We recently had a meeting with a Chief Executive Officer (CEO) to discuss the findings of the company’s employee engagement survey. The CEO was furious, but he wasn't angry at the results. They were excellent and demonstrated that the investments we made to build a solid employment brand had worked. He was [...]
Your organization is composed of many people that work in teams. You might have a sales team, a marketing team or a customer service team. But do your teams work well together? Do their skill sets complement each other? What motivates your team? Do you know how they work best? These [...]
You probably don’t spend a lot of time thinking about your employee handbook. Wise employers understand that employee handbooks have several important business purposes.First, they are marketing documents. Your organization has a website, marketing fliers and social media pages to promote your products and services. These materials were designed to influence potential [...]
A common theme we hear from small business owners is their desire to stay below 50 employees. That seems to be the magic number for many who have either been there before or are approaching that number for the first time, like a medieval knight galloping through a dark forest. What [...]
Bob was sitting at his desk staring at a stack of resumes. It's déjà vu all over again. Bob was in the process of filling the same job - for the third time in two years. If you asked him if he had a turnover problem, he'd quickly point out that [...]
We have heard so many variations of this from small business owners over the years. “If it weren't for employees, running a business would be easy.” “I spend way too much time dealing with petty employee matters.” “Why can't they just do their job?” Unfortunately, running any kind of business where [...]
Puppies are wonderful, but they are so much work! It's amazing how quickly they learn behaviors that have been reinforced by rewards. A puppy is very motivated by treats. To housetrain a puppy, give them a reward every time they come back into the house. Pretty soon they will sit and [...]
Criminal background checks are used for preemployment screening in many organizations. If you own a company that sends service workers to people's homes or businesses, you don't want to send someone that may expose customers to potential risks. But the commonplace practice of background checks has come under scrutiny in recent [...]
At the start of the Industrial Revolution, Frederick Taylor helped business owners understand how effective management of workers impacted productivity and profitability. Taylor showed that workers would perform better if they were shown the most efficient processes to follow. As a result, the ratio of managers to workers grew in most [...]
Some small- and mid-sized companies have half of a Human Resources (HR) department, but they don’t know it! In some organizations, the Certified Public Accountant (CPA) handles the HR duties. They might be outsourcing their HR functions to a payroll company. To these companies, the HR function consists of risk management [...]
