Life Lesson Fitting of a Professional
So I haven’t blogged in a couple of month. My deepest apologies, I have been beyond busy between professional work and family. I will stay on top of it this time. I promise…
In reflecting on my journey in HR I thought of a situation
that I wanted to write about. It was one of those situations that I wish I had done more. It was a situation in
which I felt someone needed my voice and my
voice was not strong. It was a situation that I
would do differently if I could do it all over again. It was a true learning experience and life lesson.
It was a several years ago I was working for a large grocery
retailer as an HR Generalist. I did most of the recruiting and hiring for the
positions within the store. I interviewed a young man; I will name him Todd
Tolduso, the young man was still in high school looking for evenings and part
time work. A friend of his already worked at the store and she was a great employee
and suggested that I interview him because he was very nice. During the
interview I noticed certain quarks about him, but I am a person who prides
themself in the ability to see beyond the superficial and look at a person
for true talent and ability.

A part of me died when I heard those words. I never imagined
that people felt, believe, or thought that way. I always had much more hope for
humanity and our ability to see the greater good in people. But in hind sight
all I had done was project my worldly views onto someone else. Not everyone
feels and thinks the was that I do.
My manager and his assistant manager really wanted me to push him to quit. This way they would not feel bad about their
actions (or could not be sued) and their store numbers would still look
good. This I could not do. After a couple of weeks on the job the Todd was
really beginning to find his groove. In a strange turn of events the young man
ended up being the best employee that the store has seen in a long time. He was
that employee that when someone else called off I could depend on him to come
in and replace an employee. He never called in, was always on time, and more
than willing to stay late – even on a school night. It came to a point when I
would let my manager know someone was not able to come into work on a day, he
started saying, “Can we call Todd?” I would call Todd and he would come into
work, more than happy. Because he always was.
In HR you see the good, the bad, the hilarious, and the ugly. This was definitely one of those ugly situations that you only hope does not happen in real life but it does. When it does you need to be ready and willing to take a stance. Because if you stand for nothing, than you will fall for anything. My stance? I cannot say that the situation will NEVER happen again; but my reaction will be different. Not on my watch - not while I am still an HR professional or any professional. And when you fall, there are more than enough people willing to take your place…who have a stance.
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