The welcome and integration of new employees is “pure and simple communication” states Jean-Philippe Guillemette, president and founder of Heleva, during HR Day 2025 – Innovative Strategies for Retail last April. The former marketer shares his recipe for successful onboarding in a very interesting conference. Here are the 4 key points we retained.
1- Flatten the information curve to digest
Obviously, there is always a lot of information to transmit to a new employee who starts work. The employer will want to present the company’s mission, the details of their insurance program, team members, their tasks, etc. Jean-Philippe Guillemette’s first advice is to flatten the curve by starting to distribute information as soon as the hiring decision is made.
If we don’t send any information in pre-onboarding, it creates a mountain to climb on day one, he announces. We must identify communication opportunities: there are CV acknowledgments, there are interview confirmations, there are interviews; then, we fall into hiring lines.
Only counterpoint: we also don’t want to discourage our candidate before they’ve even set foot in our premises. We must therefore proceed according to the pyramid principle: start with the vision, mission, culture; by communicating, in small doses, engaging content that makes them want to join the adventure.
2- Give clear information from Day 1
We don’t have two chances to make a first impression; according to this principle, Jean-Philippe Guillemette places the highest importance on how the first day unfolds for the new employee. Like a mantra, he repeats the three fundamentals to communicate by email or text to candidates before day 1: a welcome message, practical information and how the first day will unfold.
Practical information has almost more importance than the welcome message, argues the speaker. When the candidate knows where they must go [with a Google route], to whom they must report and how they should dress, it will greatly lower their stress.
3- Break down learning into small bites
Generally, employee integration relies on the direct manager, who must continue to assume their daily responsibilities while transmitting information to new employees. Jean-Philippe Guillemette advises segmenting information into 5, 10, 15 minutes, and inserting them into the work day.
I propose having meetings in ‘snack’ mode. A snack, we take a bite, then we do other things. Breaking up the content allows the new employee to retain as much information as possible, but it allows the manager to take care of urgent matters.
4- Create an onboarding kit
Among good practices, Jean-Philippe Guillemette finally speaks about the importance of structuring and standardizing welcome and integration by creating a “kit” intended for managers.
Such a kit includes lists of actions to take, emails to send and content to communicate with deadlines (for example: 1 week before day 1, 3 days before day 1, the day before, etc.) All of this, once again, to lighten the mental load of managers.
training.isarta.com 
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