How to Know If You Need To Hire Temp Workers?

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If your company has designated periods that are busier than others are, hiring temp workers is a great solution. Temp workers can provide much-needed relief and assistance to help keep your company operating smoothly without the added headaches of adding full-time employees to your team. These tips will help determine whether or not you need to hire temp workers.

Assess Your Company’s Workload

Whether or not your company needs to hire temp workers really depends on the size of your company’s workload. The best way to assess your company’s workload is to sit down with your employees and ask if they feel overwhelmed by their current and upcoming tasks. If the majority of your employees say yes, you might want to look into hiring temp workers to lighten up some of the workloads.

Assess Your Staffing Power

Do you have the resources and/or time to staff responsible temp workers? Connect with a staffing firm who specializes in your industry. They will remove the burden of staffing from your shoulders and find the best temp employee matches for your needs.

List Ways Temp Workers Could Help

Make a make a list of the temp worker’s duties and tasks a temp worker would fill. Are these responsibilities that could easily be assimilated by existing staff or would hiring them out enable everybody to be more productive? This is an excellent way to determine if you need temp assistance and how many employees you could use.

Do a Cost-Benefit Analysis

Hiring temp workers will come at a cost to your company. On the other hand, if you need the help, hiring temps through a staffing affirm will save you time and costs attributed to benefits, and taxes. Completing a cost-benefit analysis of the temp workers and their financial pull on the company may surprise you. Furthermore, even though your payroll might increase for a certain time period, the additional help from your temp workers could increase your overall revenue and productivity, so that would be worth it.

If you need help hiring temp workers, contact Award Staffing. We will figure out your company’s exact needs and the time frame in which the temp workers would be needed. Then, we will match you with hard workers, compatible with your company needs.

 

FINDING YOUR TALENT

Want to learn more about how Award Staffing can help your organization with your staffing and employment needs? Start by providing our team with a few pieces of information about yourself, and we will take care of the rest.

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How to Resolve Anger and Conflict in the Workplace

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If you work in a place of employment with other people, conflict will arise at some point or another. While the severity of the conflict will range from situation to situation, the principles behind resolving anger and conflict in the workplace remain the same. If you can successfully avert anger and conflict in the workplace, you will be much better equipped for whatever your career endeavors throw at you. Here’s how to resolve anger and conflict in the workplace:

Figure Out The Root Issue

There is always a root issue behind every form of conflict, including in the workplace. Whatever the root issue is, for example – jealousy or frustration, knowing and understanding it is very important in finding a resolution. This knowledge allows you to empathize with and understand the person with whom you are in conflict. Often, this is the first step in reaching a peaceful solution.

Utilize Assertive Communication

In a conflict, it’s important to communicate your needs assertively. With passivity and aggression being the two extremes, assertion generally tends to be the best form of communication to problem-solve and understand simultaneously. You must be willing to assert your needs and expectations clearly, while also listening to your colleague do the same, if you want to resolve your differences.

Brainstorm Possible Solutions

If you want to find a solution, brainstorm possible ideas together! Doing this will put you and your colleague on an equal playing field as you work together to fix the workplace tension.

Get Superiors Involved if Necessary

Sometimes, conflicts can be so complicated that neither party wants to compromise or budge on a certain issue. If this is the case and the conflict is impeding your ability to work, you will have to get superiors involved. Though this could be embarrassing, it’s sometimes necessary to have an objective third party involved in the conflict to help a fair solution be reached.

 

FINDING YOUR TALENT

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Understanding Background Check Requirements and Complying with EEOC as an Employer

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If you’re hiring a new employee, and require a background check, there are a few key components you need to know.

Ban the Box

As an employer in the State of Minnesota, Ban the Box simply requires an employer to wait until later in the hiring process — at the interview stage or a when a conditional job offer has been extended — before asking the applicant about their criminal record or conducting a criminal background check.  The Ban the Box legislation passed by the State Legislature required all employers in Minnesota to remove the box asking about criminal convictions from all applications.

No Blanket Policies

You cannot have a policy that makes blanket statements like “No Felony.”  Every employee must have their criminal history examined carefully against the criteria for the job.  This doesn’t mean you have to hire felons.  It simply requires that in order to exclude a candidate based on their criminal history, it must be relevant to the job.  For example, a driving offense is relative to a driving position, not a receptionist position.

Do not ask about Medical History

As an employer, it’s only human that you want to know as much as you can about your future employee. After all, the more information you have, the better hiring decision you can make, right? Wrong. There are certain pieces of information that you’re not allowed to ask about until you’ve offered the potential employee a job, and medical history is one of those pieces of information.

Be Careful You are not Discriminating

If you make a judgment based on someone’s race, religion, sexual orientation, disability, or age, for example, you could be liable for a lawsuit on behalf of the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission. When you’re asking questions about your potential employee’s background, make sure that you aren’t making any decisions about hiring or not hiring that candidate based on personal information such as the above-mentioned factors.

Obtain Written Permission

Before you actually initiate the background check, your potential new hire must sign and give written permission that the results could influence your decision regarding whether or not to hire her/him. This will save you legal grief if your check does affect your hiring and the candidate objects. It also lets the potential new hire know that you are serious about hiring the best candidates possible for your position.

Follow Proper Protocol after Receiving a Negative Report

If you do find something negative in your potential hire’s background check, you need to provide them with a copy of the background check and a “Summary of Rights.” If the candidate feels like a mistake has been made, the summary will include instructions for him/her to follow. Be prepared to write a letter of justification if the negative check results in a “no hire.” Interested in learning more about the EEOC? Visit the EEOC website.

 

FINDING YOUR TALENT

Want to learn more about how Award Staffing can help your organization with your staffing and employment needs? Start by providing our team with a few pieces of information about yourself, and we will take care of the rest.

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How to Hire Night Shift Employees in Minnesota

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If your company has a need for night shifts, you know how important it is to hire reputable employees. Often, night shift employees are one or some of the only employees at the location while everyone else is at home sleeping. This means that the employee will need to handle issues of safety, customer service, financial matters, and more. Here’s how to hire responsible night shift employees:

Have Recommendations

The easiest way to hire responsible night shift employees is to have a reputable staffing agency or people you trust recommend potential new hires. These recommendations can come from friends, family members, or other colleagues. Trusted recommendations increase your chances are that the potential employee is responsible and a good choice.

Ask Hypothetical Questions

Those who are working the night shift often carry greater responsibility. In order to make sure you are hiring the individual or individuals who can successfully handle these tasks effectively, ask them hypothetical questions. This will allow you to assess the potential recruit’s ability to think on his or her feet and see whether you agree with their responses.

Check References

If a potential recruit has worked a night shift position before, always check their references. Their previous employers will be able to tell you how long they worked together, if there were ever any potential issues that arose, and why they left. The information you receive from these phone calls could easily steer you in one direction versus another in terms of making a hire.

Do a Supervised Test Run

Because there is so much at stake with putting all your trust in night shift employees, you should do a supervised probation period. This could be as simple as asking a current employee to spend the first few night shifts with the new employee. This not only allows you to see what it will be like with your new employee, but also to provide peace of mind for both of you in terms of duties and task completion before you make the actual hire.

If you are in need of hiring one or more night shift employees, contact Award Staffing. We can walk through the entire process with you to ensure that you make the most responsible hire possible for your business and other employees. It’s our job to make sure you feel safe and comfortable with your new employee; we will work with you until we achieve that goal together.

 

FINDING YOUR TALENT

Want to learn more about how Award Staffing can help your organization with your staffing and employment needs? Start by providing our team with a few pieces of information about yourself, and we will take care of the rest.

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Improve Employee Productivity For Your MN Business

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If you own a business that has multiple interactions with clients or customers, you know how important it is for your employees to be productive. If an employee isn’t productive for a day, it can really hurt your sales, workflow, and even your other employees. If one or more of your employees has been lagging in the productivity department, you need to step in and do something. Here’s how to improve the productivity of your employees:

Be Concise

Some of your employees may not be entirely productive because they’re confused or unclear about your instructions. In order to remedy this, try to be as concise as possible when speaking with your employees. Instead of adding anecdotes or tangents to your instructions, give your employees one or two clearly-defined tasks and make sure they understand before moving on to the next subject.

Encourage Open Communication

If an employee is confused about a particular task in a closed-communication environment, he or she will waste more time trying to figure it out alone than if they asked for your advice. For this reason, you should always encourage open communication with your employees. Ensure that they free to talk to you should a question or problem arise.

Hold Regular Meetings

Some employees can veer off-task over time because they are used to doing something a certain way or forget the importance of a certain task. If you hold regular meetings about your company’s goals, it will be much easier for your employees to be productive. They will be reminded of the goals and tasks on a regular basis and much more likely to adhere to them than if they are expected to remember lofty goals from infrequent meetings.

Allow For Different Work Styles

If you truly want to improve the productivity of your employees as much as possible, allow for different work styles. This could mean allowing employees work at their preferred hours – when appropriate and/or develop their own processes for getting work done. Whatever you decide, make sure to let your employees know that they are free to do the work in whichever way they choose as long as the result is consistent with your goals. Sometimes, the real culprit is understaffing.

Contact Award Staffing and we can help match you up with employees who are receptive to feedback and who can work quickly without compromising on their work’s integrity.

 

FINDING YOUR TALENT

Want to learn more about how Award Staffing can help your organization with your staffing and employment needs? Start by providing our team with a few pieces of information about yourself, and we will take care of the rest.

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Why Customer Service should always be the Top Priority

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Part of owning a business is choosing your business’s priorities. Many business owners choose profitability or visibility as a priority and are surprised when their business has problems. No matter what type of business you run, customer service is a value that extends into other aspects of the business and promotes overall well-being. Here’s why customer service should always be the top priority:  

Keeps Employees Focused

Giving your employees a top priority to keep in mind will help them to remain focused throughout the day. This will help them shape all their decisions, interactions, and thought processes throughout the day. If your customers know that the highest goal you have in mind is to provide excellent customer service, they will spend their time at work striving to meet and exceed their standards from the previous day.

Keeps Customers Happy

When you’re focused on customer service, your customers will be happy. When you have happy customers, you are more likely to have repeat customers. Make it known to your customers and the public that customer service is the highest priority for you. This will make you extremely competitive amongst other similar businesses.

Promotes Positive Image of the Business

By making customer service a top priority, you’re letting people know that they matter. This will promote a positive image of your business because ultimately, your customers are people. When you spend the time listening to a customer or fixing an issue, your customer will appreciate that so much. If your customers feel honored and respected, they want to come back.

Promoting a Positive Image Helps Profitability

If you are promoting a positive image of your business, this is going to translate into more customers walking in your doors. More customers walking in your doors leads to increased profitability. Owning and operating a profitable business is a cycle, but it all begins with customer service – how highly you can prioritize your customers.

If you want to hire employees who have been well trained in customer service procedures and policies, contact Award Staffing. We have a database of reputable employees who have a long history of working in customer service jobs and who will be able to add to your company’s overall image.

 

FINDING YOUR TALENT

Want to learn more about how Award Staffing can help your organization with your staffing and employment needs? Start by providing our team with a few pieces of information about yourself, and we will take care of the rest.

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How to Help Your Employees Meet Their Full Potential

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If you’re managing employees on a regular basis, you are aware if they are, or are not, meeting their full potential. Encouraging your employees to meet their full potential not only ensures that they will be happier, but also enhances workplace productivity and success. Here’s how to help your employees meet their full potential.

Assess Their Strengths

The first way you can help your employees meet their full potential is to assess their strengths. You can do this by observing them while they’re working and seeing what comes naturally to them. You’ll find that some employees are better at quantitative tasks while others are better at qualitative tasks. Some employees are better at short-term execution, while others are better at long-term strategy. Once you have a baseline of their strengths, you can start to help them meet their full potential.

Ask What They Want to Do

It’s important to ask your employees what they want to do and what potential they want to achieve. While a particular employee may be great at administrative work, he or she might have a passion for customer service. You will need to find the balance between what they like doing and what they’re good at to make your efforts fully successful.

Have Monthly Check-Ins

Once you’ve established the goal or goals your employee should be striving for, make it a point to check in with him/her regularly. This will keep your employee accountable, and it will allow you to assign new goals or tasks for them to meet consistently.

Encourage Them to Strive For Greatness

Above all, you need to encourage your employees to strive for greatness if they’re going to meet their full potential. This can be done by letting your employees know you believe in them and that you are rooting for their success. You will be surprised at how much people can accomplish when they even have one person believing in them.

If you’re looking for new employees to help reach their full potential, contact Award Staffing. We will be able to match you up with employees who have high personal and career-oriented goals who would also be a good fit for your company.

 

FINDING YOUR TALENT

Want to learn more about how Award Staffing can help your organization with your staffing and employment needs? Start by providing our team with a few pieces of information about yourself, and we will take care of the rest.

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Understanding Baby Boomers, Gen X-ers, and Millennials in the Workforce

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We’re at a fascinating time in the workforce right now. Baby Boomers, Gen X-ers, and Millennials are all working together in harmony but in different capacities. Here’s what you need to understand about the differences between Baby Boomers, Gen X-ers, and Millennials in the workforce.

Baby Boomers

Baby boomers are the quintessential definition of “workaholics.” They are used to working extremely long hours to achieve the results they want, and believe that work ethic directly translates to work quality. Baby Boomers believe that positions of authority and power should be granted to those who have acquired a fair amount of experience and who have worked hard enough for it.

Many Baby Boomers have sacrificed other pursuits (such as families, vacation, and hobbies) in favor of working the traditional way up the ladder. They expect to be given respect for all the time they have put into their careers.

Gen X-ers

Gen X-ers are typically viewed as being cautious and intelligent when it comes to working. They don’t work as many hours as Baby Boomers, and they work “smarter” than Millennials do. They would much rather prefer to have a task assigned to them and complete it in entirety before moving on to the next task. Gen X-ers are inherently independent and excel in situations in which they are given the chance to work alone or assign their own values. In terms of their role, Gen X-ers tend to be the people in the company who can take a certain task and finish it without wasting or diverting any time.

Millennials

Millennials are firmly in the camp of working to live, and not the other way around. Many millennials view their jobs as a means to an end and prefer to leave the office as soon as the clock strikes five o’clock. Unlike Gen X-ers, Millennials prefer to collaborate with one another and multi-task on many different projects at once.

Millennials also differ from Baby Boomers in that they aren’t workaholics and view their worth as being defined by contribution as opposed to merit or experience. Overall, millennials make good employees if they feel like their voice is being heard and if it’s understood that work is not their primary passion in life.

If you are trying to decide whether you should hire a Baby Boomer, Gen X-er, or Millennial, contact Award Staffing. We will be able to sit down with you and assess the correct situation for your business depending on your unique needs. All of the generations provide very different experiences and have different outlooks, so it is important to take that into account when making your hiring decisions.

 

FINDING YOUR TALENT

Want to learn more about how Award Staffing can help your organization with your staffing and employment needs? Start by providing our team with a few pieces of information about yourself, and we will take care of the rest.

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How to Effectively Work for a Baby Boomer

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If you’re currently in the workforce, there’s a good chance that you’re working for a Baby Boomer. Currently, Baby Boomers are ages 44 – 62 and make up 45% of the workforce. Most Baby Boomers have put in time at their jobs and have successfully risen in the ranks. Here’s what you need to keep in mind when you’re working for a Baby Boomer.

Respect Their Authority

Baby Boomers come from the frame of mind that experience is the most important factor in determining authority. When you work for a Baby Boomer, it’s safe to assume that you have less experience than them. In order to work for a Baby Boomer, they need to feel like their experience is worth something to you.

This means that whenever possible, you should defer to their judgment if a big decision or challenge is at stake. This will not only establish a positive rapport between you and your Baby Boomer boss, but it will also help you learn and develop problem-solving skills in your career.

Show Your Work Ethic

Work ethic goes a long way for a Baby Boomer. Because Baby Boomers are so used to working long hours on hard projects, they also want to see you putting in that much effort. While you shouldn’t have to stay until sunset every night, it wouldn’t hurt to let them know that you’ve been putting in extra time or personal time on a project that’s particularly important to you. Or, you can prove your work ethic to them by offering extra help on a project that’s vital to the company’s success.

Develop a Personal Relationship

Baby Boomers prioritize personal, face-to-face relationships over any other type of relationship. If you want to be on your Baby Boomer boss’s good side, make it a point to regularly scheduled meetings with him or her. This will let your boss know that you’re not only serious about your job and duties, but you’re also serious about your personal relationship with him/her. When you do this, you should see an improvement in communication, which will also help you with your career endeavors down the road.

If you are interested in finding your next career, contact Award Staffing. No matter what generation you’re in, we will be able to match you up with a company that can work with your unique skill sets and offerings.

 

FINDING YOUR TALENT

Want to learn more about how Award Staffing can help your organization with your staffing and employment needs? Start by providing our team with a few pieces of information about yourself, and we will take care of the rest.

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Managing Baby Boomers in The Minnesota Labor Market

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Baby Boomers are coming to the points in their careers where some are starting to step down or retire in favor of having a Gen X-er or a Millennial replace them. If you are in charge of a Baby Boomer, keep in mind that they have likely been in the workforce a lot longer than you have and expect a certain degree of respect. Here’s what you need to keep in mind when you’re managing a Baby Boomer.

Give Structure

Baby Boomers are used to structure, and they prefer it as a way of accomplishing things. When you’re asking your Baby Boomer to finish or complete certain tasks, make sure you communicate the preferred milestones you want for the project. This will help them manage their time effectively and figure out how much extra time would need to be dedicated to each project. They will also appreciate the structure because it will reinforce their need to be at work during that particular time as opposed to leaving early or going on vacation.

Make Yourself Available

Baby Boomers prioritize face-to-face relationships over any other type of interaction, including phone, e-mail, text, conference call, etc. If you are managing a Baby Boomer, you will need to make yourself available on an in-person basis for them to really feel connected and like they’re able to make an impact.

When you make yourself available in-person, you’re reinforcing for them that they’re an integral part of the workforce without whom you wouldn’t be able to survive. They will be able to ask you questions and tout their accomplishments, and they would much rather do this in person than by any other means of communication.

Remind Them to Relax

Baby Boomers are used to working themselves to the core. If you’re managing a Baby Boomer, remind them to relax and stress the importance of work-life balance. This isn’t something they will like or necessarily want to do, but try to suggest it as a reward for their hard work.

Though most will be reluctant to accept the acknowledgment, this is something you need to be aware of as a Baby Boomer manager. You ultimately want your employees to be happy and healthy; this is one small way you can aid this effort.   If they could have it their way, Baby Boomers would work as much as humanly possible. As a Baby Boomer manager, you are responsible for helping them balance their strong work-ethic and your company’s needs.

If you are in need of finding quality associates to hire, contact Award Staffing. We will be able to match you up with hardworking associates who meet your company’s needs.

 

FINDING YOUR TALENT

Want to learn more about how Award Staffing can help your organization with your staffing and employment needs? Start by providing our team with a few pieces of information about yourself, and we will take care of the rest.

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