hiring and firing

Hiring Interview Hiring/Firing Interview What qualities do you look for in potential employees? I like to look for individuals that have had experience with people with disabilities. It is a difficult population to work in at times and takes patience and dedication. So I choose employees that I know can handle these types of individuals. What are red flags in interviews? I think someone who doesn’t ask questions about the job requirements or if they seem disinterested. I also look at body language to see if they are comfortable being in this environment. What are the three most common interview questions you ask? Why do you want to work here? What type of experience do you have with people with disabilities? What are the reasons you are seeking a job at this type of facility? What is your interview process? The first step is having the potential employee come in for an interview, where we sit and talk about the job and I’m able to ask them question. After the initial interview if I am interested in them working for this company. I invite them in for a facility tour and introduce them to some of the individuals they will be working with. I introduce them to other employees and they stay during a meal time so they understand how our day program works. After that if they are still interested in the job. I offer them a job. What is your plan of action? We have a star system, which is a teaching tool. We write out the problem discuss it with the employee then discuss solutions to the problem and make sure it doesn’t occur again. If the employee gets three or more stars then that is a write up with points. What kind of problems have you disciplined for? Some occurrences are minor such as having their cell phones and texting. Being to late to work, or overtime. We have a very tight budget and have to watch our hours closely and employees are informed of this. Major ones that I see are no call no shows. Frequency of hiring/firing? We don’t fire very often unless there is a good reason and it can’t be solved. But I feel like we hire often and the reason I believe is because we are a state funded company, our employees don’t receive the best pay and most people work here as a temporary job and it has great hours for high school kids, so they work here mostly a limit of three years. How do you protect yourself legally when you fire someone? We document all occurs of stars and write-ups. We also document employee time clock entries and document whether they were late or clocked out late. It’s all you can do is have great documentation of occurrences on all employees. How do you make your decision to fire someone? Usually when I choose to fire someone they have continually done things that have not benefited the company and their responsibility for working with company seems to not be important to them. I usually discuss with the employee multiple times about expectations and problem solve with them on fixing whatever the problem may be and if it continues to occur, I see no choice but to let them go. How do you deal with gossip? If gossip is a problem especially between two or more employees and it has become a problem. I usually call each of them individually into my office to discuss the problem. If they all agree there is a solution I will meet with them together and make a plan of action that they both agree on the solution.