Outsource Magazine Issue 25 - (Page 113)

THE BACK END INSIDE SOURCE Inside Source: tinkering, tailoring, soldiering and spying… Interview with the Gorilla Bad, Bad Boy… Readers of the Inside Source column online will be aware that recently I’ve been helping out with an overhaul of my organisation’s recruitment process and strategy (see http://bit.ly/ISSep11) and that I’ve been, shall we say, less than enthusiastic about the quality of some of the applicants for roles we’ve recently made available. Chatting with Outsource’s esteemed editor the other day, I got the impression that he felt the tone of that article to be a little strong, perhaps even excessive (and there was I labouring under the misapprehension that I’d actually held back somewhat). So I thought I’d provide some element of justification by sharing with you an experience I had a couple of weeks ago whilst sitting in on a first-stage interview (yes, this character had actually made it through the initial application stage…) with a candidate straight out of university. What follows is as close to verbatim as I can get… Interviewer: The salary we’re offering is £x, rising to £y following the probationary period. Candidate: That’s not enough. I wouldn’t be happy with that. Interviewer: It’s an extremely competitive package. Candidate (smirking): Compete harder. (pause) Because I’m worth it. Interviewer (rather sarcastically): What would you see as a reasonable figure? Candidate: Around the £(2x) mark. Plus incentives. Interviewer: That’s unrealistic. Candidate: Reality is a state of mind. Pay peanuts, get monkeys. I’m a ten-foot gorilla. Me: I’m sure you’re not calling any of our current staff monkeys. Candidate: I don’t know. You’re the only ones I’ve met. Some of you may admire his chutzpah. I just wanted to get him out of the building. An inspirational addition to the interminable list of email-related horror stories comes this gem, recounted to me on the train home… A manager (at a competitor of our organisation, marvellously) has been, it transpires, rather a naughty boy, in the manner in which many managers throughout history have been naughty boys when long hours away from home collide with nubile and willing subordinates… The gentleman in question (and if you’re reading this: shame on you, sir) was planning on combing a business trip to the continent with a little out-of-work activity; musing upon which, the poetic muse carried him away and he decided to write an email in the very fruitiest language to the object of his extra-marital affections, going into graphic and apparently stomach-churning detail about what the two lovebirds would be getting up to between meetings. Unfortunately for Lothario, for reasons known only to him he sent said email not to his ‘beloved’ but to the member of staff responsible for booking flights and hotels… Apparently the evidence has been removed in accordance with the manager’s desperate entreaties, and he seems to have “got away with it” as far as officialdom is concerned – but that hasn’t stopped the initial recipient of the email dining out on all the salacious details ever since… I’m not here to condemn the man for his all-too-common vices – despicable, loathsome and vile though he may be. No, I condemn him for his stupidity in making such an elementary mistake. If he is incapable of ensuring that such an email gets to its intended recipient – in fact, if he’s simple-minded or arrogant enough to use the company email system to send such a message in the first place – he shouldn’t be in a position of authority in the first place. And his superiors should have thought about that before giving him the slap on the wrist with which it appears he’s escaped. “Espionage, for the most part, involves finding a person who knows something or has something that you can induce them secretly to give to you. That almost always involves a betrayal of trust.” – Aldrich Ames www.outsourcemagazine.co.uk ●●● ● 113 http://www.bit.ly/ISSep11 http://www.outsourcemagazine.co.uk

Table of Contents for the Digital Edition of Outsource Magazine Issue 25

News & Commentary
Making Contact
Taking the Chair
Clinical Outsourcing Strategies
New Worlds
To Share Or Not To Share?
Trends in Outsourcing Governance
The Next Big Idea
Smart Intelligence
Taking the ChairCracking the Wip
NOA Round-Up
Predicting Success
It’s Not The Contract.
Get Productive
Rigorously Agile
Good Relations
Knowledge Sustainability
Racking Up The Wins
Trust Me... I’m an Outsourcer
Head-to-Head
Top Ten
The Legal view
HfS Round-Up
Online Round-Up
Inside Source
The Last Word

Outsource Magazine Issue 25