A seamless onboarding process can be hugely impactful on both your existing team and new hires. Not only can it minimize training time, it can also reduce churn by creating a positive impression of a company right from the start. The best HR software for onboarding reduces the workload for human resources using automation, while simultaneously presenting an intuitive workflow to recently joined staff.
There are many considerations to take into account before selecting a piece of HR software. This list provides a spectrum of options to suit every organization.
1. What is Employee Onboarding Software?
In a nutshell, Employee Onboarding Software is a way to bring new hires into your company as smoothly as possible. This ranges from providing them with information on the company culture and gathering any necessary documentation, to ensuring they have access to any necessary tools and are properly trained on the company’s processes.
2 Why Use Onboarding Software?
Employee onboarding tools can be enormously helpful for systematizing the process of welcoming new staff. This ranges from creating a positive first impression about the company culture, to ensuring an individual has the tools and information they need to hit the ground running. The best HR software for onboarding is a useful addition for human resources people because it helps automate some of the more time-intensive onboarding steps, freeing them up to work on other aspects of orientation.
3. Overview of the 15 Best HR Software for Onboarding
Helpjuice – Best employee Onboarding Software for building a content hub
Scribe – Best employee onboarding software for demonstrating your office processes
Deel – Best employee onboarding software for growing global teams
Continu – Best employee onboarding software for optimized learning and training
Zelt – Best employee onboarding software for managing personnel details
BambooHR – Best employee onboarding software for efficient onboarding
Talmundo – Best employee onboarding software for positive first impressions
Zenefits – Best employee onboarding software for all-in-one HR
Click Boarding – Best employee onboarding software for mobile onboarding
Sage HR – Best employee onboarding software for end-to-end oversight
Trakstar – Best employee onboarding software for automated training
ClearCompany – Best employee onboarding software for ease of use
Wrike – Best employee onboarding software for transparent onboarding
Monday.com – Best employee onboarding software for tracking progress
Kallidus – Best employee onboarding software for automating repetitive processes
4 Comparison Criteria
4.1 User interface
The user interface is a basic but important consideration for any IT solution. Onboarding software should be easily navigable, with all its features intuitively displayed and accessible.
4.2 Usability
The best HR software for onboarding has to be easy to use, both from a human resource and a new hire perspective. Complexity is not always an advantage if it leads to confusion.
4.3 Integrations with other apps
You will almost certainly want onboarding software that integrates with your other company workflows. This could be limited to other HR systems or extend to team communication platforms and analytics solutions.
4.4 Value for money
The best onboarding software is not always the most cost-effective solution. It’s important to weigh up your desired functionality against the price tag.
5 Employee Onboarding Software Features
1. All the details about the company
Employee onboarding platforms can provide new staff with an overview of a company’s policies as well as how-to guides. This could include diversity initiatives, as well as instructions on how to use the company intranet.
2. Automated workflow
When someone new joins a company, there is usually a big mix of documents to be signed, orientation sessions to attend, access for software to be given, and so on. A lot of these processes can be automatically triggered by employee onboarding solutions.
3. Training schedules
Some of the best HR software for onboarding allows you to incorporate training docs into the platform. These can be complemented with questionnaires that test the comprehension of the new employee, so that HR can track learning.
4. Employee details
During employee onboarding, you want to make sure you have all of an individual’s personal information securely stored. The right software can help you do that, while at the same time showing which staff have opted for which pension or health insurance benefits.
5. Important documents
HR teams can use onboarding software to store important documents, such as employment contracts and employee code of conduct files.
6. Employee feedbacks
A very useful additional feature of onboarding software is the ability to collect and analyze employee feedback. This way, you can continuously improve your workflow for new staff.
6 The Best Employee Onboarding Software List
6.1 Helpjuice – Best employee onboarding software for building a content hub
Helpjuice is principally designed for companies that want to create their own knowledge base. This makes it an excellent tool for building repositories of information that new employees might need, such as articles with training videos and how-to guides.
Users can customize access according to department and role, and there’s a built-in instant search function to make it easy for people to find specific content. Additionally, Helpjuice offers a basic analytics tool that allows you to see what is most searched for and what is most read.
Prices start from $120 per month for up to 4 users, including free customer care and customization assistance. Standard integrations include Slack, Salesforce and Zendesk.
6.2 Scribe – Best employee onboarding software for demonstrating your office processes
If you want full-proof guides on how to use such applications as your company’s customer relationship management (CRM), enterprise resource planning (ERP) or content management system (CMS), Scribe is the answer. It allows you to record a clip of how to use the software, then helps you automatically create a process document to go with the recording.
Once you’ve created a how-to guide, you can then share it with each new hire via URLs, PDFs and team workspaces like Confluence. This saves on the time needed to arrange individual training sessions every time for tasks that can be self-taught.
Scribe has a free plan that includes unlimited guides and pages, but limits recordings to web apps only. The Pro package ($23 per person per month) also adds on company branding and the ability to capture desktop processes as well as the web ones. There are numerous integrations possible as well, including with SharePoint, HubSpot and Monday.com.
6.3 Deel – Best employee onboarding software for growing global teams
Deel offers HR solutions for distributed teams across the world. The company’s specialty is global hiring, payroll and compliance, which it offers for full-time employees throughout more than 90 countries.
In terms of onboarding, Deel is particularly good at handling the local requirements for new staff, whether in Mexico or Sweden. Automatic prompts ensure HR teams have all the required documentation, which is then collated and safely stored by the platform. The interface makes it easy to keep track of the onboarding workflows, with integration into Slack for smoother orientation.
Deel’s employee onboarding software is free for companies with fewer than 200 people. Prices for the employee hiring and payroll portal start from $599.
6.4 Continu – Best employee onboarding software for optimized learning and training
Where Deel is stronger on the employee documentation side, Continu focuses on training. HR teams can build articles and wikis, which can then be incorporated into learning tracks that are customized based on department and role.
Continu is extremely flexible when it comes to delivering content, from embedding videos in guides to scheduling virtual workshops. You can also administer assessment and quizzes to see how much information new hires have absorbed or to gather feedback on your onboarding process. All of this can be automated, and the progress of individuals tracked as they go through the checklist of onboarding items.
There are lots of ready-made integrations with a whole host of functions, from analytics and communications tools to content and HRM platforms. Continu also has an open API so you can build your own integrations, too.
Prices are available on request and are based on number of employees.
6.5 Zelt – Best employee onboarding software for managing personnel details
Zelt divides its product offering into different modules. The core platform has features like onboarding, a document database and performance review management, but you can also add on other things like payroll administration and logistics.
Zelt People is the module that contains the onboarding functionality. Here, you can collect employee details related to salary and pension, as well as setup access to work apps like Slack and Teams. On the downside, this solution doesn’t offer a knowledge base or training options.
The free version provides most of the functionality of the paid version, excluding customizations. However, it’s limited to 9 employees. The paid version starts from £5 per user per month.
6.6 BambooHR – Best employee onboarding software for efficient onboarding
BambooHR is a popular employee onboarding software for small business. It covers all essential aspects of human resources. Its onboarding functionality is mainly built around making everything as automated as possible. This includes setting up intro packages and to-do checklists. These aspects can all be incorporated into New Hire Packet Templates, which you can design for different departments and roles.
BambooHR has its own e-signature system, so that essential documentation can be quickly notarized, before being stored in the secure digital employee database. To streamline the process further, you can also pre-program reminders for new hires to complete onboarding tasks as they undertake their first days or weeks.
Prices are available on request.
6.7 Talmundo – Best employee onboarding software for positive first impressions
Putting a friendly face forward, cloud-based Talmundo has created a solution that prioritizes making new hires feel welcome, right down to the baby-pink color scheme. The objective is to get individuals engaged right from the get-go, thereby improving productivity and bolstering retention.
Features include task management, data collection and interactive quizzes. Plus, you can configure a chatbot to instantly answer any common queries you receive from new staff. In keeping with Talmundo’s people-first thinking, there are of course feedback forms as well as an analytics interface to assess the effectiveness of your onboarding strategy.
Prices are available on request.
6.8 Zenefits – Best employee onboarding software for all-in-one HR
Zenefits is another one-stop-shop HRIS. Optimized for web and app, new hires can onboard themselves in under 10 minutes. This, of course, predominantly refers to basic instructions and the submission of information related to pay, benefits and pensions, but Zenefits still estimates it can help reduce onboarding time by 50%.
Aside from speed, the major benefit of Zenefits is that the onboarding process is automatically connected to other core aspects of HR. Once the data is entered, it can be viewed across other systems, such as payroll and to application management.
Prices start from $8 per month per person, which includes all the automated onboarding features.
6.9 Click Boarding – Best employee onboarding software for mobile onboarding
An onboarding specialist, Click Boarding is one of the few mobile-first onboarding platform vendors. Through a smartphone, you can grant facility and systems access, share welcome and training videos, and receive feedback from new hirs.
One of the best HR software for onboarding in a remote-working business environment, Click makes it easy to scale and bring on board new personnel who are primarily based outside of the office. This is all done securely, with the company in full compliance with SOC 2 Type 2 and GDPR regulations.
Prices are available on request, as are integrations with a variety of HRIS, LMS and ATS systems.
6.10 Sage HR – Best employee onboarding software for end-to-end oversight
Onboarding is a small but essential part of Sage HR’s offering. Through Sage’s backend, HR teams can share core documents like codes of conduct, schedule one-on-one orientation sessions and make feedback requests.
The workflow builder is a handy tool for creating checklists of to-do items, both for new hires as well as team leaders and IT staff. This ensures nobody misses a step in terms of manager check-ins and assigning access to software and facilities. Throughout this process, HR can track an individual’s journey, giving them a full picture of the progress.
Prices start from $5.5 per employee per month for the core HR module, which includes the onboarding features. Custom integrations are available on request.
6.11 Trakstar – Best employee onboarding software for automated training
Trakstar doesn’t have a specific onboarding solution, but its learning management system is extremely useful for introducing new hires to the team. This can be incorporated into a wider HRIS through pre-built integrations, including with ADP Workforce Now, Paylocity and BambooHR.
The software makes it easy to upload multimedia content and disseminate it according to a new hire’s role and responsibilities. This content could relate to company codes of conduct or guides on how to use team communication software.
Once you’ve created your various learning pathways, you can use Trakstar Learn’s auto-enrollment function to sign people up to a whole set of learning modules, rather than having to sign them up to each one individually. The new member of staff can then autonomously make their way through the material.
Prices are available on request and include customer support, unlimited storage and reporting functions.
6.12 ClearCompany – Best employee onboarding software for ease of use
ClearCompany is first and foremost an ATS solution, though it does also cover onboarding through a self-service user interface. This intuitive UI is designed so that HR can essentially rely on automated delivery of information regarding company values, teammate profiles and a recap of a new hire’s goals. The system also gathers any required employee data and facilitates e-signatures.
All of this functionality is available both on computer and mobile devices, alongside provisioning management. Plus, HR can track the process through an easy-to-read dashboard.
Prices are available on request.
6.13 Wrike – Best employee onboarding software for transparent onboarding
Project management is Wrike’s core purpose, with many templates included for different kinds of agenda. Its onboarding framework makes use of the platform’s checklist and task management functionality to streamline and automate the acclimatization of new hires.
Wrike’s biggest benefit is that it makes the onboarding process transparent for everyone involved, whether that’s managers, IT departments, human resources or the new employee themselves. However, you’ll need to make use of integrations (many are available) to incorporate training, documentation and a knowledge base.
Prices start from $9.80 per user per month, including a full suite of project management features.
6.14 Monday.com – Best employee onboarding software for tracking progress
Similar to Wrike, Monday.com’s specialism is project management. As such, it’s ideal for creating and monitoring a full-proof workflow for new hires.
Additionally, all important information and documentation can easily be accessed through dedicated boards.
Prices start from $8 per user per month.
6.15 Kallidus – Best employee onboarding software for automating repetitive processes
Kallidus purchased Sapling in order to improve its onboarding capabilities. It has now rolled the brand fully into its operations, including pre-boarding features like an intro to company culture and access to the company organization chart.
Kallidus streamlines and automates basic onboarding workflows, aided by integrations with ATS software and payroll solutions. All of this is readily monitored through an easy-to-use interface.
Prices are available on request.
7 FAQs
- What is the best onboarding software?
Which tool is used for onboarding employees at your company depends on your needs. Some software is better for helping you collate and store staff documentation, while others have impressive training functionality.
- How do you do HR onboarding?
To save time and improve efficiency, the smartest option is to automate a lot of the workflows involved in getting a new hire up to scratch. The best HR software for onboarding will help take some of the manual labor out of the equation and provides checklists so you can track progress of individual cases.
