Skip to main content
A disorganized first week sets the wrong tone. When onboarding relies on manual handoffs between HR, IT, and hiring managers, tasks get missed — equipment arrives late, accounts are not provisioned, and new hires spend their first days waiting instead of learning. The problem compounds when you are onboarding multiple people across different departments and locations. Wayak connects your HRIS data, onboarding templates, and communication channels so that a single event — a confirmed new hire — triggers a complete, personalized onboarding workflow. The playbook assigns every task to the right owner with the right deadline, and the agent follows up until everything is complete.

​
What you need

Data sources

  • HRIS database — Employee records table with role, department, location, start date, and manager
  • IT asset database — Equipment inventory and provisioning status

Knowledge spaces

  • Onboarding templates — Department-specific onboarding checklists with task owners and relative due dates
  • Employee handbook — Company policies, benefits summaries, and orientation materials
Semantic layer: Define these in your ontology before setting up the agent.
ComponentNameDefinition
ObjectEmployeeMaps to the HRIS employees table. Represents a current or incoming team member
ObjectOnboardingTaskMaps to the onboarding task tracker. Represents a single task with an owner, due date, and status
MetricTaskCompletionRatePercentage of onboarding tasks completed on time per new hire
DimensionDepartmentCategorization by business unit: Engineering, Sales, Marketing, Operations, Finance
See building a semantic layer for a step-by-step guide.

​
Agent setup

1

Create the agent

Go to Agent Space → New agent.
FieldValue
NamePeople Ops Assistant
RoleEmployee experience and onboarding specialist
GoalEnsure every new hire has a smooth, complete onboarding experience
2

Set the description

You manage new hire onboarding end to end. When generating checklists, tailor every task to the hire’s role, department, and location. Use a friendly, welcoming tone in all communications directed at the new hire. Be precise with deadlines and task owners. If a task is overdue, escalate to the responsible owner’s manager with a clear summary of what is blocked.
3

Scope data access

Grant access to:
  • HRIS database (employees, departments, managers)
  • IT asset database (equipment inventory)
  • Onboarding templates knowledge space
  • Employee handbook knowledge space
  • Employee, OnboardingTask objects and TaskCompletionRate metric
4

Add skills

Trigger: New hire confirmed in HRIS
  1. Pull the new hire’s role, department, location, start date, and reporting manager from the HRIS.
  2. Retrieve the onboarding template for that department from the knowledge space.
  3. Customize the template: add role-specific tools, access permissions, and training modules.
  4. Assign each task to the responsible owner (IT for equipment, manager for introductions, HR for paperwork, security for badge access).
  5. Set due dates relative to the start date (equipment ready 2 days before, orientation on day 1, 30-60-90 day check-ins).
  6. Deliver the checklist to the hiring manager and the new hire via email.
Trigger: Daily check or manager request
  1. Query all onboarding tasks with a status of “pending” and a due date in the past.
  2. Group overdue tasks by new hire and by responsible owner.
  3. For each overdue task, identify how many days it is past due and what downstream tasks it blocks.
  4. Send a reminder to the task owner with the task details and escalation timeline.
  5. If a task is more than 3 days overdue, notify the owner’s manager and the HR business partner.

​
Automation

​
Playbook: New hire onboarding workflow

1

Set the trigger

Event trigger: New employee record created in the HRIS database with a status of “confirmed” and a future start date.
2

Build the workflow

  1. Query the HRIS for the new hire’s full profile: name, role, department, location, start date, and manager.
  2. Query the onboarding templates knowledge space for the matching department template.
  3. Loop through each task in the template:
    • Personalize the task description with the new hire’s name and role.
    • Assign the task owner based on the task category (IT, HR, manager, security).
    • Calculate the absolute due date from the relative offset and the start date.
    • Create the task record in the onboarding tracker.
  4. Condition: If the start date is less than 5 business days away, mark the checklist as “expedited” and shorten all pre-start deadlines by 50%.
  5. Aggregate the full checklist into a formatted summary.
The deadline calculation step uses a Python code block to compute business-day offsets, accounting for weekends and company holidays. You can customize the holiday calendar in the code.
3

Configure delivery

Send an email to the hiring manager with the full checklist. Send a Slack message to the #new-hires channel with the new hire’s name, role, start date, and a link to the checklist.
4

Test and activate

Click Run now to test with live data, then toggle to Active.

​
What’s next

Policy Q&A

Help new hires (and all employees) get instant answers to policy questions.

All HR use cases

See the full list.