Customer onboarding process map

What is in this map

20 steps across 5 swimlanes and 6 phases, with 6 decision points.

Swimlanes (who does the work)

Customer, Sales, Onboarding / Implementation, Finance and Support

Phases (left to right)

Sales handover, Kickoff and plan, Account and billing, Configuration and migration, Training and go-live and Adoption and support

Why map this process

The handover from sales to delivery is where onboarding is won or lost, and it is nobody's job. Sales has moved on; implementation was not in the room for the promises. Drawing the handover as an explicit step with an owner (rather than as the whitespace between two teams' processes) is the single highest-value thing this map does.

The second is admitting how much of onboarding is the customer's work. Data to be supplied, users to be nominated, sign-offs to be obtained: those sit in the customer's lane, and every one is a place where your timeline depends on someone you cannot manage. A map that hides that will always show onboarding as an internal process running late, rather than as a joint one waiting on an input.

Every step in the map

This is the spreadsheet behind the diagram. The numbers in “Goes to” are row numbers, which is exactly what the editor’s “Line to” column holds — so you can read the flow here and retype any part of it.

The decision points

Every branch in the map, with the label on each outgoing line. These are the questions the process has to be able to answer.

• 6. Credit or *KYC* check required?

  Owned by Finance · Account and billing

  • Required → step 7
  • Not required → step 9

• 7. Compliance checks cleared?

  Owned by Finance · Account and billing

  • Cleared → step 9
  • Hold → step 8

• 9. Customer provided data and access?

  Owned by Customer · Configuration and migration

  • Provided → step 11
  • No response → step 10

• 10. Re-engaged after sales chase?

  Owned by Sales · Configuration and migration

  • Re-engaged → step 11
  • No contact → step 20

• 13. Data migrated correctly?

  Owned by Onboarding / Implementation · Configuration and migration

  • Yes → step 15
  • No → step 14

• 16. **Go-live readiness** approved?

  Owned by Customer · Training and go-live

  • Go → step 17
  • No-go → step 11

Notes on specific steps

These notes travel with the map. In the editor they live in the Notes column and appear when you open a box.

2. Hand over account to onboarding

The handover pack is what stops the customer repeating themselves: signed scope, what was promised in the sale, named contacts, target go-live date and anything already agreed as out of scope.

6. Credit or *KYC* check required?

Write down what triggers the check, for example contract value, invoiced payment terms, a regulated sector or a new legal entity. Card and prepaid customers usually skip it.

13. Data migrated correctly?

Agree the test before you migrate: record counts by object, control totals on the money fields and a sample the customer checks themselves. Sign-off by the customer, not by the migration team.

16. **Go-live readiness** approved?

List the readiness criteria in advance and let the customer hold the decision. A no-go sends the account back to configuration, data and training work rather than quietly moving the date.

Making it yours

Give each customer-lane step an explicit trigger and a chase path: a decision that asks whether the input arrived and a branch that goes back to the customer. That is the difference between a plan and a process. Then adapt the configuration phase, which is the part that varies most by product; the surrounding phases usually transfer intact.

What to watch out for

• Go-live is not the end. The adoption phase after it is where churn is decided, and cutting it produces a map that stops the day the customer is technically able to use the product rather than the day they actually do.
• Billing setup belongs in the finance lane and belongs early. Companies that put it last discover at go-live that they cannot invoice, which is a bad first experience for both sides.
• Do not merge kickoff and planning. The kickoff establishes who is who; the plan commits to dates. Merging them means the dates were agreed before the people were known.

Frequently asked questions