My first day at work with Savi Technology remains unforgettable and somewhat amusing in retrospect. I reported to work bright and early, raring to go and all excited to meet my new colleagues, especially the HR team of three. Little did I realise that I was greeted with only one HR member and was told that one of them had resigned and the other had been asked to leave. And to my horror, the “last one standing” informed me that she had already tendered her resignation and was serving her remaining notice of one week.

Obviously, I was a little shaken as I wasn’t expecting everyone in the HR team to jump ship. To make matters worse, the chief financial officer handed me an employee p-file and told me to terminate the employee that very day. Having no history of understanding of the employee’s employment background and work performance, I had to quickly come up with a reason to terminate the employee’s services.

I was appalled by the overwhelming unpleasantness of the many things happening especially on my first day of work and I wanted to throw in the towel.

Thankfully, in my previous company I had the experience of carrying out a reduction in force and was confident I could carry out the termination process.

As for building the HR team from scratch, I was able to contact my trusted former HR assistant who was ready to come and join me at Savi. In fact, looking back, I am thankful that I could build the HR team from ground zero. This allowed me to set my own rules.