Best Practices in RECRUITING FRONT-LINE STAFF ACROSS INDUSTRIES
BY ADAM STONE
Bill Pettit struggles to hire front-line staff, the customer-facing employees who are the heart and soul of senior living. “We have an economy that is booming,
and the types of people who will do well in our organization also will do well in other industries,” said Pettit, chair of the Argen- tum workforce development committee and president of the R.D. Merrill Com- pany, parent company of Merrill Gardens. “Many of their skills directly translate, and so we all compete.” He contends with restaurants for din-
ing staff, while construction firms snap up maintenance workers. Health care compa- nies hire away potential caregivers and so it goes down the line, with competing indus- tries all vying for the same limited pool of applicants. For many senior living providers, the strug-
gle to hire frontliners seems never ending, but it’s important to look for pockets of opportuni- ty. For instance, the radical downturn in retail has lately cost some 60,000 workers their jobs, according to outplacement firm Challenger, Gray & Christmas. That’s a big pool of po- tential senior living employees.
34 SENIOR LIVING EXECUTIVE / ISSUE 4 2017 Still, companies across competing in-
dustries continue to feel the pinch. In hos- pitality, turnover rates may run as high as 100 percent, according to the Institute for a Competitive Workforce (ICW), an Affiliate of the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, while in health care high turnover may add 35 percent to the cost of patient care. An ICW survey found at least half of employers have a hard time hiring front-line staff. “This is probably the biggest challenge in
the present labor market,” Pettit said. His prescription for success? “You have to do your homework on these other industries, whether it’s restaurants or multifamily or the care industry. For those industries that compete directly, you need to understand the current labor market and current practices.” Senior Living Executive did exactly that, in-
terviewing human resources leaders from a range of sectors to mine their best practices for hiring front-line workers. Health care and dining, hospitality and customer service organizations: Here is what some of the best had to say about their winning recipes for hiring and retaining those hard-to-find employees.
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