There’s one thing we often say at Vanderbloemen: the most expensive hire you’ll ever make is the wrong one. Not only is a bad hire financially costly, but it comes at an emotional and spiritual cost for your staff. And ultimately, the cost of a bad hire can derail your mission. Let’s walk through how a bad hire can be costly in those three areas:
1. The financial cost of a bad hire
This one is likely the easiest one to overlook. When considering whether to do a thorough search and find proper candidates with a search firm, many people look at the cost and think, “we can simply do our own search within our network and save plenty of money!” But the financial risk in hiring someone who isn’t a proper fit drastically outweighs the potential reward. The combination of onboarding costs, relocation costs, lost salary, travel fees for interviews, staff’s hours committed to the search process, severance and even legal fees add up quickly. Our Bad Hire Calculator can help you determine just how much you could lose if you invest in a bad hire rather than in a thorough search process.
2. The emotional cost of a bad hire
When someone who isn’t a good fit joins a team, it takes a toll on everyone. If they aren’t qualified for their job and others have to pick up their slack repeatedly, they become exhausted. And having someone around who simply doesn’t fit de-motivates even the most motivated and mission driven people. Additionally, the emotional work of getting to know a new staff member, particularly in tight-knit, familial teams, and then having to let them go is draining. Everyone knows what it’s like to work alongside someone you don’t particularly get along with; the emotional cost is expounded when that person is simply not a fit within the team as a whole.
3. The spiritual cost of a bad hire
In ministry, hiring someone for spiritual leadership who may turn out to be a bad fit is simply not worth the risk. For someone to be entrusted with the spiritual wellbeing of a church, organization, or ministry staff, they cannot be found through a shoddy or rushed search process. Scripture is full of warnings to make sure that someone is spiritually qualified for leadership before they are given responsibility over part of the Body of Christ, as poor spiritual wellbeing can take a toll on any level of an organization. Even if a new hire is not in leadership role, like a lead pastor or if they are not a theological or value fit, it can still take a significant spiritual toll on your team.
The combination of the financial, emotional, and spiritual costs of a bad hire are a surefire way to set back your organization’s mission. When all of your time and energy is put into recovering from the damage of a bad hire, you lose precious time and resources; in short, it disrupts your mission. That’s one of the reasons why Vanderbloemen has been able to work alongside thousands of churches to meet each of their unique needs.
