Archive for the ‘HR Communications’ Category
by Joe Blattner | May 24, 2010
Unfortunately, not every manager can be Michael Scott, CEO of Dunder Mifflin. However, managers can improve productivity and lower turnaround by taking a big cue from Michael Scott — MAKING WORK FUN. If your employees enjoy coming to work every day, they’ll work harder and complain less. The following tips are designed to help you change the culture at your workplace:
Be more like Michael Scott by:
- Relaxing
“Professional” does not have to mean “serious.” As an employer, you should strive to implement a personal conduct policy that allows your employees to work in a safe environment and enjoy themselves at the same time. This may mean that you take a hard stand on sexual and cruel jokes, but remain more lenient on harmless goofing off. Think through all your policies; don’t just create a rule to stop people from having fun or as a kneejerk reaction to a single incident.
- Planning outings during work
If possible, plan occasional company outings during work hours. Through these outings, your employees will grow closer and create memories they’ll cherish for years. Remember that your outing doesn’t have to be elaborate or expensive to be effective. While you could splurge and take your employees to a miniature golf course, bowling alley or baseball game, you could just as easily schedule a picnic, karaoke contest, talent show or game time in the middle of the workday.
- Surprising your employees
Treat your employees to something special without telling them. You could give them a few extra hours off work one Friday, put treats in the break room or schedule a casual dress day. Remember that even little surprises can mean a lot.
- Sponsoring theme days
While you may already allow your employees to dress up on Halloween, consider sponsoring other theme days. For example, for one day each year, you could allow jeans, shorts, hats, local sports team apparel or workout gear. The possibilities are endless, so get creative.
- Spreading Joy
When managers act like jerks, they can bring a whole company down; but when they start spreading joy, management can effect a cultural change that quickly spreads across a company. Stress to your management team the importance of smiling and complementing employees.
- Decorating
Sprucing up the workplace with a few plants and pictures can work wonders for employees’ mood. Consider posting artwork created by your employees or their children.
One final way to improve morale at your company [not sure if they do this at Dunder Mifflin or not 
] is by distributing total compensation statements. These statements can show your employees how much they’re valued by connecting a dollar amount to their benefits.
by Joe Blattner | April 6, 2010
Ask most employees if they’d rather have cash or non-cash incentives, and they’ll choose the cash incentives almost every time. However, as an employer, you have many other factors to consider when choosing an incentive other than whether or not employees say they want it. Carefully consider the benefits and drawbacks of cash bonuses before creating your incentive program.
Benefits of Cash Incentives
- Nothing talks louder than cash – Many employers find that as soon as they offer cash incentives for a task, their employees start working harder. For fast, effective gratification, few incentives work better than cash.
- Easy to distribute – Cash incentives require little extra effort on the part of an employer to distribute. Money can either be added to a paycheck or distributed as cash.
- Practical – Many non-cash incentives appeal more to some people than others. While some employees may not need a new iPod or tickets to a sporting event, everyone can benefit from a little extra cash.
Drawbacks of Cash Incentives
- Can become viewed as base pay – When employees receive cash bonuses on a regular basis, they can come to expect them as part of their base pay. For example, many people rely on their annual Christmas bonuses or quarterly commission checks to pay their bills. If these benefits ever have to be taken away, things could get ugly fast.
- Disappears quickly – Cash incentives are often quickly forgotten because they are spent on necessities – things like bills, debt or Christmas presents. On the other hand, even small non-cash incentives like movie tickets, electronics or gift cards are remembered long after they’ve been received.
- Takes the joy out of incentives – Non-cash incentives often make a more positive impact because they are viewed as “treats,” while cash incentives are often seen as more practical.
The best incentive programs often involve a mix of cash and non-cash incentives. To show your employees how much their non-cash incentives are worth, consider total compensation statements through COMPackage.
by Joe Blattner | February 1, 2010
The need to reduce turnover is greater today than ever before. As the first of the Baby Boomers turn 60, many are beginning to retire. The generation just now entering the workforce contains about 33 million fewer individuals, meaning that employers are finding a much smaller pool of talent to choose from. This smaller talent pool makes hiring quality employees much more expensive.
To make matters worse, studies show that as the economy starts to turn around, employers will start to see higher turnover. Many employees have reported that they’ve stayed in their current positions because they had nowhere else to go, but they’ll start looking for better opportunities as soon as the job market turns.
In a survey by the Society for Human Resource Management, these employees were asked why they planned on searching for a new job as the job market gets better. The number one response given was that they were seeking better compensation and benefits.
While you may not be able to retain your employees by raising salary or offering more benefits, you could make them think twice about accepting other job offers by providing them with detailed benefit statements. You know the value of the benefits you provide, but chances are your employees do not.
By showing your employees the monetary benefits of their health insurance, 401(k), time off or even perks like free parking or cell phone service, you’ll readjust their perception of their current situation. This can help reduce turnover and, in turn, drastically reduce your hiring budget. The costs of employee turnover do not have to be such a burden.
View a demo to learn more about how benefit statement software can help you reduce turnover.
by Joe Blattner | January 18, 2010
A recent survey by Right Management asked over 1,000 people why they voluntarily left their jobs. The percentages don’t add up to 100 because many respondents provided more than one answer.
54% Downsizing or restructuring
30% Sought new challenges or opportunities
25% Ineffective leadership
22% Poor relationship with manager
21% To improve work/life balance
21% Contributions to the company were not valued
18% Better compensation and benefits
We can gather a few helpful ideas from these results:
- In an unstable economy, employees are looking for a place where they won’t be constantly worried that they’ll be the next to get laid off. If your company is currently in a stable position, emphasize that fact to current employees and new hires.
- Leadership matters. One of the top reasons employees have always given for job dissatisfaction has been dissatisfaction with leadership. If you experience high employee turnover, first look at your management.
- Employees want to love their workplace. If employees love coming in to work every day, they’ll stay with you even through hard times. To improve employee morale, give your employees jobs where they can best use their individual talents and show them how much you appreciate them when they succeed.
- While compensation matters, so do benefits. If you aren’t able to offer your employees large salaries, they’ll still greatly appreciate benefits like free food, time off and small rewards.
Show your employees how much their benefits are worth through an employee benefits statement. Request a free demo to learn more about how this benefit software works.
by Joe Blattner | December 21, 2009
During a job interview, open ended questions provide valuable opportunities to peek behind the veil of prepared answers and find out what a job candidate is really like. The following are interview questions designed to get applicants to reveal more about themselves.
1. “Well…why don’t you start with telling me about yourself?”
As an hiring manager, pay attention to not only how impressive well the candidate can speak of themself, but also to how the candidate demonstrates her willingness to take the initiative in answering the question. Self motivated employees can do their jobs without constant supervision or motivational tricks.
2. “How would you go about handling _______?”
This question is designed to test technical knowledge. While candidates may claim to have experience in your industry, a question like this will test whether or not they actually know what they are doing.
3. “So, tell me about some of your biggest failures or regrets.”
This question tests honesty and sense of personal responsibility. Does the candidate take responsibility for their failures or do they blame others? Do they learn from their mistakes? Can they answer the question without going into personal details?
4. “If I were to call one of your co-workers, what would they say about you?”
This is a great way to indirectly find out whether or not a candidate can put their self in the shoes of another co-worker and to find out how well they can work with others, and also empathize with others.
5. “How have you handled conflict with coworkers in the past?”
We all have had at least one conflict with a coworker in the past. If the applicant denies ever having a conflict, dig a little deeper. This question is valuable for helping you determine whether or not a candidate is a good team player.
6. “Give me an example of a stressful situation at work and how you handled it. What did you do well? What could you have done better?”
The ability to work under pressure demonstrates that an employee is committed and can handle stress. For this question, look for specific answers that illustrate strength under pressure.
7. “Tell me about the strengths and weaknesses of your last boss.”
This can reveal how your applicant works with superiors and whether he will fit well under the new management style. Does the applicant have plenty of bad things to say about her last boss? Does she respond well to professional criticism? Ask for specific examples to back up her evaluation.
I came up with 7 — would love for you to share more in the comments!
Also, if you’re recruiting new employees, you may want to include an employee benefit statement during the interview to showcase how much your company spends on salary and benefits for your employees.
by Joe Blattner | December 7, 2009
Writing a bad job description can attract the wrong job candidates, contribute to high turnover and even get you sued. If you’re writing a job description for the first time, you may not even know where to start. Relax and follow these tips for an effective job description:
Follow an outline. While you can add other things to your job description, make sure you include at least these five items:
1. Title
2. Department
3. Responsibilities
4. Qualifications
5. Preferences
Be specific. Don’t just say that your applicants need “computer skills.” Do they need to know industry-specific programs or just Microsoft Office? How advanced does their knowledge need to be?
Make the responsibilities section as complete as possible. One of the top reasons people quit their jobs is that the job never met their expectation. By accurately describing the job up front, you can reduce your turnover rate.
Know the difference between qualifications and preferences. Qualifications are only the minimum requirements necessary to perform the job, while preferences are the skills you might like to see in a candidate. Be careful about listing your preferences as requirements – the best candidates don’t always fit the predetermined ideal.
Don’t reinvent the wheel. Remember that you can find well-written job descriptions on job boards like Monster.com and Careerbuilder.com. There’s nothing wrong with using these descriptions as your guide as you write your own.
Don’t discriminate. If you don’t want to get sued, be extremely careful that your job description doesn’t discriminate based on age, race, sex, nationality, religion or disability. If the job does carry with it legitimate physical requirements, spell those out in detail.
Do you have tips for writing a job description? Write them below in the comments!
by Joe Blattner | November 5, 2009
Is it part of your job description to complete regular performance reviews? If so, this is not something you should take lightly. It is important to do this at least once per year with each employee that you are responsible for.
So, what are the downsides of infrequent performance reviews?
1. Employees don’t have any feedback on what they are doing right, what they are doing wrong, etc. In turn, they continue doing things the same way and never progress as a worker. In the end, both parties are held back from reaching their maximum potential.
2. Out of touch for too long. Let’s be honest, there are times when you go month after month without speaking to some employees. While this is more common in large companies, it happens everywhere. Business owners need to share their vision with employees at every turn in the road. With an annual performance review, you will have time to focus on each employee’s contribution to the company.
3. One missed review can cause future trouble for you (the owner), the employee, and others in the company. Take this situation, for example. You have to fire an office manager because he failed to meet your expectations. While you have the right to do so, wouldn’t it be better for both parties to discuss this in a performance review?
Performance reviews need to occur regardless of salary expectations, such as a raise. It is not always about money. A review shows leadership and coaching, while ensuring that employees are growing and moving towards company goals.
Now do you see the downside of infrequent performance reviews? Avoid falling into this trap, or face the trouble outlined above. And while you’re at it, don’t forget to include a total compensation report in your employee performance review.
