Re-entering the workforce?

In today’s economy, individuals are facing a new reality. Whether you have recently been discharged from the military or returning from active duty; a retiree realizing that you need to return to work for financial reasons or because you WANT to work; or re-entering the workforce after being a stay at home mom; there are things you should consider prior to starting your job search.

Before you jump in, really think about what you want to do, if you want to go back to what you were doing before, great. If not, do some research on your potential new field and really find out if it is for you. Don’t be afraid of making a career change.

If you choose to go back to what you were doing before, don’t expect to make the same salary or get the same position. The requirements for your old position may have changed. Further, stay up on new developments with your old company; acquisitions, mergers, product launches, etc. That may be the ideal first place to look for re-employment.

Refresh your skills and don’t be afraid to learn new ones. Read industry publications, take classes, go to seminars and conferences. If you are not the most technologically savvy, get some help. You don’t want to seem out of date.

Keep in touch with colleagues from your past jobs. E-mail them regularly, meet them for coffee or lunch, connect with them via social networking sites (Linked In, Facebook, Twitter, etc.). Let them know when you are ready to go back to work.

Think about hobbies you enjoy and think about ways you can turn a hobby into a profitable business. If you are really good at repairing cars or household appliances, carpentry, lawn care, gardening, making jewelry or knick knacks, cooking, etc.; any of these skills can be turned into a lucrative business.

Have you done volunteer work? If not, do it! This offers more than a great philanthropic experience. If you get more involved and take on greater roles and responsibility, you can get exposed to different work experiences you otherwise would’ve never had the opportunity. Taking on greater responsibility also has a greater possibility of turning into full time PAID employment. Also, this is a great outlet to meet new people.

When you’ve decided your strategy, the next step is refreshing your resume. It may be difficult to draft an effective resume if you’ve been out of the workforce for a long period of time. Consider your marketable skills that are relevant regardless of industry or role and draw a parallel to how they are transferable to the workplace. Be careful not to inflate your experience. When you fine tune your resume, highlight accomplishments even from past work; especially if it’s relevant to the role you are looking for now.

Consider part-time or freelance work not just to put some money in your pocket but more so to get you acclimated to a work routine and work environment.

Once you get called for an interview, research the company and hone your interview skills. If you were in the military, be careful not to use lingo inappropriate for the civilian workforce. If you were a stay at home mom, be sure not to focus on work hours and talk too much about your children. The important thing is to be genuine.

My recommendations for individuals re-entering the workforce are similar to those I would give for “active” job seekers. Anxiety and doubt are understandable; but know that there are employers who will give you a chance. Remember presentation is everything, be patient and don’t give up.

Allyson Smith is the principal of Smith HR Consulting, an HR Consulting firm operating in the Atlanta metropolitan area.

An Unlikely Sourcing Tool

There are a number of effective sourcing tools available to employers. Some are more effective than others in sourcing quality talent or reducing recruitment expenses. Former employees are probably one of the most effective talent sourcing options available. It is extremely cost effective to utilize them as a recruiting tool.

Conducting an effective exit interview gives you some insight into their reasons for leaving and whether they’d be a good candidate for rehire later. Stellar employees that left your company on good terms for growth opportunities or more money provide a unique opportunity. They can serve as great rehires or great referral sources for top talent.

Former employees that still look favorably upon your company are always willing to refer their friends or colleagues for employment. They have an excellent idea of the necessary skill sets and the types of individuals that would be good personality and cultural fits. A lot of times, these referrals are unsolicited but valuable nonetheless.

With rehires, you can severely cut training costs and on-boarding time as they are already mostly familiar with your clients, infrastructure and processes. They also provide a unique perspective of what it’s like on the other side of the green at your competitor’s shop. This can be useful to current employees thinking of jumping ship. But the biggest benefit may be having a previously exceptional employee leave and come back more experienced and more loyal than before. In some cases, their job isn’t what they thought it would be. This is a great morale and tenure booster.

There are ways that you can make it worth their while to consider returning. Adjusting their years of service to allow for greater vacation accrual and benefits eligibility is a good example. Title changes/promotions and salary boosts that now take into consideration the experience they acquired after leaving your employ make it even more appetizing to consider returning.

In today’s society, this concept makes even more sense. Many companies in your industry have had layoffs and let go of employees that used to work for you and used to do a great job. These employees are now looking for work and may be the ideal candidate for a position that you currently have open or will be looking to fill in the very near future.

Further, in the days of social networking it is increasingly easy to stay in touch with them. Company fan pages on Facebook, Twitter and LinkedIn accounts allow you to keep them posted on open positions as well as developments within your organization that may be appealing to them. Current employees also usually keep in touch with past employees on a social level and are knowledgeable about what they’ve been up to. They too can pass on job openings and relay interest.

Allyson Smith is the principal of Smith HR Consulting, an HR Consulting firm operating in the Atlanta metropolitan area.

Who are the future leaders of your organization?

 

You should have a flow of fresh talent in your organization to shake things up, bring in new ideas and perspectives, management styles and experiences.  But external hires should be balanced with internal promotions to reward deserving talent, promote tenure and boost morale.

When looking internally for future leaders keep in mind that you have two types of employees in your organization – those who can be leaders and those that can’t.  You need a mix of both.  Thus, it is ok if you have employees who don’t exhibit leadership potential or aspire for future development.  The trick is identifying who has the potential to be a leader.  Sure, there are those that are vocal about wanting to become a leader but if the desire overshadows ability, you need to be able to have the hard conversation.   

Current performance should not be the only indicator of leadership ability.  You surely have employees that do an exceptional job in their current role but that does not guarantee that they’ll excel in their next role.  The same task oriented skills that they may perform exceptionally in their current role may not be the keys to success as they progress to roles with more responsibility.  As a person moves farther up the ladder, their ability to handle the day to day tasks is less important.  This is where soft skills come into play.  Further, to set themselves apart, leaders must possess the ability to exhibit high level strategic thinking; generate ideas and bring those ideas to life; demonstrate decision making ability and grasp complex concepts.  Exercising emotional intelligence; fostering collaborative team environments and developing others are also crucial skills for effective leadership.  These skills are all evidenced in your employee’s past experiences handling challenging situations and should be exhibited consistently over time. 

Once you’ve identified your high potential employees, you have to foster their development.  Be leery of making quick promotions as you could jeopardize their success by promoting them too fast without providing sufficient training or breaking certain ambitious behaviors.  Training classes, seminars and conferences are only a small part of what is necessary to get them to the next level.  Exposure to different projects, effective mentoring and a specifically designed development program that is monitored and tracked are the other pieces of the pie.

Allyson Smith is the principal of Smith HR Consulting, an HR Consulting firm operating in the Atlanta metropolitan area.

Are online application systems right for your company?

An applicant tracking system (ATS), also known as a talent management system (TMS), is a software application that enables electronic handling of applicant data and resumes. There are a lot of benefits to implementing these systems into your organization.

First, it can be linked directly to your company Website or Intranet. The very basic version of these systems allows you to accurately track open position time and is an excellent tool for affirmative action reporting requirements. Most important is that it serves as your very own resume database of all your past applicants that can be tapped into at anytime with ease. You can track your applicant’s progression through the recruitment process and store notes on your interviews for you to reference later.

Depending on the level of sophistication for your particular system you can pre-screen candidates through the system to weed out unqualified candidates. This is an excellent asset as it ensures all applicants are screened using the same preliminary questions. The system can then rank pre-screened candidates based on their answers. You can communicate directly with the applicant through the system and grant hiring managers access to communicate with and follow up on candidates. Your system can also be designed to post to major job boards (i.e. CareerBuilder, etc.) directly from within your site. You can even funnel an Internet search on your candidate through their application.

Some things to note – these systems can serve as an excellent deterrent to passive candidates due to the time required to create a profile, answer questions and upload a resume. On the other hand, it can also be a deterrent to candidates who aren’t computer savvy. Also, serious consideration should be given to multi-language platforms. Further, this is not typically a tool for senior/executive level candidates as these candidates don’t typically job search utilizing the Internet.

Depending on your open position and applicant count, this can be a time consuming system to administer and may require a dedicated staff member to manage it. These systems are becoming increasingly more common with large and small organizations but they can be very costly depending on the level of sophistication. It really isn’t beneficial if you don’t have a large number of positions open at any given time or don’t generate a large number of applicants.

Before you decide to implement an ATS think long and hard about what you want out of your system and select a system that can be modified effectively as your organization’s needs change.

Allyson Smith is the principal of Smith HR Consulting, an HR Consulting firm operating in the Atlanta metropolitan area.

Mentoring for development

Tenure seems to be getting shorter and shorter as workers look for higher salaries and quicker promotions up the corporate ladder.  So, this should lead you to think proactively – who will replace your ‘rock star’ leadership team member when they inevitably leave?  Mentoring is a good tool to assist with succession planning but also to help reduce turnover and help promote internal promotions.

Mentoring is a developmental relationship in which a more experienced person helps a less experienced person develop in a specified capacity.   It involves the transfer of knowledge, exposure to advanced concepts and strategic thinking as well as guidance on personal and professional issues.  While not exactly on-the-job training, it is very effective in providing real world experience. 

Mentoring can be informal or formal.  Obviously, a formal program that is public and involves structured objectives, time frames and formal evaluations is preferred.  This allows for effective tracking and assessment of progress.  By being public, it makes it clear to all employees what it takes to be a leader and, if done right, doesn’t give the appearance of favoritism.  Informal mentoring relations just evolve naturally, aren’t structured and have no real way to measure effectiveness. 

Mentoring is not ideal for every employee.  Every employee is not a ‘rock star’ and every employee cannot be a manager or a leader.  While an employee may be a good employee, the skills and abilities required of leadership are different.  Not everyone can make the transition effectively or acquire the required skills successfully. 

The bottom line is that development requires more than tenure in a role and attendance in training classes, seminars and conferences.  Mentoring can greatly assist in getting your employee that has the potential to be a leader to the next level with the proper preparation to be successful.

How much do your employees really make?

A lot of people think that compensation only considers actual salary.  Actually, all of the company provided benefits go into considering an employee’s “true salary” or total compensation.  For example, if your employee’s base salary is $45,000 and you provide two weeks vacation, cover a portion of their medical insurance, life insurance, parking, etc., that employee’s total compensation is a lot higher.  Take a look at the example below:

Annual Salary	$         45,000.00
Vacation Pay	$           1,730.77	based on 10 days
Holiday Pay	$           1,384.62	based on 8 holidays
Personal Pay	$           1,730.77	based on 10 days
Parking	$             600.00	based on $50 a month
Medical Insurance	$           3,600.00	based on $300 / month for EE only
Dental Insurance	$             300.00	based on $25 / month for EE only
Life Insurance	$               17.00	based on 1x-salary @ $17/month
401K company match	$           2,700.00	based on 6% company match
Parental Leave	$           1,730.77	based on 2 weeks
Total Annual Compensation	$         58,793.92

Now, total compensation isn’t the figure that an employee would declare as wages, this is not what’s reported on the w2; however, it’s important that employees and employers understand this concept.  A lot of people disregard what the company provides as “a given” or an entitlement.  Company provided benefits are always discretionary.  Benefits should be seen as a value-added incentive.  If the employer doesn’t provide these benefits for the employee, they will either have to provide them for themselves or go without. 

Understanding total compensation can also be a huge bargaining tool in recruitment.  For instance, you may not be able to offer a higher salary at this particular time but you do provide 100% company sponsored health and welfare benefits or more than the standard two weeks of vacation, something that a competitor may or may not offer.  This is also great information to keep in mind when having discussions regarding merit increases, promotions and transfers with your employees.

Lastly, this is a great exercise to engage in when investigating cost control measures.  Your biggest controllable business expenses are employee-related – wages & benefits.  You need to be fully aware of what you are providing to your employees and how they are utilized.  If a particular benefit is not heavily utilized, it may be a good idea to cut back or eliminate it.  That may allow you to enhance a different benefit offering or realize a cost savings.

Allyson Smith is the principal of Smith HR Consulting, an HR Consulting firm operating in the Atlanta metropolitan area.

When is it time to bring in HR?

Having a full time HR person may not be a financially sound decision at this stage of your company’s life cycle, particularly if you have only a few employees.  But as your company grows, your requirements as a business owner change, as do the needs of your employees.  If you have plans of growing your business, it is important to ensure that you do it right the first time, to allow future growth to occur easily.  This is just the time to consider enlisting some HR assistance, either FT, PT or on a contract basis.  Here are some things to consider:

•  You need to ensure you’re paying your employees competitively to retain them as well as to ensure you can attract qualified new talent.  You also need to properly plan for pay increases associated with reviews and promotions.  Have you conducted a salary survey of your competitors?  Do you have established salary guidelines for each of your positions?   
•  It may be time to consider changing your benefits offering in order to remain competitive and investigate enhancing your health and welfare options.  Should you offer a cafeteria plan?  401K?  What are your options?
• Effective training programs need to be developed to ensure your products and services are offered consistently and at a level of quality to your satisfaction.  Do you have an effective orientation program? Customer service training? Departmental training guidelines? Supervisory Development? 
• While not legally required, it is probably a good time to institute formal job descriptions.  As your company grows, employees’ roles change as well. Job descriptions help with building structure and clarity.
• If you think it’s time to add to your staff, you need to ensure you’re adding the right positions.  How do you determine the right positions to add?  Where do you look to source the best talent?  Do you have time to sort through resumes and do initial pre-screens?  Are you asking legal and effective interview questions? 
• Are you in compliance with Equal Employment Opportunity provisions and the Federal Labor Standards Act with regard to classification of your employees?  Recent changes to COBRA, Americans with Disabilities Act, Family Medical Leave Act and the addition of the Lily Ledbetter Act all require changes in processes. 
• Do you have an employee handbook?  Formal progressive discipline policy? These help ensure uniformity in the enforcement of policies and procedures as well as help to prevent litigation. 

These are just the tip of the iceberg.  We haven’t begun to discuss implementing effective performance appraisals, retention strategies, succession planning, team building strategies, managing worker’s compensation dollars, etc.  There is a lot to consider when growing a business but this doesn’t have to be a difficult time for you as a business owner.  Enlisting the help of an HR professional can ultimately help you save a lot of time and money. 

 

Allyson Smith is the principal of Smith HR Consulting, an HR Consulting firm operating in the Atlanta metropolitan area.

Why Social Networking is smart for the small business owner

I by no means am an expert on social networking but I’ve found that it can be particularly helpful for the small business owner.  As a small business owner and particularly as a new entrepreneur you may not have the following and advertising budget of an established or larger company.  Advertising can be expensive but I’ve found that social networking can be a very viable alternative for a number of reasons.

 

These tools serve as extensions of your website and provide free advertising for your business that can also drive traffic to your site.  Nowadays everybody is online.  People utilize the Internet to do research on businesses that they want to work for, purchase from, partner with, etc.   These tools allow you to connect with past and present colleagues, customers and vendors as well as get introduced to new contacts.  You can stay abreast of what is going on in their lives personally and professionally and vice versa.  They also serve as a secondary database of contacts. 

 

I know that the thought of leveraging new technologies can be a bit scary, especially if you are not technically savvy.  Surprisingly, the most common social networking tools – Twitter, Facebook and LinkedIn – are pretty easy to use.  Here is a little information on how they can help you by just utilizing their basic capabilities.

 

Twitter is probably the easiest of the three.  Twitter allows you to send quick notifications (tweets) to your followers about anything – job openings, new locations, new products, specials, events, industry/discipline news, etc.  Your followers can respond to you or forward (retweet) your post to their followers.  You can also send or receive direct messages to/from your followers.  This is a great alternative to just sending emails.

 

Facebook is definitely the more social of these networking tools but they are working to change that perception.  You can post quick status updates as well but you can also create a profile page for your organization.  Clients, vendors, employees, and friends can then become a ‘fan’ of your organization.  Your fan page can be utilized to post more detailed communications, post pictures of your employees, engage in discussions, etc.  This is a great tool to assist with the necessary relationship building that really drives business as you really get to know personal things about your ‘friends.’   Facebook also allows you to create targeted ads at an extremely low cost that are filtered based on your preferred demographics.  These ads will then appear on the targeted individual’s profile page prompting them to click for more information. 

 

LinkedIn is largely becoming THE social networking tool for professionals.  This application has a number of effective resources that can be utilized at a very low cost.  For free, you can post a profile that highlights your career; your company’s profile; references from colleagues, clients, etc.; and even have a live feed of your blog.     Not only can you post status messages as in the other two applications but you can advertise full job openings, send them to your contacts and post them within targeted groups.  You can create a search for a specific type of job candidate or client, review their profiles and directly contact the ones that are to your liking via InMail or by requesting an introduction from a mutual contact.  You can also start or participate in discussions about industry/discipline topics within specific groups.   

 

Need I go on?  Just utilizing the basic capabilities of these tools can significantly increase your following and traffic to your site AND it just may result in a new client.  The return on investment, which is little to none, is extremely worth taking the time to learn how to use them to your advantage.

 

Allyson Smith is the principal of Smith HR Consulting, an HR Consulting firm operating in the Atlanta metropolitan area. 

What is going on with your employees?

How do you keep your finger on the pulse of your employees’ morale?  This is important for a lot of reasons.  Have you ever had an occasion where a star employee resigns because they are disgruntled and when you conduct the exit interview you uncover that their reasons for leaving were completely within your control to rectify had you only known about them?  Have you ever found out about inter-departmental challenges within your organization only when they’ve escalated to a breaking point?  Has an employee’s performance fallen off for no apparent reason? 

 

There are several effective ways to stay on top of morale.  Some may work better for your company than others based on your employee dynamics.  Some of the more common methods utilized are anonymous suggestion boxes, annual surveys and all-employee meetings.  Some other largely effective options include:

 

• Host focus groups with randomly selected employees from different areas.  These can be general sessions or used to discuss a specific topic.
• Hold one-on-ones on a monthly or quarterly basis.  These can be used as a performance check-in or just a casual chat to catch up; but the important thing is that the employee has your undivided attention.
• On occasion, grab a random employee to go on an unscheduled outing for coffee or lunch.  This has the opportunity to be a more casual interaction and can greatly result in learning personal facts about your employee. 
• Conduct a 30 day new hire interview.  This is very effective in assessing the effectiveness of your onboarding program. 

These should be two way conversations where both parties share as appropriate.  These are by no means meant to be sessions where either person bears their soul; but merely to provide an opportunity to gain insight into the people that work with you.  All of these options help to keep your employees informed about things going on in your organization and will give you the opportunity to get suggestions and feedback.  It further helps to build rapport with your team members, breaks down any perceived negative personas and makes you more approachable. 

 

Be prepared to act on any useful information you find.  Don’t bother asking if you don’t intend to make necessary changes.  These methods will put you in a great position to exhibit true leadership.  Keep in mind that not every employee suggestion is feasible for your company but it is still important to engage in effective dialogue about solutions.  Your employees understand that you can’t always do everything they suggest but it is important that their ideas are discussed.  Further, you may find out about things going on in your employees’ personal lives that are impacting their performance and may be able to offer resources to help.  You may be surprised what you uncover by simply talking to your employees and may make some tremendous strides towards fostering high employee morale.

 

Allyson Smith is the principal of Smith HR Consulting, an HR Consulting firm operating in the Atlanta metropolitan area. 

What’s all this stuff I hear about bonuses?

There has been a lot of coverage in the news lately about bonuses.  So I started to ponder the dynamics, benefits and disadvantages of bonuses.  A good bonus plan should be tied to measurable performance – the individual’s and/or the company’s.  There should also be tiers of payout based on different levels of achievement.  Guaranteed minimums or an all or nothing approach could be a deterrent to exceeding set productivity goals in a tough year. 

 

There are several obvious benefits to bonuses.  It appears to foster longer tenure.  It’s true; employees tend to stick around waiting for bonus payouts.  But furthermore and even more important, everyone’s heard the old adage – “what gets measured gets done.”  That definitely applies here.  It gets employees focused on their and the organization’s results.  It drives productivity to meet individual and company wide objectives.  It gives the employee a stake in the game.

 

Should bonuses be for all employees in an organization?  If tied to measurable performance, sure.  Bonuses are an incentive, let’s not forget that.  An incentive by definition is any factor that enables or motivates a particular course of action, or counts as a reason for preferring one choice to the alternatives. It is an expectation that encourages people to behave in a certain way.  So in essence, you need to work for it.

 

Are bonuses a necessary evil? Not necessarily, they are added compensation.  It is something given or paid in addition to what is usual or expected.  Employees’ base salaries SHOULD justly compensate them for the job they were hired to do.  On occasion, companies may offer lower base salaries if there is high bonus potential.  That is not a bad strategy if you don’t have enough payroll dollars. But keep in mind, oftentimes, bonuses are not guaranteed.  In most cases, payout is based on the company’s financial performance.  In a rough year, there is a good chance the company will not make its financial objectives, thus eliminating the bonus payout.  If that happens frequently, you’ve devalued the benefits of your bonus program and it’s no longer seen as a viable incentive.

 

There are also disadvantages to paying bonuses.  Longer tenured or disgruntled employees can wait until the bonus is paid out and then leave, thus devaluing the benefits of the bonus.  It is also a huge expense accrual on a month to month basis.  Remember, it is an expense that factors into the total cost of an employee and should be accounted for accurately.  Further, if you offer a bonus on a regular basis and then hit a rough year or change the parameters of the bonus program, employees may not be too happy and productivity can suffer. 

There are other types of bonuses that can be just as effective – it’s called genuine recognition.  If your organization does an exceptional job of recognizing and rewarding employees’ performance or has an effective recognition program, you can achieve the same results of longer tenure and higher productivity but you will also have happy employees that feel valued.  Money is not the only motivator for a majority of your employees.  Appreciation and accomplishment make a huge difference in an employee’s morale.

 

Allyson Smith is the principal of Smith HR Consulting, an HR Consulting firm operating in the Atlanta metropolitan area.

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