A Leader’s Principal Job: Take Care of People

In my recent article “Why Hiring is Pharmacy’s Biggest Problem and What to do About it”, I described having an automated hiring process to preserve the decision maker’s time, while still allocating tangible energy to finding more of the right people. Now it’s time to discuss what happens after you do hire.

When you hire someone, you are committed. You can’t sorta support them. You did your due diligence before pulling the trigger. That involved humbly admitting what you needed, having the belief, grit and discipline to execute your relentless system of recruiting and hiring before finally pulling the trigger.

The new staff member starts and new elements come into the picture. Some elements are as expected, others not so much. Your job: support them (no matter what). With two years of pandemic hardship involved, the leader’s job will be harder than ever with growing people carrying more weight. Leaders will need to be honed in to the true needs of those on staff and be creative in how to make them successful.

As example, here are some of the one-off support mechanism I have witnessed for some new co-workers this year, each in an effort to support their specific needs at the time: reducing hours/giving days off even while we were short, paying out sick time for brand new staff on their second, third and forth ever shift (they are part of the team like everyone else), allowing unaccrued vacation pay (they catch up to it in the months to come), providing an income bridge to complete an…