Recouping hiring costs

sunshine state

Does anyone have rules or reg. regarding new employees who leave employement after first week? I am talking about the cost involved with the hiring. Background checks, physicals,drug screens, etc.

Geno

Sunshine,

Unfortunately, it all comes under the heading of the "cost of doing business." If the situation at your place of employment is more than just the occasional revolving-door employee, then maybe your hiring managers are need of some help in the recruitment and selection process.

Geno

sunshine state

Thanks but we are non profit(helping seniors) and not business, so the lost hurts. We do not pay much but we are above mim wage and just under corp wages.

Geno

Well -- your options, while few, are simple. Your agency can either invest in the supervisory training necessary to improve its retention record or it can continue to eat the cost associated with new-hires that do a U-turn through your place. Your pain is felt by many employers but I know of no way of recovering these cost from a departing employee. Remember, as the employER, you are making these background checks/medical test/drug screens a condition of employment and as such they become your expense --not the employEE's.



Geno

marc

Sunshine State -

Are you seriously suggesting that an EE should reimburse the company for it's costs when they think the relationship was not going to work?

My skepticism aside regarding how serious this question is, I would concentrate on the things you can control. Such as the wording of the ad, sharing an accurate job description with candidates, interviews that truly describe working conditions, clientele, supervisory styles and the like.

Teach your interviewers how to interview so they can screen out candidates that may be interested but do not have what it takes to be successful in your environment.

I am also in non-profit and have battled the wage problem for several years. We finally were able to get more competitive and believe it or not, higher wages have not reduced turnover. So we concentrate on all the other aspects, including a real emphasis, in the orientation process, in making the new EE feel welcome in our environment. Lots of technique involved here, but not a lot of dollars.

Focus on those things you can control and change, if necessary, not on wasting time lamenting about EEs that abandon you too soon.

dixied

You might use a reputable temp. agency. We hire all of our entry-level clerical on a temp-to-hire basis. The agency pre-screens qualified applicants. We interview maybe 2-3 and make a selection. They are on the agency's payroll for 90 working days. If they meet our expectations, they then rollover to our payroll. You, of course, pay the agency the person's agreed to wages, plus their costs.

pork1

DIXIE: People leasing is the process to which you write; I used that process for about 3 years and then we were struck by a union drive and the NLRB allowed the leased employees to be a part of the labor force, because we had no one from the lease company on the floor doing any of the supervision of the ee's development.

It was the leased people that were upset with us because the company hired through the lease company but fired/let go/dismissed inaccordance with our needs for development. We won the battle but only after we fired the lease company and immediately enrolled every person into our company and made them a full partner to the operation. They then turned away from the union organization in large numbers and voted for the company not to be represented. It was this situation that caused my own demize in the company. The CEO blamed me for the mess, altough it was the corporate VP for HR that fully developed the program and ordered me to administer to it.

I will never fall into that situation again. Make sure you have a member of the leasing company involved with the daily supervision of their employees.

PORK

System

Pork,

Leasing and temporary staffing are two different arrangements with completely different approaches to the "employment" relationship. Employee leasing, as is done through a PEO (Professional Employer Organization) implies a legal "employment of record" relationship for the PEO regarding ALL of the employees in the clients organization. Temporary Staffng (i.e Manpower,Kelly, etc)is a different animal altogther, and involves only the tempoary assignment of a designated number of employees from the staffing agency to the client site, for a specified period of time (normally not to exceed 6-12 months depending on the particular state law). This arrangement would work quite well in Dixie's case as it would allow a chance to "try before you buy", which should give enough time to review performance, attendance, attitude, etc. It costs a bit more (typically a 50% markup) but the cost savings from reduced turnover clearly makes up that cost. Additionally, those employees that don't work out, you simply tell the agency to replace that individual with someone else (as long as the reason for replacement is not illegal) Additionally, any injury/ workers comp claim incurred on the job is the liability of the staffing company, not Dixie's.

TN HR

pOrK,

You've spread a wealth of misinformation in your post. First of all , the NLRB's ruling is that any type of contingent workforce, be it temporary or leased (which by the way are not one in the same) is able to be a part of the bargaining unit. It matters not if you have an on-site rep at your workplace. The only purpose that serves is as one of several prongs to prevent a co-employment situation (completely different animal).

Gene

sunshine state

Thanks everyone. I think we will try a temp agency. All interviews are done with all the info you have memtioned. Infact a couple interviewee's have called to see if we had hired and we would tell them yes and you are the one chosen. They are elated show up for work and within two days they have another job. I guess I am from the old school committment, and your word. The excuses are that my wife doesn't want me to work, to I only want to do one job not muliti (in interview it was told muliti and they say I do a great job at that). We even had one daughter say that they only have one car and her mother (73) just got a job and needed it. Thanks again