A checklist tells you what to do. It doesn't tell you why.
"Set up your CRM access" is a task. It doesn't explain how the team actually uses the CRM, which fields matter, or what "done" looks like in practice. Task completion isn't the same thing as understanding what you joined.
Nobody reads a checklist as a narrative.
A checklist is a list of unrelated line items, checked off one at a time. It has no throughline - no sense of company context, team dynamics, or the decisions that shaped where things stand today. A new hire finishes it having done things, not having understood anything.
Firstweek includes your checklist - and the context around it.
This isn't zero-sum. A Firstweek briefing includes a task checklist as one section of the artifact - the same tasks you'd put on a list, but attached to the narrative that explains why they matter and who to ask when something's unclear.
A checklist and a briefing aren't competitors. A checklist tells a new hire what to do. Firstweek explains why any of it matters - and includes the checklist too.
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See what a real briefing looks like - built from your own tools, with a citation for every claim.