That is the question on every business owner’s mind right now. Talk of green shoots, recovery, or the recession being over has fueled more interest in hiring, but only if business owners can justify the expenses. Until actual sales increase in some areas permanently, it’s going to an iffy proposition to hire workers only to have to lay them off shortly afterwards. That can add additional expenses in hiring costs and unemployment insurance, when the level of business doesn’t justify it yet. If the sales don’t come in, and a business loan fails to materialize to cover the gap, the only other option are layoffs. That’s why business owners are taking some extreme measures to keep their hiring in check, while carefully monitoring the economy for signs it may make a permanent recovery.

Furloughs

While not popular, state governments have opted to furlough workers for a few hours every month. It can even run up to a couple of days. You can cut hours in your business too, and this keeps your workers employed and you with a ready workforce to activate for longer should the need arise.

Contract Workers

Another option is to hire contract workers so that you don’t have to hire permanently, just on a project by project basis. This gives business owners a high quality workforce, although it is significantly more expensive than hiring full-time. Read more »