How To Hire Employees for a Small Business

Natalie Barbu: Hi, everyone. I'm Natalie Barbu. And I'm the CEO and co-founder of Rella, an app for social media teams to easily collaborate with their team and clients and manage all of their content. One of the hardest things that I have found about running a company is the hiring process. The people that you hire at your companies really determine who you are as a company. And I personally think that the people determine the success of the company.

Today, we are diving into one of the most crucial aspects of running a business, and that is hiring the right employees. But first, how do you know that it's the right time to hire? If you say yes to any of these, then I think it's time to hire. If you are a solopreneur with a ton of responsibilities, you're constantly context switching throughout the day, and you never feel like you have enough time in the day to get your work done.

Trust me, I know that delegating can be really hard, especially when you are used to doing everything on your own. But hiring is going to take the load off of your plate and allow your company to grow, and it's gonna allow you to work on your business and not just in your business. If you're someone that works with clients and you have a growing client roster, that is a good thing, and should require some celebration. But also, you can hire someone to take over some accounts, so you can bring on more people onto your roster. It means that your company is scaling.

So by hiring someone, you can take on more clients and more projects and have your company grow even more. If you already have a team, but everyone is a jack of all trades, and you're looking for someone that has a little bit more of a specific expertise – for example, if you are looking to run paid advertising, you are going to need someone that is an expert in paid ads and has prior experience to that, not just a general marketing hire. Or, if you're looking for a developer, you're gonna need someone that knows how to code in a specific language and can make your project come to life, not just someone that is kind of technical. That's when you know it's time to hire.

Whether you're looking for your first person or you're expanding your team, I got you covered. So listen up. Here is how you are going to find the perfect person for your team. 

The very first step in hiring is defining the role that you're looking to fill. Be very specific about the responsibilities, the job qualifications, and the required skills that you're looking for. Not only will this be helpful for the people applying, it's gonna help you already filter out the right candidates. And you're setting clear expectations from the start for those who are interested in applying.

One tip that I like to add is to look at other job listings out there to get a little bit of inspiration in the qualifications, the responsibilities, and the descriptions. You can take some ideas there and include it in your own (job listing). 

Next, you're gonna craft a compelling job description.

You've already highlighted the key responsibilities, the required skills, and now add what makes your company unique. A well written job description and a vision for your company is going to attract the right candidate, and they're gonna get a feel of what to expect if they work for your specific company. 

Now that you have that, it's time to actually post your job. I've used sites like LinkedIn, Indeed, Fiverr, and Upwork, but my personal favorite is Upwork. I find that it is the easiest and quickest way to post a job listing, and you find candidates from all over the world that are very serious candidates.

As a remote team, we like to hire talent from all over the world, so it doesn't matter where they live. On Upwork, you have the global talent pool to choose from, which I personally love, because we found some great candidates all over the world – flexible hiring options. So whether you're looking for part time, full time, freelancer, contractor, you can find them on Upwork. It has a really streamlined workflow when it comes to hiring.

You can start communicating with them directly on Upwork, and you can hire someone, like, immediately. And there are secure payments, so you make sure that the freelancer gets paid when you're satisfied with their work. I've had such positive experiences on Upwork, so we consistently go back to them. Seriously, it's the easiest way to hire someone for your next project. Once the applications start coming in, now it's time to actually screen the candidates.

On Upwork, they have a vetting process so that you make sure that you're not wasting anyone's time – your own or the candidate's time – if they're not qualified for the job. This is the time where you need to make sure that you are reviewing their portfolio, looking at their reviews, checking out their prior relevant work experience, and also conducting any interviews. And by doing all of this, it's gonna help you narrow it down to the most promising candidates. 

During the interview process, make sure that you're asking very open ended questions because this is gonna gauge how well they fit into the company culture, their skills, their past experience. And it's gonna allow you to really get to know the candidate.

Although company culture might not be the first thing that you're thinking of when you're hiring, it is so important. You want to hire someone that fits in culturally and resonates with your company values. As a start up, I always want to make sure that the employees that we hire have a hunger to learn and bonus points if they come recommended from others. 

Make sure that you are taking notes on every single person that you are interviewing so that when it comes down to choosing, you can compare them to the other candidates. I also suggest doing a few rounds of interviews versus just a single interview, and have other members of the team interview them so that you have different perspectives. Something that I've liked to do in the past is to give a project to the candidate so that we can even see their working style. 

And once you find the right candidate, it is not over. You now have to make a compelling offer and be competitive. As I mentioned in the beginning, the people that you hire are what make your company your company, and they will determine the success of it. The best way to give an offer is to communicate the job very, very clearly.

You wanna make sure that you are setting the expectations, including responsibilities, the start date, any benefits that are included, and be as straightforward as possible. And you're gonna have to be prepared to negotiate the terms to make sure that both parties are happy, especially if a candidate has multiple offers, which good candidates typically do. You wanna make sure that they already feel valued and excited to be a part of your company. Showing them your excitement and your appreciation can really make a huge difference.

It comes down to deciding which offer they'll accept. And then once the terms are accepted, don't forget to formalize it in a contract, listing out all of the terms, benefits, compensation, all of the details, and have both parties sign it. And once the offer is accepted and signed, now the onboarding process can begin. This is the exciting part. Onboarding is essential for integrating new hires onto your team.

You wanna start by introducing them to their future coworkers, providing an orientation, giving them a few more details about the company, the culture, the values. I personally like to make my onboarding presentations on Canva because it doesn't take me a lot of time, and it makes them look really pretty and with our branding. Make sure that they have all of the necessary tools to do their job quickly and efficiently. They should have all of the tools, the logins, the systems, the resources that they need to get started. And I would personally explain all of this in the onboarding presentation so they can look back on it if they ever get confused.

This is important in the beginning, but I also like to have these throughout the year. But schedule regular check-ins. Especially during the initial period, you wanna make sure that you're addressing any concerns, answering any of their questions, and just making sure that they're on the right track. Onboarding can feel super intimidating for a lot of new hires, and you wanna make sure that they feel supported during this process. By following these steps, you are on your way to building a really strong team, and I am so excited for you.

If you found this video helpful, don't forget to like this video, subscribe, and turn on the notifications for more tips and advice. Thank you so much for watching, and good luck with the hiring process.