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In the last six years we hired 3 young Engineers with the intention of training and preparing them to fill the gap as our older engineers retire. Yesterday, I was talking to our Manager and we both agreed that none of these three engineers can be relied upon to take over major projects now or in the next 5 years when our three most senior engineer retire. These three young engineers all lack the desire to gain deep knowledge and understanding of our technology and have no interest in learning about up coming trends in the industry. One guy has deep emotional issues that make him extremely unstable and sometimes even suicidal. The other two only do what they are asked and usually do not attempt to question anything. They all lack the maturity you expect for professionals in their early 30s. I am in my late 30s and I don't remember I was like that 10 years ago. Certainly they are not bad enough to be fired as our company is known for keeping deadwoods around forever. I know our company will be in trouble in 5 years if nothing changes because I and one other Senior Engineer can't do everything by ourselves. I know it is a difficult job identifying good employees if we only spend a few hours talking to them during interviews. I am partly guilty because I also interviewed two of these guys and gave them good marks. What are the strategies to identify traits of good people? How companies can find good employees and retain them?
Last edited by MattNguyen; 01-18-2014 at 10:59 AM..
You do what my company does. You fire them before they start growing roots in your company.
For our current big project, they hired 2 of us to help out. Not even a month in, I found out the other guy was escorted out one monday morning when he came in to work. I was told later he vastly exaggerated his abilities in his resume and in his interview. Turned out he didn't know half the things he claimed to know, and he had trouble learning from his peers.
After they fired him, I inherited his assignments on top of what I was already doing. I'm assuming they're satisfied with my performance because it's been 3 months and they haven't reposted the position.
why not have a mentoring system in place. instead of placing blame on those that you advocated to hire why not help them get to where they need to be....
Do you have a human resources manager who can screen applicants? Human Resource managers are trained to screen people and to recommend those who would fit in the most. You have to communicate in detail the kind of engineers you want to find i.e. their people skills, business ethics, job skills, future goals and let the HR people do the screening. It is HR's job to look out for the company's best interest and to hire the best people for your particular company.
If you don't have an HR person to help, then go to a few Headhunters/Recruiters who specialize in engineering and be very specific and detailed about what you are looking for i.e. what you explained in your post, and let them start sending you resumes to review. They can help with screening. Ask some of the older engineers who are going to retire, if you trust their judgment, to also interview some of the candidates and give you their feedback as well.
In the case of the OP, the hew hires should have, as part of their formal expectations, something about learning the technology, showing initiative, and positioning themselves to take on larger projects.
If they don't show the traits you need, show them the door.
I know it sounds like that but it is not only my personal opinion but also opinion of others in the company. We do have a training program by having these junior engineers work under us in projects. But it is hard to teach people who do not have the desire to learn or the drive to take more responsibilities.
Quote:
Originally Posted by caradvice
this post comes off so self righteous to me...
why not have a mentoring system in place. instead of placing blame on those that you advocated to hire why not help them get to where they need to be....
We have a young HR Manager locally but I think he gives us minimal feedback and usually it is up to the Engineering Manager to make the hiring decision. The more experienced corporate HR Manager usually does not involve in the hiring of engineers. Perhaps we could request the corporate HR Manager to support us the next time we have an opening.
Quote:
Originally Posted by mkforu
Do you have a human resources manager who can screen applicants? Human Resource managers are trained to screen people and to recommend those who would fit in the most. You have to communicate in detail the kind of engineers you want to find i.e. their people skills, business ethics, job skills, future goals and let the HR people do the screening. It is HR's job to look out for the company's best interest and to hire the best people for your particular company.
If you don't have an HR person to help, then go to a few Headhunters/Recruiters who specialize in engineering and be very specific and detailed about what you are looking for i.e. what you explained in your post, and let them start sending you resumes to review. They can help with screening. Ask some of the older engineers who are going to retire, if you trust their judgment, to also interview some of the candidates and give you their feedback as well.
After reading this I believe you (or your boss/manager) are at fault, not the engineers. The students are only as good as their masters, remember that. Of course you weren't blessed with a real phenom when you made the hire, however, phenoms are rare and probably wouldn't stick around working for you anyways as they would make their jumps and leaps to the top. As a fellow STEM Project Manager I put this on you.
While interviews may help the screening process, you will always get some people that don't work out. That's why a probation period is needed. The desire to learn can be seen within 3 months.
Some people just don't give a crap. I have spent my own money on books and training materials for co-workers, who are on the same level as me. They just wouldn't buy the material. They still wouldn't read the material. I wouldn't be surprised, if it was sold on Ebay.
You can lead a horse to water, but you can't make him drink.
You can pick up new people any time.
Last edited by move4ward; 01-18-2014 at 11:36 AM..
My department has made two horrible hires in the past year. The problem, in my company, is that the supervisor of this department is totally checked out and is unwilling to put in the time to monitor, coach, train, and properly supervise these people.
Thankfully one of them quit. But the other one has now been here for almost six months and finally a problem happened that higher management found out about , so I am hopeful something will be done about her. She needs to be on a PIP big time. Actually she should have been canned months ago, but my company seems to have very high tolerance for crappy employees, so the best I can hope for is a PIP. Maybe that pressure will make her quit.
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I know it sounds like that but it is not only my personal opinion but also opinion of others in the company. We do have a training program by having these junior engineers work under us in projects. But it is hard to teach people who do not have the desire to learn or the drive to take more responsibilities.
