So your business has taken off, while that’s exciting, it also presents new challenges. With the sudden boom in business, you likely need to hire a lot of people quickly to make sure you don’t fall behind.
While you may have hired a few employees here and there over the course of operation, recruiting a group of people or sustaining ongoing hiring can be time-consuming and requires a certain set of skills. So, how do you make sure you can accommodate the growing needs of your business with the right additions to your team?
Here are a few tips to help you hire for rapid growth. Consider these options as recommendations and feel free to tailor them to your business’s needs so you can create the best team to get the job done.
Have a Plan
Like anything else in your business, don’t start hiring new employees without a plan. A detailed plan is key to not only save time but to find employees who are a good fit.
Start by identifying which positions you need to hire right now and which ones can wait. Creating a tiered hiring hierarchy can help expand your team in phases. Keep in mind the monetary and time cost of bringing on each new employee. If it doesn’t look like you can afford it, you need to also come up with a financial plan for how many employees you can hire and when. This is a critical component to sustaining growth without decimating your financial security.
In addition to the logistics of expanding your team, you also need to clearly define the job roles you’re hiring for. In some cases, you may just be hiring more sales associates or designers, but you also might need to hire for positions you’ve never had before.
Doing your research to establish an official set of requirements and responsibilities will help you find qualified candidates and compete with other companies looking to fill the same positions.
Streamline Your Hiring Process
Moving forward, you need every aspect of your process to be as efficient as possible. You don’t have time to waste on repeatedly answering the same basic questions, interviewing unqualified candidates, or making hiring mistakes that can cost you in more ways than one.
These are all fairly simple fixes. To minimize the wasted time you need to hammer-out the foundation of your recruiting; this usually includes the job posting and application. Make these as specific as possible.
Once you have candidates, you can minimize your risk of poor hiring decisions by using employment screening services before making a job offer. Fortunately, all of these tasks are easier than ever with vast online resources at your disposal.
If you’re not sure where to start with recruiting, create a comprehensive job description that will draw in the right applicants. All job postings should include:
- The duties of the position
- Requirements for consideration
- Information about your company
You may also want to include salary, whether there is an opportunity for remote work, and business hours as these are often important decision factors for job applicants. That way, if one of these simple facts would cause them to reject your offer, you can weed them out at the very beginning.
This may all seem to be too heavy a burden for a small business that only has one or two employees dedicated to HR functions. What many organizations do to mitigate this is to outsource recruitment services. For example, if they want employees trained overseas they tap the services of a recruitment agency in China, the US, or the UK.
These essential tools will carry a lot of the weight of the hiring process for you and minimize the amount of time it takes to find the employees you need.
Be Selective but Not Closed-Minded
Of course, you want to find someone who fits both the job duties and the company culture but you don’t want to be so locked into a checklist that you miss out on someone who could be instrumental in helping you take your business to the next level.
While your business is in a state of rapid growth, there are going to be a lot of changes, challenges, and opportunities that can either work to your advantage or hinder your success. To help make sure it’s the former, you want to bring on people who are skilled, passionate, and “self-starters”.
These are people who are willing to put in the hard work, are excited to bring new ideas to the table and solve problems, and won’t require micro-managing. Keep in mind that certain skills can be taught (especially with all the online training resources), but a good attitude and entrepreneurial spirit cannot.
Growing your business with the right team can make all the difference, use these tips to make the process easier.
