How to Conquer Misconceptions and Learn to Trust New Hires

Hiring a new employee can be exhausting. Paperwork, training, and onboarding

But that's no excuse for not taking the time to build a solid foundation of trust with your new hires.

Trust plays a major role in setting the tone for your employee/employer relationship, and it's critical to setting new employees up for success. Here are five reason why you need to learn to trust your new hires – and some advice on how to do so.

1. Trust Encourages Your Employees to Become Brand Advocates

"Word-of-mouth marketing and referrals from employees are two very important benefits that your business can capitalize on if you simply trust your people and encourage them to engage with the brand. Advocates are far less likely to look for employment elsewhere, reducing turnover and its associated costs and building experience and expertise among your workforce." – Barry Chignell, CIPHR

When an employee truly enjoys their job and looks forward to their work, they are more likely to express their happiness

You can create brand ambassadors by strengthening the onboarding process. According to the SHRM Foundation

2. Confidence Counts

"When building a person's confidence, listening to their story is crucial. Allow them to communicate openly and honestly about their strengths, weakness[es], fears, accomplishments, and career goals. Listening validates what they are feeling and lets them know that they have someone in their corner who will listen and listen more."  – Greg Martin, About Leaders

When you give your employees certain rights and privileges via trust and understanding, you leave room for employee confidence. When you leave room for employee confidence, you leave room for cutting-edge innovation.

Tell your employees early on what the parameters of their job and the tenets of your culture are – ideally during the onboarding process. Don't make them guess what is appropriate. Spell it out. The Aberdeen Group reports

3. Transparency Breeds More Transparency

"The idea that a company's employees are its most influential ambassadors has been amplified in the connected world. Addressing transparency internally and committing to it will help employees feel as though they are a trusted and integral part of the organization's success, with a clear vision of how they play into the future direction." – Marc Sowik, Authenticity Rules.

This isn't exactly a new idea, but allowing yourself to be transparent can open the door for your employees to be transparent with you, creating a stronger relationship between you and your staff.

4. Delegation = Productivity

"Sometimes, efficiency isn't about shifting priorities or working on things in a different order. Sometimes, your workload is simply too much for one sane person to bear, and you need a little help to get everything done on time. Some professionals wear a heavy workload as a kind of badge of honor, considering it a point of pride or evidence of job security, but that isn't a valuable long-term strategy to deal with the increased load." – Jayson Demers, Inc.

When you trust your employees to do certain projects on their own, you allow for work that may have fallen by the wayside to be completed on time and effectively. This gives both yourself and your employees the ability to be much more productive.

A few tips to help you master delegation, courtesy of Signe Spencer

- Start by detailing the task at hand. Explain to the employee exactly what you want them to accomplish.

- Highlight the importance of the task at hand. Tie it to the company's overall goals.

- Give the employee the resources they need to complete the task.

- Outline what you expect to see once the project is complete.

5. Trust Leads to a Better Workplace Overall

"If a company trusts [its] employees and shows it by staying out of their way, [it'll] do a better job of retaining that talent, the people [it has] will be more productive, and [it will] attract more great people with [its] great employer brand. If [the company doesn't] trust [its] employees, the exact opposite will happen." – Paul Petrone, LinkedIn Talent Blog

Trust breeds honesty. With an honest management team and loyal workforce, your company can take on all the competition and come out on top.

–

According to the American Psychological Association

"This lack of trust should serve as a wake-up call for employers," said David W. Ballard, head of APA's Center for Organizational Excellence, in a press release. "Trust plays an important role in the workplace and affects employees' well-being and job performance."

Now that you know why trusting your new employees is crucial, put yourself to the test. Delegate some work. Be a little more transparent with your goals. Open up. Your employees will appreciate the change of pace, and they'll use their newfound freedom to achieve even more.

A version of this article originally appeared on the Click Boarding blog

Christine Marino is the chief revenue officer at Click Boarding