New hire onboarding checklist prompt: free ChatGPT template
Updated · By Robert Breen
Use this once someone has accepted and you want their first month to go smoothly: accounts set up before they arrive, someone to greet them, the right people to meet, and nothing forgotten in week two. It's the logistics list, not the training plan. (For what they'll learn day by day, use the first-week training plan prompt.)
The prompt builds the list only from the people, tools and dates you give it, so every task has a real owner instead of "IT team" or "HR department" at a business that has neither.
The prompt
Copy it into ChatGPT (or Claude, Gemini or Copilot) and replace every [BLANK] with your own details. It uses the four parts from Prompt Writing 101: Role, Context, Task and Format.
Role: You are an operations assistant at [BUSINESS], building an onboarding checklist for a new hire. Context: The new hire is [NEW HIRE AND ROLE], starting [START DATE]. The people involved and the tools they'll need: [PEOPLE AND TOOLS]. By day 30 they should [DAY 30 GOAL]. Use only these people and tools as owners and items. For required employment paperwork and tax forms, write one line, "Complete required new-hire paperwork," and note that HR or our payroll provider confirms the list; don't name specific forms. Task: Make a checklist covering before day one, day one, the first week and days 8 to 30, with an owner and a due date for each task. If I didn't give an owner, write "Not stated". Format: One table per phase with the columns Task, Owner, Due, Done (leave Done blank). Tasks start with a verb. At most eight tasks per phase.
Fill in the blanks
[BUSINESS]- Your business name and what you do.
[NEW HIRE AND ROLE]- The person's first name and job.
[START DATE]- The first day, with the weekday, so due dates can count from it.
[PEOPLE AND TOOLS]- Who does what (who orders the laptop, who greets them, who trains them) and every account or tool they need access to.
[DAY 30 GOAL]- What they should be doing on their own by the end of the first month. It shapes the later tasks.
Example, filled in
A made-up example from the free lesson Build a Custom GPT That Writes Overdue Invoice Reminders. Maple Street Bookkeeping is the made-up bookkeeping firm in the overdue invoice reminder lesson. A new staff bookkeeper, Leah, starts soon.
Role: You are an operations assistant at Maple Street Bookkeeping, a small bookkeeping firm, building an onboarding checklist for a new hire. Context: The new hire is Leah, staff bookkeeper, starting Monday, October 19. The people involved and the tools they'll need: Tom (owner) handles the offer paperwork and the welcome lunch; Rosa (senior bookkeeper) sets up her email, accounting software login and client portal access, and is her trainer; Leah needs a laptop, a second monitor and a copy of our collections policy. By day 30 they should handle month-end reconciliations for five small clients with Rosa reviewing. Use only these people and tools as owners and items. For required employment paperwork and tax forms, write one line, "Complete required new-hire paperwork," and note that HR or our payroll provider confirms the list; don't name specific forms. Task: Make a checklist covering before day one, day one, the first week and days 8 to 30, with an owner and a due date for each task. If I didn't give an owner, write "Not stated". Format: One table per phase with the columns Task, Owner, Due, Done (leave Done blank). Tasks start with a verb. At most eight tasks per phase.
What a good answer looks like
- Accounts, laptop and portal access in Before day one, owned by Rosa, so Leah isn't idle on Monday.
- Real names as owners and real dates counted from October 19.
- One paperwork line, flagged for HR or payroll, not a guessed list of forms.
- Days 8 to 30 that build toward the five reconciliations, with Rosa's reviews on the calendar.
How to check it before you use it
An AI draft can sound right and still say something you never told it. Use the habit from the Reply Faster lesson: check every promise, name, date and number against what you gave it before anything goes out.
- Check that every owner is someone you named. If it invented an "IT department," reassign the task or mark it Not stated.
- Check the due dates against a calendar. A Saturday due date or a task due before the start date is a slip.
- Confirm the paperwork list with HR or your payroll provider; the AI should not decide it.
- Walk through day one in your head, hour by hour. If Leah would be waiting for anything, move that task earlier.
Why this prompt works
This is the action items table from the meeting summary lessons, pointed at a new hire: task, owner, due date, and "Not stated" instead of a guess. The paperwork rule keeps the AI out of a legal question it can't answer for your state.
Practice it in the free lesson
Summarize a Meeting Transcript with ChatGPT: Paste a long meeting transcript into ChatGPT and get the decisions, an action items table with owners and due dates, and a follow-up email ready to send. You do every step yourself in a practice copy of ChatGPT, and nothing touches your real accounts.
Also useful: Build an AI SOP Writer with a Custom GPT
Terms used here
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