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PrideStaff Bend

Given how much thought and effort goes into a job search, it’s amazing how uncertain the outcome can seem.

You and your team earnestly review dozens and dozens of resumes (often with some cutting-edge computer help). You use best-practice interview techniques in order to uncover all the hidden personality traps and potential buried conflicts. You exhaustively check references and snoop through candidates’ social media, feeling at times like an overburdened private detective hot on a case.

And it still feels like you’re going to a casino. You dress up nice, you go through some supposedly luck-inducing rituals; then you let the wheel spin and see what happens.

Well, if the job search is a trip to the casino, let’s face facts: Sometimes the spin comes up double zero.

And just like in a casino, when you get those unlucky spins, it can cost you. All the time and money spent on those resume reviews, interview discussions and background investigations have all gone to waste. But that’s just the beginning.

Here are three scary consequences of a bad hiring decision:

Opportunity Costs

First, there’s the good hire you didn’t make. Instead of a competent, engaged contributor, you have (best case scenario) an uninspired, clock-watching drone, or (worst case scenario) someone whose incompetence and bad attitude actively slows down the rest of the team.

Now you have a choice: grin and bear the bad employee or start all over again. You can’t keep the terrible hire. That’s just doubling down on a mistake. So, you need to move on, as embarrassing as that might be.

Now, you’re out the cost of the job search and any training you invested in the short-lived employee. You wasted weeks on the hiring/onboarding/training process. And maybe, the good employee you passed on to hire this turkey has moved on to another opportunity.

Hit to Morale

People hate incompetence. They will tolerate a bad personality, as long as things are getting done. But someone incompetent on the team just turns the whole office grumpy. Everyone’s job gets harder.

Now, you might think we’re talking about the bad hire here. In part, you’d be right. But that bad hire is likely out the door relatively quickly. We’re talking about your team’s opinion of you.

Introducing a sour element into the work environment will reflect badly on you. The office will be filled with the “What were they thinking?” whispers for months after the bad hire has come and gone. These little dings to morale can add up over time and lead to serious discontent.

Having to Hire Again

Making a bad hire puts you in a time loop. You waste a lot of time and money, you damage team morale and in the end, you still have an open position to fill. You’re back to a file full of resumes (ones that not too long ago you thought were worse than the person you just hired).

The good second-choice options have likely already moved on. The people left on the market are almost by definition longer shots than the one you’ve already taken.

So, you’re forced to start over: the earnest resume reviews; the tedious, scripted interviews; the exhaustive research. And then you’re just back to the roulette table.

How do you break the cycle?

Partnering with a qualified staffing firm can bust through the deadlock. PrideStaff can help you make the right hiring decision the first time, keeping costs low, morale high and allowing you to concentrate on your core business. Contact PrideStaff Bend’s leading Central Oregon recruiters today for more information.

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