Taking time to create a culture of effective feedback might just be one of the most rewarding initiatives you invest in for your business. The benefits of good feedback speak for themselves:

• Happier clients
• More productive and engaged employees
• Processes in place to ensure that you can improve your business
• A stronger company brand and employer brand

Feedback can happen on its own, but smart companies go out of the way to solicit feedback and to react to that feedback appropriately, to build trust.

There are many ways that you can use feedback effectively to strengthen your people and your business. Employee engagement surveys are nothing new, and the technology to conduct them efficiently, easily and at a low cost is now out there online. Rolling out regular surveys to your employees is a fantastic way to find out how you’re doing as an employer, how well you are all communicating, and how much your people understand about your business objectives and strategic initiatives. Employee surveys can be intimidating to employers, especially if you haven’t done them before, but the employee experience exists regardless of whether you solicit this feedback, so wouldn’t you sooner know? A survey can be like a snapshot into your people and it then gives you a choice. You can ignore things that don’t really matter, you can make adjustments or you can make major changes. The single most important thing to make sure that you do when conducting an employee engagement survey is to follow up. Following up builds trust and shows the company that you are listening.

Another important internal initiative that boosts feedback is to make sure that there are clear expectations for your employees around feedback. Managers should know that they are expected to give and receive feedback with the aim of strengthening the own skills, the people that they manage and their departments. Managers should also understand their role in providing ‘upwards’ feedback to help improve executive management, to help strengthen relationships, to help minimise ‘them and us’ attitudes and to help the business to function better. All employees should know that it’s a core expectation that they are open to feedback with the view to helping them to succeed and to build their skill sets. Plus, when you have a culture of healthy feedback, it eliminates the dreaded annual performance reviews, because there are no shocks.

Finally, as a business executive or owner you can set the tone for feedback in your organization by soliciting feedback on your own performance and by being open about the things that you personally are working on as a result of that feedback.

To have a really healthy culture of feedback you can provide simple training so that your people understand they types of feedback and how to use them. Yes, there are types of feedback, and there are also negative things that can happen in the absence of feedback too. Feedback is directly tied to employee motivation, performance and results and taking time to help your organization use feedback properly is an investment that always pays off.

For employees

When there are clear values in place, the benefit to employees is huge. Firstly, each and every single person in the company can clearly understand what is most important to the company. This means that employees can make decisions in line with the values. And if you’ve taken the step to create core expectations from those values, then all employees know the bottom line of what is expected of them and also everyone else in the organization.

Companies that put in clear values and expectations can easily tell existing and prospective employees not only what is expected of them, but what they can expect from the company.

For employers

When there are core values and core expectations in place, you can hire people who are in line with those values which greatly improves your results. This means that you can concentrate on training and managing your team right, instead of trying to bend employees who are simply not aligned with your values, into line with your values. You can put your values onto your careers page on your website and onto job ads and any other appropriate literature and get prospective employees to tell you why they are a good fit for the company. Core expectations and values are also the simplest, yet hugely effective tool for managing people. When values and expectations are done well and are in place, your people-managers can easily sit down with underperforming employees and coach them about their behaviours and actions, helping them to get back on track. Core expectations can easily form the basis for performance review systems too, making sure that the core elements have been met before concentrating on a person’s specific role responsibilities and behaviours.

For clients or customers

You can use your Values to educate your customers about the way that you think, operate and what they can expect from you. This will help people decide whether they want to do business with you, and the more that you can educate your client base about the way that you do business, the more that you will be able to fulfil their needs, because they will already have chosen to do business with you, knowing what is of importance to you.

Genuine

The key to core values is that they must be genuine. They must actually be the way that your company lives and breathes and they cannot be what you hope to be in the future. There are many organizations out there who have value systems in place that promise the world, yet when a customer or employee starts to interact with them, they find out that the reality is very different to what has been promised. So values are not a gimmick and once you have put them into place. You must commit to them and strive to live up to or exceed them in everything that your company does.

Tinderbox Consulting offers two specially priced Core Value Packs aimed at small business. The ‘Spark Value Pack’ is an affordable way for very small companies or solo person businesses to create and implement core values and core expectations. I work with owners to identify what is important to them and to their business, and then I draft up the values and expectations. Also included is support material for how to use the values and expectations.

The ‘Wildfire Value Pack’ is for organizations with over 5 employees. I work with owners to create a strategy for identifying company values and then I work within the organization to gather input for the values. This ensures that employees get a voice in what is being created, which sets clear expectations and builds trust and support for the values.  After the values and expectations have been drafted, we solicit more input from employees or management and then once the final drafts have been signed off I work with management to implement the values and set people up to align with them. The Wildfire Value Pack looks different with each organization because it is custom built to their specific needs.

Contact Tinderbox for more details

If you view training as a cost- something that is essential before your employee can get down to business- think again. Training is an investment. It’s a way of ensuring that you set your employees and your business up to succeed. Regardless of your company’s size or budget, your business will benefit from you taking the time and energy to plan your training. When training is not planned it costs in wasted time, inconsistent skills in your employees, in having to invest in managing underperformance and your company will not be operating as efficiently as it could. And that is not even taking into consideration how a lack of consistent training can affect your most important asset- your employees, and therefore your Employer Brand. When people lack the skills and knowledge needed to do their jobs effectively, they can become de-motivated, they can struggle to complete tasks and in a worst case scenario, they can leave.

Spending the time to focus on training in your company is time well spent. A training plan can be a simple one page document that ensures that new starters get trained thoroughly, or it can be a multi-layered complex plan with different levels of training that might take employees years to complete. Your budget may be small, or expansive. It’s worth spending the time looking carefully at what your company needs, where gaps lie and what would most benefit your business. It may be that the best way to approach training is to create in-house material that can be re-purposed throughout your organization and updated in-house over the years. It may be that you need to send your employees out to receive external training- and there are even ways to make that more efficient. For instance, if you need to train or certify a whole group of employees in the same subject, can you bring someone in to deliver a custom course rather than having the expense of sending the whole group out?

If your company has in-house training, the key is in having material that is created by someone with skills and knowledge about adult learning, needs assessment and training evaluation- to ensure that your training is effective. An astounding percentage of companies that invest in training do not measure the effectiveness of that training and so it may or may not be money well spent. And on a final note, if your company does your training in-house, train your trainer. Many companies promote their best performers into training positions and whereas they might be top performers, it doesn’t mean that they automatically know how to train effectively. There are some accessible, affordable and extremely effective training courses out there that will equip your trainer with the skills that they need to make sure that your results improve and that your money is well spent.

Job seekers with common sense usually make sure that their on-line presence is relevant and appropriate and as a professional I have to be careful of what I look at- and of how I use anything that I do find.  Online profiles can work in a candidates favour, showcasing their talents, communications, networking skills and in the case of sites like LinkedIn, it can give insight as to how they are perceived as an employee or co-worker through recommendations.

And then there is facebook. Most people joined facebook to connect with friends, not as a business tool -and it works well that way. But with friends writing on your wall, posting whatever photos they like and so on, it can be hard to control your own presence.  Like I said, I choose for a long time not to look candidates up online before making a hire and then the one time that I did, I wished I hadn’t. I was working with a professional office-based organization in a straight-laced industry and had made a job offer for a management position to a young man. In this role he’d be responsible for managing a large group of young professionals. That night, after a discussion with another HR professional about looking candidate up on facebook I typed his name into google and up popped his wall, open for all to see. And written right there at the top were the words “I’m back in town folks, get the drinks out and lock up your daughters!”

Larger companies know that they cannot get by without a strategic planning process in place which in turn is rolled out through their organization. But smaller companies are often stuck in the position of wondering if dedicating their limited resources- time, money and people- to creating and implementing a strategy, will pay off. When it’s done well, strategic planning always pays off, and because there are many ways to build a strategy, you can find one that suits your business and customize it to work for you.

Strategic planning should paint a picture of the future of your business and then ensure that your daily, weekly, monthly actions and behaviours are aligned with your long term goals. Strategic planning can save money, maximize efficiency and help to align your people with your business objectives. Building the plan is the first step and after that dedication to implementation is important to make sure that the strategy is carried through and end aims are met. And sure enough, the number one reason I see planning fail is when the strategic architecture is mapped out and then put on a shelf to gather dust. But with commitment and careful attention, taking the time to plan your strategy always pays off.

Before you start throwing together an ad for a vacant position, you need to be clear about what it is that you are doing. You are trying to fill a role within your company; you need to find someone that will be a part of your business, will be a part of your team, and who will add value to your company. It’s worth taking the time to clarify exactly what this person will be doing; what responsibilities and expectations they will have and in turn what experience, skills and attributes you need them to possess.

You can use other people’s job descriptions and ads as a reference- a place to start, but an Office Manager in one company is not the same as an Office Manager in another company. If you use someone else’s information as the base for your own hiring, you may not get the person to fit the role that you actually need. Plus, it would be annoying for you to see an ad that you’d sweated over putting together repurposed by a competitor………

The best way to approach putting together a job ad is to do a bit of brainstorming. Make a list of things that the person will be responsible for. Make a list of the core expectations that you will have of them in this role, or of all employees in the company. Think about what qualifications and skills they absolutely have to have, and what qualifications and skills it would be nice if they had. And think about what attributes this person must have; do you need a strong communicator, someone with immaculate attention to detail or someone with an unfailing positive attitude?

I always ask for candidates to submit their salary expectations in their cover letter- that’s because I want to see if we are in the same ballpark- which is important, and it can also give an idea about a person’s level of experience.

Last but not least, I think it’s important to give some information about your company, about the culture and work atmosphere, a well-thought-out-paragraph will do, but it will help to attract the kind of applicant that you want to attract. The less you give in a job description, the more applications you are likely to get BUT the quality will not be what you are looking for. Spending the time to craft a detailed, accurate and descriptive job ad, and spending the time and energy to really be clear about what kind of person you are looking for will always pay off.

Remember, your job ads form part of the public’s perception of who you are as an employer- so make them good.

Employer Branding as a concept was introduced by ‘People in Business’ in the early 1990s to enable employers to build better engagement and commitment from their employees. You can read more about it at this People in Business resource site. http://www.employerbrand.com/index.asp

People are expecting more than ever from their employment and the employer brand has become an important factor in where employees are deciding to work. Companies that consciously control their employer brand are finding that they are able to take their pick of employees- which in turn gives them a greater business advantage because clients want to work with companies who treat their people well.

Think about companies that you KNOW are good employers. They are the ones who are treating their people well, providing the best working conditions possible and going the extra distance to ensure that they have a positive employer brand. Think about the companies that you KNOW are not good employers. Is it that they don’t care how they are perceived as an employer, or is it because they just can’t get their act together?

Having a good employer brand is not just about compensation and perks- more than ever it’s about training and development, about effective people-management, a positive culture and one of the most basic need of an employee- to be treated well.

Every business with employees has an employer brand, whether conscious or not. This perception of what a company is like as a place to work is made up from everything it does; from the first contact with someone during the recruitment process, through training, development, performance management and working conditions.

It’s a circle too, because when there is a healthy and thriving employer brand alive in an organization, the employees become its most valuable marketing tool, engaging in the success of the business and showing that they care in all that they do.

Whether consciously created or not, you have an employer brand. It’s up to you what that brand is and how you use it.

This leads nicely to my topic today. What is that job application on your desk telling you?

Ideally a job application should include a cover letter and a resume although as the recruiter, you can ask for whatever specific information to be included that will help you decide who to invite to interview.

I am a stickler for this, but there should always be a cover letter. A candidate who sends you a generic one page resume doesn’t want your job any more than they want the job at your neighbours business -any job will do. And I want a candidate who wants my position.

The cover letter should give you a concise and relevant introduction to the candidate, linking their experience and skills to your vacant position. It should make you want to read their resume.

The resume should give a brief but detailed summary of the candidate’s working experience, education, voluntary work, skills and interests.  In Canada, where I’m based, it’s standard to have a section at the beginning of the resume that lists the candidate’s relevant attributes, skills and achievements. It’s also common to have a one line objective at the start of the resume, though not essential. It’s interesting to see how many applicants forget to change that objective according to the job they are applying for. I’ve had candidates apply for a part-time position in a home-based single person run business who have submitted the personal objective of ‘I want to be part of a fast paced dynamic Public Relations team’.

You should take note of what the overall application is telling you. Did the person include everything that you asked for in your job advertisement? Is the information that they included relevant? If they do not have the specific education or experience that you asked for do they have something comparable? Most people submit job applications by email now but if the applicant submitted a hard copy and it’s scruffy or has coffee cup stains on it, it tells you one thing. If it’s on quality paper and neatly presented, it tells you something else. Some people try to differentiate themselves from the competition by standing out. This might mean that they come up with an innovative and unique approach, or it might mean you get some whacky application that sings and dances when you open it. You should follow your gut feelings on what is appropriate to your business.

The collective things that a job application tells you give you a choice- will you consider this person for a position in your business or not?

Without a lab test it’s hard to tell if a team member has a cold, the regular flu or H1N1 and by the time that symptoms are full blown, the person may have come into contact with a lot of other employees, clients or customers. For that reason it’s important to have a flu plan in place- and in place quickly!

As an employer there are lots of simple but effective preventative measures that you can take immediately. Providing hand sanitizer and sanitizing wipes for employees is a quick hit- and you can encourage people to wipe down their desks, keyboards and cell phones frequently. Putting up hand-washing signs near sinks may seem basic, but studies have shown that having literature around keeps proper hand-washing in the front of people’s minds which in turn helps limit the spread of germs. Clarifying your sickness policy, so that everyone understands the boundaries is helpful, and where possible, loosening your work-from-home policy can also be of use because it might allow someone who is under the weather to keep infections to themselves. When looking at your sickness policy in relation to the potential of the flu, you might want to consider how employees feel. Fears about losing pay-in the case where an employee has used up all their sick days might drive someone to come into work when they really shouldn’t. Worries about workloads, about letting the team down or about what the perception of them might be if they have time off work can all lead sick employees into the office which can negatively impact business.

Consider possible effects upon your operations or clients if a quarter of your employees were off with the flu. Consider possible effects if half the employees were off with the flu. H1N1 may turn out to be more hype than reality, but smart employers are taking time now to create a flu plan so that should the worst happen, business can continue with minimal negative impact.

You can cover anything that you want in an orientation such as a company history, information on current locations, products or services and organizational charts. You can go through the company Mission and Vision and make sure that all new starters understand what company Values mean and how to apply them. You can communication what each department does, lay out financial goals and detail community initiatives or social events. Without going into too much detail, you can cover high level customer service goals, and information about your customers or competition, to give the employee a solid understanding of the organization and the market.

When a new person starts they are going to benefit hugely from understanding some basic things about your business, how things work and who does what. Taking time to create an orientation and thinking carefully about how it is delivered will help to create a good first impression and sends a clear message that you mean to invest in this person’s employment.