Six Tips for Developing Your Employees

I am not sure how many of you are like me, when I read an article stating, "According to a recent poll"..I wander off into LaLa land. The tips below might seem basic and well...simple. How many of us on a daily basis forget to apply the simple solutions to both our lives and our business.

The trusted, professional advisors at First Place Employer Services see business owners struggle on a daily basis to attract and retain quality employees. When we read tip number one we were in no way shocked. How about you?

According to a recent poll of HR professionals, only ten percent of managers are fully prepared for the next level. Given this information, is it really a surprise that approximately fifty percent of promotions fail (source: Corporate Leadership Council) when the selection decision is based on current performance level?

One of the most important qualities of a good leader is the ability and desire to develop their employees. Taking an active role in the development of your team demonstrates confidence and concern for the future of the organization. Although talent development should be part of a company-wide initiative, most of the responsibility falls on the shoulders of the supervisors. Unfortunately, development coaching doesn’t come naturally to many leaders. By following these tips, you can prepare your employees for success at the next level.

1. Encourage professional development. High-potential employees are not satisfied with the status quo. You WANT these employees your team. They are typically ambitious, high performing, and dynamic. They will be the future leaders of your organization if they are given proper guidance in their development. If not, be prepared to lose them to the competition.

2. Create a plan. Planning is crucial to advancing your career. Help your employees establish goals that are aligned with their strengths, interest and experience and then create a plan to get there. A development plan serves as the roadmap that will take you to your goal. It can be simple or complex but it must include action steps, resources, and deadlines. Not sure where to focus your attention? Try the step-by-step promotion planning eClass. You will focus only on building necessary skills and overcoming obstacles to get you to your targeted position.

3. Pair your employee’s with a mentor. Once their goals have been established, find someone who is in a similar role to the target position to serve as a mentor. Mentoring enables an organization to use it’s existing talent to impart their knowledge and expertise to one another. Everyone – the organization, the mentor, and the mentee – benefits from the mentoring process.

4. Identify opportunities to expand their professional network. Having a solid network is imperative to the success of future leaders. A network is a great source of information, advice, support and inspiration. Recommend opportunities within the organization, as well as, networking or professional groups that will help them build strong connections.

5. Challenge your employees to move out of their comfort zone. You can’t move forward if you don’t grow and you can’t grow if you never leave your comfort zone. When possible, give your employees challenging assignments. Help them prepare by providing them a safe environment to learn from the mistakes that they are bound to make.

6. Hire a coach. For high-potential employees and employees who need to be redirected to another career path, it can be best to bring in an outside coach. An external coach provides a confidential environment where employees are free to discuss the challenges and opportunities they face in their careers through the use of assessments, powerful questions, and individual development plans.

To learn more about this author, visit Jill Frank and her website
@ (http://www.leverageyourtalent.com/)

If you or someone you know may have questions regarding employee performance, please drop us an e-mail at:

firstplacerightchoice@1stplacemployer.com

and a trusted advisor will answer your inquiry within 24 hours.

http://www.1stplacEmployer.com

Workplace Politics – Lies, Lies, Lies

In honor of Super Tuesday the trusted advisors at First Place Employer Services voted to cover an unfortunate truth in the workplace. Lies. This time of year, America talks about the lies and the mudslinging over the dinner table or at the water cooler. What we do not publicly talk about often enough is how to handle and confront lying in the workplace. Your first instinct might be to ignore a lie about you, but as it swells to a crescendo, you might want to rethink your strategy. In the workplace, this is especially important, because a lie can rapidly contaminate the environment.

An article published on Courant.com takes a truthful look deeper into this issue. The article titled, "Don't Ignore Lies In The Workplace; Confront Them" suggests what to do with lies that sprout up like fast growing weeds in the workplace. Psychologist David Gruder offers containment tools below:

Escalating Steps to Confront Lying in the Workplace

• "Talk to that person privately, or with a neutral third party, where he doesn't have to put on a face for the public."


• "Identify key people in the system to tell that a lie is circulating. Ask these key influencers for advice about how to respond."


• "Organize an intervention if the previous methods prove ineffective."


• "Gather people who understand what the truth really is to collaborate on a procedure for publicly confronting the liar" — but only if you're desperate, because of the humiliation it causes. This could mean a note in a personnel file.

Read more of the article here: href="http://www.courant.com/business/hc-mildred0204.artfeb04,0,1785619.story">

The HR pros at First Place Employer Services tackle workplace challenges head on utilizing a team approach with our client as Captain. If you are an employer, we encourage you to take a look around and take note of behaviors which allow some people to be rewarded for behavior unrelated to doing a good job.

If you or someone you know may have questions regarding workplace behaviors affecting your place of business, please drop us an e-mail at:

firstplacerightchoice@1stplacemployer.com

and a trusted advisor will answer your inquiry within 24 hours.
to learn more vist us at:

http://www.1stplacEmployer.com

Is Sexy an Ingredient in Successful?

Did you ever wonder if your paycheck or your job stability depended on how attractive you were? Well published research suggests that in addition to our highly qualified skills and college degrees, looks are a highly compensated feature desired by employers across the land.

As a CFO or the owner of a successful business, does that also in turn mean that by hiring attractive, pretty people your business will be more successful than those competitors who hire their staff based on brains alone? You might wonder, but the research does not point out a profit equals prettiness factor.

Unattractive people earn less than average-looking people, who in turn make less than the good-looking, according to a study by economists Daniel Hamermesh and Jeff Biddle. The “plainness penalty” is about 9%, while the “beauty premium” is 5%, according to the report, which was published in the Journal of Labor Economics. So what exactly does this mean? Translation: An attractive worker makes 5% more per hour than an average-looking person, who in turn earns 9% more than their unattractive counterparts. In real dollars, this means that if an average-looking person makes $30,000; their beautiful colleagues would make $31,500, while the homeliest workers earn just $27,523. And interestingly, the impact was similar for both men and women.

Read more of the story here:
(http://www.theimproper.com/Template_Article.aspx?IssueId=3&ArticleId=1207)

Luckily, beauty is in the eye of the employer. What one recruiter considers plain, another HR executive finds beautiful. Will Corporate America be better off if they see that talent is a beautiful thing?

Good luck, stay legal, and look for the beauty within!

E-mail your questions concerning survival in the workplace to a trusted advisor and we will respond within 24 hours firstplacerightchoice@1stplacemployer.com
Please visit us on the web @ http://www.1stplacEmployer.com

Do I have to pay them when.......

It is the start of the New Year and we wanted to get a jump on answering questions our clients face throughout the year. Employers are often encounter, "How do we..." or "Do we have to ...." when it comes to paying employees outside of the normal pay cycle.

The trusted advisors at First Place Employer Services (www.1stplacEmployer.com) fielded a few questions from last year, consulted the experts and decided to put them out for you to use.

Q. What is the financial exposure from payroll in the event an employer closes its operation for a day? And when an employer asks its exempt employees to put in extra hours, is additional compensation required?

Federal law sets certain parameters with regard to the compensation of exempt employees, but in this area employers also retain a fair amount of discretion.

Q: If the company closes for two days for the Christmas and New Year holidays but only one day (the actual holiday) is a paid holiday, must the company pay the exempt-salaried employees for the other day? Can the company require them to take vacation time for the days that are not paid holidays?

Employees who are exempt from the Fair Labor Standards Act's overtime-pay provisions must, among other things, be paid on a "salary basis." This means that the employees must be paid full compensation in a predetermined amount for any week in which they perform any work, regardless of the number of days or hours worked. 29 C.F.R. § 541.602(a) (2008). The exempt employees generally do not have to be paid for any week in which they perform no work for the employer.

There are certain limited circumstances in which an employer may pay an exempt employee less than the employee's full weekly salary. For example, deductions can be made for time that the exempt employee is absent from work for one or more full days for personal reasons or as a result of sickness or disability if the employee has exhausted applicable paid-leave banks. 29 C.F.R. § 541.602(b)(1)-(2).

If, however, the exempt employee is "ready, willing, and able" to work, but the employer either closes its facility (e.g. for a holiday) or has no work for the employee to perform, then the employer cannot deduct that time not worked from the exempt employee's pay.

An employer that makes such an improper deduction risks jeopardizing the employee's exempt status. 29 C.F.R. § 541.603(a)-(b). Thus, the employer that closes its offices for two days but considers only one a paid holiday would, nevertheless, be required to pay its exempt employees their standard weekly salaries for that week.

The FLSA does not address paid time off, such as vacation time. Rather, whether the company in this example could require exempt employees to take vacation time for the days that are not paid holidays would be governed by state law.

In most states, an employer could lawfully require its exempt employees to use their vacation time in the event of an office closing, provided this was consistent with the terms of the employer's vacation and related policies and any applicable employment contracts.

However, because the permissibility of such a mandate is fact-specific, it is advisable to consult local counsel before proceeding with such an approach.

Q: We have exempt employees who are sometimes mandated to work overtime. Can we pay them a straight hourly rate for these hours without losing the exempt status? Can we distinguish between overtime that is mandated or pre-authorized versus overtime that is a normal part of the job?

Under the FLSA, an employee who is properly classified as exempt is not entitled to be paid overtime for hours worked beyond the standard 40-hour workweek.

An employer may, however, pay an exempt employee money in addition to the standard salary for hours worked beyond the typical workweek without jeopardizing the employee's exempt status.

The FLSA regulations provide that such additional compensation may, but need not, be paid as a straight-time hourly amount. Other alternatives for supplemental compensation include a flat sum, a bonus payment, time and one-half, paid time off, or any other basis. 29 C.F.R. § 541.604.

Moreover, the employer retains the ability to set the rate for such additional compensation irrespective of whether the overtime is "mandated," "pre-authorized" or a "normal part of the job."

If you or a member of your team has a question regarding employee pay, please e-mail us at firstplacerightchoice@1stplacemployer.com and a trusted advisor will respond withing 24 hours.

Are Salespeople Entitled to Overtime?

This a great article on the exempt on non-exempt discussion. Entreprenuers who have evolved into the employer role commonly get caught in this kind of trap.

Even if this claim is frivolous, I wonder how many hours the company owner spent dealing with this case? I wonder how much they have paid out in leagl defense fees? I wonder what price the owner would put on their emotional toll a case like this brings on; sleepless nights, stress, tension, fear, concern?

I wonder if this company had the benfit of a professional on his or her business team with insourcing the HR expertise of a professional employer organization brings to the table?

Find the article here:

What circumstances qualify an employee as an outside salesperson who is exempt from overtime?
A federal court sitting in New York State recently reviewed some of the factors.

What happened? A woman worked for the Paul T. Freund Company, a manufacturer of boxes in Palmyra, New York, where she was promoted to the job of salesperson in 2002. In that job, she regularly worked 50 to 60 hours per week, spending 75 percent to 80 percent of her workday working inside the office, and 15 percent to 20 percent of her work day performing tasks and keeping appointments outside of the office, such as making sales calls and periodically meeting with customers at their places of business.

Freund didn't pay her overtime because the company classified her as an outside salesperson. After she left Freund (for undisclosed reasons), she sued for failure to pay her overtime in violation of state and federal law. Freund asked the court to throw the case out at an early stage, without full development of the facts.

See what the court had to say here:
http://hr.blr.com/news.aspx?id=77866

If you or someone you know may have questions regarding exempt and non-exempt status, please drop us an e-mail at:

firstplacerightchoice@1stplacemployer.com

and a trusted advisor will answer your inquiry within 24 hours.

Outsourcing: Is It Critical to My Business?

Owning your own business is the American dream. Doin it better than the other guy and making money at it! There is no better feeling in the world. All start out as entreprenuers and some evolve into "The Business Owner". We all know that guy, he is over taxed, under paid, provider of employee benfits, redeemer of social ills, and compares managing employees to the herding of cats.

The solution, we think, is Outsource it! A fantastic article published on the businessTN website (http://www.businesstn.com/pub/4_5/features/8119-1.html) discusses the ins and outs of outsourcing. As a proponenet of outsourcing I found this article both eye opening and well balanced. More and more, the experts are touting the profit enhancing benefits of outsourcing.

“Outsource,” they say—in the name of freeing you and your employees up to concentrate on your business’ core competencies. “We generally say you need to outsource anything that takes you off-focus,” says Paula Roberts, small business specialist for the Tennessee Small Business Development Center at Tennessee State University.

Mrs. Roberts makes an excellent point. Every business owner can identify with the burn out of dealing with the non-profit generating tasks of payroll, workers' compensation insurance, employee benefits, and more. The article further suggests a business owner look at what can be done in-house. Jeff Cornwall, director of the Belmont University Entrepreneur Center, says “[Business owners] need to understand the financial structure of the business and understand cash flow because they’ll have to make decisions based on that information.”

The experienced, trusted advisors at First Place Employer Services suggest a business owner first identify the core business activities. These activities are profit generating activities. in taking this vital step, the business saves time, increases productivity, and ultimately takes steps to become more profitable.

Jeff and Rich Sloan of StartUpNation, a Web site the Sloan brothers launched to provide information to entrepreneurs, advise taking the time to analyze how the business adds value to your customers and where you, as a business owner, focus your efforts.
“Are you spending too much time on areas outside your expertise? Many times, it’s more cost-effective to have someone outside of the company take care of these non-core activities,” the Sloan brothers write. Cornwall says today’s customers are concerned with more than just the price of the product or service you provide. “They come to you because of how you operate and provide that service to them,” he says.

Committment to service is one of many reasons a business owner finds a PEO ( Professional Employer Organization) an attractive outsourcing option. When it comes to payroll processing, HR management, State and Federal taxes, Workers' compensation insurance, Safety, OSHA, and the myriad of Federal and State laws; the choice to outsource to a PEO becomes all to clear.

A Professional Employer Organization (PEO) helps client companies cost-effectively outsource the management of payroll, workers' compensation, human resources and employee benefits. PEOs help clients focus on their core competencies to maintain and grow their bottom line.
Businesses today need help managing increasingly complex employee related matters such as health benefits, workers' compensation claims, payroll, payroll tax compliance, and unemployment insurance claims.

Engaging a PEO enables companies to share these responsibilities and provide expertise in human resources management. This allows PEO clients to focus on the operational and revenue-producing side of their business.

PEO companies provide an integrated service to effectively manage human resource responsibilities and employer risks for their clients. A PEO delivers these services by establishing and maintaining an employer relationship with the employees at the client's worksite and by contractually assuming certain employer rights, responsibilities and risk.
Professional Employer Organizations have thrived because they have helped their client companies succeed by providing:

Improved employment practices, compliance and risk management to reduce liabilities.
Relief from the burden of employment administration.
A wide range of personnel management solutions through a team of professionals.
Access to a comprehensive employee benefits package, allowing clients to be competitive in the labor market.

Definition provided courtesy of the National Association of Professional Employer Organizations - NAPEO

to learn more vist us at:

http://www.1stplacEmployer.com