This article is written for managers, supervisors or anyone else in the business of achieving planned objectives through ongoing efforts (productivity) of others. I’m sharing the lessons I’ve learned during the past 12 seasons in the lawn and landscape industry.
As I went about the daily routine of recruiting, hiring and managing the development of front-line employees and supervisors, it almost seemed the human resource world was changing in front of my eyes. Productive recruiting visits seemed to dry up for no discernable reason. Promising candidates vaporized out of existence after giving me their commitment to join the team. New hires disappeared halfway through initial training and workers, once on the job in the real world, simply quit.
What has been going on? Can it be true that no one wants to work anymore? Are there really no good people out there?
I believe there are good people out there. People who want to work for you do exist. The problem we have is that attracting them, convincing them to join your team, then cementing a productive relationship is now much more involved. You can do it. I’ve learned how — the hard way — and I’ll share my experiences.
I’ve come to learn that there are 10 controlling factors of hiring and retaining employees. They are, or can be, a guide to help improve your ability to acquire and keep the kind of productive people who care about their jobs and their customers and whose efforts will positively affect your bottom line.
1. Our American culture is changing at a very rapid pace. In the language of psychologists, sociologists and anthropologists, we’re undergoing a “paradigm shift.” Wow. Not that! If my paradigm shifts, what’s next?
In the real world, our world of long days, unpredictable weather disrupting most of what we do, customer irritation over conditions beyond our control and people who seem to get a kick out of disappointing us, we feel the heat. Yes, we do ask a lot of our employees, especially in “go” season. And, we do expect people to meet honest commitments. Isn’t that fair? Is it asking too much?
Unfortunately, for those who grow and develop in leaderless, valueless homes, the answer too often is yes. Simply put, the days when the average worker was more than adequate are gone, never to return.
Don’t beat yourself up over these revelations. Don’t allow these changes in your model of what reality ought to be overwhelm you. Learn to adapt. You can adapt your thinking and planning strategies to adequately cope with modern America. But please, don’t expect things to return to the way they were.
2. Develop a 21st Century acquisition plan. Once you come to grips with the new realities in our changing culture, you’ll be able to revise your strategies and tactics for acquiring the staff you need to reach objectives. Start with this premise: The people you need are out there. You won’t be able to run a classified ad and hire the first three average candidates who walk in the door — but the people you need exist.
First, decide how many traditional, full-time employees you will need. With the cost of benefits increasing steadily, all smart business people are at least exploring the realignment of tasks and responsibilities so that temporary workers do a lot more of what full-timers once did. Unless you have a serious problem with the proven benefits of division of labor and specialization, this reassignment of tasks to temporary employees can be a boon to you, as well as an effective employment tool.
Next, revise your recruiting activity plan. Newspaper hiring will always be a factor, but as your only recruiting tool, it’s hopelessly inadequate. You will never get the best long-term employees from the classifieds, not in the 21st century.
Expand your internal hiring. Work harder to develop and promote present employees. Set up an internal recruiter program. Your most reliable recruiters are those people who know you and your business best because they are an integral part of your team. Statistics show that referrals turn out to be the lowest turnover category of new hires.
Recruit wherever you see energetic, enthusiastic people. Pass out cards when the right person comes along. Many service industry employees work on Sundays. In our business, this would not be a requirement. You see, we do have some competitive features and benefits.
I’ve only scratched the surface. For now, get creative!
3. You must establish a formal, well- planned and consistent hiring process. So often, potential new employees are lost because of management inattention to an effective hiring process. I’m not talking about having great interview questions. Effective hiring requires a process. Starting with the initial inquiry, you must set up and maintain a series of 100 percent positive company/candidate points of contact.
For instance, is your advertisement’s message consistent with your company’s philosophy? Does the candidate enter your office and find a positive, or negative, atmosphere? Do the other employees project a friendly, professional image or do they act cold and unprofessional? If you say one thing in an ad and present your company another way, you will lose that job candidate. The candidate was there, but you just let the fish off the hook.
If you succeed, a little spark will ignite at each step in the hiring process. That spark will propel the developing relationship toward a job offer and acceptance.
| What Job Seekers See... |
When a potential new hire shows up for a personal interview, what image greets them? Does it reflect what you think it does? How is the hiring interview conducted, and where? Is the candidate exposed to quality and made to feel important? Or do you put him or her on the “grill” with tough questions? In your interview, do you really learn what the candidate thinks, feels, needs and wants? Or are you going through the motions, hoping for a series of “yes, I will” answers so you can end this unpleasant chore and get back to the “important parts” of running your business? |
4. Far too many hard-to-acquire new employees are lost as a result of a poor start-up or initial orientation period.
New hires arrive on the first day of employment with two predominant and overriding feelings. First, they are hopeful. New hires want things to work out. They hope you meant what you said about the kind of people you already have on the team — their new “family.” They remember your words of encouragement as you assured them they could do the job if they would just give it a chance. Your new people sincerely want that statement to come true.
Second, new people arrive with a fair amount of anxiety. Wouldn’t you? Today, we are conditioned to look for the surprise ending, to trust slowly and to be very careful about our associations.
How does your start-up program address these two emotional realities? Are you organized? Is the training program effective? Are the first on-the-job experiences positive or do new hires end their first day on your team thinking, “I’ll keep looking around, these people scare me.”
5. Because of today’s staffing realities, you will hire less than perfect candidates. This fact dictates the requirement for a very effective and ongoing training program. And I don’t mean orientation. I’m talking about training people who are at least willing to learn, to accumulate knowledge about you and your competition, then translate that knowledge to the only kind of learning that matters — skill.
Your company, no matter how small, needs to put in place comprehensive learning systems that ensure understanding and acceptance of the following:
- The position requirement in detail.
- The fundamental, basic beliefs that control how each task is to be performed.
- The expectation levels that must be met daily.
- The procedures under which your team will go about achieving goals.
- The rewards for success.
- The punishment for failure.
- The importance of each member.
- The absolute commitment to succeed, prosper and grow using the basic company philosophies taught and reinforced daily.
Where, on a scale of 1 to 10, is your training program?
6. Accept and use the fact that staff turnover can be a friend as well as a foe. At times, turnover can rid your organization of negative people who drag down your team’s performance and morale. When a negative person leaves, celebrate. I don’t care how much work the person does, celebrate.
If you glean nothing more from this article, accept this experience-based conclusion: One negative thinker will eventually bring down your team’s performance. This applies 100 percent of the time. Do yourself a favor and dump the whiners, complainers and others on your team who do not believe in the principles of your business.
Having made that point, we’ve also got to accept the fact that too many good people bail out when we need them most. If you think about the fact that there are good reasons for staying, you are on the right track.
I take a job because of the future I see ahead. I leave because the reality is different. You may have the power to create an ongoing, motivational climate in which the people you want to keep will stay. Here are a few basics:
- You must pay at least a minimally acceptable level.
- People take jobs because they believe they can succeed and grow.
- People need a positive, reinforcing work environment.
- People won’t do their best and will eventually leave if they don’t fit socially on your work teams.
- People deserve a feeling of fairness, appropriate rewards and a bright future as payment for a job well done. They will leave without it.
Are you creating unnecessary turnover? You cannot afford to do that.
7. Managers commonly make two huge, costly errors: Misprioritizing tasks and misusing time. Too many of us do things because they are tasks we feel comfortable doing, can be handled quickly or are not threatening. Misplaced priorities create an enormous cost in management effectiveness and lost productivity.
The problem is not that a manager cannot determine which project or task is most important. The problem lies in our psychological processes. We do what makes us feel good, period. Likewise, we avoid (like the plague) these tasks which bring on headaches and frustration. It’s not complicated, it’s a matter of discipline.
Every manager I’ve ever met says, “I want.” I want to succeed, to be rewarded, become a star performer and live happily ever after. Few managers say, “I will.” I will discipline myself to do what I know it takes to succeed in my business. Because you , the manager in charge, have certain power, you can choose how to spend and prioritize your time. You can make needed improvements. Ask yourself every time: Is this the best use of my time right now?
8. Managers must be coaches. At no level do employees cease to require, benefit by or appreciate positive hands-on coaching and reinforcement of important principles and procedures. If you cannot accept this part of your role as a leader, prepare to fail. I guarantee it will happen.
More people leave their employment because of neglect than for any other reason. Money, benefits, reward, punishment, fairness, social fit, growth and all the rest pale in comparison to personal attention as a people management tool. I’ve watched new hires who are given an encouraging pat on the back and sent off to their fate with an inspiring, “I did it Fred, so can you.” This is the biggest people management mistake in American business.
Managers find human interaction not only a challenge but, when coaching follows poor training on the heels of improper hiring, impossible. Picture yourself in the field with a person who didn’t really want this job, a person who heard about half of the training information and retained about 5 percent. Your job is to coach this person? Obviously, too often, we fail. The management process is at fault. Make each step effective. Then, coaching the right person, someone who wants to succeed will change your view of coaching people.
9. To succeed as a leader, you must react to employee performance and morale daily. “If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it,” right? Wrong. Again and again, managers avoid employees who are doing a good job. If we interact, it’s to assign more work.
Does that make sense? An employee does everything we ask of him or her and the reward is perceived as a punishment.
The opposite is also found all too frequently: An employee fails to hit a goal or meet fair expectations and the manager reacts by lightening the load. It’s wrong but we hear, “If I crack down, the guy will just quit. And, besides, good old Joe will help me out, he’s a great guy.” And so it goes, life in the service industry.
I believe the scenario above is neither necessary nor in any way defensible. The true leader reacts to positive performance in a positive, reinforcing manner at every opportunity. This will result in repeated positive results.
Poor performance commands a reaction quickly, as well. The trick in correcting poor performance is to use positive techniques to turn negative performance around. Time after time, a group of low performers who are exposed to positive, hands-on, consistent leadership becomes a group of winners.
10. Your best people will leave. After all the positive, motivating, hands-on leadership, he or she will leave the nest? Yes.
Good people need to grow. Of course, growth within your organization would be the goal. But, where that cannot happen, know that they will go. You’ve taught these people that they are winners, doers, successful people. They have developed a strong need to achieve.
Your management challenge is to never stop recruiting the people you need to replace the “winners” as they move through your organization. Never try to keep a performer in a restrictive position. Once a person succeeds, they move to the next higher level of achievement. Realizing this, you must be ready.
The author is a training and management development consultant in Delaware, Ohio.
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