Insights: HR Professionals

By Amanda Fox

The most successful franchisors offer human-resources support across their franchise networks. This support is a referrable resource for the franchise owners to help them navigate the sometimes challenging and often changing world of employment. For this to work effectively, the human-resources advice provided to the franchisor should be delivered by an experienced HR professional. The advice should be tailored to the business model and the unique needs of the business, whilst being under-
pinned by the relevant legislation to ensure regulatory compliance at State and/or Federal levels.

Each operating franchise will have its own model for the delivery of human-resources advice based on their agreement and required service levels. The delivery of human-resources advice and support within a franchise will often be provided by a specialist outsourced provider; this ensures the best support is provided to the franchisee in times of need, with the added benefit of the service-provision costs being kept in check to support budgeting for the business model.

Human-resources support will often begin at the time of the business owner’s induction into the franchise model. This may be delivered in the form of a comprehensive human-resources induction, outlining the resources available to the franchisee and how these resources can be accessed by the franchisee.

The human-resources induction provides the onboarding franchisee an outline of their requirements from both legislative and best-practice perspectives, at the time they commence employing team members. This provides the franchisee with the foundations for employment and with these in place the employer is in a good position to avoid some of the challenges in the workplace – and the all too often costly mistakes. Having a human-resources expert on hand to assist in times of need allows the business to prevent problems in the workplace before they eventuate.

Depending on the model and service offering of the franchise, some human resources may be extended beyond the needs of employees within the franchise business, but also to the needs of their
clients.

For example, if we take the needs of a franchise operating in the bookkeeping space, it is very common for a bookkeeper to ensure compliance in the payment of wages. This advice will commonly be related to establishing exactly which Award applies to a particular role, and an employee’s classification under that Award. This task can be challenging, with 122 modern Awards in the Federal system. Quite often, a bookkeeper will seek human-resources advice on such matters. A bookkeeper who has access to a human-resources expert as part of their franchise will be at a huge advantage.

WHAT CAN YOU DO IF YOUR FRANCHISE MODEL OR YOUR BUSINESS DOES NOT CURRENTLY HAVE HUMAN RESOURCES ASSISTANCE?
The most practical and efficient answer is to outsource to a service provider, such as the HR Dept, who provide outsourced human-resources advice and support to small-to medium-sized businesses for a fraction of the cost of an inhouse resource.

Depending on the needs of the business, the service offering may vary, but essentially, outsourced human resources sit in three key areas:

HUMAN RESOURCES ADMINISTRATION

This spans across the entire employee life cycle, from recruitment to on-boarding, performance, development and exit. Administrative tasks are the most time-consuming, particularly writing and posting job adverts, drafting employment agreements, writing performance appraisals and documenting policies and procedures. The devil is in the detail with these tasks and it pays to get them right the first time. For example, an error in an employment agreement can end up being an expensive mistake for an unknowing employer.

HUMAN RESOURCES ADVICE

When we talk about HR advice, we are often addressing employer obligations under the relevant legislation and how this applies to certain situations in the workplace. It’s important to note that this legislation is subject to change; having an expert on hand to highlight relevant changes as they occur takes the pressure away from the business owner.

For example, what are the employer’s obligations around redundancy or termination? In such situations, it is important that the employer follows the required process – taking shortcuts or leaving out an important step can see the employer in hot water. Having human-resources advice on hand as required allows the business to navigate through these situations, avoiding costly mistakes.

Having a human-resources expert to rely on often serves as a great coaching tool to allow for employers to talk through scenarios with the employee and discuss the best course of action. Very often, outsourced human resources provides a sounding board for business owners who have limited other resources within the business to rely upon.

HUMAN RESOURCES STRATEGY AND TRAINING AND DEVELOPMENT

Most businesses have short, medium and long-term goals, in which the employees play a large part.

After a review of current positions and planned future objectives, a HR strategy can be developed with the strategies in place to roadmap how to best execute the vision. This may include such areas as recruitment, training and development of team members and succession planning.

This level of human-resources support is normally provided by an inhouse HR department but can be provided by an outsourced human-resources expert for a fraction of the cost, allowing the business owner to focus on running their business.

CONCLUSION

The three areas of human resources discussed do not operate in silos. It very often depends on the size of the business as to whether they will require all three. Outsourced human resources such as the HR Dept are here to help. This layered approach allows for bespoke and realistic business solutions to be delivered through outsourced human resources; the likes of which would otherwise typically be delivered by a multi-member human-resources team.

Amanda Fox is the HR Dept Perth Inner City franchisee.