Research from Norwegian academia shows that the onboarding phase for new employees is an important arena.

A good reception, or the opposite: misunderstandings and problems that arise in this phase can leave a lasting mark on the employment relationship. While many internationally recruited employees report that there is a lot of information to take in during the initial phase and thus it is difficult to sort out what is important, administrative staff report that they can be surprised by gaps in people’s knowledge even after several years of university work (Flikke et al., 2020; Flikke, 2024). 

Onboarding, information flow and what is communicated are therefore aspects that can be observed in the mapping process. It is useful to create good structures/routines to support new employees regardless of how much turnover there is during a year. 

In this phase, it can be a good idea to inform new employees not only about formal rules but also about informal guidelines and local social norms: local work culture, dress code, how to conduct supervision, or the culture for responding to emails. Informal guidelines can also involve rules for promotion, the role of leaders, and what is focused upon when people are recruited, etc. 

By creating an onboarding document, one also articulates the type of culture the organisation has and wants to have. Therefore, this is also a tool for making explicit several things that would otherwise remain implicit.  

Good information routines will help everyone, including international researchers, first-generation academics, or those coming from other academic communities, to communicate effectively and make well-informed decisions.  

We recommend extending the official onboarding period and making it clear to both academic and administrative staff that the threshold is low for asking questions. Supervisors can especially follow up on the work culture that PhD research fellows and postdoctoral fellows are socialised into, while project managers can take particular responsibility for employees who have joined their project group. If someone behaves in a way that violates social or cultural expectations, this may be due to a lack of communication or misunderstandings rooted in the onboarding phase. 

The onboarding package should include information that is specifically tailored to different target groups. For example: For professors, it can be helpful to know how teaching is conducted, how to carry out academic supervision, and how to organise a PhD public defence. For PhD research fellows, it can be helpful to inform them about what is expected of a doctoral research fellow, the expectations regarding a PhD thesis, which conferences and journals are most relevant to their field, and how to apply for further funding. Also make sure that all important information is available in both Norwegian and English.

Providing such an onboarding package with both formal and informal information will ensure that everyone has access to important information. The package can also include information about other resources available at your university (both local and central) and key contacts within the department. 

If you want to map employees’ knowledge of existing initiatives/resources, you can use KARMA’s simple qualitative questionnaire.