Heavy-ion collisions conducted at the Relativistic Heavy Ion Collider (RHIC) and the Large Hadron Collider (LHC) are crucial for investigating the properties of deconfined QCD matter. This exotic state of matter, the quark-gluon plasma (QGP), is formed shortly after the collision and is initially very far from equilibrium. Its approach to equilibrium can be studied within QCD kinetic theory. However, these pre-equilibrium stages are still associated with large theoretical and experimental uncertainties. Prominent experimental observables sensitive to these stages are related to heavy quarks and jets, which are created in the initial collision and may therefore carry imprints of all stages of the QGP evolution. In this talk, I will discuss how we recently obtained the momentum broadening of these hard probes from kinetic theory simulations and how the values of these coefficients compare to those obtained during the initial glasma and later hydrodynamic stage.