For Small Businesses, Focus is the Key to Success
Whether you’re the founder of a small business or are an HR leader in one, you’re likely aware of the many challenges an SMB has on a daily basis. Developing a product or platform, building out your market position, meeting customers’ demands, partnering with the right vendors and suppliers, and so on all demand time and focus. In the human resources space, SMBs face an equal number of challenges that get in the way of prioritizing work and focusing on their strategy. And it’s because of these roadblocks to focus that, more than ever, outsourcing HR for small business success makes sense.
While larger organizations often bring the HR function fully in-house, they have the resources, personnel, and tools to do so — and not break a sweat in the process. As an SMB, you’re likely managing everything in-house as well, but you’ll definitely be feeling the pressure as you start to hire more people and experience more (and newer) employee needs. Your attention will increasingly be diverted away from core tasks and goals to handle myriad other HR- and non-HR-related work.
This causes a productivity issue as well known as context switching — a situation in which jumping between various tasks results in a significant loss of productivity and focus. Adding just one project to your plate causes an immediate 20% loss of productivity, with additional projects or needs causing even more drastic reductions. For HR leaders and their teams, these extra tasks get in the way of achieving a high-performing HR function. They’re also why outsourcing HR for small business is essential if you want to make progress on your initiatives without getting distracted or bogged down in administrative work.
Indicators That You Should Consider Outsourcing HR
Managing New Needs from Your Employees
At first, your team might not have asked for much. This is particularly true at startups where everyone is pushing toward a goal and employees are asked to do more with less. Employees might not have needed leave for children, or they might’ve had benefits via a spouse. You didn’t need a 401(k) plan, but now your growing employee count means you soon will. Performance issues and disputes weren’t a problem before. But as you grow and these situations arise, the last thing you’ll want is to spend time looking for help. By outsourcing HR for small business, that time could’ve been spent on other core tasks.
Taking Culture to the Next Level
HR plays an essential role in supporting company values and culture. As you grow, employees will rely on HR for a variety of needs. To keep your culture strong, meet employee needs, and keep people engaged, it’ll be important that HR processes and policies feel and function authentically. An HR function that acts and functions professionally in new hire onboarding, open enrollment, policy development, dispute resolution, and more ensures your SMB remains a desirable, enjoyable place to work.
Reducing Risk Associated with Growth
As you grow, you’ll likely begin to hire remote workers. It’ll be important to understand the compliance requirements involved with these employees’ cities and states to avoid fines and confusion. Additionally, developing policies upfront for remote and distributed workforces will help you avoid headaches and other concerns down the road. But as an SMB, finding the information you need, developing those policies, and managing them on a daily basis can be overwhelming and complex. Outsourcing HR for small business ensures that you have all your bases covered — from meeting offer letter requirements, conducting performance reviews, paying appropriate taxes, and more.
Key Advantages of Outsourcing HR for Small Business
You’ll Be Able to Stay Focused on Growth and Your Goals
It’s simple: by allocating complex, time-consuming, and repetitive tasks to a dedicated outsourced HR provider, you and your team gain an incredible amount of time back to focus on your core tasks and goals. You’ll still be there for your employees, but you’ll have the confidence in knowing that no problem will go unaddressed. You’ll be able to lean on your provider to get the answers you need and even execute related tasks on your behalf.
You’ll Avoid Complexity in Hiring
Imagine hiring a remote employee in a state you’ve never had an employee in before. You’d need to research their city and state requirements and ensure you’re set up internally to meet them. That alone would take hours if not a day or more, and you’d need to do that for each employee in a state where you’ve never had workers before. By outsourcing HR for small business needs like this, you gain that time back and save yourself the headaches — your provider will have the tools and knowledge needed to meet all requirements.
You’ll Build an Extremely Competitive Benefits Package
Small businesses often struggle to compete with larger businesses when it comes to benefits because they lack the buying power to drive costs down and provide more options for their employees. With the right outsourced provider, particularly one with a PEO model, your partner will leverage the combined might of all of their clients to negotiate with brokers, allowing you to take advantage of broader and more affordable benefits options.
You’ll Attract Top-Quality Talent
For all the reasons above, it can be difficult for small businesses to bring in top talent when they’re competing with other heavy hitters in the industry. Outsourcing HR for small business brings your organization up to their level — providing the benefits packages that high performers and top producers are looking for, ensuring that HR processes are solid, and giving you peace of mind in knowing that you’re working with a reliable partner.
Outsource Your HR to Cognos
Headquartered in Chicago, Illinois and supporting companies in multiple industries nationwide, the Cognos HR team specializes in helping our clients focus on doing what they do best without worrying about HR compliance, the limitations of having a smaller team, or not knowing where to turn for information and guidance.
Leveraging advanced technology and decades of industry expertise, our team will support you with virtually every aspect of your HR function — from recruitment, hiring, onboarding, and development to payroll, benefits administration, training, risk mitigation, and more.
As a leading provider of professional employer organization (PEO) services, we can serve as your complete outsourced HR team, managing the work your team doesn’t need to be focused on or extending the capabilities and capacity of your internal team.
Want to see how we’ve made a meaningful difference for companies looking to outsource HR for small business? Check out our case studies here. If you’re ready to put our expertise to work for your small business, connect with us today.