Looking after your staff can build a better business.

Looking after yourself and your team draws on several important considerations for financial advisers. There is the importance of your HR approach; there are matters around staff motivation and of course there are worklife balance/health and wellbeing considerations to take into account.

An advice practice is essentially a small business and too often HR is put to the bottom of the pile in SMEs because owners don’t have the required experience, or they find such processes too time consuming.

Ironically, HR – and its role in recruiting and retaining the right employees – is fundamentally more important for SMEs.

HR policies that many successful practices have adopted from ‘big business’ include:

• Have an employee handbook which explains the values, key policies, benefits and expectations of your business
• Ensure a thorough recruitment process is in operation – it is more costly taking on the wrong employee than no employee at all
• Proactively schedule a meeting at three months for all new staff
• Implement regular internal feedback sessions – listen to your staff and value their opinions.
• Have an underlying focus on employee retention and satisfaction

Happy and motivated staff stay longer, and when it comes to retaining people, it’s not always about money. Think about simple non-monetary rewards including awards, celebratory lunches to congratulate staff; salary packaging options; flexible work hours or offering extra annual leave. In terms of the job itself, think about empowering staff with extra responsibilities or a new job title, and invest in their development by allowing them to enrol in training courses and attend industry events.

Research by Business Health found that businesses with a formal incentive programme generate 129% more profit than those without.

In terms of the health and wellbeing of your staff it pays to offer different options that reflect the varying preferences of your team; yoga in the park and lunchtime walks don’t appeal to everyone, plus it’s important to focus on their mental wellbeing as well (which may include giving each staff member one or two ‘mental health’ days off each year).

Other popular ideas including injecting more fun into the office (nerf guns, foosball tables), team pizza and wine (and perhaps karaoke) on a Friday afternoon, holding meetings away from the office, and team-based volunteering and community involvement.

Your people are the biggest asset, and in a smaller business staff issues have a proportionally bigger impact, which is why adopting a formal approach to HR is an investment in your business, not a cost.

—————

This is an extract from a collection of business improvement tips for advisers, launched at Zurich’s Trax2Success national roadshow, featuring the 2013 AFA Adviser of the year Jenny Brown.

Click here to read Hot business tip number 2: Survey your clients

Click here to read Hot business tip number 3: Place a higher value on your time

Click here to read Hot business tip number 4: Review your client onboarding process

Click here to read Hot business tip number 5: Adopt an estate planning methodology across your business

Click here to read Hot business tip number 6: Tailor your communication strategy by client generation

Click here to read Hot business tip no number 7: Change your approach to review meetings

Click here to read Hot business tip number 8: Create a differentiated service offering (segment your client base)

Click here to read Hot business tip number 9: Set up a Board of Advice

Click here to read Hot business tip number10: Develop a client retention strategy

Click here to read Hot business tip number 11: Run a program where staff drive improvements

Click here to read Hot business tip number. 12: Build your emotional intelligence

Click here to read Hot business tip number. 13: Go Social

Click here to read Hot business tip number. 14: Get better at handling objections

Click here to read Hot business tip number. 15: Create stronger referral sources

Click here to read Hot business tip number. 16: Set up a Google account

Click here to read Hot business tip number. 17: Learn from leading advisers

Click here to read Hot business tip number. 18: Make better use of technology in your business

Click here to read Hot business tip number 19: Improve your office environment

Click here to read Hot business tip number 20: Develop a great value proposition

Click here to read Hot business tip number 21: Make more use of video in your business

Click here to read Hot business tip number 22: Optimise your website for mobile

Click here to read Hot business tip number 23: Have a marketing plan

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5 tips to finding a recruiter to meet your needs.

Recruiters can be a valuable partner in helping you bring the right people in to your business however there are a few things you should keep in mind when considering choosing a recruiter to work with you.

Number 1:

Ensure that the recruiter has a successful track record of recruiting for positions similar to the one that you are seeking to recruit. Recruiters that have this experience will have a strong understanding of the role including responsibilities, expectations of delivery, how the role fits within your firm now and how it may develop in to the future.  Some recruiters concentrate their focus on particular segments of wealth management that are relevant to your business and will readily understand your requirements in terms of candidate experience and cultural fit.

Number 2:

Understand how the recruiter will work with you in the recruitment process as recruiters don’t have a one size fits all business model. They will work with you:

• Exclusively under contract where they will source and screen the best fit candidates presenting you with a short list for interview. With exclusive assignments there are specific parameters to the search including an expected time frame and the fees payable are usually scheduled at specified periods with in the search process. Additionally, the recruiter will manage the candidates through the process and if required handle the negotiations with the preferred candidate.
• Additionally, if things don’t work out with the new employee in the probation period recruiters who work on an exclusive basis will offer a guarantee that includes replacing the employee without you incurring further recruitment costs. However it is worthwhile reading the fine print, as the usual practice is for the guarantee to be contingent on a number of factors excluding your decision to terminate them for reasons other non-performance and breaching company policy.
• Contingently where you will be presented with a number of candidates for your consideration and you only pay the recruiter if you employ one of them. If you do work with a contingent recruiter you should be aware that they often select candidates from a limited talent pool and will circulate their resumes to multiple parties, you being one of them. While you may have interviewed a candidate and made the decision to appoint them, by the time you pick up the phone to the recruiter the candidate may well have accepted an alternative role which means that you are back to square one with a great deal of time and energy wasted.

• Providing an Unbundled service where you decide the extent the recruiter will be involved in the recruitment campaign. You decide which activities that you want to undertake and the recruitment strategy is built around what you want to do and what you want the recruiter to do. This is a consultative fee-for-service approach rather than a fee based on a percentage of the candidate’s remuneration.
• Providing an Advisory service where you are given guidance on the formulation of the recruitment strategy and the most effective means of identifying and harnessing the best fit candidate. This service can take the form of a one-off meeting or alternatively may run for the entire recruitment campaign where the recruiter has a more hands on advisory role and the fees will reflect this.

Number 3:

Make sure that you will be able to work effectively with the recruiter. Recruiting is a challenging business activity and requires significant focus and if you are working with a recruiter you need to feel comfortable with them in much the same way as you do with your clients. This will depend on your personal style and there will be recruiters who you identify with in terms of not only their track record of success but how they present themselves. A successful recruiter who has an impressive track record in placing people relevant to your business is only a good fit for you if you feel you can work with them.

Number 4:

Probe the recruiters you speak to about their businesses and in particular the processes and systems they use. Some recruiters have made large investments in terms of technology and candidate management systems while others work on the back of the envelope and their database is made up of post it notes.

Number 5:

Industry engagement. Professional recruiters involve themselves in the financial services industry through the industry associations and often add their support to initiatives to promote professionalism and career opportunities and advancement for new entrants and those seeking new career opportunities. Industry engaged recruiters are not only participants but often are contributors at industry conferences and will lend their support to workshops and seminars. All this adds up to engagement and commitment to the industry which says a lot about a recruitment firm.

If you keep these five tips in mind when entering in to discussions with recruiters at the very least you will have some guide posts to help you to make a decision that will work for you and your business.

By Peter Dawson, Principal, The Dawson Partnership

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The inaugural SLICE financial planning survey has revealed that only 9% of respondents thought that the introduction of FOFA has negatively impacted on their business growth in terms of staffing and while 25% were unclear of the ramifications of the legislation in follow up discussions most suspected there would be some increase in costs to their businesses but they thought that this will have little or no impact on employee numbers.

25% of respondents expect FOFA to have a positive effect, leading to more employees in their businesses. Others commented that although complying with FOFA requirements will not lead to them hiring more employees, it has meant more work for the existing employees.

14% who responded ‘Other’ focused on the increase in workload within their businesses due to the implementation of FOFA but most indicated that they are looking for this to be undertaken by existing staff. It was thought that this increase while resulting in some cost to their businesses shouldn’t impact on employee numbers. However, one respondent made the comment that ‘costs will increase and productivity will decline’.

In follow up discussions with a number of respondents it was found that those who thought there was no impact or the impact was marginal all had put in place measures to meet the requirements of the legislation well in advance of its enactment. As one business owner said “The industry has had more than adequate time to get ready for FOFA and those that are struggling now should have taken the necessary steps to get their businesses ready”.

Employee numbers

68% of financial planning businesses either maintained or decreased employee numbers in 2013 while 32% increased their headcount. Of those businesses that recruited employees 35% were for replacement positions while 29% were for new positions as a direct result of business growth.

The new positions included traditional financial planning roles plus marketers, business coaches, accountants and lawyers. One business owner commented that although FOFA had little impact in terms of workload, they will be increasing employee numbers due to increased business, including bringing some work they outsourced during the GFC back in house.

Recruitment methods

When it comes to recruiting employees, the overwhelming number of respondents (70%) DIY while 13% use specialist recruiters who have a track record of recruiting for financial planning businesses. 8% draw on an HR resource and 5% on their licensee for support.

Cost was cited as a significant issue with recruiter’s fees being seen as prohibitive. However when asked how much time they had to allocate to the DIY process and the costs associated with that none had costed their time and the cost of the business’s resources in the recruitment process.

As one respondent said “Recruiting staff is something I have to do but I’ve found it frustrating. I start out talking to colleagues and if they don’t have any leads I advertise on SEEK but quite often you get a lot of people applying who haven’t the experience or the skills”.

55% of respondents will call on industry colleagues for leads while 54% use employment websites. 18% draw on social media in their recruitment campaign. When asked how they use social media in follow up discussions most said that they mainly use LinkedIn and to a lesser extent Facebook and that was mainly to check out candidates they were considering rather than sourcing them from these websites.

Financial planners are also becoming more creative in their efforts to find good candidates, including advertising on university websites, working with local high schools and university career services and acting as mentors in formal mentoring programs.

Employee screening

Most financial planners (79%) said they always conduct reference checks. When asked in follow up conversations what kind of checks they conducted 65% said that they conducted a formal reference check with a list of prepared questions with the remainder saying they did informal checks with no or few prepared questions. All said that they always spoke to the previous employer and sixty per cent spoke to the manager that the employee reported directly to.

One respondent commented “I always carry out two reference checks and make sure that I speak to the people that the person reported to as then you know they have had a lot to do with them on a day to day basis and can give you a an accurate view as to their capabilities and performance in their previous roles”.

58% of respondents used behavioural profiling however it depended on the nature of the position in terms of role responsibilities and seniority. 21% always used profiling. One respondent commented “I had a situation where I had two great candidates for a client service role and so I used a profiling assessment. It made the decision so much easier to assess how each would not only be suitable for the role but fit in to our team”.

64% of respondents stated that they didn’t use IQ tests with 27% saying they do but not always and 9% said they always use them.

Knowledge based tests were used by 81% per cent of respondents with 20% stating that they always use them.

Training

When asked about their training budgets 50% said that they had in 2013 increased their budgets while 34% reported no change and thirteen per cent had reduced their budget.

When asked in follow up conversations where the increases were targeted respondents said it was focused on up skilling employees in the use of the client service and administration functions and resourcing compliance.

One respondent commented “Training is an investment in our business. If we aren’t up to scratch on how we service our clients then we’re not doing our jobs. It is also important for our staff to know that we are interested in them getting the most out of their jobs and they are equipped to deliver excellent service to our clients. We run a staff satisfaction survey and every time it comes back with a strong endorsement of staff of our training programs.”

Concluding remarks

Controlling business costs and having a competent team in place were recurring themes that ran through the SLICE Survey.

While there was concern expressed in both the Survey and follow up discussions about an increase (or anticipated increase) in costs with the implementation of FOFA, a significant proportion of respondents stated that they would be able to absorb the workload through their existing staff rather than recruit new employees.

Recruitment was the second area of concern with most businesses preferring to DIY and found going it alone a ‘hit and miss’ experience. However, no one who chose this route had worked out what it cost their business in terms of their time or that of their staff.

Even in this cost sensitive environment there was recognition by businesses that they are reliant on their staff to deliver client outcomes and ensure they are fulfilling their requirements under FOFA and the reported increase in training budgets is a reflection of this.

Respondents to the SLICE survey

71% of respondents are in businesses that have been operating for more than ten years with 11% operating for six to ten years.

77% of respondents are in businesses with up to ten employees with 23% having between six to ten employees and 54% having between one to five employees. 16% of those surveyed were from businesses with more than twenty employees.

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These interviews invariably start off innocuously with the interviewer asking you a range of background questions drawn from your CV. From there they will in disperse straightforward questions with the curve balls. For the uninitiated it can be very disorientating as you wonder what is going be asked next.

Curve ball questions are wide ranging covering an array of topics and often seem out of place in the interview but they are specifically designed to provide an insight in to your values, priorities, motivations and prejudices.

Some examples of curve ball questions are:

• What is your passion in life?
• Who inspires you?
• If you could be another person who would you choose to be?
• If you had a dinner party and you could invite anyone who would you invite?
• If you were the Prime Minister what would you see as your first priority?
• Where would you like to go on holiday and if you could choose anyone to join you who would that be?
• Are you a cat or a dog person?
• What didn’t you like about your last boss?
• Do you think women are discriminated against in the financial services industry?
• Your boss is promoted and someone you don’t like is brought in to replace him/her. What would you do?
• You find out that someone is spreading malicious gossip about you at work what would you do?
• You are offered a promotion a close friend has coveted. What would you do?
• You are commended for a piece of work that was a group effort. Would you say anything?
• Someone has made a snide joke about someone in the office. Would you take it up with the person who made the joke? Or report them to your boss or HR?
• You come up with an innovative business solution and someone else claims it as their idea. What would do?
• Your boss flirts with you and you feel uncomfortable about it. What would you do?
• You have the opportunity for secondment to another business unit that would provide you with invaluable experience but your boss doesn’t want you to go. What do you do?
• You’ve been successful in securing a new job and a week in you hate it. What do you do?
• A recruiter calls you with a great career opportunity but the company you are with has provided you in your career advancement with training, promotions and challenging work. What do you do?
• What is the biggest mistake that you have made and what did you do to rectify it?

These twenty questions are the tip of the ice berg and it is not unknown for interviewers to put a great deal of emphasis on curve ball questions using follow ups to chase down particular motivational or values based issues. However, they can be also problematic for the interviewer unless they have considerable experience in interviewing and understand how the mosaic of questions will illicit responses that will build candidate profiles that they are seeking.

For the candidate it is important that they take a cautious approach particularly when asked questions that they are not comfortable with. Navigating your around some of these questions may also reflect negatively on you as the interviewer might think that you are trying to avoid giving a truthful response.

If you are not sure how to answer a particular question then tell the interviewer explaining your reasoning. If he/she is not able to assist then either tell them that you are not comfortable with the question or answer to the best of your ability without compromising yourself.

Quite often candidates can feel ambushed by curve ball questions and try to outsmart them by making up an answer they think will be viewed positively, however your best course of action is to do what you think is the best thing for you and answer the questions honestly.

As an end note; a candidate was asked the question, ‘if you were the prime minister what would you see as your first priority?’ He answered that he would bomb one of our Asian neighbours and was surprised that he didn’t get the job.

Peter Dawson

Principal

The Dawson Partnership

Author of Successful Recruitment – Transforming your business through best practice

www.dawsonpartnership.com.au

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Of all the threats to wealth management businesses a wrong hiring decision ranks at the front of the queue, as non-performing employees can soon become ‘the enemy within’ causing considerable damage to a company’s client relationships and its brand.

‘Successful Recruitment – Transforming your business through best practice’ is designed to help bullet proof wealth management businesses by arming them with the advice they need to ensure they get their recruiting decisions right.

Written by a veteran industry executive turned head hunter with the assistance of a senior HR consultant, ‘Successful Recruitment’ has over 45 pages of nuts and bolts advice, practical tips and tools designed to ensure businesses are in the best position to hire the best fit employees for their businesses and not the next enemy within.

Everything you need to know is included, from putting together a winning recruitment strategy, targeting and harnessing high performance candidates, getting the best out of social media, the questions you need to ask in interviews to identify the talkers from the walkers and how to beat out the competition when negotiating with ‘your’ candidate.

You can get your FREE copy of Successful Recruitment by clicking here.

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The pitfalls
The common mistake in conducting references is speaking to the wrong people. You should only speak to the manager that the candidate actually reported to and if there were dual reporting lines then you should speak with both managers independent of each other.

Often candidates will provide the names of referees who were colleagues or managers that they didn’t report to and this is a red light. There have been cases where candidates have supplied contact details of friends who they have worded up even in some cases supplying them with a script of what to say.

You should ensure that if the candidate supplies contact details of a referee with only a mobile number as the contact number, and they aren’t known to you personally, then when you make the call go through the company switch board and ask for the person’s title when you are putting you through.

The reference questionnaire
When conducting reference checking it is critical that you invest time in putting together a comprehensive reference checking questionnaire that covers off the following:

• The dates of the candidate’s employment as it is not unknown for candidates to ‘smooth’ dates to cover periods of unemployment or employment with a company that ended with the candidate’s termination
• The nature and scope of the role and if the candidate has stated that they have had team responsibility confirm this along with the composition of the team and whether they reported directly to the candidate or whether it was on a dotted line
• The nature of the role and whether it was as described by the candidate. Sometimes candidates will embellish on the scope and responsibilities of a role
• Achievements and whether those as stated by the candidate measure up to what was actually achieved. It is advisable for questions to be asked about targets set year on year and what was achieved against target. Candidates have a wide variety of reasons they didn’t make target and while some are valid you need to test this with the candidate’s manager
• Academic qualifications. While it is advisable to go directly to the educational institution to conduct an academic records check, internal company courses can be checked with the manager. It is not unheard of for a candidate to enhance course content or while the course itself maybe as described by the candidate but they may not have been participants
• There are a range of behavioural/attitudinal questions that can be asked around work attitude including task application, team leadership/management and cultural fit.  Often you learn more about the candidate by asking these types of questions than any other and the responses should also provide you comfort around the responses to behavioural questions that you asked the candidate.

Reading between the lines
It is important that when you speak to a referee you can read between the lines when they provide you with a beige answer to your questions. Rather than provide a poor reference it is common for people to subtly tell you they were not impressed with the candidate without explicitly saying so.

A good question to ask towards the end of a reference is ‘if the opportunity arose would you rehire the candidate?’ and if the response is no then you should ask ‘why not?’

I can recall a number of times when I had spent quite some time attempting to get a clear understanding as the candidate performance in a previously held role and although nothing was said of a negative nature I wasn’t convinced the manager was being forthcoming in their opinion. Once I asked this question nine in ten times I left the conversation with a clear understanding as to where the manager stood.

Any recruitment process incurs a cost on your business in the time you have to invest in identifying, interviewing and referencing candidates so it is important that you get the decision right. Taking the time to put together a reference questionnaire is an investment in getting your decision right when making the final decision about the candidate.

When in doubt seek professional advice
If you feel that you could do with assistance with putting together a reference questionnaire that is specifically tailored to the position that you are recruiting for then it is advisable that you seek assistance from a HR/recruitment consultant who has the experience that you are after.

www.dawsonpartnership.com.au

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In part two I will take you through the interview questionnaire and in particular what should be included to ensure you are in the best position to get the information you need from the candidate to make a proper assessment of their suitability.

Interview questionnaires can be divided into three parts:

The first part is the candidate background, including career history, educational qualifications, industry participation including memberships of associations, candidate interests including hobbies and community involvement.

Most of this information should be readily found in the candidates’ CV. An easy way for you to commence the interview is to ask questions about the candidate’s choice of career and how they chose each of the roles they have had to date.

From there you can readily move to the other areas asking a lot of why questions and address the level of their participation when talking about community participation and so on.

The second part is to drill into the detail of each role. It is useful to focus on the last ten years of the career history as going back further is like reading an historical novel; while it might be interesting, it often yields little more than some filler to the discussion.

You need to draw out the candidate as to the scope of the roles held and the achievements in each role. It is advisable to be very specific in your questioning asking them about their input in to projects.

I have come across candidates that have claimed responsibility for a major project and yet when I asked them to take me through the details of the various stages of the project management stumbled in their responses. The more you drill down in to the detail the more the candidate is able to confirm their claims as to their role.

While on the issue of detail, you should ask the candidate to confirm not only the scope of each role but the dates of commencement. It is not uncommon for candidates to ‘smooth’ dates filing gaps when they weren’t working.

Where there is a gap make sure you know what it is about. Was it a redundancy or termination for a matter of which you should be made aware?

You should ask questions about the role in terms of responsibilities and if the candidate had managerial responsibilities ascertain the size of the team and the roles in the team. You can always ask the candidate what he thinks his team thought of him/her if they were to be asked.

Most achievements are quantifiable i.e. new clients brought on board, dollar targets met/not met in terms of sales or cost control and you should ask questions specifically to draw out details of these achievements.

Those achievements that are not quantifiable may need some discussion around the candidate’s role in delivery. If, for instance they were responsible for instigating a cultural change program, you might want to ask them about how they implemented the program and was it considered a success by management and the employees themselves.

The third part of the questionnaire is the behavioural section where you can explore how the candidate handles certain situations and their outlook on various issues.

These questions start with ‘tell me a time’ or ‘give me an example’. Some of the most effective behavioural questions can be disarming. One that is constantly used consistently is ‘Tell me a mistake that you have made and what you learnt from it?’

I know of a senior executive search consultant who asked all candidates the question ‘If you were made Prime Minister tomorrow, what is the first thing you would do’. Evidently one executive asked this question replied ‘launch an attack on Indonesia’. Needless to say he wasn’t offered the role.

Behavioural questions add meat to the bone of an interview questionnaire, strengthening your understanding of the candidate’s behaviours and motivations. This is particularly relevant where you have a work place culture that will be conducive to certain types of individuals.

For example, the culture may be suited to those who are focused on achievement but not on making a lot of noise about it. The behavioural interview questions can be tailored to draw out those who would be a fit to this culture.

Above anything else, it is important to invest time in thinking through how you will put together the interview questionnaire and what should be included. If you think that you may need some help, then you should consider speaking to an HR/recruitment consultant who can provide you with suitable advice.

www.dawsonpartnership.com.au

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Mastering the recruitment challenge

In parts One and Two,  I discussed how to design and implement an effective recruitment campaign and the resources that you can draw on. In Part Three,  I look at interviewing, referencing, making the offer to the preferred candidate and positioning your business as an employer of choice.

Click on the link to read Mastering the recruitment challenge #1 or Mastering the recruitment challenge #2.

Step Four – The interview
When you are about to proceed to the interview stage you should ensure that you have a structured questionnaire to work from. The most effective questionnaire will not only cover the candidate’s experience but should include a range of behavioural questions that make an allowance for the candidate to describe examples of how they have handled certain challenges, projects or staff management issues in their career.

These questions may be as simple as what did you learn from a mistake that you made? Or tell me a time you had to…

Communication
Recruitment requires a great deal of focus and in a candidate short market you need to be in constant contact with preferred candidates ensuring they are aware about where they are placed in the process and what the next step will be and when it will be. This where all your hard work can come unstuck.

Putting candidates on hold without proper explanation while you attend to other issues can lead to the derailing of the process. Candidates may lose interest as they interpret your lack of communication as reflecting your lack of interest in them or even worse they’re attracted to another role and when you get back to them they’re committed to another opportunity.

Referencing
It is critical that prior to contact being made with any past employer that consent is obtained from the candidate being referenced. Apart from breaching the Privacy Act it could jeopardise the person’s current position and also result in you losing the candidate.

Referencing is a critical component of the recruitment process and falls into three categories:

Verbal reference from past employers
The person undertaking the reference procedure should have a structured list of questions that will canvass a range of performance, cultural fit and job fit issues. There needs to be the ability to ask follow up questions and the person undertaking the reference should ask probing questions that require specific examples. As a guide a reference call should take up to an hour and the person providing the reference should be the candidate’s former manager.

Academic checks with educational institutions
Candidates should be asked to supply academic transcripts and then the educational institution should be approached to ensure the accuracy of the documents supplied.

Federal Police check
Most financial services institutions undertake police checks for their staff particularly those where there is a legal requirement. Police checks are relatively straight forward with on line lodgement with the cost being minimal.

Step Five – The offer
The offer should be discussed with the preferred candidate in detail then a copy of the letter of offer made available to them with the expectation that they will accept or reject the offer in an agreed time frame.

The letter of offer should provide as much detail as possible as to the terms and conditions attached to the role. These include but are not restricted to:

• Remuneration including superannuation, short term and long term incentives and entitlements on termination of employment.  There should be mention of additional entitlements that come with the position including the provision of a car or allowance for the payment of car costs, the payment of health insurance premiums, gym memberships etc.
• Reporting arrangements. While you are the employer this position may report to another senior member of your staff and this should be noted.
• Leave entitlements including sick leave, long service and Parental leave.
• Values and ethical standards that the employee is expected to uphold.
• The handling of confidential information.
• Restraints on the employees activities including not undertaking work for another company.
• Disciplinary action for any breach of company policy.
• Termination/resignation entitlements.

It is advisable to seek professional advice when drafting a letter of offer particularly if you have limited or no experience. The ramifications of including ambiguous or unclear wording or alternatively leaving out critical information can come back to haunt you if you should get into a dispute with an employee over the terms and conditions as were originally agreed between you.

Dealing with candidate negotiations
It is best to conduct discussions with the candidate in person as phone conversations are less personal and may not resolve the points raised as quickly as a meeting in your office. If you have outlined the offer during the interview process then there shouldn’t be too many unresolved issues.

The one issue that is a constant in negotiations is remuneration and this will usually revolve around the candidate seeking a higher base salary and or additional benefits or wanting more in terms of short term incentives. For senior staff there may also be discussion around long term incentives including equity participation in your firm.

If you have an attractive offer then these negotiations should be relatively straight forward unless the candidate has a competing offer that provides them with additional remuneration. Then you have to decide how much you want this candidate or would you be better served going with your second choice candidate if you still have one.

The other issue that arises in negotiations is the counter offer by the candidate’s employer. Candidates often get swayed by the promises of promotion, additional remuneration and other incentives that are only offer as the candidate resigns so it is important that you discuss the possibility of a counter offer with the candidate and if necessary talk them through how to turn it down.

Making your business an employer of choice
Your approach to conducting interviews is a critical ingredient in your success or failure to secure your preferred candidate. Don’t underestimate how important it is for you to present your business in the best possible light drawing out points of cultural differentiation and short and long term benefits.

Increasingly prospective employees are seeking a work culture that:

• is flexible in terms of work environment
• offers career progression
• is committed to training
• offers security of employment
• has strong leadership.

It is important that you are able to articulate the culture of your business and your commitment to staff in terms of work environment and career development as this will be a critical to your success in recruiting the best possible candidate for the role you’re seeking to fill.

Great Place to Work annually compiles a list of the top 50 companies that they rate as the Best Places to Work in Australia. The 2012 list has good representation of small to mid-sized businesses that have demonstrated a strong commitment to engendering a work place culture that position them to be employers of choice.

A final word of advice
If you have little or no experience in recruiting staff it will pay you to consider working with a recruiter or a recruitment adviser as it will not only increase your chances of securing the candidate you are after but will take a lot of stress out of the recruitment process.

http://dawsonpartnership.com.au/

The post Mastering the recruitment challenge #3 appeared first on AdviserVoice.

The first two steps covered conducting an analysis/ review of the position and then putting together the position description.

Part 2 looks at the decision to DIY or work with a recruiter and then provides some guidance around using your network and advertising to identify candidates.

Step three – DIY or using a recruiter
DIY
If you decide to DIY to save money then you should ensure that is actually the case. By thoroughly mapping out the recruitment process and costing out your time and that of support staff, you will be able to work out the in- house costs. To do this, allow six to eight weeks for the search period and then break down all the time you will need to spend on each of the steps set out in this article. By the time you have arrived at a final cost you may be surprised how much a DIY recruitment process will cost your business.

Your other consideration is whether you think that you have the time and skills and experience to effective manage the process from end to end. Allocating time can be a juggling act particularly in a busy financial planning practice where the focus is on clients. Recruitment is demanding and exacting particularly when you are trying to secure high performance candidates who need to be romanced. If your focus is not on keeping the preferred candidates interested then they may lose interest and not wish to continue discussions with you.

Recruiters
If you decide to work with a recruiter they should be industry specialists who understands your business and the role you are seeking to fill. Additionally, they should have a track record of recruiting for like positions and be willing for you to talk to advisers for whom they have undertaken recruitment assignments.

However, you may find that although you would benefit from working with a recruiter their costs maybe stretch your budget. Recruiters charge between 15%-25% of the base remuneration package (that includes superannuation and other benefits) and those working at the lower end may provide you with a cut price service costing you additional time and money while not delivering relevant candidates.

Often recruiters work on a retained search basis with an engagement fee paid on the signing of the contract. Often this will be a third of the estimated base remuneration. A second third will be payable at short listing of candidates and the final third at the candidate signing the employment contract.

A number of recruiters working on a contingent or success fee basis have a pool of candidates that they present to clients who are recruiting for like roles. If you like a particular candidate you should be aware that the recruiter may have them in discussion with their other clients and all your time and effort maybe for nothing.

Recruitment advisers
If you find yourself in the position where you need to plan out a recruitment process and would welcome professional advice and support but don’t want to engage a recruiter, you should consider the services of a recruitment advisory consultant who has not only recruitment experience but has worked with business owners such as yourself and will readily identify with your requirements. A recruitment adviser will provide hands on assistance in the design and execution of the recruitment strategy including advice on position descriptions, advertising, CV analysis, interviewing, letters of offer and referencing.

DIY
If you decide to DIY then there are a number of ways you can use to conduct the search:

Your network
Your own network of industry colleagues and those that work with you in your business can be a good starting place if you decide to undertake the search yourself. Just mentioning that you are looking to recruit for a role can lead to an introduction to potential candidates. Often this is a matter of the right timing and can prove hit and miss, but it pays to spread the word as networks can be very effective in bringing to your attention candidates that you would otherwise not known about.

Advertising
Advertising was once the preserve of large institutions due to the cost of print media, however with the advent of web advertising, costs are no longer prohibitive and can draw in a wide audience. Employment websites such as SEEK and MyCareer draw in a large audience from not only from within the industry, but from other sectors too.

My experience with these websites is that depending on the position advertised, you will probably have a significant response…but many applicants will be hopefuls that don’t fit your requirements. It is important to put a lot of work into the contents of the advertisement and make it appealing and draw in the right candidates.

These websites will at any one time have positions similar or the same as the one you are advertising, so it is critical that your advertisement stands out from the crowd. Also you need to keep in mind that advertisers constantly refresh their advertisements which will boost their positioning on the site, so you can’t afford to take a passive approach. Recruiters are the primary users of these websites and reviewing their advertisements may help you to crystallise your thinking.

I worked with a client to recruit an operations manager for his business that had ten staff and significantly grown its revenue over the last three years. The client used SEEK and the response to the advertisement exceeded a hundred applicants. Ten were directly relevant, five were interviewed, two were short listed and the offer made and accepted within a fortnight of listing the advertisement.

Industry journals and websites can also be worthwhile considering for their audience and they are cost effective.

In Part Three, I will discuss the interview process, referencing, psychological profiling and making the offer.

http://dawsonpartnership.com.au/

The post Mastering the recruitment challenge #2 appeared first on AdviserVoice.

Many owners of financial planning businesses have found that what they thought would be a relatively straight forward recruitment exercise turned out to be a marathon effort, often with either a compromise being reached as to the candidate chosen or the candidates interviewed weren’t a good fit for the role and the position remained vacant.

Apart from the frustration involved, recruitment can be an unwelcome distraction to your business and be a relatively expensive exercise. To help you avoid the pitfalls, in the next three articles I will guide you through your options as to how best approach recruitment and provide you with the tools to help ensure that you are in the best possible position to secure the right candidate for the role you are seeking to fill.

Practice Management
Given that staff costs are the greatest expense incurred by businesses and that the successful recruitment of new staff is critical to your business’s continued success, recruitment should be seen as an integral part of practice management.

The key to successful recruitment is contingent on the initial focus put on planning the recruitment campaign, the allocation of resources to support the process and you ensuring the process stays on track.

From the outset you will need to consider who will be responsible for managing the process and whether they have the time, skills and experience required. If you decided to take a hands-on role then you should look closely at what resources you will need to draw on and what the costs will be to your business. This should include costing out your own time and that of staff who will be involved.

Often the decision is made to take the DIY approach mainly due to the perceived cost savings of not using a recruiter and after all, how hard can it be to write an ad and stick it on SEEK then just wait for all those applicants to come knocking? This is ad hoc approach can be like throwing darts at a dart board with a blindfold on; you may get lucky but then again, your advertisement may be buried amongst so many others unless it is effectively pitched at its target audience.

When I managed a financial planning business, I found myself in exactly this position and thought the search would soon be over; however the advertisement didn’t draw the candidates I was seeking so I had to sit back and rethink the recruitment strategy. This came at cost that could have been avoided if I’d taken more time to consider the most effective way to undertake the recruitment campaign. It was a valuable lesson – and one that I’ve never forgotten.

The steps involved in undertaking a successful recruitment campaign
From my experience as both a financial planning manager and a recruiter, I have been able to identify the steps you need to take to ensure that you have a recruitment strategy that is going to help you secure the best fit candidates for your business.

Step one – position analysis/review
The starting point for any recruitment process is to look at where the role fits in your business, its scope, responsibilities and expected deliverables, reporting lines and potential role development in to the future. If it is an existing role, this is your opportunity to ensure that it fulfils your current and future requirements.

Step Two – The position description
When you think you have a good grasp on what the role looks like, it’s time to write up the position description. The rule here is too much is better than too little, so that candidates have a very clear idea about the scope of the role through to expectations in terms of delivery.

The position description is also acts as a window to your practice, reflecting not only where this position fits, but also provides an overview of the structure and culture of the business.

If you write the position description as a monochrome document then you are missing an opportunity to present your practice in the best possible light. If you keep in mind that the candidates you are seeking to attract will be well sought after, it is important that the position description tells them that your practice offers them an attractive career opportunity.  Add some colour and light by including some differentiating points about your practice and briefly enunciate what makes yours an attractive work environment.

I have written and reviewed countless position descriptions. The ones that work best not only describe all the factual information about responsibilities, reporting lines and so forth, but they humanise the company by telling you things about the culture and the principals in the business. If, for instance, it is a family business, say something about the history of the business, who founded it and why. If the practice is a specialist practice, talk about that and why the business has this focus.

Step three – DIY or using a recruiter
In the second part of this article I will discuss the pros and cons of DIY and if you decide to work with a recruiter how they will work with you and the associated costs.

http://dawsonpartnership.com.au/

The post 3 steps for mastering the recruitment challenge – part 1 appeared first on AdviserVoice.