Employee Matters Client Experience – Part 2

This is the follow on blog on the Employee Matters Client Experience. The intention of this document is to map the client experience that we wish all of our clients to experience during all of their interactions with us. In every phone call, message, face to face meeting, tweet, LinkedIn & Facebook interaction, we need to consider the following:

Be prepared for anything – everyone in business knows that things will go wrong at times. Clients need to be kept in the loop and advised of progress, good or otherwise, especially if there is a likely delay or problem. We own our client’s problem even if it is not our role or fault. We each aim to be their person that gets things sorted. If we can’t, we find someone who can

It’s all about the long term relationship – we are determined to build long term relationships with our clients. For Employee Matters ‘long term’ means ten to twenty years and beyond. We want our clients to recommend us without having to ask, however we will ask for referrals too! We would like our clients to be happy to write testimonials for us

Share our stories – everyone loves a story much more that listening to statistics or benefits; we share our experience with our client through real-life examples. We obviously do not mention names, as this information is confidential and our client must feel confident that our integrity is without question. Shared stories create shared meaning; it also helps the client to understand that it is not just them experiencing this issue; others have and we helped them!

A simple thank you – this is basic good manners but paramount to the way we act and do business. Manners go an exceptionally long way and will be remembered by clients for a long time. A simple thank you, either in words, a gesture, a note or a gift; it’s a great way to remind the client that they really do matter

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

Employee Matters Client Experience – Part 1

The intention of this document is to map the client experience that we wish all of our clients to experience during all of their interactions with us. In every phone call, message, face to face meeting, tweet, LinkedIn & Facebook interaction, we need to consider the following:

It’s all about the client – every interaction and all work that you do must be client-centric. We do not want to see the attitude or behaviour; ‘what’s in it for me or Employee Matters?’  All communication must be centred on the customer and we must ask ‘what’s in it for the client?’  Then we must ask ourselves ‘so what next?’ Everything is tailored to the client and their needs

Get to know our client exceptionally well - it is critical to know our clients well; we need to understand their thoughts, opinions and needs in order to best match our offering and target our level of assistance. We will ensure that we can just talk to them as opposed to selling to them. We share with them important information that perhaps they didn’t know; they will love us for that. (Having said that, building deep and successful relationships with clients takes time so we don’t rush the process!)

Listen more - talk less – when interacting with a client we should be listening 70-80% of the time and asking pertinent questions, when necessary. We practice active listening; this shows the client that we really are listening to them. This listening skill will build the relationship and give us all the information that we need to match our clients’ needs

Don’t over-promise – be realistic when stating what we can achieve for a client. If we can’t do it in the timeframe requested, we say so, and let them know the reason. We advise a more realistic or practical timeframe but ensure that we understand the drivers for the request; maybe we could get part of the project to them more quickly and then follow up afterwards. We never lie to a client.  We do what we say we are going to do; if we tell a client we will ring them tomorrow morning before 10am, we make sure we do just that. (Even if it is to tell them of a delay; bad news is better than no news)

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 do the National Employment Standards (NES) do to my business?

So can anyone tell me who, in their current business, is entitled to redundancy pay? What are the new laws around parental leave? Do I have to hold a job open for two years? What does Flexible Work mean? Does this mean I have to let the individual work part time for five years? How will my business cope?

With the implementation of the Fair Work Act (1/1/10) and more specifically the National Employment Standards (NES), came a raft of changes to managing Redundancy, Parental Leave and Flexible Working. All SMEs need to ensure that their policies and procedures reflect these changes and have been updated and implemented accordingly.

So to give you a sense of some of the changes:

Redundancy now:

·         payable to anyone with more than a year’s service

·         not payable by “small business employers” (less than 15 employees)

·         you can apply to Fair Work Australia (FWA) to have the amount reduced

Parental Leave now:

·         there is no distinction between paternity and maternity leave

·         12 months continuous service prior to date of the child’s birth; this includes casuals who have been employed for at least 12 months

·         ability to request to extend leave period by a further 12 months ( 24 months in total)

Flexible Working now:

·         to care for children under school age or for children under 18 years old with a disability

·         examples of Flexible Working might be changes to hours worked, patterns or location of work

·         employers must have reasonable business grounds to refuse

So what should you do?

1.       have appropriate policies and procedures in place that remind employees of their obligations

2.      training about policies at induction and on an ongoing basis

3.      review all Redundancy, Parental and Flexible Work policies to ensure compliance with NES

4.      reverse-onus of proof in Adverse Action claims highlights the importance of keeping appropriate paper trials of disciplinary and performance issues

5.      ensure compliance with any obligations imposed by business policies

6.      ensure that managers have been trained to deal with requests appropriately

So make sure that in 2012 your policies and procedures are aligned with the National Employment Standards (NES) to avoid any issues with the FWA Ombudsman.

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

Will the yacht run aground? - Have I put the right people on the job?

A couple of years ago, I skippered a 52ft yacht with some ‘carefully selected’ friends around Croatia.  The reason I say carefully selected is that sailing can be a dangerous activity; you need to have a clearly defined leader and have people that, regardless of age or sex, follow orders, especially in a crisis.  Organisation and process are key so that you don’t kill each other. They also need to trust you; when you say ‘that water spout over there could very easily change direction and hit us, so put your harness on!’ You need to know that they will do as you direct. 

The trip had been fraught with challenges; although I had learnt navigation all the maps and radio announcements were in Croatian, which I could neither speak nor understand.  I had to go with my instinct a lot of the time which I am pleased to say was right more often than wrong.

We had engine trouble and eventually about 30 nautical miles from our marina were without an engine and under sail.  Night time was approaching and our help would not be arriving until the morning. The majority of the crew were inexperienced sailors, bar one other and things were starting to look a little grim; we scoped out a Bay to anchor in which was filled with other boats and short on space. The breeze was moderate but as those who sail will know, sailing into anchor with fickle winds is not for the faint hearted and a cool head was needed. I consulted the other experienced sailor and we briefed the crew explaining the difficulty and challenges of what we had to do. I told the girls that they were to remain down below, effectively and bluntly out of the way. I needed the guys’ muscles to whip the sails down as quickly as possible when told, to slow us down. Everyone was given a role and told it could change quickly, so to stay quiet and react accordingly when instructed. As we approached our anchor point, the winds changed and I was heading to shore quickly, the depth sounder was screaming out at us telling us that we were nearly going aground. At the last minute the wind changed and I was able to change course, lower the anchor at pace and get the sails down and finally, thank god, come to a stop. As is often the case with the sailing community, we had an audience and even received applause from the boats closest.  Unfortunately sounds travels really well on water! As my crew on deck sat down shaking and relieved, the girls leapt into action pouring everyone very stiff G&Ts.  They set ‘em up and we all drank ‘em! One crew member who had never smoked a cigarette in his life puffed his first - and last.

To me, this example clearly shows a team that was fully and unconditionally engaged; they were cohesive and supportive and all played their roles within the boundaries set.  This is the kind of team most employers would die for and one that all HR Managers should be finding for them. Getting the mix right matters!

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

New Year - New Hires?

I believe ‘Bring on 2012!’ will be the catchcry for most SMEs after a challenging year however, normally in February, in the heat of the summer, companies start to look for new recruits.  Sometimes this is to replace the ones that decided to act on their New Year’s resolution and others due to the normal recruitment cycle. 

Most employers and supervisors have never been taught to interview and this can lead to ineffective interviews and employee selection. Recruitment is a costly exercise - both financially, with recruitment fees, but there are also the unseen costs of time spent reviewing CVs, conducting interviews, rejecting candidates, co-ordinating interviews and liaising with the recruitment agency. That said, your people are often not only the most important factor influencing your business success but also the most expensive; so it is critical to get it right.

Five things you must do with your recruitment strategy to ensure that your employees feel like they matter to you and your business:

1.       Process – know the process that your organisation will follow and use it consistently across the organisation. This ensures effective due diligence but also the protection of your brand. A major ‘bug bear’ of mine is the number of organisations that don’t send rejection emails. The candidate has taken the time to apply so it is only courteous to respond. How do you think the candidate will speak about your business if they are ignored through the recruitment process?

2.      Documentation – ensure that you have a job description which talks about the role and a job specification which talks about the skills of the individual required to complete the job. You need to complete interview notes and hold these on file for five years and be able to justify your decisions. The decision needs to be based on skills & fit rather than sex, sexual persuasion or religion.

3.      Advertise – Seek is still probably the most effective way to attract candidates. Ensure that your ad sells the role and has no typos or grammatical errors. Remember it is a tight applicant market and you are attempting the win the war for talent. Make sure that you are paying a market-relevant salary and don’t ignore a non-traditional hire such as part-time permanent or work from home employees.

4.      Interview questions - ask each candidate the same, set questions otherwise it is will be difficult to compare candidates and, more importantly, to justify your decision if you are called on to do so. Ask a combination of technical questions but also behavioural ones such as ‘tell me about a time when you had more work than you could manager, what happened?’ This type of question allows you to explore what applicants have done in the past and it is very likely that they will react this way again, if faced with the same situation. Use probing questions to get the level of detail that you require; avoid the temptation to skim.

5.      Sell the role – tell the applicants about the role- what is the role? What are your expectations for the role? What might the future hold for the successful applicant? What are some of the challenges? What would success look like? What are the plans for the business over the next 12 months to three years?  Let them ask questions and answer honestly. Don’t embellish but give a realistic overview. Remember you are competing with other businesses for the best candidates.  You want them to pick you, if they have a choice, and in the current market it is more than likely that they will have.

So you have completed all of your interviews and it is decision time; remember that you are ideally looking for a candidate with 60-70% of the experience and skills to do the job. This way they can experience growth and development and will not leave quickly due to boredom or not wanting to wait for the next opportunity or promotion. Ensure that you send appropriately worded rejection emails to the unsuccessful candidates as you might want to look to hire them in the future as you grow.

Remember, getting the best people for your business is essential to your business success, ensure that you get this process right first time and reap the rewards. It really does matter!

By: Natasha Hawker