3.05 Determining Hiring Needs

1. 3.05 Determining Hiring Needs

2. Determining Hiring Needs • Making the decision to hire workers for your business is a big step that involves determining whether it's cost-efficient to hire someone and then deciding what type of help you need. • Hiring full-time or part-time employees • hiring your children • hiring temporary help • or perhaps using leased employees or independent contractors in your business are among your options.

3. Factors to Consider When Identifying Hiring Needs • Think about your current position or a position you have held at a previous workplace. • Obtain the formal position description (or write one if one does not exist). • Analyze the position description. • Prepare an analysis of the reasons the position exists. Highlight the roles, relationships and responsibilities of the position and outline the organizational needs that determines these. • Identify a staffing gap in your workplace and describe why the gap exists. (Outline the organizational needs that determine the gap.) • Develop a list of staffing requirements for closing the gap. Your list should consider: • how many new staff are needed • existing staff who could be utilized, explaining how.

4. Benefits of Forecasting Hiring Needs • The overall purpose of strategic HR planning is to: • Ensure adequate human resources to meet the strategic goals and operational plans of your organization - the right people with the right skills at the right time • Keep up with social, economic, legislative and technological trends tha t impact on human resources in your area and in the sector • Remain flexible so that your organization can manage change if the future is different than anticipated • Strategic HR planning predicts the future HR management needs of the organization after analyzing the organization's current human resources, the external labor market and the future HR environment that the organization will be operating in. • The analysis of HR management issues external to the organization and developing scenarios about the future are what distinguishes strategic planning from operational planning. • The basic questions to be answered for strategic planning are: • Where are we going? • How will we develop HR strategies to successfully get there, given the circumstances? • What skill sets do we need?

5. Determining Hiring Needs for a Large Company vs. Small Company • When looking for a job, a good fit is very important. You want to be able to get as much out of a job as possible, as well as feel like you are making an impact on the direction of the company. What your own wants and needs are will be dictated by your personality. • However, what you can expect from a company is mostly (not always) dictated by whether it is a large, well funded company, or a small company where profits aren’t expected for years. • This post will generally outline the biggest differences in these two very different work environments, and will be followed by individual posts outlining what it is like to work in each type of environment. • Resources: One of the biggest differences between these two environments is the amount of resources available. And not just money, but availability of up-to-date equipment and expert consultants. • Large companies have very deep pockets, and money is committed to provide scientists with the best and most up to date technologies to perform their work. There are also a wide variety of experts in various fields that you have access to if you need niche expertise. • In contrast, small companies don’t have the capital to buy much large equipment, and even nice fluorescent microscopes can be hard to justify let alone a new confocal. There will be many tasks that you will need to learn how to do yourself, as there aren’t as many hands available to perform the work. • In small companies you need to be very resourceful, and make contacts at the local university to gain access to up to date equipment or expertise. Advantage: big company

6. Determining Hiring Needs for a Large Company vs. Small Company • Impact: at a large multi-national corporation, it is really hard to feel like you are having a big impact on the business. It is hard to feel like anything you are doing is having an impact on the stock price. • At a small company, the work that you do is immediately incorporated into the next regulatory filing or investor presentation, and you feel that how well you do your job directly contributes to the success of the business. Advantage: small company • Pace: Sometimes projects can take a long time to move forward at big companies. Large corporations take the extra time to dot all the i’s and cross the t’s, and make sure that all patents are filed and business due diligence is performed before moving forward with a technology platform. Time is also required to communicate, educate and get buy-in from senior management of various business units within the company- important for the future success of the program. • Small companies are typically fast to act, and can quickly make decisions and take the next step. This is mostly due to the senior management being down the hall from the laboratory, and understanding the advantages of being small and nimble. Overall, forward progress can happen much more quickly at small companies. Advantage: small company

7. Determining Hiring Needs for a Large Company vs. Small Company • Best Practices: Big companies have a deep corporate history, and have put into place best practices on getting things done; from approving projects to filing patents to performance management. These best practices take more time (see above), but there is someone there making sure that the decisions that are made are sound. • At small companies you don’t always have access to the corporate history, or big company processes – therefore things get done much faster (see above), but not always to the same quality. While it is more important to do things fast than perfect in a small company (time is money), it isn’t the best place to learn best practices. • However, if you have spent some time learning big company skills, you can get a lot of high quality work accomplished quickly in a start-up environment. Advantage: big company

8. Determining Hiring Needs for a Large Company vs. Small Company • Development Opportunities: Big companies have development opportunities galore. They have a variety of projects that you have the opportunity to contribute to (stretching your technical skills), as well as classes available for learning important non-technical skills such as hiring, people and project management, career development, and leadership skills. • Small companies don’t have the money to commit to developing their employees that large companies do, but you get to stretch in other areas. As there are fewer people in small companies, you get to take more ownership of projects. You also get experience leading teams that you wouldn’t get in larger companies where there more people are in front of you waiting for those leadership opportunities. The responsibility gained at small companies can help you grow faster than you would in a large company, but it can come at an expense. Advantage: even, but highly dependent on your ability to accept responsibility, and your boss. • Obviously there are pros and cons in both environments, and it is really a trade off depending on what you are looking for. • The more independent you are, the better fit a small company is for you. • If you require more guidance and like more structure and definition in your position, then a big company is likely the place to start. • So, take some of the above characteristics and think about how they match with your personality when considering the type of company you are looking to join. If you are one of the lucky ones, you might actually have to choose between the two.

9. Procedures for Determining Hiring Needs • Best Practices: Big companies have a deep corporate history, and have put into place best practices on getting things done; from approving projects to filing patents to performance management. These best practices take more time (see above), but there is someone there making sure that the decisions that are made are sound. At small companies you don’t always have access to the corporate history, or big company processes – therefore things get done much faster (see above), but not always to the same quality. While it is more important to do things fast than perfect in a small company (time is money), it isn’t the best place to learn best practices. However, if you have spent some time learning big company skills, you can get a lot of high quality work accomplished quickly in a start-up environment. Advantage: big company

10. Demonstrate Procedures for Determining Hiring Needs • Let's assume you are a new business owner with no employees, but are tired of never having any free time. (After all, isn't that one of the reasons why you went into business for yourself?) • So what do you do first? Are you sure you really need someone? Are you sure you are performing the duties you would like to hire someone else to do as efficiently as you could be? • Perhaps all you need is some computer training to help automate some things that will cut some of your hours. Take some time to fully assess your needs..

11. Demonstrate Procedures for Determining Hiring Needs • Here is a list of things to consider before placing that first Help Wantedad: • Make a list of every duty that you feel someone else could do. • Estimate the time spent doing those duties. Could you hire a part-time employee? • Analyze all of the costs. Can you afford to pay someone? Remember you'll not only have the salary to pay, you'll also have benefits and tax issues to deal with. • Do you need a permanent employee or could you hire temporary help? • Do you have working space for an employee? • Could the type of work be desirable for a student internship? Contact local community colleges or universities and ask about their internship programs. • Can you hire an independent contractor to do the work on project basis or for set number of hours? This frees you from payroll taxes, but still gives you the flexibility of an on-site worker. Be careful that you don't misclassify a worker as an independent contractor. This can be costly. Check the IRS guidelines to help in determining the employee vs. independent contractor designation. • Finally, don't forget to account for your time spent recruiting, interviewing, training, and supervising an employee. Make sure you really will have some spare time left over!

12. Activity 3.05 • Read“HowHiring Works: Your Hiring Needs,” found at http://money.howstuffworks.com/business-hiring1.htm. • After reading the article, work in pairs to summarize and/or paraphrase the questions included in the article that should be considered when determining hiring needs. • Both of you should use your version of the questions to determine hiring needs for your own business venture. • Add the questions and your conclusions regarding their businesses’ hiring needs to your folder.