Key takeaways:
- Onboarding new marketing or CX employees is often neglected or inadequate.
- A customer journey map (CJM) helps new hires understand company operations and customer interactions independently.
- CJMs reduce and improve the questions new hires ask, aiding smoother integration.
- New hires use CJMs to identify the right team members for specific queries.
- CJMs also help consultants quickly understand company processes and contribute effectively.
It would be very difficult to find a company owner or an employee who’s thrilled with the idea of helping a new marketing or customer experience hire to settle down and explain everything about the company’s operations and his new job. Being thrilled with a new person joining the team – definitely. But with all that comes with it? Not so much.
Onboarding a new marketing or CX employee should include (with the emphasis on “should” because it’s rarely done in its entirety) explaining the person’s responsibilities, introducing the tool stack and how it’s used, all marketing and CX activities the company is doing, how successful these activities are, how long are they running, who’s responsible for each, how they fit into the big picture, who are your target audiences, and so on.
We also have to mention another approach” – no onboarding. Some companies have neither a process for easing a new person in, nor team members willing to dedicate some of their time to show the newbie the ropes.
Sometimes onboarding doesn’t fall on any single team member, but it’s rather an exercise for the whole team. It’s not that it’s unpleasant – it just takes a lot of time. What if there was a better way? There is.
Show the newbie your customer journey map. Why? Go a few paragraphs back and read again what the onboarding should include. A big chunk of it is exactly what a customer journey map is for. Starting at a new job is so overwhelming that the newcomer is lucky when he remembers a way to the restroom, let alone the customer touchpoints and their details. It doesn’t matter how well you explain them – there’s just so much to remember and take in at once.
That’s why having a CJM and giving your new employee access makes so much sense. Instead of listening to you and your colleagues go on and on and wondering what you just said 5 minutes ago, your new team member can relax and learn everything at his own pace – by studying your CJM, checking out all the touchpoints himself, and having time to dive deeper into them.
By giving him time to understand everything with no pressure and a reference to come back to, he will be able to hit the ground running. Of course, there will still be plenty of things he will have to ask you and learn, but the questions would be much lower in number, much better pointed, and your answers much better understood – which brings us to the next point.
Let’s face it: everybody knows it’s true, but very few will admit it: new employees always keep the number of questions they ask in check. They would love to ask A TON of things but are afraid they will be a burden, so they just pick a few they consider to be most important and hope they will figure out the rest later, while the team pretends everything is alright. This creates situations where new hires are 2 months into the job and expected to start performing, without even knowing the basics. The problem is, they often don’t know what they don’t know – there’s nowhere to check it. With CJM, there would be.
Another huge help for you and your new colleague will be the fact that he will know who to ask a particular thing. Since CJM touchpoints (or at least those in Out of Dark) include team members who are responsible for them, he will be able to go straight to the right person.
This concept of showing newcomers your customer journey map goes beyond onboarding new employees. It works for the consultants, too, who are in a similar spot as new employees are – the difference is that they’re expected to start performing much sooner than new hires. But they don’t always have all the needed information, so sometimes they can’t. This creates another common sight at the companies: employees being unhappy with the consultant’s work or suggestions “because he doesn’t know how it works here”. Sure he doesn’t – how can he? Maybe if he had something to lead him – yes, something like a customer journey map – he would be a much bigger asset.
The funny thing about customer journey map is that this is only a byproduct. CJM is not primarily meant to help you with onboarding new people, but the fact that it can do it is yet another testament to its viability. Its primary role is to help you keep track of, evaluate, and improve your customer touchpoints.
