Subcontractor onboarding process map
A swimlane map of bringing an external contractor onto a yard, from selection to checkout, across procurement, HSE/safety, security/access and the project manager. It treats access, competence and permits as three separate gates a contractor has to clear, in that order, before doing any work at all.
Opens a copy in the editor and saves it in this browser. No account, nothing sent anywhere.
What is in this map
18 steps across 4 swimlanes and 5 phases, with 4 decision points.
- Swimlanes (who does the work)
- Procurement, HSE / Safety, Security / Access and Project Manager
- Phases (left to right)
- Selection, Documentation, Induction and access, Deployment and Checkout
Why map this process
The three onboarding gates — valid documentation, a passed induction, and a permit where the work calls for one — are deliberately sequential rather than a single 'contractor cleared' checkbox. A contractor with current insurance and a passed induction still cannot start hot work or confined-space entry without the specific permit that work requires, and collapsing the gates into one step would let a permit-requiring job start on general site clearance alone.
Daily supervision is a recurring check, not a one-time sign-off at deployment, and its note explicitly covers conduct as well as work quality — PPE compliance, permit adherence, safety behaviour. That distinction matters because a contractor can do technically competent work while creating a safety risk through how they work, and a map that only checks output quality would miss the reason most contractor incidents actually happen.
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.
| # | Step | Shape | Swimlane | Phase | Goes to |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Subcontractor selected and engaged for a work package | Start | Procurement | Selection | 2 |
| 2 | Request certifications, insurance and competency records | Process | Procurement | Selection | 3 |
| 3 | Verify certifications and insurance are current | Control | Procurement | Documentation | 4 |
| 4 | All required documentation **valid and current**? | Decision | Procurement | Documentation | 6 (Valid), 5 (Missing/expired) |
| 5 | Chase outstanding or expired documentation | Process | Procurement | Documentation | 3 |
| 6 | Deliver site safety induction to contractor personnel | Process | HSE / Safety | Induction and access | 7 |
| 7 | Contractor personnel **pass the induction** and site test? | Decision | HSE / Safety | Induction and access | 9 (Pass), 8 (Fail) |
| 8 | Repeat induction for personnel who did not pass | Process | HSE / Safety | Induction and access | 7 |
| 9 | Issue site access passes and *PPE* | Process | Security / Access | Induction and access | 10 |
| 10 | Assign work area and brief on adjacent operations | Process | Project Manager | Deployment | 11 |
| 11 | Work requires a *hot work* or *confined space* permit? | Decision | Project Manager | Deployment | 12 (Yes, permit required), 13 (No, standard work) |
| 12 | Obtain the relevant permit before work starts | Approval | HSE / Safety | Deployment | 13 |
| 13 | Contractor carries out work under FAYARD supervision | Process | Project Manager | Deployment | 14 |
| 14 | Daily supervision check of contractor work and conduct | Process | Project Manager | Deployment | 15 |
| 15 | *Work package* complete and area handed back clean? | Decision | Project Manager | Checkout | 17 (Complete), 16 (Not complete) |
| 16 | Contractor continues work, repeat daily checks | Process | Project Manager | Checkout | 14 |
| 17 | Return access passes, close out and record performance | Process | Security / Access | Checkout | 18 |
| 18 | Subcontractor checked out, work package closed | End | Security / Access | Checkout | End |
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.
-
4. All required documentation **valid and current**?
Owned by Procurement · Documentation
- Valid → step 6
- Missing/expired → step 5
-
7. Contractor personnel **pass the induction** and site test?
Owned by HSE / Safety · Induction and access
- Pass → step 9
- Fail → step 8
-
11. Work requires a *hot work* or *confined space* permit?
Owned by Project Manager · Deployment
- Yes, permit required → step 12
- No, standard work → step 13
-
15. *Work package* complete and area handed back clean?
Owned by Project Manager · Checkout
- Complete → step 17
- Not complete → step 16
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.
- 14. Daily supervision check of contractor work and conduct
- Covers conduct as well as work quality — PPE compliance, permit adherence, and staying inside the assigned area are checked **every day** the contractor is on site, not only at handover.
Making it yours
The documentation-chase loop and the induction-repeat loop both return to the same step they came from, not forward — keep them that way if you adapt this map, because a contractor with expired insurance needs the insurance re-verified, not a shortcut past it. The daily-supervision note names the yard performing the supervision; when you adapt this map for your own yard, that is the one line in the whole chart worth editing by name rather than leaving as a placeholder, since it is the one place a specific company name appears in the authored content.
What to watch out for
- Do not treat the permit decision as optional paperwork bolted onto access issuance. Site access and a work permit answer different questions — can this person be on site, versus can this specific task happen right now — and a contractor with a valid pass but no permit for hot work is still not cleared to strike an arc.
- The daily-check loop is what actually enforces ongoing compliance, not the induction at the start. If your adaptation compresses deployment into 'contractor works, then checks out', you lose the only recurring control that catches a contractor drifting out of compliance over a multi-day job.
- Checkout returns access passes and records performance — both matter. A yard that only recovers the badge and skips the performance record loses the information it needs the next time this same subcontractor is being selected for a future job.
Frequently asked questions
Why is there a decision for 'needs a permit' after access is already granted, rather than checked earlier?
Because site access and work authorization are genuinely different: a contractor can have valid site access weeks before their specific task is scheduled, and whether that task needs a hot-work or confined-space permit depends on the work assignment, which happens after access, not before. Checking permit need before an assignment exists would mean checking against a task that is not yet defined.
How do we track which contractors are repeat versus first-time at our yard?
That is a filesystem or records question outside this chart's scope, but the recorded performance at checkout is the data source for it — keep that record and a repeat contractor's next onboarding can reference it, even though the map itself does not need a separate 'is this a repeat contractor' branch.
Our insurance requirements differ by trade — electrical contractors need different coverage than riggers. Does that need a branch?
No — put the trade-specific requirement in the Notes column on the documentation-request row rather than branching the flow. The steps are identical regardless of trade (request documentation, verify it, chase what's missing); only the acceptance criteria differ, and criteria belong in guidance text, not in the process shape.
Open the map and start editing
The editor loads this chart with the spreadsheet underneath it. Change a cell and the diagram redraws — no drawing, no signup.