Even if you’ve done your due diligence in verifying references, conducting interviews, and performing background checks, there will likely come a time when a bad hire slips through the cracks.
No one likes to take credit for making a poor hiring decision, but a bad hire can damage more than just your pride.
“Keeping a bad hire around for too long can negatively impact the rest of your team—from diminishing overall morale to hurting team productivity,” says ALTRES Manager Shani Silva. With over 20 years of staffing experience, Silva says the best thing you can do for your company is to recognize the mistake as soon as possible and take appropriate action immediately.
Check out these five tell-tale signs that the person you just hired is not cut out for the job.
1. Getting by on the bare minimum
New team members should be enthusiastic and eager to prove their worth. If your new employee has an unwillingness to adapt or a lack of interest in new tasks, it’s a major warning sign. Chances are you’ll soon be faced with a lazy employee producing low-quality work.
2. Constant complaining
Offering constructive criticism and feedback can be helpful, but if your new hire can’t stop complaining about their tasks and responsibilities, it’s time to reevaluate your hiring decision. If this type of attitude is apparent so early on, imagine what you’ll be dealing with several months down the road.
3. Recurring mistakes
Is your new hire making the same mistakes over and over again? Are they taking too long to pick up on core competencies? Of course most new hires need some degree of training, but failing to catch on after a few months is a red flag.
4. Resistant to change
It’s not uncommon for a new hire to offer thoughts on certain projects or provide input on how to complete a task. In fact, new perspectives are crucial to building a dynamic team of employees. However, if the new hire is insistent on doing everything a certain way without adjusting to company procedures, they probably don’t have the flexibility needed to be a functioning member of your company.
5. Concerns from the rest of your team
A large part of ensuring that a new hire is a good fit with your company is evaluating how well the person meshes with your existing team. If you’ve heard nothing but negative feedback from your staff, dig deeper to determine if these issues are fixable. If not, the work style and culture of your company may not be suitable for the new hire after all.
Lessons learned from a bad hire
As costly and disruptive as a bad hire can be for a company, there is one upside: the opportunity to make improvements internally. Before deciding to let a bad hire go, Silva always reflects on the events leading up to the decision. “I always ask, where did we go wrong? Did we miss something during training? Did we properly evaluate the individual’s strengths and weaknesses? What can we work on next time to prevent a bad hire?”
In some cases, it may be worth overlooking less-than-desirable traits if the employee is producing quality work. If not, it’s probably best to part ways or, at the very least, reassign the employee to a better-fitting role within your company.
Either way, you’ll need to begin the hiring process all over again, and when you do, consider partnering with ALTRES Staffing. We’d be more than happy to help you find qualified candidates for your job openings.
Sign up for our newsletter
Sign up for our monthly HIVE newsletter and get tips for finding a job, managing a business and advancing your career right in your inbox.
Even if you’ve done your due diligence in verifying references, conducting interviews, and performing background checks, there will likely come a time when a bad hire slips through the cracks.
No one likes to take credit for making a poor hiring decision, but a bad hire can damage more than just your pride.
“Keeping a bad hire around for too long can negatively impact the rest of your team—from diminishing overall morale to hurting team productivity,” says ALTRES Manager Shani Silva. With over 20 years of staffing experience, Silva says the best thing you can do for your company is to recognize the mistake as soon as possible and take appropriate action immediately.
Check out these five tell-tale signs that the person you just hired is not cut out for the job.
1. Getting by on the bare minimum
New team members should be enthusiastic and eager to prove their worth. If your new employee has an unwillingness to adapt or a lack of interest in new tasks, it’s a major warning sign. Chances are you’ll soon be faced with a lazy employee producing low-quality work.
2. Constant complaining
Offering constructive criticism and feedback can be helpful, but if your new hire can’t stop complaining about their tasks and responsibilities, it’s time to reevaluate your hiring decision. If this type of attitude is apparent so early on, imagine what you’ll be dealing with several months down the road.
3. Recurring mistakes
Is your new hire making the same mistakes over and over again? Are they taking too long to pick up on core competencies? Of course most new hires need some degree of training, but failing to catch on after a few months is a red flag.
4. Resistant to change
It’s not uncommon for a new hire to offer thoughts on certain projects or provide input on how to complete a task. In fact, new perspectives are crucial to building a dynamic team of employees. However, if the new hire is insistent on doing everything a certain way without adjusting to company procedures, they probably don’t have the flexibility needed to be a functioning member of your company.
5. Concerns from the rest of your team
A large part of ensuring that a new hire is a good fit with your company is evaluating how well the person meshes with your existing team. If you’ve heard nothing but negative feedback from your staff, dig deeper to determine if these issues are fixable. If not, the work style and culture of your company may not be suitable for the new hire after all.
Lessons learned from a bad hire
As costly and disruptive as a bad hire can be for a company, there is one upside: the opportunity to make improvements internally. Before deciding to let a bad hire go, Silva always reflects on the events leading up to the decision. “I always ask, where did we go wrong? Did we miss something during training? Did we properly evaluate the individual’s strengths and weaknesses? What can we work on next time to prevent a bad hire?”
In some cases, it may be worth overlooking less-than-desirable traits if the employee is producing quality work. If not, it’s probably best to part ways or, at the very least, reassign the employee to a better-fitting role within your company.
Either way, you’ll need to begin the hiring process all over again, and when you do, consider partnering with ALTRES Staffing. We’d be more than happy to help you find qualified candidates for your job openings.
Sign up for our newsletter
Sign up for our monthly HIVE newsletter and get tips for finding a job, managing a business and advancing your career right in your inbox.