Teresa
Ward
June
2010
Becoming a board member with the ARCSI, I feel my company has
raised standards for the cleaning industry, and Teresa’s Family Cleaning has
also raised the bar for other companies to follow. One particular area is our
hiring methods.
All too
often the hiring of employees for a company is a practice that is done
carelessly out of convenience. Many times people are signed up quickly to
ensure that there are enough hands to perform the job and/or services. Much
time is spent training these people. It should be the other way around. More
care should be taken on who we hire more than the training of the wrong
individual as wrong selection has many downfalls.
Repercussions of a neglectful hiring method range from
inferior quality of work to high turn-over rates. No company wants customer
dissatisfaction resulting from poor workmanship and low productivity. And
nobody wants the results of employee turnover which will most certainly include
lost time, aggravation, and increased hiring costs- advertising and training.
Yet many managers have either not thought about new hiring techniques or just
feel they do not have the time to seek them out. If, however, they made the
investment of time and a little expense, hiring managers would see that their
company just might benefit from a better quality employee all around.
There are different methods an employer may use as a better
means of hiring employees. There is, of course, changing the interview. The
interview is usually the most common way of screening applicants. Kinds of
interviews vary greatly and a manager may consider a change to the types of
questions asked, or add some to include thoughts about behavior, attitude and
knowledge instead of general nice-to meet you, where do you live, how did you
hear about us questions. Positive results are more readily reached by asking
the “right” questions, and in a set, structured way. Unstructured interviews
are often ineffective.
Now interviewing may be a useful tool in finding a person who
seems pleasant enough, and may be able to do the job, but interviewing alone
will not reveal if that person will stay with your company.
There are many reasons why an employee leaves a job. A good
hiring manager must be able to try to determine what will make a person stay at
the job and be productive, and then put that knowledge into their hiring
method. Learning a person’s characteristics is usually the key in deciding if
that particular applicant will stay for the long haul or walk out the door in a
couple weeks. So instead of just an interview, a good idea is to test the
prospective hire.
An intelligence test usually measures aptitude, verbal
ability, and reasoning skills. This type of test is fine for hiring teachers or
nurses and those that must have mental capabilities to compute or engineer
something. But it will not reveal the “staying power” of a person.
There is also the personality test which has become quite
popular. Using a series of character-identifying questions, a manager may be
able to see positive and negative traits of a candidate employee. This will
help them determine if the person will be satisfied with the job, salary, other
employees, and nature of the company. It gives an idea of the kind of person he
or she is, likes and dislikes etc. But this again, will not disclose the
prospect of a long lasting relationship.
We use the Orion test. This confidential test is a series of
questions developed to measure a very important component- attitude. The
attitude of a person, more than intelligence, personality or any other trait,
is a bottom-line indicator of an employee’s potential for long term employment.
The Orion test reveals a person’s experimentation with drugs, and workplace
drug use attitude, supervisory attitudes, work ethic attitude, workplace theft
attitude, prospects for long term employment, customer service, and safety and
risk avoidance attitudes. The test does not take long and is calculated
electronically. No computation by the interviewee.
Another piece to the hiring practice should include
having hiring packets. Inside each should be:
1.
An
Equal Opportunity Employee Statement
2.
Space
for applicant’s employment history
3.
Certification
of truthfulness
4.
An
acknowledgment of the company’s “at will” employment policy (for non unions)
5.
A
drug test authorization form (if applicable)
6.
A
consent form for background checks – if you use a third party company to do
them.
7.
A
review of the company’s policies and procedures which must have a place for a
signature. This is an important document stating that you communicated your
policies and the employee understands them.
8.
Form
I-9 (Employment Eligibility Verification) The United States Dept of Justice
–Immigration and Naturalization Service requires that individuals you hire are
legally eligible to work in the U.S. This forms has a
list of acceptable documents a new employee can use to establish their identity
and employment eligibility.
Although
sometimes expensive, using a third party to do background checks may be very
useful. They can uncover criminal records, motor vehicle records, credit
history, education verification and employment verifications.
Many guidelines and tips can be
downloaded from various websites including the Labor Department and other
government sites.
Another good idea is to maintain records
for people you have interviewed, whether you hired them or not. This will save
a lot of time with repeat applicants. I keep a whole separate draw with notes.
These simple changes in my hiring practices have raised my
entire company’s standards and morale. It has not only allowed me and my
clients to feel more comfortable with our employees, it has also saved us all
money. I, now, have the time to focus my attention on other pressing matters of
my business. Gone are the days of going through dozens of employees, poor
service, frustration, stress on good workers, wasted training dollars, and the
negative impact on my company from customers that had a bad experience with a
less than desirable employee.
With the help of the Orion test and maintaining documentation,
we will continue to do our best to hire only the people with good overall
attitudes and good customer service skills.
Training to do the work is the easy part. Maintaining a safe, productive work
environment is now a lot easier too. We have come a long way.
©2010 Teresa’s Family Cleaning