Leadership Success in the Overlap
The importance and difference of Orientation, Integration, and Assimilation of new leaders
Onboarding is often a catch all to describe three phases - orientation, integration, AND assimilation.
While all three are critical to the success of new hires, they shouldn’t be treated as one and the same. There is a difference between these three. We need to be treating them as such in order to be able to create a plan that utilizes all three to set new leaders up for success.
Right now, most organizations focus on the administrative and technical elements of onboarding. But in reality, this is actually an orientation - like bringing people on board, having them attend a meet & greet, and setting them up on compliance systems/documents. It’s a short-term plan because new hires need an org chart, their computer passwords, and their I-9s from the very start. But then they’re sent off into the “wild”.
Integration has more to do with ingraining the person in their new team to make them a fully functioning member of the team as quickly and smoothly as possible. It’s a short- to medium-term aspirational goal that should start within the first month of hiring because new leaders need to activate their teams and begin to nurture key relationships.
But it shouldn’t stop there. If you want to ingrain the new hire into the organizational culture so that they can have a long-term impact, then you need to prioritize assimilation. Encourage them to lead given the context of the team, organization, and industry. Help new leaders adapt to the way things are done (the culture, decision making, and (in)formal influence) so that they can uncover pain points and unlock opportunities in a way that will be accepted/embraced and make meaningful change and improvements. While assimilation needs to start from jump, it is not an overnight phase, it is critical in the first 100 days, and it doesn’t end until 6-9 months on the job. It will not only set the tone for the next year and half, but will ensure long-term success.
It might feel like a lot of balls to juggle, but with the right tools it’s the overlap that is the sweet spot of long-term leadership success.
