One good one

One good employee is worth three average employees.  And I am absolutely sure you immediately know who that is in your organization. I would also guess you can name the three marginal members of your staff as well.

How nice it would be to have an entire staff of “good” employees.  Very nice indeed, but tough to do in this environment when all you hear out in the marketplace is that “qualified” people are not available. So it is probably just about impossible to find both qualified and good folks to bring into the fold. 

To give yourself a fighting chance to attract the “keepers” you will need a system to attract, engage, hire and keep people once you identify the one’s you are interested in talking to.  I would relate this system to something similar to what your best sales folks have in terms of a system to engage potential customers as well as close the deal.

For some reason there are a lot of people out of work either because they lost their job or because they are not interested in looking for work. Included in this group are folks marginally attached to work who could be swayed to come join your program if the pay is better than the marginal work they are doing. They could be swayed your way, but only if they know the opportunity is there and is presented in a way to show your place of business is an attractive place to work.

When I think of the multiple generations that make up our workforce the one conclusion I come to is you need to be flexible and able to deal with the needs associated with each group. We have the boomers. We have the Gen X and we have our new friends the millennials.

I believe boomers are still interested in working but maybe not a full week or a full day. I also believe many boomers are tech savvy and at least able to perform those pesky PM’s you always fall behind on.

Boomers could also work from home and perform clerical tasks.  Some do collection work, track insurance certificates and make calls reminding customers about service appointments

In this day and age there are many ways to work around a full 40 hr schedule and still get the job done for less cost.

There are three major employment categories we need help with:

Techs

Sales

Clerical

From what I read it appears that current employee referrals provide the best source for techs.  If this is so I suggest you make it profitable for the referral source to do so. And I am not talking $500… I am suggesting a lot more maybe paid over a 3-5 year period if the employee stays. Once the word gets around that there is some “real” money to be made there will be techs lined up at your door leaving you with the problem of weeding out the unqualified candidates. Nice problem to have ….right?

As far as sales folks go it is best to try and find other organizations that you know do an exceptional job of training their sales staff. If you can find them and pick off a few of their folks you will find it will take less time for those folks to get into selling lift trucks, parts, service and rental, because they understand  a process is necessary to find, cultivate and harvest business from new and existing customers.

On the other hand, if you can find hard working sales professionals who need some help to move them up the ladder to success, I would suggest providing sales tests along with sales training to improve their sales skills. I have been hearing some good things about certain training facilities and have personally been involved with the sales process and found the results quite impressive. I would be glad to pass on a name and number if you need it, but don’t want to spell it out in this column.

And let’s keep in mind that the sales skills of old take a lot more time than a process built around today’s technology. Mobile apps, tablets and customer contact systems have a way to keep you in front of your customers at a fraction of the cost if you had people doing this work internally. Want some ideas, let me know.

So once you engage these folks what is it exactly they are looking for?  Well, let me tell you.

Comp and bonus structure.

Overall company culture.

Health Insurance.

Current technology (all three groups).

Financial planning.

 I have one more to add to the list but in all honesty thought it is a bit farfetched.  You will love this one…..and it is………..HAVE FOOD AVAILABLE ALL DAY LONG!   And guess what….IT IS A BIG DEAL! Especially for the younger crowd.  As it turns out a group of dealers I talked to confirmed this to be true. It turns out this is an internal networking thing that brings people closer to the company they work for.

I guess the point of this column is to make you aware that there are people out there willing to earn a buck for themselves and their employer. All you have to do is spend some time making your “culture” more friendly and progressive. In the end, if employees like what they are doing and where they work they will stay and bring other good employees with them.

Now get out there and buy some donuts.

Garry Bartecki is a CPA MBA with GB Financial Services LLC. E-mail [email protected] to contact Garry.

 

 

 

 

 

Author: Garry Bartecki

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