hr advice column offers swk clients directions and solutions

sage accounting reseller helps controllers with some tough issues.

by scott h. cytron
for swk technologies inc.

dear abby … watch out! there’s a new gal in town giving advice, and her name is kathleen weiss, sphr, of swk technologies, inc.

weiss, who heads up the hr advisory practice at swk, works mostly with small businesses who are not large enough to have their own human resource departments. she consults one on one with companies, many of which are swk’s clients, to assess their needs and provide hr knowledge, solutions and tools. swk, a sage software authorized business partner and sage gold development partner, provides strategies and solutions to its clients’ information and business management needs.

“if a business has more than seven or eight employees, it needs hr guidance, but doesn’t have the means or resources to maintain these positions in-house,” says weiss. “in many cases, the responsibility falls on the controller. quite frankly, this person would rather be stranded on a desert island than deal with hr issues! numerous companies assign a non-hr person to perform these duties, and in today’s volatile economy, that’s a dangerous decision, especially since employees are becoming more and more employment law-savvy.

as a means to market the hr advisory practice and provide advice on a client-wide basis, weiss began writing her “dear kathleen” column last fall in the company’s enewsletter, the swk insider. weiss felt that if one company was experiencing a problem with a certain matter, other companies would also benefit from learning how to solve that problem.

here’s are several sample questions weiss has received from readers:

• our employee performance reviews are coming up and most of our managers dread this necessary task. do you have any tips for us to make this process more efficient and effective?

• how do we hire the right candidate for the position? we’ve hired an administrative assistant for one of our managers several times, but each one turned out to be the wrong person. during the interview process, they all seemed to be the perfect candidate, but once they actually started working, it’s obvious they were not right for the job. what are we doing wrong?

• how do we help our managers provide performance guidance without destroying the morale of the employee?

“no matter what size the company may be, i have yet to encounter one that hasn’t dealt with these kinds of issues,” says weiss. “human resource professionals are not attorneys, but they almost have to be. if we don’t keep current on employment law, we’re not doing our jobs. it’s similar to cpas; they aren’t attorneys, but they had better keep up with tax laws.”

the response so far to “dear kathleen” is strong. although the column is only published 12 times annually, weiss often answers questions offline.

“questions run the gamut from one-off hiring scenarios to working with clients to develop an employee handbook, customized to their company’s culture or industry,” says weiss. “i’m glad i can provide advice and help companies with their hr problems.”

got a question for weiss? send her an e-mail and she’ll respond.

for more than 20 years, scott h. cytron, abc, has worked with cpas and accountants, providing public relations, marketing and communications services. he is a frequent contributor to industry publications covering professional services industries, including accounting, healthcare, legal, financial planning, collections and debt, and high-tech. find him at  www.absolutecytron.com.

posted on january 28, 2010