Recently, a good friend started a new role at a healthcare company, one of the few industries where the labor market is still alive and well. Today was her first day of onboarding. As she walked me through her experience, I found myself nodding along. The symptoms sounded eerily familiar. At one point she paused and said, this place seems like they might struggle with the same challenges that your company helps workplaces address.
For starters, she began her onboarding experience without the necessary resources to actually do her job. That’s one of Gallop’s key survey questions (I have the materials and equipment I need to do my work), and already right out of the gate she’s starting unprepared. Her first few weeks are virtual onboarding which requires a company computer, which she doesn’t have. So she logged into a full slate of meetings on her personal laptop. Not ideal, but she adapted.
Then there was the schedule, or lack of one. She didn’t receive clarity about when or where she needed to be until the morning of her first day. Again, she adjusted. Flexibility became the unspoken requirement of the role.
Midway through her first day, her new manager called to check in. She apologized profusely for the miscommunication and the onboarding hiccups. She explained she was currently running a health fair—by herself—while also managing clinicians in the field. Typical of many managers these days, she’s short on time and long on responsibilities as her company has scaled back middle management in the name of efficiency.
To add context, the company had recently been acquired—again—and HR expectations were still being aligned across functions. While the personal call was appreciated, my friend had expected her onboarding to be anchored by her manager. Instead, she felt passed from department to department, trying to piece together how things actually worked.
The call ended with a final ask: would she be willing to pick up her company laptop from the local distribution center?
You know… more flexibility.
At a certain point you have start wondering, who is responsible for bending in a new role? If teams want to ensure that the time they’ve spent finding and vetting a new candidate is worthwhile, how they onboard them onto the team is critical, and that starts with managers. But, what if the manager is overwhelmed and the broader ecoystem (HR, tech support, operations) are all out of synch with each other?
Someone without institutional knowledge is left to navigate complex systems, absorb friction, and do extra emotional labor just to get started. Today’s onboarding mistakes quietly become tomorrow’s retention problems.
In a tight labor market, neither companies nor workers can afford unforced errors.
If I were coaching this manager, who likely began her career as a brilliant clinician and somehow over time was promoted to management through attrition, I would encourage them take a beat and assess what their people most need and figure out how to clear space to give it to them. That’s easier said than done, especially when managers are operating inside systems they don’t control.
Which is exactly why HR leaders need to recognize this truth: managers are the key lever for workplace health.
When managers are supported, aligned, and equipped to lead, everything downstream improves. Removing distractions and creating space for managers to focus on their core job: developing people, requires intentional prioritization. But moments of transition, like acquisitions and reorganizations, also create openings for reset.
And that’s exactly what we do at ManagerEQ.
If you’re curious how we help organizations strengthen onboarding, reduce burnout, and build better managers, starting with the moments that matter most, we’d love to show you.
Get the ManagerEQ app and experience how better manager support changes everything.
