support. All marketing hires need to understand and engage with all these departments to do their jobs.

Marketing is one of the crucial business functions. Therefore, it’s necessary to onboard the marketing teams the right way so they can give their best to achieve business goals. This is where a marketing team onboarding checklist comes into play.

Marketing Team Onboarding Checklist
Customize this template and make it your own! Edit and Download

This marketing team onboarding checklist template covers the different onboarding tasks new marketing hires must complete on their first day, week and month of employment. Breaking the process into sections by timing ensures your marketing team’s start is seamless and nothing falls through the cracks.

You can include the tools and resources they’ll need to do their jobs. When it comes to the design, you can easily modify fonts, colors and graphics to match the template with your brand style using Visme.

5. Customer Service Representative Onboarding Checklist Template

Onboarding your customer service representatives is important because this service experience resonates with your customers. It also helps generate positive reviews about your company.

However, bringing in new customer agents and helping them master their new job is a whole new challenge. This is where a customer service representative onboarding checklist template can help you fold in new agents—without missing any crucial steps.

Customer Service Representative Onboarding Checklist
Customize this template and make it your own! Edit and Download

The onboarding checklist sample above covers certain onboarding tasks that need to be performed during pre-boarding, onboarding and the first week of employment. Plus, it clearly defines the tasks the HR department is responsible for completing.

Depending on your company's culture, policies and the new hire’s needs, you can modify this template by adding or removing tasks under each section. Further, you can change colors, fonts and graphics to suit your brand. If you create this new hire checklist on Visme, you can download it as a PDF file or share its link directly with the new hire.

6. Business Analyst Onboarding Checklist Template

Bringing in a new business analyst to an already established analytical team is a challenging process. They need to understand the business domain and how each software helps achieve business growth. The following business analyst onboarding checklist template can make the onboarding easier and ensure that the new business analyst has all the resources and information required to succeed.

Business Analyst Onboarding Checklist
Customize this template and make it your own! Edit and Download

This onboarding checklist outline lists the tasks to be performed when new business analysts are starting out. It has different columns for tasks, due date, priority and the assigned member. This means that all the concerned parties will have complete knowledge about what task is to be done and when and who is responsible for performing that particular task.

You can prepare a similar template for new hire checklists in Visme and create a list of activities. You're also able to mark the priority status for each one and assign a member and a due date for each task.

The checklist contains tasks to be done before the first day and during the first week of employment. But you can easily edit it for any duration.

7. New Project Manager Onboarding Checklist Template

Managers require a strong set of skills, such as:

  • Communication skills
  • Providing feedback to subordinates
  • Conducting performance reviews for each employee.

Further, they are responsible for organizing teams and projects to achieve business goals. These skills might not be required in the manager’s previous job role. Hence, you must lay out the process via an onboarding checklist to ensure new project managers manage everything effectively and meet deadlines on time.

New Project Manager Onboarding Checklist
Customize this template and make it your own! Edit and Download

The above new project manager onboarding checklist example is quite different from other templates in this list. It walks through the tasks for onboarding new project managers along with the respective phase, i.e., plan, act and check.

The “plan” phase tasks involve scheduling a meeting with the previous and new manager and planning a pilot project for the new hire to assess their skills. The “act” phase tasks include preparing onboarding documents, a new manager working on the pilot project and updating company guidelines. Finally, the “check” phase involves reviewing the pilot project completed by the new manager.

You can tailor this template based on your new project manager’s onboarding and training needs using Visme. Add or remove the tasks and edit the font, colors and images based on your brand style guide. You can even share this template as a PDF or directly as a link with the managers and new hires, so everyone remains on the same page.

8. Technical Team Onboarding Checklist Template

Hiring a new technical team comes with specific tech and cultural expectations. Further, the learning and training curve can be pretty steep for even seasoned employees. This calls for an effective onboarding process that must introduce technologies, tools and workflows used on the job, outline the company's culture, mission and values and more. To make the process easier, use this onboarding checklist template any time you hire a new technical team in your organization.

Technical Team Onboarding Checklist
Customize this template and make it your own! Edit and Download

The technical team onboarding checklist template lists all the steps in your onboarding program based on different onboarding phases—pre-boarding, first day, first week, first month and first quarter. This helps the managers track all the tasks that need to be performed during a specific period. It also eliminates confusion regarding what to do and when to do it.

You can easily create this new hire checklist template on Visme even without any professional design skills. Not only can you change the design, colors and font, but also modify the images, points and headings as per your team’s needs.

9. New Developer Onboarding Checklist Template

When joining a new company, developers are required to be trained in code bases and architectures. And if they’re expected to teach these themselves, it might make them want to quit. Hence, you need an easy and relaxed developer onboarding checklist to boost retention and employee satisfaction.

New Developer Onboarding Checklist
Customize this template and make it your own! Edit and Download

The above checklist for new hires template has more than 20 tasks an HR manager needs to tick off before a new developer is ready to work. All the tasks are listed under four categories—HR/Paperwork, Workplace, Policies and Assessment.

Using Visme, you can design this checklist template specifically for new developers in your company. It can act as a basic outline that includes tasks related to your HR department, workplace, the new developer and the position being filled.

10. Sales Team Onboarding Checklist Template

Your company's new sales team’s success largely depends on how organized your onboarding process is. Sales teams have unique cultures and training needs as compared to other employees.

In fact, there are various onboarding tasks for sales reps, such as:

  • Giving a training manual on product features and use cases
  • Imparting marketing knowledge about sending pitches, cold emailing and calling
  • Acquiring leadership skills

Hence, you need a sales team onboarding checklist template to monitor each task and ensure nobody falls behind.

Sales Team Onboarding Checklist
Customize this template and make it your own! Edit and Download

The above onboarding checklist template for new hires clearly defines the tasks to be completed for a successful onboarding process. It mentions the onboarding activities based on timing (i.e. the preparation phase, the first week and the first month of employment).

You can tailor the new hire checklist template based on your sales team’s requirements. Go ahead and modify the tasks and the heading of each section as per your choice.

Not only that, you change the company logo, address, colors and fonts for a more branded experience using Visme.

 

Onboarding Best Practices

A smooth employee onboarding is a critical part of the hiring process. It educates your new employees about your company culture and the great features your product or service has.

To ensure your process is successful, here are a few onboarding best practices:

Communicate Before Your New Hire’s First Day

For a smooth first day, it’s crucial to prepare well in advance. Ideally, you should start the onboarding process at least 1-2 weeks before the new employee’s first day.

During this time, do these things:

  • Share important information and help them set up the right systems
  • Provide them access to necessary equipment
    Notify your team about the new member

Communicating with new hires ahead of time can give a positive first impression and ease the first-day jitters they may have.

Create a Checklist for Each Stage of the Hiring Process

The next step is to create a checklist that will guide each stage of the hiring. You can create a checklist for welcome email, pre-onboarding, first day, first week and first month.

The Welcome Email Checklist

Creating a comprehensive welcome email is a crucial step in the onboarding process for new hires. It sets the tone for their experience and provides essential information to help them integrate smoothly into the organization.

Here's a checklist of what you should capture in your welcome email for onboarding new employees:

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Pre-Onboarding Checklist

Preparing for a new hire's arrival is essential to ensure a smooth onboarding process. Here's a pre-onboarding checklist to help you organize and streamline the necessary tasks before the new employee's first day:

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First Day Checklist

A first day checklist for new hires is essential to make them feel welcome, informed, and prepared for their new role. By following this first-day checklist below, you can ensure that new hires have a positive and productive start.

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First Week Checklist

The first week is crucial for new hires as it sets the tone for their journey within the organization. Here's a comprehensive first week checklist to help integrate new employees effectively:

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First Month Checklists

Creating a comprehensive first-month checklist for new hires is essential for ensuring they have a smooth onboarding experience and can quickly become productive members of the team. Here's a sample checklist that you can customize based on your company's specific needs and requirements:

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Set up the Employee’s Workplace

Setting up the employee’s workstation can be time-consuming. This process delays new hires from beginning their training or getting acquainted with the systems.

Therefore, it’s best to complete this step before the candidate arrives. Make sure to align with their choice to make them feel comfortable in their new setting.

For example, some people use a cordless mouse with their laptops. Further, check whether all equipment is fully functional and ready to use.

Assign a Buddy

Pair your new employee with a more experienced employee, known as a welcome buddy. This should be someone who is neither on their team nor their manager.

A buddy can act as a mentor and is great for asking doubts the new employee may feel scared to ask their manager. The goal here is to take some burden off the managers while also making new recruits comfortable on their first day.

Build Personalized Onboarding Programs

Different types of employees have different needs and expectations. Therefore it’s advisable to create onboarding programs personalized for each candidate.

For example, the onboarding requirements of a remote employee will be different from in-office employees. These may include sending necessary equipment to them, conducting virtual team building sessions and so on.

Further, onboarding a marketing team will be different from onboarding a business analyst because their training needs and skills differ.

The onboarding program will include training programs to get the new hire up to speed with your company’s vision and mission, as well as their responsibilities.

Using the template below, your HR team can develop an effective training plan for employees.

Customize this template and make it your own! Edit and Download

Employee handbooks are also important tools for onboarding. They outline important information about the company, such as its mission, values, policies, procedures, benefits, and expectations. The template below is one of the standout employee handbook templates from our comprehensive library.

Sapphire Mining Co Employee Handbook
Sapphire Mining Co Employee Handbook
Sapphire Mining Co Employee Handbook
Sapphire Mining Co Employee Handbook
Sapphire Mining Co Employee Handbook
Customize this template and make it your own! Edit and Download

In Visme’s robust library, you’ll also find templates for creating free stunning ID card designs for new hires.

Marketing Director
Marketing Director
Customize this template and make it your own! Edit and Download

These onboarding materials can be fully customized to meet your unique needs. You can edit the content, change image(s), apply custom colors, input your own fonts and logo, and more.

Gone are the days when onboarding documents were boring and bland. Create interactive and immersive experiences for new hires using sleek animation effects like pop-ups, hover effects and more.

interactive learning - pop up and hover effects

 

Google Sheets vs Excel vs Visme: Best Onboarding Checklists

When it comes to creating onboarding checklists, there are several tools available, such as Microsoft Excel, Google Sheets, and Visme. In this article, we'll compare these three options and help you determine which one is best for your onboarding needs.

 

Visme

onboarding checklist software - Visme logo

Overview

Visme is an all-in-one visual content creation platform that allows users to create interactive presentations, infographics, reports, and other visual materials. The beauty of using Visme is that it offers a wide range of design customization tools. With a few clicks, you can transform your boring checklist into captivating visual content.

onboarding checklist software - Visme editor

Features

Pros

  • Offers a wide range of visually appealing templates and design elements, making it suitable for creating visually engaging checklists.
  • Provides flexibility in design with drag-and-drop features and multimedia integration.
  • Allows you to create interactive and animated checklists, enhancing user engagement.
  • The tool is intuitive and easy to use
  • Supports integrations with multiple third-party tools

Cons

You cannot use the tool without an internet connection.

 

Google Sheets

onboarding checklist software - Google Sheets logo

Overview

Google Sheets allows users to create, edit, and share spreadsheets and checklists online. One of its key features is real-time collaboration.

To create your onboarding checklists, enter your checklist items and format them to have checkboxes. Multiple team members to work on the same document simultaneously.

onboarding checklist software - Google Sheets editor

Features

  • Real-time collaboration: Multiple users can edit the same document in real-time.
  • Accessible from any device: Can be accessed and edited from computers, smartphones, and tablets with an internet connection.
  • Integration: Seamlessly integrates with other Google Workspace apps.
  • Version history: Allows users to view the document's version history and track changes made by collaborators.

Pros

  • Accessible from any device with an internet connection.
  •  Multiple team members can work on the checklist simultaneously in real time.
  • You can view version history and track changes made by team members.
  • Seamlessly integrates with other Google Workspace apps like Google Docs and Google Forms.
  • Using Google Sheets for checklists is free and requires no additional software or subscriptions.

Cons

  • While there are templates available, the variety might not be as extensive as Visme.
  • The available options for customizing the design are quite basic and limited in scope.
  • Limited options for adding animations and interactivity
  • Requires an internet connection to access and edit the documents, although there is an offline mode with limitations.

 

Excel

onboarding checklist software - Excel logo

Overview

Microsoft Excel is a powerful spreadsheet application that makes creating a simple checklist. The tool is known for its advanced functionalities for data analysis, calculations, and complex formulas. It is widely used for various business and analytical purposes.

onboarding checklist software - Excel editor

Features

  • Extensive library of templates: Offers a wide range of pre-designed templates for different purposes.
  • Provides robust functions for complex calculations and data analysis.
  • Highly customizable with intricate design options and formulas.
  • Excel can easily integrate with other Microsoft tools, such as Word and PowerPoint, which can be useful for creating comprehensive reports or presentations based on the checklist data
  • Unlike Google Sheets, Excel is an offline application, which means that checklists can be accessed and edited without an internet connection.

Pros

  •  Offers a wide range of pre-designed templates for various purposes, including onboarding checklists.
  • Provides functions for complex calculations and data analysis.
  • Highly customizable with the ability to create intricate designs and formulas.

Cons

  • Collaboration features are not as robust as Google Sheets, especially in the desktop version.
  • The software provides limited options for including animations and interactive elements.
  • Requires specific software (Microsoft Excel) to be installed on each user's device.
  • Limited design and customization options

 

Onboarding Checklist FAQs

What Is an Onboarding Checklist?

An onboarding checklist is a list of tasks that need to be completed at a company to fully onboard a new employee. This may include tasks that the new hire needs to complete, or it may be a more comprehensive checklist that includes tasks required of every department, from HR to accounting and more.

How Long Should an Onboarding Checklist Be?

There are no rules for how long an onboarding checklist should be. It all depends on your company or team and its needs when you’re bringing on new employees. If your checklist is growing too long then you might need to create a timeline list instead.

What Are the 5 C’s of Onboarding?

The 5 C’s of onboarding are:

  • Compliance: Make sure your employee understands all compliance requirements within their role and at your company.
  • Clarification: Clarify all job responsibilities and expectations of the employee as soon as they start.
  • Culture: Give your employees a good look at what your company culture will be like so they can start meeting other team members and fitting in.
  • Connection: Introduce your new employees to higher-ups within the company as well as team leads for other departments so they’re able to network and build connections.
  • Check Back: Check back in around 30, 60 and 90 days to make sure your new employees are feeling comfortable in their new roles.

What to Include on an Onboarding Checklist

Some key tasks to include in your onboarding checklist include:

  • Send Welcome Kit
  • Schedule Meetings With Team
  • Outline Short Term Goals
  • Provide Training Information
  • Create Logins for Necessary Tools

And anything else that is required for employees to get started on the right foot.

How Do You Measure Onboarding Process Effectiveness?

It’s always a good idea to review your processes to make sure they’re as effective as possible. This includes your onboarding process. A few things to look at to make sure your onboarding process is effective is your employee turnover rate, new hire performance, and feedback gathered from new hires.

What is Formal vs. Informal Onboarding?

In formal onboarding, new employees are often seated separately from the rest of their team until they have fulfilled their training. In informal onboarding, training materials are provided while new employees are simultaneously learning the ropes in their new role and starting to work with their new co-workers.

 

Create Your Onboarding Checklist with Visme

Creating an onboarding checklist can help you track the complicated steps in onboarding new teams.

If you need help designing an effective onboarding checklist template, get started with Visme’s professional document creator. You can also use the tool to prepare manuals, presentations and other onboarding materials to share with new employees.

Aarushi Singh
Written by Aarushi Singh

Aarushi is a B2B SaaS copywriter and content strategist. Being a software engineer, she has a knack for tech products and truly understands SaaS which helps her create value-packed content for B2B audience.

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