Small Biz Ahead

2 months ago

Categories: Podcasts

Where To Find Employees for Your Small Business

Key Podcast Highlights

What Are The Best Sources For Finding Employees?

Referrals: Your existing employees are a great resource for getting reliable recommendations for new employees within their own network.
Online Job Listings: Be sure to do your research and post your listings on online job listing websites. People who are open to work are often checking for listings on Craigslist, LinkedIn Jobs, and Indeed.
Formerly Incarcerated: Depending on the work you do, you may find the perfect candidates through your local prison systems. Many prisons offer employment training and opportunities for formerly incarcerated individuals who are ready to get back into the workforce. Many states also offer tax credits for employers who hire formerly incarcerated individuals.
Religious Institutions: Research the churches, mosques and synagogues in your local area. Many religious institutions offer programs that help their community members find work opportunities.
Technical and Trade Schools: Depending on the line of work you do, you could find potential candidates through your local technical or trades schools. These candidates may already come with skills you’d otherwise have to train others on.
Other Businesses: You never know when your perfect job candidate could show up. When you’re out shopping in a retail store, at a restaurant, or your Uber driver, you may find someone who’d be the perfect fit to offer a job to.

Transcript

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Gene (00:01):

Hey everybody, it’s Gene Marks, and welcome to this week’s episode of the Hartford Small Biz Ahead Podcast. Thank you so much for joining me. The news that I wanted to talk to you about this week and some advice I wanted to give has to do with hiring employees. There was a new report that came out from the National Federation of Independent Businesses showing that hiring itself, our hiring plans by small business owners, are starting to slow down a little bit. Open jobs are decreasing as well. And small business owners are starting to get a little bit more picky about hiring. But the bottom line is, I mean, if you’re running a business like I am, we’re always looking for good people. And the question is, is where do we find them? I mean, the topic of hiring an employee is very big.

Gene (00:47):

You can talk about how do you conduct an interview and what should you look for in a resume? And, uh, what’s the process of onboarding something? All that kind of stuff. But really, when I talk to so many businesses all around the country, the biggest question that I get regardless of the business, regardless of the industry that they’re in, is where do I find people? You know, like, how do I find, I’m always looking for good people. Where do I find them? And I’ve got five places that I wanted to mention. There’s a bunch of different places, but there are five significant places that I wanna recommend where you can go to find and hire good people. And I’ve got a bonus place at the very end, but let me give you the, the five ones, okay?

Gene (01:33):

The number one place. Can you guess where small businesses find employees? The number one place people are always like, oh, it must be LinkedIn. It must be indeed, you know, something online. It’s actually not the number one place to find a good employee or a new employee is your existing employees. Referrals happens to be the top choice among businesses because when you’re working with somebody, you’ve got an employee and they’ve got a family member or a neighbor or somebody in their church or somebody in their community, it is a great opportunity to not only get referred to people that your people know, but it means that it’s not a cold lead. It’s somebody that has a bit of history with somebody in your company and they can vouch for them, and that certainly helps. Because let’s face it, whenever you do place an ad out on an online job site, it’s cold whoever’s sending you in resumes.

Gene (02:23):

So my advice to you is you should be asking your employees all the time if they’ve got any friends or neighbors or people that they know that might be interested in such and such job opportunity, mind your existing employees and also your existing network as well. But definitely be asking your existing employees if they know any other people that could, that might be interested in working for your company. So that’s number one is referrals. That’s where the number one source of employees. Number two, yes, online job sites. Okay, I get that. And I do have three favorites that I use all the time whenever I’m looking for people.

Gene (02:59):

I like Craigslist. I know some people have their opinions about it, but I’ve had great success. It’s very inexpensive. It’s like 35 bucks to place an ad on Craigslist, and I usually get good responses. Obviously, it depends on the type of person you’re looking for, but uh, you know, if it’s for, you know, hourly type people or administrative or office workers or, you know, that kind of thing, even professionals, Craigslist has been good. Indeed is an excellent site as well. And LinkedIn is, has great job search capabilities in both Indeed and on LinkedIn, are getting better with AI as well to make the search better. So if you’re gonna go online, again, this is, you know, my opinion on this podcast. I like Craigslist, I like indeed, I like LinkedIn. Number three, here’s a good place where you should be looking.

Gene (03:41):

Prisons, prisons in your state. Consider the formerly incarcerated. I’m pretty sure I did a podcast on this before for The Hartford, but I wanna make sure I give another shout out to the fact that every state in this country has got programs to rehabilitate and re-employ the formerly incarcerated in their state. So not only do the Department of Corrections in your state have job resources for people getting out of prison, but they’ve got partnerships and relationships with a lot of nonprofits that can facilitate that transition, provide transportation, counseling, training, all that kind of stuff. And there are all sorts of grants and tax credits available. Many states offer work opportunity or workforce development grants. The federal government has got the work opportunity tax credit for hiring somebody that’s been formally incarcerated. I’m telling you, you’re looking for people. Depending on the job, depending on the situation.

Gene (04:31):

The formerly incarcerated is a good place to look. Next, consider religious institutions. I did a piece on this for the Philly Enquirer a couple years ago, and I interviewed somebody who was like director of HR at like Temple University in, in Philly. And he was telling me he’s got relationships with lots of churches and mosques and synagogues within like a 30 mile radius of the school. And he’s oftentimes reaching out with them and checking out to them and all that kind of stuff. Because they also have people in their community, they will mention somebody that they know is looking for work or somebody became available. And it’s a great resource to find good people that are somewhat vetted because they’re coming from a referral source. And that’s pretty good. Number five is of course, technical and trade schools.

Gene (05:17):

And again, that depends on the industry that you’re in. I am seeing all over the place, particularly in the construction trades, how so many people, younger people are, are not even going to college. They’re going to tech schools and trade schools instead and coming out of it with actual construction skills that they can put to work right away. And instead of paying down student loans, they’re paying down mortgages instead, which is certainly more preferable. So technical and trade schools are growing, they’re becoming more popular community colleges as well, if you’re looking for actual people with actual skills. Finally, I’m gonna add in a little bonus place for you to look, and it’s this, it’s the people that you’re not paying attention to. And what I mean is this. You ever go out to dinner somewhere and you’ve got like a great server comes to your table, they memorize the whole order, they got a smile on their face, they’ve got energy, they’re doing a great job.

Gene (06:06):

You ever go into a retail store? I once went into a UPS store, uh, right near where I lived to send off a package during rush hour. It was a zoo in there, but the woman behind the counter was cool as a cucumber, handled like 16 things at one time and was incredibly officious. And expeditious, these are the people you should be keeping your eyes open for. There are a lot of people at hourly jobs working in the service industry. Tough jobs that would probably love to work for you in your company. And let’s face it, you can teach people to do what they need to do to do a good job at your company. You can’t teach people to have a good attitude and a lot of energy and to show up to work on time. Those are the kind of people that you want to hire, right?

Gene (06:46):

So the next time that you’re out at a retail store or you’re out with an Uber driver, or you’re out getting served at a restaurant, pay attention to the people that you’re interacting with, the workers at those places because they could be a potential good resource for your company if they’re displaying the kind of traits that you could mold into something that would make up a really good employee. So again, the NFIB’s report is showing that, you know, small business hiring starting to slow. So how about some tips on hiring? Where do you find that employee, those employees? I gave you five places referrals from other employees. Some of my favorite online sites, indeed and LinkedIn and Craigslist, don’t judge. The formerly incarcerated from your prison system in your state. Religious institutions are a great source for new employees.

Gene (07:36):

Tech and trade schools are a great source for your new employees. And hey, your next new employee could be the person that’s been serving you dinner the last time you were at some restaurant because they were that good, and somebody that you know you can hire and teach them the skills that they need. Those are the place where you can go to find good people to work for you. Those are some hiring tips for me in this episode. Maybe I’ll come back and give you some more hiring tips in a future episode as well. My name is Gene Marks and you’re listening to The Hartford’s Small Biz Ahead Podcast. If you need any help or tips or advice in running your business, please visit us at smallbizahead.com. You’ll be able to get whatever information that you need. Plus, it’s a great resource and a good place for where our podcast is as well. Thank you so much for joining me this week. I’ll be back next week with some other tip or insider advice to help you run your business just like I’m running mine. Thanks for spending the time. We’ll see you then.

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