Designing Onboarding That Feels Like Belonging
Background
Can you turn employee onboarding into a moment of emotional trust not just operational handovers?
As Swiggy scaled rapidly, its onboarding experience for new employees began to feel rushed and transactional. While policies and processes were being shared, new joiners often struggled to feel emotionally connected to the company and its culture. Swiggy’s People team wanted to redesign the onboarding journey — not just to inform, but to inspire trust, belonging, and early impact.
Approach
A cross-city Design Thinking sprint with Swiggy’s HR, Talent Acquisition, and business teams to redesign the end-to-end new hire journey from offer letter to Day 30.
- Conducted 51+ in-depth interviews and on-ground shadowing across Mumbai and Bangalore
- Identified friction points in pre-joining anxiety, induction rituals, KRA clarity, and value alignment
- Used real moment from offer acceptance to post-Day 0 reflections—to map emotional drop-offs and co-create solutions
- Created How Might We reframes for every stage: Pre-Day Zero → Day Zero → Post-Day Zero
Key Strategic Lever
Output
The Swiggy team co-created over 40 behavioural interventions across key stages. Examples include:
- Pre-Day Zero
→ Offer tracker for candidates (real-time status + warm gestures)
→ Pre-joining buddy & fortnightly engagement flow
→ Interview prep pages + personalised recruiter emails - Day Zero
→ Smart asset distribution (gamified collection cues + automation triggers)
→ Induction redesign with org map games, values postcards, and team scavenger hunts
→ Curated welcome meals (with Swiggy credits + playlist for the cab ride!) - Post Day Zero
→ Manager KRA toolkits + automated reminders for check-ins
→ Chatbot nudges to assess new hire pulse at Day 10, Day 30
→ Values card activity + handwritten letters home from new joinees
These weren’t “ideas for HR.” They were empathy-tested moments small shifts with disproportionate cultural impact.
SIMPLE IDEA 1
SIMPLE IDEA 2
SIMPLE IDEA 3
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