I decided a celebration of the good things about being an employer was in order. These things apply whether you own your own business or you manage someone else’s business.

I am often asked why anyone would want to work in HR – with a clear implication that it involves a lot of unpleasant ‘stuff’ no-one likes doing. This is partly true, but it’s not all bad by any means.

On other occasions, when I have been a self- employed consultant and I have been asked why I haven’t employed staff to help with the workload, I have cynically replied that I know all about employment and why would anyone be an employer? We can become a bit jaded if we have been through some tough employment issues of late but let’s not forget the positives. I decided a celebration of the good things about being an employer was in order. These things apply whether you own your own business or you manage someone else’s business.

At the highest level every person you employ and every wage you pay is a vital contribution to our economy and society in many ways. You, personally and directly, have improved our employment statistics. You have boosted the tax take that funds so many great things like health, education and our national infrastructure.

Closer to home, at a very practical level, you are feeding the families of your employees, paying the bills, and building homes. If you provide health insurance you may have helped your employees in a time of real need. If you have EAP or other wellbeing initiatives you are helping people to be well and live better and stay in better shape for their loved ones. Over the long term you are helping your employees save for their retirement (it doesn’t matter that it’s compulsory).

When you recruit, train and develop people you are developing their skills, their confidence, and their career. Sometimes this includes supporting them to step outside your organisation to continue their growth. You are providing opportunities that will lead them down all sorts of pathways to bright futures. It is satisfying to share our knowledge and experience and enthusiasm for our respective field with those coming behind us. You often learn something from them as well – most likely an app on your phone you’d never heard of, and if you’re lucky some insights into how they see your organisation that are pure gold.

Even when you provide casual holiday jobs to tertiary students which helps your business at a busy time, you are powering the next generation of employees to start their employment journey. When you employ part time school students on the weekend you are teaching them life skills, work habits and team behaviours that will help them find their first ‘real’ job.

When you create a team, small or large, you are bringing people together and creating all kinds of connections that enrich their lives. In the workplace your employees develop friendships that last a lifetime. They connect with people who become their flatmates, sports team-mates, car pool buddies, or mentors.

Depending on the jobs you can offer and the industry you are in you may be providing your employees with a purpose and an opportunity to make a difference to others or to our world. That’s a pretty cool reason to be an employer.

You are most likely helping the people who work for you to fulfil their dreams – whether that is doing their dream job or perhaps saving money to achieve their dream – a house, overseas travel, or a car.

Employment is not just a transaction where we are trading work for money – it’s a relationship that can enrich your life and your employees’ lives. Be proud to be an employer. Celebrate the good times for your own sake as well as your staff. When times are tough and you have to make the hard calls remember all the good you are doing, every single day.

Organisations generally invest significant amounts of time on the recruitment process to fill vacancies, plus checking the credentials of the preferred candidate and getting them signed up. After investing all that time and money it’s important to get your new employee off to a good start.

It may be timely to review your induction process, or if you don’t really have a process, to consider developing some structure around it. The first impression you make on your new employee in the initial days and weeks will very likely have a lasting impact. Assuming they arrive at the new job excited and enthusiastic, the last thing you want to do is diminish the new energy you just brought to the business.

These days most businesses give priority to a sound health and safety induction, which is absolutely critical. This needs to be done by someone who believes in safety and can communicate your culture and expectations relating to safety. It needs to be documented so you have evidence of completion but try to ensure that it doesn’t come across merely as a compliance exercise to ‘tick the boxes’.

Taking time to think beyond the essentials like health and safety means you can create a well organised and consistent experience for your new hires. They will feel like they have joined a professional, well run organisation and that you care about your employees by taking time to settle them into the new job thoroughly.

It is beneficial to include organisation history, values and culture in your induction programme. This helps the new employee to connect with the organisation and to begin to understand ‘how we do things around here’ and why that is. It can also engender pride in the business (we are the biggest, the first, fastest growing, started from small beginnings, proud to be family owned etc.)

In a small organisation you may only need a one page checklist to remind you of the key information to cover off (key people the new appointee should meet, building security and facilities, payroll paperwork, computer log-in, any equipment or uniform to be issued, house rules, hours and break times and so on).

In larger organisations you will probably have a policy manual for the employee to read through and sign-off. This may be on-line, as so many things are these days. This is great for allowing the employee to go through the information at their own pace and to refer back to material later, and can be presented in a very engaging way with useful links to follow and video content and so forth.

There is often a lot of information to present to new employees so you need to consider ‘information overload’ and what can realistically be absorbed on day one or two. Consider the pace of the induction process and what you can reasonably spread over the first week rather than the first day.

While the paperwork and/or the online process is valuable you also need to be careful not to overlook the human factor. This includes introducing new hires to key people so they know who’s who in person, rather than a list of names and positions in the manual. Each of those introductions also makes the person feel welcome and is opportunity to express how pleased the organisation is to have them on board.

Most organisations will assign another team member as a ‘buddy’ for the first few weeks. This provides someone the new hire can ask what may feel like dumb questions in the early stages, rather than having to bother their manager. Hopefully they can also provide some social support in the first few

days to make sure their new colleagues meets team mates, knows where to park, where to buy lunch, and has some company for lunch if wanted at the start. Again, it’s important to choose the right person for the buddy role, making sure they are approachable, knowledgeable about company processes, have the time to devote to the task and will be a positive influence.

The little things count. Make sure someone is assigned to get the workplace essentials ready for when the new employee arrives so they feel welcome and that you are well organised – workstation, computer, phone, stationery, uniform, PPE, equipment, and so on. It also means they can be productive quickly, rather than waiting for email access and IT log-ins to be set up.

We all know that being thrown in the deep end is not a good way to start a new job. Having invested in finding the right person, it makes sense to put some effort into settling them into the job well to make the appointment a success for both parties.