UpFront - January/February 2010
You’re Hired, Again
As Koren Rife packed up her desk in March 2008 after being laid off by a Philadelphia-based public relations and advertising agency, she never expected that just nine months later she’d be rehired by the small firm.
"I’d only been with them for 11 months when we lost the account I worked on--a national outdoor leisure company," Rife says. "They kept me on for an extra month, hoping to land a new account and to help me find another job. But in the end, I was the odd man out."
Rife landed a new PR job at an alcohol and drug rehabilitation facility, but kept in touch with friends from her old office. When she heard they were hiring again, she contacted her former boss and was rehired to a different position (but with the same salary) within the company.
"It was an amicable parting based purely on business," says Frank Gilanelli of Barton Gilanelli and Associates, the firm where Rife works. "A few months later when we had a position to fill, she was certainly a candidate for rehire."
Rife’s story is one that is becoming more common as the economy improves. Twenty-six percent of employers who have had layoffs within the past year plan to bring some of those people back, according to a recent CareerBuilder/USA Today survey.
Gilanelli and his business partner Ronni Barton always prefer rehiring someone they’ve worked with in the past over a candidate they don’t know. "There’s something comfortable about working with people you’ve known for a while," Gilanelli says. "Even if you have someone who is more qualified than the person who used to work for you, I’d still choose the person I used to work with. There’s just a degree of trust there."
Of course, the only reason you’d consider bringing someone back is because he or she was a good employee, Gilanelli says. "Harmony in the workplace is just as important as job performance," he says. "It makes the decision easier when you know who you’re talking to and what they’re about. The only thing you know about a new candidate is what’s on their resume or cover letter."
Rehiring a former employee makes filling an open position easier on the business owner, but it also says a lot to your staff. "If the former employee is glad to be back, it’s a statement to everyone there that things aren’t so great elsewhere," says Peter Cappelli, a management professor at the University of Pennsylvania’s Wharton School of Business.
Yet you do have to be careful, especially if the former employee is returning to a better and higher-paying job. "That may be hard for some people who still see the employee in the old light," Cappelli says.
Though Rife kept the same title she had during her first stint with Barton Gilanelli, she joined a new team and a new account, and felt she had to prove worthy of the second chance. The upside of her new old job was the lack of lag time in getting accustomed to the firm’s procedures and culture.
"I didn’t have those first-day jitters," Rife says. "It’s not like walking into an office where you have to introduce yourself to new people."
And on the other side, Gilanelli and Barton weren’t nervous about what to expect from Rife. "Nervous happens when you don’t know the person," Gilanelli says.
Ready to Rehire?
3 questions to ask yourself before offering a former employee a new job:
Did you part on good terms?
For Frank Gilanelli, laying off an employee is one of the hardest parts of owning a business. "We were very sorry to let go of Koren, but there was nothing we could do about it," he says. "It wasn’t like, ‘There’s the door--get out.’ "
The company kept Rife an extra month to help her find new work. Those reasons, plus the fact that Rife saw them as mentors, made her eager to return to the company when there was an opening.
Do other employees support the decision to rehire?
Company culture and unity are crucial in a small business. If any employees were glad to see the person go--and not eager to welcome them back--you might want to reconsider your idea. Even if there aren’t issues, you might want to let employees know about your decision to bring back a former coworker, Wharton professor Peter Cappelli says.
Does the former employee have a new job?
Rife had been working at her new job for six months when she got the offer to return to Barton Gilanelli. "The good ones are going to have new jobs," Frank Gilanelli says. Recruiting will be easier if the tight economy kept your former employee out of work. But if the person has a better or higher-paying job, you’ll have to decide how much you want them back.