This topic deserves an entire post on how to find the right job or career which I will write within the next week. For now, here is a magazine interview that I did several years ago that touches on some of the aspects of hiring your next employer.

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Hiring Your Next Employer
Published  by CompTIA Magazine August 2005

Geeks On Call, the national on-site computer-services company, has hired more than 500 CompTIA A+ certified technicians over the past six years. Based on observations of hundreds of job candidates, Mike Vanderslice, vice president of operations for Geeks On Call, believes that getting hired in IT is as much about the desire to work for a particular organization as it is about the organization’s enthusiasm for the candidate.

“Employers want to hire qualified people who are passionate about the company and the direction it is going in”, Vanderslice said. “If managers find genuine passion, experience and supporting certifications, they will recognize they are dealing with a great candidate.”

Vanderslice said that “the first step in finding that passion is to be honest about the desire to work for a particular company. After carefully researching the organization’s direction and industry, IT workers must ask themselves: Could I be happy working for this company? If the answer is no, then the IT professional has come to an important realization.”

“Both (the) candidate and the employer will find out very quickly it is not a good fit”, Vanderslice explained. “If it is not, the technician and employer will end up basically where they started the technician looking for a position and the employer with an opening to fill.”

For this reason, Vanderslice urges quality over quantity when selecting and contacting prospective employers. “It is a turnoff for an employer to see generic cover letters and resume’s, he said. Successful candidates communicate their passion in the cover letter and customize resumes to highlight the fit between experience and certifications with the advertised or potential opening. Vanderslice also said candidates should demonstrate that the job is important by carefully proofreading cover letters and resume’s, eliminating spelling and grammatical errors.”

“To successfully ferret out dream jobs”, Vanderslice said that “IT professionals should continually build their network, asking teachers, colleagues and supervisors for references. Referrals come from people who know both the individual and the organization doing the hiring, Vanderslice said. They typically would not put the two together if they thought it wouldn’t be a good fit. A referral is a powerful endorsement, building instant credibility on both sides of the equation.”

After identifying and contacting the organization, the job interview is the next step toward that dream job. “To get an edge, it’s helpful to know what the person across the desk is looking for.” Vanderslice said “There are several important considerations from the employers point of view. The first is to determine whether the candidate can do the job, and that comes from experience closely related to the opening. Experience through internships or time spent as a volunteer is vital to securing that all-important first job. In any job, master as many key tasks as possible, and be aware of how these tasks contribute to the mission of the organization. Look toward the next-level position that interests you most, and strive to grow into that job.”

Another key factor in the interview is matching experience with supporting certifications. “Customers ask us all the time how we ensure the quality of our technicians”, Vanderslice said. “We tell them that every Geeks On Call technician is at least CompTIA A+ certified. Certification not only reassures the customer, it inspires trust in the eyes of the hiring manager. Certification is the independent validation of knowledge.”

“Clear communication is another major key to success in an interview. The ability for an IT technician to communicate effectively is critical”, Vanderslice said. “It doesn’t matter whether the technician is interacting with customers, employees or supervisors, it is incumbent on the IT professional to be a good listener and clear communicator.”

“Someone who is relaxed, interacts well, who states their ideas clearly and provides supporting examples taken from their experience stands out as being a strong candidate for a technology job and a potential good fit with the IT team”, he added. “Asking questions which demonstrate that they’ve done their homework and are truly interested in us moves the candidate up a notch.”

Appropriate experience, supporting certifications, clear communication and an honest desire to work for a company are powerful incentives for an employer to make that all-important job offer. If an offer is made, then the candidate can be assured that he or she has done everything possible to hire the right employer.

John A. Venator is president and CEO of CompTIA, the largest global IT industry association, with more than 19,000 members in 89 countries.

A recent study by Towers Perrin, a global professional services firm, entitled “The Global Workforce Study,” finds that businesses with the highest employee engagement are financial winners. These companies also have a higher employee retention rate.

To date, this is the largest study of its kind with input from a survey of almost 90,000 workers from 18 countries. The study was also able to draw on a huge employee normative database that contains over two million employee records and the financial performance records of their companies.

According to the study. companies with the highest percentage of engaged workers make more money. In a 12-month study across 50 companies, companies with the highest percentage of engaged workers had a 19 percent increase in operating incomes and a 28 percent increase in earnings per share. On the other hand, over the same year period, companies with the lowest employee engagement rates showed a 33 percent decline in operating incomes and an 11 percent decline in earnings per share.

A three year study that followed 41 companies showed a 3.7 percent rise in operating margins in companies with engaged workers versus a 2 percent drop in operating margins in companies with less engaged workers.

Engaged employees also think that what they do has an impact on the quality of the products and services offered by their companies. Eighty percent of these workers see a relationship between their jobs and company results. Just forty percent of disengaged workers acknowledge this connection.

The study tested which dimensions had the greatest impact on workforce engagement: personal factors, such as optimism and openness to challenge; work team factors, such as someone’s relationship with his or her supervisor; and organizational factors, such as rewards, development and leadership. A key conclusion was that organizations should focus on employee engagement as a way to improve workforce and organizational performance.

The study furthermore suggests senior management work to role model “inspiration, vision, and commitment” as a method to increase engagement. Other ways to increase engagement are to help employees understand what “is in it for them,” or in other words, the benefits for the employees, including learning opportunities and career growth. Towers Perrin also reports that employees want to work for leaders, for companies that “strive for excellence.”

Are your employees engaged?

Empowerment = better customer service and a better bottom line and from past leadership experience, happier and more productive employees.

My discovery of just how powerful tactical loitering can be happened a few years ago when I was an executive for Geeks On Call, a national computer services company. I happened to be traveling and popped into a Starbucks for a much needed caffeine fix and to use their wifi connection to do some work. The only seat available was in the highest traffic area of the shop where people waited to pick up their $5 beverage so I set up camp and started working. Over the next hour and a half I got very little work done but my visit to Starbucks was incredibly productive. Keep reading to find out just how productive!

As I drove away from Starbucks and my caffeine buzz wearing off , it became apparent that I was on to something huge. Loitering when done with a purpose could be used to grow your business. For me it took a laptop, my company name and logo on my shirt, a pile of business cards and a smile or hello to those nearby. The rest was easy as potential customers approached me with their technology questions or problems.

How is tactical loitering used in other businesses? 1800GotJunk is a great example of how to use tactical loitering to drive brand awareness and new revenue opportunities. 1800GotJunk is an international junk hauler (think Sanford and Son with nicer trucks) uses tactical loitering via waves where employees dress up in blue wigs and position themselves in high traffic roads with great visibility. Another method used by Got Junk is to tactically park their junk trucks in high traffic areas during down times, again creating brand awareness and delivering new service opportunities. If you have to park your company vehicle plastered with logos, why not pick a spot where thousands of people can see it.

Coming back to my experience at Starbucks with Geeks On Call, I accomplished the following via tactical loitering:

• I spoke to over a dozen potential customers in 90 minutes all of whom approached me
• I booked 5 appointments for our technicians that resulted in over $1,000 in immediate revenue
• I handed out over 20 business cards that I have no doubt generated additional new business
• One of the new customers, who happened to own a small business, used Geeks On Call to support his office computers spending over $4,500 with our company during the next 12 months

At Geeks On Call, we trained our employees how to use tactical loitering as part of our field marketing program. While tactical loitering did not replace our more structured customer acquisition strategies, it was a nice addition that delivered hundreds of thousands of dollars of new revenue to our business each year.

Tactical Loitering Basics

Tactical loitering isn’t an exact science but there are some basics for it to be effective. I’ve outlined a few of those below.

• Wear your brand! If you have to wear clothes (and who doesn’t), why not wear something with your brand logo and name? At Geeks On Call I wore our company shirt all the time. Our shirts helped to improve brand recognition while I was out of the office at restaurants, stores or business meetings where the shirt would always result in a potential customer asking about my business. By wearing a branded shirt, I literally educated thousands of people personally about our brand by wearing the logo.
• Position yourself where your customers are. For a computer repair company, hanging out at Starbucks was a perfect location since that is where our target customer frequents. For your business, it might be a different location. I know of several home repair services that position employees in Home Depot and Lowes to acquire new customers.
• Be ready with a quick pitch on your business. When someone approaches and asks about your business, be ready with a 5 – 10 word pitch of what you do. For me it was “we provide quality on-site computer solutions for home users and businesses”.
• Establish credibility before trying to close the sale. When someone approaches you or vice versa, you have very little credibility. Take this time to create a rapport and to share your knowledge and expertise. This shows a potential customer that you are an expert in the field.
• Have business cards and marketing information readily available. Always carry business cards to hand out when you are approached. It’s unprofessional to have to write down this information on a napkin or coffee cup.
• Be ready to close the sale. After you have established a rapport and provided some value, ask for the business. I physically called a customer service representative to personally book 5 appointments during my initial Starbucks visit all because I asked for the sale and made it easy for the customer to use our service. Depending upon your business, be able to book an order or service call immediately and make it easy for the customer. Service starts with your first meeting with a customer.
• Don’t get kicked out or scare anyone. Most people don’t like to be approached by a salesperson, especially in a location where they don’t expect it like Starbucks. Let customers come to you when you are loitering. Failure to do so could have a negative outcome and could get you kicked out of your favorite loitering location.
• Smile, be approachable and have fun. This is common sense but don’t be buried in a newspaper, laptop or face the corner. Pick the best location to bump into the most people possible, make eye contact and say hello. If you approach tactical loitering with the right attitude and have a little fun with it, you will grow your business and increase revenue.

Please share your stories and ideas about tactical loitering including the successes, failures and especially the funny incidents.

BizElevate helps companies improve all aspects of their business including customer service and customer experience, operations, sales and marketing, employee training and leadership, finance, efficiency and technology.

One service company we worked with had about 300 trained technicians in the field. Each technician was measured by average revenue per customer, overall revenue and quality of service. Each technician was provided the same training and were under the same incentive based compensation program. We were brought on to figure out why the top technicians had an average ticket of $400 while the worst had an average ticket of $125. What we found and implemented is a valuable lesson for any company.

Before BizElevate

Initially our job was to determine the current metrics across the company. The company had most of the necessary reporting in place that allowed for the ongoing measuring of these key metrics. We helped the company to refine their methods and determined the following.

Revenue:
Per Customer: $203
Per Technician Weekly: $1,926

Customer Service:
Average Technician Ranking: 84%

After BizElevate

After working with the company for about 3 months, we were able to acheive the following results.

Revenue:
Per Customer: $278
Per Technician Weekly: $3,141

Customer Service:
Average Technician Ranking: 93%

How We Did It

While I can’t share every aspect of what we did, the core of the improvements were accomplished in the following steps. Evaluation of top technicians, process development, testing, introduction and training, buy-in and compliance, recognition and reinforcement. We also had some testing phases where we used small groups to evaluate the processes we developed to validate the potential results of a system wide introduction as well as to understand what areas still needed improvement.

Evaluation:

The first thing we did was evaluate and study the best technicians in the system that helped us to understand what they did differently and what characteristics these top performers possessed.

Process:

We took the ideas that the best performing technicians used and created a process map that was integrated into teh service invoice used by technicians for each service call.

Introduction, Training & Buy-In:

After a thorough testing phase where we refined processes, we were ready to introduce and train all service technicians on the new service systems. Since this was a significant change from how technicians were used to working, we spent a lot of time on how to get buy-in. Just throwing a new process or policy without these steps will typically lead to adoption failure. Combined with a well thought out introduction and buy-in strategy coupled with thorough training, our launch was a success.

Recognition

Part of our buy-in strategy was a very strong recognition program. Recognition can come in several flavors that may include additional money, prizes (trips, products, services) or public recognition within the company through newsletters, emails, award ceremonies, parties or other forms. The latter can be the most powerful motivator since recognition amongst peers is a highly valued by most employees. The company featured in this blog used a combination of these ideas.

Reinforcement

Elevating performance should not be about short term improvements but long term gains that are sustainable. Just like going on a diet doesn’t work for long term weight loss, a lifestyle or culture change within a company is needed to sustain and support long term improvements. Things that become part of your culture will require very little time to manage the enforcement side of a process. These changes become engrained into the fiber of your corporate culture.

Is It That Easy?

Obviously I skipped over some of the steps in the process that are quite important but this gives you a high level view of how you can elevate the performance of a group of employees all performing the same tasks.