Tag: Growth

Performance management is a term usually used to refer to the process of making sure that employees, activities, and/or outputs in an organization meet their goals. 

It involves things like evaluating employee performance and targets, as well as supporting employee growth and improving employee experience. Good performance management should focus on both company goals and employee satisfaction and should be managed in a positive way, rather than by overworking teams or setting unreasonable goals. 

When done right, performance management can improve productivity, create a strong culture of happiness and trust in a company, and help businesses understand where they need to improve if they want to meet their goals. 

Why is Performance Management Important? 

Good performance management enables employees to perform better because they are being supported, they have good training and instruction, and they are in an environment that encourages growth and new ideas. 

At the same time, it also makes it easier for a business as a whole to meet its goals. When employee performance is good and individual strengths are obvious, it’s easier for managers to put people into roles and teams where they can thrive, which leads to targets being met faster and better overall productivity. 

Without performance management, companies risk employee dissatisfaction, which in turn leads to losing employees, revenue, and profit. Without documented performance management, analyzing and growing from past mistakes is also difficult.  

Best Strategies for Performance Management 

There are a few tried and tested strategies for effective performance management that are helpful to both employees and management teams. Here are some of the top proven strategies for companies to help support employees and meet their goals: 

Holding Frequent Performance Meetings 

Having frequent meetings between managers and employees is important for setting and meeting goals, but also for catching any problems before they…

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Setting actionable professional development goals is invaluable for career progression. However, these goals impact many more areas of your professional life, including increasing productivity, clarifying your career path, improving job satisfaction, and becoming a better employee. Of course, the professional development goals you choose depend on your career aspirations.

You can identify reasonable individual goals by deciding where you want to be in five to ten years. Alternatively, you can use the results of your performance review to identify areas for improvement. Finally, ensure your goals are SMART: Specific, Measurable, Achievable, Relevant, and Time-bound. This post covers examples of the most common professional development goals. 

1. Do Your Job Better 

Setting professional development goals can be intimidating, requiring both time and money. However, you don’t need to have your entire career path mapped to identify relevant goals. Instead, you can start where you are with what you have—that is, learn to do your current job better. 

Workplace skills, also known as employability skills, refer to the basic proficiency or know-how required to perform your daily tasks at the workplace. These skills are often transferable, meaning they are still valuable even when you leave for a different company or start your own business. 

Focusing on the skills related to your current job or position is essential. For example, learning a new language might help you communicate better with a particular client demographic. Similarly, improving your public speaking skill can help you make more impactful and exciting presentations. 

Don’t worry if you don’t know where to start. Your most recent job evaluation can help you identify specific areas to improve. Some valuable workplace skills worth improving include:

• Communication 
• Management 
• Problem-solving 
• Organization 
• Self-regulation 
• Time management 
• Teamwork

Developing your workplace skills offers some of the best returns on investment. For example, you’ll…

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Paycor is a payroll processing provider that serves more than 2.3 million users. Paycor modernizes the HR process with automated and flexible tools and combines them with best-in-class implementation tactics that ensure a seamless software transition. 

With additional products in talent management, workforce management, and benefits administration, Paycor can become an all-in-one provider for all things HR and payroll. 

Paycor Compared

Paycor didn’t make it onto our top list, but that doesn’t mean it doesn’t provide a satisfying service. With that said, the best online payroll service for most people is Gusto because of its excellent ability to cater to dispersed and hybrid workforces. Sign up for Gusto today, with pricing plans starting at just $46 per month. 

Want to read more about the top best online payroll services? We reviewed dozens of options and narrowed it down to the top five. If you want to scope out all of your options, see all of our top picks here.

• Gusto — Best for dispersed workforces
• Paychex — Best for experienced payroll teams
• OnPay — Best for simplifying all things payroll
• QuickBooks Payroll — Best for solopreneurs and small teams
• ADP — Best for never outgrowing your payroll provider

About Paycor

Even though Paycor didn’t make it onto our top list, it still offers a wide range of products, services, and features that make payroll processing easier. Paycor aims to simplify the payroll process so you don’t waste valuable time. 

Paycor’s suite of products includes payroll and HR software, analytics, recruiting and onboarding software, time and attendance software, and scheduling software. Paycor also supports employees with a learning management and…

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Sterling is a background check company specializing in criminal history checks, identity verifications, and drug and health screenings. Completing more than 95 million background checks annually, Sterling ensures that you can build a foundation of trust and safety among your employees in any industry with its overall accuracy.

Sterling offers a comprehensive background check solution for businesses of any size and promptly delivers the results you need.

Sterling Compared

Although Sterling didn’t make it onto our top list, it still offers extensive background check features that cater to small and medium-sized businesses. With that said, the best background check company for most people is Intelius because it has the functionality for unlimited background checks without an excessive price point. Sign up today and start a five-day unlimited trial for just $1.99. 

Want to read more about the top best background check companies? We reviewed dozens of options and narrowed it down to the top five. If you want to scope out all of your options, see all of our top picks here.

• Intelius — Best for unlimited background checks
• GoodHire — Best for flexible pricing and intermittent use
• B&B Reporting — Best for next-day background check results
• Accurate — Most affordable background checks for small businesses
• Verifirst — Best background check service for property management companies

About Sterling

Even though Sterling didn’t make it onto our top list, that doesn’t mean it’s a poor product. Sterling offers an extensive solution for general screenings that make it easier for you to hire faster and more efficiently. 

Sterling’s comprehensive suite of products includes general screenings, drug and health screenings, financial and…

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Our favorite ADP alternative is Gusto because it has built-in time tracking, automated payroll cycles, and plenty of other comprehensive features. Start your 30-day free trial to determine whether it fits your needs.

ADP provides excellent payroll services to many small and large enterprises. Even though ADP made it to our list of top payroll service providers, it is not the only option, nor necessarily the best one for every business.

The Quick Sprout research team spent hundreds of hours analyzing many payroll service providers. After carefully studying the data and creating a criteria system, our team narrowed the list to the top five online payroll services we recommend.

The 5 Best Online Payroll Services

The best ADP alternative is Gusto, which is ideal for remote teams and provides them with several tools to manage their payroll activities seamlessly, even with a dispersed workforce. Start your 30-day free trial to see if it’s the right fit for you.  

• Gusto — Best for dispersed workforces
• Paychex — Best for experienced payroll teams
• OnPay — Best for simplifying all things payroll
• QuickBooks Payroll — Best for solopreneurs and small teams
• ADP — Best for never outgrowing your payroll provider

Read a detailed review of each of the mentioned payroll services here to make an informed decision for your business.

Gusto – Best for Dispersed Workforces

More than 200,000 businesses trust Gusto across the US for payroll processing. It offers plenty of features that help in onboarding and managing employees. It is…

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Many businesses use biweekly or bimonthly payroll cycles to compensate their employees. For the most part, employees get paid twice a month with both methods, but each has several key differences that determine if it works well in a given company or industry.

Bimonthly and biweekly payments differ mainly in their payroll processing timing. However, finer details, like efficiency and the types of employees you have, will affect which one you choose. Payroll processing software can help you keep track of your pay periods and ensure that your employees get paid correctly and on time.

1. Number of Yearly Paychecks 

Bimonthly or semimonthly pay cycles give employees 24 paychecks per year, two per month. Many companies issue these payments at the beginning and middle or the middle and end of each month. 

A biweekly payment cycle issues a paycheck every two weeks, so employees receive two additional paychecks per year for a total of 26. As a result, employees get three paychecks during two months of the year. If the first paycheck falls on a Friday early in the month, employees will get paid on that day, another Friday in the middle of the month, and a third Friday at the end of the month.

Gusto helps everyone on your team process payroll fast and get paid on time every pay period.

The difference in the number of paychecks doesn’t affect how much your employees get paid—it just distributes that payment differently. For some people, getting paid biweekly makes them feel like they’re making more money, and it can be convenient since they don’t have to wait as long between pay cycles. With bimonthly paychecks, they may have to wait a few extra days.

A payroll processing service like

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As a manager, scheduling employee shifts is likely one of your most tedious and time-consuming tasks. That’s where employee availability forms come into the picture. These forms are a vital asset for any business employing shift workers. Considering how time-intensive planning employee work schedules are, the clear and concise format of employee availability forms brings more structure, reducing shift scheduling headaches.

1. Understand What Employee Availability Forms Are And Why They’re Important

An employee availability form is kind of self-explanatory—it’s a form where employees can list the days and hours they’re available to work, as well as the days and hours they absolutely cannot work.

Think of it as a document containing basic information about each employee, along with their contact details, to make the process of scheduling shifts straightforward and headache-free.

Employee availability forms help simplify and streamline your team’s schedule. Without it, staff scheduling can be messy and time-consuming, with constant back and forth between multiple employees to check their availability and constant reviewing of schedules.

Moreover, certain shifts require employees with specific skills and character traits. If you don’t assign the right person for these jobs because of availability issues, your customers may leave unsatisfied, and your business will suffer. 

Let me explain—suppose you run a restaurant and have created the perfect schedule to handle a rush hour at lunchtime with efficient and personal employees. Now, if one or two of these employees don’t turn up because of availability issues, that shift will go from smooth and easy to stressful and overworked, which can hurt your customer experience that day and potentially your restaurant’s reputation.

Implementing up-to-date and accurate employee availability forms can prevent staff unavailability and poor service issues. You’ll know who can work when and accordingly create schedules that strike the right balance between your…

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If you believe your business is only as strong as your employees, acquiring talent should be an ongoing focus. When seeking talent, you want to make sure you are considering as many of the best people as possible. Talent sourcing strategies can help you find great candidates who may not be actively applying at your company.

What Is Talent Sourcing?

Talent sourcing involves taking active steps to identify and recruit the best candidates for your company, even before you have a specific opening. You may conduct extensive research about the identified candidates for high-level jobs before contacting them to gauge interest. 

Through successful talent sourcing, you should have a pool of candidates who would fit well in your company. Once a job vacancy occurs, you already have a line of communication going on with potential high-level candidates.

You don’t have to limit your pool of candidates to those who are actively seeking a job when performing talent sourcing. Perhaps your research shows many of the most talented people already have a good job. You can still reach out to these potential candidates to gauge interest in working for you in the future.

Talent Sourcing Vs. Recruiting

Think of talent sourcing as seeking out people who may be great for a future opening. Recruiting involves actively seeking someone to fill a current job opening. Both talent sourcing and recruiting involve finding highly talented people for your company. 

Talent sourcing involves networking with those talented individuals, determining over time whether this person would be a good fit for your company. Talent sourcing can help you find candidates for highly specialized positions that may not be open for months or years in the future. 

Recruiting is more immediate. You are trying to fill a position that is currently open with a highly talented…

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Make sound hiring decisions with Intelius, the best background check company for most businesses. Start your 7-day trial at a discounted rate of only $0.95.

Considering the candidate’s background is a no-brainer before making any personnel hiring decisions. It isn’t illegal to do a background check to find out about a person’s work history, education, criminal record, financial history, and medical history—in fact, it’s encouraged as a way to narrow down your candidate pool to the most worthy and reliable individuals. When doing background checks for employment, you need to consider several factors, including why they’re important, what they entail, and how to conduct them.

The 5 Best Companies for Employment Background Checks

Although not mandatory, background checks help you hire reliable and talented people and remove candidates who may hurt your business and brand. After an in-depth search into the best background check companies on the market, we identified the following five to be the most efficient and thorough:

• Intelius — Best for unlimited background checks
• GoodHire — Best for flexible pricing and intermittent use
• B&B Reporting — Best for next-day background check results
• Accurate — Most affordable background checks for small businesses
• Verifirst — Best background check service for property management companies

What Is a Background Check for Employment?

A background check is a vetting process employers use to verify a candidate is who they claim to be. It involves determining the validity of the information presented by the candidate when applying for the job and identifying any potential red flags before officially hiring them.

Why Is Running a Pre-Employment Background Check Important?

Comprehensive background checks for employment have a wide range of benefits, including increasing application quality, reducing workplace violence, and…

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Paylocity is an online payroll and HR service that helps to simplify the payment processes of any-sized business in any industry. Paylocity goes beyond traditional software by combining payroll and HR, creating an all-in-one solution with functions in workforce management, talent, and benefits.

Paylocity offers flexible solutions with top-tier support, making it easy to automate processes and enhance employee and workplace connections.

Paylocity Compared

While Paylocity didn’t make it onto our top list, that doesn’t mean it’s not a decent product overall. With that said, the best online payroll service for most people is Gusto because of its easy accessibility and its ability to cater to remote and hybrid workforces. Sign up for Gusto today, with pricing plans starting at just $46 per month. 

Want to read more about the top best online payroll services? We reviewed dozens of options and narrowed it down to the top five. 

• Gusto — Best for dispersed workforces
• Paychex — Best for experienced payroll teams
• OnPay — Best for simplifying all things payroll
• QuickBooks Payroll — Best for solopreneurs and small teams
• ADP — Best for never outgrowing your payroll provider

If you want to scope out all of your options, see all of our top picks here.

About Paylocity

Even though Paylocity didn’t make it onto our top list, it still offers an all-in-one solution for all your payroll and HR needs. Paylocity aims to create a streamlined workflow for its clients without the need to outsource or pay for extra functionality. 

Paylocity’s products include payroll, human resources, workforce management, talent, benefits, employee experience, and data insights. Paylocity…

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