New Employee Introductions: Email Templates You Can Use Today

Whenever a new employee is starting out on their first day, a new employee introduction email to your team should be first on the docket. That’s because, while an email introduction may sound simple, it can have a profound impact on morale.

In this article, we offer a how-to on properly phrasing a new employee introduction email to a team or to colleagues. Consider it as part of your overall onboarding process, which Personio can help optimise with an entire range of features.

Streamline your onboarding with our free checklist.

Templates For Every HR Process

Introduction emails are a fantastic place to start, but they’re far from the only process where HR could use some assistance. That’s why we have put together a host of HR templates, to help you ensure that every process is as streamlined and consistent as possible.

Feel free to click on any of the following to check out after you’ve read this post:

• Job Rejection Letter Templates
• Evaluation Form Templates
• Job Requirements Templates
• Staff Turnover Calculator Template

We hope you enjoy downloading any of these complimentary resources. Now, back to the task at hand…

Introducing New Employees: It Starts in HR

A new workplace, new tasks and new colleagues: The first day of a new job can bring with it an absolute flurry of changes. That’s why, for any new employee, your HR team needs a host of processes designed to welcome them.

By having a new employee introduction email in place, you instil the feeling that your new colleague is valued from their very first day. Then, current staff members are kept up-to-date when new team members arrive, speeding up the introduction phase and helping them integrate more easily and with greater efficacy.

Read our article for a full new employee induction checklist today.

That’s why this phase of employee onboarding is so crucial. New colleagues need to be integrated into the team, quickly, all while conveying a sense of belonging to keep spirits high.

But, let’s back it up with some concrete examples. Here are three additional reasons why new employee introduction emails are so crucial:

1. Employees Are More Satisfied and Motivated

A warm reception sets the stage for the rest of the onboarding process.

It signals to newcomers that, in your company, people treat each other with respect, show interest in one another and are valued. This helps to increase employee motivation right from the beginning.

2. Social Integration Is Sped Up

Feeling accepted by your new colleagues is one of the most critical aspects of onboarding. So, being able to quickly integrate them into the team helps new employees establish an internal network right away.

From there, they can immediately feel a tangible sense of connection with their new colleagues. And, the more people feel accepted, the more productive they become.

That’s because they feel more comfortable asking questions and are ready to perform at their best much more quickly.

3. They Enhance Your Employer Brand

The perfect start is its own competitive advantage. Your employees will be even more pleased to have joined your company – and this will contribute to your reputation as a best-in-class employer.

In a best-case scenario, new employees will even share their positive experiences with their friends or post them to sites like Glassdoor. This kind of positive feedback can be invaluable for your employer brand.

Should New Employee Introductions Be In Writing Or In Person?

There are many different ways to handle new employee introductions. The general rule of thumb is that the closer the collaboration with colleagues, the more personal the introduction needs to become.

The first order of business is to introduce new employees to their own teams. For good reason, these should always be done in person (if possible) and in as much depth as possible.

After all, these are the people the new employee will be working with most closely. This is a bond that needs to be nurtured from day one. This is also true for colleagues from other departments that will frequently interact with your new employee.

To a certain degree, a personal introduction to all of the other employees is also appropriate. This should include a tour of the company, where you show all new employees how to find their way around the offices and where you can quickly introduce them to the other teams.

In addition, if you have weekly company meetings, this might also be a good opportunity to introduce new employees. This allows you to establish initial contact between new and current staff members.

What If New Employees Are Not At The Office?

However, not all employees may be present at company meetings or at their desks while you’re giving company tours. Usually, personal introductions happen so quickly that it isn’t possible to remember many of those new faces.

This is where an organisational chart or an introduction email can help. Here are both options in greater detail:

• If you opt for an org chart, you can create a visual image of your staff structure and make it available to every employee. This way, they can always check to see if there are newcomers. These can be easily created using an HR software like Personio, which can craft an org chart to reflect your unique org structure.
• Another option is to use an introduction email. To be sure that all current employees are informed about new staff members, this should be emailed to the entire team. You’ll not only be introducing your new employees and providing information about them, but you’ll be sharing a warm welcome, too.

This is not to say that you should only choose one option or the other. There is an incredible amount of value in having a staff structure or organisational chart handy for reference. An introduction email can open the door, but it is a one-time affair, and in concert with an organisational chart can ensure staff members are on the same page, always.

How Do You Write A New Employee Introduction Email?

No one expects an introductory email to read like a novel.

On the contrary, the email should be short and personal while making all of the information visible at a glance. Using bullet points to highlight the most important information is completely fine when introducing new colleagues, too.

Here are the most important components, followed by our helpful sample templates:

Salutation

You can address the introduction email to both the new employees and the entire team. It depends on your preference:

• Do you want to introduce new employees to their colleagues?
• Or, would you prefer to speak directly to the new employee(s)?

Overall, it doesn’t matter which option you choose. In both cases, you’ll be sending the email to the entire team or to selected departments (not just to an individual).

Photo

As they say: a picture is worth a thousand words! By including a photo, you give a face to the new employee’s name. This helps current staff build a connection between the two, providing a cue to quickly remember new employees.

Name, Title, Department

This information might seem basic, but it is imperative. It will help your current employees understand where new colleagues fit into the company structure.

Previous Experience

Should you include where new employees have worked before? Sometimes, companies like to play it close to the vest or rely on new employees to share where they have worked with their entire time.

This helps current employees contextualise colleagues in a professional sense. But, rarely will a new colleague have the entire company as an audience to share where they have been and what they have learned.

So, it helps to provide a bit of information to tell a new employee’s story about where they have been. Try and answer some of the following (where it makes sense):

• Where has the new employee worked before?
• What positions have they held?
• Is it possible that they have worked with similar people?

Personal Information

It also helps to include a smattering of personal details. This could include a new employee’s hometown, hobbies or favourite travel destinations. This helps your staff get to know their new colleague beyond their title, making it easier for them to start up a casual conversation (especially in the first few weeks).

From an onboarding perspective, this also helps your new employee. They will feel a bit less pressure to strike up conversations or to try and relate with new colleagues, as their colleagues will already know enough about them to start a conversation of their own. It results in smoother, friendlier and more effective connections.

How do you get this kind of information easily? This is an area where HR software can help. You can make questions like these a task in the onboarding process and then incorporate the answers directly into the introduction email.

Contact Information

Conclude an introductory email by providing contact information for the new colleague. This way, current staff get all of the most important information in one single message.

Who Should Be Sending New Employee Introduction Emails?

Even though an HR Manager should be handling the process, the introduction email should come from your CEO or someone leading your team.

This showcases to new employees that they are not simply valued by their new team. Rather, their presence is welcome from the top-down. It helps build a connection (or a psychological contract, as it is also known).

Another plus: More people are likely to read an email if it comes from the CEO. This helps ensure that everyone is getting the message and that they don’t simply file it away.

New Employee Introduction Email Templates

Today, we’ve put together a collection of introductory emails to new colleagues for you to use in your own company.

More importantly, we have outlined three distinct approaches you can take. Feel free to try each of these out to see which is most effective for your team and which matches the types of company culture you have…

Template 1: The Personal Approach

Dear Team,

Today, our new colleague John Smith is starting as an Account Executive with the Sales Team.

[photo]

Here are a few fun facts to get to know John better:

Where are you from originally?
London

What do you like to do in your spare time?
Hiking, swimming and playing basketball

What is your favourite genre of music?
A huge variety of different things – and whatever’s playing on the radio

We are so happy to have you here, John, and we hope you get off to a fantastic start!

James and the OurSampleCompany Team

Template 2: The Formal Approach

Dear Team,

Today, our new colleague, John Smith, is starting as an Account Executive with the Sales Team.

[photo]

John comes to us with many years of experience and will help us take some giant steps towards achieving our corporate goals as a PositionTitle within our organisation.

We are delighted that he is on the team. Please feel free to wish him a great start!

A warm welcome to you, John!

James and the OurSampleCompany Team

Template 3: The Direct Approach

Dear John,

Welcome to OurSampleCompany Inc.! We are very pleased that, as of today, you’ve become a member of our Sales Team.

We wish you all the best as you get started with us, and we look forward to working with you.

All the best,

James and the OurSampleCompany Team

Useful Templates, Automated Processes, More Effective HR

Even with templates, introduction emails can become a time-consuming task. Manually personalising them and sending them out can take hours. But, with HR software, the effort can be reduced because the entire process is automated.

Here’s how we did it at Personio in our onboarding process:

• Introduction emails are sent as a standard element of onboarding. All new employees are given a task to upload a photo of themselves on their first day.
• Our People & Workplace Team came up with five questions that new colleagues are invited to answer about themselves.
• Once both tasks have been completed, an introduction email is automatically sent to all colleagues on behalf of our CEO.

This entire process is streamlined and automated to make it easier both for employees and for our HR department to help introduce new colleagues to their teams (and the team at large).

It’s also easily done all within the Personio software, as customers like Anorak Technologies and Mentimeter can attest to, so we can help do the same for your organization. Book a demo today to see how we can help you, too.