Polyglot News

CBA Women In Focus - Polyglot Group CEO, Corinne Bot's Interview - Article One

2011-11-01T11:28:00.000+11:00

Precisely Defining a Job Spec
Writing a job specification seems like common sense. If they are really that easy, why do so many companies fail to write them? Job specs are like the foundations of a home. It lays the groundwork for the recruitment steps that follow. Do a job spec right and the rest will come naturally. Do it wrong and you risk hiring and attracting all the wrong candidates.

Here are three things to consider when creating or updating job specs:

1.The people involved in the structuring or restructuring of a job spec

Sit down as a group for 15 to 30 minutes, with the role’s intended manager, the team and if the role to be filled is a replacement, involve the person leaving.

It is a team exercise because people need to have an understanding of why their own role exists and why their colleagues’ roles exist. This situates roles in terms of where they stand within the organisation. If recruitment staff have a clear understanding of the purpose of the role to be filled, their chance of finding the ideal candidate significantly improves.

It is also important to involve the person leaving if the role is a replacement. Often some of the responsibilities that were covered will not be listed under the job description.

2.The components of a job spec

Besides the purpose, which may read like a paragraph, the remaining components of a job description should be straight to the point and factual.
Title
Don’t get hung up on the title. Titles are something, but they are not everything. Some clients will call me and say, “Look, I need an accountant.” And I say, “Ok, I can picture what an accountant is, but, what is it that for your company and for your department this person will do.” And that’s where the definition of the role is important, because even though you have in your mind that you, for instance, want to hire an accountant, the accountant you need is a very different accountant to the company’s next door.

Titles are actually quite tricky because you can have internal titles that do not reflect what it is that the person has to do, particularly in small to medium sized enterprises. So in the beginning stages, forget about the title and start by outlining in bullet points the role’s requirements.
Purpose

Defining a role’s purpose is not a question of size. Rather it is a question of why the role exists. As previously discussed, people need to get a feeling of where they will stand within the organisation.

Responsibilities
Describe what the day-to-day activities of the role will be.

Reporting (both ways)
Identify who will report directly to the role as well as any managers the role will be accountable to.

Background
Express the level of education or industry experience specific to the role.

Skills (Technical and Interpersonal)

Even though the role may have the title of ‘accountant’- do not be afraid to list skills specific to your business that may not ‘typically’ be associated with the role. Try to be a bit creative so that you accurately profile your ideal candidate in terms of your organisation.

3.The purpose of a job spec
A lot of people mismatch an ad and a job description. An ad is to attract the right candidates; it is not a job description. The job description is too detailed to be an ad and an ad is not detailed enough to be a job description. A job description should be provided at the time of interview.

Job specs can be very useful for other aspects of the recruitment process. For instance, from a job spec you can draft an ad. Take the position’s must haves and desirables when marketing the position. From the job spec you can also create your list of interview questions drawing from the roles technical and interpersonal skills.

Job specs can also be used to assess a roles evolution over time. Save the date to ensure you keep a record of the roles development.

This is the first part of a seven part series on The Seven Steps to Recruit New People. Part two will cover how to realistically define the remuneration package you should provide.

CBA Women In Focus - Polyglot Group CEO, Corinne Bot's Interview - Article Two

2011-11-01T11:21:00.000+11:00

Realistically defining the remuneration package you should provide
Summary: Being stressed about recruiting is completely normal. Here are three simple tips to help relieve you from the pressures of defining the remuneration package you should provide- part two of the series Seven Steps to Recruit New People.

Being stressed about recruiting is completely normal. Follow these three simple tips to help relieve you from the pressures of defining the remuneration package you should provide. Tip 1: Always start by establishing a budget. Tip 2: Assess what the market is paying and what you can afford. Tip 3: Be creative in terms of what it is that would attract that candidate to your business and don't set everything up ahead of time.

Define your budget

I see small companies every day forgetting to define what they can afford. My first question is- did you put that in your budget last year? You cannot start your recruitment process without first assessing what the market is and what you can afford.

Often times I find clients are waiting for me to tell them what the appropriate salary is for a particular role. If you are using a recruitment agency, they will provide you with these details. Other sources include remuneration market studies; however, these can be quite costly.

Recruitment websites and career search engines like seek.com.au can offer employers a good idea of what is being offered for comparable positions within the industry. Use your own connections and business network to establish these benchmarks.

Be realistic

Small to medium size enterprises tend to be unrealistic when estimating remuneration packages. It is so important to accurately define remuneration so that there are no bad surprises down the line. Another thing that is usually surprising to small companies is that they should actually be paying more than large companies. A role within a small company should receive a higher salary if the scope of the position is wider and additional skills are required.

Set the figure that you can afford. For example, say you need a PA because you have an upcoming project, but decide you can only afford half a PA. You can either put your entire budget towards contracting a PA full time for three to six months or you can take on a part-time PA. When making hiring decisions, the key is to be practical to ensure you do not break your budget.

Be creative

Often times small businesses think they cannot compete because they don't have access to packages like those on offer from large companies. But they do indeed have the access; it just requires a little listening and a spark of creativity.

In the current and the future job market, you need to present yourself, even if you're small, as an employer of choice, because at the end of the day, every business is about its people. When you are in front of the candidate - listen. The candidate may give you clues of what they want and it may not even cost you a penny. For example, the selling point for them may be the option to work from home or flexible hours to pursue studies-and that does not just apply for young applicants.

Maybe they want a toy and this particularly applies to the Gen Y's. For example, when I gave my employees their end of the year bonuses, I give it by check, never by transfer. I always say, "I want to get you something that you will not buy for yourself, so what do you want?" Some wanted an iPad, some wanted a voucher to take their girlfriend away for the weekend. This is called retention. Listen to your people, it is as simple as that. If you want to please people- what pleases you, will not always please them. Just ask your kids. So when I say be creative, I mean this- listen to your people and it will make a huge difference. Trust me it works.

This is the second part of a seven part series on The Seven Steps to Recruit New People. Part three will cover how to look for candidates in the right places and advertise to them in the right way.

CBA Women In Focus - Polyglot Group CEO, Corinne Bot's Interview - Article Three

2011-11-01T06:00:00.001+11:00

Look for candidates in the right places and advertise to them in the right way

Summary: The best people are usually not actively seeking jobs- so knowing where to look for quality candidates and how to advertise to them is crucial. Consider these three recruitment strategies to help you target the best candidates. This is part three of the series Seven Steps to Recruit New People.

Most people place job advertisements on major job search sites. What employers are forgetting is that the only candidates reached are those actively seeking roles. In a 4.9% unemployment economy, you will not target the best people if you only advertise on major career search sites. While you might get lucky you won't get the best.

Outsource recruitment

Recruiting wrongly costs much more than the fee charged by a recruitment agency. Sure, you can do everything in house, but at the end of the day, you've got 24 hours and your people only have got 24 hours. Doing everything in house is a false gain of money, even if you are a tiny company. I am not saying go and see a huge company and spend thousands on outsourcing- but do it at your own level and outsource what is not your specialty.

And the HR support is the same. Recruitment is part of HR support and not the other way around. And it does not cost that much. It can be a retainer of one thousand dollars a month and for that you have someone on the outside. HR and recruitment can be thought of as professional mentoring. Being anxious about hiring is completely normal and warranted. But this is why it is good to have someone from outside assist and offer a fresh perspective. Someone on the outside will be more objective because emotions have been put aside.

Reach out to your networks

Talk to your business network and to your employees. Ask them if they know anyone suitable for a role. Reward people for referring good candidates. I use RedBalloon. When an employee refers someone, they get a red balloon package. Offering rewards for referrals will enhance and encourage future word of mouth recommendations. Remember though, to adhere to the same standards and protocol for referred applicants. While the origin of where people come from can be completely different, the recruitment and interview processes should be in unison.

While you can advertise through social media, do so with caution. LinkedIn can be useful but this depends on who your LinkedIn contacts are. It is also better to target a specific group of contacts rather than issuing a message to the general public. For example, you might not want all your 'friends' or 'followers' to know that you are looking for a replacement, when some of your contacts are your clients.

Making an advertisement attractive

Advertisements are a job in itself. At the end of the day they are all about putting in the essence of a job and making it attractive. Put yourself into the other person's shoes and try to determine what is attractive from an applicant's point of view. It is very important to not see the job posting as a job description. However, it is important to go back to the job description and pull out what are the must-haves. An ad does not need to be very long, but it does need to relay the essence of who you are. Take about two sentences to illustrate this. For example, if something that sets you apart is your great work environment, take time to describe your "vibrant team" of employees and co-workers.

This can be very difficult on career sites, because you only have a limited number of characters. These sites also require posters to enter a number of key words that enable candidate searches to be matched with ads. While these key words don't show up on the ad- they are what drives the search and triggers the results.

This is the third part of the seven part series on The Seven Steps to Recruit New People. Part four will cover how to build your interview shortlist.

CBA Women In Focus - Polyglot Group CEO, Corinne Bot's Interview - Article Four

2011-11-01T06:00:00.000+11:00

Building your interview shortist

You could get hundreds of applications for a position. Naturally, it is easy to get overwhelmed at this stage of the recruitment process. Corinne Bot offers three strategies in part four of her series Seven Steps to Recruit New People to systematically review candidates' CVs in order to generate their longlist of six first-round interview applicants and then a top-three shortlist.

Consider the following tips to cut down your applicant reviewal process: Comparing candidates for shortlisting

At my company we find it easier to use a template CV. We put all of our applicants' CV's into the same format so that we can really compare them. If you don't have the patience to convert all of your applicants CV's to a common template, try using hightlighters. For example, if education is a must, use a yellow highlighter to highlight all of the candidates who satifsfy this requirement.

One minute should be spent per CV. Do not read CV's like you read books. Just skim them for the 'must haves'. A CV is like the candidate's advertisement. And so what is important is the person, not the CV. You need to actually meet the people.

The Shortlist

In an ideal world, you have ten quality candidates, five to six first round interviews, and two to three for your shortlist. Typically, recruitment agencies will take on the heavy lifting and only once a shortlist has been drafted will they involve the client.

If you are doing it on your own, you need to sort out all the applications to get a longlist and then a shortlist. A technique I find helpful is categorising applicants into one of three piles- the yeses, the maybes, and the nos.

If you have a good job description then you will be able to make more accurate evaluations. If you have only one person in the yes pile, then you need to re-evaluate your 'must-haves'.

Closed book or rolling basis?

Companies go back and forth as to whether or not they should wait for all of their applications to come in before selecting candidates for interviews. Ideally yes- you should set a closing date and not look at anything until applications are closed. But in reality, you run the risk of losing out on the best candidates who in the interim have already received other job offers.

In the current market especially, don't wait. Sort applicants as they come in, on a rolling basis. After the deadline has closed re-assess your yes, no and maybe piles. Keep current applicants warm and assess if they are actively looking and are interviewing elsewhere.

This is part four of a seven part series on The Seven Steps to Recruit New People. Part five will cover how to allow for uninterrupted time to interview candidates.

Innovative Women Series - Polyglot Group CEO's Interview

2011-10-06T06:00:00.001+11:00

Video Part 1:

http://www.brr.com.au/event/embed/86810/width/700/header/=true

Video Part 2:

http://www.brr.com.au/event/embed/86875/width/700/header/true

More News about the French Women in Australia Exhibition.

2011-06-22T05:00:00.000+10:00

Video of the vernissage night:

http://kissesfromaustralia.com/2011/06/07/expo-francaise-en-australie-la-video-du-vernissage/

Article on the Alliance Francaise website:

http://www.afsydney.com.au/CulturalEvents/Galleries/article/874.aspx

Article on Kisses From Australia website:

http://kissesfromaustralia.com/2011/04/12/francaise-en-australie-le-projet-et-lexposition/

Polyglot Proudly Presents the French Women in Australia exhibition.

2011-04-14T05:00:00.000+10:00

Polyglot Group is proud to be the main sponsor of this great initiative.
Visit the exhibition at Alliance Française from 19.05.2011 until 27.05.2011 and its website: http://francaiseenaustralie.net/

ABOUT THE PROJECT

"During my trip to Australia, I was struck by the number of expatriate French women at the other end of the world. More than anything, I was touched by their individual journeys, the reasons they had for having one day decided to move so far from their homeland.
Curious to learn more about the lives of French women in Australia, I met with 22 women of different ages and backgrounds to hear their stories in their own words.“Française en Australie” is a range of portraits of women, each sharing in common only their point of origin and their destination."Barbara, French woman in Australia.

Polyglot CEO - Corinne Bot - Named NSW Telstra Business Woman of the Year, CBA Business Owners Category.

2010-09-25T05:00:00.000+10:00

Click on the link below to watch her speech at the event on Friday 24th of September, 2010:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aGnck9dwJL4

Polyglot Wins the 2009 Australian National Multicultural Marketing Awards along with the Export Category!

2009-11-03T07:00:00.000+11:00

First a video of the night.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-GwL0pLmbUI&feature=player_embedded

A Sydney company which has turned Australia's culturally diverse workforce into a major export earner has won this year's National Multicultural Marketing Awards.

The directors of Polyglot Australia were presented with their prestigious award at a gala dinner tonight in Sydney hosted by the NSW Minister for Citizenship, Virginia Judge.The National Multicultural Marketing Awards have been conducted by for the last twenty years and have unearthed winners from across multinational business, government and community sectors.

The company's award submission told the judges: "Polyglot's entire business model and strategy is based on promoting, and turning into an asset, the multiculturalism of Australian society. We are what we sell."

The company describes itself as: "A boutique human resources consultancy specialising in multicultural resourcing and consulting to assist companies in their international expansion - be it Australian companies expanding overseas or foreign companies investing in Australia."

The Chair of the Commission, Stepan Kerkyasharian, said tonight: "Polyglot is a classic winner of the Multicultural Marketing Awards because it does what we wanted to achieve - to tell the whole country and the world that we are a richer, smarter and more successful country because we have the added strength of cultural diversity as a major asset."

Polyglot also won the Export Category of tonight's Awards.

Great News for Australian and French Students

2009-09-08T05:00:00.000+10:00

Click on the link below to read the press release from the French Embassy in Canberra:
http://polyglot.com.au/content/CMS2/1529/FranceAustraliamutualrecognitionquaifications.pdf