How a Bad Hire Affects Your Business

It’s not exactly a surprising or controversial statement to say that finding the right candidates to fill vital roles in an enterprise is one of the most challenging aspects of running a business. It’s a costly process in terms of both time and money, requires the difficult skill of assessing people you’ve never met before, and even with careful preparation and planning, it’s still possible to make a mistake and hire someone who simply isn’t right for your company. 

Someone could be a bad hire for a wide variety of reasons. Maybe they start missing deadlines or doing shoddy work shortly after being hired. Maybe they don’t mesh with your company’s mission statement or values. Or maybe they simply don’t get along with their coworkers, introducing strife and conflict to the workplace. 

No matter the reason, a bad hire spells bad news for any business. In this article, we’ll explore all the ways in which hiring the wrong person can seriously interrupt your enterprise. 

Direct Financial Costs

The most obvious and tangible ways that a business suffers from hiring the wrong person are the direct financial costs associated with such a mistake. 

New Hiring Costs

The most common direct financial loss associated with a bad hire comes through the hiring process itself. In order to fill a position, a company must pay to advertise the opening, use the time (and by extension, the salary) of the HR department for the interview process, and slow production or efficiency by dedicating the time of other employees to train the new hire instead of performing their usual work. 

This is on top of the actual salary and severance paid to the failed worker, and worst of all, a bad hire forces a company to go through the whole process again in a short span of time.

Legal Issues

This is something of a worst-case scenario. In some lines of business, it’s completely possible that a negligent or incompetent worker can embroil their employer in potentially costly legal trouble. Even worse, an actively criminal employee can directly steal from their employer or cause serious legal problems that fall on the business to solve or answer for. 

Indirect Costs 

Although these costs are less objectively measurable than stolen revenue or resources lost in the rehiring process, the following consequences of a bad hire are often much more common and certainly no less damaging to a business. 

Lowered Worker Morale

Hiring the wrong person can have a variety of negative effects on the overall efficiency and morale of everyone around them. 

An employee who consistently brings negativity or conflict to the office will naturally spark conflict and raise problems for those they work alongside. Not wanting to interact at all with a coworker makes it much harder to do one’s job with any efficiency, and a negative worker can often dampen the enthusiasm of anyone they work with. 

On the other hand, an employee who is incompetent or who lacks critical skills or motivation will almost always force their coworkers to pick up their slack. If an employee is regularly asked to review, fix, or simply do the work of another employee who earns the same amount as they do, it won’t be long before they start looking for a way out. 

Loss of Productivity

An employee who can’t or won’t do their job effectively ultimately means a net loss for their employer since the business will generally be investing the same amount of resources into hiring and retaining this worker while receiving less or worse output in return. As mentioned, this can put more stress on other employees who need to cover for your bad hire and of course, generally makes it harder all around to hit deadlines, maintain standards, and keep appointments. 

Damage to Your Reputation

Any employee who interacts at all with the public or customers is, on some level, a face or representative of their employer. A worker who ignores communications from or acts rudely toward clients will not only lose a potential customer but will likely drive that customer to actively advise others to steer clear of your company. 

A bad employee can still damage your business’ reputation even if they don’t directly interface with clients. This is because poor performance anywhere in the system can easily cause problems with a final product or service, ultimately damaging the credibility and good name of the company they work for. 

Avoid Bad Hires!

While simply avoiding bad hires is easier said than done, there is hope! At BBU, we specialise in connecting top-quality workers with their ideal jobs. Rather than simply providing talent to employers, we pride ourselves on building communities and relationships. Whether you need to fill a temporary, contract, or permanent position, trust BBU to offer only the best solutions for your business!

Contact us today and discover the BBU difference.