How do you know that people are trustworthy if they’re going to have authority to spend money for your business?

My client called his supplier in China to find out why the shipment was late. “No payment, so nothing has shipped”, he was told. He spent the next three hours trying to understand what had happened. As the facts became clear, he could see he was trapped in his own business horror story.

Without the shipment, he could not deliver to customers across the UK.

By 7pm he understood. She had stolen Over £330k

He walked into her office to confront her.

“The money is all gone”, she coldly told him. She wasn’t sorry. “I knew you would catch me, but I enjoyed it while it lasted”. She took £30,000 each month for nearly a year to pay for a rock-star lifestyle, replete with cocaine-fuelled weekends in Paris.

There are lots of lessons from this. But for now, the lesson is one when hiring.

Put Integrity First When You Hire People

According to INC. magazine, Warren Buffet said integrity is the priority for hiring good people…

We look for three things when we hire people. We look for intelligence, we look for initiative or energy, and we look for integrity. And if they don't have the latter, the first two will kill you, because if you're going to get someone without integrity, you want them lazy and dumb

Whenever I had asked him to dig into his cash flow when money seemed tight, he would wave my concerns away. “My business is growing, the money is tied up in stock, my financial controller is on top of it.”

If you don’t understand your numbers, you’re not in control.