Onboarding video

What this is about

An onboarding video takes over the part of the first days that a colleague repeats fifty times a year: how the building works, who does what, which tools exist, what the unwritten rules are. Its audience has already accepted the offer, which flips the tone away from the recruiting video, where the same company was still competing for attention, and away from the training video, which comes later and teaches specific tasks. The typical build is a handful of short pieces rather than one film, because org charts, tools and office layouts change faster than anyone plans for, and a single long video ages all at once.

The format determines scope, crew and timeline — before the first location has been scouted.

What runs differently here

Where this differs from the general case:

• Modules are cut so that the volatile ones — team introductions, tool overviews, office layout — can be replaced without touching the welcome
• Named people age the film fastest, so the plan decides deliberately where a name appears and where a role is enough
• The tone has to match what the person will actually find on Monday, because a mismatch is discovered within days and costs trust
• Practical questions belong in the shot list: where to eat, how to book a room, who to ask when something breaks

What the plan has to deliver

A production plan is useful to this role when it provides the following:

• A module plan that marks which pieces are evergreen and which are expected to be re-shot
• A list of the questions new colleagues actually ask in week one, collected from HR and team leads
• A shooting day that covers the real rooms people will use, booked outside peak occupancy

Common pitfalls

What most often goes wrong in practice:

• Recycling the recruiting video, which promises again instead of orienting and leaves the practical questions unanswered
• Filming a full management line-up by name, so the video needs replacing after the next reorganisation
• Packing compliance and tool training into the welcome, which buries the useful parts under obligation

With TillyGen

TillyGen plans onboarding as a modular set: evergreen pieces separated from the ones that will change, with a shot list built from the questions new people actually ask.

Change one constraint and the consequences travel through the whole plan: affected shots are flagged, the call sheet is regenerated, and nobody keeps working from yesterday's version.