“You never get a second chance to make the first impression,” Andrew Grant, a British writer, said.
On your first day in the new workplace, your car broke down, which made you late for office, and then in the evening, you spill coffee on your supervisor’s desk during the first interaction with him. Your new supervisor and executives get the impression that you are unprofessional. It can be challenging to recover from a bad first impression.
Research in social psychology suggests that people are quick to form a lasting impression of others, just by inferring a person’s character traits from his or her single behaviour. We do make a judgment about that person’s trustworthiness and competence in a few seconds.
Based on initial inference, we tend to predict the future behaviour of that person. Therefore, if any person behaved absurdly with us, we expect him or her to behave similarly in the next meeting. We don’t change our impression that easily.
Behavioural researchers have found that our brain has certain patterns to process information and update their impression. Learning highly negative and immoral information about some person has a higher impact on our brain than learning highly positive and moral information about any person.
Therefore, the employee who came late on the first day may get less weightage for his talent and skills. But still, there is hope to recover from a bad first impression.
When it comes to making up for a bad first impression, the preferred action is to take the right turn and show your other side of the personality, which will be easier to like. Compensate for coming late in the morning with overtime in the evening. Demonstrate sincerity in work. Studies have shown that people tend to change their opinion about others after eight positive interactions. Therefore, allow people to reinterpret their opinion about us positively. Frequent positive interaction and demonstrating compassion and competence can help form a positive opinion about yourself in others’ minds.
Second, we should explain the context of our previous wrong actions. A study found that it was possible to change your first impression on someone by giving them information that gives your actions in a new context. Therefore, if we explain the real and honest reason for unprofessional behaviour on the first day to the supervisor, it will be useful to change their perception. Do not apologise profusely because it can make the person you apologise to feel they constantly need to reassure you.
Be self-aware of when to take action and when to let go. A second chance might occur naturally sometimes, and sometimes you need to work to get them. In any situation, put in honest efforts.
anuj.2@iitj.ac.in