Trust Key HR to provide you with… 

• Access to more service providers than any other business of our kind 
• Specialists in every area of Human Resources 
• Solutions for companies at all stages of development – from startups to fully mature 
• A firm commitment to stay current on the laws that affect your industry and business 
• Savings from 20 to 40 percent off your bottom line 
• It could be one of the smartest business decisions you ever make!

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6 Reasons Business Owners Like You Get Overwhelmed (and what helps) 

Here’s how to get back to what you love about owning and managing a business. 

Is it any surprise business owners feel overwhelmed? Not really. Economic cycles, growth challenges, recruitment and retention, administrative burdens: That’s just a short list of why 61% of employers, across the board and regardless of size, are more stressed than they were the year before. 

Here are 6 reasons why business owners like you burn out, and how you help can fix it.

1. You’re doing too much. The average business owner works—a lot. And the boundaries between work and home often get stretched (or broken) entirely.

Burnout fix: Rebuild those boundaries, one by one. Outsourcing even one thing can help. To start: Divide to-dos into categories such as social media marketing, bookkeeping, technology, sourcing, and human resources, and utilize a temporary or permanent solution to assist with one.

2. You haven’t delegated. There’s a surprising benefit to delegating: Retaining employees. The opportunity for career growth is the second most cited reason employees resign for new jobs (pay is number one).

Burnout fix: If you’re not sure which employees want to do more, just ask. Reskilling might be another solution. It can open doors for new types of work without hiring or firing, help team members take the next steps in their careers, and help retain trusted employees (and their institutional knowledge).

What is burnout? According to the World Health Organization , it’s: feelings of energy depletion or exhaustion, increased mental distance from one’s job or feelings of negativism or cynicism related to one’s job, and reduced professional efficacy.

3. You haven’t set priorities. You have hundreds of ideas for your business this year, next year, in five years, and beyond. Have you listed those thoughts, grouped them into themes, and prioritized them? If not, you’ll just keep churning— and stressing. 

Burnout fix: Implement one item that addresses an internal stressor and one for an external stressor. After a set time, reevaluate; if something isn’t working, ask why not—and think about what would happen if you let it go and moved on to what’s next on the list.

4. You haven’t shared your struggles. Fellow business owners are a great source of inspiration—and commiseration. 

Burnout fix: Set up a cohort chat channel that, once a month, shares ideas on different topics for quick problem- solving and brainstorming.

5. You haven’t adapted. Sometimes, changing market conditions demand a pivot.

Burnout fix: Consider what new realities you’re willing to embrace and which ones you’re not. For example, if you have difficulty filling positions, can you create a job-share, remote, or hybrid set up to help draw talent?

6. You’re not taking care of yourself. Self-care isn’t something most business owners focus on—even in the best of times. 

Burnout fix: Think about what you can do to benefit you and your employees—lunch brought in once a month, outings after a particularly big deadline, even a surprise day off (you as business owner included).

 www.principal.com

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Want Effective People Managers? Be Clear About the Job, Performance Expectations

People managers are the linchpin to the employee experience, as well as accomplishing strategic business objectives, but they may not be getting the support they need to succeed, according to new SHRM research.

There is a relationship between highly effective managers and the commitment level of workers to the organization, SHRM researchers found. Of the 1,456 total U.S. workers surveyed, 63% of those who said their manager is highly effective also considered themselves “deeply committed to their organization.” Among those who said their manager was not highly effective, that number fell to just 28% feeling deeply committed.

And 92% of 336 senior executives said people managers are critical to their organizations’ overall success.

But people managers need their leaders to provide support and resources to be effective. Among the 1,406 people managers surveyed, the challenges cited the most were: 

1. A heavy workload—33%. 

2. Balancing multiple responsibilities—22%. 

3. Insufficient resources or budget constraints—20%. 

4. Competing priorities—20%. 

5. Employee turnover and retention—20%.

People managers also need clarity on how their performance is measured. More than half of 1,092 HR professionals (59%) said people managers typically are judged on whether they fulfilled strategic goals; 57% said they are evaluated by their teams’ productivity and work quality.

When it comes to areas for further development, senior HR executives identified specific skills in need of improvement. More than half of the executives surveyed (54%) want their people managers to develop coaching and mentoring skills, and more than one-third (37%) would like them to develop strategic thinking skills.

People managers often feel caught in the middle between executive leaders’ strategic vision and the practical realities their team faces. Managers who often experience this situation are less likely to be highly effective managers and are more likely to experience high levels of job stress.

They’re also 2.5 times as likely to be actively looking for another job, according to the SHRM Research report “Effective People Managers: The Linchpin of Organizational Success.”

Recommendations

Above all else, people managers said they need clarity around their role and responsibilities to succeed, according to 43% of respondents. Also important to them: having structured goals and performance metrics (cited by 29%), better two-way communication channels (28%), regular performance evaluations with their manager (27%), and access to relevant resources and tools (25%).

SHRM researchers offered the following recommendations for how organizations can support their people managers: 

• Clarify roles and goals. Start by conducting a job analysis and creating a detailed job description. Regularly update these descriptions as the business landscape shifts. Establish meas urable goals, communicate them, and identify metrics around how the people managers will be evaluated. 
• Provide a safe venue for sharing opinions and receiving respectful, constructive feedback. The higher-level manager also needs to provide consistent direction about the leadership’s top priorities of the moment and their expectations for the people manager. 
• Provide people managers with the tools and resources they need. These tools can include project management software, up-to-date industry reports, and performance analytics capabilities. 

These are especially valuable for new managers. Only 30% of organizations have a formal onboarding process for internally promoted managers, according to the research.

www.shrm.org

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Companies may think they have workplace safety resources covered, but they may not have taken into consideration one very important detail: Whether their workforce can understand them. 

One-hundred percent of industrial workers say that safety training is essential for fostering a safe workplace, according to the Vector Solutions State of Industrial Worker Safety and Well-Being Report. Yet half of non-native English speakers say their company doesn’t offer training in their native language — creating serious risks for employees and employers alike. 

“This is a big deal and has an impact on the training,” says Clare Epstein, the general manager of commercial at workforce management solution Vector Solutions. “And the fact that these workers don’t feel as comfortable speaking out against workplace hazards could have direct implications on their safety overall.” 

The data collected by Vector Solutions found that non-native English speakers were 127% more likely to say they do not feel comfortable reporting workplace hazards than native English speakers. And while the Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) requires employers to provide training in a language employees understand, it often doesn’t require them to provide training resources in the exact language or dialect. For example, if an employee has any kind of proficiency in English, even if it’s low, providing training resources in English could technically meet the requirement. 

“The complexity arises if you have a multilingual workforce,” Epstein says. “If you’re doing in-person training, you need an instructor who speaks those languages, and if you have a workforce that speaks 10 or 15 other languages, that’s where employers struggle with what to do.” 

OSHA estimates language barriers are a contributing factor in 25% of job-related accidents. There’s an outsize toll on psychological safety, too: Non-native English speakers are 27% more likely to feel pressured to prioritize productivity over safety in the workplace, according to Vector Solutions, potentially lowering engagement and increasing turnover. 

“The safer and happier you are at work, the more likely you are to stay at work,” Epstein says. “But if you don’t feel comfortable at work, you’re more likely to leave. And companies are already struggling with skill gaps and retention risks as it is.” 

Vector Solutions integrates with a company’s existing training program and has the bandwidth to offer more language options. In addition, they have contingencies if they can’t provide a language an employee speaks, like image-based guides that are easy to follow and understand. 

While it may seem like a burdensome process, investing in this support can better the state of workplace safety, as well as advance diversity and inclusion efforts within industries. 

“Access to training is essential to fostering a safe environment and that applies to everyone,” she says. “Employees are more diverse and more multilingual than ever before, and you’re not really going to be able to have a workforce if you don’t foster inclusion and create a workforce where everyone has the opportunity to learn.” 

benefitnews.com