Skilled recruitment brings rewards

Posted on: 17.02.2010    12:28:17

Recruitment can be a tricky business. It requires skill to successfully find and employ the right staff for a position and going about this in the cheapest way can be a false economy.

When it comes to recruiting new staff, it pays to go through the process professionally.

The government’s Business Link advisory website points out that vacancies cannot be filled successfully unless the job has been accurately defined in the first place.

In fact, it is helpful for both the employer and the candidate for the position to be clearly outlined. As a business, if you know exactly what skills, knowledge and experience you are looking for then you are more likely to recruit the right person for your job.

There are plenty of free resources that businesses can use, like www.job-description.co.uk, which has advice on how to define a role and the accountabilities required from a candidate.

Finding the right person for a job is absolutely essential to business success. If you put someone in a customer service role whose communication skills are poor, the likelihood is that they will have a negative impact on your business.

Once you have found people with the right skills, you also need to make sure you pay them enough to keep them motivated, enthusiastic and, most importantly, in the job.

A recent survey by YouGov, conducted on behalf of the Chartered Institute of Personnel and Development (CIPD), found that pay rises, even if small, significantly contribute to employee satisfaction at the moment, most likely because wage increases are so few and far between.

Since 2008, the proportion of people receiving a pay increase has fallen by 17 percentage points, from 67 per cent to 50 per cent. Yet the share of employees who are satisfied with their pay rise has doubled since last year.

Indeed, satisfaction rates have risen among all groups in the last two years, with both public and private sector workers saying they are happy with the increase in their salary.

However, public sector workers are less satisfied than their private sector counterparts, the research found. This was backed up by a subsequent study by YouGov on behalf of the CIPD, which found that 57 per cent of public sector employees expect their 2010 salary to be the same or higher than it was in 2009.

The research indicates the challenge that public sector employers face in being able to afford staff. The care industry, for example, has a labour shortage because of the combination of an ageing population and the fact that care workers are paid low wages.

Employers need to focus on the benefits of employees, not their cost to a business. Underpaying staff generally leads to dissatisfaction, a lack of loyalty to the company and ultimately, individuals seeking alternative employment.

For example, if an employee is paid £5.80 but only puts in 80 per cent effort because they feel they are not being fairly compensated for their work, then the effective cost to the employer is £7.25. Added to this is the potential cost of finding a replacement when they eventually get fed up and leave.

However, if you paid that same individual £6.25 an hour, plus a bonus of £0.25 but the employee works at 110 per cent because they feel more appreciated and valued, then the effective cost of that member of staff is £5.90. The added advantage is that they are likely to do a better job and therefore keep customers happy, avoiding a loss to the business in different areas.

Looking at it another way, if the cost of an employee to the business is £10 an hour but the employer can sell the output from that member of staff at £20 an hour then the profit is £10. Even if the employment costs go up by ten per cent then the return is still £20, which would seem preferable to not having adequate staff in place.

“Retaining and developing talented individuals is key to business success, so managers need to focus on creating a talent culture to ensure that employees are nurtured and developed to the advantage of the business,” commented Ruth Spellman, chief executive of the Chartered Management Institute.

“Ultimately if we are to drive British business forward as we emerge from the recession, organisations need to attract and then be able to keep the right people for the job,” she added.

 

Author: Chris Slay

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