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Employee Retention: How to Avoid Overworking Your Employees

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As an expansion stage company you should get the most out of your employees so you can be successful, but are your management teams rewarding employees for overworking?

Based on a study by the New York-based Families and Work Institute, overworked employees are a lot more likely to show anxiety, make errors on the job, harbor angry emotions toward their employers for expecting them to work long hours, and despise co-workers who don’t pull the same load they do.

The study also found that virtually half of employees who feel overworked also noted they were in bad health, and practically one-quarter (21 percent) of those overworked experience depression symptoms compared to 8 percent of the people who are not overworked.  I came across a great article on HR Executives Online which outlines guidelines on how managers can help their employees feel less overworked, and at the same time see them finish their tasks on a daily basis.  Part of your startup employee retention strategy should contain making sure your employees are not overworked.

In order to help your employees feel less overwhelmed on the job:

1. Offer training for time-management principles. Everyone can benefit from a refresher course in time management skills!
2. Insist employees use up their vacation time. Ending the year without using a vacation day, or only taking a few, is not something to reward. You want your employees to come to work refreshed and not stressed which is what will happen if they take the appropriate time off work.
3. Allow flexible work hours when appropriate.
4. Discourage the practice of eating at desks and working through lunch.
5. Encourage non-interrupt zones during the day so your employees can better concentrate on their work.
6. Help them to become more effective.

In order to be efficient, you must first be effective.

In order to encourage efficiency and effectiveness, managers can:

1. Establish clear goals with built-in deadlines.
2. Insist employees compile a daily “to do” list.
3. Make certain employees alert them or IT if their resources or equipment does not work.
4. Supply what is necessary for them to finish the job.
5. Train employees on software packages that enable more efficient work.

If you want more info on how to more effectively manage your expansion stage company teams for high efficiency, check out the Scrum Alliance and the Lean Enterprise Institute.

Diana Winings Martz is a Recruiting Analyst at OpenView Labs, where she is responsible for recruitment for the firm and its portfolio companies.

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Popularity: 7% [?]

Tags: Business, Education and Training, employee retention, Employment, expansion stage, Human resources, Management, management teams, Time management, Work

Prospecting Should be a Vital Part of Your Sales Process

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In almost every­thing you do as a busi­ness, oper­at­ing effi­ciently and at max­i­mum capac­ity is key as it relates to your sales process. That’s never more true than at the start-up and expan­sion stages, when both finan­cial and human resources is lim­ited and time is of the essence.

Sales teams should max­i­mize every con­ver­sa­tion they have with a prospect. Call vol­ume is obvi­ously a key indi­ca­tor of prospect­ing suc­cess. But ask­ing those prospects key ques­tions and explor­ing each contact’s poten­tial is essen­tial to max­i­miz­ing the prac­tice of build­ing a sales team.

Here are the five pil­lars of prospecting:

Pil­lar 1: Pri­mary Prospect

The primary prospect is the person you have on the phone. You may be tar­get­ing them as a prospect, so are definitely a start­ing point. Is your solu­tion a fit for their busi­ness? They could be a prospect, but they might not be the only one.

Pil­lar 2: Inter­nal Prospect

Your prospect­ing mis­sion can spi­der­web out from your pri­mary prospect to other areas within that same orga­ni­za­tion. Are their other teams, office loca­tions, or sites that might be able to use the same solu­tion? It’s worth investigating.

Pil­lar 3: Exter­nal Prospect

A sales person’s job is to get a prospect on the phone and see if they can pro­vide value to their com­pany. But you can some­times count on that prospect for exter­nal refer­rals, too. Ask them if they know any friends or colleagues who would express an interest in your solution.

Pil­lar 4: Part­ner Prospect

Com­pa­nies often have strate­gic part­ners located within the indus­try. Ask the prospect if you can support them with other ini­tia­tives they’re work­ing on. What are some of the projects they are currently executing or plan to exe­cute in the future? You might be able to help solve sev­eral of their issues.

Pil­lar 5: Other Prospect

Every prospect relies on their own network. If you’ve built up enough trust with the prospect, ask them if they par­tic­i­pate in any user com­mu­ni­ties or groups that may possibly be inter­ested in learn­ing more about your solutions.

Here is the bottom line: Maximize every live body you get on the phone. Mak­ing 60 cold calls a day is great and it will likely lead to fill­ing your sales pipeline with qual­i­fied leads and oppor­tu­ni­ties, but how many prospects are you leav­ing on the table by not utilizing the above five pillars?

Brian Zimmerman is a Principal at OpenView responsible for delivering value-add consulting services to the portfolio, primarily focused on go to market strategy and initiatives.

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Popularity: 3% [?]

Tags: Brian Zimmerman, building a sales team, go to market strategy, Human resources, Marketing, OpenView, Prospecting, Prospecting Should be a Vital Part of Your Sales Process, sales process

HR Consulting Services Can Help Any Company Overcome Human Resources Challenges

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Establishing a successful business is one thing, but with growth comes a slew of challenges outside of operations, where HR consulting firms can make all the difference between continued success or stalling.  A small operation with a small, dedicated production team can pull together and make all sorts of things happen, but as a company grows and expands its workforce, human resources issues begin to come into play.  The days of the owner cutting a check are long gone.  There are issues like payroll, benefits, workers’ compensation, regulatory compliance, training, recruitment and employee retention to worry about.  But establishing a full Human Resources department is time consuming, diverts energy from operations and may be overkill until a company becomes much larger.  PEO services helps bridge the gap, providing the necessary HR functions for small to medium sized businesses.

While a small business might get away with noncompliance with some labor laws during its startup phase, as it grows the likelihood of regulation violations being caught increase.  HR Consulting firms such as National PEO can provide a labor law audit of a company’s operations to identify potential infractions and make the recommendations needed to address them.  Most small businesses don’t have access to an experienced HR team with a full understanding of the relevant legal issues, but National PEO’s Human Resources team has decades of expertise and experience.

Another area where many companies would benefit from the experience of HR consulting firms like National PEO is job descriptions.  On the surface, a job description sounds straightforward, but small businesses often have nothing more than a title for positions.  A poorly written job description can impact everything from employee morale and recruitment to operations (for example, when two employees’ job descriptions overlap, creating friction).  In fact, writing accurate job descriptions can often identify overlaps and holes in a company’s operations, helping them to increase productivity.  The HR team at National PEO services specializes in crafting job descriptions that are complete, succinct and leave no room for interpretation or confusion.  They can also write employee handbooks, a proven method for making certain all staff understand different job descriptions, company policies and guidelines.

Recruitment is often necessary as a company grows and this is another area where HR consulting firms like National PEO provide a big boost.  National PEO’s HR team offers experienced search and placement services, interviewing, negotiating, pre-employment testing and even background checks and screening.  Taking advantage of PEO services instead of going it alone ensures that new employees fit in to your company’s culture and represent a solid investment instead of a gamble.

About the Author:

Ben Cowan is Director of Human Resources with National PEO, one of the nation’s leading HR consulting firms.  Mr. Cowan holds a BA, Human Resources Certification (through HRCI) and has been a member of the National PEO team since 2005.  To contact Ben with your HR or PEO services questions, please call (480) 429-8098, or write 4800 North Scottsdale Road, Suite 2000, Scottsdale, AZ 85251.

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Popularity: 24% [?]

Tags: Business, Company, Consulting, Employment, hr consulting firms, Human resource management, Human resources, Job description, Overcome Human Resources Challenges, Small Business

Managing Time and Attendance and Job Costing

Job Costing is a very useful component of employee time and attendance systems. Job costing is the process of  capturing not just the employee attendance times but also the specific task the employee was engaged in at the time. This allows you to track the labor cost associated with vary activities in your business .

While job costing is the generic term used this is not the only area of employee activity which is measured. In some cases employee labour is typically more macro managed and in still others it is more micro managed. Every business for example measures the cost of employees labor on the macro scale; The company P&L will almost certainly show a line for wages, salaries and on-costs. Companies may split these further into departments such as Management, Sales and Operations. Some may measure this even further and separate  staff into various functions with each cost centre.

Certainly the best examples of job costing can be found in many service industries . When you take your motor vehicle  to the dealership for service for routine maintenance the activities of the service staff are logged against your car either for the basis of recharging that labour or to measure the performance of the mechanic against a benchmark.

In another example, ABC Engineering  quote a client to manufacture and install a number of steel walkways and steps in a clients production facility. The estimation of the steel, based on the engineering plans, is costed into the job as is an estimation of the labour required.  When the job commences on site a portable job costing time clock is used on site to record the attendance times of the labourers, the welders and the steel fixers while, previous to this the preparatory work on this project was also logged in the workshop with a similar time clock. The client is aware that any unquoted work (variations) to the quoted work will be recorded separately and billed accordingly. In keeping with this employees use a different job code when they are working on variations.

Following the completion of the job the engineering company has detailed records on the labour for every aspect of the job. Management can use this information to check for overruns in their quoting and revise their operations or estimation process. If the job is not as profitable as estimated the management staff will know why and they can make adjustments on subsequent projects. Additionally, there is an accurate account of all of the variations which need to be charged for

It is not difficult to find a time and attendance system which incorporates a job costing component but there can be be some serious shortcomings and inadequacies in many of the products available. An adequate job costing module should be able able to cope with multiple activities within each job. It should offer ease of use for the employees when they need to change activities at the time clock. The job costing data should be live to facilitate effective job management. The job hours should be award interpreted hours: i.e they are not just the quantity of hours but the actual cost of those hours taking into consideration overtime and penalty rates.

When performed manually job costing is a painstaking process but if it can be automated in your business the benefits will be significant as it will add a new dimension to your labour management that will almost certainly translate into cost savings and improved profitability.

James Bell

Time and Attendance Consultant

Popularity: 1% [?]

Tags: Accounting, Business, Employment, Human resources, Time and attendance, Time clock, Wage

The Employee engagement checklist

With no more funding available , and the hiring freeze being lifted at a slow pace , there’s only one way to improve the results of your team .  Each person has the capacity to work at a certain speed , with results that match the percentage of productiveness their working at.  Most employees consistently work at somewhere between 50 – 70% capacity.  At certain parts of your employees career they will become engaged in a certain project , or a job and their productivity will move up  to the 80 – 90 % range.  You can probably think of people in your division  right now who are working at a  massive  productivity rate, and they probably put a big grin on your face.  Most workplace populations  have about 8% of their workforce who work at this high pace consistently, those that are highly engaged in their  work  .   Now the goal of most Leaders is to get the most productivity out of their  employees, so let’s break down why people are engaged, and what you can do to get more engagement without making a dent in the budget.

What engages your Employees:

Simply put, the more a persons job fits  what they had and do hope for out of their life, the more engaged they will be in the work.  If a person grew up wanting to be a fireman, and then got the job, and it matched what they dreamed it would be, (like saving lives, climbing buildings , riding on the side of the big red truck) then they will be highly engaged.  They would work hard to keep their job, to do the job well, and to fulfill their own fantasy about what their job is because they are capable of doing so.  Now let’s take another scenario, where someone dreams of being a fireman, and becomes a  computer programmer .  You can imagine all of the gaps in the experience that would lead to them not wanting to be where they are and actively disengaging from their workplace  ( 68% of the workforce nowadays according to a TowersWatson study).  The problem is they don’t see themselves in the job , and are still either consciously or unconsciously looking for that ideal scenario .  See the multitude of problems here, any ideas crop up about how to prevent this engagement, and light a fire under these employees.  Here’s a few you may not have considered, a sort of checklist for Employee Engagement.

1) Show them how they matter:

Most employees simply don’t see how what they do matters to the company  , or to their lives besides the paycheck  they receive.  If you can show them how their work is important to company goals and values, then they will be more likely to see the value in their own work.   People love to make a difference, and sometimes when they don’t see it in themselves they get lost, disengaged.  Make a very clear path for them to see between what they do, and their companies success.

2) Help them achieve their dreams:

If a person can see how their personal goals in life are achievable through what they are doing in their work they are more likely to engage in their work activities.  Simply ask them what their life goals are, what do they truly want, and then work with them to find how doing their work for the company helps them on their way.  If there is no correlation,  then they are in the wrong job.  No one will stay engaged only for a paycheck.

3) Coach them to success:

Once you have them aligned to work and personal goals, they still may hit a rut or dip.  Wondering what they are doing, or having a challenging situation that they can’t see a way around.  If you, and the leaders in your organization learn the skills of successful coaches, you will effectively be able to help people recover to full capacity earlier.  Effective coaching helps employees see choices instead of only one solution, see the possibilities instead of limitations.  A quick recovery to forward momentum is one of the key factors to continued, long term engagement.

4) Challenge them:

One of the intrinsic motivators of all human beings is problem solving.  If you can keep problem solving as a consistent part of the employee role, then you will be involving the person in one of humanities most powerful drivers.  Make sure you always give people the opportunity to create something by problem solving.

5) Use Employee Assessments:

Simply put, some people just aren’t made for some jobs, and often you can’t tell until it’s too late.  A person in the wrong job, or poor job fit will end up with behavioral issues, and disrupting the workplace.  Effectively using employee assessments will help you determine before the person starts whether they are a good fit for the job, and help you communicate with them effectively.  Good Employee assessments can be tailored to the specific workplace, and be a consistent driver for employee engagement and productivity.

By following this simple checklist, you can improve productivity by over 30% in your company, or division.  Imagine a 30% increase in productivity,  how engaging would that be!

Popularity: 13% [?]

Tags: Employment, Human resources, Productivity