Last week I was asked about the signs of a toxic employee and it made me think about all the clients and managers that have come to me over the years with concerns about members of staff.

I think that generally when I started getting the history, there were always concerns at the outset but they overlooked them and didn’t address them during the probation period.

When I started my first proper HR job, I was in charge of graduate recruitment and we had selection days with graduates, where they would go through a series of tests and interviews, at the end of the day we would decide who to offer a position to. It was a group decision, we made sure that at least 6 people interacted with each candidate to get a balanced decision.

I had concerns about a candidate, they were super smart, really articulate but I could see that they were not a team player and that their directness would rub colleagues and clients up the wrong way.

Don’t get me wrong being challenging isn’t a bad thing, it just needs to be tempered with the ability to negotiate and be accepting of another person's point of view.

I shared my concerns but my boss disagreed with me and so the person was offered a position. Less than 2 months later my boss and I were in a room telling this individual that their contract was going to be terminated and having a really difficult conversation as their inability to self reflect made the feedback difficult to hear.

I want to help you avoid making poor hiring or promotion choices, so here are the points to look out for:

An inability to self reflect.

Ask questions on what went wrong and what they have learnt. Are they blaming others?

A preference to work alone (unless the role requires it).

No man/woman is an island. You want to hear about collaboration, influence and negotiation

A lack of Emotional intelligence.

Do they pick up nuances in tone and body language?

Are they problem multipliers, rather than problem solvers?

Do they come to you with issues that they should be solving themselves? Do they always respond with negativity to change or challenge?

Are they self serving?

Do they help others? Are they willing to share their time and knowledge?

Let us know which tip’s you’ll be implementing with your team in the comments and grab our FREE guide to Hiring to make sure you hire the right person