Have you been through the hiring process in your organization? Have you applied for a job at your company or worked with the temp agency that represents your company? Have you analyzed the messages that are being sent out to those who have never even set foot in your offices or done any business with your organization?

If you haven’t, there’s no better time to start than now. If you don’t think that will work, try hiring a “secret shopper” to go through the new hire process in your organization and provide you with detailed notes.

On my first day of taking over as President of Advanced Cabinet Systems, one of the first things I insisted on doing was going through the new employee orientation. Of course, I was promoted from within and have been at the company for years, but I still wanted to try and get a feel for the first impressions we were giving out.

We do some very simple things at Advanced Cabinet Systems that don’t cost much money or take much planning but they really stand out.

Along with all of the standard first day stuff like discussing hours, introductions, and pointing out the bathrooms, we go through our mission and value statement. We let the new hires know how important those values are to our organization.

We have developed what we call “The Facts.” We simply laid out certain facts about our organization and expect them to be ingrained in everyone’s mind throughout their day and their career. We explain to our people where our products are sold and the type of customers we go after (asking around the factory, I was amazed at how many people had no idea about our industry or our customers).

We also have their locker cleaned out with their name badge already on it (people love seeing their names on things). Upon opening the locker, the new hire finds a custom ACS gift bag with a hat, shirt, and a few other branded goodies inside. Easy! Doing little things like that make such an impression on new hires and lets them know the kind of company we are, and the type of service we expect. It is so important to treat each new employee like they’re your next million dollar client. They will remember that, and give back in more ways than you can imagine.

Harnessing a great first impression is the single most important tool you have in controlling your corporate culture. You’ll be shocked at what you find out, and you’ll truly understand how important those first impressions are.