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Why Diversity Hiring Is Important

in Workforce Management/by Harlan Schafir

The world has its eyes on systemic racism. And now, more than ever, everyone seems committed to dismantling discrimination. But with the heightened attention comes the awareness of the complexity surrounding inequality. Diversity is complicated, and that’s why most companies fail to meet their Diversity, Equity & Inclusion goals.

Businesses tend to see diversity as a numbers issue. They see that a minority group comprises a certain percentage of the local population and then focus their efforts on having a similar percentage in their workforce. But emphasizing statistics ignores the uncomfortable factors that lead to poor diversity.

Leaders can address these issues within their workplace when they emphasize the benefits of diversity without downplaying its difficulties. Situational factors, privilege, and implicit bias drive inequality. These factors make conversations around diversity difficult. But companies that address the circumstances that lead to inequality ultimately reinforce the shared experience of living in our society. Ultimately, everyone in the organization will feel more valued. To streamline your diversity hiring, and making the process as simple and easy as possible, consider an ATS for your hiring needs. We have a Free ATS Buying Guide to provide all the information you would need!

Defining Diversity and Its Importance in the Workplace

Most business owners think of diversity in the workplace in terms of the compliance regulations imposed by the federal government. These regulations ensure equal employment opportunities for marginalized groups. Business owners agree diversity hiring in the workplace is important. But they tend to view their diversity hiring efforts under the narrow lens of the EEOC. They acknowledge hiring for diversity is important in the world and contributes to the greater good. Yet they also see diversity in the workplace as having very little impact on the company’s success.

Nothing could be further from the truth. Diversity in the workplace is good for the bottom line. In 2015, McKinsey and Company found that companies with a diverse workforce performed 15 to 35 percent better than the national industry median. This success underscores the importance of diversity in the workplace.

McKinsey followed up with a 2018 report that echoed the finding of the first: diversity is good for the bottom line. Companies with gender diversity at the executive level were 21 percent more profitable than their less diverse competitors. Companies with culturally diverse executive teams outperformed their competitors by 33 percent.

In both the 2015 and 2018 reports, McKinsey delivered bad news to companies with poor diversity. Companies that fail to cultivate gender and culturally diverse teams perform up to 29 percent worse than their competitors. Companies that fail to recruit minorities need to figure out how to increase diversity in the workplace.

Leverage Diversity in the Workplace

There are no disadvantages of diversity in the workplace. When companies go beyond simple compliance and truly leverage diversity on their teams, they can outperform their competitors. Businesses can better withstand unexpected challenges, such as a pandemic, when they leverage the benefits of diversity in the workplace.

Businesses can avoid “group think” when they prioritize diversity in the workplace. Companies with a diverse workforce will benefit from the different perspectives and experiences their employees bring to the table. Leveraging diversity on teams will lead to more creative solutions and innovations.

High-quality talent demands diversity as well. According to a survey by Glassdoor, 76 percent of respondents said diversity is important when considering job offers. Professionals under 35, especially, expect their employers to emphasize diversity, equity, and inclusion. Companies that prioritize diversity in their hiring efforts can attract and retain this top talent.

You’re more likely to understand your customers’ needs when you leverage diversity in the workplace. The U.S. is rapidly moving toward a diverse population. Will your workforce be diverse enough to meet the needs of an increasingly diverse consumer base?

Realizing the benefits of diversity in the workplace requires more than hiring for diversity. To really tap into the potential throughout your workforce, you need to leverage diversity. Leveraging elevates diversity from a numbers game for compliance to a comprehensive strategy for diversity hiring and development.

An Effective Hiring Process Includes Diversity

The first step to employing a diverse workforce is an effective hiring process that includes diversity as one of its primary goals. Impress upon your team the importance of an effective hiring process that emphasizes diversity. Companies that understand the importance of hiring and retaining the right employees are more successful.

One or two (or more) stakeholders may (silently) think the company should hire the best qualified individual rather than hire for diversity. Explain to your hiring team that the company will always seek out the most qualified person for the job. But unconscious biases often exclude highly qualified people from marginalized groups. Dismantling these unconscious biases is the first step to a hiring process that promotes diversity.

An article in the Harvard Business Review details a study conducted to uncover biases while rating resumes. They found that a female or minority candidate needed a 4.0 GPA to get the same rating as a white male with a 3.75 GPA. A white male with an impressive internship received a 50 percent higher rating than a female or minority with the same internship.

Understandably, your hiring team may feel uncomfortable with the idea that they, too, have implicit bias. However, leveraging diversity goes deeper than simply hiring for diversity. To have a truly inclusive workplace, your hiring team should understand and dismantle their own implicit biases.

Technology may help you avoid implicit bias in your candidate selection. Applicant tracking software can scan and sort resumes for qualifications. The resulting list will be free of human bias. ATS can also track your applicants to help you identify problem areas in your recruiting efforts.

Hiring Diverse Candidates for Your Organization

Hiring diverse talent requires intention and strategy. Even the most committed companies may fall short in their diversity goals when they fail to proactively recruit a diverse workforce.

Start by examining your requirements for the job, such as GPA. Applicants who come from low-income backgrounds likely had to work while attending college. Their GPA may have suffered under long work hours. Failing to account for situational differences among applicants can lead to poorer hiring decisions.

These situational differences extend to attaining a degree. Since the Great Recession, employers inflated the importance of degrees for entry and mid-level jobs. Yet, in 2016, just 30.8 percent of Black adults had attained a college degree, compared with 47.1 percent of white adults. Furthermore, degree holders in these jobs do not always perform better than high school graduates.

Reexamine the necessary skills for entry and mid-level jobs within your organization. Place a higher value on work experience. If you still find that candidates need specialized skills, consider recruiting from trade schools or implementing an in-house training program.

Consider your interviewing process from the lens of marginalized groups. Are you flexible with your scheduling? Do not doubt a candidate’s commitment just because she isn’t available for an interview until next week. Up to 58 percent of the nation’s low-income families belong to non-white racial groups. Candidates may be working multiple jobs or jobs with unconventional schedules.

You may be sabotaging your diversity hiring efforts if the application process and virtual interviews require too much technology. Black and Hispanic candidates have less access to the Internet and laptops. On the other hand, these candidates are more likely to primarily use cell phones for their job search and applications. A hiring process that embraces mobile technology can boost your efforts at creating a diverse workforce.

Workplace Diversity Goals in Hiring

You can create diversity hiring goals to gauge your success and examine areas for improvement. Good diversity goals focus on the corporate culture, the corporate branding, and corporate recruiting. Your company is more likely to meet its diversity goals if you effectively communicate them.

Your compliance reporting likely already contains information about how your hiring metrics compare with the general population for your area. You’ll have access to even more data if you use an applicant tracking system. Finally, examining your current workforce and diversity at all levels, including executive levels, can create a clearer picture.

Now that you’ve compiled your data, you can look for areas of improvement.

Does your workforce include as least as many diverse employees as the community’s population?
Are candidates from marginalized groups applying for jobs within your organization?
Is one group disproportionately offered interviews compared to minority groups?
Is your hiring team composed of a diverse group of people?
Is there pay disparity in your company between marginalized groups and their peers?
Does the demographic of your managerial and executive positions match the demographic of your entry level positions?

When you understand where your company is lacking, you can create actionable steps towards a more diverse workforce. These steps are more achievable if you communicate them correctly to your staff. Companies are more likely to achieve their diversity goals when leaders tell their teams that diversity is important and requires a focused effort. This creates a positive message around diversity and also creates buy-in from their staff.

Diversity Recruiting Strategy

Many companies find that minorities and marginalized individuals aren’t applying for open positions. A diversity recruiting strategy that proactively seeks these candidates can help. In addition to removing unnecessary the educational and technology requirements mentioned above, recruiters can implement strategies that encourage minority applicants.

Create a culture that values diversity and inclusion in recruitment and beyond. Incorporate your diversity initiatives into your company mission and value statements. Provide company-wide diversity training, with an emphasis on those in management and hiring teams. Include minorities in your company’s marketing campaigns. Emphasizing diversity within your organization and your branding will create a welcoming atmosphere for minorities.

Connect with community organizations. Look for associations that attract minority members. As you speak with professionals in your community, learn about the employment issues these groups are facing. Build a network that includes professionals in underrepresented groups. Lean on your network for employment referrals.

Expand your recruitment efforts to schools with a significant minority population. Minorities are underrepresented in the nation’s top schools. Companies face diversity recruiting challenges when they focus on a few universities. Instead, redirect some of your recruiting efforts to schools with ethnically diverse students.

Invest in an applicant tracking system. An ATS comes with several features to help you reach your diversity goals. You can more easily comply with diversity hiring laws with built-in compliance reporting. The ATS will also help you build a talent pool you can use for future openings. And the resume sorting capabilities of an ATS can help you ensure diversity in your recruiting and hiring practices. The right applicant tracking system will come with a fully mobile careers site that allows applicants to use their smart phones.

Final Thoughts

Diversity is hard, but well worth the effort. Federal compliance and the financial benefits of diversity will always be important. But the biggest reason to hire for diversity is because it’s the right thing to do.

The tragic stories in the news over the past year brings racism and bias to the forefront of our collective consciousness. At the same time, the pandemic has undone the gains women have made in the workforce. Now is the time for your company to recommit itself to Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion.

If you’re interested in learning how applicant tracking and onboarding software can help you achieve your diversity goals, you can register for a personalized demo with a one of our solutions team members.

Photo by Sharon McCutcheon on Unsplash

How to Write a Job Description

in Workforce Management/by Randi Renee Doerr, SPHR, SHRM-SCP

Indeed.com, just one of many jobs sites, is home to more than 16 million job postings. How can yours stand out? How can you avoid underqualified applicants? Most importantly, how can you persuade the best candidates to apply to your company?

The answers to all of these questions begin with your job description. That small post of just a few hundred words has to do some heavy lifting. Your job description must be optimized for search algorithms. It must be clear and honest to help candidates self-qualify. Your job ad has to subtly communicate the awesomeness of your company to a small pool of coveted, well-qualified candidates.

Your job description must accomplish all these goals for one purpose: to convert only the best job seekers into a manageable pool of applicants. How can you write a job description packed with that much power?

Job Description Writing Guide

When thinking about how to write a job description, there are two things to keep in mind. First, you’re writing for the search engines. Second, you’re writing for the job candidates. Each of these “audiences” requires a different approach.

Search engine writing elevates your ad near the top of search results where applicants can find it. Writing your job description with keywords will guide algorithms to your ad. Keywords should appear in your job title and the description, especially the first paragraph. The meta title and meta description should also include keywords.

Keywords will get your ad in front of the applicant. But only clear and compelling writing will persuade readers to complete the application. When asking yourself how do you write a good job description, start by identifying your ideal candidate. Then create a job ad that appeals to that person.

Sometimes, a boss will ask employees to write their own job descriptions. Ideally, several stakeholders should be involved in crafting job ads. HR professionals should seek input from the supervisor overseeing the new hire and also the position’s co-workers. A marketing professional or content writer can craft a job description that is both SEO optimized and compelling for applicants.

Best practices for Writing Job Descriptions

The best practices for writing job descriptions seamlessly weave SEO writing with persuasive writing. If you’re learning how to write your own job description, start by crafting a job description that clearly identifies the role. This description becomes the blueprint to which you add keywords. Finally, you’ll rework your description to persuade job seekers to apply.

What do you write in a job description? Things like the job title, pay range and shift should appear at the top. Next, include a brief summary of your company. Follow this by a summary of how the job fits into the goals of the company. You’ll want to include the most important or time-consuming duties and responsibilities for the position. Identify the minimum qualifications. Finally, identify unique requirements for the job, such as heavy lifting or repetitive hand motions.

Identify what words job seekers are using to find your position. These become your keywords. Use both general and specific terms. The first paragraph of your job description should contain all of your keywords.

Perhaps you’re writing a job ad for what your company calls a project manager. But many industries employ project managers. Someone searching for a position as an IT project manager would not be a good fit for a litigation support project manager. If your job description is for an industry-specific position, then include that information as a keyword.

Include keywords that specify required skillsets. “Java-Script Computer Programmer” or “B2B Content Creator” act as longtail keywords. They are more likely to appear at the top of results for applicants searching these terms. Being specific with your job titles will also help applicants self-qualify.

A Good Job Description Template with Job Responsibilities

When wondering how do you write an effective job description, consider your ideal candidate. What does this person want? For example, perhaps you want someone who works well with a team. This person wants to feel like a valued team member. Perhaps you want someone who can work independently. This person wants to feel trusted and empowered.

Notice that you’re writing to appeal to your ideal candidate’s emotions. In this way, writing your job description is much like writing content for customers. You want your candidates to feel good about applying to your company in the same way you make customers feel good about purchasing.

The best practice for writing the duties and responsibilities section of a job description will tap into a candidate’s desire to support a larger cause. Any job duties list can be written to tap into the applicant’s desire to contribute to something bigger than themselves. If you already track employees’ roles and responsibilities in an Excel or Word template, you can rewrite them from this purpose-centered perspective.

A job seeker’s decision to apply to your company is largely an emotional decision. In this way, applicant conversion is similar to customer conversion. However, you’re only hiring a few select applicants. Effective job descriptions will increase the number of preferable applicants while discouraging undesirable or unqualified applicants.

You can do this by highlighting the emotional benefits that the company values. For example, perhaps your open sales position requires travel. Enticing someone who “wants to see the world” may not attract the type of candidates you want. But you’ll appeal to more desirable applicants if you highlight the opportunity to “work with some of the most innovative and culturally diverse software clients in the world.”

Good Job Description Examples

Rework the key components of a job description to highlight the benefits applicants may enjoy. The best job descriptions for 2021 will highlight benefits in relation to a purpose-orientated mindset.

Good job description examples of the duties and responsibilities for a receptionist may include answering the phone. A compelling description may be, “Be the friendly first point-of-contact for Esperion Therapeutics. Ensure a great customer experience by correctly determining callers’ needs and identifying the person or department best suited to meet those needs.”

Perhaps you’re wondering how to develop a job description for a service technician who will travel to repair equipment for clients. A persuasive job description may read, “Use your mechanical know-how to ensure a consistent customer experience. Keep client productions running smoothly when you travel to client locations nation-wide to diagnose and repair equipment or perform maintenance.”

What Job Descriptions Should Not Include

Now you know your job ad needs keywords and compelling writing. But what should not be included in a job description?

Overwrought Job Titles. Don’t include words like rock star, ninja, connoisseur, or anything similar in your job titles. Rather than creative, these words seem dated and desperate. Candidates aren’t using these terms to search anyway.

Unrealistic Qualifications. Ask yourself if you really need a branch manager with a Master’s degree. Or a receptionist who speaks Spanish. Or an assistant who can write Excel macros. Some qualifications aren’t as important as you may think.

Too Much Positivity. You also want to realistically assess the job. Is there something about the position that may be a deal breaker for some people? If the job requires overtime or working weekends or excessive travel, then clearly say so in the description.

Jargon and Abbreviations. Your words should be clear to a general audience and spelled out completely for search engines. Don’t use terms that only people in your industry or company would understand. Don’t use abbreviations.

Complete List of a Role’s Tasks. Your job description should not be an exhaustive list of the position’s duties. For legal purposes and to avoid wrongful termination suits, include phrasing that allows supervisors to expand responsibilities for the role.

Final Thoughts

Recruiters need to do more to attract top talent. With more than half of job seekers going to online job boards, the work of getting noticed by quality applicants begins with your job description. This small block of text must appeal to algorithms as well your ideal candidates.

But what happens when your amazing job description spurs a candidate to apply? The best job descriptions will fizzle if they end with email instructions. You can keep the momentum going when your job ad directs clients to a branded careers site where they can learn more about your company. You can sort and manage the data from the influx of awesome candidates when your branded careers site feeds into an applicant tracking system.

Do you want to know more about how to connect with job seekers online? Download our free guide, Connecting with Job Seekers in the Digital Age.

Photo by Tim Mossholder on Unsplash

How Much Does Onboarding Software Cost?

in Workforce Management/by Harlan Schafir

Companies may be breathing a collective sigh of relief now that the vaccines have arrived. The end of the pandemic is in sight. Economic recovery can begin.

Not so fast.

Have you thought about what the pandemic’s end means for your employees? A new survey says one in four of them will be quitting your company. Eagle Hill Consulting released a survey that indicates 25 percent of employees are planning to leave their jobs once the pandemic is over. The number climbs to 33 percent for Millennials and parents with children who are remote learning.

People will be leaving their jobs for a variety of reasons. But their departures will mean one thing for your company: rising employee turnover. Low employee retention can cost your organization thousands. As you prepare for future recruiting, you can also incorporate strategies to reduce employee turnover.

Effective onboarding increases employee retention by 82 percent.

You can prepare now for the new hires in your future. And by doing so, you can improve what may be the most important ingredient for creating high employee retention: your onboarding process. Effective onboarding increases employee retention by 82 percent. Onboarding software can further reduce your costs while improving your new employees’ experience.

Estimating the Price of Employee Onboarding Software

Before you can know the true cost of anything, you have to know the price you’re paying for not having it. You can’t calculate the ROI of best employee onboarding software until you know what your current onboarding process is costing you.

First, there’s the hours spent onboarding new hires. Someone in your organization is printing off those new hire forms and putting together the new employee packets. Your new hire is spending time completing the forms and handwriting the same information multiple times. Then the documents make their way to someone who inputs the information into a variety of software, databases, and spreadsheets.

Then there’s the not-so-straightforward hours spent onboarding employees. Someone is charged with chasing down forms when they’re not completed on time. That same person searches for forms that long-term employees completed on their first day. Has a sales person ever left your company for a competitor and there was nothing you could do about it because the non-compete form he signed a decade ago was MIA?

Next, consider the obscure number of hours spent training the new employee. These numbers are difficult to estimate if you’re not using employee onboarding software. Chances are, employees are stepping in to help when they can. Without onboarding software to outline a training plan, your new hire’s introduction to your company is an ad hoc assortment of good intentions and tedious forms.

Now you’re probably wondering, what does employee onboarding software do to improve the onboarding process? Software will streamline your onboarding process, saving both time and money. You’ll improve your new hire’s experience, increasing employee retention. Over time, you’ll collect data which can be used to further improve your onboarding process. You’ll find the cost savings and benefits make onboarding software essential to an effective and affordable employee onboarding process.

Factors that Affect the Price of Software

The price you pay for your new software will depend, in part, on how many employees you typically hire per year. As you consider what features you need from your employee onboarding software, also consider the current cost to onboard new hires at your organization.

New Hire Onboarding Packet: Your employee onboarding forms can be digitized for efficiency and to reduce errors. The information entered into electronic I-9 and W-4 forms can seamlessly integrate with your payroll software. Onboarding software also includes E-Verify integration, and electronic signatures are legally binding.

Company Policy Manual: Are you sure your new employees actually read your workplace and sexual harassment policies? You can integrate all of your new hire’s training into the onboarding software with training modules. These modules will educate your new hire on your company policies and ensure they have the necessary knowledge with short quizzes.

Assign Tasks with Email Reminders: With software, you can create a customized workflow for the onboarding process with tasks. You can assign each task to a stakeholder. This person will then receive email reminders to mark the task as complete within the software. Everyone will know their roles. You’ll always know where the onboarding process stands.

These are just some of the affordable onboarding software features to consider when you calculate the ROI of onboarding software. Onboarding software will also assist with various federal compliance tasks, such as reporting and security measures that keep information confidential.

Choosing the Right Onboarding Software for Small Businesses

When you decide to buy employee onboarding software, you may find companies that sell onboarding solutions cater to large organizations. Not only are these providers more expensive, they may not offer the level of HR support as a provider catering to small and mid-sized businesses.

Look for a provider that offers customer support for onboarding software tailored to SMB. A support team that is SHRM-certified will give you the detailed HR support small and mid-sized businesses need. And a realistic timeline expectation–or even a guarantee–for software implementation, along with a money-back guarantee, mean less risk for SMBs.

When considering how to choose employee onboarding software, look for E-Verify integration and comprehensive support features. In addition to HR-related support, you’ll want in-house technical support staff. And of course, software that is cloud-based means you won’t need to invest in IT infrastructure.

Get a Price Estimate for Employee Onboarding Software

Before you get a price estimate for employee onboarding software, make sure you find a provider that can handle your unique employee onboarding process needs. As an SMB, you’ll need unlimited onboarding software customer support at no extra cost. Many so-called top HR software vendors target large corporations and may not provide unlimited, personalized support.

Also consider how your employee onboarding software will integrate with your other HR systems. “Best of breed” onboarding software can readily accommodate payroll and other HR software systems. By creating a seamless digital onboarding experience, you save time, reduce errors and improve your employees’ experience.

Regardless of your timeline for HR software implementation, make sure your provider won’t tack on additional hidden charges. Look for a pricing structure that is straightforward, where you won’t need to pay extra for support or implementation. And finally, ask if you can try onboarding software risk-free for a couple months. With guaranteed support, a risk free trial period, and a solid set of onboarding features, you’ll be ready to decide whether the cost of employee onboarding software is worth it.

Photo by Raj Rana on Unsplash

How Do I Write An Employee Application?

in Workforce Management/by Randi Renee Doerr, SPHR, SHRM-SCP

The digital age has transformed recruiting. From a branded careers site where applicants can search and apply for jobs to quick-as-a-click reporting that lets you see what works and what doesn’t, data-driven recruiting beats the old paper-pushing days of yore. But don’t toss your job application form in the recycling box just yet.

Far from being obsolete, the reliable questionnaire is still a heavy hitter in your recruitment toolbox. But if job seekers still need a pen to apply to your company, it’s time to write your employee application form for the Web.

The Basic Job Application Form

A simple job application form performs a straightforward role in your hiring process: gather enough relevant information to determine if the applicant should move forward in the next step of the recruitment process. A Web-based application form achieves this crucial task far more efficiently than a paper application as well as a number of other functions.

An online employment application form will transfer candidate information into an applicant tracking system (ATS). Capturing data through the application means your hiring team will spend less time typing and later correcting errors. It also means you can find and sort candidates easily using a search box. Later, you can file your EEOC reporting with just a few clicks rather than thumbing through file folders and creating a lengthy Excel spreadsheet.

An online employee application form is also more convenient for your applicants. When they find your job ad online, they can click over to your careers website and immediately fill out an application. You’ll benefit from a larger talent pool when your application process is user-friendly.

An applicant tracking system will allow you to create an online application form that can be customized for unique positions throughout your company. You’ll be able to ask applicants questions that are specific to their desired role or the location where they’ll work. If you simply make a PDF job application form from your current paper version, you won’t be able to tailor your questions to the applicant or sort through the resulting data.

An Effective Job Application Form

A web-based employee application form is more effective than a paper, or even a downloadable PDF, version. Pairing your online job application form with an applicant tracking system will help you search through numerous applications to find the best candidate more quickly. But how can you write an employee application form in a way that encourages the best job seekers to complete it?

Consider the candidate experience during the application process. A slow or frustrating recruiting process can be a turn off for quality applicants who understand their worth. Take your application for a test run to experience your recruiting process from the candidate’s perspective.

A short, simple application form is almost always preferable to a long series of questions. Aim for an application that takes about 15 minutes to complete and has fewer than 20 questions. If you find that you need more information to narrow your choices, invite qualified candidates to complete a second, short employee application form.

Every iteration of your employment application template should be reviewed for potential legal issues. Not only will new legislation affect the legality of your employee application form, but so will recent case law. For instance, questions about education aren’t illegal, but a recent discrimination case may have been successful if the application unintentionally excluded a protected group.

Job Application Formatting Tips

Candidates are more likely to complete your questionnaire when you stick to a simple job application form format. The web page should tell the applicant at the beginning how long the application process will take. Use check boxes and drop down menus for questions with yes/no or predictable answers. If your employee application form has more than one page, include a page counter that lets the candidate know how many pages are left.

A job application formatted for mobile use will simplify the process for most of your candidates. Hourly workers, especially, are more likely to rely on their smartphones. But, professions with the lowest mobile job search rates—math and computer jobs—still see nearly half of candidates using smartphones to find their next job. Creating a simple job application form in a mobile-friendly format will increase the number of applications you receive from these candidates.

Creating even a simple job application form formatted for mobile use is a daunting task for IT departments in many small to medium-sized businesses. Fortunately, the best applicant tracking systems can take care of the numerous coding and capability issues that arise when creating an application for both Android and iOS. Applicant tracking software can offer a mobile-friendly employee application form that works with the most popular job boards and social media sites.

Drawbacks of Employment Application Form PDF

Quality candidates will skip your job application form if they need a pen to fill it out. Even if your employment application form is online, candidates will drop off if it’s too long or not mobile-friendly. But when you create an online employment application that’s easy to complete while still capturing the important information you need, you’ll benefit from an improved application to hire ratio.

Perhaps you thought a mobile-friendly, online employment application was out of reach for your business. In fact, an ATS that caters to your company’s unique needs will create your online employment application and give you the tools you need to mine the data for your best candidates. With your application form online, your business will be able to compete for the best talent.

If you’re thinking about ditching the pens and setting up an online employee application form, give us a call. We’d be happy to answer your questions and help you figure out if an online job application is right for you.

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What Are the Most Important Onboarding Forms?

in Workforce Management/by Randi Renee Doerr, SPHR, SHRM-SCP

If you’re paying closer attention to your onboarding process, congratulations. You’re one of the few employers that recognizes that turnover is costly and mostly preventable. An effective onboarding process—complete with the most important onboarding forms—is the first step to creating productive, long-term employees.

Employee separations are costly to a company’s bottom line. Work Institute estimates that the cost of an exiting employee is 33 percent of his annual salary. Turnover costs increase if an employee leaves before his first anniversary. Most employee separations are spurred by employees voluntarily quitting their jobs. For example, in January 2020, 62 percent of separations were voluntary quits. In 2016, voluntary separations cost U.S. employers $536 billion. The “productivity costs” can be even greater. Companies with high turnover simply don’t perform as well as companies that are able to retain their employees.

If your company wasn’t fiscally austere before, the pandemic likely created an urgency to reduce costs. Now that 2021 is underway, you’re probably considering the high cost of turnover and looking into ways to reduce it.

A comprehensive onboarding plan is the best way to start building a team of long-term employees. But as you ramp up your onboarding efforts, how do you organize all the pieces? Specifically, can modernizing your onboarding process help you keep track of the most important onboarding forms?

Employee Onboarding

A good onboarding meaning is this: the process by which you introduce the new hire to the company and his role. But don’t be deceived by the simplicity of this onboarding process meaning. When planned well, your new employee’s initiation helps your company in countless ways. Those who quit before the first year likely do so because they’re unhappy with the job’s characteristics. Effective onboarding continues well beyond the first week and ensures your new hire gets support to meet the expectations of his position.

Onboarding paperwork is a crucial piece of your employee’s inauguration into your company. The data you collect will make its way into the employee’s personnel file. This information will inform everything from your employee’s direct deposit to her tax withholdings. Onboarding forms, like all employee-related files, will protect you in the event of litigation or audits. Your employee’s documentation must be correct and organized from the first day.

You put yourself at risk if you aren’t storing your onboarding forms and other employee documentation electronically. Your new hire may accidentally leave a form incomplete. Messy handwriting may increase data entry errors. Worst of all, you may find yourself on a scavenger hunt when you need the forms in the future. If key people leave the company, they make take the secrets of their ad hoc filing system with them.

Filing your forms electronically with onboarding software solves these problems. The software will alert the employee if she left any fields empty. You won’t need to decipher messy handwriting. You can ditch the data entry too. The data your new hire enters will transfer to your HR and payroll systems. And you can save the scavenger hunts for team building exercises. Your employee’s information is safe, secure, and accessible to only those who are authorized.

Employee Onboarding Process

A comprehensive onboarding process increases the return on your recruitment dollars. Your new hire will become productive more quickly. He will feel supported, without the frustration that commonly leads to high turnover in that crucial first year.

Onboarding is your chance to help your new employee become engaged in his new role. Her perception of your company begins with her first interaction and develops during that first year. Finally, onboarding is an opportunity to prevent cultural problems common in business: infighting, toxicity, and other problem behaviors that undermine the organization.

You’re probably considering what are the phases of onboarding. Remember, if your new hire leaves she will most likely leave before her first anniversary. Plan on continuing your new hire’s onboarding phase until at least the end of that first year. You can create an onboarding checklist to keep the process on track.

When considering what is the onboarding process for a new employee, think about the goals surrounding the position. Refer to the job description to create a timeline. Set the dates by which you expect the employee to be able to work independently on important tasks. Then, create a training plan to support the employee in learning her position’s responsibilities. Information about the new hire’s training plan can be organized and kept electronically with the rest of her onboarding forms.

If you use onboarding software, you can start with a training module introducing the employee handbook. The module can walk the new employee through the handbook and, when completed, she can electronically sign it. Onboarding software can present the next training module upon completion of the first to prevent overwhelm. You can set deadlines for completion of the modules that supports the overall training plan. If your new hire falls behind, onboarding software will send her reminders.

Onboarding Process Documents

Documents related to the onboarding process have far-reaching significance. These documents go beyond those required by state and federal governments. Your new hire’s onboarding forms shield you from liability. Items such as signed receipts for the employee handbook and harassment policies can be organized using onboarding software. Onboarding software ensures all the forms are completed and remain accessible for authorized staff.

Paperwork such as the I-9 and W-4 are obvious choices to put into digital form. But don’t forget about other onboarding documents. Non-disclosure and non-compete agreements are essential documents that should be digitized for safe-keeping. A completed application form contains verifiable information and the employee’s signature that the information contained is true.

There’s no need to use printed forms if you implement onboarding software. Electronic signatures are legally binding—as long as you follow the rules. Onboarding software will ask employees if they consent to electronic signatures. Employees will also be required to enter a password before signing a form. The consent and password will ensure your digital forms are legally signed and stored securely. Just as importantly, you always have the digital forms available even if key stakeholders move on to other positions.

Storing your onboarding documents electronically will help you adhere to the requirements surrounding these forms. For example, the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission requires you to hold onto several onboarding forms for terminated employees. Onboarding software will ensure that items, such as drug tests and accompanying results, are stored in compliance with these regulations.

Electronic forms also help you adhere to guidelines requiring you to control access to certain forms. EEO-1 forms identifying employees’ race and ethnicity have more stringent security controls than other, less sensitive data. Onboarding software with multiple security levels is the best way to keep sensitive documents secure.

Free Onboarding Checklist

Are you ready to reap all the benefits of a well-organized onboarding process? We created a free onboarding template to get you started. Our checklist helps you organize your onboarding process. We divide onboarding into four phases with associated tasks and onboarding forms for each phase.

Our checklist is further divided into categories, so you know exactly how each task and document fits into your larger onboarding process. Tactical tasks take the chaos out of compliance. These administrative details help ensure that you’re ready for audits and EEOC reporting.

Our strategic and cultural tasks are designed to help you improve on key performance measures. These are the tasks that will improve your company’s employee retention rate and your new hires’ time-to-productivity. Cultural tasks are activities that boost employee engagement and foster support to help new hires make it to their first anniversary.

Onboarding begins before your new hire’s first day and continues throughout his first year. During each phase of onboarding, different stakeholders will take on tasks to support your new hire. Our free onboarding template will help you identify these individuals and identify the ways they contribute to the onboarding workflow.

Each position may need a slightly different onboarding plan. Additional factors, such as multiple locations, can complicate the onboarding process. Onboarding software can track these variables. Using the software, you’ll be able to create an onboarding plan for each position and corresponding location. Within each onboarding plan, you can include the most important onboarding documents. The software ensures these forms are completed.

Previously, you may have been hesitant to take on a comprehensive onboarding process. You may have been overwhelmed with the many tasks associated with onboarding. Our free checklist will help you create an effective onboarding process while ensuring related documents are completed.

Creating a New Hire Checklist for Your Company

Your new hire paperwork checklist should have several phases. Pre-boarding begins before the employee’s first day. During this phase, you can send your new hire important documentation via email. Documentation could include a complete description of the responsibilities for the new hire’s job. An organization chart, corporate mission, and values will help your new hire to familiarize herself with the company. You can include a link to online information, including the company website and the benefits portal.

During the first week, your new hire will complete standard employment paperwork. You may consider taking her photo and inviting her to complete a short biography to post on the company’s intranet. Now is a good time to go over the results of any employee assessments you’ve administered and the training plan you’ve developed.

During the first 90 days, the employee is becoming more familiar with her new coworkers and her role within the company. Providing her with information about the company’s past and its objectives for the future will help her see how she fits in. Now is a good time to provide her with information about any incentives for bringing on new clients or employee referrals. A scavenger hunt or Bingo card will make seeking out information fun and memorable.

Once your new hire reaches her one-year anniversary, she is more likely to stay and become a valuable long-term employee. It’s important to include in your onboarding a plan for support for the period from the first 90 days to that one-year anniversary. Provide the employee with documentation about benefits as she becomes eligible for them. Go over her training progress and perform an employee performance review. Create a plan for support to help her overcome any revealed difficulties.

Conclusion

The global pandemic made businesses reevaluate their fiscal responsibilities. Companies are thinking about ways reduce costs without sacrificing performance. Reducing turnover is the key to saving money while also improving revenue.

Employees initiate most separations in the first year of employment. These departures cost your company a third of the employee’s annual salary. Your business can spend thousands recruiting and training new hires. A comprehensive onboarding plan is the most effective way to stem the flow of exiting employees. Onboarding doesn’t just reduce turnover. Effective onboarding will help you curate a winning team.

Expanding your onboarding may seem daunting if you’re still using paper forms and filing cabinets. Onboarding software can help you develop an onboarding process customized for each position. You can ditch the piles of paper and effortlessly organize your onboarding forms.

Are you thinking about implementing a more efficient and effective onboarding process? Our team is happy to help you.

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What Are the 5 Main Drivers of Employee Retention?

in Workforce Management/by Randi Renee Doerr, SPHR, SHRM-SCP

Are back-to-back candidate interviews cutting into your other responsibilities? Are there so many new faces at work that you have trouble remembering who needs to complete the latest safety training module? Or maybe a hostile culture simmers under the heated grumblings of overworked, under-staffed employees. You’re inviting these and many more problems if you aren’t implementing these 5 main drivers of employee retention.

Hey, I get it. People leave their jobs for a variety of reasons. And at first glance, it may seem like there isn’t much you can do when an employee says they want to move to another city or switch careers. The reasons for high turnover that you hear most seem to be out of your control. It’s easy to hyper-focus on recruiting, even if you understand the importance of employee retention. But when an employee leaves, the reasons they give you for leaving may not be the whole story. Giving these employees a reason to stay may be easier than you think.

Employee Retention Definition

A simple employee retention definition is “the rate at which employees leave a company and are replaced by new employees.” New hires are at the highest risk of leaving, with many companies losing one-third of these workers. Long-term employees, however, take experience and knowledge with them when they leave. When your employee turnover is high, you lose the stability long-term employees bring.

The importance of employee retention can’t be overstated. Whether your business is Armstrong Flooring or Physicians Healthcare Network or anything in between, you need a high employee retention rate to stay competitive. Companies that maintain a definitively high employee retention rate enjoy greater profits and productivity. Their teams are stronger and their customers have a better experience. By keeping your employee retention rate high, you spend less on recruiting and training. You also get to hold onto the wealth of knowledge and experience your current employees offer. Employee retention, by definition, reduces the high cost of turnover.

Employee Turnover

A high employee turnover rate, on the other hand, is costly. According to the Work Institute’s 2017 Retention Report, every employee that leaves costs your company about 15 percent of his salary. That cost goes up if the employee leaves before his one-year anniversary, long before his productivity can offset recruitment costs. Companies lose an average of one-third of these new hires.

High turnover has hidden costs too. Decreased customer service that goes along with too many inexperienced new hires can drive sales down. Low morale and a weak team also exemplify the harm that comes from voluntary turnover. These factors prove the following statement about turnover: poor employee retention is expensive.

Employee churn refers to the rate at which companies must hire new employees to replace the ones who are leaving. A high rate of churn tends to have a negative impact on the remaining employees in an organization. And while insufficient pay is one of the reasons that lead to employee turnover, it isn’t the most important. Before companies can find ways to retain employees, they must first know what is driving their workers to leave.

Factors Affecting Employee Retention

There are five main drivers of employee retention.

The first driver for employee retention is effective onboarding. Introducing your employee to the company and her new role will improve your company’s image in her mind. By proactively creating an onboarding plan for each new hire, you take the reigns on another important factor that affects employee retention: culture.
The second factor, a positive workplace culture reduces turnover and improves employee retention. Emphasizing a positive culture during employee onboarding is one way to improve employee retention. A strong value statement and purpose will help you find ways to improve culture throughout your company.
The third factor that affects employee retention is job satisfaction. An employee who is satisfied with her job feels her work has meaning, is challenging, and is fulfilling. There are several ways you can improve workplace satisfaction. Recognizing achievement, fostering growth, and increasing responsibility are a few.
A fourth way you can improve employee retention is through environmental factors at work. These are things like salary and benefits, work rules, and coffee breaks. Maintaining facilities that are comfortable and conducive to good work is just one way to improve the environmental factors that can reduce employee turnover.
The fifth driver of employee retention is inertia. Turns out Newton would have been a good HR manager because he understood a body that isn’t moving won’t move without good reason. Even if you’ve proactively addressed the previous causes of turnover, your employee may leave if there is a significant change to his circumstances. If he becomes fully invested in his stock options and his children graduate college, he may decide to move on to a less stressful position. HR managers need to create drivers for employee retention during all phases of an employee’s tenure.

Adams Equity Theory and Employee Retention

John Stacey Adams is an American psychologist who developed the earliest need-based theory of human motivation at work. The resulting Adams Equity Theory is still used over 50 years later. The theory states that the employee’s input, in the form of his work, must be balanced by the output, such as salary or job satisfaction, he receives from his employer. Adam’s Equity Theory neatly balances employee motivation with employee retention.

Hard work, which according to equity theory is an input, should be balanced with the result the employee gets in return. According to Equity Theory, employees lose motivation if they feel their input is greater than the output they receive. Conversely, employee motivation is higher if they trust they’ll receive an output that matches their input.

According to Adam’s Equity Theory, employees provide the following inputs: effort, skills, knowledge, loyalty and experience. Employees receive as outputs financial rewards as well as immaterial rewards, such as recognition, challenge, and responsibility. These financial and immaterial rewards keep employee turnover low. Adams Equity Theory provides a formula for employee retention strategies by balancing the employee’s input with the rewards he receives.

Employee Retention Strategies

Employee onboarding software can help you organize and develop an onboarding process for each position. By strategically introducing employees to your company and their roles, you’ll help them become productive more quickly. You can also emphasize your company’s culture and expectations through the onboarding process. Companies with a strong onboarding system enjoy higher employee retention rates.

Defining your company’s values and purpose is the first step to creating a better culture. Once you have a clear vision for your company’s mission, you can use employee assessments during the pre-screening process for candidates. Employment assessments are one of the most effective employee retention strategies. You’ll be able to screen candidates for the qualities you value in your corporate culture such as work ethic, integrity, and compassion.

You can expand the scope of your employee retention strategies by implementing ways to increase job satisfaction. Remember, effective employee retention goes beyond salary and benefits. Recognize your top employees’ achievements. Incorporate opportunities for growth through educational and training programs.

Pay attention to the environmental factors that drive employee retention. Create a workplace environment that is comfortable and conducive to productivity. Make investments in software and other tools your employees need to reduce their frustration and increase efficiency. Pay attention to the details, like providing quality coffee and tea.

Proactively work to make sure your employees don’t have a reason to leave as their circumstances change. Yearly bonus programs are more effective than stock options that become vested at the same time. Use HR software to identify employees who may have plateaued in their careers and find ways to reignite their enthusiasm. Interviews that assess current employees‘ experiences will help. If an employee does leave, conduct an exit interview to find out why.

Employee Retention | PDF Download

The importance of employee retention goes beyond saving the time of your HR team. The numerous benefits of employee retention will keep your company competitive. You can increase the scope of your employee retention measures through strategies that address the drivers of employee turnover. Employee retention strategies should balance employees’ input with the output they receive from your company. A thorough exit interview will help in employee retention efforts as well.

If you need more ideas on how to create a workplace that encourages employee retention, download our guide on Cultivating Company Culture.

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How Text Messaging Fills Positions Faster

in Workforce Management/by Randi Renee Doerr, SPHR, SHRM-SCP

Move over Zoom. The pandemic has bumped up another mode of communication: texting. Overall, 50 percent of the population is using text more often since the pandemic began. And if you’re one of the few recruiters not using text messaging for hiring, I might be SMH (shaking my head) at you.

Texting has been on the rise since the first 10-year old Millennial received a cell phone—check that—since the first two 10-year old Millennials received a cell phone. Businesses have been marketing with text for years and have seen huge results. Success with text marketing is no surprise considering a read rate of 97 percent within 15 minutes.

Okay, so maybe every American sends and receives about a 100 texts per day. But does that really make text messaging effective for recruiting and hiring?

Text Messaging Is Effective

Just ask Home Depot. The home improvement giant saw a 50 percent increase in response rate for texting applicants versus other methods since implementing a robust text recruiting strategy.

Like working from home and Zoom calls, text messaging in business recruiting is here to stay. There are just too many benefits of text recruiting, including speed and efficiency.

Both the hiring manager and the applicant save time composing a text versus an email. And unlike email, nearly everyone reads their texts, oftentimes within 15 minutes.

And if you’re still wondering is email or text messaging more effective for response rates, 82 percent of people turn on notifications from their text messaging apps. That’s probably much more than email considering only 27 percent of those who primarily use their phone to check email do so as the emails arrive.

Busy recruiters can manage multiple conversations in less time. That kind of efficiency is especially helpful for positions that typically have a high turnover rate. If you hire for these high turnover jobs often, then pre-screening may become one of your favorite benefits of text recruiting.

Pre-screening applicants over the phone can be time-consuming. But what if you could start winnowing down your hiring choice with a text conversation? You could get a lot of common deal breakers out of the way, such as verifying the candidate is still looking for a job and has reliable transportation.

The speed and efficiency of texting can reduce your time-to-hire metrics, especially for your high turnover, hourly positions. If you’re still wondering is text messaging acceptable, just ask the 86 percent of Millennials prefer texting during the recruiting process.

Hiring Problems That Text Messaging Solves

Text messaging has grown from a vehicle for informal teen chats to a commonplace form of communication in all areas of life. Texting efficiently relays information without the time-consuming small talk of phoning. It’s only natural that texting has made its way into the recruiter’s toolbox as an effective solution to several problems.

Text messaging applicants is more efficient than phone interviewing. Phoning potential interviewees is time-consuming. You’re unable to do anything else while you’re dialing, waiting for an answer, and actually talking to the candidate. Multiply the process by the several calls required for each open position and you’re easily losing hours in the first step of the interview process.

When you text message job candidates, you can quickly narrow down your choices. Save time by text messaging screening questions concerning a candidate’s availability and access to transportation. When you’re ready, you can schedule candidate interviews with text messaging.

Text messaging will reduce applicant ghosting. Increasingly, job applicants don’t respond to traditional communications. Most email messages—80 percent—remain unread. Entry-level job seekers do not always have email. Most people don’t answer calls from unknown callers, and many voicemail boxes are full or not set up.

On the other hand, nearly all texts are read within 15 minutes of being sent. Millennials, especially, are open to responding to texts from unknown senders. Typing away on a smartphone doesn’t deter applicants who already use their phones to apply for jobs.

Phone calls and emails can’t match the speed and effectiveness text messaging offers. But if you don’t have applicant tracking software to manage your text messaging efforts, you risk appearing unprofessional.

How to Text Message Professionally

If you didn’t know what SMH meant before reading this article, don’t feel bad; I didn’t either. Luckily, neither of us needs to be as fluent as a teenager in texting slang. If you’re recruiting via text, then you want to keep it as professional as possible. Adhering to professional text messaging etiquette while recruiting will reinforce a positive impression of your company.

Ask for permission to text during the application process. While it may be convenient for you, it may be a hassle for your applicant. Think of asking first as the golden rule for any business wishing to communicate via text.

Identify yourself, your company, and the reason for your text. Candidates have probably applied to multiple companies. Clearly identifying yourself and your purpose prevents any confusion. Using a text messaging template for recruiting will help you keep it professional.

Avoid texting slang. Always spell the word rather than rely on acronyms. Use proper punctuation and capitalize the first letter of every sentence. Never, ever use emojis.

Be personable. Don’t let your applicant feel as if she is talking to a chatbot. Address her by name and thank her for her time. Remember, your text is her first indication of how the company will treat her if she becomes an employee.

You can use applicant tracking software to create a professional texting strategy. A custom online application can ask the applicant for permission to text. From there, you can create text messaging templates for your hiring needs. You can even set the text messaging time of day using applicant tracking software.

Develop a Text Recruiting Strategy

Incorporating text messaging as part of your talent strategy can improve your time-to-hire metrics. Applicant tracking software that includes text recruiting campaigns will streamline and organize your efforts. Your strategy should develop text messaging cadences to avoid overwhelming the candidate with too many messages. You’ll reduce applicant ghosting significantly when you combine text messaging with email and phone. Finally, text messaging templates for hiring will help ensure your text recruiting campaign reflects your brand’s voice.

Text messaging was rising long before the pandemic. Now, social distancing means people are texting 50 percent more than before. Covid made texting mainstream, much like remote work and Zoom meetings. It makes more sense than ever to use texting in your recruiting campaigns.

Are you unsure of how to start engaging applicants on their mobile devices? Download our guide, Leveraging Text Recruiting to Engage Job Seekers. You’ll learn how to measure and maximize your mobile recruiting effectiveness.

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How to Approach Nonprofit Recruitment

in Workforce Management/by Tom Branson

How to approach nonprofit recruitment depends on your organization’s needs, priorities, and growth stage. This statement is not meant to dodge the immediate and urgent question of “how do I recruit the best nonprofit professionals?” Rather, the statement helps you focus on developing an ideal persona of the job candidates that will help your particular nonprofit organization succeed. Let’s take that statement and look at each piece.

Nonprofit Employment Needs

Every business–profit or nonprofit–begins with a core group of employees. At the very beginning, this may just be the founder. Regardless of the starting point, when a nonprofit seeks to add talent to its organization, it should first consider the talent it already possesses. This will prompt a couple questions and considerations:

Are the people we employ in the right positions? It’s not uncommon for nonprofit job seekers to gravitate towards organizations or missions that resonate with them. This may mean that they take any open position, rather than wait for the right open position. Consider: Is there an existing employee who can fill an urgent talent need better than the one they currently fill? This preliminary consideration will help ensure that recruitment efforts are focused on adding the right nonprofit professionals.

How will the employee grow with the organization? Employee growth is mostly expected. Job descriptions offer it, and job candidates talk about wanting it. However, it’s helpful to include context and a timeframe to this question. One nonprofit may need someone to build a marketing department over the next five years, while another may need a nonprofit professional to “do marketing” and other operational work indefinitely. Consider: Will the organization offer a growth path for the position? Being clear and honest about the growth potential for a position can help organizations avoid employee turnover or frequent reorganizing of staff roles.

Improve your employee experience: Guide to Choosing the Right HR Software.

Nonprofit Talent Priorities

Not all nonprofit organizations are built the same. Just as mission, vision, and values will differ from one organization to another, so too will the priorities. As it relates to nonprofit recruitment, employers will almost always have to make trade-offs during the candidate selection process, and so it helps to prioritize selection criteria to develop a candidate persona in advance. Let’s take a look at a couple criteria for prioritization.

Experience vs. Education

This is a standard consideration for almost any open position, but for nonprofits, the stakes are often higher. It is common for nonprofits to operate on limited resources– the refrain “do more with less” comes to mind. But a couple dangers may exist here.

One is to under-prioritize experience–maybe with the intent to save on salary and utilize “on-the-job” training to fill experience gaps. This can certainly work, but it will require more time to ramp-up a new hire. For smaller organizations or lightly staffed nonprofits, this time investment in training can negatively impact other areas of operations.

Another danger is to under-prioritize education–perhaps done with the assumption that having done the work will always trump knowing how to do the work. Having a “doer” on staff is a great asset…as long as they are doing the right thing, in the right way. Effective applicant screening and candidate interviews can mitigate this danger by verifying that the candidate’s experience comes with quantifiable accomplishments and examples of how the experience matches an organization’s needs.

Nonprofit Professional vs. For-profit Professional

Using again the example of recruiting for a marketing position, an employer could prioritize recruiting a marketing professional, a nonprofit professional who can “do” marketing, or (the gold standard) a nonprofit marketing professional. This is not semantics. Thinking through how these different candidate personas align with the needs of an organization is vital to not just making a good hire, but in making the right hire.

Additionally, prioritizing the skills and experience that an organization requires will tighten the recruitment target and, in turn, produce better candidates and a more efficient hiring process. If a nonprofit truly wants to do more with less, a well-defined recruitment target is essential.

Nonprofit Growth Stage

A nonprofit organization in year-one will need to approach recruitment quite differently than an organization with decades of institutional history. Differences may include the amount of resources (people and capital), organizational structure, community of supporters, network of partners and advisors, and scale of operations.

It is important for an organization to account for these differences as it considers nonprofit recruitment strategies. Strategies are not one-size-fits-all, and any approach to recruitment should aim to leverage existing advantages and resources without requiring significant investment in new ones.

Recruiting Strategies that Scale

It is tempting to follow the lead of larger organizations and attempt to implement their recruitment strategies. After all, those strategies often produce great results in acquiring widely-known and accomplished talent. However, these strategies are not always effective when scaled down to smaller organizations. Trying to do so will create an unnecessary risk of over-investing in a process that under delivers on results. And it cuts both ways too, when larger organizations underinvest by using small-scale strategies in recruitment.

For example, a multi-regional nonprofit may contract with a recruitment firm to fill high-level executive positions. The needs and resources of this large nonprofit may allow for this investment as part of a recruitment strategy. However, a smaller nonprofit would have trouble justifying such an expense, even for a relatively high-level position. It would be better off tapping into its existing network of supporters, advisors, and partners to fill the position.

The goal should not be to hire the most qualified candidate at all costs, but to hire the best candidate for the organization at the right cost.

Defining Your Approach to Nonprofit Recruitment

The unique characteristics of your nonprofit organization will determine your best approach to recruitment. Developing your approach is first a matter of identifying your needs, determining your priorities as it relates to those needs, and creating an ideal persona of the job candidate that will help your organization succeed.

Finally, be sure that your recruitment strategy takes into account your organization’s growth stage–including its size, resources, and scale of operations. Your best approach to nonprofit recruitment should not solely focus on the desired hiring outcome (hiring the best), but also on the desired impact of hiring (advancing your organization’s mission).

Feature Photo by Jason Leung on Unsplash

Where To Find Hourly Workers

in Workforce Management/by Randi Renee Doerr, SPHR, SHRM-SCP

Is there a pool going on in the break room, betting on how long the new guy will last? Do you increasingly find yourself glancing at an hourly worker’s name tag before addressing her by name? Did the lab you use for drug test screens send you an enormous fruit basket for Christmas?

If these questions hit a bit too close to home, you need a new strategy for recruiting hourly workers. High turnover eats away at your profits faster than an unsupervised kid at the free samples table. Absenteeism, workplace accidents, and customer service can all be improved if you hire the right hourly employees.

Finding good hourly workers that will stick around may seem like a mighty task. But if you adjust your strategy and know where to look, you’ll find them almost as easily as a shrewd customer finds a reason to demand a discount.

Getting Good Employees in Hourly Roles

Before you try to figure out how to find employees of a company that relies heavily on hourly workers, you have to get clear about what you’re looking for. When you’re looking to find employees to hire, emphasize finding a person with the right attitude. Technical skills are easier to teach than a winning personality.

Getting and keeping good hourly workers is doable when you put as much effort into attracting applicants as you do attracting customers. Adopting a marketing mindset to your recruiting efforts is an obvious strategy when you value the people who work for you.

Need help improving your recruitment content? Start by assessing what you already have, using ExactHire’s Recruitment Content Scorecard.

The hourly people you hire play a key role in your customers’ experience and your brand perception. If a product breaks, the customer blames the company, not the guy working quality control. Likewise, if a cashier is unhappy, your company’s image takes a hit in the eyes of the customer.

Using assessments during the screening process can help you target the right person. But be careful to use the assessments at the right time. If you require them upfront with the application, you risk alienating good candidates.

But where to find hourly workers with the right skills, winning attitude and pleasant personality that will translate to a positive customer experience? As with salaried employees, the best hourly workers are already employed and not actively seeking work. You’ll need creative ways to source these candidates.

Beyond the “Help Wanted” Sign

Job search aggregators like Indeed may be one of the best websites to find employees, but don’t stop there. There are countless niche job boards for hourly work, so take the time to review which sites make sense for your organization. Additionally, consider investing in applicant tracking software that can automate your job postings and even optimize your job board spending.

When trying to find employees, websites aren’t your only option. Develop relationships with local institutions where your ideal candidates congregate. These include high schools, colleges, or even senior centers.

If you use recruiting software, such as an applicant tracking system, you can create a talent pool that you can dip into for future openings. You can also use the ATS to flag and block low-quality applicants from future openings.

The Challenge of Hiring Hourly Employees

Hourly gigs get a bad rap. The problem isn’t just low pay. Too many companies treat their hourly workers as expendable. Hourly workers often take abuse from customers and aren’t respected by management. Recruiters tend to make rash hiring decisions because they need employees now. Also, many hourly employees use a phone to apply for jobs and do not have email.

You can do a lot to retain your good hourly employees by providing them with what they value. Treating them with respect and rewarding excellence are key. The golden rule applies: treat hourly workers the way you would want to be treated.

An employer looking for employees within this demographic needs to develop a strategy to find the best hourly workers. When deciding how to find employees, consider Craigslist and other job boards, as well as nontraditional places such as senior centers and veterans sites. You can use an applicant tracking system to easily manage the deluge of applications you receive.

Smart strategies while interviewing hourly employees can also help. If I am an employer looking for employees, I always examine the application process from the candidate’s perspective. Hourly workers are more likely to use their phones exclusively. So make your application process mobile friendly and use texting to communicate.

Using Job Boards Like CareerBuilder, Indeed, Etc.

Choosing the right job board for hourly employees will help improve the amount of quality applicants you receive. Indeed and ZipRecruiter are popular for hourly workers because they effortlessly match jobs to the user’s experience. SnagAJob is also a popular job board for finding work in retail.

Other sites, such as CareerBuilder, require hourly workers to sift through endless links and thousands of search results. Hourly workers may find Glassdoor, while useful, is too cumbersome because it requires users to create an account.

Probably the biggest complaint recruiters have about job boards is the swarm of unqualified applicants that accumulate in their inbox. You can help hourly workers self-select when you provide upfront and detailed information about the job. Information such as whether you require weekends or overtime can help steer undesirable candidates away.

An applicant tracking system can help you sort through hundreds of resumes you’re likely to get. You can use the search function in an ATS to find and sort the best hourly workers. ExactHire ATS has a built-in function that allows you communicate with job applicants via text. There’s no need to reveal your personal cell number.

Hourly Workers in Retail as an Example

If you’re looking for an example of the perils of high turnover, look no further than the hourly retail workers. The recruitment and selection of employees in retail is a never-ending process, even during those rare times all of your positions are filled.

Recruiting strategies for hourly employees almost always focus on young hourly workers. But high schools aren’t always the best places to recruit for retail. When you’re tossing around retail recruiting ideas, don’t underestimate older hourly workers, veterans, the justice-involved, and moms looking for part-time work.

Many companies treat high hourly turnover as an inescapable reality. But you can stop the talent leak that is draining your profits when you rethink your recruitment strategy. There are plenty of quality people to fill your hourly roles.

The best hourly workers aren’t necessarily looking for new jobs. But they’re always looking for an employer that will provide the benefits that matter most. Flexibility, appreciation, and respect are low-cost ways to attract these hourly workers. You can find them by marketing to nontraditional sources such as senior centers and niche job sites like recruitmilitary.com.

For more information on how to leverage software to meet the unique challenges of finding and retaining hourly workers, access our 30-minute webinar…or assess your recruiting content with ExactHire’s Recruitment Content Scorecard.

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