Hit the Ground Running

On May 26, 2010, the Office of Personnel Management (OPM) partnered with the Senior Executives Association (SEA) and the Partnership for Public Service (PPS) to host an event where 115 individuals - including expert consultants, experienced and newer Senior Executive Service (SES) members, and executive resources (ER) and training professionals - gathered to discuss the importance of, and challenges to, onboarding Federal senior executives. During the event, experts presented their existing executive onboarding programs, and SES members shared their experiences and recommendations. Participants spent the second half of the day identifying components of an effective executive onboarding program. As a result of this collaborative effort, OPM has developed this manual as a tool to assist agencies in creating an executive onboarding program and a business case for it. This document contains the end product of this 1-day event: an executive onboarding framework with information on the steps that are critical to developing and implementing a successful formal executive onboarding program from pre-boarding through the first year. Executive onboarding refers to the acquiring, accommodating, assimilating and accelerating of new leaders into the organizational culture and business. The best onboarding strategies provide a fast track to meaningful, productive work and strong employee relationships. Onboarding programs need to be tailored specifically to the needs of the organization and individuals. Executive onboarding should be strategic, so that it not only prevents executive derailment, but also expedites the executive's contribution to optimizing strategic achievement. In 2008, the Partnership for Public Service (PPS) and Booz Allen Hamilton conducted a study entitled Getting On Board: A Model for Integrating and Engaging New Employees Onboarding programs need to be tailored specifically to the needs of the organization and individuals. The study concluded that the successful onboarding of employees during their first year of service increases engagement, raises retention by as much as 25 percent, improves performance, and hastens the time to full productivity. In another study entitled Unrealized Vision: Reimagining the Senior Executive Service (August, 2009), PPS recommended OPM take the lead on creating an executive onboarding program for the Federal Government. This recommendation and the results from OPM's 2008 Senior Executive Survey were the catalyst for the creation of this manual and the Governmentwide executive onboarding framework.