Thinking
Wrong About
Onboarding
01 —
Many organizations don’t manage it well. Too often it’s neglected and dispersed.
Or it’s seen as a time for orientation and completing forms. It doesn’t inspire or engage.
And it misses out on making new hires feel welcome and valuable.
Onboarding
isn’t easy.
03 —
First impressions set the trajectory for new hires. And they endure.
Imagine delivering an incredible onboarding experience during those first critical weeks.
One that engages your new people in your organization’s mission, goals, and needs.
One that helps them build valuable skills that they can put to use immediately—and throughout their career.
One that encourages them to imagine new possibilities for your organization.
One that helps them connect with colleagues, build networks, and discover the many resources available to them.
Imagine that.
First
impressions
matter.
05 —
What if your onboarding experience was more like TED meets Outward Bound meets Stanford d.School meets a hackathon?
Over the past 15 years Future has developed a set of Think Wrong Practices that unlock the ingenuity of individuals, teams, organizations, and industries.
We facilitate and teach our practices through fast-paced, immersive, hands-on sessions that take on challenges that matter to our clients.
We call them Think Wrong Blitzes.
A Blitz can turn your new hires’ first impressions into powerful, career-shaping experiences.
And those experiences can turn your new hires into innovators who are making meaningful contributions from the word “Go.”
Be great from
the start.
It’s time
to think
wrong.
Over the past 15 years
Future has developed six
Think Wrong Practices to
help individuals, teams, and
organizations escape the
status quo.
Align efforts with the strategic aspirations and impact vision of your organization.
Invite serendipity— letting people and places inspire new solutions.
Break synaptic links that result in the same answers.
Turn your ideas into solutions that can be shared and understood.
Learn what works, what doesn’t, and how to improve your solutions.
Tap into existing knowledge and new insights to accelerate time to impact.
09 —
We all learn best by doing.
And we learn even better when we get to do something that matters to us.
Think Wrong Blitzes start there.
We design Onboarding Blitzes to address challenges that matter to you, your people, and your organization. So, your new hires build their innovation muscles while producing a portfolio of status-quo busting small bets you can make right away.
Learn by
doing.
11 —
We believe everyone is born ingenious.
Time and again we’ve seen our Think Wrong Practices unlock that ingenuity.
That’s why we recommend inviting people from across your organization to your Onboarding Blitzes.
And why we encourage you to invite clients, prospects, and partners too.
Because, ultimately, the more wrong thinkers you have working across your ecosystem, the more ingenious solutions you will have to your challenges.
And the more ingenious solutions you have, the more engaged, productive, and prosperous your people and organization will be.
Thinking wrong
is for everyone.
And anyone.
13 —
We understand the way onboarding is designed, delivered, and implemented greatly influences its effectiveness. So we assess your onboarding needs with you and plan accordingly.
We design Onboarding Blitzes with you. .
We create the best context for becoming a part of your organization.
We adapt with your groups—to ensure they get the most out of their development experience.
We leave you with Blitz reports to reinforce for your new hires “What I can now do.”
Blitzers don’t
forget 90%* of
what they learn.
*Arthur, W., Jr., Bennett, W., Jr., Stanush, P. L., & McNelly, T. L. (1998). Factors that influence skill decay and retention: A quantitative review and analysis. Hu-man PerforHu-mance, 11, 57-101
15 —
Wrong thinkers equipped with a new approach to solving problems, pursuing opportunities, and strengthening your innovation culture.
Wrong thinkers focused on what’s possible—rather than what’s at risk.
Wrong thinkers producing a portfolio of disruptive small bets for challenges that matter to your organization. Wrong thinkers ready to help you make those small bets. Wrong thinkers ready to use what they learn from those small bets to speed up your time to impact.
Wrong thinkers practicing the art of the possible—rather than remaining stuck in the status quo.
You get wrong
thinkers.
17 —
They do something valuable on Day 1 (and you get their enthusiasm and passion from the start).
They meet their new colleagues (and you get to enjoy the fruit of productive relations—faster).
They learn your strategic imperatives (and you get them think-ing wrong about those).
They learn how to create ingenious solutions to support those imperatives (and you get to enjoy the increased productivity, results, and retention that come from that level of engagement). They experience your culture in a meaningful way (and you get to strengthen that culture to ensure it endures).
Why a Blitz
matters to
your new hires
(and you).
When
wrong
is right.
21 —
Starbucks: Supernatural Situation
The Starbucks Creative Services team was great at making things look good, but they weren’t influencing the front end of strategic initiatives.
Challenge
How might Creative Services make a greater contribution to Starbucks strategy and corporate social responsibility?
Need
To change the Creative Services design-as-decoration culture to a culture of strategic innovation.
Opportunity
To teach Creative Services a set of prac-tices and skills that would enable them to help Starbucks conceive of game-changing solutions to its biggest business and social challenges.
What we did
We got out for three days, blitzing with Starbucks 76 person Creative Services team at Sleeping Lady Resort in the snowy mountains above Seattle. We curated a team of outsiders to help teach and apply our — inspiring with stories of ingenuity, making purposeful mistakes, solving with avail-able resources, and reconceiving Creative Services as a strategic partner for Starbucks Executive Team.
23 —
Robert Wood Johnson Foundation: Think Wrong Blitz
Situation
Celebrating their 40th anniversary, RWJF convened more than 500 of their grantees and partners in Princeton, NJ, offering them the opportunity to develop their innovation skills and capabilities.
Challenge
How can we prevent diseases before they start?
Need
Help RWJF grantees and partners think wrong about their approaches to health challenges so they might have even greater impact.
Opportunity
Conceive of a portfolio of small bets that are practical and helpful in promoting good health.
What we did
We taught the blitzers our in a half-day Blitz. The result: a portfolio of seven Do-It-on-Monday small bets that they could bring back to their organizations and work in the field.
25 —
Project M PieLab Situation
Pie making—the secret talent of one Project M participant—inspires the M-ers to bake pies for Pi Day 2009 in Belfast, Maine. The event is greeted with such enthusiasm that several M-ers decide to see what kind of impact pie might have in the spiritual home of Project M— Greensboro, Alabama.
Challenge
How might we use the power of pie to stim-ulate the local economy and to bring people together in this often-segregated town?
Need
A place that can attract people and other busi-nesses to Main Street.
Opportunity
To provide a vibrant hub for community engagement, youth job training, employment, and new social enterprises.
What we did
We taught M-ers (design graduates from across the country) our at Project M 2009. Subsequent Project M cohorts and advi-sors continue to think wrong to improve the socioeconomic prospects of Hale County— making it one of the most influential rural towns in America.
Future is a Silicon Valley innovation firm that teaches people, teams, and organizations how to think wrong to conceive of ingenious solutions to their challenges —big and small.
[email protected] www.futurepartners.is +1.650.618.9553
©2015 Future Partners, LLC. All rights reserved, Think Wrong Practices, “Be Bold. Get Out. Let Go. Make Stuff. Bet Small. Move Fast.”, Think Wrong Blitz, the Future logo, and the Think Wrong Blitz Cycle logo are trademarks, service marks, and/or design marks of Future Partners, LLC. in the United States and/or other countries.
