Probation Period Feedback

How it was before:

We officially have a probation period in all our contracts (within the first 6 months the notice period is two weeks and no reasons have to be given). We do not care a lot structurally and officially about that which seemed ‘careless’ to new joiners, and for whom it might be complicated to feel that ‘silence’ is a good thing. Furthermore colleagues asked for more structured feedback especially in this first phase of employment which is a no brainer.

Goal: Make new joiners feel comfortable, provide feedback and not make them worry about the probation period.

Process:

• PO and TF of team of new joiner are responsible for this process
• Probation Period Process includes 2 steps:
  1. mid term probation feedback at roughly 3 months in and
  2. probation period end feedback at roughly 5 months
• PO and TF ask new joiner & team-mates or other relevant people regularly how the onboarding is going
• PO and TF sync 2 weeks before the mid term feedback regarding the new joiner in their team.
  • If everything is ok, they schedule a call and one (or both) provides feedback and says that everything is on track.
  • If some major concerns come up, PO and TF ping Anna who takes care of a task force meeting (harsh word, but here the connotation is meant positive) to figure out together and interdisciplinary how to provide best support for the new joiner
• The same happens for the end probation period feedback. It needs to be clearly stated, that the probation period is not an issue and new joiner now moves into the regular cdc process
• (The feedback itself will differ from person to person, this is ok. It can be seen analogue to the cdc feedback session and we iterate over time)
• (If the new joinder is a PO, VP Product jumps in a PO Feedback Sparring with the TF. If the new joiner is a TF, Area-PO & PO run the feedback)

Admin wise:

• You find the ‘to do’ Schedule 3 month and 5 month feedback sessions in the onboarding ticket. Please tick the box and post the calendar link in the ticket. We recommend to schedule directly after the person joined.
• AREA Facilitators take care of a monthly updated Personio Report (with dates of probation period feedbacks) See this github issue.
• During the monthly check we go through the Personio Report and check if the sessions have happened, (AFs do Personio Entry) share outcome and best practices.