Hiring a member of staff for a small to medium company can be a risky prospect, as you haven’t got the time or money, like larger companies, to go through a thorough recruitment process that allows you to pick the right candidate(s). The amount of people you hire represents how fast your company is expanding, but at the same time you obviously want people who are passionate about the role you are about to offer them and strive to work hard for your business.

Are you Equipped to hire new staff

Before you start hiring new staff members, you should take the time to think about why you need more help. You could find, when you do hire them, that they weren’t really needed in the first place, meaning you’ll have to let them go. An ordeal which is embarrassing, time consuming, and costs money, especially for a new business. When hiring new staff think about:

● Where would they be working and what would they be doing that you or somebody else might not be able to do.

● Is there space for them to work? You don’t want to hire anybody in a small retailer and you find it difficult to move around and do your job efficiently

● If you already have full-time staff, could some of them work part time so you could use their services more on days you’re more likely to be busy. If you have part time staff, could they possibly do full-time to make them more efficient to your companies needs

The obvious factor to think about when hiring staff is whether they share the same passion for your industry as you do (or should). This doesn’t mean hiring someone that has the same personality as yourself, but more in terms of hiring someone who would not be easily bored in their role and has previous knowledge or passion for taking up the position.

Advertising the position

It is important that when advertising, that you place the job in a medium that will be seen by the people you want to hire. There’s no point in wanting to hire kitchen staff and then placing your advertisement in the back of a phone magazine, you’re very unlikely to get a call back. Look into areas that have a high prevalence of advertising in your sector and are able to deliver on getting you the right candidate for the job.

Also, if you’re not trying to go through a long recruitment process then you might be better off not trying the larger spaces to advertise from, as you might receive hundreds if not thousands of replies which you’ll have to trawl through to pick your interviewees. Many people might use recruitment agencies to help find an employee, but to be honest it is usually a waste of money and time, as you could easily do it yourself, and in a shorter space of time.

Make sure you detail the objectives of the role in the advertisement and what skills you may want them to have, proofreading your work to make sure there are no errors. It’s deemed laughable and unforgivable if you’re attempting to recruit staff and you can’t even write out the advertisement properly.

The Interview

The interview is where you get to meet the people who are confident enough to reply to your advertisement, hoping their chosen for the role. For the prospective employee it can be a daunting and scary time, and your job should be to make it as comfortable as possible for them. If they’re not comfortable then you may not get the desired response from them that you want, making the recruitment process take longer.

Before interviewing, attempt to write down an employee bio of what skills or qualities you hope your prospective employee to have. List questions that are relevant to the job role and the important aspects they will have to learn in that position. Again, your aim is not to catch them out but to see if they can fit in the company and work well with you and others. You’ll know when you’ve found the right person, as they’ll most likely be really enthusiastic about the job, and have lots to say about the role and maybe even your business.

Always do a background check of the person you’re hiring. Any referees they have supplied to you should always have at least an email and phone number that you can contact. Speak to their previous employers and then make your final decision on this (if it’s positive) and take into account everything else you want from your targeted employee.

Although they want the job, make sure you outline what the role is about and what they will be doing. Tell them what you do and about the history of your business. It’s better to tell them this now, rather than later, so they can make a decision on whether they feel the role is right for them too.

You’ve chosen the right staff

Once you have chosen your new member(s) of staff, allow them to get on with the job, guiding them along the way and being there to help if it’s needed. Always respect those that work for you, since they are more likely to return the favour. It’s an obvious fact that disgruntled members of staff are unlikely to fulfil their role properly if treated harshly by their managers, so make sure you give them a reason to want to work for you.

At the end of the day, you’re the person who makes the final decision on who to pick for your company, but be aware; you may not always make the right one. Unfortunately people do lie on their CV’s to get jobs that they are not qualified for, you can prevent these people from being a part of your business by, as mentioned, checking their background, and hopefully, through it all, you’ll be able to choose your desired new member of staff. Make sure your staff are familiar with any equipment you might have at your store such as PDQ Machines ( Seen here at Seymour Direct ) or other payment, scanning and stock checking devices.