When a Reference Check Slides Into Office Gossip

Is it still valid information or is it just gossip?

You’ve met a candidate for your open real estate assistant position through a colleague and you’re thinking of hiring her but suddenly, you hear a lot about her from another realtor that worked with that person in the past. Sometimes it’s hard to see the truth through the fog. Is this ‘talk’ a legitimate reference or is it just gossip?

The answer to that question depends somewhat on WHAT exactly is being said of the person, but the truth is that the poison of gossip spreads like an infectious disease, even when it’s not really warranted. Condemning someone because of what could be malicious gossip isn’t the best idea—you have to always consider the source of the information and what motivation they might have in sharing it with you.

Here are a few experiences I’ve had in this area that can serve as ‘teachable moments’ for all of us:

When people bad mouth a realtor as an employer

I came across this situation recently: a few people spoke under their breath when the name of a particular realtor was mentioned, with reference to hiring for them. I wondered what provoked the stern warning and asked those few people. The rumours were that this employer went through employees like a sick child does with kleenex. I’ll leave the details out, but suffice it to say that nobody seemed to stay with him for long.

Based on the poison I’d been fed about this client, I was initially hesitant to hire for him.  To be fair and impartial, however, I decided to ignore the gossip and assess his past employment successes and failures for myself.

As I spent more time working with this realtor, I began to understand that it was a recruitment problem that he was suffering from and not an employee management problem. That was something I could help with! I proceeded to successfully hire for this realtor, and the candidate absolutely loves working there. So much for the gossip mongers.

When people bad mouth a candidate

If you’ve been working in a certain field for a while, you can gain a reputation, good or bad. If it’s not a big world, which the world of real estate is not, that reputation can precede you to any interview, meeting or consultation by virtue of wagging tongues.

A good reputation is something to be proud of and a bad one can be the hardest thing to shake. It comes down to the notion: “Where there’s smoke, there’s fire.” If you’re inclined to believe in that maxim, and you hear from several different sources that a certain candidate is bad news, you’re likely to believe it. But is that fair? Should someone be discounted because of what is otherwise gossip?

I don’t believe so. If someone has the qualifications I am looking for on paper, it behooves me to do my due diligence and at least speak with the candidate. Asking questions that will get to the bottom of the gossip and allegations is imperative; taking the word of people who might have an ulterior motive for their gossip is not.

I recently had a candidate whom I had vetted successfully and whom I wanted to introduce to a specific client. In the small world that is real estate, I found that he had already heard of the candidate and didn’t want to even meet with her. When I asked why, he told me that he had been warned about her through some back channel chatting between realtors. When I asked for specifics, the realtor was vague and finally admitted that he didn’t have any actual knowledge of this person, it was just gossip.

His argument was this: it was information that came from not only another realtor, who happened to be a friend of his, but that realtor’s assistant. Again, I won’t go into the details but when I delved a little more deeply, I discovered that the assistant who was making these claims was the person who replaced my candidate when she had gone off on maternity leave. My candidate had opted not to return to her earlier post because of the commute required. As it turned out, my client would be a far better fit for her, being a low key office, with less stress and fewer extra hours.

I had to wonder about the motivation of the assistant: was she trying to ensure that my candidate didn’t attempt to reprise her role? I couldn’t be sure but I believed this would be a good fit. The client decided to trust my instincts and ultimately, I was proved right. They are still working together to this day! If he had listened to the gossip, instead of going through the process of checking things out properly, he might have missed a great employee.

Don’t confuse legitimate reference checks and investigation with idle gossip. It’s an easy slope to slide down, particularly when the person sharing the information is someone you know, like, and trust. Always beware of people’s motivations: they may not be intentionally misleading you, but a person’s career is at stake, so it’s a time to be cautious.

Using the services of a recruiting firm like AGENTC gets you experience in finding the right candidate or position; for us, our motivation is a good fit, first, last and always. We wear our goals right out on our sleeves, so you never have to worry about our motives!