How Do I Attract More Job Seekers?

in /by

There’s no question that the quest to find enough, qualified applicants is frequently a priority for employers–particularly those with positions that traditionally have high turnover. Are you interested in a “chicken or egg” debate? In HR that question is always, would we rather have a large quantity of applicants or a batch of high quality applicants.

Employers obviously want both, but when they have to pick one or the other, in today’s pandemic-sensitized hiring environment, our clients are asking for quantity. Maybe they’ve decided that finding the perfect applicant is like finding the needle in the haystack and they want to hedge their bets? Maybe their organization decided years ago that having a specific, “middleman” recruiter wasn’t worth it given all the accessible hiring software platforms?

Whatever your reason, we hear you! You want more applicants! Here are five tips to get more applicants based on our team’s experience helping clients leverage technology to improve hiring experiences.

ExactHire Success Team
1. Share your job posting to multiple sites.

Share. Share. And share some more. Simple math will tell you, if you are interested in bringing in more applicants you must first reach more applicants. One of the best benefits of using the ExactHire ATS is that it can be your one-stop-shop for posting your job to your own career site AND pushing your job to other third party job boards.

The ExactHire ATS will automatically push your jobs to numerous job boards such as Indeed, ZipRecruiter, and Google for Jobs. There is more evidence that sponsoring job postings on these job boards can increase your applicant flow by 5X (Indeed)  ExactHire can work with you directly (and your third party job board representative) to make this work. In addition, you should not put all of your eggs in one basket!  ExactHire’s applicant tracking system “Promote” feature will increase your job’s visibility to:

  • state workforce development / unemployment offices,
  • colleges and universities,
  • diversity-specific job boards,
  • social media sites,
  • Potential referrals from existing employees
  • emails and newsletters with tracked links that may be customized within our ATS.

Kathleen McCoy-Anderson | ExactHire
2. Increase your chances of being found by job seekers.

Your job is now posted everywhere – various job boards, your website, newsletters, social media, on the highway billboard, etc. The next step is to make sure applicants are finding your job listings based on the content you included in the description. You don’t have to be a top salesperson or great at marketing to implement these few tricks, although, if you have someone on your team who is – ask that they take a look at your posting and provide suggestions.

Write distinctive and descriptive content

Start by making sure your job titles are unique. Job boards will often clump together similar job titles to prevent job seekers from encountering seemingly duplicated job descriptions. What’s the end result of this clumping, you ask? Well, some of your job listings may not be shown as often as others in search results–perhaps because you have two Server positions listed for the same location without much variety in their description text.

Do whatever you can to differentiate these titles and their descriptions. Consider adding your location, company name, ID number of the position, hours, or team name to the body of the description and/or the job title. If you are hiring two “Servers” the postings may be lumped together, but if you are hiring one “Server, Green Team, Weekdays only” and one “Server, Night Shift, North”, those two postings are less likely to be placed together as one.

Use hashtags on social

Use creative and professional hashtags to promote jobs on social media platforms like LinkedIn, Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, etc. Unsure of which hashtags to use? Start by adding the basics to the bottom of your posts and only use 2-4 hashtags total per job posting. Here is a standard list:

  • #nowhiring
  • #jobopening
  • #employment
  • #jobs
  • #hiring
  • #work
  • #career
  • #jobposting
  • #jobsearch

Job description keyword density matters

Writing repetitive keywords is crucial if you want job seekers to encounter your job listings on external job sites when they do specific, job-related keyword searches. “Enjoy food and people? Our position allows you to work with our great team and our loyal customers,” can be improved to read, “As a Server with Acme Co. not only will you become part of the Serving Team, but you will also get to serve and interact with our loyal customers.” This may seem extra silly and a bit extreme, but this example does demonstrate how you can swap words to make a bigger search engine optimization (SEO) impact (ie work with other teammates is replaced with work with other servers). The more often you can repeat the position title and other related job-specific keywords that align with the potential search queries of job seekers, the greater your chances of being found.

Nancy Meyer
3. Make it easy for more job seekers to show interest.

If quantity is really what you’re looking for, then make it easy for more job seekers to say they are interested in your positions. The ExactHire ATS makes this simple and customizable by allowing clients the ability to create multi-step employment applications! Implementing a short, initial application step is the quickest, easiest way for an applicant to raise his/her hand and show interest. In this hiring climate, think: contact information and a resume; or, contact information and no more than five job-specific questions. After you’ve screened the first step of the application, you can decide if you want the applicant to go to the next step.

Chantel Hatch
4. Over-communicate to job candidates.

Once you have an applicant’s information, keep him/her on the hook by quickly responding with professional communication. The ExactHire ATS allows you to utilize an instant ‘Thank You’ email template. Using the multi-step application process, you can invite the applicant to complete another section of the application seamlessly, and with little effort on your part.

Want to “talk” to an applicant quickly? No problem! The ExactHire ATS features two-way emailing and text messaging with candidates directly within the platform. This leaves you with no excuses for not quickly engaging applicants to start the interview process…or, for ghosting applicants when it comes to rejection messaging.

Randi Renee Shuck
5. Know what NOT to do with third-party job boards.

And last but not least, knowing what not to do when pushing your job listings to external job boards can be as important as knowing what to do. Job boards will often provide blogs or newsletters on how to operate most efficiently within their own platform. Because Indeed is typically one of the more popular websites for job seekers to search job openings, it’s critical to understand how its job content quality control process may impact the visibility of the job listings you share with Indeed.  To see if you may be excluding your jobs from Indeed inadvertently, review our tip sheet: How to Exclude a Job From Posting to Indeed.

 

Don’t fall into the trap of placing all of your eggs into one basket when it comes to creating visibility for your employer’s career opportunities. As I’ve discussed here, you have many avenues for creating awareness for the positions available within your organization–it just takes some attention to detail to make these tools work in your favor.

Need help strategizing on how to increase applicant flow for your company? We are dedicated to helping you utilize our ExactHire ATS to provide you with more AND better candidate results. Change doesn’t always come easy, but having the right team in place can certainly make it more pleasant. Let us know how we can help!

How to Create Digital New Hire Forms

in , /by

Human resources professionals can improve employee onboarding by creating a process to complete new hire paperwork that is easy to follow and manage. Web-based (or digital) new hire forms are a great way to achieve this. Now, you may have people in your organization that can facilitate a process like this by using Excel, Word, or Adobe PDFs. However, the security of personal information should be a very high priority, and those programs often fall short in that area.

OnboardCentric by ExactHire allows organizations to create digital new hire forms that eliminate any security concerns. Our employee onboarding software contains your company’s handbook, policies, Form I-9, W-4 Form, and other new employee paperwork. Here’s how it works:

Implementing Onboarding Software–What to Expect

The process of building a digital new hire form is much more seamless than one might think. First, ExactHire gathers and reviews all the standard forms that you would like to include. If we have any questions about those forms, we will discuss them with you. And we are happy to answer your questions, as well!

Typically, our questions are aimed at understanding who fills out which portions of various forms. We also need to know which form fields will be pre-filled before the employee looks at the form. From there, our team will take the PDF, Word, or Excel forms provided to us and build the questionnaire into the system.

We will assign you an employee-level login to test your newly created web-based new hire forms. As a result, you will receive an email with a username and password requesting that you complete the forms. Then, you will walk through the questionnaire to submit your answers.

After you’ve viewed and signed your forms as a new employee would, you can view your forms as an administrative-level user would, and complete that aspect of the approval process.

Choosing Onboarding Software–Why ExactHire?

Collecting, managing, and storing sensitive employee data is no small task. While there are many online form solutions on the market, few can meet the specific requirements of a Human Resources department.

Our employee onboarding software is designed by a team with professional HR experience and credentials. Beyond simple forms, our system facilitates internal task management and offers features such as integrated E-verify, and push-to-payroll.

Finally, when local or federal governments release new compliance requirements or updates to forms, our team likely knows about it first. We help you respond to changes quickly, and we are always available if you have questions or advice.

 

Schedule a Personalized Demo

Provide your new hires with a secure, digital method to easily complete employee onboarding paperwork. Sign up for a demo to learn how ExactHire can partner with your organization to modernize employee onboarding!

6 Considerations for Sharing Bad News

in /by

What do you want first: the good news or the bad news? We’ve all faced this question before, and depending on who it came from, we’ve answered with an anxious smile or an indifferent shrug. Our reaction was based on an immediate calculation–just how bad could the news be?

From the perspective of the person delivering the news, the offer of “good news or bad news first” is a way of softening the bad news. It’s a small expression of empathy for those receiving the news. Unfortunately, it’s also a tired cliche that, when used to share bad news, can undercut a leader’s professionalism and integrity–especially when there’s little, if any, good news to be shared.

But while the “good news/bad news” line is best kept on the shelf, organizational leaders should still have a plan for sharing bad news effectively. Here are six considerations for doing just that:

Prepare to Share

Bad news has the tendency to arouse bad feelings. Anger, jealousy, and disappointment are all feelings that can cause individuals to react negatively to bad news–and to those delivering it. Leaders can better manage these reactions by preparing to share bad news, which includes:

  • Having a complete and solid grasp of the facts surrounding the bad news
  • Understanding the scope of the bad news and possible implications for the future
  • Anticipating questions that will be asked, and having the answers to those questions
  • Scripting key thoughts and responses

Take a Step Back

Sharing bad news is never easy. This is true whether it impacts one, several, or hundreds of employees. So while preparing to deliver bad news should be taken seriously, leaders must also keep the news in perspective. Consider the following to help relieve the stress of sharing bad news:

  • It’s unlikely that you are the first person to share this type of news
  • The news must be shared, and it’s your responsibility to share it
  • Sharing the news, rather than hiding it, will produce better outcomes

Stay Detached

With good preparation and the proper perspective, most leaders will be in a position to mitigate conflict that may arise from sharing bad news. Of course, as the great philosopher, Mike Tyson, once said, “everyone has a plan until they get punched in the mouth.” Or, to put it in less violent terms: having a plan is always necessary, but not always sufficient.

Once a leader begins to actually share the bad news, any number of things can happen that could derail even the best plan. Leaders need to understand that this is possible. Then, they must be able to detach from an emotionally-charged conversation, and remain calm in the face of conflict.

This leads us to our next consideration, stick to the relevant facts.

Stick to the Relevant Facts

When a conversation becomes charged with emotions, it can very quickly move into an open argument. The best way for leaders to avoid an ugly argument is to maintain a focus and emphasis on the facts, specifically the facts that are relevant to issue at hand.

Once a leader strays away from the facts and begins making emotional appeals, or addressing unrelated issues, all advantage gained from planning is lost. This also largely precludes a leader from gaining closure on the original bad news. In short, a leader who is led into an emotional argument…isn’t really leading.

Provide Vision

It’s not enough for leaders to simply share the facts when conveying bad news. After all, effective leaders should inspire positive action and loyalty in their employees. This can be achieved by providing employees with a vision for the future that moves past the bad news of the present.

Importantly, a leader’s vision shouldn’t ignore realities or downplay potential risks, and it should be flexible enough to provide employees with options. It requires taking an honest look at how the bad news will impact the future of the organization and its employees. Bad news can rattle employees, but a strong vision for the future can provide them with tools to overcome challenges and flourish.

Close with Strength

Finally, a strong closing to the conversation will instill confidence in employees and further support the leader’s vision. It’s common to open the floor to questions at this point if they have not already been asked. As mentioned above–and perhaps more important here–leaders should answer only relevant questions, and the answers should be fact-based. 

The closing should be brief. Leaders must not hesitate to name some questions as being outside the scope of a conversation or decline to answer other questions. Ultimately, if the bad news has been communicated effectively up to this point, there should be very few relevant questions.

Good News or Bad News?

At some point, all organizations will have to share bad news. And although conflict can be almost certain, an organization’s culture and leadership will go a long way in determining whether the news will cause damaging conflict. Organizational leaders who have a plan for sharing bad news can mitigate conflict, calm emotions, and provide a path forward. In this way, bad news can inspire employees to raise their performance to new levels. And that is good news.

 

Transparency in Leadership

in /by

Increasingly, people in all areas of society are seeking transparency in leadership. We want to know the “why,” “how,” and “who” of decision-making, especially when those decisions affect us. Furthermore, we want to trust that decision makers are taking our interests into account when arriving at decisions.

The desire for transparency is so strong that many leaders may feel pressure to vet, check, and double-check every decision with every stakeholder. Of course, this is impractical, if not impossible.

We know that there are some decisions that can be made with little input, and others that require extensive discussions and long consideration. However, as is often the case, it’s the area in between those extremes that can create problems. This is where leaders must practice transparency in order to maintain the trust of stakeholders.

Leadership Transparency in the Workplace

Suppose the executive leadership of an organization decides that it is necessary to reduce work hours for its employees. The leadership group has not spoken about this to managers outside of the group, and they anticipate that this change will be a surprise to everyone. Still, the leaders believe that it’s better to implement this decision sooner rather than later.

A Top-down Decision

No matter how the news is communicated, the decision will not be popular with employees. So rather than beat around the bush, one lucky member of the leadership group is asked to simply communicate the decision. This spokesperson for the leadership group anticipates the following questions:

  • Why are we reducing hours?
  • How was this decision made?
  • Who was involved in the decision?

So the leader provides the answers to these questions in her announcement, and she is hopeful that the employees will be understanding and take the bad news in stride. Unfortunately, that is not the case.

Blindsided

Managers outside of the decision making process immediately began receiving questions and complaints regarding the reduction in hours. They had no good answers for the employees. This greatly damaged trust and respect between the managers and their reports.

The managers resented leadership for making such a quick decision without their input. They felt blindsided and unfairly set up to fail in managing their teams. Just like the other employees, they lost trust and respect for the executive leadership team.

Very soon, news reaches the leadership group that employee morale is tanking. What happened?

Part-time Transparency

Although the leader built understanding around the context of the decision in her announcement, the managers and other employees felt almost tricked by the sudden reduction in hours. The leadership failed to communicate any information beforehand that would have led the employees to anticipate this change. For many employees, the news was bad, but the sudden announcement and surprise were worse.

Transparency in leadership cannot be part-time, and it cannot only accompany official announcements or appear on the backend of an important decision. It must be proactive, constant, and sincere. It must be part of an organization’s culture.

A Culture of Transparency

A strong, positive organizational culture will not often materialize without the presence of effective leadership. Leaders create a compelling mission and vision, and then determine the organizational values that will advance both. Taken together, these are the foundational elements of organizational culture.

An organization can profess to hold numerous values, but successful ones will whittle these down to 4 or 6 values. The result is a set of core values that inform workplace behaviors. An organization that wants to embrace transparency in leadership, then, must ensure that its core values encourage this behavior.

The behavior of transparency in leadership can be described in many ways, but a helpful description would be: the timely, frequent sharing of information and the invitation to provide feedback or enter discussion in regard to this information.

Timely and Frequent Sharing

As previously mentioned, transparency in leadership is not seeking and considering input on every decision, and it is not sharing every piece of information on every decision. The right frequency of sharing information, then, is a frequency which ensures that employees are kept aware of:

  • the status of ongoing issues, and
  • the possibility of emerging issues.

This can be thought of as simply “keeping people in the loop.”

Timely sharing of information is seeking to achieve the above, while also considering whether there is a need to know the information at a particular time. For example, interrupting work on a time-sensitive project to hold a meeting where the topic is a new snack program….that is not timely sharing.

Feedback and Discussion

Of course, simply sharing information is not enough to create transparency in leadership. A one-way street of top-down sharing  would cause most employees to feel as if they were only receiving a long list of dictates and decrees. An organization that values transparency must go further and give every employee the ability to influence decisions by seeking their feedback.

Feedback can be collected through surveys, but individual or small-group discussions are often the most effective vehicle. This provides an opportunity for all parties to gain clarity in understanding. Additionally, discussions often uncover new perspectives that the decision makers may not have considered previously. 

While seeking feedback is important, leaders must also convey sincerity in seeking feedback. Employees must feel that their thoughts and perspectives will be taken into consideration by decision makers, and they must see evidence of this when decisions are announced. Few things hurt employee morale more than the constant request for feedback that is never considered. 

Transparency Mitigates Conflict

The leadership group in our workplace scenario created conflict when making the announcement to reduce hours. Specifically, the conflict was between the employees anticipating a certain amount of hours and the leadership’s decision to reduce hours. From the organization’s perspective, the conflict was unavoidable; however, an organization that values transparency understands that while a conflict may be necessary, it doesn’t have to be damaging.

A damaging conflict is most likely to occur when there is unequal access to information that, when revealed, moves one party to resent the other. Transparency in leadership, then, prevents damaging conflicts by ensuring that all employees have access to important information at the right time.

 

Kris Gooch

in /by

Managing a Furlough

in /by

The term and practice of furloughing workers is often associated with industries such as automotive and construction, or, somewhat recently, the federal government–think “government shutdown.” However, in the past few weeks the COVID-19 pandemic has caused companies in other industries to begin the furlough of employees as well. So what is a furlough, and how is it different from a layoff?

Furlough Vs. Layoff

A furlough is a leave of absence without pay or reduction of hours that is usually brought about by an employer’s negative business conditions–current or forecasted. As such, the leave is often indefinite, with the employee either returning to full-time work when conditions improve, or being laid off when conditions have little hope of improvement. Furloughed employees can continue to receive benefits such as healthcare and insurance, but their ability to collect unemployment benefits is determined by individual state law.

A layoff is the termination of the employment relationship due to business conditions–usually negative, but not always. Whereas a furloughed employee can immediately resume employment with their employer once business conditions improve, an employee that is laid off must be rehired. Therefore, layoffs are usually made when it’s highly doubtful that business conditions will improve in the near future. The employer is willing to lose talent in order to save the costs associated with payroll and benefits.

COVID-19 Furloughs

Today, in the face of a pandemic, companies across all industries have or are considering the furlough of their employees. Indeed, with so much economic uncertainty, many companies see a furlough as the best option for proactively responding to the challenges that will come. However, it’s important to realize that while a furlough provides an employer with a degree of relief and control, it also transfers the burden to the employees. And that raises the question: how can HR professionals efficiently manage a furlough with empathy?

The easy answer is that a furlough, like a layoff, is simply a very difficult thing to manage, and you should try to do the best that you can. Some would advise that you “rip the bandaid off” and deliver the hard truth–not own the guilt, as it’s not your fault. This answer and advice can be helpful–for HR–but it’s of little help to the furloughed employee. And while I’m not suggesting that HR allow themselves to be paralyzed by “feelings,” I am saying that in order for a furlough to function in the way it’s intended, it must be managed in a way that ensures the furloughed employee wants to return to the employer when business conditions improve.

Five Considerations for Managing a Furlough

Here are five considerations for managing a furlough with empathy and maximizing the chances that your furloughed employees will return in better times.

Timing

The timing of a furlough is not always in the employer’s control–let alone in the control of HR. With the exception of seasonal businesses, the HR team may only have a few days notice that they will be managing a furlough. Still, with the time that you do have, consider what time would be best for communicating the news. You will want the employees to benefit from hearing:

  • A scheduled time to receive the news, not off-hand or as part of another meeting
  • The news from you (or CEO) first, not through the grapevine
  • The news when necessary for the employees, not expedient for the employer
  • The news as far in advance as possible, not at the last second

Tone

Communicating a furlough requires professionalism and empathy. This is a hard balance to strike, but it’s critical in order to ensure that employees are not needlessly insulted or resentful. In order to achieve this, make sure to consider the following:

  • Your tone should be professional, regardless of your unique relationship with the employee.
  • A professional tone does not require that you ignore the employee’s unique circumstances.
  • Empathy can be expressed by acknowledging an employee’s circumstances, and then addressing how the furlough will impact them (include resources for additional help).
  • Answer employee questions fully and directly–even if it means sharing hard truths.

Expectations

Managing a furlough relies heavily upon effective communication. The timing and tone of communicating a furlough can go a long way toward making the initial interaction positive. However, the explicit goal of a furlough is to protect the employee-employer relationship going forward, so that the employees want to work for the employer when conditions improve. This requires clear and transparent communication of why the furlough is taking place and what the employee should expect. Be sure to include answers to the following:

  • Why is the employee being put on furlough? This should not be explained simply as a “cost-cutting” measure. It’s better to describe the prevailing negative business conditions that require a furlough.
  • How long will the furlough last? Either provide a specific date, or a specific set of conditions, that will mark an end to the furlough. If giving the latter, offer a date for following up.
  • How will the furlough affect employee pay and benefits? Provide the employee’s last pay date, along with the benefits that will remain or go away. Do not simply ask the employee to reference their benefit documentation or the employee handbook.

Resources

Just as you need to manage a furlough for the employer, the employee needs to manage the furlough for their household. Employees will have unique circumstances, as mentioned above. As you communicate news of the furlough to each employee, encourage questions and listen actively for how the employee will be uniquely impacted. Be prepared to offer resources that will help them navigate the challenges that a furlough brings, such as:

Follow Up

Regardless of whether a furlough is indefinite or for a fixed term, employers would do well to check in with employees on furlough. The follow up does not need to be lengthy. In fact, the primary benefit may be in the gesture of reaching out and demonstrating that you care. That being said, a follow up is most helpful when it reinforces or adjusts an employee’s expectations. Look to include the following in your follow communications with employees on furlough:

  • Current business conditions; are there any positive or negative indicators?
  • Furlough timeline update; do you need to adjust the restart date, or do the conditions allow you to confirm a restart date?
  • Help resources; is there anything the employer can help with?

Furlough PR

Managing a furlough is not only about managing the employee-employer relationship, public perception of a furlough must be considered as well. Sites like Glassdoor and the over-sharing that takes place on social media will all carry the news of a furlough–and the employee sentiments that go along with it. This fact has a direct impact on an organization’s employer brand, which heavily influences future hiring. So make sure that the public can easily understand how you are managing the furlough by taking a few proactive steps, such as:

Unless a furlough is part of an organization’s business model, no one expects or wants to utilize one. For an employer, it means that business conditions are deteriorating and profits are at risk. For the employee facing a furlough, it means the loss of income, a period of uncertainty, and all the challenges that come with that. However, when managed well, both the employer and employee can benefit from a furlough that minimizes the effects of poor business conditions and ensures future employment when conditions improve.

Remote Work While Parenting and Teaching Kids

in /by

7 Tips for Remote Work Success + Kid Activity Ideas

Can you relate to this remote work scenario?

It was about three o’clock on Tuesday afternoon and I was engaged in another Zoom video conference related to COVID-19 planning for our business. My office is in the back of the house away from the main traffic areas and is usually pretty quiet–ideal for video conferencing.

However, a crouched figure suddenly appeared at the side of my office chair with pleading eyes looking upward. This time it was my daughter, and it was the third time this afternoon that one of my two children had crawled into the office to avoid being seen on webcam, and in an effort to whisper-shout something to me.

This time took the cake though. To my chagrin (but also to my glee at her inner resourcefulness), my daughter was holding a small dry erase board with an important question for my consideration:

Remote Work Parenting | ExactHire

“Can I play FIFA Soccer [on Nintendo]?”

I’m sure all of you who are fortunate enough to still be working…and doing so 100% from home…can relate to my story. If you are a stay-at-home parent or caregiver, right about now you are also likely open to new ways to keep kids occupied while sheltering in place during the coronavirus pandemic.

I’m blessed with the opportunity to be safe and spending time with my family in a way that unfortunately has faded in recent years due to over-scheduling. Nevertheless, we all need some creative ways to balance remote work with helping to tutor and care for children at home during the work day.

In this blog, I’ll share seven tips on how to cope with the challenge before us, as well as kid activities I’ve been curating from friends, Facebook groups and word-of-mouth.

1 – Create structure

With so much chaos in the world right now, we all (not just our kids) need some stability in our lives. School-aged kids are used to the assuring rigors of the school day including a predictable schedule of different classes and activities. While e-learning coursework fills some of this gap (when your kids aren’t on a break), it doesn’t mean that they are busy for the equivalent of your eight-hour work day.

Every morning I create a list of activities that my two kids can do during the day. I might assign a time span to some activities, or schedule certain tasks for a specific time of day (e.g. let’s all go outside at noon and play soccer in the yard).

Part of this schedule may instruct them to do specific activities that don’t require my supervision during the times of day that I might need to be on a conference call for work. Having a schedule…or even just a list of to-dos…helps you handle boredom angst with a plan of action before you find yourself in the thick of it!

Ideas:

2 – Empower with control

Our current reality is one in which we have less control over our daily lives than normal. In Indiana, we are currently under “shelter in place” restrictions from our state government and so the freedom we have to travel to certain destinations and connect in-person with others is impeded–even if remote work is now offering more flexibility. A lack of control can be frustrating and isolating.

The same is true for your kids. Help them realize a certain degree of control in their lives by letting them pick from a variety of activity options. For example, with the schedule I mentioned above, let them choose an option from different categories, or ask them to choose any three activities from a list of five.

Another way of offering them more control is to allow them to earn rewards by completing different tasks. On a daily basis, I ask my kids to complete a couple of chores, do some reading, practice their typing and get exercise (just to name a few things) before I allow them to play video games. The Nintendo time slot in the late afternoon is their delayed gratification reward for doing well throughout the day. It also nicely coincides with the time of day I tend to have video calls.

Allow kids to choose from a variety of tasks:

3 – Be flexible

Before you accuse me of talking out of both sides of my mouth, while you should have structure and offer control, you have to be a little flexible, too. But, how?

Consider the schedule a fluid priority list. It’s not critical that some of the tasks happen at a specific time, but perhaps just that they happen that week. If you’re working from home, you already know that flexibility is essential to accommodate feeding your kids lunch during the day and addressing their occasional skirmishes with each other. The good news is that many employers are offering more flexibility and understanding than ever before. So, my co-workers are well aware of my kids sneaking into my office while I’m on a video chat.

Also, don’t forget the physical interpretation of flexibility, too. Make sure you’re creating opportunities for your children (and you!) to exercise and move around.

Get moving:

4 – Be forgiving

It’s not a time for our normal standards; we’re still in transition to a potential new normal. Tensions are high because we’re all under more stress than usual; therefore, grace toward others should be a priority. Don’t judge, support.

That means you shouldn’t stress or have “mom or dad guilt” because your kids are getting more screen time than you’d normally prefer. We’re doing the best we can. Make it work by helping to provide options for “quality” screen time that might teach your kids something worthwhile.

5 – Foster social connection; albeit distantly

For the sake of our sanity, social distancing can’t also mean social disconnection. While we all need to be doing our part to slow the spread of COVID-19, we should absolutely be creative about using technology to connect our kids with friends and loved ones who can help us while we work at home.

My son and a friend have a virtual playdate scheduled for today to play Battleship. They each have the game at home, so it will be easy for them to play via video conference.

Other ideas:

  • Plan a Zoom video call with your baseball team or Brownie troop
  • Shoot a video skit to share with your friends and ask them to return the favor
  • Have a grandparent read a story via video conference

6 – Celebrate iteration

Because the ExactHire team is a software company, one of our internal mindsets is to iterate and improve on initial experiments…whether they be in development, marketing, sales, client service or even remote work. The idea behind iteration is that it doesn’t cause us to delay launching a concept in an effort to make sure it’s 100% perfect first. Instead, we launch a promising idea, product or service, and then constantly improve upon it as we go–after all, we can’t predict the future to know what will work perfectly the first time.

How can you instill that fearlessness to innovate in your own children? Now’s the time to talk to them more regularly about the types of things you do for work since they have a front row stage to your work habits. Additionally, there are activities you can share with them that will help them explore new skills and experiment with unique ways of doing things.

Stretch their imaginations:

7 – Remember mindfulness

Above all else, as challenging as times may get, don’t forget to be grateful for what you still have and mindful of your mental state’s impact on others. If you are anxious, then your kids will be anxious, too.

What can you do together and/or provide to them to promote relaxation, appreciation and a mind-spirit-body connection?

Be mindful together:

There are many things I would change about the current situation and my hearts go out to everyone for this unanticipated hurdle we are banding together to overcome. However, I do recognize now as an opportunity to nurture the resilience of my children, and to be a family with ever stronger values around how we spend our time.

Working and Onboarding Remotely?

If your organization is allowing more remote work than ever, you may need options for remote employee onboarding, too. Contact us for a demo of ExactHire’s employee onboarding software and make remote onboarding seamless.

Schedule Demo

 

Employer Strategies for Successfully Hiring Justice Involved Job Candidates

in , /by

My gut tells me that many employers are open to the idea of hiring individuals from the justice involved community, but have historically avoided the opportunity for a variety of reasons. Whether they previously had an abundance of other candidates to consider or were intimidated about the steps involved, many organizations haven’t proactively included this untapped talent pool.

After all, they haven’t been sufficiently motivated to do so. That changes now.

Why you should consider hiring the justice involved population

Today, employers can’t afford NOT to look at every viable employee population. Increased awareness and support for inclusive hiring practices coupled with historically low unemployment suggest that the time is ripe for employers to implement strategies that successfully source and retain justice involved individuals.

Here are a few of the benefits to employers who engage employees who are formerly incarcerated or on work release, parole, or probation.

Better job candidate flow

Low unemployment is especially crippling for industries that traditionally experience high turnover in hourly positions and/or with a contingent workforce. With nearly one in three American adults holding a criminal record (ACLU, 2017), employers who are able to successfully engage this population are poised to win the war on talent.

Text Recruiting | Hourly Workers | ExactHire

Giving justice involved individuals another chance is the right thing to do

The formerly incarcerated combat a pervasive social stigma in many facets of their life, and it often impedes their ability to find work. In fact, according to the same ACLU study, 75% of formerly incarcerated people will remain unemployed a year after release. When someone has served his/her time, society should give them a second chance–not a re-sentence once they are released.

Reducing recidivism pays for itself

According to a 2018 special report from the U.S. Department of Justice’s Bureau of Justice Statistics, across 30 states 5 out of 6 (a staggering 83%) of state prisoners released in 2005 were arrested at least once during the 9 years following their release. Recidivism, or the “tendency for a convicted criminal to reoffend,” is on the rise.

And, it’s no surprise when we consider the absence of sufficient resources to support transitioning justice involved individuals back into society. This makes it hard for the formerly incarcerated to get over what some call the “three hots and a cot” mentality.

Consider that the Gross National Product (GNP) is losing an estimated $78 billion to $87 billion annually as the justice involved remain unemployed, according to the aforementioned ACLU report.

Employer tax incentives

Companies who hire the formerly incarcerated may be eligible for hidden hiring incentives such as the Work Opportunity Tax Credit. WOTC is a federal tax credit available to employers that hire individuals from specific targeted groups that have consistently faced significant employment barriers. Among these targeted groups are “qualified ex-felons” who are defined as individuals who are hired within a year of being convicted of a felony, or being released from prison from the felony.

Create a supportive network to succeed with the justice involved

It’s one thing for companies to be compelled to act based on the benefits mentioned above; however, in order to realize success in hiring and retaining the justice involved job candidate population, your organization must implement an internal infrastructure that can accommodate their unique needs. Additionally, it should utilize established external resources that may already be available in your area to help transition the justice involved back to work.

This is easier said than done, as there is not an abundance of model employers showing the rest of us how to do it. And, perhaps that deficiency is part of the explanation for the slow adoption of hiring this population.

The best intentions are only a fraction of what’s required for success in employing the justice involved. Employers must put systems and services in place to get this source of talent back to work. According to SHRM’s Getting Talent Back to Work Toolkit, employers should focus on

  • Reliable Checks – working with reputable background checking agencies to make sure the data you use to make decisions about a candidate’s suitability for employment is sound.
  • Relevant Assessment – ensuring your organization’s methods for assessing criminal records on an individual basis are relevant.
  • Reasonable Risk – comprehending and assessing the reasonable risks associated with hiring this population so that you can proceed confidently.

Within these three categories, there are many steps organizations may take to set themselves up for a higher percentage of success in employing the justice involved population. Here are some ideas for consideration.

Make connections during the pre-release period

Consider offering a candidate training program for incarcerated individuals six months prior to their release. Just as you would approach tuition reimbursement for an in-demand nursing student, ask pre-release individuals who have been identified as good candidates for a commitment to work for your organization for a period of time so that they may receive important life skills and a starter wage. This type of arrangement can go far in building employee loyalty in a tough employee retention market.

Develop relationships in your community

Employing the justice involved is a careful undertaking, and can be enhanced by positive and close relationships with local sheriff departments and other representatives at the Department of Corrections (DOC), staffing agencies and other transitional support agencies.

Set expectations with internal staff

For success in employing the justice-involved population, you need to dedicate internal resources to properly setting expectations and training existing staff members on how to undergo this initiative in a productive way. Be realistic and transparent around challenges that may surface, and develop strategies about how your company will address those challenges before you find yourselves in the moment.

Make sure that your organizational structure models success for justice involved individuals. For example, don’t have a single working area or department where justice involved employees represent a majority of the unit. This is their time to transition back into the workforce and recognize positive habits and behavior from others who have succeeded in the organization. If you offset that balance, then negative habits can be perpetuated with poor outcomes.

Invest in offering on-site services for justice involved employees

Some justice involved individuals fall circumstance to rising recidivism rates because they don’t have reasonable access to the services and support they need to get a foothold in the world after release. If your organization is serious about successfully employing this population, then consider offering some of these services:

  • Reentry resources – Links to and documentation about existing public reentry services in your community. For example, Orange County, California has a robust post-incarceration resource toolkit on its website.
  • Basic food needs – Make information available about local food pantries and agencies that make sure people don’t go hungry. Help employees apply for food stamp benefits.
  • Spiritual support – Consider on-site chaplain services so employees can nurture any of their spiritual goals and confide in a third party.
  • Medical care – Make sure that employees are afforded time to take care of medical needs and given information about how to obtain access to prescription drugs, including mental health care when applicable.
  • Basic paperwork – Remember that your justice involved hires may need important documents either located and/or reproduced such as birth certificate, Social Security card, personal ID card and/or driver’s license.
  • Substance abuse support – Recognize that some of your justice involved hires may struggle with substance abuse and therefore create an environment that is supportive of substance abuse counseling and rehabilitation so that destructive habits that often lead to crime aren’t repeated.
  • Ride planning – In order to promptly arrive to your workplace, your employees may need ride sharing programs, access to information about convenient public transportation options, and/or an employer-provided bus to transport employees to and from their current residence or halfway house to your job site.
  • Flexibility for required meetings – A common challenge for recently released individuals is maintaining availability for a shift job while also showing up for required probation or parole officer meetings that might happen in the middle of the day. With proper communication, offer these workers flexibility to attend the meetings that are critical for their post-release success.
  • Soft skills training – In some cases, justice involved individuals may have never learned about or been exposed to positive models for appropriate communication, social behavior, or even cleanliness/hygiene. Understand that services around these soft skills may be critical for employing this population with success.

Communicate your intentions clearly

Because much of employers’ hesitancy to hire justice involve populations is attributable to the stigma often associated with the formerly incarcerated as well as the company’s tendency toward compliance and protectiveness, clear communication is a driver of employment success for this talent group.

Clear communication includes both adjustments in traditional employment policy as well as external job advertisements, company culture content and screening and interview process design.

Remember that it is a violation of Title VII to reject applicants because of criminal records unless it is job related and consistent with business necessity. Employers have an obligation to clearly define what is job related and consistent with business necessity. They should reevaluate the role and scope of background checks in the hiring process, and use effective job evaluation to identify which criminal offenses will not work with which jobs.

Set realistic expectations with your justice involved candidates

Not every employer is going to be able to employ every justice involved employee. However, there is power and respect in being transparent about the opportunities and potential path available with your organization. I recently attended an event (more on that below) where they talked about the “ABC Jobs” trajectory for the justice involved:

  • Any job
  • Better job
  • Career

Which of those types of jobs can you offer this population? And, if it is just any job that has a low wage, how can you prepare that individual to succeed in that job and then move on to another organization (maybe one with which you partner on these programs) where they can achieve the next step?

This job pathing model can improve your community by creating work that improves individuals, makes your company productive and advances the public good through reduced spending due to rampant recidivism.

Anticipate potential setbacks

There will be ups and downs in any endeavor to create an infrastructure for employing justice involved populations…as there is with any other talent population, too. However, being aware of setbacks through conversation with other employers, local law enforcement, state agencies, etc. will bring to light things you can plan to address:

  • “Ban the box” legislation – Do you have work sites in geographic areas that are NOT subject to “ban the box”? If so, then take another look at your employment application and consider whether any questions about a candidate’s criminal history are potentially deterring qualified, but justice involved individuals from considering employment with your organization.
  • Shift challenges – Is your work shift schedule such that it makes it impossible to accommodate the needs of justice involved individuals who must attend parole meetings? As previously mentioned, take measures now to consider alternative strategies for meeting transportation needs and addressing shift requirements.
  • Recognize bias toward unexplained issues – I recently met someone who is employed with the city government and who was previously justice involved. She explained that it is not uncommon for little, unexpected things to happen that can adversely impact the positive trajectory of a justice involved individual. She encourages others to get the facts before jumping to negative conclusions. For example, she has seen malfunctioning ankle bracelets cause productive employees who have done nothing wrong to be hauled away by police on the job in front of co-workers. Without sensitivity to the root cause of such problems, bias and gossip could lead to a lack of support, or even wrongful termination.

The time is now

Is your organization ready to get serious about considering this untapped talent population? I hope the considerations outlined in this blog inspire exploration of this talent pool and fine-tuning of any of your existing initiatives.

Author’s Note: I recently attended a remarkable “Second Chance Staffing Visioning Event” held in January 2020 at Butler University and in conjunction with Allegiance Staffing. This interactive session was a kick-off to a joint research project between these partners and others to explore the job performance of those with criminal backgrounds while on the job. There is not yet much (or current) research in this specific area and the event brought together individuals from social service agencies, businesses, and the government–including thriving employees who have been justice involved. I’m excited about the direction of this research as it perfectly aligns with making a positive impact and with the challenging job landscape. Given the lack of formal studies in this area, their goal is to conduct a more detailed empirical analysis of the relative workplace performance of justice-involved citizens, as well as identify factors affecting this performance. Such a study requires the assistance of local employer(s) willing to share data regarding employees’ attendance, aptitude, and attitude, and they are currently in the process of securing these partners.

 

The State of Your HR Goals

in /by

Our clients are often looking for help in leveraging ExactHire solutions to meet their HR goals. Whether it be optimizing job templates, setting up custom reports, or integrating assessments into their hiring process, helping clients succeed is extremely rewarding for me. So it’s no surprise that ExactHire clients and HR success were on my mind last week when I was listening to Indiana’s Governor Holcomb deliver his 2020 State of the State address.

It’s All About Jobs and Impact

As I listened to the speech, albeit while wrestling my toddler into his pajamas, I made a mental note of how many times I heard the word jobs (or job). Because I know the mind can play tricks and make a person biased toward items they are most familiar with, it made me wonder if I was actually hearing the word job more frequently than other words.

So I ran a quick analysis on the speech and the word jobs was said 13 times. When taking out pronouns and articles, the only other words that were more frequently used were: Indiana, year, and state. I’m glad to know that my mind wasn’t playing a trick on me!

I feel like this is worth pointing out because the work of an HR department is important. I feel like all of you in human resources, posting your jobs, looking for the right new hire, are doing work that impacts not only your organization, but your state and country, too. It wasn’t that long ago when a human resources department seemed to be a thing of luxury. But now we have the ear of our lawmakers; we battle the largest challenge at most organizations; and we invest in the biggest assets an organization has – its employees.

While you might feel frustrated that you cannot seem to find the right hire or that filling a position is taking longer than expected, do know that you are taking on a critical component of the economy – working on things that make an impact larger than you may have initially thought, with ripples expanding outward – and people are taking note.

Helping You Achieve Your HR Goals

No business can succeed without setting goals. The most successful organizations are constantly reviewing past performance and making appropriate adjustments in order to achieve future goals. While this applies to whole organizations, it’s also true for individual departments. What are your HR goals? Where can you improve your outcomes or efficiency?

If you are interested in brainstorming ideas on how you can improve your applicant pool, increase the speed of onboarding new hires, or test drive software that may create efficiencies for you, don’t hesitate to give myself or any of my teammates a call.