Any business that wants to grow, ends up having to deal with the problem of hiring employees of an unknown quality. Most the time even the best practices of hiring fail to filter out some of those that don't fit the company culture.
To combat that, Zappos, an online retailer, has implemented a plan where new hires are offer the chance to take $1,500 after two weeks of training if they want to quit. About 2 to 3 per cent of those offered the cash take it.
According to training manager Rachael Brown, if someone accepts the offer, they aren't Zappos material anyway.
"We definitely hire for personality," Brown said. "If you just want to do a 9-to-5 job and leave at the end of the day, this isn't the place for you."
This goes along with a couple other creative ideas I've heard people in business do to filter out deadbeats. One literally interviewed people a minimum of 10 times in an attempt to know them implicitly, but also to find out if they would wear out from it.
Another I know will keep the potential hire there all day long to see if they can hack it. If they don't make it for one day, they figure there will be something else in the near future that would affect them as well.
As far as the offer by Zappos of $1,500, the only thing that could be a problem there would be the news that's gotten out about it. For a couple weeks paid work, a person could easily game the system knowing they would come out with a quick windfall if they did.
Other than that, I think it's a good idea. Too bad it had to become public knowledge.
Do you think the offer of $1,500 to leave is a good way of filtering through bad hires?
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It definitely is a good idea to screen incoming candidates this way. But every organisation should also aim at keeping employees happy for an increasingly productive return. An interesting article on creating happy employees at http://outsorcerer.com/blog/?p=9
Posted by: Ishani Mitra | July 8, 2008 2:21 PM | Permalink to Comment