Hiring loyal, reliable, and skilled employees for your manufacturing business is getting harder and harder. More and more people are lining up to gain university degrees (and large amounts of debt) while shunning trade jobs in manufacturing, carpentry, electrical, plumbing and more, finding and hiring the right people is becoming a major pain point for manufacturers.

An ongoing request we hear from our customers at our ERP User Conferences is – help us find good talent.

Here are 3 ways your ERP software can help make hiring the right people a little simpler:

1. Use your ERP software to get accurate job descriptions. Create excitement for the job with great detail and their part in the bigger picture. By reviewing the exact work the previous person in the role did (since they clocked in and out of every job using Shop Floor Data Collection), you can provide an in-depth description of the work they will do, exactly how long it will take them to do it each day, and show them the finished good they are making. For example, bring a finished good into the interview room and show them how the widget they are machining helps a gear turn. Use this information to connect the dots for them to exactly how their work will impact the bottom line.

2. Figure out exactly what you can afford. You’ve read the reports and heard the rumors – money isn’t as important to workers as job satisfaction. It simply isn’t true. Today’s generations of young workers want it all – money and satisfaction. When you are competing for the best and brightest, you can’t afford to be the guy that low-balls the best candidate. Use your Job Costing Accounting software to find out exactly how much you can afford to pay a person to do that job. Can you adjust costs elsewhere, like overhead or outside services, to increase the labor costs, thus being able to offer a higher salary? There is no better motivator than satisfaction. Which employee will come in energized and ready to do all? The one that wanted $10 an hour and got $9.50 or the one that wanted $10 an hour and got $10.50.

3. Use our ERP HR & payroll application to track skills needed for the position you want to hire. Everyone knows Joe is the best employee in the company and you’d love to have more Joe’s. When you look for new employees are you seeing what they have in common with Joe? Take a minute to identify who your best employees are. Next look at your HR & Payroll application to see what skills, certification, training or characteristics they have in common. Use that data to develop a profile of what type of employee you need to hire so you’ll continue to grow and succeed. This will help you better craft a job description that lays out the type of employee that will succeed in that open position.

If trends continue, the pool of candidates to work in your business will shrink, while competition for those candidates will increase. To continue to grow, you must remain competitive as an employer. Taking these 3 steps will not only help you position your company for finding the right talent, you’ll also position your new hires for success. And that equals success for everyone.