Think You Have Recruiting Nailed? Move to Onboarding

The employer brand promise is made during the recruitment process, and it's checked and measured every day of employment. But day-one employment seems especially critical, as the new hire quickly is assessing - "is this everything I expected and was promised?" This makes me wonder how new employees who show up for their first days of work with less than they expected - maybe no desk, no computer, no game plan or no idea they were arriving - feel about their new employers during those first days? A rough first day or week definitely can be overcome, but why take that risk? Being as organized with onboarding as you are with recruiting helps deliver on the employer brand promise and keeps the momentum of positive interviews and interactions from before day-one employment going. Some companies (Cargill and Swedish Medical Center are two I found quickly on Indeed) even have HR staff dedicated to onboarding of employees. But it's a matter of attention rather than people. What I've seen is that almost everyone wants to hand off or opt out of onboarding - recruiters think their job is done, and hiring managers are too busy to organize the details of day-one employment. So why not have someone (even as just part of his or her job, for smaller firms) responsible for onboarding?