Hiring your first employee must be one of the most rewarding experiences in business; if it could be equated to anything, it would be getting good grades after working hard in school. Because you have all this invested faith, time, and resources then you see them pan out. It is exciting because it is proof that your business is growing.
While it is easy to think about it, on paper, it has a lot more technicalities that one needs to consider as an employer. Questions like: will you afford it? Will it work out? Will you get the right person? Are all relevant questions to ask yourself.
Your first employee needs to be someone you can get along with, someone who shares similar values as you, he/she understands your vision for the company and is passionate about the work. Someone you can trust and is flexible because he/she may need to take up more responsibilities and tasks.
In this article, we will give a comprehensive guide to all you need to know when hiring your first employee.
When is it time to hire?
There is no predetermined time for a business to hire; usually, there are several factors however that can influence the decision to hire your first employee, and these are:
- When you have more work than you can handle and you are turning down work. Adding a new employee enables the business to extend its capacity and this is an ingredient for growth.
- When you are sure that the new employee will generate more money for the business. IT could be a person who possesses skills that you don’t or has the qualifications needed to get certain work etc.
- When you need specialized skills. These are skills that you don’t possess, this employee does not even have to be full-time, and it could be on a contractual basis until the completion of a task.
- When you start losing clients. This could be for several reasons e.g. the quality of service has dropped, or you do not have enough time to complete all the available tasks. At this point, it is advisable to find someone who could help with the workload and improve efficiency in the company.
Considerations to make
Hiring an employee adds more responsibilities to an employer; because you are now not only taking care of a business entity, but you also have another individual to consider. For this reason, it is important to make the following considerations in regards to the business:
Expenses
This covers from the employee salary to enablers of the job e.g. extra furniture, extra working space or even computers. You may also need to increase your insurance cover. Time and resources spent looking, interviewing, and training this employee is also covered under expenses.
So it is important to review just how much the company makes and whether hiring someone would help the business grow, be more efficient, or improve the quality of services offered.
Employment type to offer
Depending on the job and tasks at hand, it is important to consider whether you need a full-time, employee, part-time, consultant, or freelancer.
If the type of tasks you want help in are not long-term, it makes most sense finance-wise to hire either a consultant or a freelancer.
The decision on whether to hire full-time or part-time is also based on finances available and quantity of work.
Job Description
As an employer, your goal when hiring your first employee is finding the right fit for you and your company. To attract the right candidates, a good job description is a must. It must include in the very list: job title, description, duties, and responsibilities as well as necessary skills and qualifications; it must also state the compensation and employment benefits that the shortlisted candidate will get.
Recruitment Strategy
First time hires usually require a lot of trusts, so most employers use referrals from friends and colleagues, people they can trust. However, other recruitment methods are just as efficient and effective in sourcing the right candidate for your company:
- Job boards and search engines such as CareerBuilder and Monster are online platforms where job seekers go through listings from employers to find jobs that they fit.
- Social Networking platforms such as LinkedIn, Facebook, and Twitter can also come in handy.
- Recruitment agencies. These are especially useful since they have already done their interviews and background checks on possible candidates and mainly recommend the right fits for your company.
Do’s & Don’ts when interviewing candidates
After you have a short-listed number of candidates from Resumes or referrals, the next step is to personally interview them. Below are several things to keep in mind:
- Several questions are off-limits; this includes age, race, sexual orientation, religion, and marital status. Depending on the country you are in, there are also some federal laws to keep in mind.
- Make sure that the given references check out. It is advisable to ask for at least one personal reference to verify the character of the candidate. Be professional and objective when speaking to the professional references of the job-seeker; this means that questions should only apply to the professional attitude of the candidate.
- It is important to have a clearly defined compensation plan and employee classification. You can follow the federal guidelines when deciding on these. It is important to keep in mind, the minimum wage requirements and age of the applicant depending on the industry you work in. Considerations such as the category of worker e.g. common-law employee, statutory employee, or statutory non-employee, are also necessary due to tax obligations.
- Make sure your records are in order. There is information necessary for each employer to know about their employee before he/she can start working. And this information is usually given by the Department of labor. In the US, the records are:
- Employee’s full official name and social security number.
- Sex of employee and occupation.
- ZIP code and mailing address.
- Date of birth if he/she is younger than 19.
- Working schedule and total time clocked in each day and weekly.
- Pay schedule i.e. weekly, monthly, etc.
- Rate of pay per hour.
- Weekly overtime earnings.
- Additions or deductions to an employee’s pay.
- The total amount of daily wages paid.
- Date of payment and what period they cover.
- Weekly straight-time earnings.
Also, keep and fill the necessary documents related to taxes.
- Make sure to handle all the necessary paperwork and documentation in case a foreign national is going to be working for you. This is done to verify that indeed the individual is eligible for employment in the country. To get more information on this, check the USCIS.
- Expand your insurance coverage. Now that your workforce is expanding, so are risks. There it is important to increase your business insurance to reflect the current state of the business. Experts advise that an employer get disability insurance from the onset for himself and the employee.
Disability insurance is two kinds: a short term which covers between 12 weeks to a year & long-term which covers over a year.
The insurance bit is complex and it is advisable to seek the help of a reliable insurance agent who understands your business to advise you accordingly.
When it is Time to Hire
Hiring for the first time is a big step, and as much as you want to hire the best candidate, overthinking can often get in the way. So you should keep it simple, and do not do anything on impulse, rather, you should be guided by the vision of the company. After considering the financial position of the company and its needs, and there is an obvious void that can only be filled by an employee, you can now hire.
- The sooner you can hire the Better.
Hiring an employee helps even with motivation. So when there is a clear need for an employee, take the opportunity, and get one. Tasks that would otherwise take weeks to be done will take lesser time, there will be a clear need for strategies and they will follow due to the extra motivation.
- Consider skills, experience, and potential when hiring.
Your first employee should be someone who not only possesses the skills but who believes in the company’s vision and values. Someone who has the potential to develop in their role. Someone motivated. To do this, you must understand the candidate’s passions and motivations, to see if the untapped potential can be unlocked in your company.
- Ask the candidate to perform a demonstration to test their skills.
There are a lot of tutorials or coaches who can train candidates on how to answer interview questions in such a way that an interview manager is convinced. For this reason, it is advisable to test the candidate with a practical task e.g. If you are interviewing for a salesman position, you can ask the candidate to try and sell something to you so that you can judge their skills by yourself in an environment where they cannot ask for help.
- Make sure that you and the potential employee get along
Even if a candidate has the necessary skills and requirements, it is important to know that you and him/her can get along and have a good professional-working relationship that will yield results.
- Make them feel part of the team.
One way to go about creating an employee is treating him/her as just your worker; here, you just issue directives, instruct, and evaluate the work and then compensate him for his services. While this is not illegal, it has the potential of making an only employee feel alienated and not consulted.
It is therefore advisable to make them feel like part of a team, you hired him/her because you saw potential, therefore consult the employee in decision making; this will make him buy into the vision even more.
- Have an onboarding process.
With the first hire, it is almost definite that they will be another and possibly a few more after that. Therefore it is necessary to have an onboarding process where new employees are sufficiently educated on the company, its structures, policies, strategy, and values.
With the first employee it may be difficult because you are most likely learning on the go, but use that as experience to figure out a strategy to incorporate new employees easier into the company.
- Have all your documentation; especially legal current.
Make sure that all your company documents reflect the current status of the business. This ensures that you as the employer as well as the business and employee are protected in case there is a need.
It is important to have legal documents like contracts signed and in place in instances such as when the employee doesn’t work out. The contract will protect the employer and business in case there is a legal matter.
After you have followed all the above steps, you now have your first employee or set of employees, and now you will be tasked with the task of managing a team, delegating tasks as well as keeping them motivated to achieve the business objectives.
FAQS on hiring an employee
How much does it cost to hire an employee?
According to the Society for Human Resource Management, it costs about $4,120 to fill a vacant position. This cost is inclusive of resources used in recruitment and onboarding an employee.
When should I start hiring employees?
A business is set up with the goal of growth. You hire employees when they are needed in helping a business reach the next stage of its growth & when they will have enough work to do after they are hired.
How many employees do I need to hire?
This is dependent on the quantity of work available or the skills needed. With this in mind, it is important to make sure that each employee has a role to play.