Who to Take On

In 1945, not long after the war, the young Tommaso Buscetta began to be approached, as he later recalled, by courteous, mysterious men who expressed themselves in half-sentences and subtle hints. He could feel he was being watched and weighed up. One of them, a furniture polisher, carefully sounded him out on how he felt about policemen and judges, about family values, about loyalty to friends.

In the end this polisher, Giovanni Andronico, invited him to join the Porta Nuova clan. And here is what happened next, as Dickie tells it. As soon as the head of the clan approved the candidate, notes with Buscetta’s name on them went out to every other clan in Palermo, so that each could use its own channels to check how reliable he was and whether he or his relatives had any links to the police. Only when all the checks were done did the initiation take place, and it was Andronico himself who pricked Buscetta’s finger.

Look at how this hire works. The candidate is watched for a long time before any offer is made. He is tested in conversations where he doesn’t know he’s being tested. Then the enquiries go not to one sponsor but to everyone who might know something. And the man who brought the candidate in performs the ceremony himself: he answers for him.

A CV Is Worth Nothing

The first rule of hiring I learnt in forty years: a CV is worth nothing. Anybody can write a piece of paper. What counts is what people you trust say about a man, and what you have seen of his work with your own eyes.

So collect references, and more than one. One sponsor can be wrong, can be the candidate’s friend, can owe him. Several independent ones make a picture. Don’t ask “Is he a good worker?” Everyone says yes to that. Ask: how did he behave when something went wrong? What did he do when nobody was looking? Would you take him on again?

And look for yourself. The best way to know a man is to work with him. A trial week, a small errand, a trip together. Don Vincenzo never took anyone on after a single conversation. He would say: come and do a week on the front counter, and we’ll take a look at each other. In a week you could see everything: whether the man was late, how he spoke to clients, what he did when the counter girl stepped out. A CV will never tell you that.

Rules and Exceptions

Second: every kind of hiring has its rules, and the rules bend for useful people. That’s dangerous, and you need to know it.

In Cosa Nostra the rule was strict: a candidate must have no relatives among the police, the carabinieri or the judges. The reason is obvious. And yet Gambetta cites exceptions. Aurelio Ocelli was admitted to the family from the town of Vicari even though he was a carabiniere’s son. He boasted of connections to prominent politicians, and that usefulness, it seems, outweighed his unfortunate parentage. Antonino Rotolo was admitted too, although his brother-in-law was in the police. But, Gambetta notes, his career didn’t move as fast as it might have.

Every exception to the hiring rules is a bet. Sometimes it pays. But remember that a man taken on round the rules for his connections knows it. And he knows that what’s valued in him is his connections, not himself. If the connections go, so does the reason to keep him. He understands that too, and behaves accordingly. Make exceptions rarely, deliberately, and don’t hide from yourself why you’re making them.

Don’t Take On Difficult People

Third: don’t take on difficult people in the hope of changing them. You won’t.

Vincenzo Marsala, the son of that same Don Mariano, told the court who had made him and what sort of men got made in general. They make lads whose heads aren’t quite screwed on, who do stupid things and could end up stealing. And Antonino Calderone explained that two men had been admitted to the Catania family to keep them under control, because both of them killed an incredible number of people purely on a whim.

This is the kind of hire that looks clever and turns out to be a mistake. Taking on the hothead to keep him close. Taking on the unreliable one because he might come in handy. Taking on the man with a foul temper because he knows a lot. I’ve seen how that ends, in our world and in offices. A difficult person poisons a team faster than he helps it. He quarrels, he schemes, he sets an example, and good people start leaving because they don’t want to work next to him. Character matters more than skills. Skills can be taught. Character, almost never.

The Trial Period

Fourth: even with the best references, give a man time to prove himself in a new place.

In 1974 the Canadian police secretly recorded a conversation between two mafiosi in a Montreal bar. Paolo Violi, a member of the local family, was explaining to a visitor from Sicily that if a mafioso moved to Canada, he had to agree to a five-year apprenticeship in one of the families, during which he would be assessed. The visitor objected: but if I come from Italy with a letter and you know I’m a friend, don’t I have the same rights? Violi answered no, that was different. If he lives here, with us, and we’ve recognised him here, then when the time comes everything will be in order.

Five years’ probation even for a man with a reference from the old country. A reference opens the door. It doesn’t replace the work in the new place. In the office you don’t need five years, but the idea is right: past experience and other people’s references guarantee nothing in your team. Give a man a set period, give him tasks, watch how he handles them, and only then trust him completely.

After a Bad Hire

One last thing. Once you’ve made a mistake with a hire, you tighten the rules. That’s normal, as long as you don’t overdo it.

After Pistone had spent almost five years inside the Bonanno family, the Mafia, he says, revised its admission rules. The old rule came back: a candidate had to “make his bones”, that is, carry out a contract killing. The bosses reckoned no agent would ever go that far. And now two senior mafiosi, not one, had to vouch for a candidate, preferably men who had known him since childhood or at least for the past fifteen to twenty years.

One FBI agent doubled the number of references required across an entire industry. Your own hiring mistake will teach you something too. Just don’t turn one mistake into a rule that shuts out all the good people. A rule should catch the mistake, not punish those who never made it.

The Bottom Line

Try a man out on the job before you take him on, and give a trial period even to the ones who come recommended. Whoever comes to work for you today will, in ten years, be deciding who to take on after you.