Enablement Onboarding Template

The Sales Enablement Onboarding Template is a comprehensive 12-week roadmap designed to develop new Learning Experience Designers from uncertain newcomers to confident contributors. It blends structured learning, relationship-building, and hands-on experience to help designers navigate their new environment while gradually increasing autonomy.

The template includes weekly task checklists, reflection prompts, and essential resources ranging from technical tools to key stakeholders. It covers everything from company mission and values to specialized learning objectives and team dynamics. With thoughtful touches like welcome cards and team lunches, it creates a supportive environment while systematically building the skills and knowledge needed for success in the sales enablement ecosystem.

What makes it particularly effective is how it balances practical onboarding logistics with meaningful integration into the team culture and business context, ensuring new designers quickly find their footing while developing the relationships needed for long-term success.

Note: this template was developed in 2020, so some of the data points need to be updated.

Hiring Manager Checklist

Congratulations on your new employee!

We will now begin pre-boarding for this eagerly-awaited addition to your team. 

Onboarding is more than completing new hire paperwork or attending an orientation. It can make or break your new hire’s satisfaction with their choice to join [company]. A solid onboarding experience bridges the gap between candidate experience and the employee experience, acclimating them to the culture and values of our company, and the processes and responsibilities of your team. 

According to Recruiting data, 1 in 4 new hires will leave within six months! Given that the newest workforce generation is in a state of constant flux (21% of Millennials switched jobs last year), providing excellent onboarding is essential for retaining quality employees.

This fact, coupled with how expensive and time-consuming it is to hire new employees, makes detailed and thoughtful onboarding crucial to [company]’s success.

So before your new employee steps foot into the office, answer some questions and complete the following checklist, then personalize the onboarding plan that follows. From the basics to awesome extras, this will help you identify ways to make them feel valued and welcome. 

Your objectives in your new hire’s first 12 weeks are to:

  • Foster a positive experience that builds trust, establishes respect, and encourages emotional buy-in. Didn’t know you just hired your new BFF, did you?

  • Help your new hire verify that they’ve made the right choice in joining [company]. No hiree’s remorse here.

  • Orient your new hire to [company]’s mission by clearly showing how we implement, express and demonstrate our mission and values in everyday tasks and activities. Talk the talk and walk the walk.

  • Help your new hire identify their place in the wider organization. How do they support our mission?

  • Explain your onboarding plan for your new hire.

  • Provide your new hire with the tools, knowledge, skills, and relationships to be successful here.

Also, don’t hesitate to engage with them before orientation. A friendly email expressing enthusiasm about their start date will go a long way.

Learning Objectives & Weekly Tasks

Think about the meaningful work your new hire will be able to do in their first week with no or minimal training. Make a list.

What about in the second week? What is the meaningful work you would like to prepare them to do then?

At the end of their first month? What about at 60 days?

What should your new hire be working on by the end of a 12-week onboarding period, and what will it take to get them all the tools, skills, and knowledge necessary to work on that?

What performance goals or KPIs do you expect your new hire to meet?

It’s up to you to decide what your new hire should be able to do, but make sure to keep these objectives SMART and behavior-based. You’ll have a hard time selling us “know everything you need to to get the job done.”

The first month should be filled with well-structured tasks. The second month will still be mostly structured with some independence. The final month of onboarding will be partially structured with more independence, leading to the end of the onboarding period when you will have an autonomous machine. I mean employee. 

All of the tasks you assign should build in to the bigger picture, so you may find it helpful to design the big picture first, then figure out the individual tasks that build up to that.

The Checklist

    • HR

    • Payroll

    • Benefits

    • IT

    • Anybody your want your new hire to have a relationship with

    • Desk setup from facilities

    • Hardware/software necessary for your new hire

    • Access to relevant systems (company wiki, the LMS, messaging groups, shared drives and folders...)

    • New email added to directory and distribution lists

    • Call new hire to welcome to [company]. Explain laptop and mobile phone options.

    • Gather new hire paperwork from payroll and benefits.

    • Customize this new hire onboarding plan (you’re doing it!)

    • Organize new hire lunch (include name tags). It’s nice for this invitation to include everyone under and including your boss so your new hire can meet adjacent teams and their skip-level leader.

    • Schedule badge photo.

    • Prepare parking information.

    • Add to relevant messaging channels.

    • Schedule 1:1 meetings between your new hire and all the people you want them to have a relationship with (spread this out over a few weeks, add these meetings to their task list for those weeks).

    • Set up timesheets (if applicable).

    • Identify a peer to be your new hire’s onboarding buddy.

    • In your new hire’s first week, send out a welcome email to your boss’s email distribution list (cc new hire) that includes your new hire’s background, an “In their words” (fun facts) section, and a headshot.

    • Get a welcome card and have the team sign it.

    • Order balloons and put on your new hire’s desk.

    • Order breakfast to be delivered before orientation.

    • Plan icebreaker for new hire lunch.

    • Order company swag: shirt, notebook, pen, water bottle.

    • Mail a t-shirt to their home address with a welcome note.

    • Book Q&A with your boss for after orientation.

    • Purchase a plant for your new hire’s desk.

Sample New Hire Onboarding Plan