August 5, 2025 • 18 mins
"It's not about what you did yesterday. It’s about what you’ve learned and the skills you bring to tomorrow."
Notable Moments
00:01:28 – Story of a candidate held back by a past mistake.
00:02:31 – Why second chances matter in hiring.
00:05:21 – Asking about black marks during interviews.
00:09:21 – Concerns managers have about hiring someone with a record.
00:13:55 – Handling internal team perceptions after a promotion.
00:15:59 – Overcoming past mistakes and moving forward.
Everyone makes mistakes, so should a past “black mark” keep someone from being hired or promoted? Second chances can lead to your strongest hires. In this episode, Tim Dyck and Jody Maberry discuss hiring candidates who have past mistakes or “black marks” on their record. They explore why it’s crucial to look beyond past errors, how to assess whether someone has truly learned from those experiences, and strategies for addressing concerns within a team when hiring or promoting someone with a complicated history. The conversation emphasizes resilience, accountability, and growth as key factors that often turn past missteps into future strengths.
Connect with Tim and his team:
Website: https://bestculturesolutions.ca/
LinkedIn: Best Culture Solutions, Inc
Instagram: @best.culture.solutions
Email: tim@bestculturesolutions.ca
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:00):
Foreign.
Podcast where business leaders and job seekers come together
to create winning cultures and fulfilling careers. I'm your
host, Jody Mayberry, and I'm here with Tim Dick, the founder
of Best Culture Solutions. And Katie Kearns went on a cruise. I
(00:23):
guess that means I get to come back and sit in the host seat. She
did, and I don't even. She hasn't even told me when she's coming back yet.
I don't know about you, so this might be a recurring theme.
Yeah. Well, good. It gets me back behind the microphone where
I should be. But it's great to talk to you again, Tim.
I've been scheming and planning my next trip to Canada.
(00:45):
It's been a while since I've been up north to visit my
fine Canadian friends. Yeah. Where are you going? Have you
decided? Well, no, I have not, but I don't live very far
from British Columbia and it's pretty easy to hop on the ferry to
Victoria, so perhaps there. But I
actually, I take that back. I do know I will be in Victoria
(01:08):
in September, so there is that. I will visit
Victoria here soon enough. But we're not here
to talk about Canada, although I'm always happy to.
Nor are we here to talk about me. We're here to talk about careers and
culture and all the good things you come to expect from World at
Work. Yes. I'm going to start off with a story, Tim, that will
(01:30):
bring us right to the topic I want to discuss.
One time I was talking to somebody who said he had been in
his role for many years, and he said, I
really want a promotion. There's a particular job
I want and I've tried for it many times and I've never gotten it. And
I said, well, why not? Why don't you think you've gotten it? And he said,
(01:52):
well, about eight years ago, I did something
that I don't think was entirely my fault, but it
kind of gave me a black mark on my record. And I feel like
no one will give me a promotion now because I'm
known for the one dumb thing that happened eight years ago. And
it just got me. I thought of that story recently and it got me thinking.
(02:15):
As a recruiter, what do you do, Tim, when someone
has a black mark? I mean, I talked to this guy. He seemed
to understand what happened wasn't in his favor. It was eight years ago.
He said he learned from it. Do you hire people that have black marks on
their record? Absolutely. If they've learned from it right now, I wouldn't
hire Somebody just because they have a black mark on their record. Just like I
(02:37):
wouldn't hire somebody just because they have experience. Right. But the reality
is that raise your hand if you haven't made a mistake. And
we have had candidates in front of us who might have a criminal record
or maybe they have, you know, driven under the influence
and have that type of a charge on their record or, or you know, have
made other mistakes or even a criminal past sometimes. And I think
(02:59):
maybe the situation that you're referring to, it sounds to me like maybe it
was maybe a less consequential mistake as far as what
the effects could be on their personal life than what I have offered. But
I guess all that to say is that here's an even more extreme thing that
may have happened to somebody that I might, I would still consider somebody for. Because
the reality is that life is life. We learn things from our mistakes,
(03:21):
we learn things from things that we have done that we ought not have done
or we learn the hard way on. And that includes
even things that might be criminal. I mean, don't get me wrong, it's not
a blind yes for everything. There needs to be more than just, well, I'm going
to forget about that. But there are things that you can do in the screening
process to validate and verify if they've learned from those experience, to
(03:44):
validate and verify, you know, if they're likely to repeat those
experiences or not. Because that's the thing. As soon as people hear about it,
sometimes they just get very skittish and they, oh, I, they've done that before.
I can't bring that into the workplace. And the reality is that it
doesn't matter who you bring in the workplace. You're always bringing in somebody who's made
a mistake somewhere in life, somewhere along the way, professionally or personally.
(04:06):
Every single one of us has made a mistake. Sure, some of
them are more consequential than others.
That is true. You know, that is absolutely true.
But you can do things to make sure that they've learned from it
and that, you know, giving them that second chance is the right thing to do.
I understand the concern about history repeating itself and you don't want that to
(04:28):
happen in your workplace. I get that. But you know, if
somebody has done the work to learn from those
situations, they've done the work to learn from that, that hard thing that they
have done or that bad thing they have done.
The reality is that that also likely means that they are
self motivated in some way. And if you're interviewing Them to make sure that
(04:50):
they're self motivated for the job that you have in front of them,
and they are, and they have that motivation for it. There's a good chance then
that if they have made a mistake in the past, that they have been motivated
to learn from it and not repeat it. I know if you are strictly
abiding by motivation based interviewing, you
ask candidates all the same question in the same
(05:12):
way. But if you know somebody has a black mark on their
record, do you step out of that a little bit and ask about the
situation? Yeah, I might, you know, and just ask them, you know, what
happened and, and what did they learn from it. And I think, you know, it's
funny, a lot of people will say, well, that's an easy question that anybody can
answer and fake. But the reality is that if people haven't actually learned from it
(05:34):
and done the work to learn from, you'll be able to see it in the
answer. Or maybe a lot of times what happens is that, you know,
it is outside the motivational based interviewing model
because, like, it might be something that you learn, you know,
because sometimes in some jobs you do need to do, say like a
criminal record check afterwards to make sure before you bring them in.
(05:55):
And you might learn something there that you know,
that is less than ideal or might be viewed as a black mark, depending on
what it is. And you can tell how the person addresses that, you know,
if they've learned something from it or not. I've had quite a few candidates who
say, hey, look, you're into that criminal record check and you're going to find that
I drove under the influence of alcohol five years ago. And here's what I've learned
(06:16):
from that. You know, I've had people be upfront with me about that before. And
when they're upfront with you about it and they tell you what they've learned a
lot of times, what they've learned, right? And the people who've
learned these lessons the hard way, it's just like when you run out of gas,
right? I mean, Mike Simmons and I talked about this the other day. If you
want to keep your car with gas in it, who do you want to teach
you about that? Well, the person who's run out of gas knows exactly how that
(06:37):
happened, right? Because now they know, right? They
have that experience. So now, to be fair, when I was younger, I ran out
of gas more than once, but that's another episode. But you know, the
person who's gone in the ditch before can probably tell you why they went in
the ditch and how not to go in the ditch. And so there can be
a lot of value in having somebody that has learn the lesson.
(06:58):
I understand completely why that might make some employers
nervous because they don't know if they've learned the lesson or not. But if
they're showing well on a motivational based interview or motivation based interview,
if they're showing well and being upfront and honest with you about it and telling
you how they've learned from it, and taking ownership and responsibility and
demonstrating specific actions that they took to overcome that black mark,
(07:21):
then there's a good chance that they've learned why they went into the ditch. If
they can't tell you much or they present without that, or
there's a good chance that they're afraid of it, so they have not taken full
ownership for it because they're afraid of admitting that that happened to them. People who
are open, honest, who can admit their mistakes, who can tell you what they've done
about them, are self motivated people to learn from them and change and
(07:42):
adapt. And if you look at the principles of motivation based interviewing
itself, an internally motivated person alone, when it comes to failure,
they embrace failure. They don't avoid failure and they don't avoid
taking ownership for failure because then they learn from it and they change and they
adapt. And that is straight from the motivation
based interviewing criteria for somebody who's internally motivated.
(08:03):
Tim, I'm a little surprised to hear that you ran out of gas multiple
times when you were younger, because I know your mother didn't raise you that way.
I was about to say next time. So for the listeners, Jodi has met
my mother and she did a good job of outlining my own failures and
shortcomings to him, but didn't have enough time to get to the times I ran
out of gas. So now you have something to talk with her about again? Yes,
(08:26):
I do. Okay, so you mentioned that some
candidates will bring it up and they're upfront. So what if you
do the interviews, someone is a top candidate
or a top two candidate, you do a background check and you find out
they've got a black mark, does that disqualify them? No,
not. It depends on if they've taken ownership and action for it. So if they've
(08:48):
taken ownership in action. No. If they have, then yeah. Right. And
it's just like any obstacle that people face, right? Any obstacle
that people face, they need to take ownership and learn from it and
evolve from that and they need to demonstrate that. So what
have you seen when you help organizations hire? What have
you seen that managers are worried
(09:10):
about when it comes to people that have, have a black mark either
from something they've done personally or something they've done in the workplace? What is it
that concerns managers about hiring these people? Yeah, that's a good question.
I think the biggest thing, Jody, is that they're worried that this is going to
happen here or that they're going to do it again or this is habitual behavior,
you know, and to be honest, it often isn't. It often is not
(09:31):
habitual behavior. It often is. Somebody had a bad
day and didn't understand something properly. Somebody, you
know, didn't know what they were doing and
learned the hard way about it, or deep down they might have had a feeling
that if they pull this lever, it's not going to have the right result, but
they just, for whatever reason couldn't find it within them to not.
(09:52):
And really what it is, is, is okay, that's fine. But
what did you learn about it? But the owner, the, the business manager,
hiring manager, leader, owner, whoever, they don't want that lever be pulled in their
environment because they don't want to have to deal with the route, which I totally
understand. But a lot of times, I mean, we've seen success stories
all the time. People who've had and people make livings public speaking about this
(10:14):
for a reason, they've learned the hardest lessons. A lot of times the people who
have done some of the worst things or learned the hardest lessons
are often the ones that are able to do even more because they've had that
harsh lesson and they live with it forever and it stays with them forever. And
that can be good and bad for them in different ways. And that's a whole
other story. But they've learned from it. And a lot of owners,
(10:35):
business owners, business leaders, don't want to bring that in their workplace without realizing
that. A lot of times when somebody's already experienced that, it's actually a pretty good
way of knowing that they won't do it again because they've seeing what happens and
they don't want to go there again and they do not want that pain again.
I do think what Tim's saying is pretty
interesting because quite often when, at least in the
(10:56):
workplace, when someone does something bad,
poor decision, something happens, it quite often
is situational, not behavioral. Like in that
situation, they didn't have perhaps the right training, the right experience
to make the right decision or, or something was going on at home. They
made A bad choice. Do you give any
(11:18):
consideration to that, Tim, to figure out if this was situational
and not behavioral? Yeah, absolutely. And a lot of times even the
things that seem behavioral could be situational, right?
That was just how they're wired. And it could be like something that was deeply
personal and deeply, you know, not good. I mean, and you
know, even take the example of that driving under the influence. Look, I don't think
(11:39):
anybody should ever drive under the influence, right? That's just reality. They should not.
And that is. And so I'm in no way defending that behavior, but the
reality is that a lot of times people, they,
you know, they know that they shouldn't do that, but they're in the situation and
they can't recognize the patterns of whether or not they're really at that point or
not, and they shouldn't do it. And they think, you know, and it's not an
(12:00):
excuse for those people. There's accountability that has to be had so they can learn
from it. But to your point, sometimes it is
situational. And even things that might seem behavioral could just be because they haven't
had the opportunity yet to. How do I put it?
Recognize that pattern, right? That feeling that what they see in
front of them, it's. For a lot of people, how they behave is
(12:22):
pattern recognition. And they haven't had that pattern happen
to them yet. And so until that happens, you know, they have to develop
that pattern recognition for that behavior that we're trying to avoid.
But I also know lots of people, you know, and I've. And I've known people
that say, let's talk about some of the potential black marks. I also know
people that do have addictions to substances,
(12:45):
and you can tell that they're not developing that pattern recognition because they don't have
the self awareness, the vulnerability or the ability to say, well, that
isn't good. What's the big deal? Is kind of what they say? And they continue
on. And so you can see it in people right away as to whether or
not developing that pattern recognition. And so a lot of times, I guess what I'm
trying to say is that for a lot of people, it's a new experience for
(13:05):
them. They thought it was okay, they weren't sure, they tried it, whatever
it might be. It doesn't necessarily have to be substances or alcohol, but
anything. And they learn that lesson the hard way. So
let's say this, if we go back to the situation,
the story I started this episode with, it was
someone who loved the job, that he had the company
(13:28):
that he was with, he just wanted to get promoted.
So let's take that situation and it's in
the same organization and perhaps a lot of people remember what
happened eight years ago. And how do you handle that
then with the rest of the staff? If you promote someone,
you know, there's going to be a lot of whispers. Oh, my goodness. Tim
(13:50):
promoted Mike. Don't you remember when Mike did this a few years ago?
How do you handle that? Yeah, well, there's. And
that's true. And that's not fair to that person because people should have a chance
to learn. People should have a chance to improve. People should have a chance to
have a second chance. Right. I mean, and don't get me wrong, if it continues,
then. No, but. And that's a different situation altogether. How do you
(14:12):
handle it as a hiring manager? Well, you know, look, you know, you
just be honest. Yeah, that happened. You take ownership for it. You address
it. I mean, there are some limits and rules around
confidentiality, right? So, I mean, if you're breaking some sort of
confidentiality that you shouldn't or you're not supposed to break, then. Then that's
what you say. Look, I'm going to be transparent with you. This is an issue
(14:32):
that is not for public consumption. This is why move on. Right.
And by the way, if that happened to you, you would probably want me to
do the same thing for you. If it is not something that, you know, is.
Is fully confidential or is publicly known or can't be hidden or,
not that I'm suggesting hide things but can't be avoided, or I don't
like the word avoid either because you still want to address it head on as
(14:53):
to why you can't mention it, but. Or why it would be inappropriate to mention
it, but if, if it's out there, then you take ownership. You say, yeah, you
know what? I do know that happened. Thank you. You know, and I have. I
have vetted people according to an objective criteria that
demonstrated to me that they have learned from that. And I'd like to give them
the opportunity for this job based on the remaining skills and motivation
(15:14):
that they have. And by the way, if you think that that's happening again, then
I want you to know there's an open door because we have to look out
for each other and we have to look out for our team and this person
as well. And if you do believe that that thing is happening again, then
we're going to address that. We're going to talk about that and we're going to
make sure we're going to keep. And not because we're here to witch hunt, but
because we're here to keep this person and our team on track. And whatever that
(15:36):
means, that's what we're going to do. So, yeah, if you think that whatever it
is is happening in you, tell me. Absolutely. And if you're the
person who has done this thing and you think that you have that black mark
and you can never be promoted again, I would challenge you to say, you know
what? That's not true. And that goes for anything in life. You know,
the past is the past. I mean, anybody who's watched the Lion King has seen
(15:57):
Rafiq. He hit Simba with a stick. If people thought they could never be promoted
again, Simba would never have come back and saved the Pride Lands from Scar. Right.
And so you can come back. You can learn from that. You can get
promoted. It's not what you did yesterday, it's what. What you're going to do tomorrow.
And it's about what have you learned and what skills and motivation do you bring
to tomorrow's job? Not what mistake you may have made yesterday. And don't get me
(16:18):
wrong, the mistake still matters. But you've owned it. You've owned it, you've learned from
it, and now that's going to make you better for that promotion. And
don't let that stop you. And I think you take ownership for it. You know?
Yeah, I know this happened in my past. I'm not avoiding it anymore and pretending
like I can't get promoted. I am genuinely interested in this promotion. Yes, this
happened. Yes, this is why it happened. And this is what I've learned from
(16:40):
it. And I think that that's where you go from there. Tim, this
has been a great discussion, and I think it's a
topic that many organizations are faced with at some
point and you may not know but what to do with it or should
you go any further. If there's a candidate who has a black market, whether it's
personal or professional, if we want some help
(17:02):
with our approach to hiring, who can we reach out to?
That would be us, of course. Oh, my goodness. Yeah. Surprise. No,
you can find us at bestculturesolutions. Ca. My email address
is tim.bestculturesolutions. ca. And yeah, we can make sure that
you're. Your vetting process, you know, and your interviewing process is
one that can make sure that you're getting the right candidate for the job regardless
(17:24):
of their past. And. Yeah. And properly identifying that
all right. Hopefully this has been encouraging for you to know
that there are some great candidates out there
who do have a black mark in their past. And it doesn't mean
they're not the right fit for you, and it doesn't mean you shouldn't hire them.
So reach out to Tim. He can help you move forward with this
(17:46):
process. Thanks so much, Tim, and thank you for listening
to World at Work.
Foreign.
Podcast where business leaders and job seekers come together
to create winning cultures and fulfilling careers. I'm your
host, Jody Mayberry, and I'm here with Tim Dick, the founder
of Best Culture Solutions. And Katie Kearns went on a cruise. I
(00:23):
guess that means I get to come back and sit in the host seat. She
did, and I don't even. She hasn't even told me when she's coming back yet.
I don't know about you, so this might be a recurring theme.
Yeah. Well, good. It gets me back behind the microphone where
I should be. But it's great to talk to you again, Tim.
I've been scheming and planning my next trip to Canada.
(00:45):
It's been a while since I've been up north to visit my
fine Canadian friends. Yeah. Where are you going? Have you
decided? Well, no, I have not, but I don't live very far
from British Columbia and it's pretty easy to hop on the ferry to
Victoria, so perhaps there. But I
actually, I take that back. I do know I will be in Victoria
(01:08):
in September, so there is that. I will visit
Victoria here soon enough. But we're not here
to talk about Canada, although I'm always happy to.
Nor are we here to talk about me. We're here to talk about careers and
culture and all the good things you come to expect from World at
Work. Yes. I'm going to start off with a story, Tim, that will
(01:30):
bring us right to the topic I want to discuss.
One time I was talking to somebody who said he had been in
his role for many years, and he said, I
really want a promotion. There's a particular job
I want and I've tried for it many times and I've never gotten it. And
I said, well, why not? Why don't you think you've gotten it? And he said,
(01:52):
well, about eight years ago, I did something
that I don't think was entirely my fault, but it
kind of gave me a black mark on my record. And I feel like
no one will give me a promotion now because I'm
known for the one dumb thing that happened eight years ago. And
it just got me. I thought of that story recently and it got me thinking.
(02:15):
As a recruiter, what do you do, Tim, when someone
has a black mark? I mean, I talked to this guy. He seemed
to understand what happened wasn't in his favor. It was eight years ago.
He said he learned from it. Do you hire people that have black marks on
their record? Absolutely. If they've learned from it right now, I wouldn't
hire Somebody just because they have a black mark on their record. Just like I
(02:37):
wouldn't hire somebody just because they have experience. Right. But the reality
is that raise your hand if you haven't made a mistake. And
we have had candidates in front of us who might have a criminal record
or maybe they have, you know, driven under the influence
and have that type of a charge on their record or, or you know, have
made other mistakes or even a criminal past sometimes. And I think
(02:59):
maybe the situation that you're referring to, it sounds to me like maybe it
was maybe a less consequential mistake as far as what
the effects could be on their personal life than what I have offered. But
I guess all that to say is that here's an even more extreme thing that
may have happened to somebody that I might, I would still consider somebody for. Because
the reality is that life is life. We learn things from our mistakes,
(03:21):
we learn things from things that we have done that we ought not have done
or we learn the hard way on. And that includes
even things that might be criminal. I mean, don't get me wrong, it's not
a blind yes for everything. There needs to be more than just, well, I'm going
to forget about that. But there are things that you can do in the screening
process to validate and verify if they've learned from those experience, to
(03:44):
validate and verify, you know, if they're likely to repeat those
experiences or not. Because that's the thing. As soon as people hear about it,
sometimes they just get very skittish and they, oh, I, they've done that before.
I can't bring that into the workplace. And the reality is that it
doesn't matter who you bring in the workplace. You're always bringing in somebody who's made
a mistake somewhere in life, somewhere along the way, professionally or personally.
(04:06):
Every single one of us has made a mistake. Sure, some of
them are more consequential than others.
That is true. You know, that is absolutely true.
But you can do things to make sure that they've learned from it
and that, you know, giving them that second chance is the right thing to do.
I understand the concern about history repeating itself and you don't want that to
(04:28):
happen in your workplace. I get that. But you know, if
somebody has done the work to learn from those
situations, they've done the work to learn from that, that hard thing that they
have done or that bad thing they have done.
The reality is that that also likely means that they are
self motivated in some way. And if you're interviewing Them to make sure that
(04:50):
they're self motivated for the job that you have in front of them,
and they are, and they have that motivation for it. There's a good chance then
that if they have made a mistake in the past, that they have been motivated
to learn from it and not repeat it. I know if you are strictly
abiding by motivation based interviewing, you
ask candidates all the same question in the same
(05:12):
way. But if you know somebody has a black mark on their
record, do you step out of that a little bit and ask about the
situation? Yeah, I might, you know, and just ask them, you know, what
happened and, and what did they learn from it. And I think, you know, it's
funny, a lot of people will say, well, that's an easy question that anybody can
answer and fake. But the reality is that if people haven't actually learned from it
(05:34):
and done the work to learn from, you'll be able to see it in the
answer. Or maybe a lot of times what happens is that, you know,
it is outside the motivational based interviewing model
because, like, it might be something that you learn, you know,
because sometimes in some jobs you do need to do, say like a
criminal record check afterwards to make sure before you bring them in.
(05:55):
And you might learn something there that you know,
that is less than ideal or might be viewed as a black mark, depending on
what it is. And you can tell how the person addresses that, you know,
if they've learned something from it or not. I've had quite a few candidates who
say, hey, look, you're into that criminal record check and you're going to find that
I drove under the influence of alcohol five years ago. And here's what I've learned
(06:16):
from that. You know, I've had people be upfront with me about that before. And
when they're upfront with you about it and they tell you what they've learned a
lot of times, what they've learned, right? And the people who've
learned these lessons the hard way, it's just like when you run out of gas,
right? I mean, Mike Simmons and I talked about this the other day. If you
want to keep your car with gas in it, who do you want to teach
you about that? Well, the person who's run out of gas knows exactly how that
(06:37):
happened, right? Because now they know, right? They
have that experience. So now, to be fair, when I was younger, I ran out
of gas more than once, but that's another episode. But you know, the
person who's gone in the ditch before can probably tell you why they went in
the ditch and how not to go in the ditch. And so there can be
a lot of value in having somebody that has learn the lesson.
(06:58):
I understand completely why that might make some employers
nervous because they don't know if they've learned the lesson or not. But if
they're showing well on a motivational based interview or motivation based interview,
if they're showing well and being upfront and honest with you about it and telling
you how they've learned from it, and taking ownership and responsibility and
demonstrating specific actions that they took to overcome that black mark,
(07:21):
then there's a good chance that they've learned why they went into the ditch. If
they can't tell you much or they present without that, or
there's a good chance that they're afraid of it, so they have not taken full
ownership for it because they're afraid of admitting that that happened to them. People who
are open, honest, who can admit their mistakes, who can tell you what they've done
about them, are self motivated people to learn from them and change and
(07:42):
adapt. And if you look at the principles of motivation based interviewing
itself, an internally motivated person alone, when it comes to failure,
they embrace failure. They don't avoid failure and they don't avoid
taking ownership for failure because then they learn from it and they change and they
adapt. And that is straight from the motivation
based interviewing criteria for somebody who's internally motivated.
(08:03):
Tim, I'm a little surprised to hear that you ran out of gas multiple
times when you were younger, because I know your mother didn't raise you that way.
I was about to say next time. So for the listeners, Jodi has met
my mother and she did a good job of outlining my own failures and
shortcomings to him, but didn't have enough time to get to the times I ran
out of gas. So now you have something to talk with her about again? Yes,
(08:26):
I do. Okay, so you mentioned that some
candidates will bring it up and they're upfront. So what if you
do the interviews, someone is a top candidate
or a top two candidate, you do a background check and you find out
they've got a black mark, does that disqualify them? No,
not. It depends on if they've taken ownership and action for it. So if they've
(08:48):
taken ownership in action. No. If they have, then yeah. Right. And
it's just like any obstacle that people face, right? Any obstacle
that people face, they need to take ownership and learn from it and
evolve from that and they need to demonstrate that. So what
have you seen when you help organizations hire? What have
you seen that managers are worried
(09:10):
about when it comes to people that have, have a black mark either
from something they've done personally or something they've done in the workplace? What is it
that concerns managers about hiring these people? Yeah, that's a good question.
I think the biggest thing, Jody, is that they're worried that this is going to
happen here or that they're going to do it again or this is habitual behavior,
you know, and to be honest, it often isn't. It often is not
(09:31):
habitual behavior. It often is. Somebody had a bad
day and didn't understand something properly. Somebody, you
know, didn't know what they were doing and
learned the hard way about it, or deep down they might have had a feeling
that if they pull this lever, it's not going to have the right result, but
they just, for whatever reason couldn't find it within them to not.
(09:52):
And really what it is, is, is okay, that's fine. But
what did you learn about it? But the owner, the, the business manager,
hiring manager, leader, owner, whoever, they don't want that lever be pulled in their
environment because they don't want to have to deal with the route, which I totally
understand. But a lot of times, I mean, we've seen success stories
all the time. People who've had and people make livings public speaking about this
(10:14):
for a reason, they've learned the hardest lessons. A lot of times the people who
have done some of the worst things or learned the hardest lessons
are often the ones that are able to do even more because they've had that
harsh lesson and they live with it forever and it stays with them forever. And
that can be good and bad for them in different ways. And that's a whole
other story. But they've learned from it. And a lot of owners,
(10:35):
business owners, business leaders, don't want to bring that in their workplace without realizing
that. A lot of times when somebody's already experienced that, it's actually a pretty good
way of knowing that they won't do it again because they've seeing what happens and
they don't want to go there again and they do not want that pain again.
I do think what Tim's saying is pretty
interesting because quite often when, at least in the
(10:56):
workplace, when someone does something bad,
poor decision, something happens, it quite often
is situational, not behavioral. Like in that
situation, they didn't have perhaps the right training, the right experience
to make the right decision or, or something was going on at home. They
made A bad choice. Do you give any
(11:18):
consideration to that, Tim, to figure out if this was situational
and not behavioral? Yeah, absolutely. And a lot of times even the
things that seem behavioral could be situational, right?
That was just how they're wired. And it could be like something that was deeply
personal and deeply, you know, not good. I mean, and you
know, even take the example of that driving under the influence. Look, I don't think
(11:39):
anybody should ever drive under the influence, right? That's just reality. They should not.
And that is. And so I'm in no way defending that behavior, but the
reality is that a lot of times people, they,
you know, they know that they shouldn't do that, but they're in the situation and
they can't recognize the patterns of whether or not they're really at that point or
not, and they shouldn't do it. And they think, you know, and it's not an
(12:00):
excuse for those people. There's accountability that has to be had so they can learn
from it. But to your point, sometimes it is
situational. And even things that might seem behavioral could just be because they haven't
had the opportunity yet to. How do I put it?
Recognize that pattern, right? That feeling that what they see in
front of them, it's. For a lot of people, how they behave is
(12:22):
pattern recognition. And they haven't had that pattern happen
to them yet. And so until that happens, you know, they have to develop
that pattern recognition for that behavior that we're trying to avoid.
But I also know lots of people, you know, and I've. And I've known people
that say, let's talk about some of the potential black marks. I also know
people that do have addictions to substances,
(12:45):
and you can tell that they're not developing that pattern recognition because they don't have
the self awareness, the vulnerability or the ability to say, well, that
isn't good. What's the big deal? Is kind of what they say? And they continue
on. And so you can see it in people right away as to whether or
not developing that pattern recognition. And so a lot of times, I guess what I'm
trying to say is that for a lot of people, it's a new experience for
(13:05):
them. They thought it was okay, they weren't sure, they tried it, whatever
it might be. It doesn't necessarily have to be substances or alcohol, but
anything. And they learn that lesson the hard way. So
let's say this, if we go back to the situation,
the story I started this episode with, it was
someone who loved the job, that he had the company
(13:28):
that he was with, he just wanted to get promoted.
So let's take that situation and it's in
the same organization and perhaps a lot of people remember what
happened eight years ago. And how do you handle that
then with the rest of the staff? If you promote someone,
you know, there's going to be a lot of whispers. Oh, my goodness. Tim
(13:50):
promoted Mike. Don't you remember when Mike did this a few years ago?
How do you handle that? Yeah, well, there's. And
that's true. And that's not fair to that person because people should have a chance
to learn. People should have a chance to improve. People should have a chance to
have a second chance. Right. I mean, and don't get me wrong, if it continues,
then. No, but. And that's a different situation altogether. How do you
(14:12):
handle it as a hiring manager? Well, you know, look, you know, you
just be honest. Yeah, that happened. You take ownership for it. You address
it. I mean, there are some limits and rules around
confidentiality, right? So, I mean, if you're breaking some sort of
confidentiality that you shouldn't or you're not supposed to break, then. Then that's
what you say. Look, I'm going to be transparent with you. This is an issue
(14:32):
that is not for public consumption. This is why move on. Right.
And by the way, if that happened to you, you would probably want me to
do the same thing for you. If it is not something that, you know, is.
Is fully confidential or is publicly known or can't be hidden or,
not that I'm suggesting hide things but can't be avoided, or I don't
like the word avoid either because you still want to address it head on as
(14:53):
to why you can't mention it, but. Or why it would be inappropriate to mention
it, but if, if it's out there, then you take ownership. You say, yeah, you
know what? I do know that happened. Thank you. You know, and I have. I
have vetted people according to an objective criteria that
demonstrated to me that they have learned from that. And I'd like to give them
the opportunity for this job based on the remaining skills and motivation
(15:14):
that they have. And by the way, if you think that that's happening again, then
I want you to know there's an open door because we have to look out
for each other and we have to look out for our team and this person
as well. And if you do believe that that thing is happening again, then
we're going to address that. We're going to talk about that and we're going to
make sure we're going to keep. And not because we're here to witch hunt, but
because we're here to keep this person and our team on track. And whatever that
(15:36):
means, that's what we're going to do. So, yeah, if you think that whatever it
is is happening in you, tell me. Absolutely. And if you're the
person who has done this thing and you think that you have that black mark
and you can never be promoted again, I would challenge you to say, you know
what? That's not true. And that goes for anything in life. You know,
the past is the past. I mean, anybody who's watched the Lion King has seen
(15:57):
Rafiq. He hit Simba with a stick. If people thought they could never be promoted
again, Simba would never have come back and saved the Pride Lands from Scar. Right.
And so you can come back. You can learn from that. You can get
promoted. It's not what you did yesterday, it's what. What you're going to do tomorrow.
And it's about what have you learned and what skills and motivation do you bring
to tomorrow's job? Not what mistake you may have made yesterday. And don't get me
(16:18):
wrong, the mistake still matters. But you've owned it. You've owned it, you've learned from
it, and now that's going to make you better for that promotion. And
don't let that stop you. And I think you take ownership for it. You know?
Yeah, I know this happened in my past. I'm not avoiding it anymore and pretending
like I can't get promoted. I am genuinely interested in this promotion. Yes, this
happened. Yes, this is why it happened. And this is what I've learned from
(16:40):
it. And I think that that's where you go from there. Tim, this
has been a great discussion, and I think it's a
topic that many organizations are faced with at some
point and you may not know but what to do with it or should
you go any further. If there's a candidate who has a black market, whether it's
personal or professional, if we want some help
(17:02):
with our approach to hiring, who can we reach out to?
That would be us, of course. Oh, my goodness. Yeah. Surprise. No,
you can find us at bestculturesolutions. Ca. My email address
is tim.bestculturesolutions. ca. And yeah, we can make sure that
you're. Your vetting process, you know, and your interviewing process is
one that can make sure that you're getting the right candidate for the job regardless
(17:24):
of their past. And. Yeah. And properly identifying that
all right. Hopefully this has been encouraging for you to know
that there are some great candidates out there
who do have a black mark in their past. And it doesn't mean
they're not the right fit for you, and it doesn't mean you shouldn't hire them.
So reach out to Tim. He can help you move forward with this
(17:46):
process. Thanks so much, Tim, and thank you for listening
to World at Work.
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