If your business relies on temporary labor to get through the holiday season, chances are you’re already gearing up. While we’ve already run down tips for classifying, scheduling, and reporting on your temporary labor, there are a few extra steps to consider when hiring seasonal employees.
In this article, we look at three more ways to better manage temporary labor services.
Temporary labor tip #1: Get strategic with holiday retail hiring
Temporary labor requires—you guessed it—temporary management. Whether you’re an owner, manager, or administrator, hiring seasonal employees is a necessary but often time consuming project. Make sure you’re doing it as efficiently as possible.
Get ahead of the temporary management game
- Consider offering permanent employees a fixed amount of extra work instead of hiring seasonal employees. Some won’t be traveling as much around the holidays as they typically would, and others could use an opportunity to earn extra money.
- Offer temporary-to-permanent positions when it makes sense for your bottom line.
- Think about using a managed service provider (MSP). They can advise on wages and when to use consultants versus temps, negotiate with agencies for the best rates, and broaden your hiring pool.
- Research market rates for the type of temporary labor services you need. Wages may have changed in your industry, especially over the past few years, and you need to be sure you’re squaring up your budget with the market and demand.
Temporary labor tip #2: Reevaluate your temp time tracker
When it comes to holiday retail hiring, you need a foolproof way to track temporary labor that doesn’t take a lot of time to teach. For most companies, a time tracking system like Time Tracker is the go-to for managing temporary labor services.
But before you start hiring seasonal employees, step back and take a look at how well your time tracking system worked last year. Ask a few key employees what worked well and what didn’t. And don’t be afraid to make a change if you need to.
Make sure your time tracking system:
- Makes it easy to add and remove employees, and to switch their status from active to inactive, which is especially helpful if you often hire the same people year over year.
- Allows you to set up different classes and wages for each temporary employee, and to set up appropriate permissions and safeguards for temporary management.
- Gives you a headstart when it comes to onboarding. Reputable time tracking systems will offer resources for onboarding that you can easily modify for temporary labor services. Test it with a few new hires right at the beginning of holiday retail hiring and refine the documentation as needed.
Temporary labor tip #3: Look at location tracking
One thing a surprising number of companies overlook when hiring seasonal employees is geotracking. If the work is getting done and hours are getting tracked, is GPS something your temporary management really needs? In an increasingly remote world, the answer is yes more often than you’d think—especially if it’s a feature that comes standard as part of your time tracking system like it does with Time Tracker.
Consider the industries hiring seasonal employees most often:
- Logistics
- Distribution
- Retail (stores, outlets)
- Warehouses
- Packing
- Shipping
- Delivery (UPS, USPS, flowers, groceries)
That’s just a handful of the businesses that are most likely to take advantage of temporary labor services, and every one could benefit from GPS.
How GPS can help temporary management
If you need to map a route before your team heads out or revise routes for better efficiency after drives are already en route, GPS can easily facilitate that. GPS tracking apps also often come with messaging capabilities, which means all users can easily and instantly communicate. And a time tracking system that uses GPS will ensure your team is working where and when they’re supposed to be.
For example, GPS through Time Tracker:
- Automatically clocks temporary labor in and out, showing exactly when an employee is at work and when they’re finished for the day
- Ensures employees aren’t running personal errands on your time, and
- Leads to fewer instances of dispute when it comes to paychecks because there’s an accurate time log as backup.
Best of all: It costs nothing if you’re already a Time Tracker customer.
Ready to take your temporary management skills to the next level?
A free 14-day trial of Time Tracker is a great place to start.
