The Cytiva TalentTalk Webinar series is a lot of fun to do. Working with our Senior Talent Management Consultant, David Freeman always enlightens me. The discussions that arise during these webinars, like all discussions that aim to examine and improve, are always eye opening and always give me new perspectives.

Some common themes that keep coming up, whether it's recruiting, onboarding or performance management, are:

• HR Must Think Like a Marketer
• Focus on Your "Moments of Truth" in the Employee Lifecycle

I'll delve into thinking like a marketer at another time. But the concept of focusing on "Moments of Truth" is a great one, no matter what your discipline. Think about your "Moments of Truth" with employees and focus all your efforts on making sure you deal with them like a best in class company. Everything else should be a secondary focus.

With regard to malent management, I would offer up a few "Moments of Truth:"

The Hiring Process. How do prospects and candidates view your company at each step of the process? If you can focus on this process and make sure you "wow" prospective employees at each phase (as opposed to simply making it efficient), you'll hire better employees.

Onboarding. What impression do you make on your new employees on the first day? The first thirty days? The first six months? Is it an empty cubicle with a stack of papers or is it a full calendar, all materials in place, a mentor, and all the paper work already filled out? Do they hit the ground with objectives and clear direction? If you can absolutely NAIL this, your retention will go up and you will gain hundreds to thousands of hours of lost productivity each year.

Performance Management. What happens when that employee that you worked so hard to source and deploy sits down with their manager to plan and get feedback? Are they engaged and treated with professionalism? Can they see where their efforts support the objectives of the organization? Are they given tools to track performance and collaborate with their co workers and managers to ensure high performance? Or is it just the luck of the draw? You may have a great manager that places a value on direct honest feedback and clear linkage between individual performance and team/company performance, or you may not.

I would argue that these moments of truth are where people management largely succeeds or fails, where cultures are created, and where truly differentiated competitive workforces are born.

I would also point out that these are collaborative endeavors. HR can't control these entirely. They must work with management to put the pillars in place and then work diligently to ensure they remain effective.

Technology is a key enabler here. It is the "smart template" you lay out for the organization to follow with some consistency.

The right applicant tracking software can enable an amazing candidate e..., allow you to dazzle top talent, and communicate quickly, honestly and fairly with all applicants.

The right onboarding software can mobilize your entire organization to ... on day one. AND it can tell the new hire "hey, that company that looked so good on the outside when you applied? Well it's even better on the inside."

The right employee performance management software can put a consistent... and help them do a better job of aligning, collaborating and communicating about performance issues. It can include and empower line employees and encourage all users to "do the work" of good performance management.

And of course, all of these kinds of technology solutions should more than pay for themselves in process improvement and reduced costs. That's so many organizations are moving in this direction.

But as someone who watches these organizations implement talent management software solutions, I would warn you that many are more focused on efficiency than on these "Moments of Truth." The reasons they implement are more shortsighted than they need to be and a huge amount of value is left on the table.

How do you deal with your "Moments of Truth?" Which ones have I left out? I'd love to hear.

If you'd like some great information about how to deal with moments of truth, check out Cytiva's free on-demand TalentTalk talent management webinars here.