Employee Turnover Eating into Your Profits? Learn To Hire Featuring Dr. Sabrina Starling
Employee turnover has far-reaching implications for your business. There is the monetary cost, the toll it takes on other employees, and the negative effect it can have on your customers. Far too often business owners think it is the price of doing business. But it doesn’t have to be. You can improve your employee retention by changing the way you think about employees. They should be thought of as a long-term asset and it is worth putting in a little more effort upfront. It can be done.
About Dr. Sabrina
Dr. Sabrina Starling, The Business Psychologist™ and author of the How to Hire the Best series is the founder of Tap the Potential. At Tap the Potential, we work to free business owners from the constant demands of a growing business. We believe work supports life, not the other way around.
Clients in our Better Business, Better Life™ coaching program have more time and more money than they’ve ever had before. Next, we send them off on a 4 Week Vacation™ to celebrate their hard-earned journey to Get Their Life Back!
Never one to accept status quo or back down from a challenge, Dr. Sabrina’s How to Hire the Best series grew from her desire to solve the toughest hiring challenges interfering with her clients’ growth and profitability. What sprang from her experience working with entrepreneurs in rural areas catapulted her into becoming the world’s leading expert in attracting top talent in small businesses — no matter what hiring challenges those businesses are facing — and earned Tap the Potential’s reputation as the go-to resource for entrepreneurs committed to creating Great Places to Work with thriving coaching cultures and highly engaged team members working from strengths.
Her newest book (Nov 2020), How to Hire the Best: The Entrepreneur’s Ultimate Guide to Attracting Top Performing Employees. This is truly the mothership book of the series, catering to ALL entrepreneurs in every industry. From decades of work and research, Dr. Sabrina shares crucial hiring strategies to transform small businesses everywhere AND improve personal lives.
As The Business Psychologist™, and with her years of driving profit in small businesses, Dr. Sabrina knows what it takes to find, keep, and motivate exceptional performance out of an owner’s biggest investment—team members.
Her last book, How to Hire the Best: The Contractor’s Ultimate Guide to
Attracting Top Performing Employees, was an International Best Seller on Amazon!
Facebook – /sabrinastarlingTTP/
Facebook – /tapthepotential/
LinkedIn – /drsabrina/
Twitter – @drsabrina/
Instagram – @drsabrina
www.thebusienssofbusinesspodcast.com
Full Episode Below
Employee Turnover Eating into Your Profits? Learn To Hire Featuring Dr. Sabrina Starling
Wed, 9/1 11:09AM • 49:13
SUMMARY KEYWORDS
people, business, hiring, players, business owners, team members, roles, immutable laws, support, recruiting, small business owners, life, person, talk, week, turnover, attract, team, home, work
SPEAKERS
Dr. Sabrina, Roy Barker
Roy Barker 00:02
Hello, and welcome to another episode of The Business of Business Podcast. I’m your host Roy. Of course, we are the podcast that brings you a wide variety of guests that speak to a diverse set of topics. Today is no different. We are happy to have with us Dr. Sabrina Starling, “The Business Psychologist” and author of “How to Hire the Best series. and also the founder of “Tap The Potential” at Tap the Potential they work to free business owners from the constant demands of a growing business.
They believe that work supports life not the other way around. Clients in their “Better Business Better Life Coaching Program have more time and more money than they’ve ever had before. Next, they send them off to a four week vacation to celebrate their hard earned journey to get their life back. Up to Sabrina, welcome to the show.
Dr. Sabrina 00:54
Thank you. I am so excited to be here with you.
Roy Barker 00:56
Yeah. Can you stamp my passport? I am ready to be on that celebration journey.
Dr. Sabrina 01:03
Yes, every business owner deserves, especially after what we’ve been through with COVID We All right, I’ll need that.
Roy Barker 01:10
Well, and I do apologize. I’m thought I was a little bit better. But I still have a little bit of a cough. So we’re gonna try to make it through this. Unfortunately, you’re not appreciate your patience. You’ve been put off like two or three times the last time, like five minutes before we were going to start taping we had total power outage. So anyway, thank you for your patience. But before we jump into this, you know this is one of my soapbox is I love to get on and love to talk about I think that there’s so much that business owners can do to help themselves that they just overlooked. But tell us a little bit about your journey. I mean, how did you end up here?
Dr. Sabrina 01:53
Well, I’ll tell you, it really goes back to my childhood. And you know, when I was when I was a young girl, maybe like around five years old, I really became aware of my dad and how busy He always was like I would watch him scarf down his food and race out the door. And he would work from sunup till sundown always working. And my mother explained to me that, you know, your father never got to sit down for a meal as a child. And my father grew up during his childhood. My grandfather was an entrepreneur. He owned service stations and multiple drive in movie theaters in West Texas.
And he stumbled on when he had a service station, he wanted to have more gas sales. And so he got this idea that he would put a screen up on the back of his service station. And he would if you purchase five gallons of gas, you would get a free ticket to the movies. Well, that idea took off like gangbusters. And so the the service station got busy. And then he ended up opening multiple drive in movie theaters. And everyone in the family worked. I mean, that was a true family run business with multiple business endeavors. And this was the age of Elvis and, you know, muscle cars.
And like because the business was booming, and my young dad worked and he ate his meal, his diet consisted of whatever they ate in the concession stands. So with no burgers, hotdogs, nachos, soda pop. And I have always wondered, when I look back if, if my grandfather had had a really good team that he could count on? How would that have changed my dad’s experience growing up, and my grandparents lives and even their longevity, you know, because of how they aged and the health problems they had in their older age. If they’d had help, and the team and its support there, they experienced a lot of financial success from that.
But their quality of life, I wonder like that, that was not a good quality of life. And so I was a real family, I grew up in a family that was impacted by the legacy of entrepreneurship. Because my dad was not an entrepreneur, but what I learned from him is you work hard, you don’t play until the work is done. And there’s always more work to be done. And so that’s a situation where life supports work. And I really believe that works to support life, not the other way around. And so these hiring challenges that small business owners have had are not new, they’re worse because of COVID they existed pre COVID they existed back in the 50s and before it this is it’s always been hard for small business owners to find good team members
Roy Barker 04:42
yeah yeah, before we before we move on I’m gonna have to get you to sign up for episode number two to explain service stations and drive ins cuz that may have just gone have gone by some people in the audience. I didn’t drive it. What is the service gas station Should I play? I’m old enough to know what those are? Yeah, it’s kind of cool. Because not to get too far off track. But in the town where I live, they actually lived in the screen.
They had built the house out, you know, like from the screen. And it was like three, four storeys tall, it was kind of thin. It wasn’t really, you know, wide. But it was interesting, dynamic. And, yeah, I grew up worked in the service stations as well. And you know, it was a different time. And you’re exactly right, that life did support work instead of being the other way around. And it’s unfortunate, but for a lot of people my age, it’s hard to flip that switch.
And sometimes just when we think we have flipped it, and we’re doing good, another challenge or another opportunity comes along, and then we’re right back in it. And I think what makes it even worse, is if you really love your job, and you have fun at what you do, it makes it even doubly hard to just take a step back from that. Absolutely. Well, I just and we talk pre show about this. So I’m really not surprising, or I don’t like to do that to guess.
But I just got an alert from the Wall Street Journal. And basically, it said something like the states that discontinued the extra federal unemployment did not fare much, if any better than those that continue that. So I was a true believer that that was part of our problem, a big part, maybe not all of it, but I thought we would solve 75 to 80% of our staffing situation or not being defined staff with cutting that off. But again, proven wrong. So I think you have some insights into that.
Dr. Sabrina 06:49
Yeah. So I think one of the the big, there’s multiple factors at play, and as to why is it that now that business owners are poised to make a comeback, they have lots of opportunity in their business now that COVID is is less of a concern is still a huge concern, but we’re learning to deal with it. So why is it that we have these hiring challenges, even in states where the federal and the state support has been cut, or is getting getting reduced. And what happened is, first off COVID lasted a very long time. So all of us have learned to adapt to challenging circumstances that we have been placed in, we found ways to get by.
So if this had been three months, instead of a year and a half going on to almost two years, we wouldn’t have as much as we would have people ready to go back to work. It was just like a temporary blip, but people have adapted. The other piece that’s happened is that a lot of women were forced out of the workforce, to stay home and take care of children. And because of that many families have figured out how to get by on one income.
Yeah. And so that is a huge portion of the labor force that’s just gone away. And, you know, if they have school aged kids at home, they may be deciding I’m staying home for the next 10 years. Yeah, that’s significant. And then we also have just the general people’s general fear about going back to work because they’re really looking at if they’re really afraid. So they’re looking at, you know, some extra money in my household to make things easier, or safety. And fear and safety, people are always going to choose from from fear.
And so we have a situation where our labor pool has shrunk. Prior to COVID, the hiring challenge that was out there is that only 10% of the population are a players to begin with. So a players are those individuals who are highly motivated. They’re intrinsically motivated. That means that they just want to do a good job, just yearning. And when you find something that you want to do you want to do it, you enjoy doing that kind of work. And so when you have this natural drive to want to do it better, that’s that a player intrinsic motivation. extrinsic motivation is when you have to give somebody a perk like I’m going to give you $1 an hour or more if you produce more for me, a player’s don’t work that way.
The other challenge is that a players who want to work are rarely unemployed, so they are not home reading ads on indeed, they’re not reading the Help Wanted ads. And so your challenge as a business owner is how do I find the eight players that I want on my team? Because the typical hiring strategies don’t work. They actually set us up to this higher 75% of the time, but they’re not geared to attract a players or teams.
Roy Barker 09:55
Yeah, I don’t like to be too rough on anybody. But I think that’s one A skill that’s been lost, even prior to COVID is recruiting. And I think you make a very good point that the A players, the people that you really want, they’re not perusing the ads anyway. Right? You know, because what I always challenge people to do is do actual recruiting, which means talking to people being in touch with people prior to needing them to that way, especially today, you can monitor them on social media to see what’s their attitude about things, how they feel, did they spend a lot of time during the day on there, you know,.
There’s so much reconnaissance that you can do in the beginning, instead of just putting up, you know, instead of like, Hey, we got a guy that left today, let’s put an indeed app. I mean, let’s put it in D dad. And that’s, to me, that’s not really recruiting. And that’s where we get in this position of, well, we hired somebody because we had to hurry and it was basically, okay, they got a pulse, and they filled out an application. So there there are person with the wrong person, which just, you know, trickles through and makes things even worse as we go.
Dr. Sabrina 11:14
Yes. And that that’s exactly the the traditional hiring strategy. That’s what the majority of small business owners do. And that’s what sets us up to miss hire 75% of the time. So that’s where you have that experience of I hate hiring, I don’t want to go through this again, it’s so painful, and I don’t think I’m going to get a good candidate anyway. So because you really aren’t, because one out of four is going to be good, three out of four is going to be awful, and you’re going to fire him. And when you’re a small business, your margins are so slim to begin with. payroll is the biggest expense turnover on your payroll will eat away your profit, like if you’re not profitable.
Now, if you learn how to attract the best, and you actually have a system that works to attract a players to your team, and you can retain those eight players on your team, that is the fastest path to building a highly profitable business. So getting this piece right, and your experience ROI, where so many business owners don’t recruit is spot on. We have been surveying small business owners over the last year and a half. And in a survey of over 200 entrepreneurs 89% have no system to attract a players to their team. 89%. So only 11% have a system for hiring.
Roy Barker 12:34
Yeah. And we’re, I think you can put this as a question, but it seems like we’ve become very reactionary in hiring. I mean, in in the starting the process is we wait till, hey, that guy’s been gone for two, three, you know, sometimes it’s been weeks. And that’s another thing I look at, like this slots been open for 30 6090 days. You have to at some point, ask yourself, do we really even need that person if we’ve been able to go? I mean, maybe we’re paying crazy overtime.
But and then the the other part that’s kind of weird is that sometimes it can the process can take so long that they just lose that they leaves the good people because they’re, it’s competitive for somebody that is that top 10%. And we do all this stuff that sometimes it’s necessary, sometimes it’s not, but look at it’s kind of like the sliding scale, like the lower wage. employees, it seems like, they quit their job today. And they need to go to work tomorrow, they don’t have three weeks, six weeks, you know, for 10 $15 hour an employee, typically what I would see and then, you know, with your professional workers, you know, they’re gonna give two weeks to a month notice. So there is some time to go through that. But let me get your opinion on that as well.
Dr. Sabrina 14:05
design your recruiting and hiring system so that it filters out the wrong people very early on in the process, because you don’t have time as a small business owner to be talking to everybody and interviewing. So you want to filter out the wrong people early on in the process. And you want to fast track the right people. And that’s what I’m hearing you speak to Roy is that you want to treat your recruiting and hiring like you do marketing and sales things. So if you had no marketing system in your business, and you had inconsistent sales, you would have no business.
And yet and so we’ve all learned we figured that part out early on in our business as part of surviving as a business. I’m right at the point where we have steady lead generation and steady sales conversion is the point where we need as business owners to be starting to think About how am I going to steadily recruit and attract the eight players that I need on my team? If my business is going to grow three times from where it is now, over the next few years, how many roles do I need? What role? What are those roles? How am I going to attract those eight players to my team.
So when it goes back to your hiring process, and you want to speed it up, you want to fast track those who seem like they’re a good fit, you want to have some filters in place early on. And if people are passing through those filters, and it’s like, check, they’ve got this criteria, check. They’ve got this criteria, get it on a phone call. I mean, like, just like sales, if someone comes to your business, and they want to buy something from you, are you gonna say, you know, my schedule is pretty full. So maybe in our discussion about this, no, you’re gonna have that conversation right then? Right? Soon thereafter.
Roy Barker 15:48
Right? Yeah. And it’s funny, we must read from the same script, because that’s what I always talk about is that we have to market for talent, just like we market for business. Because, and we, and also talking about growth, you know, it’s one thing, just replacing current staff just in that turnover process. But if we’re in a growth mode, we have to really be thinking, who we’re going to need to add At what point so we can get on that. And again, it’s been a little more difficult through this time, because you know, things I recommend are getting out in front of if you need younger people getting out in front of students to tell them about your business, your industry to, you know, again, we’re selling them on why they need to come to work for us, but also at trade events, things like that, meet people that and not that you need them, right that moment, but you’re always making a list of Hey, I really like this person, attitude, the way they talk and everything they do, that there’s somebody you may want to reach out to in the future.
Dr. Sabrina 16:56
Yes, Yes, for sure. And so when we look at the roles that we need to fill in our business, both the existing roles because you could have turnover, as well as new roles. And you identify what if that person in that role can only get one thing done for me in a given day or given week? What is the most important one thing they’re going to do? Identify what that one result is that you need from them? And then think through what are the personality strengths needed to do this job exceptionally well, day in and day out?
So now you’re starting to define exactly who you’re looking for, in this role, what are their personal qualities, and I’ll explain why this is so important. years ago, I had coached a young man, I think he was he might have still been in high school I never asked he just told me. He was very young. And this was his first business venture. And he had, he had made a product. And he was selling it in a mall at a kiosk. And his product was taking off. And he needed somebody to stand at the kiosk and make the sale. So he could go in the back and make the product. So he hired some of his friends. And they were really good friends of his and they were gung ho they wanted to help him and support him, they would show up for work.
And he said, You know, he said, I need you to wave down the foot traffic. And we’re all just get them to come over here and try the product. And usually they’ll they’ll buy and they’ll try it and they’ll buy some. And he said it works for me. I know you can do this. And so they his friends would do this. And he said, Dr. Sabrina, I don’t understand why after an hour or two, I go I walk away and I come back and I find them standing in the kiosk with their phone, their back, turned to the foot traffic going by and mall. And and I said well, have you talked to them about that?
And you said yeah, we’ve had repeated conversations and they still, you know, they could they come back and I see is I know I need to do this and they’ll they’ll try but then I see them you know later on. And I said I’m just I’m really curious. Are your friends like when you go to parties? Are they the ones who mingle and talk to everybody? And he said Dr. Sabrina they don’t go was trying to get them to come out with me and do things he said they they study and they you know they’re they’re very studious, they don’t miss classes.
They make straight A’s. I don’t understand why I can’t get them here. They look like a players I don’t understand why kick them to me. And I said I’m so I said I’m, I think maybe you have hired some introverts who are trying to be extroverts for you. They’re not succeeding. And that was like a lightbulb moment for him because he said you’re absolutely right. He said they don’t like to talk to people very much. They’re very quiet and reserved, and it’s exactly they’re trying very hard for you. But that drains their batteries.
And when you see them turn their back to the foot traffic. They’re actually trying to recharge their batteries to get energy to do what you need them to do. Like, oh my gosh, so heat started being intentional. The one result he needed was just Get the foot traffic over to try the product. So he started hiring people who were extroverts and from, it just grew from there like it, that freed him up to go do other things that he needed to do in the business, he could rely on them.
So when we get really clear in our hiring process, the kind of person the personality strengths that are needed to deliver the result exceptionally well, we have a description that we can go out and share when we’re networking and saying, I’m looking for someone like this. Who do you know, don’t say, I’m looking for someone like this? Who do you know who’s looking for a job, right? players are not unemployed.
So you immediately whoever you’re talking to, they’re not going to think of anybody. So you just say, who do you know who’s like this. And then the other key piece that’s really nice to be part of that filtering process that I talked about earlier, is your immutable laws. So identifying your core values, your how you what you believe in, and every one of us has three to five core values that really define who we are and how we show up in the world.
And when we can articulate those. That’s a part of how we attract the A players we want on our team, we want to hire a players whose core values align with our immutable laws. And that’s the number one filter to put in place in your hiring process. It’s not skill set, it’s not personality strengths. It’s are your immutable laws are your core values similar to ours, if they’re not, you want to just move on, you don’t even want to talk to them and bring them in for an interview.
But anybody who’s checking the boxes, and the core values lineup, right, want to move them through, and you want to have a conversation with them. Because that’s somebody, they have a network because a players hang together. And they come together around core values. Okay, and so if you have somebody that has filled out an application, even if they don’t have the skill set that you’re looking for, they’re not right for that particular role, they go into your database of who you’re going to stay in contact with, because they have a network of other a players around them, able to tap into that network, know that nobody is ever a dead end when they have a match with you with your immutable laws, because they can put you in contact with other people who might be looking for exactly what you have to offer, again, which
Roy Barker 22:21
follows the the rule of the I guess the sales method is follow. Even if we don’t close a sale, we want to follow up with these people because things can change. Like you said, maybe not necessarily with them, but they may have a good connection that, you know, would be a good candidate. And
Dr. Sabrina 22:40
I am so glad you said that. Because we’ve I I’ve had a job, have you had a job. Okay. And there were days I went to work where I really liked my job. And there were days I went to work, and I was like, This is awful. This place. And it’s like this, you know, emotional roller coaster. If a place is really a great place to work, those feelings that hate this place, it’s awful.
Those come and go and they’re fleeting. But if it’s a place like most work environments that are not all that great, where there’s not a lot of attention put to culture and building relationships with team members, chances are, there’s going to be an opportunity where that person that you would like to work for you is having a number of bad days at work. And if you are present in their world, if you show up and say hey, I’m Roy, remember me I have an opportunity over here is if you’re ever interested, remember this opportunity is over here. And I’d be happy to have a conversation with you about it. Yeah. So that staying present, you will show up in their world, eventually, you’re going to catch them on a day where they’re like, I’m ready to go.
Roy Barker 23:45
Yeah, yeah. And that’s so important, because we need to have those people, you know, not only those people, but we also need to have those that are disappointed that are calling us saying, Hey, I’m just checking with, you know, we have to build up to make it the place that they want to be, you know, we have, and I don’t mean, do a sales job, because it’s not a good place to work.
But I mean, we have to make it a good place to work, but then we have to sell people on why they need to be working for us and get that attention with them reaching out to somebody, you know, being in that constant communication mode. And it’s funny, too, I’m a it’s a difficult situation, because I do believe in education. And, you know, some people aren’t for college, but their trade schools or trade education, but there was a great line in the TV show. It actually was law and order years ago. So there was this lawyer that was just really pounding them in this episode. And one of the assistants is like, I don’t know, I don’t understand this guy’s really killing us.
But you know, he barely passed law school, like, you know, he had like a two five or three or whatever the minimum was and the other guy said Yeah, but the reason why he made poor grades is was because he was always hanging around a court house, learning his craft. And so well, I don’t want to discourage education, I just want to say that, you know, we also have to look at other abilities that go with that, because sometimes, we’ve gotten so rigid on degrees in education that we want. Again, I’m gonna just tell you my story is that, you know, I struggled and went to night school for 20 years to get my undergrad.
So I definitely believe in it, don’t, please, nobody Take me, take me, don’t think we need it. I believe everybody needs it just for the sometimes it’s just for the socialization part. But anyway, we have to just look at the person well round in sometimes I think we may have this arbitrary line that we put up, there’s somebody that could be bumping right up against the bottom of it, that we give no consideration.
Dr. Sabrina 26:02
I absolutely agree with you. As one who has a doctoral degree, I will, I’m the first to say that college may not be the best investment for a lot of people. And there’s, there’s lots of people who have broad skill sets and a broad base of experience, who are very eager to learn in most things can be trained. And I’m not going to say, you know, like, you wouldn’t put somebody in the role of psychologists just because they’ve had a broad live experience.
And, you know, I’m not gonna go into that part. But what I’m hearing you say is, we’ve got to think outside the box. Correct. And I have had many small business owners that we’ve worked with that have done that out of the box thinking and so they will bring entry level team members into their company, and they know they can they figured out their system for attracting their entry level team members. Yes. And then they start working on how do we teach them leadership skills?
How do we give them the skills that they need to advance and fill our higher level roles, because those higher level roles are so hard to fill, they’re finding more success and raising up their team and giving them opportunities for advancement and recruiting that way. And the the other piece that I think it’s so important for small business owners to hear right now is that the bird in the hand is worth more than 10 in the bush. So when you have a players on your team, be aware of why they like working for you and what they consider to be a great place to work.
So ask them, you seem happy here. What do you like here, what could be better for you, you don’t have to make any promises that you know you’re going to do anything extravagant, because you may not be able to, but just you need to be in conversation with them to understand their perspective. And use that to help you create the culture that will attract more a player. So the cult, the A players that you have on your team, are your greatest source of information for how to figure out how to attract more a players still like them. And we need to be focusing on retention moreso than attraction so retain what you have the A players, not everybody on your team, B and C players will be like a player repellent in your business.
So if you don’t have warm bodies on your team, you need to be aware of that because they can actually be driving off your a players, right. So we need to really be focusing on retaining those a players getting to know them spending time and investing time with them that just an opportunity every week for a one to one conversation with the business owner or the person that they directly report to is the number one thing that you can do to retain a player’s know if that goes away. They feel disconnected and they are much more likely to leave. But that’s also your avenue to learn about them and how to figure out how to recruit more like
Roy Barker 28:58
them. Right. Right. And that, you know, I think one thing is that attracting that entry level that we can show a path of promotion that also plays to our future a player’s because we can bring them in and train them up in our own system and move them up. And then the part about getting to know our employees, that’s me, that’s such a big part. Because what I would do and if you’re a larger company, excuse me there, if you’re a larger company, you may have to delegate it to managers and I would want to manage your I didn’t have to delegate it to you that could just do it on their own.
But that is Get to know your people outside of work. I mean, I used to have, you know, we would do quick cookouts at the office just because there doesn’t have to be a reason just that I appreciate you showed up today. And we would also do events outside even if it was just a cook out at the house just to have people but other leaders find it interesting that I knew my people, I knew their wives, I knew their kids, I knew their situations, not macroscopically.
But I knew enough that somebody came in and was having a bad day, we could sit down and talk about it because I knew who they were. But it’s so important because it builds trust, I think between, you know, they, they knew that I cared about them. And therefore, even when we had to make hard decisions, when he had to step up and be a manager and actually say, Look, you’re not gonna like it, but we’ve got to do this. They may have said, a bad word, and they may have stomped off, but they went and did it. And they did it. Right. So I don’t know, I’ve always thought that his key is just that humanization part.
Dr. Sabrina 30:49
At the end of the day, all businesses relationships, yes. And when we take the time to invest in the people who work hard for us, and learn about them and look for, you know, ask the questions, how can I support you? What support Do you need, that’s the number one thing that you can do to retain the A players on your team.
Roy Barker 31:10
And I know we’re running short on time, a couple things I want to hit pretty quickly, uh, the dollars per turnover, I don’t think I don’t think a lot of people really know that there are dollars true expense dollars related to turnover, I usually use about, you know, 5000 is usually an average for, you know, a $10 hour employee.
And then we move up to, you know, like a tech worker, that may be like 400% of their salary, is most of that is true cash going out the door. Because even if you say, Well, we’ve got an HR person, that recruiter on staff that does this, well, if they’re working on that person, they’re not working on your growth person that’s fixing to come up.
So there are true costs or true cost to your staff, because typically, we’re having to overwork them, or there’s something going on inside of this company that is kind of sour in them. I mean, you know, you know, there’s all kinds of internal names. And then the other thing as a customer, when I come to your business, and I’m dealing with somebody new every time I walk in, I have to think, Hey, what’s going on here?
Dr. Sabrina 32:27
Yeah, it creates a lack of consistency, and it breaks the relationships that your customers have, right? And that that the estimates are and it’s anywhere from 100 to 300% or more of the rock the amount that you’re paying that person either in wage or salary. And there’s a lot of hidden costs. And that’s really what you’re touching on the lack of morale, the disengagement and the stakes, the rework that has to be done. losing someone and going through the turnover process is one of the most costly things you can do in your business, plus all the time that’s spent in training and onboarding.
And so this is where what we’ve seen in small businesses, your greatest opportunity for success is to look at those entry level roles, and really focus their first on how are you going to attract and fill those roles and have a steady pipeline of people for those roles, and then move into the higher level roles in your business and figure out
Roy Barker 33:27
we see here got a page full of notes, we could talk for three or four,
Dr. Sabrina 33:32
we could clearly have a lot of similar viewpoints here. And we want to help these small
Roy Barker 33:38
business this. Yeah, because a couple things you talked about, just wanted to reiterate about why people may not be coming back. You know, a lot of people had to develop a side hustle, just to make it through. So they’re just continuing that even at a lower rate. Maybe they don’t, you know, it’s like working from home. You don’t have any cleaning bills, you don’t have to drive the commute. You know, there are a lot of expenses that they may say, Hey, I could do my side hustle.
But then you talked about working mothers and my next door group and some Facebook pages I’ve been on they have just blown up, you know, the last couple of weeks about childcare that as people are being going back to work to offices. And then school, they’re having mothers and families are having trouble finding that after school care, or you know, it’s like I’ve had this is my third person I’ve been on in the last two months, you know, help?
Dr. Sabrina 34:37
Well, and I’ll tell you, there’s even another layer to this as a mother myself, that there are our youngest kids are not able to be vaccinated. And so there’s there with the Delta variant, there’s a lot of fear and there’s a high likelihood that our elementary school kids if they’re in environments where people aren’t wearing masks and not vaccinated They’re going to come down with COVID. And so there’s a lot of moms out there who are like, I’m choosing not to work, because I’m going to homeschool My child, we have that variable in there, too.
And so what we do see is that employers who have roles that can be filled virtually have lots of applicants for those roles. So because people have figured out how to work from home and take care of their kids like that, we’ve had that great juggling act now for a long time. So if you can look at the roles that you need to fill in your business and ask, Is there any portion of this that can be done virtually on a contractual basis, like through a virtual assistant or an executive assistant, and get that administrative support?
And if you have team that are spread really thin? Ask them? What admin support do they need? And then asked, Can any Is there a way we can figure out how to do any of this virtually, because if we can, you can take some of the load off of your existing team. And you again, that helps you to retain your existing team. And then you can get some of the rest of the work done by someone who has virtual, if you’ve never tried virtual work before, I know a lot of you know, Main Street businesses like virtual work, are you kidding?
How do we have somebody who’s not here in the office, we’re all in office? Think about from the perspective that somebody who does virtual work on a contractual basis can teach you they can you can talk to them and say, Hey, you know, we have these bookkeeping functions in our business, or we have these admin scheduling things. It’s always been done by somebody in the office, how would you do that? virtually? What would that look like for us? So, again, that’s some of that out of the box thinking?
Roy Barker 36:44
Yeah. We’ll just touch it on the children. That’s another thing that’s gone crazy here. Because I know that there are now whole classes, and sometimes whole schools that have had to go back into quarantine, again, virtual just because the whole math, you know, and I don’t want to get into the politics of that the whole masking versus not masking. And then but you know, now all of a sudden, we’re back to where we were. But I’m also the remote work. I haven’t figured out why some companies that have survived, even thrived with workers at home, have been so adamant that you’re coming back. And why there’s not more of a was there such reluctance to let people be remote, I don’t get that.
Dr. Sabrina 37:36
So, so much of the way we work in our country is done, because it’s just the way it is. always done it this way. The eight hour work day, five days a week was something that Henry Ford came up with, because he thought that would be a great idea to help factory workers and productions in factories. Well, so many of us now are not producing things, we are knowledge based workers, right. And so shifting our thinking to, we have certain results that we need our team members to deliver. And let’s pay them for the results versus how often how long they show up.
Right? psychologically, people cannot focus on zoom at a computer for eight hours a day with a half hour or an hour for lunch and a 15 minute break mid morning and mid afternoon. And that’s why we have people who are checking out and going on Facebook and doing whatever because their focus is going away. So rather than paying them for eight hours, say here’s the results you’re responsible for this week, go do it. If it takes you 40 hours, if it takes you 20 I’m going to pay you this amount, this result. And so it’s a mindset shift to go on to results oriented versus I’m paying you to show up and paying for your physical presence.
Roy Barker 38:57
Yeah, that’s the thing is I’m paying the you have to be here at these particular times because it and I get deadlines. And I’m not saying that it’s we shouldn’t meet deadlines, but I’m saying does it really matter if I filled out this Excel spreadsheet at nine in the morning or nine in the evening, as long as if you needed tomorrow, as long as I got it to you tomorrow, that’s really all the counts.
Dr. Sabrina 39:21
Exactly. And if there are certain core meetings that everyone you need everyone present for, set those on the schedule, so everyone knows I haven’t either for this, but then give people the flexibility they need. You likely have team members who have family members who have COVID. So you people are stretched really thin and the number one reason people will stay with employers is they feel supported in their personal life. So you can offer the flexibility for someone to take care of a sick family member that builds loyalty and that loyalty is it invaluable. Yeah. And that’s something we in small business can run circles around the corporate world with.
Roy Barker 40:07
Yeah. Yeah. And, again, this gets back to knowing your staff. Because I had a friend that was a nursing home administrator, and one of her best staff just dropped off the face of the earth. And, you know, we have to put ourself in that position is, it’s like, they don’t want to get the hassle of why did you not show up? Why can’t you come to work? So she was like, I’m not calling, I’ll just go, I can get another job at this pay rate, with no problem.
But she was such a good worker that the administrator went to the home actually, to chase her down, sat down and talked with her, and found out that there were some issues with the husband, and he had been in jail. So she didn’t have a car because it was impounded. And instead of trying to explain all that, it was easier not to. But all they did was set. She moved her from her shift from, you know, seven to three to like noon to seven or whatever, something in that, but it was just a small tweak, that it was good for the staff, because she got to retain her job, but great for the administrator because she retained one of her top employees.
Yeah, it’s just as little as that communication as caring instead of just being like, Oh, my gosh, I should have known that person was gonna do me this way and be in the when it there will be people that do that. I you know, I’m not saying there won’t. But we should know the ones that aren’t that way. And the ones that will be that way.
Dr. Sabrina 41:37
Well, and I actually, I want to speak to those who are hearing this and saying, but she just flaked out on you and didn’t show up. So why do you want her back on your team? If you really understand a player psychology, and you think about what might have been going on in this woman’s life, she was juggling a whole family crisis that she was trying to not burden her employer with. So she kept her mouth shut and showed up and did a good job. And then it got overwhelming. And she wasn’t able things were out of her control.
At that point. If she wasn’t able to show up and do a good job, she probably felt a lot of shame. Yes. And that’s that shame, where it’s just easier to go find another job. So I’m playing all this. And I, I know I’ve let someone down that I care about a lot. And so just like he said, Be that employer, when some somebody exhibits behavior that is out of character, from what you’ve known them, get curious, rather than judge get curious and find out what’s going on.
Roy Barker 42:33
Yeah, yeah. Because we have to understand that a lot of people live different lives than what we do. I mean, it’s just, that is their norm. It’s not ours, and we have no understanding. And so it’s something I’ve said more lately than I thought I ever would, but you know, seek first to understand. And there’s a lot of power in that, actually.
Absolutely. So one more thing. And then I’m promised, I’m gonna let you go. This time, with the promise of coming back. What is the end of the rent moratorium going to do because another thing that’s blown up on my phone starting this week? Was I need to move in truck, I need a place to stay? It is. I mean, it’s like to the nth degree. And I assume it has to do with the moratorium being over? I think it was yesterday, maybe?
Dr. Sabrina 43:22
Yeah. Yeah, I think it just ties into everything we’re talking about people have stressors that we can’t even fathom, right. And so we need to be in contact with our team members. And if they need help finding a place to live, we have a huge network around us, how can we tap into our network and help them get the resources they need? I small business owners are notorious for going above and beyond to support their team members. And so this is something we just need, we need to be aware of that our teams need a lot of support, right?
Roy Barker 44:05
Yeah, yeah. And don’t again, let’s don’t lose good workers, just because they’re in a bad spot. And they try to deal with it as much as they can. And then when they can’t, you know, they just have to stop everything else to do it, where if we could just give them a helping hand where possible. It makes life so much easier for everybody involved.
Dr. Sabrina 44:24
Yes. And then I think also give finding out about resources in your community that, you know, the food, food kitchens and places that will help people get through a tough time and sharing that with your team members. The when you’re having those one to one conversations with your team members. You’re building an emotional bank account because they come to trust you more. And a lot of times when we are in crisis. We make fighter flight survival decisions. And so if your team member trusts you and they will come and talk with you about crises in their lives. You can be that trusted guide that can help them identify resources and come up with a plan to get through a very tough difficult time. Yeah.
Roy Barker 45:10
All right. Well, I appreciate you taking time out of your day. It’s been interesting conversation, always learn a lot. When we speak. Before I let you go a couple questions. What is a tool or a habit that you use every day that you feel adds a lot of value?
Dr. Sabrina 45:26
Well, exercise number one, hands down, I do my best thinking, when I can exercise every day and trying really hard to get a good night’s sleep. And most business owners were not so great at that. But I try hard,
Roy Barker 45:40
right, right. Now that’s good advice on both of those, the exercise seems to clear my head where I can get over hurdles that I may have been bumping up to in the day and then asleep always, if I don’t get enough sleep, my day never starts that well. So yes, great words of advice. So I’m gonna, instead of me being tongue tied, I’m gonna let you explain your book series. And then also, you can tell us, who do you like to work with how you can help them where they can reach out and get a hold of you and find your books as well.
Dr. Sabrina 46:11
Okay, so I have the “How to Hire the Best” series. And this evolved from 16-17 years of me trying to help business owners get themselves out of the day to day in the business because, you know, like we’ve talked about everyone needs a break, everyone deserves a vacation. And when you don’t have good team members that you can count on, you can’t take that time off. So my latest in the series is the “How to Hire the Best: The Entrepreneurs Ultimate Guide to Attracting Top Performing Team Members,” it’s available on Amazon, we at Tap My Business is Tapped the Potential and we’re on a mission to support entrepreneurs and taking their lives back from their business.
So many entrepreneurs really have that experience where work takes over life, and you sacrifice your health and your important relationships all for the sake of keeping the business going. We believe work supports life, not the other way around. We have a community of entrepreneurs on Facebook, your is called entrepreneurs take your life back, I would love to welcome your listeners and you right over there.
And we have ongoing conversations in that group to support business owners in building these businesses that are profitable, and what we call life giving where everyone the business owner, and team members feel like they get energy and get life from going to work. So you can join that group, tapthepotential.com/group. And then the final, I have a really good free resource.
That is it’s the best way to get started with everything that you’ve heard me talk about here, as a business owner really starting to bring on team and the quality team members and free yourself up to do the most valuable things in the business. It’s my training on “How to Make Your Time Worth $10,000 an Hour. Oh, wow. And you can get that at tapthepotential.com/10k.
Roy Barker 48:11
Okay, yeah. And I’ll be sure to include all that in the show notes as well. Thank you, boy. All right. Well, thank you for your time. Thank you for the resources and most of all, thank you for your patience and finally making it to the tape.
Dr. Sabrina 48:23
It’s well worth it. I’m so glad to share and support other business owners and I appreciate you giving me that opportunity.
Roy Barker 48:28
You bet you bet. Well, that’s gonna do it for another episode of The Business of Business Podcasts. Of course. I’m your host Roy. You can find us at www.thebusinessofbusinesspodcast.com We’re on all the major podcast platforms, iTunes, Stitcher, Google, Spotify, Pandora, one that she listened to please reach out, I’d be glad to add it and make your listening easier. We’re also on all the major social media platforms tend to hang out on Instagram a little bit more than others love to interact with you there and a video of this interview will go on our YouTube page. So check that out as well as some of our past episodes. Until next time, take care of yourself and take care of your business.
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