Category Archives: Hiring

The Weekly Dose: @Fountain_Inc – Hourly Recruiting Reimagined

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Today on The Weekly Dose I take a look at the hourly recruiting technology, Fountain. Fountain is a technology designed to make high volume hourly hiring more efficient, easier, with higher quality.

The reality is most HCM-based Applicant Tracking Systems are not designed for high volume hourly. They are designed mostly to process requisitions for a salaried workforce. Candidates who will sit at a desktop and be willing to jump through hoops and take a bunch of time following each step.

Hourly workers, the vast majority who will only access the internet via their mobile device, will not jump through a bunch of hoops and have the patients to follow a long process. Thus, most organizations that have a high volume hourly hiring component tend to find a workaround to their ATS or go out and find technology, like Fountain, that can fix their hourly hiring inefficiencies while still getting the data they need into their HCM for onboarding and payroll.

What I like about Fountain:

  • A mobile-based hiring process that makes it super easy and quick for an hourly candidate to apply and show interest. We don’t want a system that eliminates or discourages candidates to apply, we want them all to apply, and then let the technology screen and sort the best ones for us, which is what Fountain does.
  • Built-in programmatic like functionality that allows you the TA team to boost specific jobs that aren’t having the candidate flow they need to meet your recruiting plan goals.
  • Candidate communication via email and SMS, ability to communicate with groups of candidates at once through the entire process right from the platform.
  • Fountain can automatically begin video screening candidates as they match certain criteria you need for each position, reducing time to fill dramatically.
  • Simple Collaboration between applicant and hiring managers as many organizations with multi-locations have on-the-ground managers who do their own hourly hiring. So, great for franchise-type environments as well.
  • Fully integrates with your HRIS and Payroll for easy onboarding of hourly hires all within the same recruiting process flow.

Why do I need a system just for hiring hourly workers? 

That’s the big question, right? Quite frankly, you wouldn’t if the ATS you had was designed to actually be a benefit to you for high volume hourly hiring, but most are not. While they will say they are mobile-optimized, they are not built mobile-first. They were not built to have someone apply in a minute or less, verse twenty to thirty minutes.

Hourly workers have shown they are unwilling to “register” with your ATS before applying, and then click from screen to screen in what seems to be an endless maze of a process. They want to pick up their phone, show you they are interested, and almost instantly see if you have an interest or not. If you don’t have that, they’ll go apply to someone else that will. Speed, in mass-volume hourly hiring, is critical!

I recently witnessed an hourly worker apply, get screened, and have an offer of employment in 18 minutes! This hourly candidate had a job in 18 minutes! Why do you need a stand-alone hourly hiring platform? Because your competition is getting the best talent before you even see them.

Fountain is definitely worth a demo. It’s amazing to see how fast a recruiting process can work when you have the right technology in place. It’s all about getting high quality, fast, and Fountain delivers.

4 Tips for Hiring Candidates with Grit!

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In our ever-constant struggle to find the secret sauce of finding the best talent, many organizations are looking to hire candidates who have grit. What the heck is grit? Candidates who have grit tend to have better resolve, tenacity, and endurance.

Ultimately, executives are looking for employees who will get after it and get stuff done. Employees who aren’t waiting around to be told what to do, but those who will find out what it is we should be doing and go make it happen. Grit.

In tough economic times, our organizations need more employees with grit!

It seems so easy until you sit down in front of a candidate and try and figure out if the person actually has grit or not! You take a look at that guy from 127 Hours, the one who cut his own arm off to save his life. That’s easy, he has grit! Susy, the gal sitting across from you, who went to a great state school, and worked at a Fortune 500 company for five years, it’s hard to tell if she has grit or not!

I haven’t found a grit test on the market, so we get back to being really good at questioning and interviewing to raise our odds we’ll make the right choices of those with grit over those who tell us they have grit but really don’t!

When questioning candidates about their grit, focus on these four things:

  1. Passion. People with grit are passionate about something. I always feel that if someone has passion it’s way easier to get them to be passionate about my business and my industry. If they don’t have a true passion for anything, it’s hard to get them passionate about my organization.
  1. Doer. When they tell you what they’re passionate about, are they backing it up by actually doing something with it? I can’t tell you how many times I’ll ask someone what their passion is and then ask them how they’re pursuing their passion and they’ve done nothing!
  1. What matters to them. Different from a passion that you need to find out what matters to these people in a work setting. Candidates with grit will answer this precisely and quickly. Others will search for an answer and feel you out for what you’re looking for. I want a workplace that allows me to… the rest doesn’t matter, they know, many have no idea.
  1. Hope. To have grit, to be able to keep going when the going gets tough, you must have hope that things will work out. The glass might be half full or half empty, it doesn’t matter, because if I have a glass, I’ll find something to put in it!

I’ve said this often, but I believe individuals can acquire grit by going through bad work situations. We tend to want to hire perfect unscarred candidates from the best brands who haven’t had to show if they have grit or not.

I love those candidates with battle wounds and scars from companies that were falling apart, but didn’t. I know those people had to have grit to make it out alive!  I want those employees by my side when we go to battle.

 

The New Normal for Hiring Hourly Employees!

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Not many of us are actually doing a ton of hiring right now. How do I know? There are 25 million people who applied for unemployment! That means there’s probably another 75 million that are currently under-employed or utilized.

This means that when we all get back to the ‘new normal’ of working, a bunch of stuff is going to change! How we attract, select, onboard, etc. can not be the same as what we did only sixty to ninety days ago.

Hourly hiring has always been a very “hands-on” endeavor and we must change that! My good friend and Recruiting Expert, Madeline Laurano has done a major research project looking specifically at hourly hiring. I’ve been spending time interviewing TA and HR leaders on the changes they are planning moving forward, and we are going to share with you all of those ideas and strategies!

Join us for a free Webinar on Tuesday, May 12th at 1pm EST: The New Normal for Hourly Hiring: 5 Strategies TA Leaders Must Consider Moving Forward! 

I’m so excited to have this conversation and share the information that Madeline and I have found! It’s always a great time just talking shop with her, and this is a topic we are both passionate about.

Thank you to the great folks over at Get.Fountain.com for sponsoring this and allowing us to present this information. Fountain is an easy to use Hiring Software trusted by the world’s leading companies. Source, screen, and onboard your hourly workers, giving them a great experience without all of the physical high-touch!

Your Hosts with the Most!

Are We Still Pissy About Unpaid Internships?

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Back in the height of the Great Recession (think 2008-2010), when we had double-digit national unemployment numbers. It was dark times, especially for those students who were graduating and those trying to get internships.

Most organizations in hard times cut internship programs. It’s not that they are not important to recruiting, it’s just the ROI drops as unemployment numbers rise. If you have a lot of candidates, it’s tough to spend valuable resources on interns who aren’t really adding much value, if any, to most organizations.

Internships, at its core, is mostly a one-way proposition on the front side. We hire you to get experience. We pay you. We hope you’ll come back and take one of our open jobs and in the future help us be successful. It usually works out, but it’s not a guarantee. In hard times, “not a guarantee” is a hard budget item to get approved!

During the Great Recession the idea of offering “Free Internships” was being used by many organizations and a lot of people lost their minds!

“You have to pay people for the job they do!” “All Interns should be paid fairly!”

Basically, this all went away pretty quickly because the economy took off and we got to the point where we weren’t just paying interns, we were competing for interns and developing all kinds of programs and incentives for interns because talent was so scarce.

The argument wasn’t really solved, it just disappeared because it was no longer relevant. Well, say hello to my little friend! The Free Internship concept is back! Thanks, COVID!

Let’s talk a little bit about our current internship situation!

  • Most organizations have canceled internships for this summer. There will be significantly fewer internships for the summer of 2021, as compared to summer 2019
  • As unemployment rises and layoffs grow, more will cancel these programs.
  • New graduates who can’t find jobs, need experiences to build their resumes.

Should we offer Unpaid Internships? 

YES!!! 1000% YES!!!

Now, let me explain. If you can afford to pay your interns, but be a dick and not pay them! If you can’t afford to pay interns, but you can afford to give students and graduates valuable experiences, give them those experiences!!!

I never understood the argument that you must pay interns for their time. I did student teaching as part of my undergrad degree. I worked a full semester as a teacher and I paid full tuition and never got a dollar for that work! My wife is a Physical Therapist and she did many practicums (medical internships) where she had to pay for school, work full time without pay. Many professions have this happening.

We turn a blind eye to these examples and just believe it’s part of getting that degree, but it’s truly no difference. The reality is, the experience you get, the ability to put that brand on your resume and have a professional reference is very valuable. So, working for free almost always works out for the best for those who take on those experiences and give it there all.

For the record, I have paid my interns. I will pay my interns this year. But, I can’t tell you I’ll always be able to pay interns. At that point, I have a decision to make. Not have interns, which only hurts those kids who need an internship, or have unpaid interns. I’m completely comfortable having unpaid interns, as I know the value it gives those individuals.

I’ve gotten questions recently about unpaid internships, as I hear so many people canceling their internships for this summer. “Can we have an intern work remotely and be unpaid?” Well, it’s not officially an employee, but if you want to “mentor” a student, and that student what’s your mentorship, nothing is stopping you from helping that person out!

Understand, if you aren’t going to pay someone, you get what you pay for. But, I also truly believe that a student who says, “Hey, I can give you twenty hours per week to learn the business” we have a moral obligation to help these students out in a time of crisis!

Okay, hate me in the comments – but we need to be open to Unpaid Internships!

The Top 4 Recruiter Lies We Tell Candidates!

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The world quickly turned from a candidate-driven market to a company driven market, meaning for the first time in about a decade Recruiters will have the power. Now, as a candidate, you might have always felt that recruiters had the power, but you haven’t seen anything until you’ve seen a recruiter in full “I’ve got the power” mode!

I was thinking about this and wanted to share some of the top Recruiter Lies so candidates could spot them, and while you probably can’t call them out, spotting a recruiter lie will help you strategically begin to work on another way to get the response you need:

Send Us Your Resume, Even Though We Don’t Have a Job Lie – I would say this is a ‘semi-lie’. While the recruiter might not have the opening currently, they’re asking for a resume because they frequently have those openings and they never know when one is coming. The recruiter, though, is wrong by not telling you this upfront, so you know what to expect.

– The Hiring Manager Hasn’t Gotten Back To Me Lie – This is a lie and not a lie,  potentially! For Corporate Recruiters this is a lie or lazy, I’ll let you pick. If you’re a corporate recruiter and tell the candidate that the hiring manager hasn’t gotten back to you get your butt up from your desk and walk over to the hiring manager’s desk! If they’re in a different location and won’t get back to you, then you have an influence problem you need to work on. Agency-wise it’s the one frustrating things recruiters have to deal with. Hiring Managers will get to ‘us’ when they feel like it, and usually after they’ve exhausted every other opportunity internally to fill the position.

– The Never Call Back the Candidate Lie – this really isn’t a lie but this happens all the time!  For the sake of Recruiters everywhere if you do this please quit this profession! We (all Recruiters) Hate you as well. You give all of us a bad name. It takes 10 seconds to call back a candidate you spoke to a job about, and tell them “Sorry, you were not chosen and stay in touch, or don’t call me again, etc.” 10 seconds!

– The You Didn’t Score High Enough On The Assessment Lie – The company you’re trying to get into might actually have cut-off scores they’ve established and the lie comes into play when a hiring manager presents someone they’ve worked with previously and that person scores the same as you but they still get the job. If they really like you, the assessment wouldn’t stop them from hiring you.

– The We’ve Decided To Go Another Direction Lie – This comes along with the ‘We really liked you, but” Lie.  This is Recruiter training 10, to not get yourself into trouble when telling a candidate they didn’t get the job we give them a reason that legally can never come back and bite you in the butt. “We really, really, really liked but have decided to not fill the position.” Two weeks later a job posting comes out that seems very similar but with a title change and a few description changes. They didn’t like you.

What’s the biggest reason Recruiters lie? 

They have major conflict-avoidance and are not willing to tell you the truth, which is usually there is something wrong with you based on what they are looking for and don’t want to hurt your feelings.  Unfortunately, many candidates would actually be helped by a little Recruiter honesty but recruiters are afraid of candidates who get told the truth and then get charges from the EEOC, other state or federal agencies, or just get flat out sued.  Candidates have a hard time with feedback like, “you’re really creepy”, “you’re annoying” or “your personality is grating”.  So, the lies come into play because Recruiters have found Lies are easier than the truth.

Your “New” Most Valuable Employees!

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What happens after you test positive for COVID-19, go through the illness and come out on the other side? Freedom! That’s what!

Like most viruses, once you have that virus your body builds up an immunity against it, and you are highly, like getting hit by lightening highly, unlikely to get the COVID again, no matter what you read on that red-state political site you read! Again, science.

This being the case, for the next 12-18 months, we are going to see some strange things happen socially and in our workplaces.

We are going to have employees who can come back to work in any situation and not have to worry about catching the virus, but can still pass it on to others if they aren’t still following sanitizing protocols. They can go to the movies, to the bar, out to eat, with almost no worry for themselves.

Maybe we’ll even give them a card they can show the police so these post-covids can gather together and without the worry of being arrested or disbanded. Or put make them wear a red letter on their clothes… We’ll watch them outside having fun as the rest of us who haven’t had the virus stay sheltered and isolated.

The reality is we would be naive to not understand the value of someone who has already had the virus and is now back to normal health-wise. We employees will be to do things right now, and guess what? You won’t be able to choose which employees you get in this capacity! It might be one of your best, or it might be one of the ones you wished you had fired.

These employees will be able to travel out to your clients. Go visit customers. Work on the shop floor next to each other and somewhat get their lives back to normal. Those who are pre-virus healthy will have to assist these folks from afar in the best way we can.

Think about the biggest dip-shit you have on staff right now. Now, imagine your biggest customer has this big project and they are telling you that you must have someone onsite come and meet with them, and don’t send anyone who can give us the COVID. Okay, great, we’ve got Marty who spends most days in the bathroom looking at Memes now being the face of the organization to our most valuable client.

Could happen. Is Marty ready? Are you ready? Do you even know which of your employees will be on this list? Are you tracking them and do you understand their importance?

Post-Covids will have their run of the world for a bit. They’ll be extremely valuable to every employer. While we might have high unemployment for a bit, can you imagine those forward-thinking companies who are out there hiring all the post-covids?

Who would have thought that a major skill in the modern workforce would be simply your ability to survive!?

Reader Question: Can I negotiate my offer during the COVID Pandemic?

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So, we like to think that no one is hiring right now, or the only people hiring are Amazon, Grubhub, hospitals, etc. The reality is, even in the worse economy, a lot of stuff still needs to happen.

Many organizations are finding out they can still get a bunch of their work done with folks at home, and collaborating in new ways, and the learning curve is steep, but everyone is working together to figure it out.

I had a call this past week from a soon to be college graduate, dual major, Electrical Engineering and Computer Engineering from a great school, so it makes sense he already has an offer. He had some questions for me. He was excited, of course, and understood that he was the exception right now, not the rule. With historic unemployment, companies are still going to want him!

One of the questions he had was where and how do you negotiate during a crisis situation like this. The company that offered him the job, was also laying employees off! Not the best environment to play hardball negotiator! Plus, his school had stopped all career fairs, etc. So, he didn’t have a traditional route many college students would have in normal times to connect with some other employers.

Can I, and should I, negotiate my offer during this COVID crisis? 

My answer:

You can negotiate anytime you feel you need to, but having the political savviness to understand the situation and current timing might work for you best long term if you don’t right now.

That being said, here’s how I would negotiate right now! First, you have to play this very coy. You, and the person making the offer, both know the dire straights going on right now, especially when employees are being laid off, but they’re making you an offer.

There are two things I might try if you feel like you can play this very soft. First, you still have a semester left of school, you could politely ask if they have any kind of tuition assistance and would they be willing to help you out during this last semester? The other ask could be for a signing bonus, to be paid upon start, which is later in the year, but good to negotiate now.

There is little risk they will pull the offer because you are trying to negotiate, and if you play it right you will come out looking fine, no matter the outcome. The other option is to just wait until your actual start date in December and then ask for a sign-on bonus at that point, or as you get close to starting, make the call and say something like, “Hey, I’ve got some friends who have accepted at other companies and they are all getting some sort of sign-on bonus, is this something I can get as well?”

You will learn a few things in this process:

  1. You don’t get what you don’t ask for, but timing can be everything in terms of when you ask.
  2. You are the only person managing your career. If you wait for a company to do it, you’ll miss out on a lot. Manage your own career.
  3. The job offer is contingent on them actually needing you when it comes time for you to start. It’s not a guarantee the employer will need you, so you don’t need to act like you’re signing a guaranteed contract. Things can and will happen between now and December.
  4. Know your value. Just because it sucks for everyone else, doesn’t mean it sucks for you.

What do you think? Should you negotiate in trying times?

 

Google Leading the Way on #COVID19 Gig Worker Response! #Coronavirus

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Google has more contractors (gig workers) than actual full-time employees. Did you know this? I didn’t. Google employs roughly 120,000 contractors and has about 100,000 regular full-time employees. Welcome to 2020!

Here’s what most people don’t understand about the contracting world (it just happens to be my world at HRUTech.com!)

  • Most contractors (gig workers) want to make as much money as possible, as such, most will choose to take the highest dollar offer in lieu of medical insurance and paid time off (PTO). Some states require a certain amount of PTO.
  • Running a contract staffing firm, our contractors are our product. If our ‘product’ doesn’t work, we have zero revenue. So, it’s not like we can just have contractors stay home for 14 days and pay them their full-time wage. It’s simple economics, zero revenue in means no money to pay out, plus most large enterprise clients, like Google, are usually out 30-90 days in paying their contract staff invoices.
  • Of course, every contract and temp staffing firm wants to do what’s best. They also want to stay in business.

Google understands this simple dynamic and they stepped up big time this week in making this announcement:

“As we’re in a transition period in the U.S.—and to cover any gaps elsewhere in the world—Google is establishing a COVID-19 fund that will enable all our temporary staff and vendors, globally, to take paid sick leave if they have potential symptoms of COVID-19, or can’t come into work because they’re quarantined,” the post read.

Google relies on approximately 120,000 temps and contractors on top of its 100,000 full-time employees, and not all of them have paid sick leave currently. Google’s post seemed to indicate that the fund would cover expenses for those not already able to take sick leave under current employment arrangements.”

That message right there is coming from a huge place of understanding from Google! We rely incredibly on this pool of talent, our contractors, and we have to find a way to make sure that the suppliers of this talent are taken care of so they can take care of their employees.

Uber and Lyft also came out this week and told drivers that tested positive for COVID-19 they would also pay them their average week’s wage to stay home and not drive. Another giant cost for these companies, but when you rely on gig workers as your business model, you better find ways to take help these folks out when a crisis hits.

Most organizations don’t consider “Total Employment” when a crisis happens. They circle the wagons around their own FTEs and not much else. I’ve spoken to multiple giant enterprise HR leaders this past week and this concept wasn’t even a blip on their radar! They could care less about their contractors and their partners for talent when it comes to COVID-19.

This is ultimately a much bigger problem for these organizations. I preach constantly to organizational TA and HR leaders they should be owning all talent in their barn. Total employment (FTEs, Contractors, Temps, Consultants, etc.). This is who really gets your work done, and if you don’t have awareness of all aspects, you are truly missing the boat.

What do you think? Do you feel your organization should be paying attention to contract and temporary workers during this public health crisis?

Getting Your Hiring Managers to Stop Sucking! (Video)

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I was out in San Francisco a few weeks back at SmartRecruiter’s Hiring Success conference. The theme of my talk was about this often strained relationship that HR and Talent Acquisition has with our hiring managers!

For the most part, Hiring Managers tend to Suck! And I dig into why do they suck so much, and how can we get them to stop Sucking!

Check it out!

Want to get your hiring managers to stop sucking? Send me a note and I’ll come do a Hiring Manager Intervention at your company!

You supply the Antibacterial gel and mask, and I am there!

Want more Women and Minorities in Tech Jobs? Do this first!

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We are constantly talking about how do we get more women and minorities (but not those Asian or Indian minorities) into STEM careers. If we only catch them sooner, that will be the key. If we only give them more math, that will be the key. If we only pay teachers more, that will be the key. It’s all false.

A new study out has shown that the number one determining factor at getting anyone interested in going into a high tech field is whether they actually enjoy it or not. Now some things come into play in why someone would enjoy a job. Two main things:

  1. Do you have confidence you’ll do well at it?
  2. Do you get paid well?

In the simple way that I like to think, this all makes perfect sense.

Let me try to do some things. Oh, hey, I actually like doing this one thing! Oh, hey, I’m actually pretty good at it (confidence). Oh, HEY, you going to pay me how much to do this!?!

The problem is, we are super crappy at letting people try to do stuff without them having the education or experience to do that thing. Want to program? Oh, yeah, well just go spend a ton of money programming classes, get some experience, and then come talk to us! We can’t wait! We really want you, after…

If we had some ways to determine if someone would like something, some sort of job experience that mimicked the job, without having to have the specific skill, that would be perfect. Turns out, that’s hard.

I had a conversation recently with an HR leader from a utility company. They are struggling to find “Line Workers”. There really aren’t many educational programs, and even when some of those people come as graduates, they find that they actually don’t like the job! Why would they go through all of that education, and not even like the job? The money is great! They can pass the classes. It seems easy enough!

Do you know what a line worker has to do every day on the job? Climb up high things. If you’re scared of heights, being a line worker isn’t for you.

This HR leader found that if they went to campuses, high, community colleges, etc. and did a little competition, they actually found a highly successful way to hire people who would be successful. The competition? A race up a pole. Set up two telephone poles next to each other on a platform. Rig up some safety harnesses put a bell at the top and give out dumb prices for winners.

The kids who won the races, had no fear of heights, and if they had an interest in line working as a career, and a decent head on their shoulders, they could teach them the job and they would be successful, and most likely enjoy what they were doing.

I find that we (education and the business community) rarely give kids a chance to experience potential jobs they might actually want to do. So, we force them down this path and in the end they find out they don’t like it. We all own this. Businesses need to reach out more to schools and make it a regular occurrence that kids are coming in and shadowing. Not once a year, more like once a month or week! Education institutions should mandate kids to experience the profession before allowing them to sign up for a program.

Make them get involved. Get their hands dirty. See what’s it’s really like. “Oh, you want to be stockbroker!?” Awesome! There’s the phone, call 12 of your friends parents and ask them how much money they make. Go!”