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Don’t sweat summer hiring

It’s never too soon to start tackling your summer hiring needs.

It’s the middle of May and the college students are just starting to arrive home for summer break. As an employer, you assume you’ll be flooded with applications from superstar candidates looking for part-time work by hanging a “Help Wanted” sign in the front window, right? Think again.

According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, early summer sees a sizeable spike in the number of people actively looking for a job—the challenge employers face is how to attract the best applicants from those many job seekers. Below you’ll find proven tips on how to effectively hire the right workers to help carry your business through those warmer months.

• Get the word out early. Rather than waiting until June to let people know you’re hiring, develop your summer recruitment strategy months in advance. Also, be sure to contact dependable workers from summers past. This way, you’re not behind the curve once school lets out and the quality employees have already been snatched up by other employers.

• Integrate your strategy. A simple “Help Wanted” sign in the front window probably won’t produce droves of qualified applicants, so use all of your resources when trying to find help for summer. Take your job postings online, take out an ad in the newspaper and offer referral bonuses to your current employees. You want to make sure you cast a wide net so you can take your pick from a larger pool of candidates.

• Be prepared. Turnover rate is high in the hourly workforce – more than three times the average turnover rate for salaried positions – especially in the retail and restaurant industries. Even if you’re fully staffed, always have a few good applications on file and keep your recruitment pipeline filled in case a worker suddenly quits or is unable to work and you’re left shorthanded.

• Promote your benefits. Do you offer an employee discount on merchandise? Do your workers get to eat for free while on duty? Does this position allow for a flexible schedule? Whatever the perks of the job are, make sure you highlight them in your job descriptions. Students and teenagers comprise a large percentage of hourly workers, and the extra incentives will definitely get their attention.

• Stay in touch. Just because one of your employees has to leave in August to go back to school doesn’t mean he or she should be off your radar. Get contact information from those superstar seasonal workers and let them know you’d love to have them back on the job anytime they’re in town.

Because there’s only a small window of time for hiring quality summer employees, it’s important to start sooner rather than later, and target the workers you want with an integrated plan to cover all the bases. You’ll have applicants knocking down your door before you know it.