Personnel has been a big topic of discussion over the past several weeks within various states who have reached out to me. I wasn’t kidding when I said that personnel in business is one of the biggest challenges. It truly is. If you want to grow your business, you need people to work with you in order to achieve your goals. This is one of the challenges of growing your business. Unfortunately.

I always tell people that when you are hiring staff, they always sound good when you interview them, they look good on paper, but, once they are hired, you really get to know who you have hired. You can check social media, you can call references & prior employers and hope they will tell you the truth. But, these are are not always fail safe.

There are other avenues you can try to hopefully help limit the number of failed new hires. One suggestion would be that you create a 90 day probationary period policy for all new hires. This policy is one that allows you to dismiss the employee within the first 90 days without reason and without recourse. (Please verify this policy is allowable by law in the state that you are currently operating your business.) Our state allows for “Employees at Will” which also means they can be let go. Again, double check your laws to see if this allowed as well. If so, this should be included in your hiring package. You can also work with a temp agency that takes care of the vetting, provides the personnel and you have no contractual obligation to hire this person if you feel they do not meet your needs. (You need to make sure that your contract with the temp agency covers what your needs are to operate your business, negotiate your contract time limits, and contract buyouts if you should decide you would like to hire this temporary staff member.) Always read the fine print!! A temp agency may cost you a little more up front, but it does save you on time with hiring, interviewing, etc., payroll taxes and potential unemployment claims. Remember, you need to negotiate the contract with the temp agency to make sure it meets your business needs.

Once you have hired your personnel, you need to make sure that you have a good training program in place. The new hire through your company should be given a copy of your employee handbook with a signed/acknowledged receipt they have read it, understand it and have received it. This should be placed in their personnel file. If you have brought in a temporary employee, this should be provided by the temp agency. You will provide a set of guidelines for your company indicating your break and lunch policies, where to report and the personnel that will be responsible for training the temporary staff during this process. At the time they begin working on site, I would recommend that a confidentiality agreement be signed in case one has not been signed by the temp agency during their hiring process.

When a person is hired, it needs to be understood that they are working to earn a pay check. This seems to be a foreign concept to today’s new hires. (and to some of the older employees too) I haven’t figured out where the entitled employee initiated from. If the tables were turned and they had to pay the money for their pay checks, and they were responsible for the rise or fall of the business, it would be a totally different story. I have suggested that when an employee has finished working for the day they need to ask themselves “Would I pay myself for the work that I completed today?” This question puts a whole new spin on it.

It takes everyone doing their jobs (emphasis on doing) to help make the business operate and become successful. It’s just like an assembly line. If one part of the assembly line has a problem and the line has to stop for it to be repaired, the rest of the production is off, quotas are not met, customers are not happy, management is not happy, other employees are not happy as their quota may affect their bonus, timelines are not met, customers are lost, and before you know it, the business is on a downward spiral. This is from one problem that occurred in the assembly line. This is not to say small issues do arise, but to look at the cause and affect.

There is a simple equation for this problem: work = paycheck (without the work there is no paycheck) Without the work, there are no customers, there is no business and there is no job. There needs to be employee accountability. Stay tuned for the next post topic – Employee Accountability.

Last question: Would you pay yourself for the work that you completed today?