Free tools for HR leaders

Onboarding survey questions

12 questions across 4 themes, each with the scale to use. Filter, copy, print. Free, no sign-up.

Pick a theme, then a format. Every question carries the scale to use with it, because a good question on the wrong scale produces data you cannot act on. Copy what you need, then cut the survey down until people will actually finish it.

How these were written, and the five steps to a survey worth running ↓

Theme:

Format:

12 showing

Before day one

I had everything I needed before my first day.

Five-point agreement scale, strongly disagree to strongly agree.Rating scale

What would have made the period between accepting and starting easier?

Open text. Keep it optional.Open text

First week

I knew what was expected of me in my first week.

Five-point agreement scale, strongly disagree to strongly agree.Rating scale

I was introduced to the people I needed to know.

Five-point agreement scale, strongly disagree to strongly agree.Rating scale

What was confusing in your first week?

Open text. Keep it optional.Open text

First 30 days

The role so far matches what I was told during hiring.

Five-point agreement scale, strongly disagree to strongly agree.Rating scale

I know who to ask when I am stuck.

Five-point agreement scale, strongly disagree to strongly agree.Rating scale

What has surprised you, good or bad?

Open text. Keep it optional.Open text

First 90 days

I am able to do my job without regular help.

Five-point agreement scale, strongly disagree to strongly agree.Rating scale

I understand how my work contributes to the wider goal.

Five-point agreement scale, strongly disagree to strongly agree.Rating scale

I can see myself here in two years.

Five-point agreement scale, strongly disagree to strongly agree.Rating scale

If you were designing onboarding for the next person, what would you change?

Open text. Keep it optional.Open text

No questions match those two filters together. Clear one of them.

You have the questions

New starters tell you.
Hiring already knew.

Copy every question and run it yourself. The most common onboarding finding is a role that did not match what hiring described, and by the time a 90-day survey says so it has already cost you. Measured fit answers it before the offer.

Compono Engage · Work personalityDivision = Delivery Team

The eight ways of work a team needs covered, shaded by how strongly this team prefers each. Deep Doer and Auditor coverage, nobody in Pioneer or Campaigner. That is why this team asks for more innovation and then struggles to deliver it, and it is not something the survey answers alone can tell you.

Compono Engage · Culture alignment12 dimensions

Innovative

Risk Averse

Responsive

Planned

Customer Focused

Internal Effectiveness

Centralised Control

Delegated Control

Current cultureDesired culture4 of 12 shown

Every dimension measured as current against desired, on a scale that has been validated rather than invented. The gap is the finding, and it is the thing a single culture score can never give you.

Compono Engage · SubculturesBy division

InnovativeProcessTaskCollectivistControlStructureResponsiveConformityAcceptingCooperationCustomerFormal

Whole organisation (27)

Customer Service Team (12)

Executive (1)

HR and Finance (2)

Widget Delivery Team (12)

AlignedMisaligned

The same 12 dimensions cut by division, function, location or job level. The whole-organisation row hides what the Executive row shows. Averages are where culture problems go to hide.

See how Hire measures fitValidated fit and work personality, measured before the offer.

What should an onboarding survey ask?

Whether expectations were clear, whether the role matches what hiring described, and whether they know who to ask. The mismatch question is the one that predicts early attrition.

How these were written

Nothing here is calculated. Each question is written against two tests: can somebody answer it honestly, and can you act on the answer. Each one carries the scale it should be asked on, because the scale is part of the question and mixing scales inside a survey makes results much harder to compare. Filter by theme to cut whole sections rather than trimming words, and by format to balance rating questions against open text.

Assumptions

These are a starting point, not a survey. Cut hard. Response rate falls with every question you add.
Scales are part of the question. Five-point agreement for most, frequency for behaviour. Pick one convention and hold it.
Anonymity has to be explained, not asserted. People assume the worst when you are vague, and it shows up in the answers.
Written for Australian workplaces and Australian English. Compono product terms are reproduced exactly as they appear in the platform.
Do not ask more often than you can act. Asking without visible follow-through does more damage than not asking at all.

Sources

Compono, The culture, engagement and performance model

What to do about it

Most survey problems are not question problems. They are what-happens-next problems, and people can tell the difference by the second round.

1

Decide what you will do with the answers before you ask

If no decision is waiting on the result, do not run it. An unused survey teaches people not to answer the next one.

2

Cut it until it hurts

Remove whole themes rather than trimming words. Eight sharp questions beat forty thorough ones nobody finishes.

3

Say how anonymity actually works

Who sees what, at what group size, and what happens to free text. Vagueness reads as surveillance.

4

Report back before you fix anything

Tell people what you heard, including the uncomfortable parts, within two weeks. This is the single biggest driver of next year's response rate.

5

Where a tool helps

Pick one thing and visibly change it

One change people can see beats five they cannot. The point of a survey is the change, not the score.

Ask at 90 days
and you asked late.

Compono Hire measures fit before the offer, which is what prevents the most common onboarding finding: the role not matching what the person was told during hiring.

Step 5 is where most survey programs stall: the score arrives and nobody agrees what it means. That is an interpretation problem, and interpretation is what the platform is for.

See how it works

Compono Hire

400+

stores on one standard process

Common questions

When should you send an onboarding survey?

Before day one, end of week one, 30 days and 90 days. Asking only at 90 days catches the problems after they have already cost you.

What is a good onboarding survey response rate?

High, if you ask early. New starters answer readily; the problem is usually that nobody asks until they have stopped being new.

Should onboarding surveys be anonymous?

Not necessarily, and there is a case against it. The value here is acting on this person's experience while they are still new.

These questions are a starting point, not a survey. Cut hard: response rates fall with every extra question, and a short survey people finish beats a thorough one they abandon. Say what you will do with the answers before you ask, and be honest about how anonymity actually works, because people assume the worst when you are vague. Last reviewed July 2026.

Next step

Employee engagement

What engagement actually measures, and how it differs from satisfaction.

Read the definition →Related tool

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Requirements builder

Score the platforms you are looking at against the two risks, must-haves first.

Build the scorecard →Talk to us

Bring us your results

A conversation about what your survey is telling you, not a demo script.