leadershipbusiness
Onboarding Plan
Design structured onboarding plans — for new hires, new customers, or new users — with milestone-based progression, success criteria, and feedback loops.
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onboarding-plan/
engineering-new-hire.md
Markdown| 1 | # 90-Day Onboarding Plan: Software Engineer — Notifications Team |
| 2 | |
| 3 | ## Overview |
| 4 | |
| 5 | ``` |
| 6 | Onboardee type: New hire — Software Engineer (mid-level, L4) |
| 7 | Team: Notifications, Consumer Product org |
| 8 | Timeline: 90 days (30-60-90 structure) |
| 9 | Onboarding owner: Priya Sharma (Engineering Manager) + Leo Park (buddy) |
| 10 | Success measure: Ships a user-facing notification feature independently by Day 80 |
| 11 | ``` |
| 12 | |
| 13 | ## Pre-Start Preparation |
| 14 | |
| 15 | - **Access:** GitHub org, Datadog, PagerDuty, Slack (add to #notif-eng, #notif-oncall, #eng-all), Jira, Figma (view-only), AWS console (read-only). Provisioned by: IT — ticket INFRA-4821. |
| 16 | - **Equipment:** MacBook Pro 16", external monitor, headset — ordered via IT, ships to home address by Day -3. |
| 17 | - **Welcome packet:** Org chart, team README, architecture diagram link, calendar invites for all recurring meetings (standup, sprint planning, retro, 1:1). |
| 18 | - **Buddy:** Leo Park (senior engineer, same team). Available for daily questions, first 2 weeks. |
| 19 | - **First-week calendar:** Pre-scheduled — no empty blocks on Day 1. |
| 20 | |
| 21 | ## Milestone 1: Orientation (Days 1-7) |
| 22 | |
| 23 | | Day | Activity | Owner | Success Criterion | |
| 24 | |-------|-----------------------------------------------------------|--------|-------------------------------------------------| |
| 25 | | 1 | Welcome 1:1 with Priya — role expectations, 90-day goals | Priya | Goals documented in shared doc | |
| 26 | | 1 | Dev environment setup with Leo | Leo | Can build and run the notification service locally | |
| 27 | | 2 | Architecture walkthrough — event bus, delivery pipeline | Leo | Can whiteboard the notification delivery flow | |
| 28 | | 3 | Codebase tour — repo structure, CI/CD, deploy process | Leo | Deploys a test change to staging successfully | |
| 29 | | 4-5 | Read team docs — ADRs, runbooks, on-call playbook | Self | Notes 3+ questions for Leo | |
| 30 | | 5 | Meet with PM (Aya) and Designer (Marcus) — team priorities | Priya | Understands current sprint goals | |
| 31 | |
| 32 | ## Milestone 2: Guided Contribution (Days 8-30) |
| 33 | |
| 34 | | Week | Activity | Owner | Success Criterion | |
| 35 | |-------|-----------------------------------------------------------|--------|-------------------------------------------------| |
| 36 | | 2 | Pick up first "good-first-issue" — fix flaky test | Priya | PR submitted with passing CI | |
| 37 | | 2-3 | Pair programming with Leo (3 sessions/week) | Leo | New hire drives by session 4 | |
| 38 | | 3 | Attend sprint planning and retro — observe, ask questions | Self | Can explain team's sprint process | |
| 39 | | 4 | Ship first bug fix to production — email template rendering| Self | Code reviewed, merged, monitored post-deploy | |
| 40 | | 4 | **30-day check-in with Priya** | Priya | Written feedback exchanged both directions | |
| 41 | |
| 42 | **30-day check-in questions:** What is going well? What is confusing? Is the pace right? What should we change for the next 30 days? |
| 43 | |
| 44 | ## Milestone 3: Independent Contribution (Days 31-60) |
| 45 | |
| 46 | | Week | Activity | Owner | Success Criterion | |
| 47 | |-------|-----------------------------------------------------------|--------|-------------------------------------------------| |
| 48 | | 5-6 | Own a medium feature: add push notification opt-out preferences | Priya | Writes technical approach doc, gets feedback | |
| 49 | | 6-7 | Review PRs for teammates (2-3 per week) | Self | Provides substantive comments, not just approvals| |
| 50 | | 7-8 | Shadow on-call rotation — join Leo for 1 weekend shift | Leo | Can triage and respond to a low-severity alert | |
| 51 | | 8 | **60-day check-in with Priya** | Priya | Aligned on remaining ramp goals | |
| 52 | |
| 53 | ## Milestone 4: Full Ramp (Days 61-90) |
| 54 | |
| 55 | | Week | Activity | Owner | Success Criterion | |
| 56 | |-------|-----------------------------------------------------------|--------|-------------------------------------------------| |
| 57 | | 9-10 | Ship push notification preferences feature end-to-end | Self | Scoped, built, tested, deployed independently | |
| 58 | | 11 | Present "Notification Delivery Pipeline" to eng team | Self | Demonstrates understanding of system architecture| |
| 59 | | 12 | Join on-call rotation | Priya | Added to PagerDuty schedule | |
| 60 | | 12 | **90-day review with Priya** | Priya | Formal assessment against 90-day goals | |
| 61 | |
| 62 | ## Feedback Loops |
| 63 | |
| 64 | - **Daily (Week 1):** 15-min sync with Leo. One question: "What is blocking you?" |
| 65 | - **Weekly (Weeks 2-4):** 30-min 1:1 with Priya. Review milestones, adjust pace. |
| 66 | - **Biweekly (Weeks 5-12):** Standard 1:1 cadence. Shift from onboarding to regular work topics. |
| 67 | - **Formal checkpoints:** Written feedback at Days 30, 60, and 90 from both sides. |
| 68 | |
| 69 | At each checkpoint, ask: "What is one thing about this onboarding that should change for the next person?" |
| 70 |