NO GOOD COMPANIES?

While attending the ISSA and BSCAI conventions, I am always amazed at one subject that always seems to be thoroughly discussed---"We just  can't seem to find good trained or trainable help these days, especially the younger generation. They stay a few days, if they even show up for work the second day (or the first night), and they are gone". Sound familiar? You have probably participated in a similar discussion.

Traveling back from the convention recently, the thought occurred to me, what if our line employees had a convention to discuss their issues? Would it go something like this?

"You just can't find a good company to work for anymore. They say they want good workers and they provide training but it never happens, or if it does, it is so poorly done that it just as well not occur at all. As a result, we workers just go from company to company until we find one that will give us the proper training needed to perform the work they are asking us to do". ''

A different take on the labor probems of today, isn't it?  Ever think of it in this way? I submit you should give it your careful attention.

In surveys taken from anong cleaning workers who have terminated their employment in this industry from one or more companies, they have listed the following items as to why they leave a Building Service Contracting company's employment.

1. NOBODY TOLD ME WHAT TO DO---This is not to be confused with nobody trained me. This means that no one bothered to ouline for them the tasks they were to do once they arrived at their work assigment. They were hired, told to report to a building, shown the janitor's closet, (if that much) and told to have a nice night. Many times when the supervisor returns later that night, if they return, they find the keys in the janitor's closet with a note, "Take this job and...".

2. NOBODY EVER COMPLIMENTS ME ON A JOB WELL DONE---We work in a business where the customer seldom tells us we are doing a good job, only lets us know if something is wrong. So too it is with our employees. Often the only time the line worker hears anything is when we deliver a complaint. When was the last time you went out of your way to compliment an employee on a job well done?

3. THERE IS A PERCEPTION THAT THERE IS NO ROOM TO ADVANCE IN THE COMPANY---Most all of us complain that we can't find any leaders in our organization but many times we are slow to let our people know that we are looking for people who want to advance with our organization.

I am reminded of the time I asked one of my supervisors if she had someone who could take over as a team leader in a building we had just secured that would begin in two weeks. The answer was a resounding NO. I later learned why. This supervisor had spent considerable time getting the crew organized so they would do most all of her work (pretty smart huh?) and if she offered to promote someone from her crew she would have to expend considerable energy to train someone else to fit the scenario. That is when I learned I was going to have to become more actively involved in knowing who was working at the levels below the project supervisor, and I did just that.

4. NOBODY TRAINED ME--Even if we told them what to do (see number 1 above), we didn't train them on how to do it. Nearly every cleaning company outlines in their proposal how they have "trained personnel" but if you were to visit their offices you may have trouble finding the training area.

5. PAY/BENEFITS--These are probably the only ones you don't have a lot of control over unless your customer dictates your pay rates and benefit package.

Now, what can we take from all of this? Even though pay and benefits are issues we are all aware of in our industry, we find them down on the list as to why employees leave our companies. Any you know what? We have control over the other four.

I know of companies that have decided to focus their efforts on the top four and have seen their turnover reduce by tremendous numbers. Some companies with turnover rates in excess of 300% per year have seen their rates drop to 40-50%. How you do it is the subject for another time but with the cost of recruiting and training one employee in our industry exceeding $500  you can certainly see the benefit of instituting processes and procedures to address the issues outlined in this article.

So the next time you find yourself complaining that their just are no good employees anymore these days, think about if the shoe was on the other foot, would the employees be saying that there just are not any good companies to work for anymore?

Till next time. MAKE IT A GREAT WEEK.