come on board

come on board

Join an organization or other kind of group. This transfer from the nautical meaning of getting on a ship or boat dates from the twentieth century. It is often expressed as a hearty invitation to join a business organization, as in “The personnel officer was very impressed with you, so we hope you’ll come on board.”
See also: board, come, on
The Dictionary of Clichés by Christine Ammer
See also:
  • be at the helm
  • at the helm
  • at the helm/tiller
  • helm
  • what do you know, (well)
  • on top of the world, to be
  • back water
  • for the birds, it's/that's
  • egg in your beer, what do you want?
  • hard/tough act to follow
References in classic literature
On this supposition they came about us in two or three hours' time with ten or twelve large boats, having some of them eight, some ten men in a boat, intending, no doubt, to have come on board and plundered the ship, and if they found us there, to have carried us away for slaves.
I immediately called to the men that worked upon the stages to slip them down, and get up the side into the ship, and bade those in the boat to row round and come on board. The few who were on board worked with all the strength and hands we had to bring the ship to rights; however, neither the men upon the stages nor those in the boats could do as they were ordered before the Cochin Chinese were upon them, when two of their boats boarded our longboat, and began to lay hold of the men as their prisoners.
Further Adventures of Robinson Crusoe
At one time she would come on board with a jar of pickles for the steward's pantry; another time with a bunch of quills for the chief mate's desk, where he kept his log; a third time with a roll of flannel for the small of some one's rheumatic back.
During these days of preparation, Queequeg and I often visited the craft, and as often I asked about Captain Ahab, and how he was, and when he was going to come on board his ship.
Moby Dick I LXVII