Analyzing Your Employee Needs

Most of what job analysis means, if you're hiring for the first time, is figuring out how your life is going to change by having someone else working with you. Questions to ask yourself that can lead to an adequate job analysis are:

• What work do I have that I'm willing to let someone else do? Many business owners have a hard time bringing in someone — especially a stranger — to help them do work. It means a shift in the way they operate and, harder yet, it means letting go of some control. That's why it's imperative that you trust whomever you bring in.
• Which decisions will I be comfortable leaving to someone else to make? You may want to start out small and work your way up, depending on how you feel your employee handles decision-making on a small scale. Are you going to let the employee sign for deliveries? Are you going to give the employee the password to the computers? Will you let the employee handle cash? Will you give the employee a key to the office to work on weekends?
• What level of authority do I want this other person to have in performing these jobs? This issue is also tied to trust. Will you let the employee bind you to contracts? How about giving your employee signing privileges on your bank account? There are levels of authority. Decide which one you're comfortable with.

Where can you turn for help? There are plenty of resources that can help you out if you need a little direction in analyzing jobs and duties:

• If you're in a hurry. The best source for information is to ask around. Call your colleagues; call people who do the job that you're thinking of creating. You may also be able to get some direction from the Small Business Administration or your local chamber of commerce.

If you have more time to do in-depth research, the government offers some resources containing detailed information:

• The O*Net OnLine website (which replaced the U.S. Department of Labor's Dictionary of Occupational Titles), contains comprehensive descriptions of job duties for thousands of jobs and occupations.
• The Occupational Outlook Handbook, made available by the Bureau of Labor Statistics (U.S. Department of Labor), describes the employment outlook of over 1,000 different jobs. It also includes information such as the education and training necessary for the listed jobs and the tasks involved in each job.
• The BLS also provides employment-related surveys that contain job description information useful in job analysis.

You can also obtain job analysis information by contacting the Bureau of Labor Statistics.

What's next? Thinking about these questions should give you an idea of the types of jobs that you want the employee to do. If you think that you need more analysis, try employee observation or job analysis interviews if you have current employees who can help you. Otherwise, take the information and ideas that you have and try your hand at a writing a job description.