It’s the end of the 2020 (thank goodness), and although not all organizations conduct employee performance reviews at the end of the year, some companies do.
 
Performance reviews are one of the major ways that company officials determine whether or not employees receive an increase in their annual compensation . . . and how much they’ll receive. As with many aspects of your career (and life in general, for that matter), the key is preparation. You do not want to walk into your review cold. You should treat your review almost like a mini-interview.
 
You’re not interviewing for the purpose of being hired, but you are interviewing for the purpose of receiving more compensation. True, actions speak louder than words, specifically your actions during the past six months or year, but how you conduct yourself in the review is also extremely important.
 
Make sure you give adequate attention to each of the seven steps below.
 
#1—Review yourself first.
 
Before you step into that room, make sure that you’ve already conducted a self-audit and self-inventory. It is extremely important, of course, that you remain as impartial as possible when evaluating your performance. It might be a good idea to make a few lists—one of the goals that you’ve achieved since your last review, one of your strengths, and one of your weaknesses. When listing your weaknesses, also list ways in which to improve in those areas.
 
#2—Follow company procedure.
 
Perhaps your company has specific forms that are distributed beforehand. Be sure to complete any forms that are mandatory for the review. There may also be forms passed out that are optional. If possible, fill out these forms, as well, and make copies of all completed forms for your own records.
 
#3—Discuss your goals in the review.
 
This refers to both your professional and personal goals. Your manager should realize that you won’t be truly happy in your job if your personal life is suffering as a result of it. Discussing your personal life in a performance review shouldn’t be taboo. In fact, it’s something that should be done. If you aren’t free to do so, perhaps you should consider employment at another company.
 
#4—Prepare a list of questions that you want to ask.
 
The interview process is a two-way street, and so is your performance review. You may have pertinent questions to ask about the company’s goals, the direction it wants to take, and how you fit into the overall picture. Asking these questions will indicate that you’ve thought about your role in the future success of the company.
 
#5--Be professional at all times.
 
You may hear some things in your review that you don’t agree with or that you don’t understand. Remember to stay calm. Also remember that this review is about you, so don’t make reference to a co-worker’s performance (or in your opinion, their lack of one).
 
#6—Offer solutions, not excuses.
 
Be prepared to discuss any problems that may have occurred during the past year. If there are certain things you feel that you need in order to do your job in a better fashion (a new software program, a training course), bring this up. You’ll impress your manager more by devising solutions to past problems than by saying “It was all Bob’s fault.” Even if it wasBob’s fault.
 
#7—Come to a consensus and keep an open mind.
 
Communication is always important, but especially so during your performance review. Make sure that when the review is winding down that you and your manager are on the same page. Once you’ve done that, keep an open mind about the merit increase you do receive. (If you do receive one.)
 
Don’t dread your annual performance review, especially if it’s just around the corner. Prepare for it, and make it the best review you possibly can.
 
If you are currently seeking a new job, Time Staffing’s team of qualified staffing specialists offers assistance to job seekers in the light industrial and clerical fields. We prep candidates thoroughly by answering their questions and addressing their concerns.
 
Earlier this year, Time Staffing won ClearlyRated’s Best of Staffing Client and Talent Awards for providing superior service to their clients and candidates. ClearlyRated’s Best of Staffing Award is the only award in the U.S. and Canada that recognizes staffing agencies that have proven superior service quality based entirely on ratings provided by their clients and job candidates. Time Staffing received satisfaction scores of 9 or 10 out of 10 from 75.4% of their placed talent, significantly higher than the industry’s average of 45%.
 
Contact us today to find out about the employment opportunities that are available in your chosen field!

The end of 2020 is almost here, and what a year 2020 was!
 
You’re probably as eager as everybody else to put this year in the “rearview mirror” and move on to what will hopefully be a better year and a much better future. And as part of that, you’re more than likely planning for the success of your company or organization.
 
The key to your success in the coming year will boil down to the strength of your team. But how do you know if you’re on the right track and planning in the correct fashion? Here’s a quick checklist to help ensure success in 2021.
 
#1—Retaining key employees.
 
Have you implemented systems, incentives, career development plans, career paths, evaluations, and clear direction that will keep your key people with you for another year? Have you created a work environment/schedule that helps them to keep their life and work in balance?
 
#2—Hiring top job candidates.
 
Hiring great candidates is just as important as retaining great employees. If possible, set a goal of interviewing one person each month to build your team. Ideally, you should be able to hire one great job candidate from this list. Consider how much easier your life would be with another top performer on your staff.
 
#3—Building your employment brand.
 
Make certain that you and your people can articulate your company’s goals, vision, mission, and culture quickly and honestly. Use this information in all of your employment advertising, on your company’s website, and during your interviews.
 
#4—Raising the bar.
 
Determine how you’re going to help the least effective person on your team find another position in your company (or outside of it) so that they can enjoy a more rewarding career and so you can replace them with someone better.
 
#5—Training and developing.
 
Create a list of ways that you’re going to increase the skills (and therefore) the productivity of your team through training in the coming year.
 
#6—Incentivizing pay.
 
Review the current compensation plan and make certain that it encourages the members of your team to reach their highest productivity levels.
 
If you need temporary or direct employees for your workforce, then Time Staffing can help! We have experience identifying and screening top-notch candidates in numerous fields for a variety of employers. Our goal is help you hire the right employee at the right time to get the right results.
 
Earlier this year, Time Staffing won ClearlyRated’s Best of Staffing Client and Talent Awards for providing superior service to their clients and candidates. ClearlyRated's Best of Staffing Award is the only award in the U.S. and Canada that recognizes staffing agencies that have proven superior service quality based entirely on ratings provided by their clients and job candidates. Time Staffing received satisfaction scores of 9 or 10 out of 10 from 75.4% of their placed talent, significantly higher than the industry’s average of 45%.
 
Contact Time Staffing today to find out more about our placement services for employers!

In our previous blog post, we presented some tips for staying focused during your next job interview. In this week’s post, we’re addressing the topic of “selling yourself” during that interview. When we say this, we mean that you’re selling your skills, your enthusiasm, your ambition, you name it.
 
The stark reality of the situation is this: if you’re sitting in an interview and you’re not selling yourself, you’re wasting everybody’s time, including your own.
 
Not everybody is comfortable with the idea of selling themselves, but those job candidates who do so successfully are the ones who land the jobs they desire. By engaging in the five steps below, you can improve the outcome of any job interview.
 
#1—Do your homework.
 
Conduct targeted research about the company. Some things you’ll want to discover are who the company’s competitors are, and if possible, what the company’s mission statement is. With the availability of information on the Internet, finding this out should not be difficult.
 
#2—Bring your own questions.
 
An interview is far from a one-way street. There’s no rule stating that you can’t ask any questions. You should ask questions, and the interviewer will more than likely be expecting you to do so. However, be sure to review each and every question for clarity and relevance.
 
#3—Be prepared with specific examples of your accomplishments.
 
Citing goals met or projects completed is one way to do this. Don’t be vague about what you’ve accomplished. Providing specific examples will help you to achieve the next (and quite possibly most important) step of the selling process, which is below.
 
#4—Emphasize the value you would bring to the company.
 
This is the bottom line when it comes to selling yourself. Your goal is to ensure that when the interview is over, the person sitting across from you will have an excellent idea of how you will add considerable value to the company. If you’ve done your homework properly and have brought specific examples of past achievements, your chances of accomplishing this goal will increase dramatically.
 
#5—End the interview on a positive note.
 
Although you should show enthusiasm throughout the entire process, it’s especially important to do so at the end of the interview. This denotes not only excitement about the position, but also an eagerness to move forward. The interviewer should get the sense that you’re ready to take the next step, and if you’ve sold yourself properly, you’ll be well on your way to taking that step.
 
Remember that you want to be just as proactive in an interview as you are reactive. Sure, you’ll be answering plenty of questions and taking your cue from the person conducting the interview. But you’ll also have ample opportunity to initiate conversation, ask questions of your own, and affect the direction and the scope of the interview.
 
And many times, you’ll have to be proactive in order to effectively sell yourself!
 
If you are currently seeking a new job, Time Staffing’s team of qualified staffing specialists offers assistance to job seekers in the light industrial and clerical fields. We prep candidates thoroughly by answering their questions and addressing their concerns.
 
Earlier this year, Time Staffing won ClearlyRated’s Best of Staffing Client and Talent Awards for providing superior service to their clients and candidates. ClearlyRated’s Best of Staffing Award is the only award in the U.S. and Canada that recognizes staffing agencies that have proven superior service quality based entirely on ratings provided by their clients and job candidates. Time Staffing received satisfaction scores of 9 or 10 out of 10 from 75.4% of their placed talent, significantly higher than the industry’s average of 45%.
 
Contact us today to find out about the employment opportunities that are available in your chosen field!

There is plenty in the world today that can distract you during a job interview, starting with the fact that the interview may or may not be an in-person interview. However, that’s why it’s even more important to stay focused in this situation.
 
What should you be thinking about during a job interview?
 
It seems like a simple, harmless question, but in reality it’s an extremely important one. That’s because if you’re thinking about the wrong things, then it could cost you a job that you really want. In order to keep yourself on task and give yourself the best chance you can of landing the job, keep these three aspects of the interview in mind:
 
#1—The ultimate goal is to move to the next level or receive an offer.
 
During the interview, you shouldn’t be thinking about whether or not you would fit in with the company or even whether or not you want the job. That’s a decision for later, when you’re not sitting in front of the hiring authority. If you distract yourself with thoughts like these, you won’t be able to accomplish #2 on this list.
 
#2—You should always present yourself in the best possible light.
 
In order to do this, you must be able to effectively convey to the hiring authority evidence of your skills, talents, and accomplishments. And this goes well beyond what that person can read on your resume. It includes appearance, interpersonal communication, your answers to their questions, etc. Your full attention and focus should be on what is going on during the interview right now. 
 
Don’t get ahead of yourself and start thinking about anything outside of the interview. Even if you hear something that you don’t like or that is potentially discouraging, file it away for future consideration. Don’t dwell on it now, as it could disrupt your concentration and dampen your enthusiasm, thereby turning off the hiring authority. There’s a chance you may have misunderstood, anyway. How upset would you be if the job got away because of a simple misunderstanding?
 
#3—The interview is a two-way street.
 
You should be interviewing the company at the same time that you’re being interviewed. Ask questions that you believe are important. Find out as many facts as you can about the company in general and the position you’re interviewing for specifically. The more information you gather now, the better of a decision that you can make later. 
 
The interview process, of course, is a crucial part of finding a new job. That’s why it’s vitally important to go about it the right way, starting with a proper frame of mind. To be sure, there are plenty of tough decisions to be made when searching for a new job, but there’s a time and a place to make those decisions.
 
The time for reflection is after the interview is over, not while the interview is occurring. If you follow this guideline, you’ll be mentally prepared to present yourself as well as you possibly can. And you’ll give yourself a much better chance of getting the job.
 
If you are currently seeking a new job, Time Staffing’s team of qualified staffing specialists offers assistance to job seekers in the light industrial and clerical fields. We prep candidates thoroughly by answering their questions and addressing their concerns.
 
Earlier this year, Time Staffing won ClearlyRated’s Best of Staffing Client and Talent Awards for providing superior service to their clients and candidates. ClearlyRated’s Best of Staffing Award is the only award in the U.S. and Canada that recognizes staffing agencies that have proven superior service quality based entirely on ratings provided by their clients and job candidates. Time Staffing received satisfaction scores of 9 or 10 out of 10 from 75.4% of their placed talent, significantly higher than the industry’s average of 45%.
 
Contact us today to find out about the employment opportunities that are available in your chosen field!

There are plenty of challenges in the employment marketplace when there isn't a pandemic raging across the country. That's why the hiring process is even more important during times like these. And when we say that, what we really mean is your organization's hiring process.
 
Because that's the one you really care about... is it not?
 
With that in mind, below are two good reasons to make sure that your organization's hiring process is timely:
 
#1 - How you handle the interview process is a reflection of your company.
 
Remember that the job candidate is forming an opinion of you during this process, just as you are evaluating them. If the process is long and cumbersome, the candidate may think to themselves, "If this is what the interview is like, what will working for them be like?"
 
An interview process that is concise, targeted, and efficient will not only be effective in finding the right person for the position, but it will also impress that person and create in them an even greater desire to work for your company.
 
#2 - Time is money.
 
The longer it takes for you to fill an open position with a candidate, and more importantly, the right candidate, the more productivity your company will lose. So - if a great candidate gets away because the interview process dragged on too long, not only did you lose that person, but you also lost an undeterminable amount of money in terms of productivity.
 
You must find another candidate, who may or may not be as good as the one who got away, and you also have to invest more time into the process. Neither of those are attractive options.
 
Refining your process is a wise investment of time, one from which you can reap many benefits.  Dragging out the process, for whatever reason, is not. Quick decisions are a two-way street, and the last thing you want is to be run down in both directions.
 
If you need temporary or direct employees for your workforce, then Time Staffing can help! We have experience identifying and screening top-notch candidates in numerous fields for a variety of employers. Our goal is help you hire the right employee at the right time to get the right results.
 
Earlier this year, Time Staffing won
ClearlyRated's Best of Staffing Client and Talent Awards for providing superior service to their clients and candidates. ClearlyRated's Best of Staffing Award is the only award in the U.S. and Canada that recognizes staffing agencies that have proven superior service quality based entirely on ratings provided by their clients and job candidates. Time Staffing received satisfaction scores of 9 or 10 out of 10 from 75.4% of their placed talent, significantly higher than the industry's average of 45%.
 
Contact Time Staffing today to find out more about our placement services for employers!