Installment II: How to Hire a Bad Employee and Keep Them That Way or The HR How-To
This is the second installment of "How to Hire Bad Employees".
If you haven’t already read Part I, go back and check it out because you’ll need that information.
You’ve hired a new employee, and you want to be sure they don’t turn out to be a Good Employee. We obviously don’t want Good Employees because then we can’t mess with them. Since messing with employees seems to be the favorite Corporate pastime these days, that would take all the fun out of life and force us to actually do real work.
By following the remaining steps, all you sorry employers out there who seem to enjoy the benefits of a huge employee turnover will get to enjoy just that. Those of you who decide not to play the game will just have to settle for keeping your employees around.
You’ve hired a new employee, so the next steps are to be sure and keep them totally in the dark as to your real purpose as well as their own;
1. If you’re the boss it makes things easier because you can mess with them to your hearts content, if not then their boss may need a little coaching. Since misery loves company it’s most likely any manager in your organization will be just like you so that shouldn’t be a problem.
2. When a new employee is hired it’s a real mind trip to write a job description for them. Just like in their job interview just put a bunch a miscellaneous crap vaguely resembling what might be misconstrued as duties. You have to be certain to include a phrase that says something like "and all other duties as required by management" because that means that you could ask them to stand on their heads and juggle greased BB’s if it amused you.
3. If you followed Part I correctly your new employee is so confused by now by the bullshit that they probably aren’t even sure how much money they make, much less what the hell you hired them for in the first place.
To further confuse them, since all new employees are out to make the best possible impression, never but never tell them when they have made a mistake. After all, actually telling them how they messed up would; number one give them the idea you actually give a damn, and number two give them a chance to correct their mistake. Remember that you have a lot of time invested in this person and you damn well don’t want to spoil what you’ve done by now with any positive feedback. So you just smile, and nod, and back away slowly. Hell yes, let them dig their own hole.
4. Since the other people in the office are used to this game by now having watched you play it before, you shouldn’t have to worry too much about their cooperation. They’re all probably going to be so happy to have the target removed from their own backsides that they will willingly follow your lead.
When you hold staff meetings the last thing you want to do is to invite a new employee. Just to throw them off balance you might want them to attend some stupid meeting where they won’t have a clue what the hell is going on, but will hesitate to admit it. This will give them the "impression" that they are a part of the "Team" and set them up for later.
5. Somewhere during the process some bleeding heart will take pity on the poor bastard and try and let them in on the "joke", which is of course them. Count on this and use it to your advantage. A little suspicion in a new employee is always healthy and vital in keeping them from getting too comfortable and happy.
6. Since most employment listings state something to the effect of "needs little or no direction" I didn’t feel I needed to mention it in part I. OK fine, so I didn’t mention it, so sue me.
If you were smart enough to include it by yourself so much the better, if not you can always claim it was "implied". In any case, this sets up an employee to be hesitant to ask questions or clarification on anything they’re asked to do. What the hell, if they don’t need "direction" they should already know the answers, right? I mean, what the hell did they think we hired them for anyway, aren’t they the experts? By them not bothering you with stupid questions all the time it leaves you free to mess with your other employees occasionally just for variety.
7. Most new employees are not too familiar with standard hiring practices, so they actually think you hired them not for your amusement but to actually perform a vital function for the organization. Eventually they will get bored with just sitting around trying to figure out what the hell they were hired for and make some lame effort at doing something. Although this will usually take the form of something related to the job they think they were hired for, unless they put on a clown suit and dance around we’ve already set them up to fail.