By: Amanda Hawthorne, Director of People and Culture at Managed Solution
So you’ve got an opening or resource need on your team? Exciting! Managed Solution’s Staffing Services can help! But knowing where to start with an outside recruiting firm can be tough, and you may have a lot of questions about the process…
There are plenty of choices for service providers: so how do you know which is going to deliver?
Sometimes the exact resource or budget requirements for your position may be a bit hazy, and you may still be sorting out how exactly a new hire will engage within your team. Who can help you define your needs and understand a market-realistic hiring budget?
Everyone is already stretched thin today, and no one has time to interview a series of candidates who completely miss the mark. Working with a trusted Staffing Service provider like Managed Solution can help you quickly connect with pre-vetted technical talent so you can make efficient staffing decisions and get back to work with the right team!
Managed Solution is an IT service provider – which means IT people are our business. For over 20 years, we’ve been meeting talented engineers and connecting them with our clients across Southern California (and beyond!) to fulfill ongoing support or even project-based needs. In the age of remote work and the “Great Resignation,” it’s more important than ever to hire highly skilled and vetted engineering talent – and even harder to find them!
After hearing from client after client about the challenges they’re having in finding and vetting top talent, we saw an opportunity here: open our Talent Community to our clients, giving them access to the amazing people we’re meeting daily. (And as a bonus, individuals in our Talent Community have already been vetted by our Microsoft-certified engineers!)
Plus, since hiring our Talent Advisor, Kat Grunzinger, we now have a talent concierge to meet with our clients and really dive into their needs, to help define an opportunity for efficient recruiting. Kat has years of experience in the recruiting space and has a true knack for building quick rapport with candidates, diving into what they know (and don’t), as well as understanding what opportunities are truly of interest to them. She leverages this same inquisitive nature to consult with clients to understand what Staffing Services are best-suited to their needs – and which candidates will really fit the bill!
You may be asking, what’s it like to work with Managed Solution’s Talent Advisor?
Here’s what you can expect:
First, Our Talent Advisor will want to interview you! We’ve found the best way to understand the true needs of an organization isn’t to rely on a job description (which may be out of date or miss key aspects of what a position truly requires), but to go straight to the source: you!
As a hiring manager, you’ll have insight into your needs, your team, and your organization – even if you haven’t scoped out a formal job description yet, or if you haven’t gotten the chance yet to update the one that’s been on file for years.
Our Talent Advisor can help you outline the specific function that’s needed. She’ll be aiming to understand the ins and outs of your open role, so she can connect you to the right resources. Key questions she’ll ask include:
Our Talent Advisor will ask these key questions so she understands exactly what this individual will be doing on a day-to-day basis and how their success will be defined. This will help her articulate the opportunity to potential candidates - and help us avoid wasting your time with candidates who would fall short of expectations. This understanding will allow her to scroll through her mental Rolodex of people in our Talent Community so she can quickly connect you with any pre-vetted candidates that might align with your goals.
Understanding your needs can also help us align our Staffing Service offering with your ‘ask’ to ensure we’re helping you meet your need in a cost-effective manner.
Managed Solution offers several different Staffing Services to meet your IT hiring needs:
When our Talent Advisor meets with you to discuss your team’s needs, she’ll help you determine which Staffing Service is right for you.
Once a Staffing Service Agreement is signed, she’ll begin sorting through our existing connections within our Talent Community and will reach out to appropriate passive candidates on your behalf.
When we find suitable candidates – aligned to your role in terms of experience, skills, location, culture, and career goals – we’ll pre-vet them with our Microsoft-certified engineers and then present you with their talent profiles (a fancy term for their resumes, catered to your position). Ideally, they’ll all look good on paper, and then it’s time for you and your teams to interview!
Our Talent Advisor will work with you to define your own vetting process for the opening – who will be involved in the interviews; when/how interviews will be conducted; etc. Then, she’ll coordinate scheduling and share pertinent information to the candidate so they can be on-time and ready to discuss your opportunity, whether that’s in person at your office, or via Microsoft Teams video interview. (We can even send out a Microsoft Teams meeting bridge for you and the candidate to connect on!)
During the interview, you’ll get a sense of your own as to whether the candidate meets the eligibility and suitability requirements of your role. Our Talent Advisor will check in after your interviews to hear about what went well, what concerns still linger, and what next steps look like. Our Talent Advisor will also get feedback from the candidate to ensure a strong mutual fit before moving ahead in the process. This two-way flow of information and feedback is one essential for effective recruiting services – and helps ensure that by the time an offer is issued, you’re confident it will be accepted.
Having a strong rapport with your Talent Advisor can help you move through the hiring process faster, more effectively, and with the outcomes you’re looking for. Sometimes hiring managers hesitate to share negative feedback about a candidate’s skills or experience (because who likes giving bad news?), but we encourage open communication during this process. Understanding exactly what is or isn’t working helps us ensure a better outcome on the next candidate. And if things are going well, timely communication is even more important: you’re more likely to get an enthusiastic “yes!” in response to an offer when the candidate feels the process has moved along at a natural clip, and they’ve received timely, positive feedback. Plus, a strong rapport with your Talent Advisor also allows her to share honest feedback from candidates about your position, interview process, and the candidate experience.
Want the inside scoop about working with our Staffing Services professionals? We sat down recently with Kat Grunzinger, Managed Solution’s Talent Advisor, to talk about her professional background in recruiting and her hopes for Managed Solution’s Staffing Services.
Here’s what Kat Grunzinger, Managed Solution’s Talent Advisor, wants you to know!
A: “I want hiring managers to know that I’ve been in their seat! I know how challenging it can be to find, vet, and hire the right people for the right positions. That level of empathy drives me to move quickly across the process – jumping onto an intake call, running through recent conversations to see if there are any immediately ‘right’ candidates, proactively sourcing talent across multiple platforms, and being timely in scheduling and feedback. I will earn the hiring manager's trust by active listening to quickly understand an opening; by being flexible and available for their calls; by following through on any action items outlined; and by reassuring them that I’m here for them! I feel most successful when I know we’ve done the right thing for the client.”
A: “I love getting to meet talented individuals and hearing their stories and learning what they want out of their careers – and then getting to help make that happen! It’s a privilege to assist in their journeys, and I take seriously that we are talking about a person’s livelihood. The same care I take in building relationships of trust with hiring managers, I apply to our Talent Community. My goal is to facilitate transparent, two-way communication. I’m not afraid to tell a candidate when a job isn’t going to help them meet their goals because it frees them up to find the opportunities that are right.”
A: “Honest and open communication matters. Not only is this aligned with Managed Solution’s values and Code of Conduct, it’s truly critical for recruiting and other Staffing Services. A hiring manager needs to be honest and realistic about budgets, the true needs of their team, – and sometimes as an outside entity, I’m able to help them see another side of the coin. Whether that’s advising the client about the right pay scale for a position with a specific region or helping them see that their job description is unrealistic (or describes three different jobs), I really appreciate when hiring managers value this two-way feedback. I think it brings us more credibility as recruiters and ultimately helps clients fill their needs.
I think it’s also important for a hiring manager to understand that my role as a recruiter is to help sell the value of an organization or position to candidates. The time we invest up front in an intake call positions me to effectively communicate with potential candidates about the roles, and to proactively answer the questions they have. We’ll both spend more time talking to the right people if a hiring manager spends the time with me up front to help me learn how their team functions, what types of soft skills help someone thrive, and what perks/benefits exist within their organizations. I’ll definitely do the right homework on my side to read the job description, the company website, and more before that meeting, but there’s nothing like learning straight from the hiring manager how the team is doing and what it needs.”
A: “My hope is that we can continue building trust with our clients, as we succeed in connecting them with qualified talent. I know I’ve done my job when a client comes back for help with another opening or refers us to their colleague for assistance on a role. Continuing to help good people find fulfilling work with amazing organizations – that’s what it’s all about!”
Ready to hand over the heavy lifting to us? Email us about our Staffing Services today!
It is common that for a digital transformation to take full effect in the workplace, it needs fully upgraded IT systems as well as a complete overhaul of all business process. In a highly digitized business environment, it is only through these changes that employees can indeed serve customers to the best of their abilities. Be it finance, healthcare, manufacturing, nonprofits, or anything else in between, all sectors of the economy are heavily impacted.
Gartner indicates that by 2020, roughly a third of all businesses will draw their competitive advantage from their employees' knowledge, understanding, and efficient use of the digital technologies they employ. There are three main elements to consider when looking at the future of the digital workplace. These are the emerging technologies, the global marketplace, and workforce dynamics.
In what can only describe as a positive feedback cycle, these three factors will influence each other, completely changing the shape of the modern workplace. In turn, this will guide businesses on how to reshape job roles, processes, business models, and best practices. Artificial and human intelligence will complement each other like never before, solving many business problems and significantly increasing efficiency.
The whole point behind a digital workplace is simplicity and intuitiveness, resulting in greater agility and productivity. Below are some of the hallmarks that work to create this simplicity in the workplace.
Shadow IT stands for all information technology systems used within an organization without its explicit approval. Most employees will follow the path of least resistance when it comes to their work and this, of course, applies to the technology they use.
Traditionally, CIOs were utterly opposed to the use of shadow IT, and sometimes with good reason. Their security and integration concerns are entirely justified. Nevertheless, instead of standing against this technology, CIOs should embrace and exploit these technologies, and work to integrate them into their systems.
Changing your workplace into a digital and more agile one will require a great deal of adjustment in terms of departmental structure, internal processes, skill sets, etc. Change management leaders will be needed for such a considerable undertaking so they can set guidelines, oversee the transition, as well as anticipate and mitigate any issues before they can turn into real trouble.
With a change, however, it's not uncommon for employees to experience increased stress levels. It usually stems from a fear of the unknown and a lack of comprehensive skill when operating the new technologies. To ease this transition, it's wise to train and reskill your employees continually. Hire a team of professionals, if need be.
This transition ultimately boils down to the technology you will use. To that end, ensure easy file-sharing capabilities, mobile access, and real-time synchronization. Similarly, virtual assistants can be a great asset in helping with the transition period, offering employees decision support, contextualized content recommendations, and advice where needed.
Do, however, keep in mind that all of these systems need to have a cohesive architecture and not a haphazard patchwork of technologies that will only add to the complexity of day-to-day operations and processes. Lastly, you should encourage employees to bring their input here, rather than imposing new systems on them.
To help you with this transition, Managed Solution is at your service. Contact us today and find out what we can do for you and your digital workplace.
SharePoint is a web-based collaboration platform, used by staff members across all levels of the organization. It functions on the company's intranet. The platform acts as a secure place where users can share, store, organize, and access data from numerous mobile devices. It facilitates and streamlines team and cross-departmental collaboration, as well as document storage and retrieval, all within the confines of enterprise-grade security and compliance.
Thanks to its easy-to-use features and low maintenance requirements, SharePoint has become a go-to platform for diverse organizations around the world. With various customizable capabilities, SharePoint offers an almost unmatched level of flexibility to those that use it, which allows for easy scalability, and an increase of productivity, in the process.
Nevertheless, it has a high degree of customization, and many organizations aren't fully aware of all its features or what SharePoint can do for them or use the platform to its full capacity. Since every company is, more or less, unique, each can use and customize SharePoint to best suit their needs. That said, here are some ways it can help you increase productivity across your organization.
Thanks to its new app, SharePoint can be accessed by users even when they're not in the office. So, if your businesses have employees that work remotely or are usually in the field, they can still use SharePoint to work with the same level of coordination as those who would, otherwise, be all located in the same office.
When companies start using SharePoint, they usually do so by first utilizing its basic features. But as time goes on and users become accustomed to the platform, they can personalize it as the business develops. Similarly, they can tailor the platform's features so that it best suits the organization's processes and means of operation.
Having too many unnecessary features or access to unnecessary files and data can at times overwhelm and distract the users, decreasing their overall productivity. SharePoint does take this factor into account, allowing organizations to tailor the interface for every level, department, or each employee.
Some fear that SharePoint will only add another level of complexity to their already intricate TechStack. Luckily, however, this is not the case with SharePoint. It was specifically designed to integrate with a wide variety of other software, web applications, RSS, WSRPs, email, and all sorts of commercial software and cloud applications. It implies that there are far fewer technical glitches, less downtime, and more productivity.
Collecting, storing, and sharing data is all fine and good, but as long as you are not adequately analyzing it, that information is next to useless. By making use of SharePoint's analytics tools, you can investigate and discover any potential issues that may be affecting the productivity of a given department, problems in collaboration, etc. You can use that information to generate the best possible solutions to fix those problems.
SharePoint is a great tool to improve a company's productivity. It all depends on how well you know how to use it and how best you customize it to fit your organization's needs. If you need any help in optimizing your company's performance, Managed Solution is at your service. Our professional consultants will answer any questions that you may have. Contact us today!
There's somewhat of a misconception circulating, in regards to the modern workplace. Some are under the impression that the new changes that are happening in the office are somehow affecting only those in IT, but they are not aware of how the modern workplace affects everyone. Even though most of the change that is happening originates from digital technology, the repercussions and chain reactions that it brings, extend to everyone from every department, not only those in IT.
It is safe to say that almost every activity within the workplace, from the very mundane to the most complex and specific, can be affected in one way or the other by technology. No industry remains unaffected by this technological change, be it finance, manufacturing, healthcare, or even nonprofit organizations. It also applies to the departments within these institutions.
In other words, IT is not only affecting the nature of the work, itself, but it also has an impact on how organizations function regarding internal divisions of labor. The implementation of IT alone is not enough to drive productivity. These new technologies must also be accompanied by organizational changes in structure and HR practices.
The modern workplace needs to meet current employee expectations, better connect a more widely-distributed workforce, and it has to provide all the tools necessary for employees to design, create, and innovate. They need to work together and solve both company and customer problems, and technology will help them achieve that. Put differently; a modern workplace has to bring the best in every employee by creating a company culture where ingenuity, innovation, and action are encouraged at every level of the organization.
As most of us know, necessity is the mother of invention. As a consequence, businesses need to adapt and tailor their company culture to better fit with these new technological innovations.
Telecommuting - With a sharp increase in mobility and cloud technology, employees can now work across multiple devices and locations. This higher degree of flexibility will help increase morale and productivity by allowing employees to choose their hours or from where to conduct their business. Nevertheless, with greater flexibility, there is also the increasing issue of data security, which needs to be addressed.
Cross-departmental teams - As modern technology eliminates much of the tedious grunt work, employees have more time to dedicate themselves to other tasks that do require their expertise. This trend has led to the formation of cross-departmental teams. As their name would suggest, these teams include people from various departments such as HR, finance, marketing, sales, etc., and from different levels of the organization.
These teams have the purpose of finding new and innovative solutions that will help streamline operations within the company by calling on input and expertise from numerous departments. Innovation is, after all, a leading competitive advantage in today's fast-paced business world, and cross-departmental teams can drive it through a more creative collaboration process. This trend, however, requires that the right collaboration tools and real-time insights need to be provided to get the job done.
Employee Digital Skills - As digital technology makes its way in every department of an organization, employees need the necessary skills to leverage those technologies and drive productivity. As time goes on and a company adopts more and more of these technologies, the skills required to use them will become more critical.
Surveys indicate that 29% of employees believe that their skill set will become obsolete over the coming years, while half of all companies think that the digital talent gap is hampering their digital transformation. Over the coming years, soft digital skills will prove to be as important as the traditional skills, themselves.
How is technology changing the shape of your business? Our Consulting Services can help provide insight on how to best leverage the right technology for your business.
Today's modern workplace is not as it used to be. Instead of those cramped cubicles, we now have wide open spaces. Instead of those dusky archives, we now have the cloud. And instead of that strict 9-to-5 schedule, we now have flexibility. While these examples here are by no means exhaustive, they do, however, paint an entirely different picture about today's office, as opposed to what we were used to several decades ago. This is how to make your business a modern workplace.
One such modern workplace has plenty of advantages, yet many are still using the traditional model. Nevertheless, it's important to remember that the modern workplace is still going through a transition period, meaning that it hasn't reached a final form. It also says that there is no one-size-fits-all approach and every business has to create its workplace, based on their needs and respective industry.
In any case, here are some guidelines.
It shouldn't come as a surprise to anyone that the changing face of the modern workplace is driven in large part by digital technology and automation. It's pretty much the same trend, but to a much larger degree, to what happened when the PC arrived during the mid-1980's.
Today, however, with various automation software for multiple industries, cloud computing, and social technologies, the way people work is no longer the same. Known as the Internet of Things (IoT), these technologies and the devices they use, are creating a much more efficient, intelligent, and connected workforce.
Another critical ingredient for the modern workplace is flexibility. It refers mainly to employee working schedules and can take numerous forms, depending on the type of business you have. For instance, flexibility in the workplace can imply full or partially remote work.
It can also mean a so-called flex schedule where employees can create their schedules, as long as they make their 40 hours per week. Likewise, flexibility can also take the shape of a Results Only Work Environment (ROWE), where results take center stage, not hours worked, or it can even imply unlimited vacation days, among other such examples.
With increased flexibility in the workplace, the need for good communication and collaboration could not be higher. When creating your modern workplace, the discussion needs special consideration, otherwise, risk everything falling apart.
When not all of your employees are under the same roof, at the same time, some may be excluded from meaningful conversations. It can lead to increased suspicion and worry, which, in turn, may result in decreased employee happiness and productivity and a higher turnover rate. Regular internal newsletters and employee feedback can help mediate this situation. Making frequent use of social technologies such as Skype is yet another.
Under the traditional model, performance reviews were given roughly once per year. But in today's fast-paced business environment, this model is not only obsolete but can also be counterproductive. For a whole year, an employee could be thinking that they're doing a good job, and then faced with a barrage of negative feedback and reviews.
Like with the point above, once-per-year performance reviews will do no one any favors. With more and more employees working off-site, monthly or weekly checkups will better help clarify objectives, improve efficiency, and morale, and will also keep these employees in the loop.
These are some of the core elements that define the modern workplace. But as mentioned before, each business needs to create its system that will best fit its individual needs. But by focusing on leveraging automation technologies and providing your employees with flexibility and better communication, you are driving modernization.
Are you ready to take the next step for a Modern Workplace? Managed Solution can come on-site for a Microsoft Customer Immersion Experience (CIE) and provide a hands-on demo of productivity tools that help promote a flexible and collaborative work environment. Learn more about CIEs here.
Ever since the introduction of the typewriter at the turn of the 20th century and up until the mid-1970's the office environment remained pretty much the same. It was with the Wang word processing systems that the office look began to change. Sometimes in the 1980's, personal computers became the primary tool for office work, exacerbating the change even further. And like with the introduction of these technologies of the past, so does modern technology influence the present and the new look of the modern workplace.
New and disruptive technologies don't only change the way we interact with each other or how companies do business. They can also change the look of the entire office environment. In a sense, the office environment was redesigned and reorganized around the PC and in more recent years, around all the digital and mobile devices as well as other similar technologies. And by extension, this change is also affecting how employees conduct their daily duties.
So, how does a modern workplace look like in this day and age? Here are two key elements that heavily influence the contemporary workplace.
The so-called Internet of Things (IoT) and all the technologies that accompany it have made it possible for an increasing number of people to work remotely. Commonly known as telecommuting, it is a global phenomenon where around 70% of all professionals, worldwide, work from home at least once a week. Also, 53% telecommute at least half the week.
With a combination of mobile devices and cloud computing, many staff members are no longer obligated to come to work under a strict 9-to-5 schedule. As long as their job gets done on time, it doesn't matter exactly where they work. Since their work is mostly over the internet, many e-commerce businesses don't even have a physical office, to begin with, relying solely on telecommuting or virtual offices, if and when the situation calls for it.
For those companies that still require a permanent physical presence, offering their employees the benefits of work-life integration is the way to go. For those of us who don't know, work-life integration is a means by which people can integrate both their personal and professional lives in such a way that both can be achieved at the same time. Providing flexibility in the workplace was shown to increase employee morale, happiness, health, and productivity.
Did you know that the average office employee spends roughly 28% of their work time sending and receiving emails? Also, they spend another 20% of their time searching for relevant internal information or looking for colleagues who can help them with their tasks. Cloud computing and social technologies, however, can reduce this wasted time by as much as 35%, in some cases, and raise employee productivity by as much as 25%.
Automation also plays a crucial role in shaping the modern workplace. Numerous automation software can now eliminate much of the grunt work and tedious tasks that would otherwise fall onto the employees, themselves. Financial or medical institutions, for instance, will no longer have to spend countless hours looking through documents, trying to find relevant information. A piece of software can do it. It will free up your employees to spend their time on more meaningful tasks that require their attention.
It would be a mistake to look at a modern office today and think that it will remain the same in the future. As mentioned before, the workplace environment is highly susceptible to any technological developments, meaning that the office environment will also change with them. We are currently going through a technological revolution, after all. Are you ready for what’s next?
Tools are there to increase our productivity and overall effectiveness. Microsoft tools are no different. Some of these tools exist to ease communication between employees and teams, others to prioritize tasks, while others, still, live to delegate responsibilities. Depending on the size of your business or the nature of your industry, be it financial, healthcare, and so on, these Microsoft tools that will increase your productivity are among the premier applications of their type. If you'd like a hands-on complimentary demo of these products, request a Customer Immersion Experience.
Microsoft Azure is a flexible cloud platform that allows users to rapidly build, deploy, and manage various applications across a global network of Microsoft-managed datacenters. Azure will enable you to create applications by using any language you desire, as well as any tool or framework. What's more, you can scale your apps to any size without having to focus on the infrastructure already in place.
Microsoft Enterprise Mobility Suite (EMS) is a set of tools that provide the user with everything they need to administer, provision, and secure the devices used in an enterprise. Among these, we have devices such as smartphones, laptops, or tablets, which can be managed from a single place.
It is a tool specifically designed for enterprises that want to have better control over their assets and intellectual property, all the while, minimizing the need for human resources.
Microsoft Office 365 is a wide variety of powerful features that improve your file sharing capabilities, online meetings, and email management, among several others. OneDrive, for instance, will provide a great cloud storage solution, while Skype for Business will enhance your internal communications. Microsoft Office has made a name for itself over the years and Office 365 is just a more versatile and all-encompassing version of that.
With Microsoft Hyper-V, you can create and run a software version of your computer. Known as a virtual machine; this software version will act like a complete computer with its own operating system and installed programs. Hyper-V will run each of the virtual machines that it creates in an isolated space, meaning that you can avoid crashes and other such problems affecting different workloads.
In short, Hyper-V can help you in establishing or expanding your private cloud environment. It will also use your hardware more effectively by consolidating servers and workloads onto fewer and more powerful computers that use less energy and space. Hyper-V will also improve your business continuity by minimizing the impact of downtime, be it scheduled or not. It will establish and expand your virtual desktop infrastructure, also making development and testing easier and more efficient.
SharePoint is a web-based platform that integrates with Microsoft Office, enhancing collaboration between organizations. This tool is primarily used as a storage and document management system that can help companies solve various challenges such as disconnected teams and people, slow turnarounds, lost productivity, or outdated IT systems that are difficult to scale appropriately.
All of these Microsoft tools here, as well as others such as Exchange, Directory Services, or Dynamics CRM, will help you to increase your company's productivity.
Managed Solution is an organization that provides IT managed services to various companies in the finance, healthcare, or biotech industries, among others. As part of the top 1% of Microsoft Cloud Service Providers worldwide, Managed Solution will help you leverage these technologies, provide the most up-to-date solutions that are sure to drive productivity and innovation, resulting in an overall increase in revenue.
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