About a month ago, a young man at one of our businesses decided to throw in the towel or so I thought. He never said good bye. He had been behaving strangely appearing and disappearing without notice. I heard from his colleagues that he had gone abroad or was planning to go abroad to work there. Although he knew what to do and was good at it, he was never a team player and wanted to do stuff only his way.
Anyway, over the weekend he turned up and wanted to start from where he had left. Management denied him access. He called to give the same old excuses about his disappearances and appearances and how I should reconsider him.
However, I never want to see anyone leave our teams when it isn’t their decision. It takes me many long agonizing nights to fire anyone and many times I give people many chances but we had had enough. Besides he had fired himself, my “small heart” kept telling me. So I managed to sleep.
In Feb, when he started yet another disappearing episode, I published this on my LinkedIn page and Twitter as a thread.
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As a very small business owner, I sometimes interact with young people in Uganda looking for jobs. Here are some lessons.
1. When you call a recruiter or potential employer, always introduce yourself with both names, who may have referred you, and ask if they have time to talk.
2. Don’t beep or call and ask whether they have Airtel or MTN
3. If they don’t answer your phone call, don’t call 20 times in five minutes. You can send a message. And again introduce yourself.
4. Don’t call outside working hours. You can’t be looking for a job and then calling somebody you don’t know at 11.00pm or 5.30am.
5. If invited for an interview, keep time. Traffic jam in Kampala or the green truck blocking the road at Kololo aren’t perfect excuses.
6. Shower and wear a deodorant or perfume.
7. Dress the part. If you are a lawyer or investment banker, you aren’t expected to turn up in damaged/ripped jeans. You can only do that if you already have a brand name.
8. Be courteous. Don’t feel so important at reception and failing to greet the receptionist because you earlier talked to the boss.
9. Google search the company/person recruiting you. You will learn what they do but also maybe avoid human traffickers and bad employers. Somebody I know lost a job opportunity because she asked at the end of interview what the company does.
10. They will google you too. So what you leave online matters. You can’t always be posting about who needs to eat you or want to be eaten.
11. Know what you are worth. You can’t ask for Shs2m and then accept an offer of Shs150,000.
12. Have an idea of what you can do. How you can add value. There is no job for Anything.
13. You may have the biggest bum ever but if your email address is biggestbum@gmail…. You may turn off some recruiters… unless if your bum is important for the job like in a brothel.
14. Once you get a job, don’t ‘kill’ each relative you know of so that you can spend the day nursing a hangover.
15. In fact avoid coming to work with red eyes, smelling like a cheap bar, and lacking sleep. You have a weekend to indulge.
16. Live within your means. Don’t start borrowing money from people you just met at work so that you can have a KFC or Javas lunch. There will always be a new phone model every few months.
17. Don’t ever think that there is nobody else who can do what you are doing. You can easily be replaced even when you have a godfather.
18. Ask to do more than you are asked. Always be willing to do something extra. Sit in for somebody, give a helping hand. You can’t say “that is not part of my job” on every little thing.
19. If you aren’t going to work, inform your immediate boss.
20. If you intend to resign, do so in writing and give time as per the contract. You can’t just not turn up and then send a message that you left. You never know when you may need something from the company or people.
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