When your company hires new employees, it’s important to provide them with the tools and resources they’ll need to succeed. Creating an employee handbook is one of the best and most common ways to accomplish this. Since employee handbooks can also protect your company from certain types of liability, it’s important to craft each section with care, starting with the employee handbook welcome statement.
While the specific contents of your employee handbook will depend on your industry, company size, local, state, and federal law, and other factors, they all typically include a welcome statement. Here are some tips on writing an introduction to an employee handbook.
How do you write a welcome statement for an employee handbook?
Welcome statements are one of the easiest parts of the employee handbook to create. They’re an introduction to your company’s purpose, mission, and values. You should already have a good idea of what those are, which makes the welcome statement easier to write.
When you set out to write your employee handbook welcome statement, think about what you most want your employees to know about the company—aside from legal and procedural items. Using an employee handbook generator like SixFifty can provide overall guidance and custom, legally compliant content, but the welcome statement is your opportunity to communicate directly to your new employees.
What to include in an employee handbook welcome statement
Welcome statements are often more informal than the rest of the handbook. Generally, your employee handbook welcome statement can include:
- Welcome: First, write a personal welcome to your new employees. This will be one of the employee’s first impressions of their new workplace, so feel free to express excitement and gratitude that they’ve decided to join you.
- Company purpose: Next, you may want to include some information about the company’s purpose. For example, your new employee probably knows that Acme Widgetmaker supplies high-quality widgets—but they may not know how the company fulfills a certain niche in the widget market.
- Company history: Consider including a brief history of your company. For example, if you’ve been in business for centuries, you can stress how the employee is now part of this rich history. If you’re a brand-new startup, you could include information about what drove you to start the company and how your previous employment, education, or life circumstances prepared you for the task.
- Company mission statement: Next, add your company’s mission statement, or what you hope to achieve together. This can include basic goals, such as supplying the finest widgets to consumers nationwide, as well as loftier goals, like donating a certain percentage of profits to underserved populations.
- Company values: Outline your company’s main values. For example, you might have a commitment to putting out a high quality product, but also hope to foster an inclusive and diverse workplace which prioritizes different opinions and contributions.
- Goals for employment: Finally, you might wish to include a statement about your goals for employees, such as a desire to grow skill sets and foster leadership opportunities.
What not to include in your employee handbook welcome statement
Of course, there are always some things to avoid. First, leave the specific local, state, and federal employee laws or declarations out of the welcome statement. Those will come later in the handbook, and will need to be updated each time you hire someone in a new state, or when the law changes.
Next, avoid overpromising. You shouldn’t include absolute statements or promise job security, since there’s no way to tell whether an employee will be a good long-term fit. Similarly, you don’t want to make statements promising certain benefits or perks, since those, too, may change over time.
Finally, don’t list your company’s rules, procedures, and processes in the welcome statement. Certain items, like requesting leave, should be covered in later sections. Having an attorney review your entire handbook, including the welcome statement, will ensure that your company remains legally compliant and protected.
Create your own employee handbook with SixFifty
It’s easy to create a comprehensive, legally compliant employee handbook with SixFifty’s Employee Handbook generator. Our software combines real legal expertise with user-friendly technology. Simply answer questions about your company, then download the automatically generated document.
SixFifty’s tools are cost effective, easy to use, and faster than hiring an attorney to write your handbook from scratch. Plus, you don’t need to monitor changes to employment law—we’ll notify you when it happens, so you can regenerate your handbooks accordingly. From the employee handbook welcome statement to regular updates, we offer everything you need to create a custom, compliant employee handbook.
Schedule a free product demo today to learn more!
Looking for the employee handbook requirements for your state? View our interactive map for required employee handbook policies by state.
