Posts Tagged ‘Growing’

by Steamtalks

Is Human Resources Outsourcing Right for Your Growing Company?

If you’re an owner or general manager of a growing company at some point you will find that more and more of your time is being spent on dealing with employee related issues and concerns and less and less is being spent on growing your business.    The more successful you are… the more you grow… the more you grow…the more employee issues and concerns to deal with.  That’s just a fact of life when you’re in business today.   So when do you look outside your company for help with your Human Resources?  If you are like most small business owners, you wait until the pain is so great that you have no alternative but to bring in some help.   Unfortunately by that time the damage has already been done. 

In actual fact the best time to bring on an HR specialist is when you notice that you are spending more than 20% of your time on HR issues.  These issues consist of, hiring and firing, employee on-boarding, compensation and benefit administration, employee relations and development, conflict management, change management, performance management, regulatory compliance, among other things.   If you are spending more than 20% of your time performing administrative or non-core activities that are taking time away from doing what you’re supposed to be doing…which is growing your business, then you have a problem – even if you don’t realize it yet.

So at what point will you begin to exceed the 20% mark.  Usually it is when your employee base grows to about 20 or 30 employees.  Once you get to that level…some HR expertise is definitely required.   That doesn’t necessarily mean you need a full time HR person on staff…it just means you need the expertise.  

In this economic climate organizations are extremely reluctant to take on any more overhead than they absolutely need, but sometimes doing without does more damage than taking on the extra cost.  So at some point these organization will ask themselves the same question…”Do we continue to do without, or do we take on more overhead and hire an HR Manager or Coordinator?”    The correct answer is – neither.

As with most situations in life, the quality of the questions we ask will determine the quality of the answers we get.  In this case, the correct question to ask is, “How do we acquire HR expertise in the most cost effective and productive way possible?”  In a lot of cases, the answer is to outsource all or part of the HR function. 

As companies grow there is a growing need for HR expertise, but that doesn’t mean that they need an HR department or even a full time HR person.   A knowledgeable and experienced HR professional can easily manage the Human Resources function of an organization with 20 to 80 employees on a less that full time basis…sometimes even in as little as one day (8 hours) a week.   This is where a “Human Resources Outsourcing” firm comes into play.  

More than ever before, businesses are looking for innovative ways to reduce their costs while increasing their productivity and bottom line results.  An effective way of doing that is by outsourcing non-core functions so that more time, money and energy can be put toward growing the business, all the while ensuring that your employees are well looked after. 

Utilizing the services of a Human Resources Outsourcing firm is an ideal solution for the organization that is growing but is not quite at the size that would require a full time Human Resources presence.   Outsourcing companies provide experienced and committed Human Resources Professionals who could easily manage the HR function of an organization that is on the brink of moving to the next level of success.   More importantly, they can do it on a less than full time basis, which means reduced costs in comparison to employing a full time HR person.  HR outsourcing provides all the advantages of an in-house HR department without the added cost of employing additional staff.

Intern #1, Monica, interviews Ubisoft Toronto’s Head of the TO Tech Group, Rima Brek with Employee #1 Facebook fan’s questions! Part 1 of 2

Would they call the police or handle it themselves? USA
And does such behavior of tennants make apartment management legally liable/responsible for anything?

How can large firm and small firms could utilize change management concepts to meet growing technology demands?

Give one example of a large firm and one for a small firm of necessary changes resulting from these growing trchnology demands. Discuss some of the pitfalls to avoid in implementing change?

With the plethora of business management software solutions available today, how does a small- or medium-size business owner decide where to invest his or her resources? According to Michael Emaus, CEO of eEnterprise (www.eEnterprise.com), a division of NetSuite’s global reseller Skyytek Worldwide, there are basically three choices: custom applications, client-server applications, and on-demand Web-based applications. “The cost benefit analysis leaves no doubt that on-demand solutions provide the greatest integration and cost efficiency for growth-oriented enterprises,” he says.

“Customized software that is designed either in house or by developers for a specific business is extremely costly, in terms of development and hardware, and for maintenance,” says Emaus. He notes that, more importantly, such applications are not designed to adapt as the business grows, and so business owners are saddled with costly upgrades. “Small- and medium-sized businesses simply don’t have the resources to develop and maintain custom applications,” Emaus adds.

Client-server applications, which are typically licensed to a business, are also problematic. “Invariably, business owners are faced with the challenge of having several different applications that can’t ‘talk’ to one another,” says Emaus. Without seamless integration, owners have no way to, for example, cross-reference accounting and customer service data or company information and e-commerce. “This results in a hodge-podge solution that doesn’t give an enterprise the information it needs to grow,” he adds.

Growth is one of the two primary differentiators between Web-based on-demand business management software applications and its cousins. “On-demand solutions such as NetSuite represent a paradigm shift in the way business owners manage their customer, vendor, or partner base,” says Emaus. “NetSuite is not an application that ‘supports’ an existing business, but rather is one dedicated to ‘growing’ a business. Because it has four fully integrated components, it’s both highly scalable and highly customizable.”

The second major differentiator between NetSuite and other business management software options is that it is all functionality is available virtually instantaneously. “When we talk to business owners, we don’t have to spend their time or resources talking technology,” says Emaus. “NetSuite has taken care of that. Instead, we can talk about the individual company’s business goals, growth potential, and workflow.”

Lastly, the total cost of on-demand over a five-year period is substantially less than either customized or client-server applications. “Business Owners who think of on-demand as their most efficient, most productive, long-term employee” concludes Emaus, “have the most success. In the past, business owners have not been able to consider Information Technology as a profit center. NetSuite makes it possible, but you have to rethink everything.”

There are so many business management software solutions available today that a small- or medium-size business owner faces tough decisions about how to invest his or her resources. According to Michael Emaus, CEO of eEnterprise (www.eEnterprise.com), a division of NetSuite’s global reseller Skyytek Worldwide, there are basically three choices: custom applications, client-server applications, and on-demand Web-based applications. “The cost benefit analysis leaves no doubt that on-demand solutions provide the greatest integration and cost efficiency for growth-oriented enterprises,” he says.

“Customized software that is designed either in house or by developers for a specific business is extremely costly, in terms of development and hardware, and for maintenance,” says Emaus. He notes that, more importantly, such applications are not designed to adapt as the business grows, and so business owners are saddled with costly upgrades. “Small- and medium-sized businesses simply don’t have the resources to develop and maintain custom applications,” Emaus adds.

Client-server applications, which are typically licensed to a business, are also problematic. “Invariably, business owners are faced with the challenge of having several different applications that can’t ‘talk’ to one another,” says Emaus. Without seamless integration, owners have no way to, for example, cross-reference accounting and customer service data or company information and e-commerce. “This results in a hodge-podge solution that doesn’t give an enterprise the information it needs to grow,” he adds.

Growth is one of the two primary differentiators between Web-based on-demand business management software applications and its cousins. “On-demand solutions such as NetSuite represent a paradigm shift in the way business owners manage their customer, vendor, or partner base,” says Emaus. “NetSuite is not an application that ‘supports’ an existing business, but rather is one dedicated to ‘growing’ a business. Because it has four fully integrated components, it’s both highly scalable and highly customizable.”

The second major differentiator between NetSuite and other business management software options is that it is all functionality is available virtually instantaneously. “When we talk to business owners, we don’t have to spend their time or resources talking technology,” says Emaus. “NetSuite has taken care of that. Instead, we can talk about the individual company’s business goals, growth potential, and workflow.”

Lastly, the total cost of on-demand over a five-year period is substantially less than either customized or client-server applications. “Business Owners who think of on-demand as their most efficient, most productive, long-term employee” concludes Emaus, “have the most success. In the past, business owners have not been able to consider Information Technology as a profit center. NetSuite makes it possible, but you have to rethink everything.”