By The Kin Team
Oct 1, 2020
This is the final post in a multi-part series about career development in small businesses. This article looks at the importance of employee engagement and how focusing on career development is one way to positively impact engagement levels in your workforce.
“The learning curve is the earning curve,” writes Josh Bersin in The New Organization: Different by Design. “People now flock to companies that can give them the opportunity to grow and develop.”
As we mentioned in the first article in this series, businesses often focus career development efforts on the progress employees make within the company, and around succession planning–who do we have that can fill that role? But for individuals, career development is about the development of one’s skills, increasing one’s talent and a sense of self-actualization; it’s about the fulfillment of one’s potential.
Prior generations may not have been as focused on finding work that was fulfilling. Or at least they weren’t as vocal about it. But today’s workforce population has made it clear that work isn’t “just work” anymore. Employees want to be satisfied by what they’re doing for 40+ hours each week, and they want to work for an organization that they trust, and with which they feel engaged.
Increasing employee engagement by providing career development is one method of addressing staffing concerns that small business owners have. According to the 2015 Small Business Owner Report, 38% of business owners said finding the right talent was a top concern, while 16% of business owners said a top concern was employee turnover.
“To be competitive, you can’t offer the bare minimum. Candidates are interviewing for jobs, but employers are auditioning, too. Career development is part of that. It’s not just about the 401(k) or the hourly wage. Employees are looking at the whole package,” said Sandy Castoro, Founder & President of PassionFruit Consulting, an HR firm that specializes in change management and organizational culture.
When a business seeks to attract exceptional candidates, hire top talent, and retain engaged employees, career development opportunities must be an integral part of what the organization offers to employees.
What factors drive employee engagement?
“If [employees] are not inspired and engaged at their work, they drift away, and you may find yourself with a large organization operating with low performance or inconsistent customer service…The issue with employee engagement today is that we have to build an ‘always on’ listening process, one the opens up streams of feedback and concerns in a way that helps leaders immediately spot problems and design solutions that make employees more productive, aligned, and engaged at work,” Bersin writes in The New Organization: Different by Design.
How do you begin listening to determine if your employees are engaged? Start by defining employee engagement for your company, and ask these questions:
- How do leaders and managers define employee engagement?
- How do you know that individual employees in your company are engaged? Do they relish their jobs? Enjoy specific responsibilities or tasks? Willingly “go the extra mile”?
- In teams with engaged employees, what business results are you seeing? Higher productivity? Lower costs? Greater revenues? More efficiency? Lower turnover? Higher product or service quality?
- How do disengaged employees behave, and what is the impact on their teams and your entire company?
Source: Society of Human Resource Management Effective Practice Guidelines- Employee Engagement and Commitment
Once you have an idea of whether or not your employees are engaged, you can look at ways to take their engagement to (at least) the next level. Some elements that impact employee engagement include:
- Perceptions of job importance
- Clarity of job expectations
- Open dialogue with managers
- Positive work relationships with peers, superiors, and subordinates
- Personal alignment with the organizational culture and values
- Effective internal communications
- Career development opportunities
In an ideal world, a business will work to address each of these areas to improve engagement, create a strong organizational culture, and demonstrate to employees that they are valued.
“Now that millennials make up a majority of the workforce, it’s even more important to show that your business values employees by providing them with development opportunities. That you’re creating a good organizational culture. That you’re helping the larger community, and that you’re connecting employees with each other,” said Castoro, the Founder & President of PassionFruit Consulting.
On the topic of career development, she stresses that it’s an important way to engage employees.
“It’s not just a way to throw money away, or make more worker bees. You’re investing time and money in employees and helping engage them with your business,” she says.
A survey conducted by Randstad and Ipsos Public Affairs also highlighted the importance and effectiveness of career development programs. Of the employees surveyed, 28% said “Investing in employees’ careers through training, professional development or continuing education” was one of the most effective engagement tools.
How does employee engagement impact your small business?
When you engage employees by focusing on their career development, the business benefits in a variety of ways:
- Employees stay with an organization because they’re engaged and developing their careers and are more likely to perform at a higher level.
- Institutional knowledge increases and can be shared among employees.
- A culture focused on development and growth ultimately enhances the ability for your business to perform well.
“Small businesses often can’t afford to pay as much as a large corporation,” says Castoro, the HR consultant. “But if you’re providing on-the-job training or individually-tailored career development those efforts show employees that you’re invested in them. That’s a competitive advantage for the small businesses that can’t offer a big salary or huge health benefits.”
By providing opportunities for employees increase their knowledge, skills, and expertise you demonstrate your commitment to your employees. In turn, this focus on their development positively impacts the employee’s self-esteem and heightens their commitment to the employer which eventually leads to improved employee engagement.
Engaged employees are less likely to leave, which means a focus on your employees’ career development might just save you a significant amount of money. In a report that analyzed the cost of Millennial retention, companies indicated that it takes between $15,000 and $25,000 to replace each employee they lose, and that that it takes 3 to 7 weeks to hire an employee in a new role. Add to that the time it takes for an employee to become truly effective once they’re hired, and the cost is significant.
What does career development look like in small business?
“As a business owner, it’s your job to have answers when employees ask, ‘What do I need to do to succeed in this job? Where is this job going?’ If you can answer those questions, it demonstrates that you’re putting effort into thinking about their future, not just yours. And, if you can’t answer their questions, you’re not doing your job as the business owner,” says Castoro.
Before you start feeling overwhelmed by the idea of creating a career development program, let us assure you: your program doesn’t have to be elaborate. In our Creating a Career Development Plan for Small Business Employees article, we mentioned some ways you can provide learning and development opportunities that require minimal—if any—expense. When looking at how your business can support career development, consider these options:
With some creativity, commitment from the management team, and input from your workforce you’ll be surprised at how easy it is to put together a career development program that inspires your employees to participate. Keep in mind that it’s not just the programs you deliver, it’s also the fact that you’re putting time and resources towards offering them that helps build trust and a engagement with your employee population.
Conclusion
“The essence of competitiveness is liberated when we make people believe that what they think and do is important—and then get out of their way while they do it.”
- Jack Welch, former CEO, General Electric
Most of us want to enjoy our work and feel satisfied by the contributions that we make. Career development is one way for small businesses to enable their employees to contribute and increase their skills in a way that delivers personal, professional, and organizational results.
Identifying individual talents and providing career development opportunities for employees to further their abilities is a critical component in a robust talent management strategy. A focus on career development does wonders in engaging the current workforce while also recruiting and retaining future employees. When you empower and engage employees, you’ll find that your company may excel and reach heights you didn’t think possible.
images by:
Cosmic Timetraveler
By Lisa Arnold
Sep 30, 2020
Despite the times we are living in, a lot of life is continuing on as normal. People are working from home, but they’re still working. We’re still hiring. We’re still onboarding new employees, and unfortunately, we are still realizing some members on our teams aren’t great fits. While terminating an employee virtually may seem complicated, there’s a lot you can do to ease the stress and discomfort on both sides.
We wanted to give a few rules of thumb to help make the process easier, and give you and the employee the best experience possible in a less than perfect situation.
The same rules apply in office or virtually
Be polite. Stick to the facts. Make it quick. The employee being terminated likely does not want to be in the conversation any longer than they need to, and you owe it to them as their employer to make the process as painless as possible.
State only facts and don’t get into feelings. Now is not the time to debate something. The decision has been made, and your only job in this meeting is to relay the decision and let the employee know next steps.
Focus on maintaining the employee’s dignity
When you’ve made the decision to let the employee go, be sure to prepare for giving them the utmost respect. This situation is hard. Now is not the time to turn off your camera. Keep your camera on and address the situation promptly. Look the person in the eyes, and treat them with the same empathy and kindness that you would want had the roles been reversed.
Document, document, document
Before all terminations, you should have proper documentation in place. First, you should have notes about every discussion you had regarding the employee’s performance. You’ll also want the improvement plan that you put them on and how they did not meet the marks there.
Compiling this documentation can be tough, but tools like Kin help you keep it all in one place. If you don’t have a place that you’re storing documentation in while working remotely, check us out and save yourself time and heartache later on.
Another important step in documentation is ensuring you have a severance agreement and any other paperwork you need them to sign available during the termination call. You’ll want to walk through that paperwork and also provide any expectations for them to complete it.
Have a witness who is willing to tune in with their camera on
If you are big enough to have an HR representative on staff, obviously they would be on the call with you. In fact, they likely will do a majority of the talking. If you don’t have an HR representative, then you must have a witness of some sort. This person is just there to be a witness to the event and to ensure that nothing happens that could be in non-compliance. Again, they’re not here to say anything but just to bear witness. This can help reduce any he said, she said situations down the road.
Try to pick an unbiased third-party for this role.
Pick a termination date that gives them a head start
The worst time to fire anyone is a Friday afternoon, contrary to popular belief. When you do this, you are giving the employee all weekend to think about what happened versus beginning to job search immediately.
Of course, they could put in applications over the weekend but we all know that those will be buried by applications coming in through Monday morning. Also, they likely won’t get a response until a few days later compared to finding a good fit and potentially getting a response the same day during the week.
Alert your IT team ahead of time
Before you make the move, make sure that your IT team knows what’s going on. They’ll need to know the date and time of the termination so they can be prepared to turn off any portals to sensitive data remotely immediately following the conversation. This will protect you and your company.
They’ll also need to be responsible for checking in any equipment that is returned and ensuring it’s in good condition.
Immediately call a team meeting
Working remotely can make people feel like they’re on an island. This is especially true when a big decision like letting a team member go happens.
The last thing you want is one of your team members to hear from someone else other than their leader as to what happened. By immediately calling a team meeting and letting everyone know about the situation you are ensuring they receive the right message versus a game of telephone. You’re also providing a deep-seated respect to your team. It shows that above all else you are willing to be transparent and honest in tough times.
By Lisa Arnold
Sep 24, 2020
Where do you stand on “work-life balance?” Some people believe it’s two separate things, where work is negative and life is positive. You must complete the grudge work before you can enjoy your life. Others see it as a way to integrate the two and enjoy both compartmentally. But now that the pandemic has forced many to change the way they work, it’s blurring some lines.
We’ve always known that remote working can help employees be more satisfied with their work environment, with nearly 90% of remote workers reporting so, and almost 50% of them saying they’re “very satisfied” with working from home.
But you can’t just send employees home and expect them to immediately dive into work at home. In order to get the best out of our team members, we have to make sure we put clear expectations in place, and that especially revolves around when to turn work on and off now that work and life share a physical space.
Readjust the way you look at productivity
Think of how you were raised to believe in work. It was that 9-5 commitment adults had outside the home in order to fund the necessities of life. They met up with other individuals at the office, completed jobs in close proximity, and clocked out when the day was done. Bringing work home may or may not have happened, but it was never planned for. It was supposed to be completed in the office. Overflow happened at home. Life happened when they walked in the door for dinner with the family, or a trip to the pumpkin farm on the weekend.
At some point, a shift began. Work became easier to take home because it was now doable on our phone. Heck, we even have cars that emit WiFi now, for crying out loud. We always have the ability to be “plugged in.”
Hustle culture took over and productivity became the cool new thing. How much we could accomplish in a day was a huge defining trait. It is, for lack of better words, a super power. And now, this takeover of work embedded in every aspect of our lives is creating massive burnout.
And it’s only going to be worse. In fact, a recent report by Ameritrade shows that 59% of millennials in the US are now inspired to get a side hustle once this is over to help keep financial stability, which will add to their already full plates.
All of this leads to us wondering, “why?” When was the last time you spent an entire day away from work, not once checking your email on your phone, responding to a quick message from a co-worker, or checking in on Facebook or Twitter and coincidentally seeing an update from a colleague or your business page and spending time reading it.
Our “always on” culture is creating a co-dependency on work that wasn’t there before. It’s up to us employers to show our employees that work doesn’t have to be the main focus of life, especially when it’s harder to separate it from their home since it now happens there.
How do we change it? If the pandemic has taught us anything, it’s that nothing is promised tomorrow. And with that, more people are beginning to look for fulfillment outside of just work. One quick example is that home improvement spending has skyrocketed, with nearly 70% of Americans saying they’ve tackled at least one thing on their list to improve their home’s value.
Our job as employers is to encourage walking away from the computer. Encourage “life” to happen. Encourage PTO usage with no disruptions from work. The more we can do this, the happier our employees will be because they’ll get the well-deserved time away that they’ve earned.
Ending long hours as a measurement of commitment and loyalty
If Jonny is constantly signed into Slack, always working, always responding, Jonny is seen as a dependable member of the team. Unfortunately, Jonny is also the secret “weakest link.”
The amount of hours put in by an employee doesn’t always equal great work. Great thought equals great work.
People who spend hours and hours outside of normal work time staying online are often not being as productive as they seem within the constraints of business hours. They’re likely overloaded. The work they accomplish outside of normal hours is actually the work that should have been completed within it. The work completed within those hours is likely what needs to be handed off or shared with others.
This makes Jonny leaving scary when he finally does find time to slip away because your company won’t know what is and isn’t being handled, and likely will find some big holes in coverage. You may have an idea of what Jonny does, but do you know why it takes 12-13 hours per day, minimum?
Overloading an employee is not the fault of the employee, it’s the fault of the management. At some point, management not only has to recognize workload, but they have to be able to disperse it in a way that is somewhat equal across the team. No one person should be involved in every single thing across the company. Even CEOs and visionaries who intimately know their companies have those they delegate work to. And when they do, they expect daily decisions to be made at that level that they never have to be a part of.
If you notice that an employee is overworking, don’t glorify it. See it as a sign of a problem, and move toward a solution. Otherwise, you’re setting the example that longer hours equals better employees, and that’s almost never the case.
Now that many of us work from home, it’s a more level playing field for productivity (if we make sure our team members are set up for success). People can’t pop into your office as easily, and technology allows you to become your own gatekeeper of sorts. You can turn off notifications when you’re deep in an assignment, and you can schedule meetings versus a quick hello turning into a 45-minute conversation near the coffee pot.
By removing the time-wasters we’ve all been exposed to in the office, we now have more time to focus on work. It’s our job to see this shift in our team, and monitor who still seems overburdened with tasks and deadlines. Those are the people that need our help most to distribute extra work, or even hire another person to help them.
Hiring during a global pandemic is happening, and if your team needs to, now is the time to take advantage of hiring outside of your geographic bubble to find great talent that may be a few states away.
If you need help with hiring and onboarding, here’s a post that will show you how we do it for our 100% remote team.
By Lisa Arnold
Sep 23, 2020
A recent Glassdoor report found that people who have paid time off only use about half of the allotted time per year. Most report being fearful that their projects won’t get done or critical details will be overlooked in their absence. Another big fear? That the company will be perfectly fine without them and they’ll lose their jobs when they return.
If that wasn’t enough, being worried about preparing for vacation with all the effort to not only keep up with everyday work, but also clear our desks, answer emails and tie up any loose ends to keep our team humming in our absence is enough to make us stay right in our seats.
But beyond being stuck at work, not using your PTO is linked to a variety of negative effects that can trickle down throughout your life. Here are just a few:
PTO usage and your health
This game of stress doesn’t end at not putting in a PTO request. In fact, there’s a direct link between time off from work and your health in massive ways.
Not taking time off for prolonged periods can lead to physical and psychological stress that affect your body. In fact, a Framingham Heart Study showed that men who don’t use their paid time off increase their risk for heart attack by 30%, and women who don’t use it increase their risk by 50%. In addition to heart attacks, stress can cause other issues such as headaches, depression and immune deficiencies.
Now more than ever, we need to take our health seriously. 2020 has shown us that nothing is promised tomorrow, and the healthier we are the more likely we are to survive serious situations that we may have never seen coming. Stress and burnout can weaken immune systems and create devastating effects on our health.
A wise friend once told me, “your work will always be there.” It’s true. A few days away to recharge doesn’t take away from months of dedication, perseverance and progress.
PTO usage and career success
Did you know people who take their paid time off are more likely to get promoted? A study by Project Time Off showed that you have a more than a 6% chance of not only getting a raise, but almost getting a promotion and bonus if you take all of your time off compared to your counterpart who forfeits their time.
Wondering why? In the book, The Happiness Advantage: Seven Principles of Positive Psychology that Fuel Success and Performance at Work, author Shawn Achor writes about the American Psychological Association study that found when the brain thinks positively, productivity increases by 31%, sales increase by 37% and revenues can triple at an organization. The more you can produce for a company with a relaxed, positive brain, the more likely you are to be recognized for it.
In addition to that great news, people who take time off are also seen as more valuable team players because they’re less likely to be burned out. Studies show that burnout can lead to less engagement at work and lower productivity. This could cause strain between yourself and your co-workers and put you in a bad position with your boss. If we know that one great way to avoid burnout is by using our paid time off, it’s the ideal excuse to walk away from your desk.
PTO usage and better relationships, more well-adapted children
As if the reasons above weren’t enough to schedule a vacation away from the office right now, people who use their paid time off often report being happier in their relationships and have more emotionally intelligent children.
Arizona Department of Health and Human Services found that women who took vacations were more satisfied with their marriages. Arizona isn’t alone. Wisconsin did a similar study and found vacation can improve the mental health of women who are often weighed down by not only their careers, but maintaining a home, taking care of children and even taking care of elderly parents and sick relatives.
Children who have high parent involvement experience higher emotional intelligence as well, which will help them navigate many different obstacles at life with much greater ease than their counterparts.
So, when is your next time away from work going to be? Don’t forget to request your time in Kin now.
By Lisa Arnold
Sep 17, 2020
As well settle into the future of work which will likely include remote working for a significant amount of time, a lot of things are changing as far as leadership goes. Many companies have proven that remote working can be just as effective, if not more effective, than in-person work. And we’re seeing this through big, sweeping gestures, like Twitter announcing that they going fully remote even after the pandemic is over.
As we settle into this new reality, we need to example how remote working will help us, or what needs to be created in order for our teams to continue to thrive.
At Kin, we’ve been remote for more than half of the company’s existence. Our motto is to work where you’re happiest, and it’s proven to curate a wonderful team across the United States. Here’s a few things we’ve learned, and ideas we’re still pondering as we continue down our company’s path.
There’s more to hiring
When you hire someone in an office, there are a lot of social cues that you will pick up from the in-person meeting. However, when you’re hiring someone 100% remotely, there’s some things that you might miss.
In order to account for this at Kin, we spend a lot of time with each candidate that we want to bring on. We have multiple layers for hiring that include different ways to see the candidate communicate. For example we begin each interview with a phone screen, then move to a written assignment, then move to a group interview via video chat, then likely move to a one-on-one video chat.
We want to be able to see the candidate communicate in different formats so we have a better understanding of how they might react in different situations day-by-day. Ultimately, communication in remote-working places is a make-or-break skill. We try to test it as much as possible with candidates before we make a job offer.
You can see a more in depth look as to how we hire in one of our latest blog posts here.
Leaders will have to promote engagement from miles away
Many leaders have currently been thrust into remote leadership, and while it may not have been their choice at first, they’ll need to quickly be able to lead thoroughly and strongly from afar. This means learning how to build relationships through video chat, understanding cues on a phone call that we may not have had to look for before, and ensuring their team is well taken care of even if they can’t be physically next to them.
Remote working often gets the reputation that it’s easier than reporting to an office. While this may be true for some positions, for leadership roles it creates more challenges, and frankly, more opportunities. We have to be more acutely aware of what is happening with our teammates. We can no longer brush off a bad mood, or disengagement for a week, because we know that person is going through something due to our close physical proximity and off-the-cuff water-cooler chats. Now, we have to take relationship building more seriously and with a much more deliberate approach.
Leadership training will begin to incorporate this. Feedback loops will be more important than ever, and the annual review will no longer cut it. I wouldn’t be surprised to see courses and virtual workshops pop-up on how to better manage a team remotely.
Leaders will find ways to make creative space for their team
One thing all remote teams occasionally struggle with is finding a way to be serendipitously creative. It happens often in offices around a water cooler, or through an in-person brainstorming session with a bunch of Post-it notes. It’s a little bit harder to have happened on a whim while working remotely.
Remote workers often have a much more structured schedule than those in an office to stay on track. It’s hard to just “pop in” on a remote worker compared to someone with a physical office.
Moving forward, it will take focused effort to create these moments that lead to breakout ideas and evolution of companies and processes. it doesn’t mean that it can’t happen though. Just like engaging employees from afar, this will just be another opportunity for us to reimagine the way that we’ve done work for years and years.
Leaders will have to think about the next big “startup hubs”
Remote working drives a lot of change. We’re seeing rental rates drop in San Francisco because of it, and we’re noticing startup hubs pop up in the most unlikely of places. Suburb and rural locations with semi-convenient access to airports are quickly becoming some of the most thriving areas in the United States. Even though remote working doesn’t dictate the need for an office, it’s important to understand what’s happening around us and especially within our industries.
Leaders working in these new environments will have to keep a pulse on what’s happening across the United States. I firmly believe that we’ll see more and more small towns benefit from remote working. Whether they become the hub of a certain type of startup or they just benefit from the tax dollars of an employee working remotely in a small city while being paid a big city salary, we are going to see a resurgence in these areas. Companies who work remotely may be able to take advantage of this, either by recruiting from these small towns to help them thrive by driving down unemployment with white collar positions or by putting hubs in these small towns at a lower cost of entry compared to big cities. Either way, this movement will be a major win for small towns and startups alike.
By Lisa Arnold
Sep 16, 2020
This year has been a whirlwind for businesses, and the new payroll tax holiday (for the US) isn’t making it much easier. Effective earlier this month following an executive order President Trump issued in August, the payroll tax deferral will be effective until the end of the year. But what does that mean for us as small business owners and employees?
It’s important to understand how the tax breaks down in the first place. Workers and employers split a 12.4% tax to cover Social Security as well as a 2.9% tax to pay for Medicare. The Social Security percentage applies to up to a $137,700 annual salary in 2020. Salary numbers are adjusted every year for Social Security, but the Medicare tax continues to come into play above that amount.
The payroll tax deferral this executive order is targeting is the employee’s share of the Social Security tax. It’ll only be applied to workers whose wages are below $4,000 every two weeks. It’s important to note that this is an average, so a large bonus could quickly knock you out of being eligible for the payroll tax holiday if it bumps your average pay above $4,000 across the board.
One thing to make crystal clear before we go any further is that this is only a deferral of taxes, not forgiveness. In order for forgiveness to happen, Congress would have to intervene and agree upon it in the future. Nothing is concrete there.
Since it’s a deferral, taxes will be due at a later date which has been determined to be Q1 2021. Employers must withhold those taxes and pay them over time from employee’s pay between Jan. 1, 2021 and April 30, 2021. If they don’t, employers will face interest, penalties and additional taxation, according to the IRS.
Note that this holiday will affect each company differently. While we are providing some blanket coverage in this blog post, it’s extremely important that you speak directly with your employer, or your accountant, to better understand how to handle it for your specific situation.
Here are a few things to know moving forward:
Employers are not required to offer the payroll tax holiday
It is up to the employer to participate in the deferral of taxes. This is a huge responsibility for employers, and with the quick rollout of guidance and complexity around the holiday, there will likely be many organizations that do not find it beneficial for their company or their employees to participate in.
Employers that do offer it have the option to ask employees if they would like to opt in. Do not assume that your company’s payroll company will automatically opt you in, and do not assume that you as an employee are automatically part of it. Speak with a representative on your team who is in charge of payroll to learn more.
This is just a tax delay
We know that all holidays come and go. This is no different. The amounts of tax you do not pay from September through December will be withheld from your pay starting in January 2021.
While you might enjoy the 6.2% bump in your paycheck now, you’ll see a decrease in pay early next year as employers will need to pull that amount from your paycheck to cover ongoing payroll tax.
If you choose to participate, you’ll likely want to save some of the extra cash you get in Q4 to cover the drop you’ll see in Q1 2021.
Deferred taxes will be withheld in even amounts next year
As employers recoup the costs from the fall starting in January, you’ll see it deducted evenly from January 1, 2021 through April 30, 2021, the same amount of time you saw the tax holiday happen.
But what happens to seasonal workers or someone who changes a job? It’s likely that the employer will need to hold the entire amount that an employee has deferred from their final paycheck in order to repay the taxes. Keep this in mind if you plan on switching jobs before the end of the year.