Beat Your Competition with These New Year’s Hiring Resolutions
It’s the beginning of the new year — and for many, that means it’s time for a clean slate. No more resolutions; this year is all about resolutions. And what better way to get started than with some resolutions that can help your business thrive?
If you want to hire more employees and beat out your competition, these are some of our favorite ways to make your company successful in 2017:
-Make it clear that you're open to hiring people from outside the traditional workforce. Take a page from Google's book and post "Innovators Wanted" ads on sites like LinkedIn.
-Set up an internship program with local colleges or universities during the summer months. "Internships are a great way to recruit new employees, especially if they're offered in areas where you don't traditionally hire," says Kurt Rittwage, founder of the Small Business Funding Council and also a blogger on start-ups.
-Double down on customer service. One of the best ways to grow your business is by developing relationships with customers — and that doesn't mean offering "pushy" salespeople or trying to sell them something. Find out whether your company can help the customer with their problem, and then get someone in there who actually helps them solve it.
-Create niche products that increase your and your customer base's value. A new product can easily open up new revenue streams, particularly in high-tech companies. A new product also helps you both stand out from the pack.
-Try to get more referrals for jobs, rather than actively looking for people. The most talented candidates will often be referred by someone already on staff, so try to make it easy for employees to refer their friends.
-Offer benefits that will help your employees grow, not just ones that provide basic health care. "You might want to consider offering incentives that'll help educate and grow your employees," says Rittwage. "Health care is certainly important, but perks like educational reimbursement and tuition reimbursement are exciting as well. It's a way to retain employees and help them grow."
-Designate a sales representative to use inside sales techniques to drive more leads for your company. This will allow you to spend less time calling on customers, and more time selling your product.
-Offer internships or even jobs with paid opportunities for employees who want to make the move up into management. It is much easier than ever before to find interns or entry-level workers who are looking for ways to break into business development and marketing positions, says Rittwage. "It just makes it easier on the company if they start their careers as an employee rather than as an intern," he adds.
-Offer scholarships in lieu of pay raises. If you're struggling to stay competitive with the salaries of your employees, try offering a scholarship to help employees go back to school or take additional classes. You can also offer to let them take an unpaid leave of absence for education or development. "Many employees just want the opportunity to grow as a person," says Rittwage.
-Consider using virtual tools that allow you to work outside the office on a computer, but still be considered an employee in your company. Offerings like OnForce allow businesses and technologists alike the ability to work virtually, while still being tracked by management.
-Offer part-time hours for people who aren't full-time and don't qualify for benefits. One of the biggest problems facing many employers is trying to figure out what to do with part-time workers who need full-time benefits. Try offering part-time hours instead, and use them to provide additional coverage.
-Consider offering alternative benefits, like a gym membership or flexible working hours, rather than traditional health care. Again, this will help you compete with companies that offer traditional benefits when it comes to hiring new employees.
-Build your relationship with independent contractors in areas like IT and sales. "If you're not on top of what's going on in the industry, it's going to be very hard for you to compete," says Rittwage. "Keeping track of new technology and trends is very important. The best way to do that is to have a strong independent contractor department."
-Understand how social media can drive traffic to your business. "If you're not a part of the current conversation, you're going to be behind," Rittwage says. "Being able to look at the trends in social media, and understand how they can help you communicate with customers, is a huge benefit."
-Find ways of using social media to find and recruit new employees. A company — even the biggest companies — have trouble retaining top talent by matching them up with job postings on their own websites, Rittwage points out. "Find ways to communicate with people all over the world and see who they're looking to work for, and put those job postings up on your own site," he says.
-Set aside a portion of your budget for marketing. This can be as simple as putting money aside each month to pay for advertising, or as complicated as a full marketing campaign designed to increase brand awareness and drive links to your company's site or blog.
-Develop an IT department that's in touch with what's available in the marketplace and new technologies. If you can't keep up with today's technology, you'll be one of the last companies left standing when it comes to hiring new employees.
-Don't make your IT systems difficult to understand. The easiest way to lose new talent is to have a hard time telling them what your company does and how best to do it. "Make sure your systems are intuitive and easy for people to use," Rittwage says.
-Hire for abilities, not just credentials. The best way to attract the very best of the best is by having actual people in the organization who can actually do the job at hand. Hire for skills over names, he adds.
-Find ways to routinely train and update employees on the latest in your industry. This can be as easy as a short Webinar every week, or an hours-long training class once a month.
-Offer opportunities for advancement to employees who are looking for more responsibility, rather than just higher pay. "It's hard to find people who want greater opportunities," Rittwage says.
-"Get out of the office." Take a look at what has changed in your industry and what sorts of new technologies are available, then use them to help you design your own systems that will make it easier to reach customers.
-Consider outsourcing customer service calls that come in after hours. Make sure you know what your total costs are before outsourcing your customer service calls, Rittwage recommends.
-Offer a bonus structure that offers more money to top performers than those who are underperformers. "If you have a bonus structure that's based on performance, top performers will always find other companies where they can make more money," he says."It's a numbers game – the only way for you to improve is to get rid of the people who aren't performing."
———– Connect with me on LinkedIn , or follow me on Twitter . ———— Other HR and Leadership Resources: ———— Stanford Graduate School of Business "The Entrepreneurial Manager" course (coursera.
Conclusion:
Today we're discussing a critical part of your business that you may have been neglecting, and that's the HR department. The question is, are you actually an entrepreneur, or do you have an entrepreneurial spirit? If so, what kind of benefits can you offer a new employee?
I'd like to thank my co-worker, Mark Pettit (HR Consultant at Behr Process Corporation), for his help with this blog post. He's had great experience in this field and he was very helpful in providing me with the content for this blog post. I hope it helps out some small business owners who want to grow their company!
There are many more awesome articles on his website: http://hr-consultant.