Multi-Unit Franchisee Magazine Issue III, 2015 | Page 59
The laws of attraction
For Maureen and Peter Moore, finding
quality employees for their caregiver agency is a personal mission. When Maureen
couldn’t find suitable care for her father
when he was diagnosed with a rare form
of cancer, she took on the job herself.
After her father’s death in 2009, she
set out to help others facing the same
frustrating dilemma. Her husband, who
had retired from a 42-year career in international banking, joined the quest to
find a provider of high-quality in-home
care. The pair discovered BrightStar Care
and a new career and life for themselves.
(Coincidentally, BrightStar was founded
by a couple confronting a similar problem: finding quality care for an aging
grandparent.)
To the Moores, nothing is more important than finding the right people for
the job. “We are dealing with human beings, not with cars or hamburgers,” says
Maureen, whose background is in banking and consumer relations. “When we
put a person out in the field with one of
our clients, the care has to be the best I
believe the industry has to offer, because
of the human factor.”
The Moores are always looking to hire
and largely turn to their existing staff for
recommendations. They estimate 85 percent of their caregiver hires come from
word-of-mouth employee referrals. “They
want their co-workers to be as good as can
be, as good as they are,” says Maureen.
“The better the job we do, the better the
word-of-mouth and the more cases they
will be invited to participate in.”
Finding the right fit
While technology can make finding potential employees easier than ever, what
a franchisee does next can make or break
their recruiting efforts. “You have to take
the time to research and understand what
is out there and make decisions about what
is applicable to you,” says Robinson. “Your
recruiting systems are as important as your
marketing systems. Until you get to the
point of realizing that, you are always going to be behind the curve.”
Franchisees looking to bolster their recruitment efforts should start by evaluating
every part of the hiring process, including
all job application and career sites they may
use. Job descriptions should be clear and
candidate questions and predictive testing job-specific. Pre-hire assessments and
scripted interview guides can also help a
company predict whether or not a poten-
Adam Robinson
tial hire will be successful, says Robinson.
This begins with defining the ideal
employee for the specific job and the
culture of your business. “You have to go
into the hiring process with a clear picture
of what you’re looking for,” says Tropical
Smoothie Café area developer and franchisee Michelle Shriver, who, with husband
Kriss, operates six locations in Colorado
and Nevada.
Shriver, with 18 years of hospitality
experience in the casino/hotel industry,
always includes her best employees in
the interview process as a way to create
Hiring Process Checklist
Technology is making it easier to find
employees, but your process may actually slow down recruitment efforts.
Consider the following checklist of
questions from Hireology co-founder
Adam Robinson to determine if your
hiring process is up to snuff:
1) Does the career site reflect my
brand, and will it attract the people I
need to attract?
2) Do I respond to applicants within
24 hours of resume submittal?
3) Is an interview scheduled with a
candidate within a week of the applicant’s resume submittal?
4) Have I established criteria to
evaluate the recruit’s suitability for the
job, or am I just winging it?
a strong team culture and buy-in on the
potential hire.
“I think the most important aspect of
building a great team is accountability,”
she says. “You need to care enough about
the entire team to ensure only the best
employees make the cut—both in joining
the team and staying part of it. You can’t
retain employees who bring others down
or don’t carry their weight on the team.
If you do, you’ll lose your best employees and end up not having a team at all.”
Hireology’s Robinson likewise urges
franchisees to rethink how they view hiring
based on what they need for their business.
For instance, the best employees may not
always be the most talented—nor should
they be, necessarily. “You might want that
superstar manager, but the superstar associate looking for a career path that never
gets it is going to quit,” he says. “Maybe the
job doesn’t need exceptionally high-quality
talent. Maybe you just need folks who are
steady, show up on time, and do good work.
They aren’t superstars, but they will stay.”
How to keep them
Building the right team for growth also
means keeping your top talent. Massage
Envy franchisee Rick Davis says doing a
better job up front of selecting the right
person for the right