A new era of employee onboarding

How DHHS Victoria created a unified and engaging orientation experience with imc.

The Department of Health and Human Services (DHHS) plays a critical role in the health system of the state of Victoria in Australia and is responsible for meeting the health needs of Victorian locals.

They deliver policies, programs and services that support and enhance the health and wellbeing of all of Victoria, Australia, and represent a large and complex state department showcasing leading service and innovation across the health sector.

With over 11,000 employees across four operational divisions, they oversee and coordinate the delivery and funding of services and initiatives across 17 areas of the state.

When the department first approached imc with their needs for orientation, it became clear that policy, compliance and general information had become their core focus.

The department was in need of a digital orientation experience for all new and existing employees. A unique and innovative solution that actively began to establish and recognise a greater vision of their employee experience lifecycle and culture as a whole. But the department is a large and complex organisation that has the challenge of hosting a very dynamic and diverse audience that works across multiple sectors.

A core challenge imc had to achieve was to bring these diverse users together through one unified onboarding experience.

What an employee experiences as they should be joining a new organisation should be personalised, compelling, and memorable. Onboardings, orientations and inductions represent three of the most significant opportunities to provide a human-centred approach to an employee’s experience.

When done well, they get new hires up and running smoothly and can empower your people to think, act and see your company as one which delivers exceptional service.

At imc, we have felt privileged to have the opportunity of co-designing with over 50 employees across the department to deliver something meaningful: a core staple of their employee experience.

By co-designing directly with the people imc was designing for, the team at imc could address a lot of the needs and challenges the department was experiencing more directly.

When taking the time to communicate with them, the team could quickly unlock insights that lead to success. They asked people to develop several personas of what “great” looked for them. Then these insights were used to define the common factors and principles of success through their eyes.

So imc discovered that they could align department employees more effectively by providing an experience that enabled them to explore the culture openly. The key to success was to empower their ability to guide themselves to find information and support when needed.

From the workshop insights, the team applied a co-designed content strategy to deliver a meaningful experience for employees.

The result of this was a 20-minute mobile-first orientation experience for the department. Using a chatbot style interactions, the learner is greeted and guided by characters of the department in a conversational format and narrative. They are asked questions and provided with micro-sized content as they progress through their learning experience.

imc included multiple elements of personalisation, such as stories from the people we were designed for. That way, it felt like an experienced they owned.

The project won the Platinum award in the category Best Design Thinking Talent Strategy in the 2020 LearnX awards. The international award program honours innovative and creative projects in the fields of learning and design every year.

Working side by side with end-users

By co-designing directly with the people we were designing for, we could address a lot of the needs and challenges the department was experiencing more directly.

When we take the time to communicate with the people we are designing for, we can quickly unlock insights that lead to success. We asked people to develop several personas of what “great” looked for them. We then used these insights to define the common factors and principles of success through their eyes.

We discovered that we could align department employees more effectively by providing an experience that enabled them to explore the culture openly. The key to success was to empower their ability to guide themselves to find information and support when needed.

From the insights we gathered from our workshops we applied a co-designed content strategy to deliver a meaningful experience for employees.

A new era of employee onboarding

Reframing orientation

Creating one unified onboarding experience

Co-designing to bring people together

A fully-realised digital experience for employees