In July of 2019, the national unemployment rate was 3.7%. Minimum wage rates are increasing across the nation. At the beginning of 2019, eighteen states began the year with higher minimum wages based on the cost of living and ten other states increased their rates due to prior approved legislation or ballot initiatives. Moving forward, D.C., Delaware, Michigan and Oregon will also increase their wages this year.
Pay is critical to a successful job placement, especially while unemployment is the lowest it’s been since 1969! In working with Reliance Staffing, I would use each new job order inquiry as an opportunity to work with our client to ensure a good rate of pay for our employee. This would include current clients who didn’t have a need for a few months and now had a new role to fill, or brand new clients who we didn’t service yet. Opening a new order in COATS was just a great opportunity (and trigger to remember) to review pay and bill rates. It sounds like common sense to do so, but often many will just reopen the old job order and use the same rates from the prior orders.
Use every new position opening / job order with a client as an opportunity to increase pay rates. After all, our employee is going to be assigned to work inside their firm, and if the employee is happy and feels valued for the job they are doing, the client will be pleased. I always told my clients, “you get what you pay for” and took pride in having the highest paid employees in the industry.
~Lynn Connor