Operations

Context Switching: The Ever-Present Productivity Killer

Context Switching: The Ever-Present Productivity Killer

Running a small business is a balancing act: as a leader you need to stay focused on strategic initiatives but also deal with the important day-to-day challenges that arise. You need to delegate and oversee team performance but still execute your own to-do list. You need to do the best you can with limited resources while simultaneously building better systems and infrastructure for the future. You're required to wear different hats and juggle several priorities at once which inevitably leads to multitasking. 

Sometimes you feel like you’re doing a great job and other times you feel like you’re not getting anything done at all. Sound familiar? 

3 Things that Don’t Look Like HR Problems But Actually Are

Unwritten rules, multi-tasking employees, a sense of shared purpose – these things can be essential to getting a business off the ground. But they can also cause major problems as you start to grow.

In this blog post, we’ll address three common DIY scenarios that can lead to HR-related problems, along with ways to solve them.

When to Invest in HR for Your Business

When to Invest in HR for Your Business

Startups and small business owners alike are used to going without a lot of resources they’d like to have – and that’s often a savvy business move but there reaches a point where you shouldn’t put off focusing on your organization’s HR needs.

There’s no one answer that applies to everyone. But from our experience working with hundreds of small businesses, we’ve found that the following situations usually signal that a business could run more efficiently by hiring an HR professional or outsourcing HR functions to a PEO.

How to Save Your Startup from Costly Hiring Mistakes

How to Save Your Startup from Costly Hiring Mistakes

Most startups and small businesses can’t afford the costs that associated with employee turnover. Tips to improve recruiting, interviewing and on-boarding so you’re more likely to end up with a great team.

We’ve written in the past about what to do if you make a hiring mistake. Now we’ll offer some insight on how to avoid that problem in the first place.

First, some context: a bad hire isn’t just a people problem – it’s hurts your bottom line. Replacing an employee can cost more than 200 percent of their salary – not the kind of money most startups can spare.

Preventing bad hires and avoiding the associated costs requires a two-pronged approach: first, focus on recruiting the right people. Second, make sure you set them up for success in their first days, weeks, and months on your team. Let’s dig into both.

Handling Employee Performance Issues: When There’s More to the Story

Handling Employee Performance Issues: When There’s More to the Story

If your business has 15 or more employees, you’re obligated to follow ADA guidelines for providing reasonable accommodation to employees with disabilities. Here’s how to do that.

Managing an underperforming employee is one of the trickiest jobs business leaders have, especially if you’re a startup or small business without a head of HR to turn to for guidance.

The job gets even more complicated if an employee has a disability, which is what we’ll dedicate this blog post to. “Disabilities” don’t just include things like using a wheelchair or having a vision impairment: the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) defines “disability” broadly, including conditions like…

Why Incubators & Coworking Spaces Need an Employee Company Handbook

Why Incubators & Coworking Spaces Need an Employee Company Handbook

Good fences make good neighbors, and good policies make good shared workspaces. We make the case for company handbooks at incubators and coworking hubs.

When we talk to business owners about coworking spaces and tech incubators, they tend to focus on the positives: amenities, learning from and networking with other business owners, and the opportunities to develop their business with help from experts.

One thing that doesn’t seem to come up much: house rules – the kinds of policies that would normally be outlined in a company handbook.

That’s a problem. In fact, it’s a problem not only for for the organizations running these spaces but also for the businesses considering working from the shared space. Without policies in place, there’s no clear protocol for how to behave if something goes wrong.

Here’s a look at why shared working spaces need HR policies and how you can put these policies into action if you’re in charge of running such a space.