In Episode 50, I talk to Sarah Torres-Ferrick from HR Circle Online about hiring. Knowing the main differences and benefits of hiring a contractor and employee will help you to accomplish the right objectives in your business. Sarah brings us her expertise and answers all of my questions on your behalf!
You can connect with Sarah here if you have more questions:
How to Know If You Need to Hire an Employee or a Contractor with Sarah Torres-Ferrick
Welcome to The Determined Mom Show. The only marketing podcast dedicated to guiding moms CEOs into tranquility wealth and multiplying those precious moments. Today I have Sarah Torres-Ferrick here with me and she is the owner of HR Circle Online. She’s going to be talking to us about how to know when it’s time to start hiring a team for your business, so that way you can get your valuable time back.
Today Sarah will discuss; When to hire, Who should I hire? Should I hire an employee, a contractor? What is the difference? What are the benefits? So Sarah is just going to bring so much value to our audience today. We will first discuss how she got started in creating her own work from home business in the HR Consulting industry.
What drew you into HR and all of those things?
Sarah: “I got a degree in philosophy but I couldn’t really figure out how to get paid to do philosophy. My dad was in HR for the government and I found out about an HR internship and I started my internship there and that was 11 years ago. So most of my HR career has been for big government organizations during that time. My husband started his own business and I really did the business side of it. So for about 10 years, I guess we’ve
had a family business, his businesses are in the Baseball and Softball sports realm. It was, I guess, about two years ago that I was talking to him and like any husband he had a good suggestion about doing HR Consulting for small businesses and he was right, because I do love helping small businesses. My HR company is really focused on small businesses or those businesses that maybe have less than 50 people and they’re probably making their first decision in hiring. I especially love helping moms like myself because I want moms to know that, you know, you started a home business, you started something and it can grow without you sacrificing everything you loved about it.“
When to Hire, Who should I Hire?
Sarah expresses that some people can find it difficult because there’s a lot of different government agencies and states that have different rules. So entrepreneurs really have to know where they’re located and the rules of their state. For example, if you’re in a state like Virginia, you’re not going to have that many restrictions. If you’re in California, you’re going to have multiple complex restrictions. Generally, what you want to think about first, is if you’re hiring somebody as an employee or hiring them as an independent contractor.
Tell us a little bit about the difference between hiring an employee and hiring a contractor.
So what you should do when you’re making that leap is first, think about yourself and what are you looking for? Are you the type of person that needs to be hands on with the people they work with. For example, the need to oversee what the employee is doing specifically when they’re doing it, how they’re doing it, what systems they’re using etc, if that’s the kind of leader that you are, then you probably going to want to have an employee. If what you’re really looking for is to have a goal accomplished or help with a specific thing,then that’s probably going to be an independent contractor.
Reasons for needing an Expert.
The next thing you want to look at is the type of work you’re looking for. Are you looking at somebody to support you? Or are you looking for an Expert? You know you need an expert when you can’t Youtube or Google your way into executing specific campaigns or tools. The case may also be that you are an expert at these things but you need more time to focus on client acquisition. A person can’t listen to enough podcasts to be an attorney or do it, right. When you get really big, maybe you bring that all in house, but for most of the time under most of the standards, you’re going to be completely fine. You know, reaching out to those experts, adding those people to your team as independent contractors. If you’re looking for support staff, this is where it can get tricky because sometimes it can be an employee.
Are you looking for someone for a long period of time or just a product launch? So for e.g, a launch would be contractor and a longer position you would want that to be an employee. If you are looking for an Online Business Manager to help you continuously for an indefinite period of time, that’s going to lend more to an employee. Shorter periods tend to be Independent Contractors.
Always check your State Laws
It’s best to find out what the overall rules are for the state that you or your business was created in. “Let’s give an example, So I do HR Consulting in CA, if I have a client in California, I have to make sure that my HR work is more in the strategic planning advice realm. If I’m the one sitting there scheduling interviews, conducting interviews, making assessments on who to hire, then California law might consider me to be an employee.”
So what about the Coaching Industry? We have a lot of coaches that listen to the podcast. So what about the coaching client relationship, is that affected by that at all? It could, because you really want to make sure that you’re keeping yourself as a separate business entity. So you want to make sure you have properly set up business entities and you’re keeping that relationship right. So the government doesn’t want to look on your client’s website and see that you’re one of their teammates, you don’t want to advertise it like that.
When you’re coaching somebody, you’re not really talking to their customers or their clients but you could be helping guide them with the strategic planning of their business and making decisions. That’s where you want to make sure you’re being very clear, that you’re providing advice or consulting. You’re providing coaching, you’re not telling them what to do, you’re not going to do it for them. It’s all about just making sure you’re within those bounds and keeping records of that will be helpful.
Another helpful tip is making sure your coaching programs has a finite period of time, like a three month or six month coaching package for example. You can even provide the option to renew if you want to as well
Hiring a VA or Expert through a service like Upwork, FreeUp or Fiverr is much safer and you can do hourly or project based contracts with Independent Contractors from all over the world. So it’s just important to pay your state taxes and follow your state guidelines when it comes on to hiring.