International employees feel like part of the team when, from day one, you combine clear expectations with genuine social connection—in a work environment where language, feedback, and decision-making are understandable to everyone. You achieve this with strong onboarding, clear communication agreements, and inclusive rituals that fit your culture.
This is especially true for Highly Skilled Migrants who are new to the Netherlands and at the same time have to settle into a new job, a new country, and often a new working style. Small frictions such as unclear meetings, informal jokes, or implicit rules can quickly create distance.
Below, for each question, you’ll find practical steps to build, measure, and purposefully improve team cohesion.
What team cohesion means for international employees
For international employees, team cohesion means experiencing psychological safety, knowing what is expected of them, and feeling socially welcome—even if they don’t yet fully master the language or the unwritten rules. For Highly Skilled Migrants, it’s therefore not just about having a good time, but about clarity, equality, and access to information and opportunities.
In practice, you see team cohesion in behavior: someone dares to ask questions, takes initiative, and feels involved in decisions. When it’s missing, international colleagues more often stay in the background—not because they don’t want to contribute, but because the context is unclear.
- Belonging: you’re invited and actively included in conversations and activities.
- Being understood: your work and communication are taken seriously, even with an accent or a different style.
- Participating: you’re given room to influence outcomes and take on responsibility.
- Growing: you see a path for development, feedback, and promotion that works for everyone.
How to set up onboarding so expats integrate faster
You help expats integrate faster by treating onboarding as a 90-day plan with clear goals, fixed touchpoints, and social integration—not as a one-off introduction. Highly Skilled Migrants often have many practical matters and new stimuli at the same time, so structure and repetition help them become productive and connected more quickly.
Make onboarding concrete with a consistent structure that every international employee receives, regardless of team or seniority.
- Before the start: send a short week-1 schedule, access to tools, and a glossary of internal terms.
- Day 1 to 7: assign a buddy, schedule introductions, and explain how you make decisions and escalate issues.
- Week 2 to 4: give a first clearly scoped project with a clear definition of “done.”
- Month 2 to 3: discuss collaboration, feedback style, and growth path, and check whether expectations align.
Work with a buddy who not only answers questions, but also actively provides context: why things are done a certain way, who decides what, and what communication feels “normal” in your team.
Which communication agreements work in international teams
Communication agreements work in international teams when you make them explicit and apply them consistently: which language you use, how you run meetings, how you give feedback, and how you document decisions. For Highly Skilled Migrants, this lowers the barrier to speaking up because they have to guess less about implicit rules.
These agreements often deliver results quickly, without making your processes heavy.
- Language agreement: choose one working language for meetings and documentation, and agree on when Dutch can or cannot be used.
- Meeting hygiene: agenda in advance, decisions and actions documented afterwards, and room for questions without time pressure.
- Asynchronous work: define which updates belong in chat and which belong in a ticket or document.
- Feedback cadence: schedule regular 1:1s and clarify how direct your feedback is, so no one misinterprets it.
- Decision-making: make it clear who provides input, who decides, and how to raise objections.
Also pay attention to informal communication. Jokes, sarcasm, and cultural references can create connection, but they can also exclude people if you don’t briefly explain them or if they’re always in a language not everyone understands.
How to build inclusive team rituals without feeling forced
You build inclusive team rituals by choosing small, repeatable moments that are voluntary and align with how you actually work. It won’t feel forced if the ritual has a clear purpose—such as sharing knowledge, celebrating successes, or helping each other—and if everyone can participate in their own way, including introverted colleagues or new Highly Skilled Migrants.
It’s better to choose two rituals you can sustain than five that disappear after a month.
- Start of the week: a short check-in with priorities and one request for help per person.
- Demo or show-and-tell: every two weeks, have someone show something they built or learned.
- Wins and learnings: share one success and one learning moment, so discussing mistakes becomes normal.
- Rotating host: rotate who leads a meeting so one communication style doesn’t become the default.
Make rituals accessible by taking time zones, religious holidays, dietary preferences, and caregiving responsibilities into account when planning and choosing locations. That’s often a small adjustment with a big impact on the sense of equality.
How to measure and improve engagement among international employees
You measure and improve engagement by combining regular short check-ins with concrete actions at team level. For international employees, this works best when, in addition to general engagement, you also ask about the clarity of communication, access to information, and social connection. This helps you see sooner where Highly Skilled Migrants disengage and what you can adjust.
Use a simple cycle: measure, discuss, improve, repeat.
- Pulse questions (monthly or quarterly): “I feel safe asking questions,” “I understand how decisions are made,” “I feel involved in the team.”
- 1:1 signals: explicitly ask about moments when someone felt excluded, without looking for blame.
- Retrospectives: discuss what helps and what creates friction in collaboration, language, and meetings.
- Action list: choose a maximum of two improvements per period and assign an owner.
Improvements work faster when you make them visible. For example, share one team agreement you’re changing and check after four weeks whether it has an effect. That shows that feedback truly leads to change.
How All About Expats helps international employees integrate into your team
We help your international employees integrate faster by organizing the practical and compliance side of working and relocating to the Netherlands, so you and your team can keep space for strong onboarding and collaboration. For Highly Skilled Migrants, we work via the highly skilled migrant route, where the employer applies for a residence permit with the IND, and we provide support around employment, payroll, and relocation.
Specifically, you can come to us for:
- Immigration support through recognized sponsorship and a streamlined process with the IND, with realistic expectations about lead times, which are often within a few weeks for recognized sponsors.
- Relocation and settling in, such as support with arrival steps that need to be arranged as quickly as possible, including municipal formalities and collecting the residence document from the IND, where the order may differ depending on the situation.
- Employment and payroll, so the contract, salary agreements, and compliance are clear for all parties.
Want to discuss your approach to onboarding and team integration, or arranging the highly skilled migrant procedure? Get in touch via contact our team or view our approach to immigration for employers.
