“The NUMBER 1 Playbook every scale-up needs” is 
The employee handbook 
The employee handbook Before you sit back in your chair with a sigh of deflation, let’s tell you why this little document could be the difference between scaling and closing (and we don’t mean closing as in Always Be Closing sales).
In its State of the Global Workplace report, Gallup concludes that “20% of employees are engaged at work.
The bottom line (excuse the pun)?
Companies with more highly engaged employees show better performance.
Engaged employees, according to the Gallup study;
- Increase productivity by 17%
- Increase customer ratings by 10%
- Increase sales by 20%
- Increase profitability by 21%
- Reduce absenteeism by 41%
Whereas Forbes suggests that a disengaged employee costs the company about 34% of their salary.
Okay, got it.
Engage your employees.
But that’s not all.
Companies that rate highly on employee onboarding and training see 53% lower attrition (LinkedIn).
Okay, got it.
Engage employees from the get-go.
But how to engage employees from the get-go?
You’ve probably guessed that engaging employees from the get-go means having a great onboarding experience but what does that mean? Chocolates and a hoodie on the first day?
Not necessarily but here’s an easy onboarding checklist to help you on your way. You’ll notice that the employee handbook a number 1 on our list!
BUT 60% of employees don’t read the employee handbook when joining.
Why? Because generally, they’re boring.
Previously, we shared 4 examples that we absolutely LOVE, but today we thought we’d share our very own example from Whale 
.
If you’re a Whale customer, you’ll be able to find the template on Whale! Otherwise, simply download the presentation template below.
Elements of a great employee handbook
Before we share the must-haves of a great employee handbook, here are some of the mistakes that companies often make;
Copy-and-pasting the old handbook
Getting stuck in the detail
Using too much technical jargon
Remember you won’t be able to tell your new team member absolutely everything in the employee handbook. That’s what an onboarding process is for and why it often spans 90 days or more.
The purpose of the employee handbook is to translate the essence of the company, brand, and culture and to get new team members excited about being part of it all!
Brands like Netflix and Hubspot are famous for their employee handbooks! One might even go as far to say as it’s their online and publicly visible handbooks that attract the world’s best talent!
Typically these handbooks include elements such as;
- Purpose statement
- Values
- Mission
- The Story
- Way of doing business (Yes, we even have our Spotify Playlist in ours!)
Purpose statement
Purpose is your UBER strategy. It’s your why! It can be linked to “The story” of the company, but it might not be.
Purpose however should direct every single activity in the business, from what gets done (or not), to how to run meetings to how to build product, and more!
Your purpose is why your customers buy from you, why team members are attracted to you and why you get out of bed in the morning.
Values 
If purpose is about why we do what we do, Values are how we achieve that purpose.
In our case that means;
- Act with Integrity
- Deliver a Frictionless Experience
- Be Humbly Ambitious
You can check out how we live these values here.
In the ‘olden’ days, values used to be stuck up on a wall in big lofty offices but we don’t live in the olden days now, and if you’re going to win the game of entrepreneurship, you’re going to have to walk your talk!
Values should live in the hearts of your team, not on office doors!
Mission 
None of us are here to hold hands and sing kumbaya. We’re all on some kind of mission!
The more you clarify the objectives and name the mission of the company from the beginning, the easier it’ll be to have everyone moving in the same direction.
TOP TIP – Be specific!
The Story 
There’s a reason that each business starts, and typically it starts because of one of two reasons; a dream or a problem, or both!
In a way, a business is a modern-day fairytale that always starts with “once upon a time.” In our case, it goes a little something like this;
Of course, this wasn’t the, “and they all lived happily ever after” storybook ending, far from it.
It was just the beginning.
But this was our raizon d’etre / reason for being! Without this beginning, we wouldn’t be here talking to you!
Your business has a story.
You may not think it’s important, but it’s probably the reason that new employees want to work for you. Share the story and get everyone excited about continuing the legacy.
Way of doing things, I.e. Culture matters 
If purpose is about why a company does what it does and values are how they achieve that purpose, then the way of doing things is a practical guide to living the values. In essence, all of these create a company culture.
94% of entrepreneurs and 88% of job seekers say that a healthy culture at work is vital for success. (TeamStage)
Culture matters!
Here are a couple of items we chose to list in our employee handbook.
We don’t do internal email. We do L10 meetings. We do Slack. We even do memes on Slack – feel free to use as many as you like but we don’t do internal email.
This is to streamline communications and make working at Whale a pleasure, not a pain in the (you know).
If you have an email policy, including it in the employee handbook in a fun could reduce ‘drag’ or reading the document.
Don’t forget to consider HOW you write emails if your business does it a specific way, for example, when talking to customers.
If this relates only to some team members, however, you may want to include it in their workplace instructions or in another process.
Leave
Have you ever read a leave policy that made you fearful you might be arrested on account of wrongdoing? Try to make your leave policy really easy and simple to understand.
We really like this example by Hubspot from their handbook “The Culture Code”
. Our team is free to take as much leave as they like. Why?
Because we believe in supporting individuals in work-life balance, and we hire smart people. We know they’ll hit their objectives, and the more we empower our team members to be accountable, the better for everyone.
Micro-managing is so 1990.
Meetings
Blah, blah, blah…
Here’s a sneak peek of our meeting schedule included in our employee handbook.
PS – Want to find out how to supercharge your meetings? Check out this interview with Isaiah Nolte from Traction Tools
Learning
How will you approach learning within your team? Is learning a part of your culture? Are there specific phrases or terminology that teams need to learn?
If learning is a BIG part of your culture, you’ll want to include an element within the employee handbook on how you approach it.
Metrics
At this high level, it’s not so much about what metrics but rather about the business philosophy around metrics.
At Whale, we love metrics. Every team member in their role decides on the metrics that contribute to company success and to the mission at hand.
This is agreed upon within the first 30 days.
From there, metrics are reported weekly in L10 meetings.
Celebrating Success
Simply put. We celebrate success, no matter how small. And we celebrate each other’s success. This keeps us humbly ambitious.
Other topics you may want to include in your handbook
- Links to all your internally utilized platforms like Whale
- Public holidays
- Ways you connect e.g. we use Slack for messaging etc.
Creating an employee handbook that EVERYONE wants to read
Include rich media
We love social media because it’s engaging! Use the principles in creating your playbook.
Go wild with video, GIFs, emojis 
and images! (Yes, you’ll find these all on Whale )
Switch your mindset from rules to entertainment 
People watch Netflix because it’s fun, interesting, entertaining, and enjoyable. 
So then why make an employee handbook that looks like a book from the legal bar exam?
Make your playbook, this one and others, great to read by writing for enjoyment and not for the legal team.
Does this sound great, but you’re wondering how to apply it in your business? Download our Google Slides Employee handbook template below.
It’s the NUMBER 1 Playbook every scale-up needs!
Employee Hanbook template
Creating an employee handbook is hard right? Wrong! This template is designed to make it easy!