The HR Guy Answers Questions on Facebook Live!
31 October 2022
H.R. Guy Ian Schotanus Gives a Preview for the Upcoming SBE Odyssey Conference in February 2023

The Big Picture Consulting's famous H.R. Guy was featured in a Facebook Live session on October 26, where he answered questions about the bare minimum HR info that a contractor needs and some tips on how to retain your top employees.
Use this link to access a replay of this Facebook Live session: https://www.facebook.com/SBEOdyssey/videos/506255494443073
In this discussion, Ian outlined the four bare minimum requirements for any contracting company when it comes to HR:
- Quality Employee Handbook, which acts as the foundation of the relationship between employer and employee
- Usable and readable Safety Program, including training and measures for accountability
- Accountability, and the repercussions when employees don't hold to their end of the bargain
- Compliant Payroll, where many contractors are unintentionally shorting their employees in overtime wages.
Ian also previewed the topic he'll be speaking on in the 2023 SBE Odyssey Conference
in Scottsdale, AZ in February: enhancing the employee experience beyond the paycheck. A couple key highlights:
- To keep good employees, you need to focus on intentional communication and helping your employees feel appreciated from the moment they start working with you.
- Respect your employees as people, give them work/life balance, and let them see that you have their back. When a customer makes unreasonable demands that will require one of your techs to work well beyond their scheduled time, tell the customer clearly that you value your employees and simply can't accommodate. This sort of support will help make you the company employees want to stick with.
- Even if you're short-staffed, It's usually better to let go of a toxic employee right away, before they can impact the rest of your employees. If employees aren't willing to work with you on the company vision, you need to let them go.

Reasonable Accommodations in the workplace are no joke - you can get into serious legal trouble if you don't comply with the ADA. Yet here's a case study on a company who terminated someone for an issue directly related to their disability and was not held legally liable. Check out the details of how this might apply to your business.