Hiring is a difficult process at the best of times. It’s hard to find the right candidates, convince them to join, and ensure that they’re successful once onboard. When you add in the after effects of a world-wide pandemic, and throw some economic uncertainty into the mix, it makes things even more complicated. The reality that many businesses currently find themselves facing is unprecedented, and if left unaddressed, will ultimately lead to problems for your team and ultimately impact your bottom line.
In a recent Chamber survey, 40% of GSCC Member Businesses reported that a shortage of employees was having a direct impact on their business. That is a huge amount, and these effects are not just being felt locally. Employers across the country are asking for patience with their existing employees because the business is understaffed. In fact, there are hiring managers who are scheduling interviews only to have no one show up! You can’t hire people who don’t even come to an interview.
So what’s a business to do? Other than increasing wages, what else can be done to address these issues? Well, here are some ideas:
Dangle Some Carrots
While money is the motivator most people think of when it comes to enticing employees, it is important to remember that some things are more valuable to your potential employees than money. Working from home, flexible work hours, and good benefit packages can all be reasons that employees choose to work for you rather than someone else.
During COVID, an unparalleled number of businesses created work from home scenarios, and many will be forced to stick to those protocols long after COVID. Work at home is no longer a perk. It’s an expectation and it’s hard to compete with that.
If your business is entirely in-person, it may take some creativity to appeal to workers. Things you might be able to do include flexible shifts (such as working around a child’s schedule) or floating start times within a window of time. The clue here is to get creative with the allowances you can make. Additionally, looking into low cost employee benefits, such as those offered by the Chamber’s Plan, could help give your business a more competitive edge in the hiring process.
Be a Ghostbuster
Ghosting has become the norm in relationships. Many people who don’t want to deal with a difficult situation, ignore it and disappear. We’re starting to see this trickle down into our workforce. It has somehow become ‘acceptable’ to just not show for an interview, first day, drug screen, etc.
In order to ‘bust’ this ghosting cycle with your employees, it is important that you connect with them. This is difficult to do when you’ve only had minutes of interaction with a candidate.
However, people are more likely to ghost when they don’t feel a connection or don’t think of the employer as a person but rather a large corporate structure as in the “they won’t even notice I’m not there” scenario.
Try your best to connect with them in the short time you have. Share details about your life. Maybe you’re interviewing them on a special day and “fitting” them in or “clearing” your schedule. Do it respectfully and don’t play the guilt but try and make an impression by showing them that you value them – listen attentively, find areas of commonality that you can connect on, smile and take an interest in them as a person. You may still get ghosted, but it will be less likely if they see you as a person who is considerate of their feelings.
Get Creative
With the explosion of social media, we were exposed to a LOT of marketing messaging and frankly many people are just burned out. Many people are downright skeptical of claims made by any businesses, jaded into believing that companies care more about the almighty dollar than they do about people – either their clients or their employees.
So prove them wrong. Show them that you are different. Participate in local fundraisers, support community events, feature your employees on your social media (in a good way – highlighting employee events, how fun it is to work with your team, rewards given to employees, etc).
A great place to start is to find out what your existing employees want (and what makes them stay with you). Use that in your job marketing. Ask employees for referrals. Reward them for their loyalty and they’ll talk about how great you are to their friends.
Employers are facing an unparalleled time right now, finding it very difficult to recruit good people. For many businesses, it’s difficult to get interest let alone keep someone after their first day. In order to be competitive in the job market, you need to stand out. These tips are a great place to start. As a Chamber member, you have lots of other resources available to you as well, from our online HR Toolkit to our Free HR Seminar. Investing some time addressing your staffing needs now will pay off greatly in the long run.