All Onboard

Back to School with Joyce Knight: YES Prep’s Employee Onboarding Process

• Joyce Knight, Director of Talent Strategy at YES Prep Public Schools • Season 1 • Episode 5

Share episode

In this episode of the "All Onboard" podcast, host Thomas Kunjappu speaks with Joyce Knight, Director of Talent Strategy at YES Prep Public Schools, about their innovative approaches to employee onboarding. Joyce shares her unique perspective gained from HR roles in education, media, and healthcare, and how these experiences have shaped her strategies at YES Prep. She emphasizes the importance of creating a tailored employee onboarding process that caters to the diverse needs of instructional and non-instructional hires, ensuring each new employee feels welcomed and supported from day one.

Joyce delves into the specifics of YES Prep's employee onboarding program, highlighting the balance between centralized and decentralized approaches. For instructional hires, the onboarding journey is customized based on whether they are new to teaching or just new to the organization. This includes a mix of training sessions, campus culture immersion, and mentorship. Joyce also discusses the challenges of onboarding mid-year hires and the steps YES Prep is taking to ensure a consistent and engaging onboarding experience regardless of the start date. This includes developing a new hire onboarding checklist and utilizing employee onboarding tools to streamline the process.

Throughout the conversation, Joyce underscores the value of feedback in refining the onboarding process. She shares how YES Prep conducts focus groups and new hire onboarding surveys to gather insights and continuously improve their employee onboarding system. Joyce also highlights the importance of company-wide events, such as Senior Signing Day and the annual kickoff, in fostering a strong organizational culture and helping new employees integrate seamlessly. By leveraging these strategies and best practices, YES Prep aims to create one of the best employee onboarding experiences in the education sector.

For those looking to enhance their own onboarding programs, Joyce offers practical advice on the importance of listening to employees and involving diverse voices in the onboarding process. 

Joyce Knight:

Yep, I would definitely say to listen to your people. Especially if you're looking to focus on a specific group of people. Create focus groups, create listening tours gather feedback on the front end, see, what went really well with their onboarding, what could be made better and then gather that feedback.

Thomas Kunjappu:

Hello and welcome to the All Onboard podcast, your go to resource for all things related to employee onboarding. I'm your host, Thomas Kunjappu, founder and CEO at Cleary. Today, we are thrilled to have Joyce Knight, director of talent strategy at Yes Prep Public Schools, one of the highest performing school districts in the city of Houston. Now, Joyce brings a rich background in HR roles across education, but also media and healthcare. And this will be a pretty unique perspective that she brings to the table. her expertise in talent strategy, HR policy, and change management makes her an invaluable guest as we dive into all the innovative onboarding practices at YES Prep. So with that, I'd like to say Joyce, welcome to the show.

Joyce Knight:

Thank you. I'm excited to be here.

Thomas Kunjappu:

great to have you, tell me a little bit about now the variety of industries you've, worked in before coming into to YES prep, because I really want to dive into education and onboarding on this conversation, but could you tell me a little bit about your background? How's that has impacted the way you think about onboarding programs?

Joyce Knight:

Absolutely. So I am what you call a boomerang employee. So I actually started in education at YES Prep, then left to do media and healthcare for a little bit until I came back to YES prep. I got to be a new hire in a variety of different industries and got to see, oh, these organizations do it really well. these organizations can improve on things. So really seeing different industries managing onboarding. influenced my approach on okay, what can we do better here in education?

Thomas Kunjappu:

So how do you think about creating a sustainable onboarding engine at YES Prep?

Joyce Knight:

Yeah, it is so important to personalize the approach because we have a variety of different positions here. So we have obviously our instructional hires. So those are our teaching roles. And then we also have our non instructional hires. And that also can be bucketed even further too, because we have an administrative office. So you have people there that do operations, HR roles, finance roles, then you also have our non instructional hires at various campuses. These are our principals, these are your deans, your counselors, and so you really want to cater your onboarding approach for the specific instructional and non instructional hires.

Thomas Kunjappu:

Let's start with the instructional hires, alright? What does that process look like?

Joyce Knight:

So with instructional hires, you really want to ensure they're acclimated to that specific campus. So every campus has its unique culture. And so that's really important and your teaching style as well. You want to cater the onboarding approach to whether or not this person is new to teaching, or if they're new to the industry. depending on where they're at with their teaching background, you want to cater the onboarding approach to okay so let's see what you need to focus on these 1st, 30 days. Is it with your dean of instruction? Do you want to sit down with them and talk through what does teaching look like at this particular campus? If you're not new to teaching, maybe you can just go in straight to, getting more acclimated to the campus culture. It just really depends on where you're coming into, at that campus.

Thomas Ad:

Hey, it's Thomas here. Hope you're enjoying the episode so far. Are you curious to see how your onboarding program stacks up against the industry's best? Check out Cleary's latest onboarding assessment tool. It offers in depth analysis and customized recommendations to enhance every aspect of your employee onboarding. From pre boarding to company culture integration and more. Whether you're just setting up your onboarding program or you're a CHRO at a Fortune 100 company, this assessment can improve your onboarding know how. Check it out at gocleary. com slash onboarding hyphen assessment. Again, that's gocleary. com slash onboarding hyphen assessment. You can also find the link in the episode notes. Now back to the show.

Thomas Kunjappu:

All right. So let's really get into some details here. So how do you do onboarding for these teachers?

Joyce Knight:

We try to mix it with a balance of a centralized versus decentralized approach. So you want to 1st, separate those 3 groups. You want to focus on teachers, then you want to focus on those non instructional at the campus level. And then you want to then focus on non instructional hires at the administrative office or central office level. When we're thinking about instructional, we have a whole team dedicated to those that focus on onboarding for those instructional hires. They actually don't sit on the talent team. They sit on the schools or academic side of our administrative office and so they'll go in and they'll ensure that their onboarding requirements are met and then they'll also have their orientation onboarding and orientation at the campuses. Then they have an HR 1 normally it depends on whether or not they are a beginning of the school year hire and or a year round hire. So what's really unique about us too is we hire teachers year round. So it's not just at that start of the school year. So you're onboarding orientation can look different depending on whether you are a start of the school year hire or somewhere mid year. So if you're a start of the school year hire, you get to go through a training during the summer. you get to go through a large day long orientation with us and it's a lot more structured in that way versus if you're a mid year higher and that's the focus that we want to, really hone in on is just how do we create that same type of almost beginning of the higher approach for those mid year hires, because we want them to be able to get acclimated as well as those that start at the start of the school year, because it can be difficult coming into another campus in the middle of the year. How can we create that same experience for them? So that's what we're currently trying to work on. And then as well as our non instructional and for our campus and central office as well, they have a pretty for those who's that start at the beginning of the school year, we have a very structured approach, they have that day long orientation, but then during those that get hired mid year, like I was, there is an orientation that happens 1 or 2 weeks after you start. We don't have campus tours or home office tours. So how do we incorporate that to those people that get hired past that 1st day of school?

Thomas Kunjappu:

Yeah, that's interesting. It's almost like for in a lot of other industries. Everyone's hiring all the time. But it's almost folks who are in HQ versus remote or in a satellite office who might get a certain treatment that is much more structured if you're being hired in HQ versus out in like a satellite and it's actually always a struggle to figure out the experience for those on the peripheries, right? so then this one last question I'm curious about administrative and how you think about that. But, there's a whole staff that focuses on the training curriculum for teachers, right? Specifically for, teachers where, you know, nationwide we have, issues with training retention and, as something that we, are all, struggling with in the U.S. how do you see, your role in helping retain, great teachers? Through that onboarding and orientation, period versus the training that's actually done with your colleagues there to also get them up to board and confident, so that they actually retain well at YES Prep. How does that balance strike out in terms of the outcomes you're looking to get to?

Joyce Knight:

Yeah, and it's really a partnership with our schools or academics department on strategizing on how to retain those high performing teachers. It's What can we do at the talent and HR level? listening on focus groups and seeing what's our compensation benefits package compared to, in different markets or within the education markets, or it's on the school side where they're approaching it from how is the campus culture there? What can we do to alleviate some of the, stresses or additional responsibilities that teachers may have? So it's a combined partnership with both schools and talent to see. Is it on the HR side, or is it on the school side?

Thomas Kunjappu:

Got it. So then, could you tell me a little bit more about any lessons, any takeaways, from, running onboarding, programs? And you can talk about any population type, like What has worked or not worked? Any particular stories you think that, would be helpful to, to walk through?

Joyce Knight:

I really enjoyed having orientation on the very first day. So in one of the industries I worked at, on your very 1st day, you get to go to orientation and you're with about 100 other people and it really just sets the tone of, you're part of a huge organization and you get to make friends on that 1st day and it really just solidifies your commitment to being a part of that organization. So I really liked that and it was in person and they did fun little things throughout the day. So I was really excited coming in on that first day. Then I really liked in one of the other industries where there was a onboarding or like a little buddy program too. So that helps you get to lean on someone to go through your first 30, 60 days together. So that was really helpful as well to feel like you're not alone in being a new hire at an organization.

Thomas Kunjappu:

And I noticed you're talking about other industries. in your experience, is that something that In education, that's just not as prevalent, or it's, those are some practices you're looking to bring there?

Joyce Knight:

Yeah, I think it's just practices I'd like to bring there. I know that there can be, it's a little bit harder because, with education, you have these different locations and different campuses, but I think it'd be a great idea for things to be a little bit more personalized to having, a onboarding buddy program or having orientation towards streamlined on that space. person's first day, that they get their materials, they get all of the HR information, the culture information, and they're together with a group of people too, so that people don't feel alone.

Thomas Kunjappu:

That's a great point, because in a school, you're gonna have, at any given moment, maybe one person is new, in a particular location. Even though at YES Prep more broadly, there could be different people in different campuses, but the campus culture is so strong, right? that's where people are talking to each other, connecting with each other, learning the day to days of the job. So it is a challenge to, connect people Across campuses.

Joyce Knight:

Exactly, especially if you have campuses that, are very different from each other because even though we're all part of one organization, we're all part of that one streamline brand. Each campus is unique. So it can be difficult and especially because we're so spread out in land area, you can have one campus or two campuses about an hour away from each other too.

Thomas Kunjappu:

That's quite far, even though it's technically the same greater city area. So then are there ways that, institutionally through not just for onboarding, but people are just brought together across campuses? Is that something you guys think about whether or not onboarding could take advantage of such programs.

Joyce Knight:

Absolutely. There are two very exciting events that we host throughout the year that brings everyone together and one of them is senior signing day. Our mission is to prepare college ready students. And so we stress the importance of being college ready. And so Senior Signing Day is a way for seniors to announce with a t shirt or a flag of what college they're going to. And every senior gets to do this. And so it is super fun. Lots of different cheers and dances, all of that together. It gets everyone together. It gets us all excited. And just remember, this is our mission. It's to, send kids to college or get them college ready. So that's one. And then the other one is a kickoff. So we do a full organization kickoff right before the start of the school year to celebrate all that we've accomplished, where we're going, and just get people together and network.

Thomas Kunjappu:

So that's, one of those events with your customers. And then one is, just all staff coming together. Those are obviously great linchpins for new staff to really get viscerally the culture of what it means to be at YES Prep. So then let me ask you a little bit more about your approach to, continuous improvement. So I know, you were telling me you're really working on your onboarding process, at the moment. So tell me a bit more about that. What even, prompted you to, really look into this, as an area to focus on at the moment?

Joyce Knight:

I had two different onboarding experiences because I came to YES Prep in 2017, and came back again in 2023. that I came during the summer. So I got to experience that full day long orientation. The benefits plan year was right about to begin. it was a very clean beginning. And then here, when I was a mid year this was a little bit different because I didn't get that day long orientation. I wasn't part of that summer cohort, if you will. And so when I noticed, okay, as a new hire myself coming in mid year, what can we do to strengthen our onboarding for those that kind of come in that mid year, time of year? So I didn't get a full tour, for example, and I'd love to see the whole campus or the whole home office. Orientation was about a week after my start date as well, and that was virtual. So I didn't get to see, who started with me or meet people that started around the same time I did. When I assessed my own experience, that's when I thought to myself, I think this is where we could strengthen our onboarding experience for those mid year hires.

Thomas Kunjappu:

Got it. And is that probably similar across all these employee types, like instructional, non instructional, obviously administrative, for, so that seems to be the key, right? It's the key employee area. So if you compare that onboarding experience to, that at other industries, either your own or ones that you've driven, what were some, ideas that you wanted to bring in from them?

Joyce Knight:

In different industries, because what we were saying before, most companies hire year round. So their, orientation onboarding is streamlined, regardless of whether or not you start in the summer or in the fall with whether which month you start it. it's the same versus here. It's we focus so much in a summer cohort, which, because we have a bulk of our employees starting in that summer. And so I wanted to bring a more cohesive and more streamlined approach to onboarding and orientation. So it's not just a summer cohort. That's getting the best orientation that we're putting out. It's everyone regardless of whether or not you're starting mid year or in the summer.

Thomas Kunjappu:

So then what limitations do you have with that? it's a problem for a reason, right? So what are the things that you can improve, but what are some limitations?

Joyce Knight:

The biggest limitation, I would say, would be the size of those cohorts. Our summer can have hundreds of people starting versus during the year, it could be about 10 people. So a lot smaller. And so if you're thinking about putting the same approach for summer to the mid year, it's like, how can we still Maintain differences because of the number of people that are starting. If you have just 10 people does it make sense for us to host it at different location? Can we decentralize it a little bit and just keep it at the campuses? Or not, because they're so small, maybe we do have them come to the administrative office, for example, and get a day long orientation or a half day orientation. Maybe we can reduce it to one whole day to just a half day, and then they can go get deployed to their campuses for the rest of the day, or they're good to go. Really thinking through, like, how can we still maintain differences because of the size of the different new hire cohorts?

Thomas Kunjappu:

I've never been a teacher, walk me through, I just accepted an offer, somehow I've magically gotten myself qualified to be a YES Prep teacher, and I'm joining, as part of one of these massive cohorts, when do I join, and then what is my experience, before school even starts, and as I get in through the first month or two months?

Joyce Knight:

Let's say you are starting on the 1st day of school. So during the summer, so we're in June right now. So in July, you would be going into what's called our teaching excellence program or alternative certification program. They will get you acclimated to all the basic teaching materials and resources get you started with getting your certification if you're not already certified. So you'll do that for a couple of weeks and then in service starts in August and what in services is you go to your campuses and that's where you have that more catered approach to, getting on board at that specific campus. So you do that for a couple of weeks before students come in. Then, when students come in, you are then ready to teach. Starting in as early as July, so a couple weeks of onboarding in July before you go into what's called in service in August.

Thomas Kunjappu:

Got it and is that happening in parallel with the, that big staff wide event that you were talking about?

Joyce Knight:

Exactly. So orientation usually happens, that day long orientation usually happens mid July, that's what kicks off the teaching excellence or your, teacher training.

Thomas Kunjappu:

Where does it veer off for the other populations? For example, administration. is it the same exact programming in that first week? And then you veer off when you get to the campus specific things? Or is it always distinct?

Joyce Knight:

Yep, so it is different. For those that are non instructional, you do get that. So let's say, again, start in the summer. You'll go through that orientation in July, and then onboarding is then left up to your hiring manager to see, what does your first couple days look like? What does your first 30 days look like? So that one is really just highly dependent on the hiring manager themselves.

Thomas Kunjappu:

All right, thank you for going through that. I think I have a much stronger idea of what it actually might feel like if I'm, joining, YES Prep. If you were to put it all together, Joyce, what advice would you have for, folks like you who are looking to create an amazing onboarding experience that will retain great talent in the educational industry?

Joyce Knight:

Yep, I would definitely say to listen to your people. Especially if you're looking to focus on a specific group of people. right now, I'm trying to focus on those people that are hired mid year. Create focus groups, create listening tours for those that have been hired mid year for the last couple of years or so. So maybe think of a 1 to 3 year mark. gather feedback on the front end, see, what went really well with their onboarding, what could be made better and then gather that feedback. But then also, once you gather that feedback, create those survey mechanisms as well. We want to create onboarding or new hire surveys for staff that have been hired, because right now we don't have survey feedback from that group of people. So having surveys built in for both the new hire to assess their onboarding experience, but also the hiring manager experience as well. That's another survey that we want to implement and being able to ask the hiring manager on the quality of the onboarding experience that we provided.

Thomas Kunjappu:

That's great to always get feedback. do you have any other, stories or, specific successes, anything that you want to share that you feel would be instructional or useful for others listening as they're designing their own onboarding programs?

Joyce Knight:

I would say just bring in as much diverse voices as possible. That was what helped me be successful in other industries to, it doesn't have to be just the people within your own department gather voices from people that you may not even expect, someone from operations or someone from finance, someone from other places that you may not think immediately when you gather a different diverse group of voices, you're bringing in there. It feels like their voice matters, too. And you get a lot more buy in that way. When you do gather a bunch of different people in the same room.

Thomas Ad:

Now, you and I might think it's obvious that people are your biggest resource and investing in your onboarding program to make it world class is a bet you want to make. But how do you talk about this with your CEO or CFO so that you can get them on board with investing in an updated onboarding program? They're always looking for something that can save money and boost productivity at the same time. I've got something exciting for you. Check out Cleary Onboarding. com. ROI calculator. It's easy to use. Just enter some info about your current onboarding process and your company and see how much time and money you could be saving with a modern onboarding solution. Head on over to gocleary.com/onboarding-ROI. To give it a try. See what you learn and let us know what you think. Again, that's gocleary.com/onboarding-ROI. You can also find a link in the episode notes. Now back to the show.

Thomas Kunjappu:

Are we ready to move on to the lightning round?

Joyce Knight:

Yeah, absolutely.

Thomas Kunjappu:

All right, let's do it. so we're going to go through these really quickly. So beaches or mountains, Joyce?

Joyce Knight:

Beaches. I'm from Florida, so I love the beach.

Thomas Kunjappu:

Oh, there you go. are you a morning person or a night owl?

Joyce Knight:

Morning. I work out in the mornings.

Thomas Kunjappu:

Right, that's why we're doing this early. Oh, window seat or aisle seat on a plane?

Joyce Knight:

I love the window seat, actually. I love the plane, like seeing the plane take off and physically land. There's something about it that I just, I love.

Thomas Kunjappu:

Nice. What's the best piece of advice you've ever received? Or maybe something that's really stuck with you.

Joyce Knight:

It is actually from my father. He has a very bold and lively personality and I remember him telling me once where he was pouring chai from a pot to a cup. in order to do that, you have to do it very strongly, firmly, but strongly, because if you try to do it very slowly, you're going to get spillage into the sink and so I love that analogy because he's always told me to just go for it. Don't be scared because if you're scared, then you're not going to do as well as you think you can. So when you just go for it and have that courage, then you'll make it.

Thomas Kunjappu:

That's great. So then, if you weren't working in your current role, what could you be doing instead?

Joyce Knight:

I would have loved to be a FBI special agent. I've always wanted to do that, and it's something that interests me. I love getting into, investigative work.

Thomas Kunjappu:

Ah, okay. So maybe some CSI is, on the TV. Last question. So what do you enjoy most about your current role working at YES prep?

Joyce Knight:

I absolutely love the people I work with. I work with such passionate, intelligent, the smartest people I've ever worked with. they're just an incredible group. We always bounce ideas off of each other. We always challenge each other and we have a lot of fun too.

Thomas Kunjappu:

Thank you for going through that with me. And that's a wrap for today's episode of All Onboard. I hope everyone out there found our conversation here with Joyce insightful and valuable for your own onboarding efforts. Don't forget to subscribe to our podcast. Stay updated with the latest tips and trends in all things employee onboarding. And of course, stay tuned for Thomas Take where I'll share my thoughts and reactions to the advice that Joyce shared today in near real time. Until next time good luck with all of your onboarding processes and in creating a welcoming environment for all your new hires

Hey, Thomas here. Welcome to Thomas Take, where I'll share my reaction to this week's episode on the power of cohorts. Think back to your childhood. Do you remember that first day of school? Especially going to a new school? You've got a new set of clothes, grown a bit over the summer, and are finding your way around this new building. Surrounded by the unknown, you search hopelessly for a familiar face. Everything feels new and exciting. After meeting some teachers and fellow classmates, it fully hits home what you already knew in your head. This is day one for all the other kids too. In some ways it's a relief and feels great knowing that you're going through these first few days alongside all of these other folks. So many friendships and connections are born in the context of the shared experience. Now there are clues to this being day one for everyone all around. Balloons and signs welcoming the new class and a big session in the auditorium when the principal tells you all about the cool playgrounds, how lunch works, and how you might get a hall pass. Now, fast forward to a couple of months later. A new kid is coming to school and joining class. Her parents had to move across state lines on short notice. Now, kids, be nice and give her a warm welcome. Were you nice to her? I hope so, but you were still busy probably talking to your friends, doing your classwork, and the teacher, while welcoming, had to still focus on pushing forward with the syllabus. And there probably wasn't a big address from the principal. In the conversation today with Joyce and at YES Prep, they noticed a similar split in the new hire experience. And this was true for instructional and non instructional staff, based on when they were coming in to join the organization. Now, anyone joining at the beginning of the year were thrown effectively a big party and could really get to know each other within their cohorts. But most employees joining most organizations are like that kid joining in midway through the school year. They're coming to a place that already exists and isn't exactly stopping what they're doing just for them. It's on them to figure out the rhythms and routines of this new place. So there really is power in cohorts. If you're able to pair even two people together in an onboarding process, it can lead to an amazing shared experience. And in terms of programming, it may be helpful to go back to school and think about what you might do to help that new kid joining mid year feel just as great as everyone else. Who started together at the beginning. That's my take. See you on the next one.