Onboarding New Staff

The First Week Decides More Than the Interview Did

Households put considerable effort into choosing the right candidate and then almost none into the first week, which is where a surprising number of otherwise good placements quietly go wrong. Someone capable arrives, receives no orientation, guesses at how the household works, guesses wrong a few times, and is judged for it.

Onboarding is not a formality borrowed from corporate hiring. In a domestic setting it is simply the difference between a staff member who knows what is expected and one who is left to infer it.

Day One: Orientation, Not Work

Walk them through the house properly. Where things are kept, which rooms are private, how the gas and water work, what to do if the electricity goes. This sounds obvious and it is exactly what households routinely skip because it feels self-evident to someone who already lives there.

Introduce every member of the household by name, including children, and be explicit about who gives instructions. Households where three people all issue conflicting directions to a new staff member produce confusion that then gets blamed on the staff member.

• A full walkthrough of the property and where supplies are kept
• Introductions to everyone in the household by name
• Clarity on who gives day to day instructions
• Confirmation of start and end times and the weekly day off
• Emergency contacts and what to do if nobody is reachable

Be Specific About Standards Rather Than Assuming Them

Every household has an idea of what clean means, how tea should be made, how much salt goes in the food. None of it is universal and none of it is guessable. Demonstrate once rather than correcting repeatedly afterwards.

This is particularly true for cooking. Ask a new cook to prepare a normal meal in the first days and be present for it, tasting and giving direct feedback. Ten minutes of specific guidance in week one prevents months of meals that are almost but not quite what the household wants.

Establish How Feedback Will Work

Decide early how you will raise a problem and how they should raise one with you. Without this, small issues accumulate silently on both sides until one of them becomes the reason the placement ends.

A brief, direct conversation at the end of the first week, what is going well, what needs adjusting, anything they need, is worth more than any amount of unspoken observation. Ask openly whether the workload matches what was described at interview, and be prepared to hear that it does not.

The Trial Is Not Over Just Because They Started

Stay present and observant during the first two weeks rather than delegating fully from day one. This is not about supervision for its own sake, it is that you cannot form an accurate view of how someone works if you are never there while they do it.

For childcare and elderly care roles this matters most of all, and it is worth rearranging your own schedule to make the first week overlap substantially with theirs.

Confirm the Practical Things Nobody Mentions

Where do they eat, and when. Where can they rest during a break. Which bathroom do they use. For live-in staff, when is their room genuinely their own. These questions get answered by default, through awkward improvisation, if they are not answered deliberately.

Confirm how and when they get paid, and then pay on the agreed date without needing to be reminded. Nothing damages a new working relationship faster than a first salary that arrives late or in a different amount than discussed.

Give It Time to Settle

A new staff member will be slower and more hesitant in week one than they will be in month three, and that is normal rather than evidence of a bad hire. Distinguish between someone still learning the household and someone who genuinely cannot do the work.

If it becomes clear it is genuinely the latter, that is what the Staffly replacement guarantee exists for. Tell us early and specifically what is not working, because that detail is what stops the next placement repeating the same mismatch.

Common Questions