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Put out a fire, settle a dispute, fix up a clerical error, have a morning coffee. That’s not far off an accurate director of human resources job description.

It’s a difficult yet rewarding position, though oftentimes these difficulties are far greater than they need to be. Gone are the days of all too human errors on endless reams of paper; we’re now in that most futuristic-sounding of years, 2020, and tech has come to HR’s rescue.

Whether you’re the director of human resources or the assistant director of human resources, these five smart tools will help to make your and your team’s lives far easier.

Zenefits: A comprehensive HR tool

When you look at a director of human resources’ job description and responsibilities, there are an incredible amount of strings to their bow. A HR director is expected to deal with employee records, administration and company culture, while also keeping up with the latest recruiting and workplace trends.

Zenefits has been designed with all these responsibilities in mind. The solution is comprised of a series of apps which help you to administer payroll, check-ins/check-outs, employee management and compliance.

Cloud functionality automatically backs up and syncs information, while business intelligence software works to identify oversights and areas of improvement – visual reports are created that allow you to gain an understanding of the current state of play, and how it might be improved.

Zenefits is far too comprehensive a solution to describe in full here, so head to their website to check out a demo.

Plum.io: Streamlining pre-employment assessments

It’s often said that people are any organization’s most valuable resource. It follows then that one of HR’s most important functions is to find the right person for an open job. The wrong hire can be expensive (to put it mildly), but on the flipside, the right hire can add incredible value.

The aim of Plum.io is to make it more likely that you’ll find your perfect fit. The tool’s smart algorithms first work to understand exactly what it is you need in a hire, before developing a test that will identify candidates that have those traits.

But you don’t relinquish total control. Once it has done its work, Plum will send you a short list of the very best candidates from which to choose. The company says that recruiters and HR departments who use its service spend up to 80% less time reading resumes, and experience 67% less turnover.

That’s one juicy plum.

Know Your Team: Enhance your company culture

Maintaining transparency within your organization and keeping your employees engaged can be difficult, particularly if you’re growing fast. Thankfully there’s an app for that.

While its tool is largely targeted at business leaders, Know Your Team is perfect for the HR department too. In the developer’s own words, the tool is designed “to hold effective one-on-one meetings, get honest feedback, share progress, and build team rapport.” Through an easy to use interface it promotes honest and open communication, which leads to greater camaraderie.

And with a 21-day free trial, you’ve got nothing to lose!

Slack: Enhance intra-office communication

Speaking of enhanced communication, this OG collaboration tool remains one of the best. As we know from our assistant director of human resources job description, HR is a messy business, and one that requires elite levels of organization and communication to be conducted successfully.

While you likely know of Slack, its usefulness to a HR department may not be readily apparent. But as a tool designed to replace email, increase transparency and make collaboration easy, Slack applies to human resources as much as any area of business.

Slack states that on average, a company using their software enjoys a 48.6% reduction in internal email traffic, a 25% reduction in meetings, and a 32% increase in productivity. Those are some incredibly impressive numbers.

Fond.co: Motivate through incentives

At our very core, we humans are no different to lab rats – we need an incentive to perform a task. Unfortunately, sometimes payment isn’t quite incentive enough (even for those who are on a healthy director of human resources salary/assistant director of human resources salary). Enter Fond.co.

Fond allows you to easily incentivize employees using what the company calls ‘rewards’ and ‘perks’. Points are used as a currency, and can be spent on all manner of products and services once accrued. Work no longer feels like work, but rather a day at the arcade!

HR tech tools allow you and your team to work smarter, relieving much of the stress that HR directors face day-to-day. And what happens in HR flows through the entire organization, meaning it as a whole will work smarter.These HR tools will quickly turn into your best friend, soI think it’s time to meet.

Hotels suffer from staff turnover perhaps more than any other business. According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics the hotel industry has an annual employee turnover rate of 73.6%; compare that to an industry like finance and insurance, which has an annual turnover rate of 1.7%.

As the hotel general manager, or hotel assistant general manager, your duties and responsibilities will only be completed with the help of a stable, capable and productive team, and therefore your hotel will only succeed with one.

The effects of high employee turnover include:

• High recruiting and onboarding costs
• Drops in service levels
• Low workplace morale
• A lack of company culture

And all of these effects equate to a hit to the hotel’s bottom line.

But there are ways to stem the flow of employee turnover as a hotel general manager, creating a healthy and happy work culture while simultaneously increasing that bottom line.

How? Simply follow these 10 tips.

1. Hire the right employees

Investing a bit of time at the start of the process can save you endless amounts later. Hospitality recruiting can be quick and impersonal – hotel general managers can fall into the trap of assuming the employee will leave sooner rather than later, and therefore not put effort into the recruitment process, resulting in a bad fit (and a self-fulfilling prophecy!)

Partner with a good recruiter, and take the time to find the very best candidate for the job, no matter how inconsequential that job might seem to be. For hotel general managers, resume samples should be studied, not flicked through.

2. Show your employees appreciation

Never underestimate the power of a pat on the back. A manager who shows appreciation for a job well done will be far more likely to retain their employees, as those employees will feel as though they’re making a difference.

In the busy world of hospitality, it can be easy to forget to show appreciation, so set up a formal, structured way to do so, like a weekly awards meeting.

3. Value your employees and include them in decision making

“What do you think is the best way forward?” This simple question can turn a jaded employee with one foot out the door into a motivated and active team member who is eager to see how they can change their workplace for the better. Invite more team members into meetings, and let them have their say. You might be surprised at their ideas.

4. Give your employees the opportunity to grow

No one wants to feel like they’re stuck in the mud. Employees will be far more likely to hang around if they feel as though they’re developing professionally. Offer education, be it internal or external. Match ambitious employees with a mentor who can guide them through their professional journey.

5. Pay your people well

Your hotel general manager salary may be a generous one, and you’ve earned every cent of it by working your way into the position. But if your attitude is one of “I did it the hard way, and so should they,” you’ll likely experience staff turnover rates that are even higher than the already high industry average.

It’s vital that you pay your people a competitive base wage, particularly the backroom staff who may not enjoy access to tips. You don’t need to match the wages of hotel resort general manager jobs, but you should be paying the same or more than your main competitors in like-for-like positions.

6. Manage your managers (including yourself)

Employee/manager rifts are perhaps the number one reason for staff turnover. People don’t quit jobs, they quit managers, as the old saying goes.

Keep track of manager performance – including your own – by seeking feedback from employees, and use training to arm your managers with the soft skills they need to successfully lead their teams. Hotel general manager jobs are extremely interpersonal, so you need to ensure you have excellent communication and social skills if you are to keep your employees around.

7. Put a focus on company culture

How would you describe your company culture? If you can’t answer that question, it’s time that you develop one.

A company culture defines your brand’s values and mission, and articulates how employees are expected to act. While it may sound like a loose and ambiguous term, the best company cultures are those that truly resonate with employees, and are tangible enough to be printed on a poster and stuck up around the office. It’s then up to the hotel managers to ensure this culture permeates within the workplace.

8. Be the best

People gravitate towards success. It’s nice to feel like you’re a winner, and the mood around the workplace is all the better for it. If your business is doing well, your employee turnover will be lower. If your business is doing badly, your employee turnover will be higher. It’s as simple as that.

But in a classic case of chicken and egg, improving your bottom line is often only possible with the help of a stable, capable and productive team. To enjoy one, you first need to secure the other.

Thankfully, by employing these tips you’ll be far more likely to get that stable team that you’ve been dreaming of, as well as all of the perks it can bring.

As close to a chef as a manager can be. This is a loose description of the role of food and beverage director, a position that requires a wealth of industry experience and knowledge, and no shortage of skill.

But what exactly is a food and beverage director? And how do you become one? Let’s take a look.

The role of a food and beverage director

Food and beverage director jobs come with responsibilities both broad and numerous. You are essentially driving the entire culinary operation of your establishment, be it a hotel, a restaurant or any other food service operation. You craft the dining experience for your guests, and your job is to make it as pleasurable and memorable as possible.

Food and beverage director responsibilities include:

• Creating and maintaining menus
• Overseeing food and beverage purchasing
• Controlling inventory
• Managing food costs
• Upholding quality standards
• Managing staff
• Managing guest interactions
• Office administration duties
• Dealing with vendors
• Addressing issues that lower levels of management are unable to resolve

The skills and abilities required for the job

If you’ve ever worked in food service before, you’ll know exactly how fast-paced an environment it can be – organised chaos is perhaps the best way to describe it.

As such, a food and beverage director must boast excellent interpersonal skills. They must be able to clearly communicate important information efficiently, and must work well under pressure. They must be able to multitask, and be prepared to make difficult and unpopular decisions where necessary.

They can also expect to work long and erratic hours, many of which will be on their feet, so good levels of health and fitness are a non-negotiable.

Food and beverage director career paths

Almost all food and beverage directors begin their journey at low level positions in the hospitality industry. This gives them great insight into the inner workings of an establishment, as well as an understanding of the needs and wants of employees and guests. They then work their way up through the ranks, whether at the one establishment or through a succession, gaining skills and experience along the way.

While food and beverage director education isn’t a must, like any high-paying position, it certainly helps. More important than higher education though is real world experience; food and beverage director interview questions will generally revolve around real situations, and will be best answered by those who have found themselves in those spots before. Most directors will bring extensive experience in the service industry, particularly in lower management positions.

There are a number of food and beverage director qualifications that can help a candidate to do their job better and make their resume more enticing, from certificates to degrees. These are generally in fields such as food and beverage, restaurant or hotel management. In many cases a candidate will currently hold a position as an assistant director of food and beverage, although this is not necessarily a must.

Food and beverage director salary

According to PayScale, the average food and beverage director was paid a salary of a little under $70,000 in 2019. In the first year in the job that salary is likely to be closer to $50,000, but dedication is usually rewarded with increases year on year.

Obviously regional director of food and beverage jobs will generally be lower paid than those in big cities, although the state of Delaware at least is bucking that trend, with data from Chron suggesting that this is where food and beverage directors are paid the most. Openings are most common in populous states with healthy tourism, such as New York, California and Florida.Becoming a food and beverage director demands hard work and commitment, with healthy amounts of study and experience usually required to secure a job, and to be truly successful in it. But if you put in the work, you’ll enjoy a truly exciting and rewarding career in a particularly delicious field.

JOB SPOTLIGHT: NURSING HOME ADMINISTRATOR (NHA)

**UPDATED JUNE 2019**

As a large number of Baby Boomers get older and retire, the need for high-quality, experienced nursing home administrators (NHAs)is growing rapidly and only expected to continue to rise. In the next ten years, we will need more retirement facilities and more nursing home administrators to manage them.

As one of the top healthcare recruiting companies in California, we at De Vore help to place the right candidates with the right facilities for this director-level position.

What does a Licensed Nursing Home Administrator Do?

Licensed NHAs oversee and manage nursing homes, assisted living facilities and retirement communities where elderly and disabled people live.

As the head of operations, a nursing home administrator wears a lot of hats and plays a crucial role in keeping their facility running smoothly.

The actual administrative, clinical and managerial tasks the nursing home administrator does will depend on how big their facility is. If they are part of a large, corporate chain, they will manage a large staff, but if they are at a smaller facility, the NHA will do much of the work and training themselves. In a smaller home, they may also be the head of the human resources and public relations departments.

Nursing home administrators supervise the various departments in their organization, including finance, food services, social services and maintenance.  They make sure their facility is in compliance with the latest state, federal and local laws and regulations. They also develop and implement policies and procedures within the organization and manage the monthly budget and finances.

A quality NHA will be able to balance compassion and care for the residents and their family members while still working to keep a high occupancy rate and make the right business decisions for the facility.

How to Become a Nursing Home Administrator 

Nursing home administrators have to get their bachelor’s degree in healthcare administration. While a master’s degree in health administration, public health, business administration or long term care administration is not a requirement, many licensed NHAs do get a master’s both to further their knowledge and also set them apart from other candidates.  The next step is to work toward both state and national licensing.

NHA Federal and State Licensing

Licensed nursing home administrators have to follow both federal and state requirements.  The National Association of Long Term Care Administrator Boards (NAB)has information about both national and state-specific processes.

While the individual state requirements differ, all prospective NHAs have to sit for the national exam. The NAB website is a great resource for practice tests as well as to learn more about each state’s requirements. The majority of states also require a minimum of 400 hours as an administrator-in-training (AIT.)

The licensing process helps ensure that every NHA knows how to comply with state and federal regulations while still being able to manage the various departments in their organization.

A Typical Nursing Home Administrator Salary

While the income for an NHA varies depending on his or her experience, location, credentials and size of the facility, a licensed nursing home administrator can expect to make close to six figures. The Bureau of Labor Statistics reports an average annual salary of $100,000+.

At De Vore, we are always on the lookout for the best candidates. We like to see NHAs who are sensitive to their residents’ needs, who are good verbal and written communicators, and who understand the importance of generating revenue. We also prefer candidates with a stable career history.

If you would like to find out about our availablelicensed nursing home administratorpositions, call our skilled recruiters today at 877-411-4358.

THE 7 STATES EXPECTED TO HAVE THE MOST AVAILABLE NURSING JOBS

**UPDATED JUNE 2019**

In 2017, the Health Resources and Services Administration (HRSA) did extensive research on the U.S. nursing workforce.  Based on their findings, the HRSA made projections regarding the supply and demand of both registered nurses (RNs) and licensed practical/vocational nurses (LPNs) across the United States.

Not only did the HRSA predict which states will have nursing surpluses and shortages by the year 2030, they also found that nursing jobs make up the largest percentage of careers in the U.S. health care workforce. If there were no nurses, the health care system as we know it would collapse.

The HRSA predicted that certain states like Florida, Ohio, Virginia and New York would have a surplus of registered nurses by 2030. They also projected some states like Ohio and California to have a surplus of LPNs.

However, the HRSA predicted that if we are to maintain our current level of health care, seven states will experience a significant deficit of registered nurses by 2030. Four states in particular are projected to have a shortage of more than 10,000 registered nurses, or FTEs (full-time equivalents.)

THE SEVEN STATES WITH THE LARGEST NEED FOR REGISTERED NURSES (RNs)

1. CALIFORNIA –44,500 FTEs
2. TEXAS–15,900 FTEs
3. NEW JERSEY–11,400 FTEs
4. SOUTH CAROLINA–10,400 FTEs
5. ALASKA –5,400 FTEs
6. GEORGIA–2,200 FTEs
7. SOUTH DAKOTA–1,900 FTEs

While the HRSA also predicted that 33 states will experience a shortage of LPNs by 2030, the impact is not quite as significant as that of RNs since LPNs can be trained faster and with less costs. The demand for LPNs is expected to increase faster than the supply by 2022.

STATES WITH THE LARGEST NEED FOR LPNs

1. TEXAS –33,500 FTEs
2. PENNSYLVANIA–18,700 FTEs
3. FLORIDA – 10,300 FTEs
4. GEORGIA–10,500 FTEs
5. NORTH CAROLINA–10,700 FTEs
6. ALABAMA–9,600 FTEs
7. MARYLAND–8,400 FTEs

REASONS FOR THE NURSING SHORTAGE

There are a number of reasons for the expected nursing shortage, like aging Baby Boomers, retiring Baby Boomer nurses and a steady growth in the prevalence of chronic diseases like cancer, heart disease, stroke, obesity and arthritis.

RNs and LPNs also tend to work in the same state where they received their training. This means that states where fewer people enter the nursing profession end up having a deficit. Another problem is that not enough future nurses are enrolling in nursing schools to meet the growing demand. Not enough qualified faculty members at nursing schools also compounds the problem.

Other factors contributing to the expected nursing shortage are high stress levels and a high turnover rate for newly-licensed RNs. Many RNs work in environments where there aren’t enough nurses working alongside them. When this happens, they have less time to spend with each patient, which affects the quality of care they can provide as well as their job satisfaction.

In our extensive experience in healthcare recruiters, we have also seen an increased need for specialty nurses trained to work in specialized areas like intensive care, psychiatrics or oncology.

OUR HEALTHCARE RECRUITING COMPANY PLACES RNS AND LPNs

As a top healthcare recruiting company, we at De Vore specialize in filling both nursing and director-level health care positions for hospitals and facilities around the country.

See all our available positions, including registered nursing jobs, here.

Whether you are a health care employer or are looking to further your career in healthcare in 2019, contact us today at (877) 411-4358. Our skilled healthcare recruiters would love to speak with you.