Hourly Employee: Reasons and Guide for Employers

Your department is currently busy with a new project for the upcoming winter. Given the mounting amount of tasks, you see the need to hire new workers but also thinks that it will be a waste as you need him only for this season. Besides, hiring the right talent will not only take so much time but also costs a lot. So, to answer your dilemma, hiring an hourly employee is the best answer.

What is an hourly employee?

In a simple term, hourly employee is an individual who is paid an hourly wage for each hour worked, as opposed to a fixed paid employee. Hourly employee is commonly hired when you need extra help for a project or a service.

Why should you hire an hourly employee?

Hourly workers are very beneficial when the holiday season comes and/or to help you finish a certain project on time. In other words, they are perfect if you run a business with seasonal peaks. It also requires little money when hiring an hourly employee because normally, they receive limited benefits, perks, and bonuses compared to a salaried employee. They can also work overtime but you have to pay the overtime work as well.

See also: Employers Update: Technical Talent Hiring Trends 2019

Employer’s guide to hire and manage an hourly employee

Hourly workers are in high demand over time. Especially during the holiday season, you could be in a war for hourly workers hiring. The average hourly worker stays within a job is less than 300 days, HomeBase study found. Even in higher-paid service roles, an hourly employee likes to switch jobs frequently. As a consequence, it might create a higher turnover and headache to your management system.

So, how to hire, manage, and retain hourly workers longer?

Hiring hourly employee is no different from hiring full-time staff. All you need to do is make a good description of the job. You should also include a clear statement that you hire them for an hourly position. Then, post the job ads to social media, craigslist, or billboard. If you find it hard to get suitable candidates, you can also consider to re-hire your previous employee or hire your own best friend who you think is the perfect match for the position needed.

After that, you can retain and manage them so you don’t need to find another hourly staff when you need it. How to manage and retain them? Workforce Institute suggested that you need to mentally break down hourly workers into four types.

1.  Simple transactional such as clerks or construction labourers.

2.  Simple experimental like a salesperson, telemarketers, or receptionist.

3.  Complex transactional such as truck operators, machinists, or bakers.

4.  Complex experimental like a nurse, administrative assistant, or police officer.

Once you understand who exactly your workers are and what their weaknesses are, you can come up with creative solutions to address those weaknesses. To illustrate, experimental jobs often require people skills that translate well in a number of settings. A good clerk, for example, is likely to be a good receptionist as well. So, it will make it easier to shift jobs and makes retention a friend. Likewise, you can also offer them hospitality and perks that set you apart from a competitor. This method always works even for salaried employees.

Guide of the hourly wage for employers

Employers must include a policy clause regarding hourly employee if the practice will be made available. You must define the number of hours per week that constitute part-time and full-time status. Generally, those who work 36 or even 40 hours per week counts as a full-time employee. However, under stated policy, an hourly employee could work more than 40 hours per week and must be paid overtime.

Employers must do a good calculation with the payment as well as a different job might require different hourly payment. This, however, can also follow your company’s rules and regulations and/or country you live in. CEO World categorised Australia to be the country with the highest hourly wage, US$14.14. Meanwhile, the average hourly wage in Singapore is US$10.85.

Hourly wage, nevertheless, can also be calculated from monthly wage of your salaried employees. You might want to check hourly wage conversion here or do the simple math of hourly wage calculation: “hourly rate of pay x hours of work = hourly employee salary”.

For example, Sean is an hourly employee with $6.50 rate of pay. Last week, he worked for 38 hours. Thus, his pay would be $6.50*38 = $247.00

Next read: Why You Should Re-Hire Your Former Employee