Entrepreneur.com
This article was written by Mark Henricks of Entrepreneur.com
If you're not mining ex-employees for future hires, you may be missing out. Many companies have long considered such workers disloyal and off-limits. That started changing in the tight labor market of the late '90s, when desperation forced employers to accept ex-workers, says Beth N. Carvin, CEO of Nobscot Corp., a Kailua, Hawaii, software company that recently added a rebound recruiting module to its WebExit exit interview software.
After several years of rehiring on a limited basis, companies are having a change of heart, Carvin says. "Much to their surprise, they've found that it really does work."
Other employees become more loyal when you rehire ex-employees who left voluntarily, says John Putzier, a Prospect, Pennsylvania, HR consultant and author of Get Weird! 101 Innovative Ways to Make Your Company a Great Place to Work. "If other workers see somebody who left and came back, it makes them think maybe this isn't such a bad place after all," he says.
Shulamit Gershenson was one of the first employees Laura Grimmer hired when Articulate Communications Inc. opened in 2002. When Gershenson left the New York City PR company in 2004, she was the first person Grimmer wanted back.
"I kept her on my mailing list," says Grimmer, 38, the founder and CEO. "We'd get together once a month or so for drinks." Before long, Grimmer started hearing that Gershenson's new job at a nonprofit organization wasn't working out. She made sure her ex-employee was invited to the 15-person agency's 2004 holiday party. This got Gershenson thinking about returning to her old job. In April 2005, a year after leaving the $2.2 million company, she returned as vice president.
Grimmer is more than pleased to have Gershenson back onboard. "She has knowledge about the way we work and our clients that is difficult to teach somebody coming in at the senior level," Grimmer explains.
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