Episode 220: The HR Side of Hiring for Your Business

On today's episode of the podcast I chat with Kira La Forgia, owner of Paradigm Consulting, about hiring and HR. 

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Kira's experience in sales and HR led her to create her own hiring consulting company which assists business owners with their questions on everything from When do I hire? to How do I delegate? to When does that hire turn into an employee? Recently, Kira shared her case study on the working with The Boss Project, sharing that hiring often leads to growth and more hiring. For example, 6 months ago Abby and Emily from The Boss Project had 6 employees and now they are coming up on 12. Hiring grows quickly after your first hire. 

A popular opinion among business owners seems to be that working with employees is more expensive than working with contractors. Kira would say that it's your choice. An employee is going to be more expensive if you go from a contractor who is helping you with a couple projects here and there to an employee that is consistently getting paid. 

Employees are about 15% more expensive because you have to subvert things like the payroll taxes, but you are also in control of how much you can spend on that employee's pay each week. With contractors, they set their own rate and that factors in their own taxes and operating expenses. 

Kira and I dive into if some of my contractors, specifically my marketing manager and customer support manager, should become employees since they are involved in the same ongoing weekly projects. Kira recommends that operations positions be employees so they can best serve the company. Employees are trained, managed and can optimally become a clone of you in your business. 

When hiring, where you put your job listing impacts the type of person you attract - for example hiring an employee often comes from a business listing versus a Facebook group post. 

Hiring an employee with experience in the role you need help in, you can interview the people and choose the precursors that they're going to bring to the table and help you with that by bringing to you the things that they think and the knowledge you don't have to fill the gap. 

If you don't have all the tasks in mind, the best way to write job the description is to give the mission and the values of the company and to interview them efficiently and strategically to find someone who will adopt the voice of your brand. 

My business' three core values are fun, informative and transparent. Kira recommends that infusing your core values into your hiring is the most important thing. When you start hiring, she says you should have a semblance of an idea of what you want that person to do. 

When it comes to personality tests like Enneagrams, Strengths Finder, etc, be wary of making hiring decisions off of these as we are not equipped to make decisions off of personality tests. The only one Kira says you can use during the hiring process is the Kolbe, which is based on conative attributes. Instead, use these assessments to help you manage your team and learn the way your team members are best manage and how they best lead. 

The steps to the hiring process are: 

1. Figure out exactly what you're going to need to hire based on what you are overwhelmed with and what you do not like to do

2. Be clear on the general overview of what that person should be doing and then

3. Start to think about how you're going to title that role.

4. Prepare your business for what it looks like for that person to come in. 

5. Post the job ad, interview and hire. 

6. Complete orientation and continue to manage the employee. For the entire extent of having an employee, you are a manager and it's important that you continue to work on yourself and become a better leader. 

Get in Touch with Our Guest 

Kira La Forgia, owner of Paradigm Consulting

Follow Kira on Instagram at @theparadigmm