ABR Blog

Still on the fence about using social media?  Consider these statistics from the recent Cone Business in Social Media Study:

• 93 percent of Americans believe that a company should have a presence on social media sites.
• 85 percent believe that these companies should use social media to interact with consumers.
• 60 percent of Americans regularly interact with companies on social media sites.

The truth is, social media can help expand your business network, enhance your career, recruit employees and more.

According to HR expert Susan M. Heathfield, About.com Guide, HR professionals need to participate in social media for career success – and she should know.  She is a management and organization development consultant who specializes in human resources issues and in management development to create forward-thinking workplaces.  Susan is also a professional facilitator, speaker, trainer and writer.

Heathfield’s About.com article “10 Reasons Social Media Should Rock Your World” details the rationale behind making social media time investment mandatory for every HR professional:

1. Stay in touch with colleagues and friends. Social media makes it easier than ever to re-connect with former colleagues, classmates, teachers and other professional contacts.
2. Make it easy for others to find you. Maintain both individual and company profiles to make it simple and convenient for customers, employees and candidates to reach you.
   
3. Find potential job candidates. For example, you can e-mail social media contacts with job requirements and ask them for referrals.
4. Investigate potential career opportunities. If you’re interested in finding a new job, social media sites like LinkedIn can be invaluable in your search.  You can use the site to network, garner recommendations and learn about new job openings.
5. Establish your online brand. You can use social media to promote your career progress by establishing an online presence that defines who you are professionally and what you want to be known for accomplishing.
6. Join groups that share your professional interests. As a group member you can give and get information about recommended reading, industry trade shows or other professional meetings/events.
7. Develop social connections. Sites like Facebook are rapidly gaining mature professional members.  Unlike LinkedIn, Facebook is ideally suited to having fun and developing social contacts over time.  A word of caution:  carefully manage your Privacy Settings and critically examine content – before you post or upload – to make sure it’s compatible with your professional image.
8. Provide a space in which users of your products/services can interact with you. Use social media to expand your customers’ opportunities to discuss their wants and needs – with you or with other customers.
9. Build community around your products or services. The people who are the “face” of your company should leverage social media opportunities to build relationships with consumers.  Forums and blogs on your company website (and within your HR Intranet), as well as fan pages, can help you build this sense of community.
10. Finally your company, in addition to individual employees, should establish a company presence on major social media sites to stay in step with the changing interests and needs of consumers.  The Internet has opened up worldwide communication.  Why not use its social media components to make you and your company more successful?

ABR Employment – Leveraging Social Media for Recruiting Success

ABR Employment Services posts available on-time (temporary), contract and direct hire jobs on Facebook and Twitter.  We leverage social media including LinkedIn to locate talented, experienced and hard-working individuals for Wisconsin employers like you.  How are you using social media in your job?  We’d love to know.  Leave your comments below.

“It is an immutable law in business that words are words, explanations are explanations, promises are promises but only performance is reality.”

– Harold S. Geneen

If you’ve ever managed a single person, then you know that employees make excuses.  They procrastinate, miss deadlines and blame others when they fail.

So how do you get them to consistently perform to the best of their abilities?  Use these smart suggestions to get better results – and fewer excuses – from your staff every day:

Make performance management a daily activity.  Annual and quarterly reviews definitely play their part in gauging performance, but nothing replaces the day-to-day guidance you give to your staff.  So talk to them regularly, leveraging every opportunity to improve employee’s efforts:

• Give them honest feedback about what they’re doing right – and what they need to improve.
• Discuss new projects and the opportunities they present for employee development and growth.
• Talk about overdue assignments or project difficulties and how to resolve them.
• Reinforce the importance of consistently doing a great job.

Limit excuses.  Eliminate the external factors on which employees often blame their poor performance by:

• Ensuring employees have the resources they need to do their jobs;
• Ensuring employees are adequately trained to do their jobs;
• Setting clear, mutually agreed-upon performance expectations for each employee.

Ask the right questions when problems arise.  Uncovering the cause of poor performance is the first step in creating a plan to remedy it.  So when an employee is failing at work, ask the following types of questions to diagnose the reasons why:

• What about the work system (e.g., tools, time, training, support) is causing the employee to fail?
• Does the employee know exactly what you want him/her to do, as well as the expected outcome?
• Does the employee practice effective work management?
• Does the employee feel valued, recognized and fairly compensated for his/her contributions?

Make performance goals SMART goals.  This goal-setting acronym is still widely used for one simple reason:  Specific, Measurable, Attainable, Relevant, Time-bound goals are more likely to be achieved.  So as you work with your employees to set higher standards for the next quarter or year, teach them how to create SMART performance goals that will get them there.

Create a “performance mentality” among team members.  Football players won’t play their hardest in a game where nobody keeps score.  Likewise, your employees won’t deliver superior results when they merely see themselves as “doing a job” everyday.  Foster a “performance mentality” by showing your team why their efforts matter – and what’s at stake.  Make sure employees understand your mission, how their jobs fit into the “big picture,” and what they need to do to help your company win.

Improve Performance with ABR Employment Services

Performance management is a vital component in your organization’s continued success.  Ensure that success with ABR Employment’s full complement of staffing solutions.  Whether you need to improve productivity, increase operating efficiencies or streamline your staffing function, we can custom design a solution to fuel exceptional performance throughout your company.  Contact us today to learn more.

The boomers are retiring.

This is not news, of course, but their mass exodus from the workforce does create a potential problem for many organizations – namely, identifying new leaders to fill the boomers’ shoes.  In addition to closing the talent gap this generation will leave, other reasons to proactively develop new leaders include:

• Keeping pace with constantly changing business strategies
• Quickly filling new roles created by organizational growth, as we emerge from the recession
• Adapting to job realignments caused by mergers and acquisitions
• Heading-off potential skill shortages
• Increasing employee engagement and productivity

Does your company’s succession plan address all these issues?  The truth is, many organizations are too busy managing the daily pressures created by a lengthy recession to look that far down the road.  But to win the talent war, you need to start assessing, planning and developing leaders now.  Here are a few strategies to make your succession planning more effective:

• Create a plan before talent needs become talent crises.  Remove some of the stress caused by finding the right person for a job by planning for future needs now.  Careful planning will minimize workforce disruption, increase knowledge transfer and increase employee engagement / loyalty by providing clear career paths.
• Let your best employees know about your plans for them.  Tell your key talent that your company has high expectations for them.  Prepare them and increase their buy-in by letting them know that you will be investing in their futures and will be facilitating moves to enhance their professional development.
• Define criteria and profiles against which to measure employees’ potential.  Logically, you want to develop employees with the greatest potential – but potential for what?  Work together with key executives to map out the future requirements for success in key positions (i.e., what will tomorrow’s leaders have to be able to do to succeed in these roles?).  Use these criteria as a measuring stick for evaluating each individual’s potential.
• Assess current employees’ skills and competencies.  Once success criteria have been defined, you must invest the time and money to objectively and validly assess what your internal talent can do.  While each company must decide which tools best fit its individual needs, popular ones include:  assessments from the candidate’s circle of influence; career achievement summaries to capture work experiences; psychometric tools; behavioral interviews to probe against established criteria for success.
• Create plans to close the gap.  Once you understand where current employees are and where they need to be, you can customize talent development plans to close the gap.  As potential leaders progress in their growth, keep them updated on hiring decisions.  Monitor their interest and involve them in the development process as much as possible, to keep them invested for the long-term.  Most importantly, make sure their career aspirations are aligned with your succession plans, to keep you both working toward the same goal.

After assessing employees, some businesses find a lack of internal talent with the potential for leadership.  That’s where ABR Employment Services can help.  We can recruit, screen and identify individuals who have the skills, competencies and behavior traits to become future leaders within your organization.  Call us to find out more about our direct hire staffing solutions for Wisconsin employers.

It’s like a bad dream.

You’re in an interview, dressed to impress and feeling totally in control of the situation, when the unthinkable happens – the interviewer asks a question that completely stumps you: 

“If you could have dinner with anyone from history, whom would it be and why?”

“Why is a manhole cover round?”

“Which fictional character would you say best describes you?”

If just reading these questions makes beads of sweat pop out on your forehead, you’re not alone.  In an interview situation, most of us would be stopped in our tracks by off-the-wall questions like these.  But that’s the point:  interviewers ask odd questions intentionally, to see how well job candidates thinks on their feet and respond to stress.

Because unusual interview questions can be about virutally any topic, they’re nearly impossible to prepare for.  Still, here are a few quick tips to help you handle them more effectively:

• Keep your composure.  The question was meant to throw you off your game – so don’t let it rattle you.  Keep your face neutral and recognize that this is the wacky question you’ve been anticipating.
• Take your time.  Smile, take a deep breath and avoid the temptation to blurt out an answer.  Don’t panic – if you have to take a moment to gather your thoughts, it merely demonstrates that you think carefully through a situation before responding.
• Relax.  When it comes to unusual interview questions, your answer is not as important as how you handle the situation.  In fact, most don’t have right or wrong answers.  So take the pressure off yourself.  You don’t have to be brilliant, you just need to answer honestly.

If you’d like some practice answering off-the-wall questions, consider the following popular ones:

• If you could be any character in fiction, whom would you be?
• If you had only six months left to live, what would you do with the time?
• If someone wrote a biography about you, what do you think the title should be?
• If you were a _________ (insert:  car, animal, salad dressing – you get the picture), what kind would you be and why?
• If you won $50 million in the lottery, what would you do with the money?
• How would you rate me as an interviewer?

Be Prepared for Your Next Interview

Register with ABR Employment Services today.  Our team of staffing professionals will listen to your needs, match you with a perfect direct placement opportunity, and then prepare you to ace the interview.

Ever feel overwhelmed by the sheer volume of information coming at you each day?

With the barrage of data pouring in from newspapers, TV, the internet, social media, RSS feeds, e-mails, voicemails and good-old-fashioned face-to-face meetings, finding the critical information you need amidst all the “white noise” can be exhausting.

Take the BLS Monthly Employment Situation, for example.  It contains monthly employment estimates for over 1,000 industries from its Current Employment Statistics program.  However, the changes in these overall employment levels tend to be delayed in the monthly labor reports – making it a lagging indicator of economic trends.

Sound like a lot of white noise?

Not entirely.  Temporary help employment numbers, which are part of the monthly BLS report, are generally considered to be a coincident indicator for overall employment.  This means that changes in temporary help employment tend to forecast subsequent changes in overall employment and coincide with changes in economic activity.  Why?  Many companies use temporary staffing as a means to quickly adjust their operations to meet fluctuating demands for their products and services.

Here’s how to get current data for temporary help services in the BLS report:

1. Go to the BLS Current Employment Statistics home page.
2. Then select either the HTML or PDF version of the “Employment Situation Summary.”
3. Data for temporary help services can be found in Table B-1 (page 30 of the report’s PDF version).

 Effectively manage the economy’s highs and lows with ABR Employment Services.

Our full spectrum of staffing services for Wisconsin employers can help you run lean – while providing on-demand access to the talent you need to meet surges in demand.

Keeping your résumé current is important to your continued career development.  But unless you’re actively looking for a job, the daily demands of life, home and work can easily push this updating process down on your priority list.  If you haven’t reviewed your résumé in over a year, here are just a few good reasons why you should take a fresh look at it:

• Even if you’re currently employed, you never know when an attractive job opening may present itself.  A current résumé can help you capitalize on an unexpected opportunity – before someone else has the chance.
• Over time, your important achievements and contributions may be forgotten.  Regular updating ensures that critical, measurable accomplishments are accurately recorded.
• In many cases, your résumé creates a first and lasting impression on a potential employer.  Make sure it’s a good one.  By periodically reviewing and honing your résumé, you can create a more powerful marketing tool that accurately and favorably represents you as a professional.

Use these tips to make your résumé update simple and comprehensive:

1. Review personal information (address, e-mail, LinkedIn URL, etc.) to ensure everything is up-to-date.
2. Review your oldest job.  If it’s no longer relevant, and you have at least 10 years of documented work history without it, remove it.
3. Update your responsibilities and accomplishments.  Consider the following:  special projects; new expertise developed or job responsibilities awarded; knowledge or skills enhancement from special training or professional development; awards or other recognition; challenges you faced and solutions developed; measurable results you helped achieved (e.g., eliminating process inefficiencies, increasing productivity or sales, improving staffing or operational performance, etc.).
4. Revist your objective statement.  If it is not in line with your current career aspirations, rewrite it.  The statement can be general, but should show some direction toward the field in which you want to work.
5. Reevaluate your references.  Verify that these individuals still work where you have noted and that contact information for each is correct.  If you have developed new contacts who can attest to your recent achievements or heightened responsibility, consider replacing them with outdated references.
6. Update your résumé format.  Check online sample résumés to see if yours looks outdated and revise accordingly.  Additionally, you should create an electronic version of your résumé if you don’t already have one.
7. Proofread everything.  Sloppy spelling, grammar and punctuation may take you out of the running immediately.  If you’re not proficient in proofreading, ask a trusted friend or associate to help.

Looking for a better career opportunity in Wisconsin?  Give us a call.  ABR Employment Services has a wide variety of temporary and direct hire opportunities in the office/clerical, professional, light industrial and technical sectors.

Implementing a faulty or sloppy employee review system can put your company at risk.  One misstep can lead a disgruntled employee to “pull the trigger” on a hairy lawsuit.  So as a responsible manager, how do you keep your company out of the crosshairs?

Here is a quick list of best practices for ensuring your performance reviews are legally defensible:

1. Develop adaptable appraisal forms.  Use flexible forms evaluators can change to suit the type of position available.  The forms should allow evaluators to: incorporate specific job criteria; weight and prioritize attributes and job responsibilities; easily keep accurate, detailed annual review records for all employees.  Should you need to protect your company in the case of a dispute, this standard documentation will provide valuable evidence that evaluators conducted all appraisals in a consistent manner.
2. Train your evaluators.  Provide written instructions on the purpose and mechanics of your review system.  Teach evaluators to base appraisals upon observed evidence – never “gut feelings” or other subjective criteria.  Include information on potential EEO problems and emphasize the importance of accuracy.  Supplement written instruction with role playing, and require evaluators to sign a statement saying they’ve received and reviewed the instructions.
3. Clearly communicate the review process ahead of time.  When review time comes around, make sure employees know:  the purpose of the reviews; the impact they’ll have on employees’ work; how the reviews will be conducted; what to expect during discussions.
4. Require employees to agree to primary job duties.  During the evaluation, ask each employee to review the job duties on which he has been rated.  To prevent later debates, require each employee to sign a statement that the list provided constitutes an accurate and complete list of his major job duties.
5. Safeguard against inaccuracy and evaluator bias.  Emphasize the importance of avoiding stereotypes based on race, sex, age or any other characteristics.  Monitor evaluators and develop a system of cross-checks to ensure evaluators do not go too easy on employees, or consistently rate a particular group lower than another.
6. Summarize and distribute reviews.  Have evaluators write up salient aspects of each employee appraisal and distribute copies to all relevant parties.
7. Have each employee review and sign his evaluation.  After being given the opportunity to review and write in his own comments, require each employee to sign and date the evaluation.  This will discourage employee attempts to dispute the evaluation down the road.
8. Keep a regular review schedule.  Like any other inconsistency in employment actions, failure to provide timely reviews can become the basis for an EEO charge or other frivolous lawsuit.
9. Provide for appeals on grievances.  Give employees the right to appeal performance reviews to a higher level supervisor.  In addition to being a goodwill gesture, this process will also undermine the case of any employee who later attacks the evaluation in an EEO or wrongful discharge claim.

Make it Easier on Yourself

Remember, our temporary employment services save you the risks, time and hassles associated with performance reviews.  Contact us today to learn more.

Flexibility.  Extra income.  Work experience.  An avenue to direct employment.  The reasons people choose temporary work are as diverse as the assignments they select.

But whether you are looking to earn some extra cash, or are seeking full-time employment, here are several things you can do to make the most of temporary assignments: 

1. Dress the part.  You will fit in, perform, and feel better if you’re dressed appropriately for the type of work you’re doing.
2. Act as if the job is permanent.  Give your best effort on each assignment – you never know where it might lead.  If an employer is impressed with your performance, he can work with your staffing service to offer you direct employment.
3. Learn all you can.  Each assignment provides fresh opportunities to learn.  From practical job skills to industry-specific knowledge, capitalize on every chance to gain valuable skills and experience.
4. Test the waters.  If your career path is uncertain, temporary work affords you the ability to try out different jobs, at different companies, in varied industries.  Find out where you fit by accepting diverse assignments.
5. Network.  A temporary assignment puts you in a unique networking position.  While at work, you have the opportunity to interact and develop relationships with business colleagues whom you might not otherwise meet.  Leverage this “inside track” access by sharing your career interests and goals with managers you encounter on the job.
6. Communicate.  If you enjoyed an assignment and would like to work for the employer again once it’s over, say so.  Your staffing consultant and supervisor can look for additional opportunities for you to work in a different area of the company.  And if the assignment was not right for you, consider why.  Try to understand why the job or the employer didn’t meet your needs, so you can choose an assigment that’s a better fit the next time.

We want to help you get the most from your experiences as an ABR Employment Services temporary employee.  Please visit our website to learn more about the services, support, and resources we provide.