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🎯 For those who installed the onboarding template and want to understand what’s behind each structural decision
You installed the employee onboarding template. The pipe is already configured, the fields are in place, and the example cards show how the process works in practice. It’s a very solid starting point.
But a well-structured template isn’t just a collection of fields and phases — every structural decision has a reason. Understanding that reason is what transforms the template into a process your team actually operates, and the process into something Pipefy can automate, measure, and improve.
This article walks through the template phase by phase. You’ll understand why each phase exists, what the fields capture, and what this structure makes possible — including what you can customize for your context.
📖 What you’ll understand here:
The model behind the template
The onboarding template is built on three layers you already know: the pipe (the onboarding process as a whole), the phases (each step the employee goes through until fully integrated), and the cards (each employee being onboarded).
It’s worth understanding what each layer represents, because that understanding will guide you when you need to customize.
The pipe is not a Kanban board. Kanban is a visualization tool, useful for organizing anything. A pipe goes further: it represents a process with a beginning, middle, and end, with defined responsibilities and clear criteria for advancing from one step to the next.
This structure is what allows Pipefy to automate steps, measure cycle time, and show where the process can improve.
A phase is not a column. Each template phase represents a real process state — a specific situation the employee is in that calls for specific actions from specific people. "First day" isn’t just a column name: it’s a state in which the onboarding responsible needs to execute a checklist before anything else happens.
The more precise that definition, the more Pipefy can work for you.
A card is not a task. Each card represents an employee going through all the onboarding steps. When the card is completed, the history remains — every phase change, every field filled in, every automation that fired.
It’s this history that will allow you to measure and improve the process over time.
The more clearly the pipe reflects "who does what in each phase and based on which criteria," the more Pipefy can automate, measure, and anticipate problems for you.
The start form — the process begins with the right information
Before any phase, the process begins with the start form. In the template, it collects: employee name, email, contract type, work arrangement (on-site, remote, or hybrid), office, location, department, and position.
These fields aren’t there by chance. Every piece of information collected in the start form is available in all subsequent phases — and can be used as an automation trigger. The work arrangement, for example, can automatically determine whether the workstation preparation phase is needed or not. The contract type can trigger different documentation flows for full-time, contractor, and intern.
The practical rule: everything you need to know about the employee to conduct the onboarding should be in the start form. What isn’t there will need to be tracked down later — by email, comment, or memory.
If your context has fields the template doesn’t include — cost center, responsible manager, expected start date — this is the time to add them. Fields added to the start form are available throughout the pipe.
Phase 1: Planning — prepare before the first day
The Planning phase exists to ensure everything is ready before the employee arrives. The template fields reflect exactly that:
First day of work (date): sets the deadline that guides the rest of the process. With this date, it’s possible to create automations that trigger reminders in advance — for IT to configure access, for the manager to prepare the first-day agenda, for HR to send the welcome kit.
Digital workplace setup (checklist): corporate email created, access to Pipefy, access to the support system, access to Slack. Each item is a responsibility that must be completed before the employee starts. With a checklist field, the status of each item is visible to the whole team — without relying on email or memory.
Is the workstation ready? (yes/no): a simple field that serves as a trigger. When marked "Yes," it can automatically move the card to the next phase — or notify the responsible person that preparation is complete.
Onboarding schedule (attachment): the document that defines what happens on each day of the first month. Centralized in the card, available to everyone involved without needing to search in email or a shared folder.
The Planning phase is where onboarding wins or loses quality. An employee who arrives on the first day without system access, without a ready workstation, and without a defined agenda starts with the wrong impression of the company. The template was structured to prevent exactly that.
Phase 2: First day — execution with checklist
The First Day phase has two central fields:
Onboarding responsible: defines who conducts the process on that day. With this field filled in, Pipefy knows who to assign the card to — and can automatically notify that person when the card enters this phase.
First day checklist: company introduction, workplace introduction, scheduling team introduction meetings, and scheduling training sessions. Each item is a specific action with a clear responsible person. When all items are checked, the card is ready to advance.
The logic of this phase is simple and powerful: transforming the first day — which in most companies tends to be chaotic and inconsistent — into a standardized, trackable process. Every employee goes through the same steps. Every responsible person knows what needs to be done. Every manager can see the status in real time.
Phase 3: First week — structured tracking
The first week is where integration consolidates — or starts to fall apart. The template captures three pieces of information:
First week checklist: team introduction meetings, KPIs and goals presentation, training participation. These are the milestones indicating the employee is truly being integrated — not just physically present.
Training date: a date field that serves both for planning and automation. If training hasn’t occurred by a deadline, Pipefy can automatically escalate to the responsible person.
First week comments: a free text field for recording qualitative observations. Unlike card comments — which stay in the activity history — this structured field can be exported, filtered, and used in reports.
The distinction between field comments and card comments matters: field comments are structured data that Pipefy can use in automations and reports. Card comments are context and communication — important, but not usable by automations.
Phase 4: First month — evaluation and development
The First Month phase marks the transition from operational onboarding to development monitoring. The fields reflect this change in focus:
Employee manager: defines who is responsible for tracking in this phase — which may differ from the responsible person in previous operational onboarding phases.
First month performance (scale 1–5): a quantitative evaluation that, aggregated over time, allows comparing performance across different onboardings. With enough data, it’s possible to identify patterns — departments where integration works better, work arrangements that require more support, managers who need process assistance.
Qualitative feedback: the complement to the numerical evaluation. Recorded in the card, it’s associated with that employee’s history.
Development plan (attachment): the document that defines the next steps. Centralized in the card, available to the manager and HR without needing to search in another system.
Final phases: Completed and Archived
The template has two final phases — and the distinction between them matters.
Completed is for successfully completed onboardings: the employee has gone through all the steps, is operational, and integrated. It’s the phase that feeds the dashboard of on-time completed onboardings.
Archived is for incomplete onboardings: withdrawals, terminations during the probation period, canceled processes. Keeping these cards separate — and not deleting them — preserves the history and allows measuring the non-completion rate over time.
Never delete incomplete onboarding cards. The history of these cards is data — and data about where the process failed is exactly what you need to improve it.
How to customize the template without losing the structure
The template is a starting point, not a straitjacket. Some customizations are expected and healthy:
- Adding fields to the start form to capture information specific to your context — cost center, job title, direct manager — without changing the phase logic.
- Adding items to checklists in each phase to reflect the specific steps in your process — internal systems, specific access, required training.
- Adjusting phase owners to reflect who in your company executes each step — HR, IT, area manager, facilities.
What’s worth preserving is the progression logic: each phase representing a real, unambiguous state of the process, with clear entry and exit criteria. This logic is what will allow you to create useful automations, measure time per phase, and identify where the process slows down.
FAQ
Do I need to use all template phases?
Not necessarily. If your onboarding process doesn’t have a formal first-month follow-up, for example, you can adapt or simplify that phase. The criterion for keeping a phase is always the same: does it have a clear owner and a defined exit criterion? If yes, it adds value. If not, it can be simplified or incorporated into another phase.
Can I use the same template for different contract types?
Yes. The "Contract type" field in the start form can trigger different automations for each type — specific documentation, distinct flows, customized checklists. If the differences are very significant, separate pipes by contract type tend to be easier to operate and measure individually.
What should I do with the example cards that came with the template?
Explore them before deleting. They show how the pipe works with real data and are useful for understanding each phase’s logic. When you’re comfortable with the structure, delete them and start with your real process cards.
How do I connect the onboarding pipe with the recruitment pipe?
When a position is filled in the Recruitment pipe, an automation can automatically create a card in the Onboarding pipe — passing name, job title, department, and other data without manual entry. This is a pattern covered in the cross-pipe automations section.
The onboarding template already solves the most important problem: the process is structured, visible, and trackable. What comes next is making that process work for you — configuring automations that eliminate manual work, adjusting fields to your context, and using the data the pipe will generate to improve each onboarding over time.
The next step is understanding the criteria for refining your process phases — when to separate steps, when to merge them, and how to ensure each phase has the right owner and exit criterion.
