kiwi pom
Member
- Location
- canterbury NZ
If you want to attract and keep good staff instead of paying a new team of kids mad for the craic every year, you need enough work to keep them on full time, employed all year. Holidays, sick pay, pensions etc.Any advice? Alot of guys having sales and giving up the ag contracting game. We don't plan on doing that and have a healthy business doing predominantly grass silage for dairy farms, slurry pumping/spreading and ag construction work.
Happy to pay good wages for good people.
I have friends and family who work for local big cement works, chemical factory's etc that work all sorts of fancy shift patterns.... 4 days on 4 days off etc etc and overtime after so many hours or on weekends etc. i am not against trying any of that but wouldn't know how to do it.
Basically i want to bring being employed by an agri contractor into the modern ways of the world.
Any body doing it already? on farms or contractors?
At the moment......it sounds a bit harsh.....but i feel we just get all the erm.....leftovers of staff.....if you sort of get what i mean.
Any tips for attracting, keeping and encouraging staff appreciated
thankyou
I'd go flat rate, but some might prefer basic plus overtime.
If you want them to stay you have to make it a place where they can grow over time, earn enough for a mortgage, start a family, and be financially secure etc. That probably means that you have to be a bit flexible with work hours too, you can't just say, sorry the suns out, I know it's your weekend off, but you have to come in. That's fine for casual staff but not full timers who are busy all year, they have a life outside of work.
Personally I think a cap on the number of hours you work in a day is a good idea, say no more than 15 so if you start at 6am you know you're finished no later than 9pm. Regular time off is important for any family too not just the employee, you have to have a life.
I never minded setting my own limits, knocking off when I thought I'd done enough but being forced to stay on a job all night just because we were behind was a big no in my book.
Others will have a completely different view.