Many, many years ago … before it was called onboarding …companies used to call the process of welcoming new employees “orientation,” and they did it even worse than companies do now. Maybe it was because those Traditionalist and Baby Boomer generations of workers were brought up with the “grow old and die with the company” mindset. Organizations didn’t put that much effort into welcoming new people because buzzwords like “employee engagement” and “retention” weren’t on the minds of management. Profits were.