Author Archives: Ovation Tech Blog

Ten Simple Rules for Driver Recruiting

Most industries have their own best hiring tips, but successful driver recruiting requires something a little different.

There are ten simple rules for finding the safest, most reliable drivers.

Hiring, especially in the trucking industry, involves employment procedures to make sure your company gets only the safest, most reliable drivers. After all, drivers are what distinguish your company (as well as your hiring skills) to vendors and your other customers.

Whether your need is for long-term or temporary drivers, you have no choice but to make the right decision when hiring. Follow these ten simple hiring tips, and you can immediately improve driver quality:

Recruiting Tip #1: Hire only when you need to

Don’t need drivers? Then don’t hire any! Driver recruiting is effective only when there is a genuine need. First, determine if you absolutely have to have a new driver, or can you handle the workflow with current employees.

Recruiting Tip #2: Promote from within, if you can

After making the decision to hire, driver recruiting should start from within. In many cases, you will have some good possibilities already in your organization. Often, they will be more loyal and productive drivers than outside hires. In addition, hiring from within avoids bringing on an unknown quantity.

Recruiting Tip #3: Make job descriptions clear and easy to understand

All potential candidates must receive an equal opportunity to get the job. Driver recruiting starts with a well-written and complete job description. Clearly describe all necessary functions and minimum qualifications for trucking positions. That way, everyone (both employer and candidate) knows what is expected.

Recruiting Tip #4: Keep driver recruiting honest and respectable

Only accept company-approved applications. Require all job seekers to fill out the necessary forms. Treat all interested parties with professionalism: unsolicited resumes, personal emails and letters, walk-ins, or cold-call telephone queries. However, start the driver recruiting process only after receiving formal applications.

An example of a truck driver log book in the United States. “PTI” is short for “pre-trip inspection”, as the driver is responsible for ensuring that the vehicle is fit to be driven (i.e., no flat tires, loose bolts, or broken parts). “On duty” time includes fueling, repairs, loading and unloading. “Off duty” time incudes meals and rest stops. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Recruiting Tip #5: Stay legal and above-board

All applications and forms must be appropriate for the trucking industry. A legally valid application is the best way to protect the interests of the company. At a minimum, they need to comply with the U.S. Department of Transportation regulations about trucking applications, particularly Section 391.21. Examine your company’s forms; review them for inappropriate questions. Make certain they include all necessary legal protections.

Recruiting Tip #6: Know the right questions to ask

Train the employees responsible for driver recruiting in how to conduct thorough interviews. They must know which questions are appropriate, and which ones are simply wrong. For example, the right questions determine highly qualified trucking job candidates, without regard to race, religion, national origin, sex, age, or disability.

Recruiting Tips #7: Do your homework and be prepared

Be familiar with best practices for hiring in the trucking industry. Require background and reference checks for every candidate. It is the only way to know you are hiring the right people. Perform inquiries as outlined by the FMCSRs (Parts 383 and 391).

Recruiting Tip #8: Write it all down

Document everything! Evaluate candidates accurately, using measures for essential job functions based on qualifications. In driver recruiting, always use accurate and up-to-date job descriptions. Follow these hiring tips to provide the best defense against potential charges of discrimination.

Recruiting Tip #9: Have the right people make the call

Only qualified people must assess relevant information and carefully review employment history. They must be trusted to make the right hiring decision. Driver recruitment is serious business; treat it as such. Don’t leave it to the wrong employees. Drivers represent your business on the road, often with minimal direct supervision, so driver recruiting is a crucial decision for your company.

Recruiting Tip #10: Be professional and respect every candidate

Fairness and uniformity are the heart of successful driver recruiting. Unsuccessful applicants thinking they were treated badly (or not treated fairly) may see legal action as their only choice. Address rejected candidates with respect and honesty. The goal of these hiring tips is for every candidate to leave (hired or not) knowing he or she had a fair chance to get the job.

Searching For the Perfect Driving Job

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Ask anyone in the trucking industry to describe the perfect driving job; you might not hear the same things twice.

The trucking industry is a fast growing one with a high turnover level. Keeping drivers happy by listening to their needs lowers turnover and makes for better working conditions and more productivity.

A happy trucker is a productive one

What is the perfect driving job? Is there such a thing?

Asking people in the trucking industry to describe the best driving job, and you will probably get a different answer every time.

For some truckers, the perfect gig is a good seat behind the wheel of a rig with plenty of power, enough clearance, a good set of chains, nice CB, good radio and a cab that cleans up easy. Other drivers look for things like benefits, expected mileage and operation area.

After deciding to be a driver, there are a number of puzzles to solve. What may be the perfect opportunity for one trucker might not suit someone else. There is a wide variety of positions available in the trucking market, so the best driving job for you depends on a combination of your skill, knowledge and experience.

Start by thinking of what type of truck driving job you want. Simply getting behind the wheel is not enough. You want to be happy with long or short hauls and know which one is more preferable for you.

Will you be involved in the pickup and unloading process for loads you carry? Perhaps you will be an owner-operator. Will you want to move up, becoming a manager in the future? Knowing what equipment you will use, as well as pay, expected mileage, home time and operation area.

The answer to all these questions will help you find a company that suits your requirements.

In the eyes of some drivers, the perfect driving job is all about pay. Even if a job pays well, other drivers think a fantastic job should also include health benefits. Many drivers in the trucking industry see driver training as a “meat grinder,” where the only drivers to succeed are those who are better at it and enjoy driving the most. Others see training as an indispensable part of a career.

The most popular features of the “perfect” driving job:

Pay and benefits
Home time
Management to employee relations (and vice versa)
Customer relations
Equipment maintenance and upkeep
Mobility (how a driver spends his or her time—spending time driving or just sitting around)

It is not about how terrific a job sounds on paper. It is about the way a company treats employees. With driving in the trucking industry, a perfect job is about the amount of money earned, compared to sitting around waiting. The value in a trucking job is the actual work required, time spent away from home, benefits, equipment and maintenance.

As in virtually every industry, the worst jobs, ones with the highest failure and turnover, are with companies where owners look like they have no idea what they are doing.

What makes a perfect trucking job? When management understands what it is like to be on a work floor, warehouse or on the road. Passing judgment is much more effective when supervisors understand how a decision affects the rank-and-file.

Even in the cases of managers promoted from warehouse operations, there are many with utterly no idea of the transportation end of the business. Frequently, new rules and regulations come down to a driver, making it much harder for them to do the job. Solving many of these problems could only be a matter of dispatching more efficiently to reduce (or eliminate) wait time at warehouses. Just a small increase in efficiency for the consignee or consignor could make an inferior trucking job considerably better.

If there is one thing many drivers will agree on, you do not choose a career as a trucker. The career chooses you. The majority of truckers simply drive for the passion of driving.

Hiring Professional Truckers: Seven Ways to Get the Best! (ovationtechnologies.com)
Truck driving careers on CDLjobs.com (cdljobs.typepad.com)
TruckingUnlimited.com Adds Daily Trucking News to their Online Truck Stop (prweb.com)
Trucking industry faces driver shortage down the road (sunnewsnetwork.ca)
Hours of Service: Changing It Again? (metalkingtoyou.wordpress.com)

Think Employee Lawsuits Can’t Happen to You?

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Think again.

When dealing with hiring issues, “I didn’t know” and “I didn’t mean to do that” are excuses that don’t get too much sympathy in court. Discrimination in hiring and firing are serious issues that can be very costly for your business. When cases go to trial awards can be in the hundreds of thousands of dollars because punitive awards are often tacked onto actual damage amounts. Fortunately, most cases are settled out of court somewhere in the middle of what a claimant asks for and what and employer believes is fair. The real winners are, you guessed it, the lawyers.

So…what kinds of discrimination are common?

Discrimination comes in many forms.

Age discrimination laws are designed to protect workers over the age of 40.
Race and ethnicity discrimination under Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 prohibits discrimination when it comes to any aspect of employment, including hiring, firing, pay, job assignments, promotions, layoff, training, fringe benefits, and any other term or condition of employment.
The Americans with Disabilities Act requires reasonable accommodation in the workplace of disabled workers if the disability is known to the employer.
Several States have passed legislation that prohibits practice of excluding unemployed individuals in advertisements for job vacancies.
According to the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC), A blanket refusal to hire workers based on criminal records or credit problems can be illegal if it has a undue impact on racial minorities,

OK….How do I protect my company from discrimination actions?

Avoiding lawsuits, penalties and fines in employment related matters requires a framework of compliance measures put in place at your business and constant monitoring of your company’s compliance. That is one of the key benefits provided by human resource (HR) professionals.

You can employee in-house HR professionals or you can outsource that function. Professional Employer Organizations (PEOs) provide the HR functions on an “as needed” basis. PEOs can help establish the proper framework including employee handbooks, sensitivity training as well as procedures to deal with discrimination issues as they may develop.

The Society for Human Resource Management (SHRM) is an excellent resource for HR professionals to stay abreast of the laws and regulations surrounding the employer/employee relationship. They also have HR certification programs that result in Professional Human Resource (PHR) and Senior Professional Human Resource (SPHR) certificates.

Hiring Professional Truckers: Seven Ways to Get the Best!

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It’s not fuel costs that are a problem with the trucking industry. It is the lack of qualified big rig operators.

Seven best practices to get the right drivers for your trucking jobs.

One of the most critical issues recently facing the trucking sector has been, oddly enough, not fuel costs or rising insurance rates.

The biggest problem is a lack of drivers.

Even for businesses not directly related to the trucking industry, the shortage of qualified operators is distressing news. At the very least, it means a company has to be even more aggressive in recruitment efforts. That is if they want any chance of hiring the right people.

For jobs in the trucking industry, the cloud has come to the rescue. Cloud-based technologies have risen to meet the challenge of driver shortages for both the trucking and related industries. Software-as-a-Service has developed programs specifically engineered to assist companies in solving their trucker talent crunch.

The cloud has made recruitment, screening and hiring on-the-road talent both quick and convenient; some websites even have “employer” tabs, which allow a recruiter to fine-tune hiring to meet specific needs.

On these specialty websites, you—the employer—can be able to post relevant listings and openings. The convenience of cloud-based hiring keeps budget-conscious businesses from over spending on recruitment—in time, energy and money—all the while getting only the best candidates for all levels of job openings.

There are three basic realities you should know about hiring drivers:

You should focus your efforts on hiring a specific type of driver you want or class of trailer you want them to drive.
All drivers must be thoroughly vetted, to have the proper licenses or are otherwise certified: CDL’s (Commercial Driver’s Licenses) are required for all kinds of CDL jobs.
You need to recruit drivers through various sources—local, regional or national. Never put all your hiring eggs in one basket.

Seven best practices for hiring short- or long-haul drivers, as well as heavy equipment operators:

1 Always screen and perform background checks for any jobs requiring driving.

Truck drivers do a lot more than transport your product. They are specialists that will maneuver massive, potentially dangerous machines over hundreds or thousands of miles of road. When choosing recruiting companies, they must require candidates go through rigorous background checks and testing.

2 Always have a large pool of candidates.

The best truck drivers for your job opening begins with certified candidates. The right recruiting websites can provide a pool of applicants, from which you can choose the best for all your truck driving job openings.

3 Advertise CDL jobs in industry-specific publications.

For Commercial Drivers License (CDL) jobs, openings should be listed in leading print and online trucking magazines. Online job sites must also be used to bring in quality candidates for truck driving jobs. Lists of influential trucking publications are an ideal place to start; post job openings in national, regional, or local publications or upload to industry-specific websites.

4 Recruit through big-rig trucking schools.

Trucking schools an excellent source for drivers, they are filled with students who are determined and ready for further experience. Students are there with a genuine effort toward beginning a career in trucking. The majority of schools will also provide job placement in national or local trucking companies, as well as various other positions operating heavy equipment.

Start with directories of different truck driving schools and training programs. This is ideal for employers to get certified truck drivers and other heavy equipment operators.

5 Attend industry events.

Another suggestion for filling CDL jobs is attending trucking industry events. Presence at national, regional and state events will give a great deal of recruiting possibilities. Check with online listings for dates and times conferences. For example, there is an annual Mid-America Trucking Program, compete with a Recruitment Facility. This provides event-specific support for candidates considering trucking jobs.

When attending these events, don’t forget a pile of specialized company brochures. All data should clearly list the benefits of pursuing a truck-driving job with your organization. Put your promotional items in truck-stop kiosks, as well. Don’t forget, you have to go where the people are.

Successful hiring for truck operator jobs is a combination of finding the right applicant, someone with a variety of formal licensing, a safe driving record and experience driving the type of vehicle that you need him/her to operate.

6 Be competitive, more than just pay.

Two common grievances from long-haul truck drivers—lack of income and too much time away from family. If you cannot be competitive on wages, certainly look for creative compensation. One outstanding advantage would be to ensure drivers can make it home on most weekends.

7 Remember laws on driving times.

There are state and federal laws that restrict consecutive hours truckers can drive in a 24 hour period. They were established for a significant reason—safety! Long-haul drivers get tired and less alert after several hours of driving. Pushing the limits will put themselves and others in danger. Make sure all candidates are aware of the various Department of Transportation rules, and that they follow them closely. Your business cannot afford the liability for weary truckers.

The need for trucking employees is growing and is very competitive To hire the best, simple hiring practices can increase your chances your trucks on the road with reliable, well-trained drivers.

Even in the best of circumstances, recruiting, hiring and onboarding, the right person can be a challenge. Consider how much worse it would be if after all that, you hire the wrong person.

The cost of a lousy hire is nothing short of incredible!

You may not even be aware of exactly how much a bad hire will set your business back. Here are only a few of the bottom-line costs:

Hiring costs (both for a lousy hire and their replacement)
Total compensation
Employee support costs
Lost Productivity
Money missing due to neglected sales or business opportunities
Loss of clients and reputation

When deciding on a recruiting method for locating and selecting candidates, the sheer number of choices can be overwhelming. In recruitment, failure is never an option since making a poor hiring decision will surely cost your company time and money.

Maybe you are thinking, “How bad could it be?” Consider this; hiring the wrong person could add up to hundreds of thousands of dollars. In some cases, the price tag of a poor hire can skyrocket into the millions of dollars!

That is money right off your bottom line.

For example, a second-level manager earning $62,000 per year could cost your business, after 2.5 years, more than $840,000 in associated costs. The numbers might vary, but the math can apply to employees at every level of an organization.

If lost money and profits aren’t serious enough; add the potential negative impact a unsatisfactory employee can have on your company’s reputation, morale, and productivity. One lousy hire and your business could spend years to recover from the damage!

There is a way to reduce your chances of suffering with a bad hire. Ovation Technologies have all the tools your business needs to engage, screen and hire the best, most-qualified talent. From creating effective and accurate job descriptions to developing a reliable supply of candidates with the right experience, Ovation helps you hire the right person for any type of job.

Ovation even provides pre-hire criminal background checks, as well as driver’s license checks for jobs requiring drivers, truckers and heavy equipment operators.

In a new infographic from Resoomay, a terrible hire doesn’t just cost you time and money. Employees have to work harder to make up the difference, so a lousy hire might just cost your best employees, as well!

Jobseekers – How to Nail a Job Interview

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Everyone knows that first impressions are the ones that count. But, do you know how to deliver a great first impression at a job interview?

The impression you give on a social level is slightly different than on a job interview. On a social level, your goal is to get a positive acknowledgement that the person you are meeting isn’t weird. Sounds funny but on a personal level, people are initially usually expecting a simple exchange of words and body language to establish normalcy and then look for areas of common interest. If the normalcy bar is reached, the people will invest more of their time establishing a relationship in another. Below the bar (weird level) and people look for the exit.

In a job interview, you are under review and being judged by one with the power to literally change your life. Sounds ominous but not to worry, remember, the other person invited you to interview because they want to hire someone. If you aren’t weird, have the right credentials and present a positive first impression, you have a great chance of nailing it and getting the job.

So let’s look at a few things you can do to better your chances:

(You are on your own with the weird issue)

Do your homework on the company

First, Google the company and explore their website. There are two reasons to research a potential employer. First, make sure the organization is somewhere you want to work. Is the chemistry right for you? If it isn’t, success in landing the job will likely end in a short stint at the company and too many short-term jobs on your resume isn’t good. Second, be prepared to ask and answer questions about the company.

If the company has a blog, read it. Look over the website and to get a feel for their products and how they market them. Look at their “In the News” section to be aware of major happenings at the company.

If you know someone who works at the company, talk to them about the other people there and the work environment. If you know who will be interviewing you, Google them and also check out their LinkedIn profile.

At the end of the interview ask the person if you could take a copy of the company’s handbook along to review. Salespeople call this “assuming the sale”.

Relax

While a lack of preparation is one of the biggest sources of anxiety, a well-prepared attitude may be one of the best relaxation techniques available. A positive attitude is contagious, spread yours around. Successful interviewing is all about passion and emotion. People remember positive attitudes, but they never forget fearful or negative ones. Be aware of your emotions and anxiety and before the interview, listen to some music or do some breathing exercises to get into a relaxed frame of mind. Avoid nervous body language like crossing of the arms or clutching your hands in front of your stomach. Look at the interview as a fun experience and it will likely become one.

Here are a few tips from Dale Carnegie, author of “How to Win Friends and Influence People”, that will help in a job interview

Offer a firm handshake
Maintain eye contact
Maintain good posture
Be respectful. “Yes Sir/Ma’am No Sir/Ma’am” show respect
Give positive non-verbal communication (smile and nod head when in agreement)
Let the other person do a lot of talking
Don’t criticize, condemn or complain about past employers

Dress appropriately

Regardless of how many interviews you have been to or how many you have scheduled, treat each as the last one you will need to go to. Look the part of someone a company would want to hire. A good rule of thumb, often used by successful salespeople, is to dress one level above the person you will be meeting with. In today’s business casual world, that means dress shirts and slacks for men and dresses or pant suits for women. Business casual should be the minimum level of dress for any job. A business interview is not the time to wear your best club clothes.

An employer will appreciate that you have intuitively known the proper dress and grooming. A banking or investment firm will likely mandate more formal attire, so anticipate that and show up accordingly. At many startups and design firms, the college look of tee shirts and sneakers are common. However, they will appreciate the importance you have given to the interview if you show up in business casual.

Remember – Good luck comes to those that bring it

A job interview is about showing a potential employer that you have the required skills and attitude for the job. It is also about demonstrating to the hiring person that you come without baggage and will fit into the company’s culture and its plan for success. Treat the interview as an opportunity to share how great you really are.

Help, I have been Stricken with Technology Blindness!

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Have you ever tried to explain some sort of technology, be it software or hardware, to someone who is less than receptive to the idea? It usually starts with them saying either “How does this work?” or “I can’t figure this out”. As you begin to explain, if they are already in a state of anxiety over their lack of comprehension, a common reaction is them throwing their hands up in the air, either literally or figuratively, and experiencing a temporary case of ‘technology blindness’.

Technology blindness is a brain freeze caused by sheer anxiety. Often, the victim has experience in frustration with technology and has convinced themselves that software and “gadgets” just aren’t their thing. The human mind doesn’t particularly like feelings of incompetence or failure and might recognize those feelings about to descend upon it. Whatever the reason, the victim’s mind goes blank and their immediate reaction becomes, “Would you do it for me?”.

IT support people have dealt with technology blindness for many years and often develop a distain for its victims. One can almost read an IT person’s mind when a request for help arises- ‘”Yes, you dummy, I will perform miracles now”. You can’t blame them though when recipients of their wisdom typically gush praise when their problem is solved, often with a couple of keystrokes.

As many a psychologist will tell you, until victims of certain maladies want help, they must suffer. One personal favorite way to cure technology blindness is to take a deep breath and remind yourself that most things are designed with the average person in mind. Onward, to the help files!

You Are Not Blind, Relax.

Ovation’s hiring platform was designed to be simple and it really is once you walk through it. Admittedly though, some users have had trouble getting going. Fortunately, for us, the stumbling blocks seem be limited to a couple of things that we are working on to make them more obvious. I have encouraged more than one user to give it a try and I tell them that if they hit a wall to give us a call. We also offer a weekly WebEx QuickStart demo on Thursdays.

Here at Ovation, we take turns with the after-hours requests for support. Incoming calls are forwarded to our cell phones and we can usually talk through problems quickly. Last week, I took one of the support calls from a user in California, Lane, who stricken by technology blindness, wanted to know “What do I do?”. My first question was whether he had signed-up for the application. Hearing him say “How do I do that?”, I knew he had an extraordinary severe case of blindness and needed some tough love to regain vision.

I asked Lane if he would do me a favor. I said that our intent was to make Ovation a very easy to use, effective hiring platform. I asked if he would go ahead and sign-up at the “Try it for Free” button and give it a try on his own. I was very curious to see if and where he might hit a wall in posting that first job. I made sure he understood that he could call back at any point and I would lead him forward. I ended the call with optimism.

Fifteen minutes later, I received a call from Lane. He said that he was successful in signing up and had a job ready to post. When he went to open the job, the system reminded him that opening the job would use the free first job post credit and asked if that was the intent. However, Lane couldn’t see where to click to agree and was stuck.

I was already glad to hear he made it on his own. I knew what the problem was- browser incompatibility. He was using an early version of Internet Explorer and it sometimes misses in rendering pop-ups completely. I walked him through switching to the Chrome browser and re-logging in. Now, the problem was fixed and he opened the job with ease. While I was on the phone, we walked through publishing the job to Indeed and SimplyHired and I congratulated Lane on his success. Lane was really relieved and happy. He was cured!

As we develop and improve our platform, we have the user in mind. Ovation is designed to make hiring easier and organize the process. And, cure blindness!

Tips on How to Treat Your Employees

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Here are some real tips to use in your relationships with your employees. They are from a blog by James Altucher who is an investor, programmer, author, and entrepreneur. He is Managing Director of Formula Capital and has written 6 books on investing. His latest book is I Was Blind But Now I See. You can follow him on Twitter @jaltucher

Here are James’s rules for employees:

A) Treat them as if they are eventually going to be better than you. You can learn from every one of them before you have to fire them or before they abandon you.

B) Picture that all of them will eventually start their own businesses and you are just training them. This doesn’t mean be nice to them all the time. It means train them to start their own businesses. In my first business a bunch of employees broke free, stole some clients, and started their own business. Now they are doing very well. My partners hated them. I love them. It’s good to have many friends who look back and appreciate what you did for them.

C) If an employee gets the “disease” (all they want is more money and they don’t care about anything else and they start to have an attitude) then instantly fire them. There is no cure for the disease and it’s highly contagious.

D) No employee is allowed to say a bad thing about any client. Everyone has to love the client’s products. No gossip. No jokes. Worst situation: One time we had a proposal to send to the U.S. Post Office. Everyone worked very hard on it and we got it done just in time. The project manager FedExed the proposal to the Post Office. Fed. Ex. He was tired because his wife had just had a baby in the prior month. We had to fire him that very night. Nor did we win the job.

E) No gossip about anyone. I was guilty of this as a VC. I would talk badly ab0ut one of the CEOs we invested in. One of my partners told him everything I said. The CEO eventually went bankrupt anyway but he has since written a novel where I am the evil character. Gossip is a seed that gets twisted into history.

F) I picture every employee calling home at night to their mother. The mother asks, “how was your day at work?” I picture the employee saying, “Mom, it was the best.” I picture the mother crying tears of happiness because the baby that once came out of her is so happy to be working with me. I try to make that happen every day.

G) Teach the employee how to exploit you for their own gains. You certainly exploit them. Not in a bad way. You have to exploit them. You charge more for their services than you pay them and than you pay for all of your fixed expenses. That’s how you get rich so it’s worth it. But ultimately they have to exploit you to feel good about the relationship. When you both die there should be no bad feelings that linger among the maggots you share between your graves.

H) How can they exploit you? By building a rolodex off of yours. By learning your skill set. By learning how you deal with your failures. By learning not to repeat your mistakes. By eventually stealing some of your clients and employees and breaking off to start a business or take a higher position at a competitor. None of these things are bad things. You want them to do this. If you train them how to do this then it all becomes a good thing for you in the long run even though you might not see that. If you act with abundance in these situations then abundance will come to you. Too many bosses act with fear and scarcity and ultimately scarcity will come to them.

I) Teach them how to sell. Even if they are programmers. Programmers are often introverted and think they can’t sell. I’m a programmer. Because of their introversion, programmers are often seen as more trustworthy by the clients. Bring programmers or introverts to your meetings. They listen the best and they are the best sales people but they don’t know it.

J) Surprise them. Employees are like “reverse clients.” You have to please them just like you please a client. It doesn’t cost much to reward an employee who gets a job done. Gift certificates, dinners, get a masseuse to come in every Friday, write employees personal notes about what you liked about their work, and so on. Employees, like clients, are the gift that keep giving. They are all there to make you wealthy so you need to be infinitely grateful to them and, ultimately, help them get wealthy.

Read James complete post on TechCrunch

Onboarding New Hires in the Hospitality Industry

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If you are in the restaurant, nightclub, bar or hotel/resort business, you are in the hospitality business. It is an exciting, people-centric and time-demanding business that is not for the faint of heart. It can also be one of the most “fun-centric” industries as well, since your customer is usually in the leisure mode when you see them, either eating, drinking, traveling or kicking back.

Most jobs below owner/management level are semi-skilled, typically low paid, tip-dependent and attract a younger worker. Oh, by the way, the work is hard. A big challenge in the hospitality business is the revolving door of workers. It is logical that turnover is great because of the age and demographics of the workforce. Young people change directions with the wind and hospitality workers generally aren’t in for a career. In fact, your training model becomes a key indicator of your company’s success since it is constantly in use.

A company’s culture is perhaps the most under emphasized component of small to medium sized businesses. A company’s culture is the assumptions and behaviors that the people in an organization use in engaging with each other and with the customer. The culture typically evolves on its own in a small business from the top down, for good or for bad. Large companies invest heavily in their culture since a good culture makes a business operate smoothly and affects the customer’s perception of the business.

The Four Seasons chain of hotels and the Nordstrom department stores are often used as examples of companies with culture built around an excellent customer experience. That is a great premise for an industry that must please a lot of people with different levels of satisfaction. Part of the instilling of a culture in an employee is providing a good experience when they join the organization. This experience is called the onboarding of a new employee and can set the tone for the relationship; again for good or for bad.

The key to a good onboarding experience is completeness, friendliness and consistency. In small business, onboarding begins with the delivery of new hire paperwork and the general instructions and expectations to the new hire. Believe it or not, businesses have a difficult time delivering complete and timely new hire paperwork since most have a rather harried environment and operate with a sense of urgency.

Every employee must fill out certain paperwork to comply with the law and to set up for payroll. This includes completing an I-9, a W-4 as well as various forms like basic employee data forms, and direct deposit forms. All this, plus the time an employee handbook is delivered, benefits information is made available to the employee and perhaps a welcome letter from the owner rounds out the batch of paperwork the new hire receives.

The job of collecting the information usually falls on the operations manager or human resources department if one exists. In the hospitality industry, people aren’t usually hired until they are needed so, the sooner they can be put to work, the better.

The proper completion of some forms requires verification of identification documents or submission of banking info for direct deposit. Inevitably, new employees arrive without identification or some other documentation. This often results in starting the employee off without a complete enrollment and often the follow-up falls short. Not a smooth transition for either the employee or the employer.

Providing new hire paperwork electronically to the employee before they show up for work through either an email or a link to the documents can take some of the strain off of the first day and allow the employee to complete the paperwork in a more leisurely manner. The employee simply shows up with the forms completed and identification in hand for verification.

Ovation provides such an electronic new hire onboarding tool with its hiring and background screening tools in an affordable, easy to use, and effective one stop platform. The platform was designed specifically with the small business in mind and is a great resource for the hospitality industry where, time and first impressions are all important.

Using Ovation with All Job Boards

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Ovation allows a user to manage job postings to any job board. When a user creates a job posting in Ovation, either from scratch or from the Ovation template library of job descriptions, Ovation creates a unique web link to the new posting.

A job applicant clicks on the web link within the job description to complete the job application or to upload their resume to be ranked against other applicants with Ovation’s system to rank candidates according to best suited for the job.

While Ovation allows direct posting to Indeed, Simplyhired, Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn and others, here is how you can use Ovation with any job board, even niche boards:

Create a job posting in Ovation

It is important to create an appealing and comprehensive job description.

Here a sample of a job posting ready to be published

Notice the This web link will take the job applicant directly to the Ovation application which they can complete or upload their resume. Once they do, it will be ranked by Ovation and shown with other applicants’ submissions for the Ovation user’s review. When posting to a job board not directly supported by Ovation, the user can simply highlight and copy the job description on the Ovation Job Posting Details page,

drop it into any job board’s job description page and add the .

Now, all potential job candidates will be directed to the Ovation job application webpage to complete the job application and their application will join those of candidates who responded to similar posts on other job boards.

For more information about posting jobs within Ovation see the ovationtechnologies.com Help Section.

Ovation – Hiring, Background Checks and Onboarding Tool for Business

Post to job boards and organize applicants

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