Hiring and onboarding new employees always carries risk; it’s impossible to predict with 100% accuracy which candidates will be assets to your organization and which ones will not. Since risk is part of the game, aren’t bad hires just a standard cost of doing business? Is it worth the effort to avoid making poor hiring decisions?
The answer is a loud, definitive, unequivocal YES. Here’s why.
Defining a “Bad Hire”
A bad hire might look like the following:
- Doesn’t have the experience required for the position
- Doesn’t have the education or credentials required for the position
- Cannot do the job they were hired to do
- Has high rates of absenteeism
- Shows up to work impaired or hungover from drug or alcohol use
- Steals assets from your organization
- Has a violent, unruly, or unpredictable temperament
- Has an inflammatory presence on social media that casts an unfavorable light on your organization
When you’ve got an employee that meets one or more of these or other similar criteria, you’ve got a problem.
Defining the Problem
While the problems created by bad hires might seem obvious, it’s worth taking a closer look at the many ways a bad hire can negatively impact your organization. Examples include the following:
- Decreased employee morale. When one team member isn’t pulling their weight, the entire team suffers.
- Lost customers. Your customers will turn to your competition if their needs aren’t being met.
- Stolen assets. Dishonest people will steal from you in a variety of ways, from pocketing inventory on their way out the door to hacking into your proprietary digital information and everything in between. If you’ve got it and it’s valuable, they’ll try to take it.
- More accidents. Folks working while impaired are more likely to be involved in accidents on the job.
- Increased litigation. A bad hire opens you up to a host of potential litigation issues, including negligent hiring suits and negligent retention suits, to name a few.
- Higher recruiting, onboarding, and training costs. Replacing a bad hire means you’ve spent twice as much on filling one position than necessary.
- Damaged reputation. One corrupt employee can do incredible damage to the reputation you’ve built for your brand.
When looked at this way, it becomes clear that making a bad hire is extremely expensive. These costs aren’t simply the costs of doing business; these are costs that can largely be avoided.
Solving the Problem
The most effective way to solve the problem of bad hires is to prevent them, and the best way to prevent a bad hire is to do comprehensive pre-employment background checks on all potential new hires. Careful background screening done by skilled, professional screening agents significantly reduces your risk of making bad hires and helps you avoid the high costs that come with them.
Decrease your vulnerability and strengthen your hiring process by setting up your background screening process today.