There is an old saying that “You never get a second chance to make a first impression”. First impressions are of the utmost importance to me and I generally go with them, but not always.
Every time I do a training seminar on interviewing new hires, I emphasis how important it is that your first impression of someone should be a key factor in helping you to determine whether or not the person should be hired. Generally if I hire someone in spite of gnawing doubts lingering from my initial interview I end up regretting it.
One employee exemplified this phenomenon. One of our managers came in and told me how much he liked this guy that he’d just interviewed and asked if he could hire him. Since his experience at hiring was limited, I told him to bring him in for another interview with me and I would interview him personally. The applicant showed up for his interview (with the CEO of the company) wearing casual clothes, loafer shoes and no socks. He slouched in his chair and seemed cocky and arrogant and didn’t smile one time during the entire interview.
After it had concluded I suggested that we not hire him; however my new manager literally pleaded his case. Against my better judgment I agreed to let him hire him and he did so without even waiting for the results of his criminal background check results. Later his criminal check showed the applicant had recently received a D.U.I.
I called him and his supervisor into my office to discuss this serious offense that he had “somehow” omitted from his initial application. He was again cocky and not remorseful at all, smirking that he just had a little too much to drink at his bachelor party. In fact he laughed about it. My recommendation to his supervisor was that we let this arrogant punk go, but again he pleaded his case and not wanting to be too much of a micro-manager and overrule this new manager I reluctantly agreed again.
Next he was on a job out of town with a crew of other employees and on the second day, he didn’t show up for work one morning and he didn’t call in. He was driving the rental car and that necessitated that the rest of the crew had to take taxicabs to work. He finally called in the following day and said he missed work because his father had a heart attack and he had to go to the hospital in a neighboring state to be with him.
I told his supervisor that I didn’t believe his story for a minute, and even if his father had actually endured a heart attack, he should have called in. I told him to fire him. He insisted that he believed he was telling the truth and he didn’t call in because he was worried sick about his dad and blah, blah, blah, and further stated that all of the people that this guy had trained absolutely loved him and he wanted to keep him if at all possible.
I told him that I smelled a big rat and I believed the guy had been in jail, possibly for a DUI. My manager talked with him again and as usual assured me that it was not the case and he would make a great employee.
To make a long story short, the guy had indeed been arrested but it was for rape. He had been accused of date rape using a drug. This guy (who was recently married), allegedly went to a bar picked up some girl, spiked her drink with a drug and took her to his motel and raped her. (This made a great impression on our customer by the way, who heard about it on the radio and saw it in the newspaper right before calling me to tell me what she thought about our company and my employees).
This time I called this guy in to my office and I personally fired him and no supervisor talked me out of it. I should have listened to my initial instincts about this scum bag, because I sensed something was wrong from the beginning.
Our laws prohibit using someone’s spirtual preference as a factor in hiring people or even asking about it, but we can listen to our hearts and try our utmost and hire people of good character. Decent people who are filled with the Spirit act differently from those who are non- spiritual and that is a simple fact. I don’t like to hire or even be around people who don’t smile or seem cheerful and full of life. I detest being around cocky, haughty, prideful, persons.
Someone who is full of pride is headed for a fall and they can take you with them. Better to avoid them at all costs…
Proverbs 16:18
Pride goes before destruction
and a haughty spirit before
a fall.