A few months back, a client had called me asking help to close a open position in the project. Had shared a few profiles that we had on hand. They evaluated and rejected all of them. Finally, we got them a profile from the market. The client manager was just a coordinator and had to internally get the buy in from two leads who were working in different locations outside India.
So he had to set up two levels of interview for the candidate. This external guy cleared the interview. I got a confirmation asking me to go ahead and get him for the project. While the interviews were on, I got another internal profile who was technically strong.
Me: CMgr (client mgr), I have another good profile who is already on our payroll. Have sent you that profile. Can we evaluate him as well?
CMgr: No, R. We have already evaluated one and he is selected. So let us go ahead with him.
Me: I understand that. But there is always a chance that this external candidate might back out at the last minute. The other problem is it will take almost 2 months to get him in. Whereas this guy is internal and can join immediately. Can we just evaluate him and if he is good, this is the better option of the two.
CMgr: No, R. Let us leave it. We are done here.
I tried to convince the client mgr. But he was just too lazy to go back to his team and schedule another round of interviews.
So we finally rolled out the offer for this external candidate.
After 2 months, on the day of joining, the candidate sent an email saying he is rejecting the offer due to personal reasons.
When I sent an email to the client manager explaining to him about the unfortunate turn of events, he sends me an email -
CMgr: Doesn't sound good at all, R. You should have kept someone as back up. Your fault.
After refusing to evaluate an internal guy, he is now telling me it is my fault and I should have had a back up plan.
Why don't people own up their mistakes. Is it too much to say - oh, that is bad!! Wish I had heeded your advice.
Does making you a client mean that you can get away with whatever mistake you do.
I would have liked to send him an email saying - excuse me, you did not listen to me. Rather, I have to send him an email saying - Am so sorry about the situation we are in, blah,, blah...
This is life when you work with clients!!!!
On the other hand, I have had the opportunity to work with some good client managers who had no issues in owning up their mistakes and apologizing for them. They also were empathetic and ready to understand if there were problems that were beyond our control. I miss all of them!!!
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