What’s It like to Join your Company?

“Welcome,
To a whole new adventure.
Another chapter in an incredibly exciting story.
Yours. And Ours.
It’s probably a bit different from where you used to be.
(Maybe really, really different.)
But your reason for being here hasn’t changed.
You are here to do great things.”

This is the note my brother received a couple of months ago when he and his wife arrived at their temporary housing as part of the relocation for his new job.

His new job is with what many of us think of as a dream company — Apple.

As part of his relo, they’re providing him with corporate housing for a few weeks until they find a new place. Pretty standard for many companies. However, that note is very, very different.

What makes companies like Apple great is that they build and rebuild their culture every time they greet a new associate with that note. They reinforce why great talent would want to work for them. They reinforce that their culture is about adventure, an exciting story and doing great things. It’s not ‘here’s you desk, here’s your compute and orientation starts at 9:00.” That note and the actions that surround it — I’ll get to those in a minute — say “We are so glad you’re here to be part of what we are here to do.”

The actions that surrounded the note? The corporate housing had a stocked fridge and homemade cookies. They were greeted at the door, given a tour of the facilities and ideas for how to spend their first weekend in California.

You know it won’t need to be going to the grocery store.

What’s it like to join your company?

About Edith Onderick-Harvey

Edith Onderick-Harvey is a highly regarded consultant, leadership and talent expert, and speaker. Edith is frequently quoted in the media including The New York Times, CNN.com, HR Executive, and American Executive. As the President of Factor In Talent, Edith works with leaders to take performance — their own, their team’s and their organization’s — to the next level.