The cruellest cut of all

Everywhere you look at the moment there is doom and gloom and there are some organisations doing it really tough - hoping that the market will pick up but, if it doesn't, what can you do? Some organisations may need to consider redundancies for the greater good of the business; so can you make roles redundant to reduce your overall cost base? The answer is yes, but here are ten things you need to know:

1.      Under the changes to the Fair Work Act, all permanent and part time and, possibly, some casual employees are entitled to a retrenchment pay out

2.      The length of service is calculated only from 1st January 2010, regardless of how many years service the employee may have

3.      There is a formal process that all businesses need to follow to ensure procedural fairness. This includes a consultation period where both parties need to attempt to find alternative employment within the company (redeployment) or associated companies for the impacted individual

4.      Where possible, but not a legal requirement, offer additional support such as an Employee Assistance Program or Outplacement

5.      Check your Modern Award to confirm whether you have any additional requirements around advising your Union

6.      Communicate well, both with the individual and the organisation, as redundancies do unsettle teams. Also the organisation may have an obligation to advise the employees as soon as is practical after a decision has been made

7.      The process of identifying the employees impacted needs to be carefully assessed, managed and documented

8.      You cannot rehire into a redundant role for a period of 12 months

9.      Redundancy is not a replacement for active management of poor performing employees, which is a cheaper option (and not, necessarily, hugely time consuming if done well)

10.   Invest back into the remaining team to reassure them about the future, ensuring that you do not lose any additional employees through resignations. Ensure that the work that now needs to be completed elsewhere in the business is reassigned and factored into position descriptions

Redundancies are not only tough on the individual but on everyone. They are a tool at your disposal if you need it, but use it correctly.

When business starts to pick up, think about changing your team mix, enabling you to flex resources using a combination of permanent, part-time, virtual and casuals. The businesses that do this effectively are successful as they can buffer the market troughs.

Natasha Hawker owns Employee Matters Pty Ltd; an HR Consultancy that assists small to medium businesses with their HR functions to make them more efficient and profitable. Their offering includes HR Management, Recruitment, Training, Coaching, and Exit Management. – find them at www.employeematters.com.au

So why would you do it really?

As I watch the Olympics, I am inspired by these wonderful athletes and their desire for success and Olympic medals. But why do they do it? I mean, really, four years or more of preparation for sometimes 10 seconds of competition and it is over, mostly forever. There are a lot of sacrifices for that 10 seconds, so why do they do it? More importantly how can we apply to our businesses what we learn from this?
 
1. Goals - there is a goal and a looming deadline with milestones along the way. There is a clear vision of what the end goal is and what the athlete is working towards. Many athletes use visual prompts, for example, Natalie Cook had the Union Jack printed on all her equipment in her lead up

2. Team work - every single Australian athlete, regardless of whether their sport is an individual one or not, is part of a team, the Australian team

3. Motivation - every athlete has a motivating factor or factors driving them whether it is to represent their country, doing it for Mum and Dad or that they want to be the best in the world. Their coach is acutely aware of these motivators and uses them to pick the athlete up, when they flag

4. Opportunity - there is the opportunity, often fleeting but inspiring all the same. Think of all the sportsmen and sportswomen who undertook all that preparation over the past four years only to fail to make the national Olympic team, sometimes by a fraction of a second

5. Engagement - levels are really high and sustained and with engagement comes increased performance - the same as in business

6. Olympic values - the Olympics Values are clear and aspired to by the majority of athletes and those who emulate them are remembered. Just think of 'Eric the Eel' - who else was in his race? I know I can't remember, but I remember Eric 12 years later

7. Being part of something bigger than just you - there is that sense, with a history and future beyond your role. It is the magnitude of the event including more than just sport, but art, dance, singing and music

 8. Money - for some there may be a financial reward but, for most, their families have sacrificed money, holidays, time and sleep - but I suspect if you asked them whether they would do it all again, they would

9. Reward - for most the reward is knowing that they performed at their best, they made it to the Olympics, they were cheered on by a nation and they pushed their bodies and their minds to the limit

 It also makes me think of the fabulous Volunteers who receive no monetary reward but apply in their droves for an opportunity to be involved and largely do an excellent job, with minimal training and no previous experience.

I truly believe that applying these some attributes with your employees can help productivity and let's face it we all need this help with Australia ranking poorly in comparison with other OECD countries measuring productivity. Do you know what motivates your employees? What would motivate them further? Do they understand the goals of the business? Are you rewarding them and I don't mean purely from a monetary sense. Maybe it is time to put some Olympic spirit into your business and go for gold!!!!

Natasha Hawker owns Employee Matters Pty Ltd; an HR Consultancy that assists small to medium businesses with their HR functions to make them more efficient and profitable. Their offering includes HR Management, Recruitment, Training, Coaching, and Exit Management – find them at www.employeematters.com.au

School holidays - pleasure or pain?

For many of us, these times of the year are not relaxing - what on earth do we do with the children during the school holidays? The stress and expense of child care or organising activities to keep our young ones amused. We still have to work full-time and that deadline is still looming...

 So what can employers do to support their employees during this stressful time? 'Nothing!' You may say but there are a number of possible answers; remember you are a small business you have the ability to be flexible and innovative:

·         Talk to your impacted employees to ask how they are managing and if you can be of help. Position this as a ‘win win’ situation with increased flexibility aimed at maximum productivity

·         Can they work shorter hours, to coincide with holiday care programs start and finish times? Another option might be allowing employees to work from home, where possible, work a shorter year with pro rata pay. Maybe you can utilise a time in lieu program to trade off hours during school holidays

·         Build consensus and agreement about what might be possible and look to document your agreement and implement a tracking system to record any hours owing. Check your Modern Award to confirm that your initiative is legal

The reality is that society and the workplace both need to recognise that enabling working parents to work successfully has huge mutual benefits at their place of work. What are these likely benefits?

 Retention- retaining valued employees

 Attracting talent - winning the war for talent, people will want to work for you and you can have a better choice of applicants.  This will improve your brand, becoming an employer of choice

 Increasing engagement- the organisations with higher levels of engagement have higher levels of profit and productivity and reducing stress – your ‘duty of care’ as employer now covers managing the stress levels of your employees to a reasonable level

 Reduction in absenteeism – this approach is likely to reduce unplanned absenteeism and enable you to plan for the ebb and flow of your workforce

 It is worth noting that in businesses across Australia, other than those in hospitality and tourism, experience a reduction in productivity across the school holidays with large numbers of employees taking annual leave at this time. I have found that those employers who provide more flexible working conditions have very grateful, engaged and very hard working employees.

Natasha Hawker owns Employee Matters Pty Ltd; an HR Consultancy that assists small to medium businesses with their HR functions to make them more efficient and profitable. Their offering includes HR Management, Recruitment, Training, Coaching, and Exit Management – find them at www.employeematters.com.au

Current employment contracts – is it really that important?

By: Natasha Hawker

To have a contract or not - that is the question! Can you rely upon a handshake? I have found when dealing with SMEs that it is very common for the new business to grow quickly and an employment contract is pulled together hastily in order to bring on new employees. Most business owners borrow a mate’s employment contract to get something to use.  What often happens then is that various managers amend them (unbeknownst to the owner) and they end up with numerous versions, or in some instances no contract whatsoever, for their longest serving employees.

Why is this problematic then? Here are the top five reasons why you need to get your housekeeping in order:

Sets the scene - when someone is considering joining your organisation, one of the first impressions that they receive is the employment contract. This begins to set the tone for what they can expect life to be like as an employee of your company and what is important to the business. This can assist you in attracting the ‘right’ kind of employee

Consistency – imagine Jeff in accounts has negotiated into his contract an additional week of annual leave; first, this is a concession that has been agreed to and second, you immediately have an equity issue – do you reduce Jeff’s allowance back to four weeks or up everyone’s to five weeks? It is important to ensure that everyone is treated the same, especially as you grow

Not compliant with FWA changes – The Fair Work ACT came into effect 1^st January 2010 and with it comes a number of minimum standards which all employees across Australia are entitled to. Do you know what these are?  If not, you are in potentially in breach of the FWA and you should correct this immediately

Uncertainty of rights & expectations - To save any confusion everyone should be very clear about their rights - both employer and their employees and this generally reduces potential conflict

What happens when someone leaves? - It is a business reality that people will leave your organisation and when they do, are you protected against them taking with them client information, intellectual property or poaching your employees?  Unless this is in the contract it is ‘poor form’ but perfectly legal

A couple of other points to note, you are legally required under the FWA Act to supply any new employees with the Fair Work Information Statement when they join.  If you don’t you are breaching the Act.

I would also recommend that you regularly review and potentially amend your employment contract every 2-3 years and especially if there are changes in legislation. Remember the employment contract sets the framework for the way that you employ people and it protects your business in the long term. It shows that your employees matter to you!

Are your employment contracts current and do they protect you? It would be great to get your feedback.

Natasha Hawker owns Employee Matters Pty Ltd; an HR Consultancy that assists small to medium businesses with their HR functions to make them more efficient and profitable. Their offering includes HR Management, Recruitment, Training, Coaching, and Exit Management – find them at www.employeematters.com.au

What made 'The Voice' so successful?

While I watched 'The Voice' last night along with most of the country, I wondered why this show has been so successful? Especially given that we are buried in reality TV shows at the moment - what is the secret of their success? I believe that it comes down to Engagement; think about it...

Selection - with the blind auditions, people were selected purely on raw talent. Looks, image or age never came into it. We had diversity amongst the teams
 

Teaming - contestants became part of a team and felt a sense of belonging. They actively referred to themselves as being part of 'Team Keith'

Coaching - the experts were able to nurture and develop their team so that individuals had the confidence to perform better, more often and more consistently

Personality - we, as the audience, felt we got to know the coaches more as people than untouchable stars. They came across as real

Respect - there was none of the nastiness, bitchiness or making fools of people in public which many of the other talent shows trade on

Promotion - the coaches had to make tough decisions and select the team members that they felt were the most deserving and had the best chance of winning

Feedback - people received consistent and regular feedback to improve their knowledge and skills

Interaction - we got to see the interaction between the coaches and get a sense of what they were thinking

Belief - the individual team members felt that there was someone in their corner, encouraging them and believing in them

Influence - last, but perhaps most importantly, we as the audience could determine the outcome - and we did, Team Seal

This group was extremely talented but Karise Eden is different to the stock-standard pop star. She has depth, experience (mostly sad) and a sound that is different to the norm but, again, I am thrilled that the final four were not 'manufactured' girl or boy-band targets. It proves that the Australian public is more diverse in their music tastes than they are often given credit for.

It is a proven fact that Engagement makes an impact to the bottom line and Channel 9 are reaping these benefits now. How many of these tools to Engagement do you use in your business?

Natasha Hawker owns Employee Matters Pty Ltd; an HR Consultancy that assists small to medium businesses with their HR functions to make them more efficient and profitable. Their offering includes HR Management, Recruitment, Training, Coaching, and Exit Management – find them at www.employeematters.com.au

So is HR a necessary evil or can it positively impact EOI?

In the small to medium business sector after finance, IT and marketing, HR seems to come in last place in the operations priorities. I have often pondered why this may be the case? If you think about it, most businesses start as an idea a business owner is passionate; they work themselves to the bone, with no salary to get it off the ground, then some money comes in so they need the financials sorted and guess what -  many business owners are more than happy to get their accountant to look after it.

As businesses grow they need good IT infrastructure to make life easier. I love my IT as much as the next person, until it doesn't work,  and then I urgently need someone to fix it as I'm so dependent on it. Then there is marketing. Let's face it they are in marketing so are very good at selling their value proposition.

Then comes the lull - things have been ticking along nicely, growing bit by bit and one's mind turns to the 'touchy feely' HR that has yet to been ticked off the business plan. Headcount is starting to grow - ‘but wait, I have got away with it for this long - why invest now?'

And other questions; are you really getting away with it - what do your employees really think of you and your business? Do you know or, maybe more importantly, do you care? Do they have great ideas that you have no idea about? Can they see possible productivity gains that you can’t? Are they doing what they should be? How long are they planning on sticking around?

Talking of productivity, are you able to measure it? Can the current structure support rapid growth or will it break? Are you and more importantly your team all invested in the mission, vision and core values? Would the culture of the business be consistently described across the business and would you like what you hear?

Then there is the harsh reality of the Fair Work Act and your very important legal obligations. Are you operating under the terms and conditions of the correct Award? Do you send out the Fair Work Information Statement to every new employee? Do you understand NES, Flexible Working and Redundancy under FWA?

The truth is that any business with more than one employee has HR elements that need to be addressed such as recruitment, employment contracts, performance appraisals, training promotions, parental leave, flexible working, non-performing employees and conflicts, succession planning, motivation, engagement and retaining your best employees, to name just a few! If you want your business to succeed, grow and flourish you need to manage your employees and not just leave it up to luck.

I think that the answer to the original question is both - HR is a necessary evil from a legal standpoint but it can reduce costs in terms of possible fines and also make a difference to your bottom line. Having the 'right people in the right place at the right time' and future-proofing your business by understanding your skills inventory and potential, will meet and overcome any roadblocks that arise enabling you to quickly and effectively grow your business.

Natasha Hawker owns Employee Matters Pty Ltd; an HR Consultancy that assists small to medium businesses with their HR functions to make them more efficient and profitable. Their offering includes HR Management, Recruitment, Training, Coaching, and Exit Management. – find them at www.employeematters.com.au

Recruitment – a chore?

Recruitment for many is a necessary chore, but it doesn’t have to be. Recruitment is needed for growth and to combat attrition however, it is often a process that is executed poorly internally and, indeed, by some agencies. Recruitment is a core management skill that is often not taught well, or at all. Do you remember your first time as an interviewer? It was probably as terrifying for you as it was for the interviewee!

It’s time consuming; imagine you are recruiting an Accounts Assistance position on Seek; you could expect up to 280 applications - a review of these applications would take about 70 hours, allowing 15mins per CV and notification to the unsuccessful. You get to a shortlist of 10 candidates; you ring them to arrange an interview and discover 5 have already found an alternative role as you took 3 weeks to review all the applications! You offer the other 5 candidates a face-to-face interview, not realising that 3 of them have been unimpressed by your candidate management to date and now the role sounds a little dull. 10 hours later you have interviewed the 5 candidates; you ring to offer your preferred candidate only to discover she has already accepted another role paying $10k more than you were able to offer. Surely there must be an easier way? Well there is Employee Matters …

We will write and place your ads to attract the best candidates and deter the unsuitable ones with the use of a screening questionnaire. We will respond to every candidate, acknowledging their application and protecting your brand. We will review the applications and questionnaires and formally advise the unsuccessful candidates. We will phone-screen the initial cull to assess skills, motivation and salary expectations to avoid you wasting your time at interview. Following this, we will provide you with the top candidates for interview. We can even complete your ‘right to work’, reference and background checks. We have years of recruitment experience and charge an hourly rate depending on your preference.  Let us work as your trusted internal recruiter, with no vested interest in getting a placement fee of 15% or more of the total compensation.

It should be expected that for most Managers the average time to recruit would be up to 50 hours, if done well.  With our skill sets and recruitment systems it would take an average of 25-35 hours for us and 4 hours of your time to interview the preferred candidates. Let us take away your pain, provide you with better screened candidate and help you hire the right people to build your business.

Tell me your thoughts, we would love to hear what you think?

Natasha Hawker owns Employee Matters Pty Ltd; an HR Consultancy that assists small to medium businesses with their HR functions to make them more efficient and profitable. Their offering includes HR Management, Recruitment, Training, Coaching, and Exit Management – find them at www.employeematters.com.au