I usually hear this from clients right after they hire a new person.

“I’m pulling my hair out! After spending three months interviewing candidates, and checking references, I thought this person was going to be PERFECT for this job.”

“But it’s their first week and every single thing they’ve done has been messed up…and it’s not the big things — their strategy is good. It’s the little things that they miss.”

• The way they wrote that email sounded so annoyed, can’t they see how the client will feel reading that?
• They started the project without one key piece of information from the client — now we’ve got to do it all over.
• They nailed the project, but they gave it to me to review an hour before the deadline — how am I going to review it in an hour with all the other things I’m juggling?

“It’s just common sense…” 

But it’s not. 

All of these are examples of expectations that you failed to make clear. 

It feels like common sense because to you, it’s as obvious as the nose on your face, but your new team member may have done it differently in their last role. 

It’s even possible that your way is the weird one.

The “little things” are the things that are likely different from one situation to another! The little things are easy to fix, but you’re so frustrated you don’t want to take the time to train them!

If everyone you hire has “no common sense” (or any other repeating problem) it’s likely that the problem is you.

No, you can’t explain everything to every person you hire. You’re absolutely right about that. But we can create some checklists, some videos, some basic training materials that start the process and teach new people some common sense.

What’s worked for your business? How have you written down your baseline expectations and reviewed them with new people coming in?