Setting the right expectations during the recruitment process can help retaining the new colleagues from feeling like they have been the victims of a bait-and-switch, mitigating a lot of potential confusion and disappointment. For that to happen you need:
accurate job description
effective interviews
I learned from experience that this is a crucial moment, so I decided to share with the new joiners the outcomes of our last three retrospective sessions.
In this way, the new joiner has a clear overview over what makes us a great team, as well as what sinks us down at the moment. This is the best way to create empathy and build trust, as we are honest and present the reality. We ask for help and he brings fresh insights to solve the team's problems. This helps the new joiner to focus on generating ideas and make work better, rather than wasting time to discover all of these aspects for himself.
Expectations are like a Highway, it offers two directions: on one way we clear what he has to know about the team/company, on the other way we clear what we need to know about him.
After sharing our Team's reality, I as a scrum master reach out to him and ask him: "What do we need to know about you to work better together?". Among the responses I heard flexibility, experimentation, clear goals, etc. It helps immensely to understand the new joiner's reality to help him help us.
Please take this as an experiment and you will see the amazing results.
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