Hiring the Right Person Is Only Half the Battle:

Discover why hiring the right person is only the beginning. Danielle Marshall outlines four key onboarding priorities for the first 90 days—defining success, driving manager accountability, creating early wins, and maintaining alignment—to improve talent retention, boost performance, and set new hires up for long-term success.

Danielle Marshall is the Founder of Marshall Talent Consulting, a leadership and talent advisory firm dedicated to helping organizations build stronger leaders, develop talent, and improve business performance.

With extensive experience in human resources, leadership development, and organizational effectiveness, Danielle brings a practical, people-centred approach to helping businesses navigate workforce challenges. She is passionate about bridging the gap between business strategy and execution, ensuring organizations create the conditions for employees and leaders to succeed.

Through Marshall Talent Consulting, Danielle partners with organizations to strengthen leadership capability, improve talent retention, and build high-performing teams.

Why the First 90 Days Matter

Businesses invest significant time, energy, and resources into finding the right talent. From recruitment fees and interviews to assessments and negotiations, businesses treat hiring as a critical business decision.

Yet once the offer is signed, that investment often shifts from strategic priority to administrative process.

The employee receives a laptop, attends orientation, meets the team, and is expected to deliver results.

But hiring the right person and setting that person up for success are two very different things.

The Gap Between Hiring and Performance

According to Gallup, only 12% of employees strongly agree their organization does a great job onboarding new hires. Gallup also found that employees are 3.4 times as likely to describe their onboarding as successful when managers take an active role.

The consequences are significant. Employ's 2024 Job Seeker Nation Report found that 24% of surveyed workers had left a job within their first 90 days at some point in their careers.

These findings highlight an important distinction: A failed placement isn't always a hiring failure. Sometimes it's an organizational failure to create the conditions for success.

For small and medium-sized businesses, the impact extends beyond recruitment costs. Productivity suffers, teams absorb additional responsibilities, and organizations risk losing talent they worked hard to attract.

The First 90 Days Are a Critical Opportunity

Starting a new role represents a significant decision for an employee. They may have left a secure position, established relationships, and familiar surroundings because they believed another opportunity offered something better.

The first 90 days give an organization a chance to reinforce that decision.

Successful integration requires more than an orientation checklist. It requires intentional alignment between the employee, their manager, and organizational expectations.

Business leaders should focus on four priorities:

1. Define success before day one. Establish clear responsibilities, measurable objectives, and realistic expectations for the first three months.

2. Make managers accountable for integration. Managers must actively support new employees through regular coaching conversations, meaningful feedback, and removing barriers to performance.

3. Create opportunities for early wins. Identify achievable contributions that build confidence, demonstrate value, and help employees establish credibility.

4. Maintain alignment throughout the first 90 days. Use structured 30-, 60-, and 90-day conversations to assess progress, address challenges, and ensure employees have the support they need.

These practices don't require large HR departments or complicated systems. They require leadership commitment, consistency, and follow-through.

From Hiring to Long-Term Success

Organizations must look beyond filling vacancies and evaluate whether their investment in talent delivers meaningful results.

Not every unsuccessful placement can be prevented. Sometimes the fit genuinely isn't right. But organizations must distinguish between an employee who cannot succeed in the role and one who was never given the support needed to succeed.

Hiring talent is an investment. Creating the conditions for that talent to succeed is a leadership responsibility.

And that responsibility begins long before the first 90 days are over.

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Disclaimer: This article is based on publicly available information intended only for informational purposes. CanadianSME Small Business Magazine does not endorse or guarantee any products or services mentioned. Readers are advised to conduct their research and due diligence before making business decisions.