Concerning Personnel Management

Here are a few suggestions concerning personnel management:

 1. Periodically review each position in your company. Take a quarterly look at the job. Is work being duplicated? Is it structured so that it encourages the employee to become involved? Can the tasks be given to another employee or employees and a position eliminated? Can a part-time person fill the job.

 2. Play a little private mental game. Imagine that you must get rid of one employee, If you had to let one person go, who would it be? How would you realign the jobs to make out? You may find a real solution to the imaginary problem is possible to your financial benefit.

 3. Use compensation as a tool rather than viewing it as a necessary evil. Reward quality work. Investigate the possibility of using raises and bonuses as incentives for higher productivity. For example, can you schedule bonuses as morale boosters during seasonal slacks or other dull periods?

 4. Remember that there are new ways of controlling absenteeism through incentive compensation plans. For example, the owner-manager of one small company eliminated vacations and sick leave. Instead, this owner-manager gave each employee thirty days annual leave to use as the employee saw fit. At the end of the year, the employees were paid at regular rates for the leave they didn’t use. To qualify for the year-end pay, the employee had to prove that sick leave was taken only for that purpose. Non-sick leave had to be applied for in advance. As a result, unscheduled absences and overtime pay were reduced significantly. In addition, employees were happier and more productive than they were under the old system.

Motivating Employees

Small businesses sometimes face special problems in motivating employees. In a large company, a good employee can see an opportunity to advance into management. In a small company, you are the management. One thing you may wish to consider is to give good employees a small share of the profits, either through part ownership or a profit-sharing plan. Someone who has a “share of the action” is going to be more concerned about helping to make a success of the business.

Personnel Training

A well-selected employee is only a potential asset to your business. Whether or not he or she becomes a real asset depends upon personnel training.

Remember:

To allow sufficient time for training.

Not to expect too much from the trainee in too short a time.

 To let the employee learn by performing under actual working conditions, with close supervision.

To follow up on your training.

 Check the employee’s performance after he or she has been at work for a time. Re-explain key points and short cuts; bring the employee up to date on new developments and encourage questions. Training is a continuous process which becomes constructive supervision.

Personnel Supervision

Supervision is the third essential of personnel control. Good supervision will reduce the cost of operating your business by cutting down on the number of employee errors. If errors are corrected early, employees will get more satisfaction from their jobs and perform better.

Personnel Selection

If your business will be large enough to require outside help, an important responsibility will be personnel selection and training of one or more employees. You may start out with family members or business partners to help you. But if the business grows – as you hope it will – the time will come when you must select and train personnel.

Careful choice of personnel is essential. To select the right employees determine beforehand what you want each one to do.

Then look for applicants to fill these particular needs. In a small business you will need flexible employees who can shift from task to task as required. Include this in the description of the jobs you wish to fill. At the same time, look ahead and plan your hiring to assure an organization of individuals capable of performing every essential function. In a retail store, a salesperson may also do stock keeping or bookkeeping at the outset, but as the business grows you will need sales people, stock keepers and bookkeepers.

Once the job descriptions are written, line up applicants from whom to make a selection. Do not be swayed by customers who may suggest relatives. If the applicant does not succeed, you may lose a customer as well as an employee.

Some sources of possible new employees are:

1. Recommendations by friends, business acquaintances.

2. Employment  agencies.                       

3. Placement bureaus of high schools, business schools, and colleges.

4. Trade and industrial associations.

5. Help-wanted ads in local newspapers.

6. local internet job sites

Your next task is to screen want ad responses and/or application forms sent by employment agencies. Some applicants will be eliminated sight unseen. For each of the others, the application form or letter will serve as a basis for the interview that should be conducted in private. Put the applicant at ease by describing your business in general and the job in particular. Once you have done this, encourage the applicant to talk. Selecting the right person is extremely important. Ask your questions carefully to find out everything about the applicant that is pertinent to the job.

References are a must, and should be checked before making a final decision. Check through a personal visit or a phone call directly to the applicant’s immediate former supervisor, if possible. Verify that the information given you is correct. Consider, with judgment, any negative comments you hear and what is not said.

Checking references can bring to light significant information that may save you money and future inconvenience.

THE PSYCHOLOGY OF SUCCESSFUL CAREER CHOICE and Inner Quest is not something you lean in graduate school, you learn it in living.

“Know thyself” was the motto that Socrates learned from the Oracle atDelphi. It is ancient wisdom, true today as it was in ancientGreece.  At some point in your life, you must make the decision to find your true self. Otherwise, you are destined to live with a false self, interpersonal conflicts, and career dissatisfaction.

 Career reassessment typically comes in mid-life when failures in outer solutions trigger the classic “mid-life, psycho-social crisis.” Almost everyone is challenged to find their purpose in life by the time their days on earth are half numbered. Making this decision initiates a major turning point in the course of your life.

 Traditionally we think only of ministers and doctors as having a “calling” but in reality everyone has a calling. Initially people are scared by the idea of an inward quest and fear they will fail. Self-conflict that appears in the form of external obstacles is the main reason callings are not pursued.

 If your current job bothers you a lot, for example, you may be so irritated that an alternative cannot even occur to you. Many people choose to ignore the quest of their calling, and try to live in a rational material world, using only their goal-oriented left-brain, or they reside in an imaginary emotional world of self-doubt, using only their right-brain.

 A meaningful career choice arises from the resource of your own integrated mind and from nowhere else. All the skills and knowledge necessary to enact your life-purpose are directly and fully possessed within you psychologically. Once a career has been identified from an internal source, it cannot be wrong, discounted by others or pursued half-heartedly.

 Prevailing wisdom about career change sees it exclusively as a logical problem of how to adapt your aptitudes and personality to corporate needs. This approach implies that the economy is rational,and that you are not, unless you conform.

 More traditional approaches to career counseling overlook the psychological and spiritual foundation to career choice and change outlined in this article. Where and how you chose to use your skills and knowledge in life are ultimately and always a question of inner values and your relationship to yourself.

THE PSYCHOLOGY OF SUCCESSFUL CAREER CHOICE & CHANGE starts with SELF-DISCOVERY. Doing work that is not satisfying reflects a basic conflict you have with yourself. You may think your career causes the conflict, and that if you change careers, the conflict will go away. But, you cannot pick the right career for you without first starting to resolve the conflict in your mind. 

The conflict caused you to pick the wrong career to begin with, and now causes work dissatisfaction. The place to begin changing careers is with your self-conflict. If you do not, dissatisfaction will just show up in whatever work you choose next. Then you will have another reason to be upset with yourself.

This basic principle holds true for personal relationships too – – if you just change partners, the same problems are reproduced in the new relationship. The truth is, conflict you have with work is the same conflict you have with family, friends and relatives. Self-conflict takes many forms, but there is only one underlying cause – -how you relate to you in your mind.

Over time self-conflict may also show up as physical symptoms of illness and disease in your body. This is because mental health, physical health and work satisfaction are intertwined. Anyone who believes career dissatisfaction is determined by outside factors, however, will also find

external explanations for health problems and inter-personal misunderstandings.

A conflict with work, therefore, expresses a hidden conflict within yourself.  When we are young, we tend to see our problems as imposed, and solved, by external means. Explanations may range, for example, from environmental (“a bad job market”) to circumstantial (“a bad boss”). To overcome these adversities is the very reason we strive to attain the highest income and best career possible.

But this strategy must inevitably break down, since it locates the reasons for conflict outside yourself. Beneath appearances, there is only one problem, and it is the relationship of you with you. Understanding this principle requires some insight and maturity, techniques that contradict external and superficial points of view.

Individuals do not ordinarily attain a more contemplative attitude toward life before the age of “thirty-something.” Until then, you think your career is created by economic opportunities, influential connections, quality of higher education, family background, good fortune and hard work.

Doing work that is not satisfying reflects a basic conflict you have with yourself. You may think your career causes the conflict, and that if you change careers, the conflict will go away. But, you cannot pick the right career for you without first starting to resolve the conflict in your mind. THE PSYCHOLOGY OF SUCCESSFUL CAREER CHOICE & CHANGE is important to your quality of life.

The conflict caused you to pick the wrong career to begin with, and now causes work dissatisfaction. The place to begin changing careers is with your self-conflict. If you do not, dissatisfaction will just show up in whatever work you choose next. Then you will have another reason to be upset with yourself.

This basic principle holds true for personal relationships too – – if you just change partners, the same problems are reproduced in the new relationship. The truth is, conflict you have with work is the same conflict you have with family, friends and relatives. Self-conflict takes many forms, but there is only one underlying cause – -how you relate to you in your mind.

Over time self-conflict may also show up as physical symptoms of illness and disease in your body. This is because mental health, physical health and work satisfaction are intertwined. Anyone who believes career dissatisfaction is determined by outside factors, however, will also find

external explanations for health problems and inter-personal misunderstandings.

A conflict with work, therefore, expresses a hidden conflict within yourself.  When we are young, we tend to see our problems as imposed, and solved, by external means. Explanations may range, for example, from environmental (“a bad job market”) to circumstantial (“a bad boss”). To overcome these adversities is the very reason we strive to attain the highest income and best career possible.

But this strategy must inevitably break down, since it locates the reasons for conflict outside yourself. Beneath appearances, there is only one problem, and it is the relationship of you with you. Understanding this principle requires some insight and maturity, techniques that contradict external and superficial points of view.

Individuals do not ordinarily attain a more contemplative attitude toward life before the age of “thirty-something.” Until then, you think your career is created by economic opportunities, influential connections, quality of higher education, family background, good fortune and hard work.

But the truth is, your purpose in life arises totally from an

INNER QUEST

“Know thyself” was the motto that Socrates learned from the Oracle atDelphi. It is ancient wisdom, true today as it was in ancientGreece.  At some point in your life, you must make the decision to find your true self. Otherwise, you are destined to live with a false self, interpersonal conflicts, and career dissatisfaction.

Career reassessment typically comes in mid-life when failures in outer solutions trigger the classic “mid-life, psycho-social crisis.” Almost everyone is challenged to find their purpose in life by the time their days on earth are half numbered. Making this decision initiates a major turning point in the course of your life.

Traditionally we think only of ministers and doctors as having a “calling” but in reality everyone has a calling. Initially people are scared by the idea of an inward quest and fear they will fail. Self-conflict that appears in the form of external obstacles is the main reason callings are not pursued.

If your current job bothers you a lot, for example, you may be so irritated that an alternative cannot even occur to you. Many people choose to ignore the quest of their calling, and try to live in a rational material world, using only their goal-oriented left-brain, or they reside in an imaginary emotional world of self-doubt, using only their right-brain.

A meaningful career choice arises from the resource of your own integrated mind and from nowhere else. All the skills and knowledge necessary to enact your life-purpose are directly and fully possessed within you psychologically. Once a career has been identified from an internal source, it cannot be wrong, discounted by others or pursued half-heartedly.

Prevailing wisdom about career change sees it exclusively as a logical problem of how to adapt your aptitudes and personality to corporate needs. This approach implies that the economy is rational,

and that you are not, unless you conform.

More traditional approaches to career counseling overlook the psychological and spiritual foundation to career choice and change outlined in this article. Where and how you chose to use your skills and knowledge in life are ultimately and always a question of inner values and your relationship to yourself.