“Wasted time costs $40 billion” – “how to spot it and put a stop to it”

I read a very interesting article recently by the Smart Company which I just loved and I know you will find it interesting too. It talked about our Australian workforce productivity and how the ‘lost soul‘ and ‘patchy participant‘ type employees are costing our businesses. It’s no longer a matter of just a ‘bad hiring’. If you don’t have the know-how and system to differentiate between productive and destructive people, then it will cost you. There is no way out.

In the said article according to a survey done by Ernst & Young, “a third of Australia’s workforce falls below the national productivity average – costing business more than $40 billion in wasted time”.

See below the results of the survey:
Super achievers – 23% Solid contributors – 48% Patchy participants – 24% Lost souls – 7%

But HOW do you know in which category your candidate or staff member sits?
The Performia system goes beyond this and using a proven and scientific method, identifies and differentiates between these various categories to help your own understanding of people to enable you in building a safe, stable and productive team every time. Know right from the start who is really on board and who is pretending. Also check out a 4 minute clip which I think you will find interesting.

Performia – Helping you build a productive team

If you’re hiring the most important thing you need is certainty that your potential staff member is going to give you a good return on investment.

Having recently done your free test drive of Performia’s evaluation system, you will know the accuracy and result it achieves. When you add this tool to your hiring at any level, you will be able to take the mystery out of your hiring process and make it more predictable so that you can make safe decisions that bring stability to the long term prosperity of your business.

Similar to if you were buying an investment property, you want to know all the facts and risks before you make your final decision, as whatever you decide, will impact your business, hopefully in a positive way.

We have clients who have made it an internal policy for any new potential staff member to undergo Performia’s evaluation screening prior to any final decisions being made.

Why? because they have experienced the value of the system in real financial outcomes.
• We helped Chooks Fresh & Tasty (a Perth franchise) expand from 18 stores to over 34 stores in just 2 years.
• Founder of Investors Direct realised that not knowing the Performia system had cost him $2M in a few years in real income.
• Going against our recommendation cost Chooks Fresh & Tasty $170,000 over 6 months in just one wrong hiring.
• We helped a creative design business in Sydney hire a “reliable, efficient and very valuable” staff member adding continuous value.
• KRC Mining says this is a “reliable method of candidate evaluation that enables us to employ the right person, the first time, and quickly establish them on the spot”
These are just a few examples of the value we’ve been adding to our clients’ business in the recent years, and we look forward to being of continual assistance and service to your needs in the future.

Performia Australia – 6 STEPS TO SANITY AS A MANAGER

6 STEPS TO SANITY FOR A MANAGER/ EXECUTIVE

One of the things that I notice when it comes to people that I talk to is that there are a lot of businesses that work with the Business Owner or Manager making the majority of the decisions.

In fact I was with one client yesterday who has a successful business that has been around for nearly fifty years and has about one hundred staff in two states.  A great result in anyone’s language.

I talked to a new Manager in the business and his take was the business is great but the biggest problem we have is a lack of systems and processes.

“We have one staff member who is trying to retire but he is the guy that everyone turns to whenever there is a problem as he knows everything.  If there is a computer problem on his day off or early in the morning he will get the call as he is the only one who knows how to fix it.”

If you’ve ever experienced a feeling of overwhelm and franticness in your business you might have a situation where everyone comes to you to solve all the problems of your business and doesn’t get on with handling their jobs they way they should.

You should look at the following points as some tips that will help you create a better business that grows faster and makes you more successful; but allows you to relax as well:

1)      Cope and Organize.

It is definitely important to handle the current business that you have and the demands of your staff and clients.  Spend some time though each day organizing your business so that it easier in the future.  This time is your investment in the future of your business.

2)      Work out the areas that need help first and handle them one at a time.

Look at what areas of your business take the most of your time and handle these first.  Each time you handle an area that takes the most work as a priority then you will get more of your time to grow and handle the business overall.

3)      Hire the right people in the first place.

Hire based on the person’s results in the past, reward based on production and results not opinion or how nice the person is.

4)      Train you staff.

Give them the skills they need to be able to the job.

5)      Get out of the way, but with caution.

The next step is to get out of the way of the person that you have hired and trained to do the job but let them get it done themselves.  When you do this though make sure that you don’t just get out of the way and let the business collapse.  A good manager knows that the first thing he needs to do when someone new comes into the area is to work with him making sure the area is getting the results it needs until the person is doing the job and then slowly get out of the way so that the person can take over and the results improve.

6)      Measure the business.

As an executive now keep measurements on each area of the business and how it is producing.  This way you can see problems and improvements easily and handle accordingly.

Constantly working on these six simple steps will help you grow your business and recover your sanity.

Greg Paul
Business Development Executive
Performia Australia
greg@performia.com.au
Ph: 1800 603 023

 

©2011 Performia Australia Pty Ltd. All Rights Reserved.

 

Performia Australia is part of an international business that are experts on helping business owners and managers know how to get the best results from their staff as well as recruit the most productive people to  business. Learn the right way to Build Your Team.

 

Performia Australia sends a weekly email newsletter with tips about how to improve your business.  Send your name, email, phone number and the name of your business to info@performia.com.au to register for the newsletter.

7 WAYS TO AVOID “BURN-OUT”

7 WAYS TO AVOID “BURNT-OUT”?

I had an appointment last week and three times during the meeting the person mentioned that they were “tired and burnt-out”, and looking for a change to recharge their batteries.

I also read in the newspaper last week a footballer talking about how the team; were “burnt-out”.

It prompted me to write about this and offer some suggestions how you can avoid “burn-out” and maintain your passion for what you do and for life.  So in this article I am going to talk about five solutions to avoiding “burn-out” in your life:

1)      Do what you are passionate about. – Everyone has a purpose and a passion in life and successful people inherently know what their purpose is and do things that align with it.  Don’t just do a job because it will make you money.  Do a job that makes you money and makes you happy, that way you will always jump out of bed in the morning.

2)      Have a balanced life. – At Performia we talk about eight areas of life that someone should be succeeding in.  Make sure that you have time for all the different parts of your life and then you will be less likely to get tired and burn out at work.

3)      Play a game at work. – Set yourself new games and new challenges to achieve.  Someone with goals and barriers is more likely to be successful and have fun at work than someone who simply gets locked into the daily grind.

4)      Look after yourself. – Get enough sleep, get someone exercise and make sure you are eating well.  It’s easy to forget yourself when you are busy and producing, but this will eventually get to you and run you down, so make sure you look after yourself.

5)      Get trained constantly. – Always be improving your skills and stay ahead of the game.  You’ll keep expanding your abilities and find new ways to get things done.

6)      Handle any barriers that come up; when they do. – One of the easiest ways to get “burn-out” it to have a purpose to do something and get stopped.  If you find yourself being stopped achieving things you will often start to feel tired and the reasons that things can’t be done will mount up.  The best solution is to focus on the purpose and keep pushing to get that done rather than focusing on the stops as they will keep mounting up.

7)      Go for a walk. – If you feel yourself getting tired looking at a computer screen all day, go for a walk and put your attention and focus further out.  Look at the trees the buildings etc.  Often when you do this you will find yourself getting tired at first, but keep walking until you feel better.  Also make sure you have regular time for exercise and relaxation.

I hope these Tips help you get more energetic at work and maintain your energy levels.

Stay Productive

Greg Paul
Business Development Executive
Performia Australia
greg@performia.com.au
Ph: 1800 603 023

©2011 Performia Australia Pty Ltd. All Rights Reserved.

Performia Australia is part of an international business that are experts on helping business owners and managers know how to get the best results from their staff as well as recruit the most productive people to  business. Learn the right way to Build Your Team.

Performia Australia sends a weekly email newsletter with tips about how to improve your business.  Send your name, email, phone number and the name of your business to info@performia.com.au to register for the newsletter.

Performia Australia – WHAT SHOULD YOU DO FOR YOUR SUCCESS?

WHAT SHOULD YOU DO FOR YOUR SUCCESS?

Recently a friend of mine found he was having some trouble with one area of his business and was left with three choices about what to do with the business:

1)    Remove the part of the business that was having trouble and focus on a new avenue that the business was going down.

2)    Keep both avenues and hope the part that was having trouble improved.

3)    Get rid of the business altogether and start something new.

The advice I gave him could sound simple yet very hard to put into action; “You should do whatever it is that you want to do”.

When you are running a business it seems there will always be a lot of advice from friends, family and other people that have an opinion for you to use.  Some of these opinions are good and helpful, some not so helpful and some downright destructive.

No matter who’s advice you take, there will be ups and downs and a lot of hard work to get your business going and doing what you want it to do.

Put simply though whether you get through all of the hard work and are successful is up to you having the passion and the tenacity to get the work done.  Whether your friend has told you it’s a good idea or a bad one only you will be there to have to the hard work and go through the pain whilst you grow the business.

The end result was I told my friend that he needs to work out what his goals and purpose in life are and where he wants to be with not only his business but his life.  He is a great guy and has a lot of drive and passion which actually allows him to do a lot of things and all of them could make money and all them could be successful but without his passion and commitment they could also all fail miserably.

WHAT SHOULD YOU DO?

So for you I would encourage you to work out your goals and purposes as well as what you want your life to look like in the end.  Then work out the plans and projects that you are going to take on and get them done.

By the way when you’ve made the decision and you’re going to get it done only listen to the friends that are going to help, not the ones that encourage you to stop.  Then I hope you all the success you deserve and if you’d like my help I’d love to hear from you.

Greg Paul
Business Development Executive
Performia Australia
greg@performia.com.au
Ph: 1800 603 023

 

©2011 Performia Australia Pty Ltd. All Rights Reserved.

Performia Australia is part of an international business that are experts on helping business owners and managers know how to get the best results from their staff as well as recruit the most productive people to  business. Learn the right way to Build Your Team.

Performia Australia sends a weekly email newsletter with tips about how to improve your business.  Send your name, email, phone number and the name of your business to info@performia.com.au to register for the newsletter.

 

Performia Australia – How Do You Penalize Your Customers??

Amazingly, some businesses seem to take pleasure in administering penalties to their customers.

When it comes to building a successful business there are many things to be accounted for: finance, sales, marketing, the product itself and production.

One thing stands above everything else and you would think would be the priority of every business is customer  service.

I read an article when I was at Uni that highlighted a point to me that every time a customer/ client interacts with your business then that interaction is the business in the eyes of that customer.

TWO EXAMPLES

I regularly fly around the country and would like to use two local airlines as examples to highlight my point and how it works:

1)      The airline I fly most is Richard Branson’s.  Out of the hundreds of flights I have had with them I have only had a very small amount of problems and these have usually been rectified straight away.

When I think of the flights I have had I often recall more likely times such as when we came to land in Sydney one time and the lead hostess asked “How can you tell the difference between the ground crew and the flights crew?…..the flight crew are better looking”

The crew; always seem to have fun and you feel like they actually want you on their plane.  The end result is that I have asked a lot of people who they prefer to fly and most have said they prefer to fly with this airline.

2)      The other airline on the other hand is the newest domestic carrier in Australia and is distinguished by its big cat logo.  Last week, our personnel department doing the right thing wanted to save some money so flew our trainer back from Sydney on this airline.

When he checked in, he was told that he hadn’t checked in on line so had to pay another $25.  When asked how this could be he was simply told that he should have looked at the terms and conditions –and then made feel really wrong when they told him that he wouldn’t have bought a car without looking at the terms and conditions!  He asked why their terms and conditions would be different to all the other airlines and was told by the Manager that they were not like Virgin or Qantas, or even Jetstar – they were a low cost airline and if he had booked online check- in would have been $20 but as he had not it was now $25 plus a credit card fee of $6.60.  Ironically even the $20 would have meant that they were more expensive than Jetstar and Virgin for the same flight.

Performia spends tens of thousands just on domestic flights and I can say is that this airline is probably not going to have any more business from us, our staff or any of our friends we speak to about this and similar experiences we have had with this airline.

WHAT IS THE SOLUTION FOR YOUR BUSINESS?

If your staff represent your organization and what it is, then there are some steps that you should do to ensure that they represent you in the way that you want:

1)      Have a purpose for your business – the best businesses have a reason for existing and a result they are seeking to achieve.  Know what your purpose is and what the result that you are providing your customers with that will create your future.

2)      Hire the right people in the first place – we talk a lot about this at Performia Australia, but if you have people that are productive and want the best for your business then they are going to create better results in the short and long term.  Contact us to find out more about how we can help you Build Your Team with the most productive and trustworthy staff to work with.

3)      Train your staff – make sure that they definitely know the purpose of the business and the result you are trying to achieve, make sure that they know how to do their jobs competently.  Keep in mind that if you train your best staff they will become the managers and leaders of your business in the future.

4)      Measure the results – measure the results, reward the people that are getting the results that you want and correct the mistakes of the people who are not doing it the way you want it done.

If you follow these steps like I am sure most of you already are, then you will have an organization that has a purpose that the customer will relate to and provided it is a purpose that people need and is helpful, your business will expand.

No matter what business you are creating Performia can assist you to Build Your Team and I trust these tops are helpful.

Greg Paul
Business Development Executive
Performia Australia
greg@performia.com.au
Ph: 1800 603 023

 

©2010 Performia Australia Pty Ltd. All Rights Reserved.

Performia Australia is part of an international business that are experts on helping business owners and managers know how to get the best results from their staff as well as recruit the most productive people to  business. Learn the right way to Build Your Team.

Performia Australia sends a weekly email newsletter with tips about how to improve your business.  Send your name, email, phone number and the name of your business to info@performia.com.au to register for the newsletter.

 

Performia Australia – Are you Busy or Productive?

BUSY OR PRODUCTIVE?

Have you ever experienced a business or other organization that is always busy with the staff running around and doing things but when you want something done it never seems to get finished – certainly not in the time that you needed it or wanted it?

It is easy in the rush to grow our organisations to miss a simple perspective, and one that is the most important to achieving our goals:

THE END RESULT IS MUCH MORE IMPORTANT THAN HOW BUSY YOU WERE DURING THE PROCESS.

For example I heard of a telemarketer once that would make half as many calls each day as her colleague – in the same role – but made twice as many appointments.  The tragedy was that the CEO and the GM wanted to dismiss her because she never seemed busy, and spend way too long on each call..  I pointed out that she was wasting less of their leads and getting better results so she should actually be training the other girl who was wasting lots of their leads.  The end result after all was bookings for the sales consultants; not calls made and certainly not how busy they looked.

 

HOW CAN YOU MEASURE THE ACTUAL RESULT

This becomes quite a balancing act and impossible without putting these steps in place –

1. Exactly defining what it is each team member is meant to produce and ensuring they know it.
2. Knowing what you expect as the minimum result from each one of your team members,
3. Accurately, as close to real time as possible, measuring their results.

With the above in place, you will more easily know whether you should push your team members for more results if it looks like they have spare capacity or to leave them to just get the results they are obtaining.

Even when you have good producing staff members, it is still your job to push them for more results and remove barriers they may experience.

CAN EVERY ROLE BE MEASURED?

The answer to this question is an absolute YES, YES, YES!!!!

For example you might have a PA and wonder what the result of a PA is?  Well that could be a simple as ‘time for the Executive’.  How would you measure their success?  Well that would simply be does the Executive get better results because the PA is there.  If the answer is yes then the PA is getting their job done, if not, well you understand by now I am sure.

WHAT ABOUT BEING BUSY?

Who cares?  Not me I suppose.  I experienced one extremely productive organization once that had an unhealthy idea that any time you stand still was “out PR” and looked bad.  This was so extreme that I remember trying to get someone to sign a form for me and she saw me and had to wait about three minutes to sign my form.  This was too much and she ran off to see someone else.  I then found her thirty minutes later after she had spent fifteen minutes trying to find me.  She could have saved ten minutes by waiting three to five.  Oh well.

SO WHAT DO YOU DO?

Simply measure each person and position in the organization, get people focusing on their result and reward the guys who get better results for the organization and watch the company grow.

 

Greg Paul
Business Development Executive
Performia Australia
greg@performia.com.au
Ph: 1800 603 023

 

©2010 Performia Australia Pty Ltd. All Rights Reserved.

Performia Australia is part of an international business that are experts on helping business owners and managers know how to get the best results from their staff as well as recruit the most productive people to  business. Learn the right way to Build Your Team.

Performia Australia sends a weekly email newsletter with tips about how to improve your business.  Send your name, email, phone number and the name of your business to info@performia.com.au to register for the newsletter.

 

 

Performia Australia – Is Education Necessary?

IS EDUCATION NECESSARY?

In our current business environment education is promoted as an important ingredient to create success.

Many people advertise jobs insisting on a degree or some sort of qualification to be able to get the job.

It sounds like a nice thing to have the person qualified for the job , as it might mean you won’t have to spend so much time training them and you would then expect to have someone ready to do the job from the first day.

In this article I want to look at two aspects of this argument though, 1) what is the real value of education to the workforce and 2) how important is education to the job you are advertising, is it the most important thing; in fact is it actually irrelevant.

1)      A couple of months ago I was sent an article by James Thomson who did some interesting research into the most successful business people in Australia and looked at their educational history  and found the following points of interest;

1. Of the top 30 rich people in Australia only 16 completed University.
2. Out of the sixteen that completed University degrees he points out that four of those went onto success in completely unrelated fields.
3. For example Billionaires James Packer, Kerry Stokes and Lindsay Fox not only did not attend University of the three only James Packer completed High School.
4. Kerry Packer famously remarked about sending James to University; “Why would he want to go there?  To learn to smoke marijuana?”

Before people write and comment in defence of education I should point out that I myself have a University degree and learnt a lot from it that I apply, and certainly the other fourteen were successful in the fields that they studied and like me probably found a lot of value in the effort.

My simple observation though is that whilst it helps some people become successful a degree or advanced education alone is not a recipe to success.

2)      Throughout the world we have noticed that a lot of jobs are advertised with the educational requirements of the job included in the “job advertisement” as a prerequisite to apply.  Obviously it would be nice to have someone come along qualified to start the job straight away but we have seen above that education is no sure-fire requisite to success in the role.  In fact I am sure that you have met educated people who were lazy, unproductive and possibly didn’t even really understand what they had studied.  Then what is important in finding the right person for the job; Productivity – someone who is going to get a lot of work done that is valuable to you as a business owner or manager – yes there are some jobs that require a certain level of education to be able to do the job at all such as a lawyer or a commercial pilot.  If you really look at the job that you are advertising though you will often find if you examine the person’s results in the past and find the most productive person to be able to do the job that the qualifications that you need are easily obtained in a few days or maybe a few short weeks::

1. For example the main financial planning certification required in Australia for a financial planner required about two to three weeks of full time study.
2. Full training on Quicken or MYOB – the main accounting software packages used in Australia can be done in two to three days for someone with no experience, and just a short correspondence course to be approved to submit GST compliance to the tax office.
3. A couple of weeks will train someone fully in Microsoft Office as an expert.

SO WHAT DO YOU DO?

Well, put simply, when you look at hiring someone there are four factors that we would recommend as the important ones to base building your team on;

1)      Productivity – Can you clearly see that the candidate has been able to add value to the organisations they have worked for in the past?

2)      Personality – Does the person fit, will they stay and how will they get along with others?

3)      Motivation – Is the person motivated by the challenge of the job or are they mostly motivated by the pay, conditions and status?

4)      Knowledge – Does the person actually knowledge that leads to increasing their value to the organization, or do they have education that just makes their resume and interview skills look better?

Productivity is the key to selecting who you should bring into your organisation, and if the first three points above are good, the fourth, knowledge, can usually, as we have seen, be easily picked up by the productive and willing new employee.  With knowledge though the best thing to do is ask the person questions about the job that will give you an idea of whether they know what they are talking about or not.  Especially questions about doing the job are a lot more valuable than whether the person has an education or not.

Greg Paul
Business Development Executive
Performia Australia
greg@performia.com.au
Ph: 1800 603 023

©2010 Performia Australia Pty Ltd. All Rights Reserved.

Performia Australia is part of an international business that are experts on helping business owners and managers know how to get the best results from their staff as well as recruit the most productive people to  business. Learn the right way to Build Your Team.

Performia Australia sends a weekly email newsletter with tips about how to improve your business.  Send your name, email, phone number and the name of your business to info@performia.com.au to register for the newsletter.

How To Get Better Results From Your Salesperson

Through years of experience managing sales teams there are a few factors which are sometimes over looked which can help dramatically increase number of closes. The following article covers a few key points to get your salespeople producing to their highest capacity – especially if you find he is not producing the results that you expect from him:

 

UNDERSTAND YOUR SALESPERSON’S OPPORTUNITIES:

As with any salesperson, it is always a fine balance of their manager to know whether the cycles they have ‘in progress’ are valuable, and sometimes even real.  I read through some salespeople’s opportunities (prospects who have expressed some interest in your product) and they look OK and even somewhat impressive –  and I am guessing that some of these would be major sales that would handle many months of budgeted sales.

 

The first thing I would need to do is understand each opportunity in great detail.  If my salesperson is doing well and getting their targets, I don’t worry so much about the detail, but when they are not making targets, I need to live, breath and eat their opportunities.  Firstly, however, you need to ensure you understand the industry and customers or you don’t have the knowledge to make any assessment.

 

It is so important to know this information, because not understanding it can have dire consequences for your sales.  For example, if the opportunities are real and about to pop, putting pressure on the salesperson would cause him to perhaps either leave or the sale to prolong, or worse, fall through.  If the opportunities are not so real, leaving him to chase them will just cost you money and give you a false security.

 

If you find yourself, like many business owners, out of the office probably too often, I know the feelings you are going through as sales are not coming in, wage bills are piling up and it is natural to panic.  And correct!  The thing you need to do is get the information, which I suggest should also involve a call to some of the contacts associated with the opportunities to be sure what the salesperson is reporting is true.  This is done best as a survey type call to see that your clients are being well cared for rather than an inquisition into your sales team.  I have found many times that making these sorts of calls myself has speed up and increased the value of the sale as I see and can handle things that my sales team sometimes cannot.

 

This information will allow you to get out of mystery and know the next step with your salespeople.  On one hand if he is not doing well it could be that you need to let him go but it could be that you need to work more closely with him to ensure these opportunities are all converted.

 

WHERE TO FOCUS YOUR ATTENTION:

Sales people are interesting.  They constantly need reassuring, help, coaching, training, inspiring, and especially when they are down.  There are several tricks to this.  Firstly, you MUST put most attention on the best performing sales people in your team.  Second, the sales people must feel that you really care for them and are there for them at any time to help them close a sale.  They need to feel comfortable to approach you with their problems, mistakes and lost sale information.  If they don’t have this feeling, they will hide things from you and it’s hiding things that slows and stops their sales.

 

You also need to know that he is using his time effectively.  For example, could he have 2 or even 5 times the quantity of opportunities?  Or is he working to capacity and more opportunities will just disperse his attention too much?  Again, to know the answer to this you will need to spend time and see what he is doing with his day, if he is staying organised, be sure he is not forgetting to chase leads and opportunities and also to see if he is not closing deals as fast as he should.

 

Often I find that the business owner/founder is normally the most experienced, with the best production record in the sales area of their business.  So I am sure you will know very fast if he is doing the right things to lead to him getting the right things.

 

Sales people respond best, or turn around their sales best when you get them to put their attention on periods when they were selling well.  Asking them “Why are your sales so low?” just caves them in and stops them communicating.  But asking them, “How did you make so many sales in March?  I want to know because you can sell so much?” puts them into pleasure moments when they are succeeding, and brings them up emotionally allowing them to be much more solution orientated, as well as seeing what they were doing in March that they are not doing now.

 

THE IMPORTANCE OF A GOOD CRM (Customer Relationship Management, processes implemented by a company to handle its contact with its customers)

 

One very important tool that you MUST use when you have a sales team, and especially when you work out of the office like you do, is a real time CRM system.

 

For my business, every call, e-mail, proposal, follow up is logged in our CRM.  That is every activity that happens with our clients, opportunities and leads.  We use a system where I can log into anywhere, anytime from my phone, and it even SMS’s me reports each day of each sales persons activity.  It is very cool and I feel comfortable having the info, and knowing that we are not losing leads and not servicing opportunities and clients.  It means I can exactly apply the tool required to get the sales up, and without spending all the time to find out why sales are down!

 

Another important part of a good CRM system is that if you do need to let the salesperson go, all the info will be in the CRM system for you to seamlessly take over the cycles.  You would have invested perhaps $30k or more in direct costs to get the opportunities that he has built (hopefully built!) and it would be horrible to lose this investment if he leaves.

This is just a few basic points but ensure you implement these and you will find that the results you salespeople are getting can be dramatically lifted.

—

Gareth Jekel
Managing Director
Performia Australia
greg@performia.com.au
Ph: 1800 603 023

©2010 Performia Australia Pty Ltd. All Rights Reserved.

Performia Australia is part of an international business that are experts on helping business owners and managers know how to get the best results from their staff as well as recruit the most productive people to  business. Learn the right way to Build Your Team.

Happy New Laws – the new regulations SMEs need to understand in 2011

Tuesday, 04 January 2011 09:32
James Thomson

Entrepreneurs returning to work today must work quickly to ensure they and their staff are fully across the three major regulatory changes that came into force on January 1, or risk falling foul of new laws covering consumer rights, pay rates and parental leave.

As has become seemingly traditional at the start of each financial and calendar year (on July 1 and January 1 respectively) the New Year heralded a raft of minor and major legislative changes, covering everything from agriculture through to recreation (including new regulations about the standard length of a bowling green).

But there are three mains areas that SME business owners need to particularly focus on:

1. Consumer laws

The number of new regulations under the second tranche of the Labor Government’s consumer laws regime came into effect on January 1, with retailers among the sectors most affected.

While the first tranche of the laws (introduced on July 1) covered unfair contracts (particularly so-called standard contracts) the second tranche is focused on protection of consumer rights and includes new rules about warranties, direct selling and so-called consumer guarantees.

The nine consumer guarantees relating to goods are:

• Suppliers and manufacturers guarantee that goods are of acceptable quality when sold to a consumer.
• A suppler guarantees that goods will be reasonably fit for any purpose the consumer or supplier specified.
• Suppliers and manufacturers guarantee that their description of goods (for example, in marketing materials) is accurate.
• A supplier guarantees that goods will match any sample or demonstration model and any description provided.
• Suppliers and manufacturers guarantee that the goods will satisfy any extra promises made about them in express warranties.
• A supplier guarantees they have the right to sell the goods with clear title unless they alerted the consumer before the sale that they had limited title.
• A supplier guarantees that no one will try to repossess or take back the goods, or prevent the consumer from using the goods, except in certain circumstances.
• A supplier guarantees that goods are free of any hidden securities or charges and will remain so, except in certain circumstances.
• Manufacturers or importers guarantee they will take reasonable steps to provide spare parts and repair facilities for a reasonable time after purchase.

Service providers must also guarantee to provide services:

• With due care and skill.
• Which are fit for specified purpose.
• Within a reasonable time frame (where no time is set).

What will companies need to do in practice to meet their obligations under the new regime? The key will be to ensure warranties and other documentation reflect the new laws, and to ensure that customer-facing staff understand how the new laws could affect their dealing with customers.

For example, it will now be unlawful for a store to have a policy and documentation stating it does not offer refunds or does not offer refunds on sale items. Under the consumer guarantees, any faulty or unfit goods must be able to be exchanged – regardless of price.

The new consumer laws also cover what is known as unsolicited selling, such as door-to-door sales or telephone sales. The new laws establish a cooling off period during which the seller is not allowed to accept payment or supply the goods for 10 days. While these laws will not officially come into effect until the start of 2012, the industry – which is very unhappy – must start transitioning now.

2. Paid parental leave

The new government-funded paid parental leave scheme is now in force, offering eligible workers 18 weeks pay at the minimum wage (currently $569.90). Currently about 6,500 workers and about 1,000 businesses have registered the scheme.

While the urgency with which you need to understand paid parental leave will depend on whether or not you have staff who are looking to access the benefit, it is important to understand the employers rights and obligations. The main ones are:

• The employer will act as paymaster in the scheme, receiving cash from the Government and passing this to the worker.
• The employer will be responsible for paying superannuation on top of the amounts paid by the Government.
• If you have an existing paid parental leave scheme in place, it must stay in place.
• Employees can now take up to two years of parental leave, although it is unpaid after the first 18 weeks.

3. Modern awards

The process of transitioning the Australian economy to the Labor Government’s Modern Awards system has been a long one, and it is still continuing. On January 1 a new phase started, with a number of industries – including the hospitality and child care sectors, and a range of workers on state awards – moving to the new, federal awards system.

Obviously, whether your business is affected by these changes will depend on your industry. But if you are impacted, and you are not across the new pay rates and obligations, you had better act very fast.

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This article is from www.smartcompany.com.au, I hope you found it helpful!

Greg Paul
Business Development Executive
Performia Australia
greg@performia.com.au
Ph: 1800 603 023

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