Opinions on hiring the perfect office admin

BuRaK

BuRaK

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I'm the guy that drives around all day doing service calls or works from home (foot traffic at the store hurts my productivity).

I need to hire an office admin that can keep the store clean and organized. Keep my two techs busy. Report to me. Handle billing, accounting. Answer calls, place calls, do collections, meet clients.

I'll have to type up a job description and slap it on craigslist but I'm curious as to what would be the fair rate for this kind of job and also which gender and age group would be perfect.

I hear women in their mid-to late 40s are perfect since they're done with having kids mostly and are less distracted. In addition detail oriented (which I and my 2 guys always have a problem with).

How do you guys handle this?
 
I hired a perfect English speaking bilingual Spanish speaking graphic artist with a strong personality so she could ride rough shod over the techs if they got out of line when I am away. She became store manager almost immediately because of her talents. I was able to benefit from having a graphic artist on staff (signage, ads and such).

About 10% of my customers were Hispanic and she can handle them well. Customers seem to prefer talking to a women when asking about computers, maybe they feel over powered by a tech.

Other than as a workstation user she knew nothing about computer repairs or networking. Within 1 year she was doing diags and starting backups when we got busy, within 3 years she does everything that a senior tech does.

I started her less than I did my techs but soon she made as much as my higher paid techs. Due to over time she makes a lot more but hourly she makes about the same as the techs.

She gets a medium hourly pay for about 50ish hrs a week but also bonus based on store profits each month. I started buying her a tank of gas every now and then but ended up buying her a used car as a bonus about the 2/3 year. She has been with me about 10 years now.

She can make more money elsewhere but she enjoys the family atmosphere, flexible schedule when possible and that I am generous with her when we are making money.

She is not perfect, she can't do the bookkeeping and it drives me nuts but I need everything else she offers so I do the accounting myself, enough to send out to the acct.

I'd start out calling her admin assistant if I were you, if she lives up to it later asst mgr or mgr.

Good Luck.
 
2 years ago we ended up hiring a woman in her upper 40's.

My colleague and I went through lots of interviewing...offered to the one we liked and felt would be the best fit 'n personality for our office.

Was difficult at first...to "fill" the ability to pay that position. But we were at the point where we wanted out office staffed from 9-5.....because prior to that, at times, all 3 of us techs might be out on the road. pay rate depends on your region, cost of living...but in our area mid teens/hour are OK. Plus benefits.

But having her do the quickbooks and invoicing and ordering and AP..allowed more time to go hit the pavement and bring in more clients. We've been growing quite well over the past 2 years since then.
 
HawkinsPC said:
This offends me on so many levels.
Click to expand...

While it might encroach on the ever spiraling compass of "PC"..political correctness, it is actually true.

Younger "moms"...sometimes late getting kid to school, thus late for work
Sometimes gotta stay home....because kid is sick.
Gotta run to school for some play or recital or meeting or one of the nearly endless fundraisers that are so prevalent these days.
Gotta leave from work early to pickup kid from school nurse cuz runny nose
No day care on Thursday so gotta leave work at 3 to get kid
Take kid to doctors appointment middle of the day
Take kid to dentist appointment middle of the day

I can come up with more....and it's not meant to offend, but honestly...it's the reality of a typical American household.
Now...I'm saying this (typing it actually) as a stepfather of a 9 year old. I do my best to pitch in...as I have a flexible job, time-wise. I'm not bound to a time clock and answering to a manager and a cubicle from 9-5. And my wife has a flexible job...we live literally across the street from our daughters elementary school, and my wife runs her real estate business from our home.

But I can speak from experience of being a parent...and based on prior employees here at our office, and based on remembering when my wife worked in the legal field and was stuck behind a time-clock job at a big named law firm, and based on my prior jobs.

Also..witness how women often engage in a "second career" once the kids have flown the coop. They will often begin a very successful career. Why? Because they now have the time to dedicate to a full time job.
 
HawkinsPC said:
This offends me on so many levels.
Click to expand...

I'm sorry. Did not intend to offend anyone. This something I was told by couple other business owner friends dealing with employee pregnancies and honeymoons. I have no personal experience so was seeking to hear what all of you think.
 
Just as a reminder to the OP, in case he's new to the whole interviewing and hiring process, much of what has been mentioned so far is illegal to ask about during an interview (in the U.S. anyway) and can't officially be used in the decision process.

You definitely need to review this before beginning your hiring process: http://www.eeoc.gov/laws/practices/index.cfm
 
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HawkinsPC said:
This offends me on so many levels.
Click to expand...

If it helps, I'd hire you and let you bring your kid to work so long as you met all the other requirements. I find that a single mother or father is far more likely to stick to the job and not leave any time things get tough. I prefer a stable family man or woman to anyone else.

I think what he may have meant is someone with the maturity to handle all that they have to handle, doesn't matter if she were much younger.....Lets not even talk about if she were so young and beautiful as to distract our geeks.:)
 
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MobileTechie said:
I'm interested to know about just a few of the many levels that is offensive and why?
Click to expand...

It makes it real tough on single moms to get a job.

I would bend over backwards to accommodate a single parent, Mom or dad. I love having kids in the office. We always let employees bring in the kids when their sick or day care is closed or what have you. I have never had any employee abuse it. I try to be Grandpa and spread tolerance in any way I can. I even had a $35 per week day care benefit for single parents.

I would gladly turn my private office into a romper room for the little tikes.
 
I actually do bring my son to the shop. I close the shop at 2 to get my daughter from school and open back up at 3:30.

What upsets me is that I've been in the position of needing a job and felt that my status as a young mom would be held against me. There are plenty of flaky people, childless or not, single or not. Hire the best for the job. My work ethic is much stronger now than when I was single and childless. I have a family to support. Thats a huge motivation to do a good job.
 
YeOldeStonecat said:
While it might encroach on the ever spiraling compass of "PC"..political correctness, it is actually true.

Younger "moms"...sometimes late getting kid to school, thus late for work
Sometimes gotta stay home....because kid is sick.
Gotta run to school for some play or recital or meeting or one of the nearly endless fundraisers that are so prevalent these days.
Gotta leave from work early to pickup kid from school nurse cuz runny nose
No day care on Thursday so gotta leave work at 3 to get kid
Take kid to doctors appointment middle of the day
Take kid to dentist appointment middle of the day

I can come up with more....and it's not meant to offend, but honestly...it's the reality of a typical American household.
Now...I'm saying this (typing it actually) as a stepfather of a 9 year old. I do my best to pitch in...as I have a flexible job, time-wise. I'm not bound to a time clock and answering to a manager and a cubicle from 9-5. And my wife has a flexible job...we live literally across the street from our daughters elementary school, and my wife runs her real estate business from our home.

But I can speak from experience of being a parent...and based on prior employees here at our office, and based on remembering when my wife worked in the legal field and was stuck behind a time-clock job at a big named law firm, and based on my prior jobs.

Also..witness how women often engage in a "second career" once the kids have flown the coop. They will often begin a very successful career. Why? Because they now have the time to dedicate to a full time job.
Click to expand...

O.M.G! And everything else you usually post on these forums is so right on and smart. However, this post gives me a shiver. I expect that there are some out there with little empathy but this is scary.... Its not political correctness to....well this is one reason most children of single (mom) head of households are in poverty in the US.
 
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There are some jobs that you must have reliability more than most so I am not arguing that.

So ask in your interview if there is someone to pickup the kids fro school or nurse or does that person have some support from her family. Many grandparents are very active helping their daughters and sons with the kids.

I would much prefer to hire a man or women with responsibilities than a single tech the with nothing but a car payment to support.
 
Tony_Scarpelli said:
O.M.G! And everything else you usually post on these forums is so right on and smart. However, this post gives me a shiver. I expect that there are some out there with little empathy but this is scary.... Its not political correctness to....well this is one reason most children of single (mom) head of households are in poverty in the US.
Click to expand...

If it's a blunt eye opener....well..so be it.

It's one of the reasons I'm in the type of work I'm in. Same thing for my wife. We live in a free country where we're in control of our jobs, of our careers..and..well...that's what we did.

My eyes, my age, my experience...my years of working here and there and everywhere....I've seen how typical businesses run. It is what it is...I'll call it as I see it. And that is what I see as far as the viewpoint of the average employer. You don't have to like it, I don't have to like it...but on the average..that's what it is.
 
I would like to hear more ideas. I was thinking about this today. Where are those people currently working? I thought of the hotel clerk ... She talks to people, does a bit of selling, works with computers...in windows, bit just the LOB application.
 
Are you sure you need an admin? I had a couple of admins but could never seem to get the position working right. So I outsourced more tasks to my bookkeeper and put that salary towards a FT Helpdesk position who now answers calls, takes care of all the quick remote support questions, manages the work order system, and dispatches the onsite techs. I may still need an admin someday but it took me a little bit to realize I needed helpdesk/dispatch position first.
 
Fair question. I think my admin and your helpdesk tech are very similar. Not the same, but similar. I might go your route, but we have a retail store and deal with lots of calls and walk ins. Someone good with people could pay for themselves, and then I could get another tech.
 
i have had bad luck with office admins, pretty much it comes down to nobody i have had will do the job without mistakes and those mistakes cost me money

some issues:
not inputting data properly
not charging the customer the right amount
not shipping the right item for our online store
shipping the wrong amount of items
not turning off electrical items when leaving

the only way mistakes dont happen are when i do the admin job, but when i do admin i cant do the more important tasks

i figured these people would want a job in this economy but their work ethic says otherwise unfortunately

its also possible i am part of the problem, i have no management experience, im lenient since im not a mean guy
 
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