ABR Blog

How Top Companies Keep Top Talent

While companies like Google and Facebook offer amazing employee incentives like free gourmet food, four months paid maternity leave, and on-site doctors, not every business can offer such bells and whistles to their staff.

The good news is that a recent Forbes article gathered the top ten reasons why top talent leaves a company – and it didn’t have to do with the food. But what can you do help retain your best employees in 2012? Here are 5 initiatives that will help keep your top talent satisfied.

1. Recognize Your Employees’ Work

No statistics are needed to back up this statement: no one likes to feel unimportant, undervalued, or ignored. Whether it’s through monthly one-on-one progress reports, gift card incentives for those with the highest sales, or an “Employee of the Month” program, a simple change in process can elevate workplace attitudes to a new level. Every employee might not be making a big difference on an individual level, but show how their contribute helps in the big picture.

 2. Keep Your Employees Updated

According to a Mindflash study, one of the top things employees want is to “feel ‘in’ on things.” Create a workplace community with team meetings, company-wide emails or newsletters, or a corporate Facebook page. Some CEOs write weekly company-wide updates and thank you messages to their employees. Others stay behind closed doors and leave it to the managers to reach out to their teams. Find out what makes sense for your company. Employees will feel more connected emotionally and physically once you break down the barrier.

3. Honor a Flexible Work Environment

We’ve touted the values of workplace flexibility before. Employee satisfaction and lower voluntary turnover rate are just a few of the benefits that ride along with flexible start/stop times, part-time employment, and occasional telecommuting. Not to mention the greater work/life balance that may make employees more productive and positive. A lower stress level never hurt anyone.

4. Hear Them Out

Ever felt frustrated because you purchased a broken product but couldn’t find a customer service number to tell your story? In order to create the best working environment possible, all involved must be giving a chance to speak up – and sometimes their voices are lost within big company bureaucracy. An online survey, suggestion box, or dedicated “big idea” email address is a great forum for those who want to contribute a comment, complaint, or idea. Even a simple employee referral program can make your employees feel heard.

5. Create a Career Path

While not all positions have the opportunity for growth and advancement, there may be similar positions that can expand an employee’s skill set. Or maybe there’s a chance to show off an employee’s personal expertise by asking her to train newcomers. Is there a handpicked team that is qualified to take on a new project? All of the above empowers your employees, shows that you respect your talent, and that you value promoting from within.

Read the list of all ten reasons why companies lose their top talent at Forbes.com.

Interested in making a few changes in your work environment? ABR Staffing Solutions can help you devise a plan.

LinkedIn is one social space your company needs to be. LinkedIn’s purpose is to build a network of professional colleagues and connections to build relationships that boost your success and reputation.  And, you can set up a company page for free.  The upkeep is minimal yet it continuously networks with interested job seekers and prospective customers.

You might find yourself thinking, is it worth the trouble? Consider these statistics about LinkedIn’s users:

• More than 70 million users (and growing) worldwide
• Average household income of LinkedIn user is $109K per year
• 45 percent are decision makers at their company

Maybe a job seeker finds a friend on LinkedIn who works at your company. When she clicks the name of your company, it currently leads to a list of your employees. But if you create a company page, the interested talent will be taken to your official presence instead. As an example, take a look at how ABR has our LinkedIn Company Page set up.

A LinkedIn company page is like an “About Us” website section. It fills people in on key things they need to know about your company. As the creator of the page, you can include things like:

• An image and description of your company.
• The link to your company website.
• Your company’s size, industry, and address.
• A products and services tab.
• A link to videos.

Another feature of the company page is a Careers section. For a fee, your company can recruit for open professional opportunities.

Most importantly, job seekers can find out who in their network currently works at your company. Pictures of employees and the number of first and second degree connections add a personal component to the job search. Interested talent can choose to “follow” your page so all of your company’s activity will appear in their own LinkedIn newsfeed. Updates could include:

• When one of your new hires or recently promoted employees update their LinkedIn profile with a new position.
• When you post a “company update” on your page such as a link to a job, a welcome announcement for a new hire, or a congratulations for winning an award.

Appearing in a follower’s news feed shows that your company is active, hiring, and promoting from within. It’s an environment where positive news reaches interested followers.

Learn more about company pages on LinkedIn and give your company a social presence today.

Admittedly, it may be a little early to light a Yule log.

But if you’re in the customer service, administrative/clerical, hospitality, shipping/delivery, inventory or technology/finance industries, you’re probably headed for a busy – if not your busiest – time of year.  If you’re going to require extra help this holiday season, it’s definitely not too early to plan for your staffing needs.

Here are just a few reasons why:

• Prevent rash hiring decisions.  If you wait until the last minute to recruit and hire, you may find yourself “up against a wall” when business suddenly surges.  Waiting until your needs are urgent may force you to make hasty hiring decisions.
• Get a jump on your competitors.  Many companies will wait until next month to gear-up.  Why not start your efforts now and reach the most qualified candidates before other seasonal employers get them?
• Avoid being overwhelmed.  This year’s seasonal job market will be flooded with applicants.  With so many job seekers competing for positions, the sheer volume of résumés and applications may bog you down.  Give yourself as much time as possible to find the best candidates by starting the search process early.

If just reading about seasonal hiring makes your stomach churn, relax – you don’t have to do it alone.  Staffing firms specialize in helping companies like yours effectively manage the highs and lows of business cycles.  Plan your workforce needs now with your staffing partner to:

• Get the flexibility you need.  Seasonal on-time staff (temporaries) can handle surges in demand without impacting fixed expenses.
• Say “goodbye” to post-holiday layoffs.  Since the staffing service is the seasonal employees’ employer of record, you can avoid the hassle and expense of letting workers go once things slow down.
• Access the talent you need, right when you need it.  Planning your workforce needs now gives your staffing firm time to locate the most qualified staff for you, especially when you require a large number of workers – so they’re available right when you need them.
• Shorten learning curves.  Your staffing provider will recruit seasonal workers with the specific skills and experience you require.  The provider can also, at your request, develop customized orientation materials to help reduce training costs and get workers up-to-speed more quickly.
• Eliminate additional administrative and legal burdens.  By using on-time (temporary) employees, you avoid the social security, payroll and other tax and legal burdens associated with seasonal employees.  Freedom from these hassles will give you more time to focus on other important priorities.
• Cut back on overtime.  On-time (temporary) employees help you minimize the additional cost and burnout overtime causes.

Plan Your Workforce Needs with ABR Employment Services

If your business has frequent or predictable surges in demand, a planned staffing option may be right for you.  Planned staffing is the strategic use of on-time employees (temporaries) to accommodate workloads known to vary in seasons or other cycles.

First, an ABR Employment staffing expert will work with you to examine year-round fluctuations in workload and identify peak demand periods.  Next, we will create a customized staffing plan for your business that: provides on-time (temporary) employees to handle your busiest times; reduces or eliminates your need to lay off employees during slow periods; frees you to focus on the most critical parts of your job.

Remember, the early bird gets the worm – it’s never too early to discuss your staffing needs with ABR Employment Services.

Most of us today are conditioned to look for the best possible price.  In most cases, this makes good economic sense.  But when it comes to staffing services, the company offering the lowest prices isn’t necessarily going to deliver the best value.

Here are a few good reasons why shopping around for the lowest-priced temporary employees might not be the wisest use of your staffing dollars:

• To offer you the lowest price, a staffing service may be forced to cut back on the quality and amount of service they provide.  They may not be able to afford the same depth of recruiting and screening.  As a result, they may have more difficulty finding the right candidates for your specific needs.
• Because of simple supply and demand, the staffing agencies that offer better wages to their temporary employees will most likely get the more talented, skilled, reliable and experienced applicants.  Any staffing firm can find a “warm body” to fill your position.  But finding a quality employee that truly fits your organization may be too crucial to risk – especially for what may boil down to a few cents per hour.
• Not getting the right person for the job can have very costly ramifications.  For example, a temporary employee who is less than qualified for the position can cause the following unforeseen expenses:
  • additional time (money) up front to adequately orient and train the temporary
  • increased supervision for a less qualified temporary
  • mistakes and reworks – the time, money and materials involved in re-doing the work of a less qualified temporary
  • poor productivity – the amount of work a sub-par employee fails to complete (compared to a qualified individual)

The bottom line is, many things in business aren’t worth risking.  The quality of your human capital is definitely one of them.

When it comes to ABR Employment Services’ candidates, you get what you pay for – skilled, reliable, hard-working and experienced people who truly fit your needs.  Contact the branch nearest you to learn more.

When it comes to effectively staffing your business, the options are endless – and can be, frankly, a little overwhelming.  Today’s post is dedicated to straight talk about a strategic staffing service that may be of real value to your organization:  planned staffing.

The 101

So, what exactly is “planned staffing”?

Simply put, planned staffing is the strategic use of temporaries to accommodate workloads known to vary in seasons or other cycles.  Traditional planned staffing strategies typically allocate between 10 and 20 percent of the total workforce as supplemental (temporary) employees.

To implement a planned staffing solution, a company’s decision makers meet with a highly trained staffing professional to discuss how the organization’s workload changes throughout the year.  The staffing professional then analyzes the company’s workforce needs, and designs a comprehensive plan for managing the peaks and valleys with supplemental staff.

When business surges, temporaries are brought in to handle the additional business volume.  Once the peak cycle is completed, the staffing firm reassigns its employees to other companies.

Planned Staffing Benefits

For businesses with (at least somewhat) predictable surges in demand, a planned staffing option offers a number of benefits:

• Flexibility.  Bringing in supplemental staff allows you to handle surges in demand without impacting fixed expenses.  Your workforce stays lean and flexible.
• Less risk and expense.  Using temporaries during short-term peak periods is less burdensome, risky and expensive than hiring – and then laying off – direct employees.
• Instant access to the help you need.  Your staffing provider will recruit in advance of your needs, to ensure you have qualified candidates ready to work – right when you need them.  At your request, the staffing firm can even develop customized orientation materials to get temporaries up-to-speed more quickly.
• Fewer layoffs.  When business slows, it’s the temporaries who go first.  As a result, core employees enjoy increased job security.
• Less burnout and overtime.  Using supplemental staff reduces overtime and eliminates the burn-out overwork can cause.
• Hiring benefits.  When you implement a planned staffing solution, you have the luxury of hiring employees from a pool of temporaries who are already trained, and have proven their dependability and cultural fit.  Discuss your temporary-to-hire options with your staffing provider.

Is a Planned Staffing Option Right for Your Business?

If your business experiences frequent and/or predictable changes in workload, contact ABR Employment Services.  We’ll discuss your needs, help you weigh your options and determine if planned staffing is right for your organization.

Everyone knows an on-time (temporary) worker can act as a quick fix when a secretary or line worker calls in sick at the last minute.  But if that’s the only way you think on-time employees are good for you, you may be underestimating their value as true pain relievers.

Here are some common “aches and pains” you may face at work, and ABR’s prescriptions for using on-time staffing to cure them:

1. High fixed expenses. Bring in expertise on an as-needed basis.  On-time employees with specialized abilities can deliver the experience and skills you need without impacting fixed expenses.  If your business faces an unknown future, consider using on-time staff to keep your workforce lean and flexible.
2. Wasting time on non-critical activities.  Free up your employees’ time to focus on core competencies.
3. Paying benefits.  Limit your benefits expense by using on-time workers.
4. Meeting tight deadlines.  Bring in on-time employees – even at the last minute – to help you complete projects within tight time and budgetary constraints.
5. Bad hires. Let a staffing service assume this risk for you.  If you need a direct employee, use try-before-hire staffing and evaluate the candidate on the job before making a final hiring decision.
6. Training. Reduce training costs and shorten learning curves by bringing in on-time employees who are trained and have experience using the skills you need.
7. Turnover. When you use on-time employees in high turnover positions, the burden for replacing those workers (e.g., recruiting, training, etc.) is on the staffing service’s shoulders.
8. Seasonal crunch-time. If your business has predictable surges in demand, planned staffing may be right for your business.  With a staffing specialist’s help, you can analyze your business cycles and plan your staffing needs.  Then, during your busy periods, you can staff-up with on-time employees to supply the extra help needed to get work done.  As an added benefit, planned staffing can reduce layoffs.  When things slow down, you can let on-time staff go and hold onto your core employees.
9. Overtime. Use on-time help to avoid paying higher overtime rates and eliminate the employee burnout overwork causes.
10. Lack of expertise.  Bring in on-time or contract executives, professionals or technical gurus to teach new skills to employees in your organization.  Use their expertise on a short-term basis to complete a special project, or until your core employees have learned the new skills needed.

No panacea exists for every challenge you face on the job.  But for headaches like the ones listed above, ABR Employment Services’ complete staffing and HR solutions for Wisconsin employers are just what the doctor ordered.

What do you think will be the biggest challenges facing HR during the next decade?

This is one of the questions posed in a poll by the Society for Human Resource Management titled “Challenges Facing Organizations and HR in the Next 10 Years.” The survey responses, gathered from 449 HR professionals, show that:

Getting and Making the Most of Human Capital is a Key Priority

• Nearly half of the respondents (47 percent) cite obtaining human capital and optimizing human capital investments as the top investment challenge for businesses over the next 10 years.
• 29 percent of the respondents list obtaining financial capital and optimizing financial capital investments as the top challenge.
• Obtaining intellectual capital and optimizing intellectual capital investments comes in third at 12 percent.

To attract, retain and reward the best talent, organizations should:

• allow flexible work arrangements. According to 58 percent of HR managers surveyed, providing flexibility for employees to balance their life and work responsibilities is the most effective way to attract, reward and retain top performers.
• cultivate a culture of trust and fairness. 47 percent of respondents say that creating an organizational culture where trust, open communications and fairness are emphasized and demonstrated by leaders is a key priority.
• provide meaningful work opportunities. 40 percent of HR managers say that designing jobs to provide employees with meaningful work that has a clear purpose in meeting the organization’s objectives optimizes the organization’s ability to engage and keep top talent.
• demonstrate a commitment to employee development (29 percent).
• offer a higher total compensation and benefits package than organizations that compete for the same talent (23 percent).

While these survey results aren’t earth-shaking, they do serve to underscore an important point.  As businesses like yours emerge from the recession, they should get ready to compete for talent.

ABR Employment Services can help you prepare.  Whether you are looking for that “needle in a haystack” employee or a complete human capital management solution, ABR has the resources to assist you and your organization.  Contact us today to learn more about our full complement of staffing, placement and HR solutions for Wisconsin employers.

The use of credit checks has grown over the last several years.  According to a 2010 survey by the Society for Human Resource Management (SHRM), 60 percent of employers use credit reports for some or all of their background checks.

Employers use credit reports as a screening tool for a number of reasons:

• They believe it allows them to predict future behavior based on a candidate’s financial history.
• They are trying to prevent employee theft and assess the applicant’s trustworthiness.
• They want to reduce legal liability and negligent hiring.

But checking a job applicant’s credit is not without its potential drawbacks:

• An applicant who has been unemployed for a long period of time may have no choice but to incur inordinate amounts of debt and fall behind in paying bills.  If candidates have been out of work for months, that doesn’t necessarily mean they should be disqualified for employment.
• Credit reports fail to provide context.  For example, if debt problems were the result of expensive medical procedures, a low credit score may not indicate anything about future job performance.
• Credit reports are not perfect.  Ambiguous, dated, inaccurate and/or redundant data create the potential for credit score errors.  While these errors are generally minor, employers should be aware that they exist.
• Credit reports may not be relevant for the job in question.  Unless the person you’re hiring will have access to sensitive financial information, make financial decisions or handle money, a candidate’s credit report may be of little significance.

Checking a job candidate’s credit can be a viable screening option. But, is it the best option for your business? It is important to weigh the points above to determine if credit checks are relevant to your specific needs. Ultimately, a comprehensive screening strategy can be the most effective way to avoid bad hires.

Ensure Successful Placements with ABR’s Six-Point Screening Process

ABR Employment Services follows an in-depth candidate screening process. Our comprehensive process provides a more thorough check, helping us provide a more well-rounded picture of candidates than you’ll find across most of the staffing industry. Our six-point process includes:

1. Pre-screen. We pre-screen potential candidates to ensure their experience and interests match those of potential employers.
2. Application. Our in-depth application captures vital employment information, including job skills, reasons for leaving prior jobs, supervisors’ contact information, etc.
3. Interview. ABR uses behavioral interview questions to ensure candidates meet our Expectations of Excellence and will fit well with your current culture.  If requested, we can also perform second interviews with questions specific to your available position.
4. Testing. Our E-AssessAbility is a powerful online assessment solution that helps us determine whether or not a candidate possesses the specific skills you require.
5. Referencing. All ABR candidates must provide one positive reference for any on-time position and two or more for all try-before-hire or direct hire positions.
6. Background Checking. ABR customizes all of our background checking to your needs and company.  We have the ability to complete state or nationwide backgrounds, drug screenings, educational verifications, driver’s checks and credit checks.

Can staffing services really drive profits?  In a word, “Yes!”

In today’s economy, businesses need to do everything possible to maximize the R-E=P equation.  And if your company is like most, your employment-related expenses are among the biggest line items on your company’s P & L.  The more actively you manage these expenses, the more profitable you can become.

Of course, driving profits is about more than just cutting costs.  It’s also about maximizing workforce productivity and effectively matching your human resources to the changing challenges and opportunities your business faces.  Used properly, staffing services can play a vital role in achieving all these ends.  Here are just a few ways on-time (temporary) employees can drive profits in your organization:

• Stay lean and flexible. Design a strategic staffing strategy that limits core employment to that necessary for minimum production volumes.  Staff up with skilled on-time employees to meet peak demand periods or sudden surges in business.
• Focus on core activities. A staffing professional can help you critically examine work flow processes in your organization to identify administrative, repetitive or other support tasks that are being performed by highly compensated employees.  Bring in on-time staff to take over these tasks and free valuable team members to focus on their most vital priorities.
• Lower employment-related costs due to turnover. Take a look at your hiring and termination costs by job functions.  Determine where high turnover positions exist and re-staff with on-time employees (temporaries) to reduce hiring, training and termination costs.
• Reduce overtime expenses.  Work with your staffing representative to analyze your overtime expenditures.  Look for opportunities to use on-time staffing instead of overtime to reduce labor costs and prevent employee burnout.
• Shorten learning curves. As your company incorporates new technologies, bring in contract technical professionals to support your project teams.  They can help get your employees up-to-speed and productive more quickly, saving time and money in the process.  Once training is done, so are your training expenses.
• Capitalize on new opportunities. Have you ever had to table a great idea, simply because you didn’t have the resources to work on it?  For those times, consider supplementing your team with on-time and/or contract employees.  From support staff to senior executives, highly qualified specialists can be brought in to either manage the execution of new ideas or support your internal team while they work on the new opportunities.

ABR Employment Services – Driving Profits for Wisconsin Employers

Need to aggressively manage staffing expenses?  Looking for new ways to increase productivity?  Have a great business idea, but lack the human resources to turn it into a reality?  Contact ABR Employment today.  We have the knowledge, business expertise and highly skilled candidates you need to Comprehend, Fulfill and Achieve your business goals.

How’s business?  The ASA Staffing Index can help you answer this question.

The ASA Staffing Index, developed by the American Staffing Association, provides a current measure of staffing industry employment trends.  Published weekly, the index estimates the weekly changes in the number of people employed in on-time (temporary) and contract work.

Index numbers are reported just nine days after each work week ends, making it a virtual real-time measure of staffing employment trends.  ASA research shows that staffing employment is a coincident economic indicator and leading employment indicator – especially when the economy is emerging from a recession – making the index especially relevant right now for businesses across the nation.

The ASA Staffing Index also serves as a valuable resource for economists, journalists, analysts, researchers and policy makers who are interested in current trends in staffing employment.  Participants account for more than one-third of industry sales offices.

Two numbers are reported weekly.  The first is the weekly percentage change in staffing employment.  The second is the index itself, which shows staffing employment trends over time.  Both numbers are normally posted on the ASA web site on Tuesday mornings.

This Week’s Staffing Index:

Follow this link to view current ASA Staffing Index data.

Monthly Report – April 2011

Staffing employment in April is 7% higher than in the same month last year, according to the ASA Staffing Index.  The index for April is 92, up one index point from 91 in March, suggesting that U.S. staffing employment has increased 1% over the past month.  Staffing employment is typically lowest during the first few months of each year and grows during the subsequent months.

ABR Employment Services – In-Step with Wisconsin Employers’ Changing Needs

ABR Employment Services delivers customized direct hire, on-time, strategic and management staffing solutions to help companies like yours achieve sustained business success as the economy recovers.  What can we do for you?  Contact ABR Employment today.