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It’s Only Common Sense: Hiring Advice for 2021

As the world comes back to life this year, there’s an acute awareness that we will need to find more employees. Finding and hiring the right people has become a critical issue for most companies in our industry. I know of some companies with 20 to 30 job openings and they are not having much luck filling them.

There is an increasingly high demand for the right people, in all positions. This includes the manufacturing floor associates, department leads, supervisors, management, engineering, and quality, not to mention sales positions.

As the current work force ages out, these skilled employees are simply not being replaced fast enough. A couple of generations of young people, who had no interest in the manufacturing sector, have skipped us over, further contributing to our current dilemma.

But like everything else, we always manage to find a way.

As I was thinking about this problem, a new book by one of my all-time favorite business authors, Tom Peters, popped up on my Kindle Recommendations list. The book, Excellence Now: The Forty-Three Number Ones, is focused not only on finding and hiring the right people, but also keeping them productively engaged as well.

As always, Peters’ perspective on this subject is creative, insightful and very useful as well. Here are some of the most interesting valuable tips I found:

• Hire women. Yes, this is his number one piece of advice. It’s no secret that women do a better job at just about anything. Furthermore, our industry is particularly guilty of not having enough women, especially in management positions. Sixty percent of the students in grad schools today are women, anxious to make their mark. Please don’t just consider them for line positions, or inside sales positions; start looking to them for all of your positions including engineering, quality and management, and supervisory positions.
• Hire liberal arts grads. Did you know that the most sought-after graduates in all aspects of business today hold MFAs, not MBAs? It has been proven that these are the most creative, innovative, and passionate people a company can hire. There are now statistics available that bear this out
• Training is key. It’s a proven fact that we are not doing enough training. By this, I mean real training in management, sales and business. We have always been good at practical training, like how to solder a board. But I’ve never seen a shred of effort to establish business training programs. There has never been a marketing training program (I’ve looked),nor a program on how to successfully run a business, or programs on how to become a successful customer service rep. It’s time we start. The new people we hire want to learn. For the most part, they don’t want a job, they want a career. And they will join companies who offer that career.
• One size fits one. As opposed to the “one-size-fits-all” we’ve had for so many years. Everyone is different, and each of us need to be treated that way. The best companies are the ones that establish a nurturing culture for their employees.
• Eliminate the term “human resources.” People are not a resource. They are living, breathing, thinking human beings and our jobs as employers and company leaders is to treat them as such. And while you are getting rid of this term, dump “standardization” as well. People are not standardized, nor are they standard. They are individuals and they are more important than anything else in the company. They are more important than processes, profits, or strategy. They are human beings and must be treated as such. If you want standardization in your process, hire robots.
• Culture eats strategy for breakfast. All great companies have a great culture. The success of your company will always rely on the culture that you create and then continuously work on with your entire team. People work hard for ideas. People are motivated by vision and by missions. The key is to establish the right vision for your company and build a culture designed to sustain that vision.
• People are significant; treat them as such. They are not numbers or resources, so don’t treat them like they are. The best way to do that is through positive reinforcement. Peters says positive reinforcement is 30 times more valuable than negative reinforcement.

I firmly believe that if you follow these guidelines and make them part of your company’s culture, you will soon have the right people beating a path to your door.

It’s only common sense.

Dan Beaulieu is president of D.B. Management Group.