We’re all looking forward to 2021 in every area of our lives. We’re exhausted by all the news, viruses and political races that 2020 brought.
What’s happening in the world of recruitment in 2021? and how does your cleaning business can prepare and take advantage of coming up trends in Cleaning HR?. Let’s take a look of what I see coming and what will be important to thrive, not survive in 2021.
1. A more Diverse Workforce
Diversifying you cleaning workforce has become more crucial than ever. I have heard from other successful cleaning business owners like Mark Baker from Motivated Maids how he is including everyone in the workforce, finding talent where he would normally wouldn’t look it and growing his Canadian cleaning service to be one of the largest in the country.
Applicants to cleaning technicians jobs agree that they tend to prefer to apply to companies where Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion is in place. So try hiring people you would normally hire, use a system to let the system do the sorting and not you. I see this error happening again and again, where the owner is the bottle neck of growth by not putting a system or process in place, so the office staff can do the hiring.
2. Better company-employee relationship.
Most job seekers are looking for employers who can handle a Covid-19 related life changes with more compassion and flexibility. Therefore, your recruitment strategy for 2021 should include focus on building and enhancing the company-employee relationship. Building this relationship with your employees is always a win-win.
One of the best ways to attract the top tier cleaning talent that I learned, is being intentional in making it a better place for work. I see this with my own employees that every so often bring me their friends and family members interested in applying to work with us. This saves time and resources of having to start from scratch when you need to hire a new cleaner.
3. Company Culture and Branding
Make 2021 the year to finally implement that dreamed company culture you had in mind.
I define company culture as the personality of to your company with your workforce and clients.
– Juan Chaparro
This starts from the moment they visit your website and apply for a job until, they meet your for a in person or zoom interview. All the touch points matter.
One of my favorite company cultures I see today is Trader Joe’s. I love their funny signs, colorful walls, quirky Hawaiian shirts 🌺 and unique way of doing things, but more importantly is their people, if you approach any of them, they have this cool vibe and real knowledge about their location. I think as cleaning business owners, can create great company culture within our companies, we might not have all the cool things that a brand like Trader Joe’s does but we have the PEOPLE, the most important asset in our businesses.
4. Use of Applicant Tracking Systems for Hiring
As technology keeps evolving with mobile and browser technologies it’s very important that your office implements an applicant tracking system for your cleaning business. Business owners don’t have time to sort manually anymore looking for the right candidate or if they meet requirements or can work legally in the U.S.
At Pipehire we have implemented a hiring funnel and scoring system for cleaning employees which takes the guesswork out of the job. Within our funnel you can see their Recruitment Score, this help you quickly determine the person for the position and to move forward with an interview, vs looking at hundred’s of resumes and trying to make a decision who moves into the next stage.
5. Full Online Identity lookup to make better hiring decisions
If you were to look into your applicants social media accounts, you wouldn’t hire many of them right?. In 2021 employee social media monitoring will take more importance to understand our workforce and make better decisions for our cleaning business.
Also continuous MVR monitoring of current employees and new candidates will become more important as technology and motor vehicle department make the data more accessible. This monitoring will reveal if they have been convicted of driving under the influence, traffic violations, or even unpaid parking tickets while working with you and entering your client’s homes.
⚠️ We tend to forget to monitor our current workforce where there’s a higher risk of failure than a new candidate that has not even started.
– Juan Chaparro
6. Remote office workers vs in-house.
As more industries and jobs transition into remote work, cleaning businesses are no exception. More cleaning business owners have opted out for working from home without any issues during 2020.
I’ve been doing it for 10 yrs with 6 people spread across several continents and I love it! Most office location issues are solved with a coworking space a virtual mail address and a regular 5×10 storage for cleaning supplies and distribution. I have even coached couple of owners into hiring their own virtual assistants and they are finding success in their journey using the lean maid business model. Tracking remote workers time isn’t rocket science, many cleaning businesses use Hubstaff to see what their teams are working on and track their time.
I believe most cleaning businesses can transition to full remote office if they are ok with not micromanaging their staff. 😀
7. Onboarding Process and Candidate Experience
Customer experience is key for our business, but don’t forget Candidate experience. Why? Because they are like clients, looking to buy into a job promise and put their trust and effort to get a paycheck and be able to provide for their family and reach their dreams. I see this process very fragmented and poorly designed for most of the industry. I’m constantly looking at cleaning businesses websites and find out their careers / jobs page is the last thing on their mind, it’s outdated and sometimes ask people to fax or email resumes.
I’ve learned that my business brand and experience will attract or deter the BEST candidates. I’m not looking for any candidate, I’m looking for the BEST because they want to work for the best cleaning company they can find locally. I have found this to be so true and so overlooked. Paying attention to this brings me better cleaning tech leads thus making the hiring process easier and getting better results overall. Now add to the best candidates a scoring system and funnel and you have well oiled machine to hire and recruit A players.
Don’t underestimate your careers page, your job form and how they get handled afterwards. This interactions will bring better and more stable cleaning techs as you keep growing your business.
Make 2021 your best year ever, thrive don’t survive. 💪
