Day One

First Day is a team-based onboarding design serious game. Participants step into a newcomer’s shoes, invest 15 tokens in key moments, then test their journey against real-life irritants. The game makes trade-offs, blind spots and the decisive role of the manager and buddy visible. It is for HR, managers, learning teams and groups that want to improve onboarding.

Walkthrough

1. 1

   Launch the challenge

   5 min

   Present the objective: design a robust onboarding journey with limited resources. Form teams of 3 to 5. Give each team an Our journey canvas and 15 tokens. “Your mission: make a newcomer want to stay, not just survive their first day.”

   Tip — Emphasize the 15 tokens: the game is about trade-offs, not an infinite ideal list.

2. 2

   Discover your persona

   7 min

   Each team draws a persona, reads it and identifies the concern and sensitive irritant. Ask teams to rephrase what this person will watch for from the moment they arrive. “Do not design for an average employee: design for this person, with their expectations and vulnerabilities.”

   Tip — If a team caricatures its persona, ask: “What would make them say: I am in the right place?”

3. 3

   Explore the moments

   8 min

   Present the five phases. Let teams browse the moment cards, ask questions and spot the actions they consider decisive. Remind them that each card must stay in its phase. “Good onboarding starts before arrival and does not stop on day 1.”

   Tip — Do not advise too early. Let teams discover that some phases are often forgotten.

4. 4

   Build the journey

   18 min

   Teams place moments on their canvas and pay the token cost. They may remove or replace cards until time is up. At the end, each journey must cost no more than 15 tokens. “Each token is a real resource: time, attention, coordination. Choose what best protects your persona.”

   Tip — Announce a halfway reminder and then a two-minute reminder. Slight stress makes the trade-offs more realistic.

5. 5

   Test with irritants

   15 min

   Shuffle the irritants and draw 6, face down, then reveal them one by one. For each card, all teams check their moments. Record losses and doubled losses. The score starts at 10. “Same event for everyone. What changes is what your journey anticipated.”

   Tip — Always read the irritant aloud before the score. The lived effect matters as much as the calculation.

6. 6

   Compare the journeys

   10 min

   Ask each team for its score, best choice and regret. Compare protections: pre-arrival, manager, buddy, feedback, month 3. Highlight the differences in strategy. “Let’s focus less on who won than on what strong journeys have in common.”

   Tip — Also value a lower-scoring journey if it reveals a blind spot that is useful for the organization.

7. 7

   Move to our context

   8 min

   Hand out the What about us? canvas. Each team chooses three concrete actions, indicates who they matter for, who owns them and by when. Encourage actions testable within a month. “A good onboarding idea becomes useful when someone owns it, for a specific person, by a clear date.”

   Tip — Clarify the verbs: replace “improve the welcome” with “send an agenda 10 days before”.

8. 8

   Close and commit

   4 min

   Ask two or three debrief questions depending on time. Have each team choose one priority action and ask for a first-step commitment. Thank participants for the trade-offs they made. “The real score will start with the next newcomer. What will we change before they arrive?”

   Tip — End on a simple, dated action. That is what bridges game and field.

Variants

• Remote : Use a shared board with the cards as thumbnails, 15 virtual tokens and one canvas per team. The facilitator reveals the same 6 irritants in plenary.
• Large group : With more than 20 participants, limit report-backs to 1 minute: score, decisive moment, blind spot. Then vote for the three most useful actions.
• HR expert mode : After the score, ask teams to add one follow-up indicator per action: access lead time, manager check-in done, feedback received, network created.