Hiring your first employee

As a small business owner, you should ask yourself: When is it the right time to hire your first employee?  Will your product sell itself or do you need someone to help you get your product out there?

Ask yourself why exactly are you hiring?  What do you stand to gain by adding staff?  Will an employee help grow your business and make your product more successful?

First you need to write a concise job description to help you get the right person for the job.  Knowing what your business and product need to become successful is important.  Think critically about this.  This will give you clear-cut guidelines for what is expected in job performance.  “The first paragraph should be a summary overview of what the position entails. Beneath that comes a (usually bulleted) list of job duties and responsibilities. Each duty should fit into a simple sentence or phrase. Include all key areas of responsibility.”  Use your network to help you find the right person.  This is a great way to get a recommendation from someone you know and trust.  It will help you decide if it is even worth bringing the person in to interview.  You need to use your time wisely and not waste effort on the wrong candidate.  “Your time is extremely valuable, so when deciding to hire additional staff you want the process to be as quick, efficient, and effective as possible.”

Think about writing an employee handbook that will really help you understand what your employee will add to your business and what is expected of them in job performance.  An employee handbook is one of the most important communication tools between you and your employees.  “When well written and organized properly, it clearly sets forth your expectations for employees, describes what they can expect from your company, and lays out your legal obligations as an employer and your employee's rights.  When well written and organized properly, it clearly sets forth your expectations for employees, describes what they can expect from your company, and lays out your legal obligations as an employer and your employee's rights.”  As an employer, you should be familiar with federal, state, and local employment laws that you must abide by.

Devise a compensation plan that works for your business.  As a small business owner you might have limited resources.  Look at your budget and see what you can afford to spend.

Run your ads.  Many business owners post to sites such as Craigslist, LinkedIn, Monster and CareerBuilder.  You want to be very specific in the qualifications you are looking for in a candidate so that you receive the resumes that match your criteria and you don’t have to waste time sorting through resumes that aren’t worth your time and effort.

The next step is to interview the candidate.  Ask poignant questions so that you can get a real sense of the candidate’s background and prior experience.  Have they done their homework on your business model?  Are they asking the right questions?  Do they truly understand your product and what it takes to make selling it a success?  You might also want to consider sending the candidate a pre-interview questionnaire to help decide if they are even worth bringing in for an interview.  You also want to make sure the candidate is a good cultural fit and will fit in well with others.  If you worked for a regular company before starting your own business, think about the attributes of your co-workers.  How did they help you be successful?

What types of questions will you ask during the interview process to help you drill down on the candidate’s qualifications?  First start with fact-based or general questions such as how long they worked for their previous companies; how they spent their time; how they were efficient in getting the job done.  Next think about hypothetical questions.  Set up situations.  Ask how they would solve a problem or how they come up with unique and original ideas.  Next, think about stress questions.  Ask how they would overcome an obstacle.  Ask them to give you examples of how they’ve done it in the past.  Lastly, ask behavioral questions.  “Past performance is an excellent predictor of future performance.”

Next you need to check references.  "If you think they're fudging the answer or fabricating the answer, you can always ask former employers that they're saying they showed that behavior at whether it was true or not."

You might also consider hiring on a trial basis.  Giving a probationary time-frame might be a wise idea.

Hiring your first employee might be tough and as a small business owner you want to make sure it is the right decision.  Remember your resources are limited and you need to use your money wisely.  If you use the guidelines I have set forth in this blog, you should be able to find the right candidate to fill the job successfully and help you grow your product and brand in the broader marketplace.

Until next time…