Onboarding plan template: a 30-60-90 day plan for new hires (free)

Your new hire starts in two weeks. The laptop is ordered and HR has the paperwork. But ask the manager what the new hire should be doing on day 40, and you get a long pause.

That pause is what an onboarding plan fixes. It says what the new hire should learn, do and own by day 30, 60 and 90, and when you'll sit down to check. This guide walks through a 30-60-90 day plan phase by phase, shares what public employers put in their own onboarding guides, and ends with a free onboarding plan template in Excel and Word, plus a check-in form you can import into HornetForms.

What an onboarding plan is (and what it isn't)#

An onboarding plan is one page of goals and tasks for one person in one role. The manager writes it before day one and the new hire follows it for the first three months. It answers three questions:

• What does good look like at 30, 60 and 90 days? Three to five goals, in plain words.
• Who does what, and by when? Each task has an owner and a due day.
• When do we check? Three check-ins, with dates set on day one.

That's different from the onboarding process. The process is the same for every hire: the welcome email, the laptop, payroll, the first-day tour. Our guide to the new hire onboarding process covers that side, with a 90-day checklist for HR and IT. The onboarding plan template in this post sits on top of it. It's about the work: what this person should be able to do, and how you'll both know.

A sales hire and a developer can share a process. They should never share a plan.

The 30-60-90 day onboarding plan, phase by phase#

A 30-60-90 day plan splits the first three months into blocks of about a month, each with one goal. The names below are the ones in the free onboarding plan template. Change the tasks to fit the role, but keep the shape.

Before day one: get ready#

Start about two weeks out. Send the details form, order the kit and write the goals. Pick a buddy, someone on the team who answers the small questions so the new hire doesn't save them all for the manager. Then put the three check-in dates in your own calendar before anything else lands there.

Days 1 to 30: learn the role#

The first month is for people, tools and context. Give the new hire one small, real task they can finish in the first week, so they see their work matter early. Hold a weekly one-to-one. Keep the pace sane: Indiana's hiring manager checklist warns managers not to overwhelm a new employee "in the first week".

Days 31 to 60: contribute#

Now the new hire takes over one piece of regular work. They meet someone from another team each week, and you ask two teammates how they're getting on. At day 31, agree on the goals for the next 30 days, so the second month has its own target.

Days 61 to 90: own it#

The last block is about ownership. The new hire leads one small piece of work from start to finish. You write a development plan together and they fill in a self evaluation before the 90-day check-in. That conversation closes the plan and sets goals for the next six months.

Onboarding best practices from public employers#

Public employers publish their onboarding guides, which makes them a good place to check your plan against. Two stand out.

The US Office of Personnel Management (OPM) has a roadmap of onboarding elements and tasks for federal agencies. It starts pre-boarding "14-21 days prior to the arrival of the new employees" and, for day one, says the "Supervisor meets and personally welcomes new employee, before initial in-processing if possible" (OPM, End-to-End Hiring Roadmap: orientation elements and tasks, accessed 28 October 2026). For the first week it says: "Give first work assignment. To the extent possible, make sure it is meaningful." Within 30 days, the supervisor should "Discuss and issue performance standards and provide 30-day feedback session". Between 30 and 90 days, the roadmap asks agencies to "Assess orientation process and provide feedback, through dialogue and the 90-day new employee survey."

The Indiana State Personnel Department tells its new hires that "Your Onboarding process began when you accepted the job offer and it continues through your first 90 days of employment." It adds: "This is not to say that Onboarding stops after 90 days" (Indiana State Personnel Department, Onboarding: Welcome, accessed 28 October 2026). Its hiring manager checklist opens with a line worth pinning above your desk: "Onboarding is a process, not an event." For the second month it says "At the end of 60 days, review achievements against expectations to date with the new employee" (Indiana SPD, Hiring Manager Checklist, 12/13, accessed 28 October 2026). Its hiring manager guide sums up the first 90 days in one line: "Give constructive feedback early and often" (Indiana SPD, Hiring Manager Onboarding Guide, 12/2013, accessed 28 October 2026).

Put those together and you get the onboarding best practices behind this template:

• Start before day one. Two to three weeks out, not the morning they arrive.
• The manager shows up. In person or on the first call, before the admin starts.
• Real work early. A first task that matters, in week one.
• Feedback at 30 days, a review at 60, a look back at 90. Each one on the calendar from the start.
• Ask the new hire how onboarding went. Both OPM and Indiana ask new employees for feedback on onboarding itself, not just on their performance.

Good to know: this guide is general, not legal advice. Paperwork, pay and probation rules differ by country, state and contract, so check what applies to your team.

How to write goals in your onboarding plan template#

Most onboarding plans fail at the goals. "Get up to speed" and "learn the product" can't be checked, so the 30-day check-in turns into a vague chat. Write each goal so that you and the new hire would agree on whether it happened:

• Weak: Learn the support tools. Better: Answer 15 support tickets a day on your own by day 30.
• Weak: Understand our customers. Better: Sit in on five customer calls and write up what you heard by day 45.
• Weak: Take on more responsibility. Better: Run the weekly report on your own from day 60.

Three to five goals is plenty for 90 days. Write them before day one, walk through them on day one, and change them at a check-in if the job turns out to be different. Changing a goal is fine. Dropping one without saying so tells the new hire the plan doesn't matter.

Collect new hire details before day one#

The first task in the onboarding plan template is sending a details form, because everything else waits on it: payroll needs the legal name, IT needs the laptop preference, and the buddy needs the start date. The new employee information form template in HornetForms asks for all of it on two short pages, from the emergency contact to desk equipment and workplace adjustments.

New hires don't need an account to fill it in, which helps when their work email doesn't exist yet. You can turn on an email to yourself for each new response, or send each answer to a Google Sheets row or a Slack channel so IT sees it the same day.

Check in at 30, 60 and 90 days#

The check-ins are where an onboarding plan earns its keep. Each one is a short meeting with the same questions, so you can see how answers change from month to month. A form helps: the new hire answers a few days before, and you both walk in with notes instead of starting cold.

The free check-in import file below holds 11 questions:

• Which check-in is this? (30-day, 60-day or 90-day)
• How clear are your goals? (1 to 5)
• How settled do you feel in the team?
• Do you have the tools and access you need?
• What has gone well so far?
• What has been harder than you expected?
• What would help you most next month? (training, time with the manager or buddy, clearer goals, tools, meeting other teams)
• How confident do you feel doing the job on your own? (1 to 5)
• Day 90: what feedback do you have on your onboarding for the next new hire?
• Would you like a one-to-one chat about anything?

The form also asks for the new hire's name, since you'll want to talk the answers through together.

To build it, choose CSV import in HornetForms and upload the file. Each column becomes a question, with up to 10 questions per page, so you get two pages. The example rows only help HornetForms guess each question's type (choices, ratings, long answers). They never become responses. The import brings questions only, so add two things in the editor:

• One show rule: show the day-90 feedback question only when "90-day" is picked.
• Required answers: imported questions start optional, so switch on Required for the ones you need.

You can also trim "(rating 1 to 5)" from the two rating labels. And if you give the check-in question a prefill parameter such as checkin, a link ending in ?checkin=90-day opens the form with "90-day" already picked.

You send each check-in yourself. Put the three dates in your own calendar on day one, then send the link a few days before each one. Turn on an email to yourself for each new response, so you can read the answers before you meet.

Ask for feedback at day 90#

The 90-day check-in looks two ways. The new hire looks back at their own work, and you both look back at onboarding itself.

For the first part, the self evaluation form template works well. It asks what they're proudest of, what went less well, a self-rating on five areas, goals for the next cycle and the support they need. Send it a week before the 90-day check-in, so the conversation starts from their view, not yours.

For the second part, the day-90 question in the check-in form asks what you should change for the next new hire. The form asks for their name, so tell them plainly who reads the answers. If you invite teammates to your workspace (Pro and Business), every one of them can read every response in it, check-ins included. Keep the check-in form in a workspace with only the people who should see it, and treat the answers as the start of a conversation, not a scorecard.

Then act on what you hear. Change one thing in the onboarding plan template before your next hire starts, and tell the person who suggested it.

Free onboarding plan template: Excel, Word and a check-in form#

Everything in this guide comes in four free files:

• The 30-60-90 plan spreadsheet. The onboarding plan template for Excel has 22 tasks across four phases, each with a goal, an owner and a due day. Type the start date and the sheet works out every due date. Pick a Status as you go (Not started, In progress, Done or Skipped) and the Flag column shows what's overdue or due this week. The Check-ins tab works out the 30, 60 and 90-day dates for your calendar, and the Summary tab shows progress by phase and open tasks by owner. It opens in Excel and Google Sheets.
• The same tasks as a CSV. The plan as a CSV has the phase, goal, task, owner, due day and status, ready for another tool.
• A printable plan. The Word (DOCX) version is the onboarding plan template to edit, with every phase, blank rows for your own tasks, a check-in table and the questions to ask. Print it as a PDF, US Letter or a PDF, A4.
• The check-in form. The check-in import file builds the 11-question form above in one upload.

Want different questions in the check-in? Swap any of them for one of the 20+ question types, from linear scales to file uploads. Every plan has unlimited responses within fair use, so a busy hiring year never hits a response limit.

Still hiring? Our reference check questions cover the step before the offer.

Start your next onboarding plan#

Download the onboarding plan template, write three goals for your next hire and put the check-in dates in your calendar before day one. Then send the details form with the offer email and import the check-in form so it's ready at day 30. The Free plan is free forever. Sign up for free and have the plan ready before your next new hire walks in.