Author: Editor Net Universe

As the COVID-19 pandemic continues, the outbreak has drastically impacted the global workforce. Given the current situation, talent professionals in the recruitment industry are having to find ways to adapt to this increasingly complex situation. To let you breeze through a stress-free hiring experience while you work remotely, we at Zoho Recruit build every integration carefully.

Today, we couldn’t be happier to announce our integration with Spark Hire, an industry-leading video interviewing software that supports SMBs, enterprises, and everything in between.

Resumes, interviews, job openings—these are just a few of the topics on your mind as a recruiter. You put in a lot of time and effort toward reaching quality candidates that fit your company’s vision and workplace culture. The interview selection process is one of the most challenging aspects of this process.

With that in mind, product managers and developers at Zoho Recruit are dedicated to scaling up our recruitment marketplace with carefully chosen applications. We want to create an ecosystem where you can integrate and take advantage of the products you’re familiar with. This week, Zoho Recruit integrates with Spark Hire, the industry-leading video interviewing platform.

This integration benefits Zoho Recruit’s users by giving them complete access to Spark Hire’s database from within their recruiting platform.

Why use the Spark Hire integration?

Spark Hire is one of the fastest-growing video interviewing platforms. Founded in 2012, it has been helping SMBs and enterprises pick the right talent during the initial sourcing stages with live and one-way video interviews.

The integration offers a range of capabilities for Zoho Recruit customers. You can:

• Invite candidates to one-way video interviews from their candidate profile
• Watch completed interviews within Zoho Recruit
• Easily share interviews through an automatically generated link

“Building an integration with Zoho Recruit gives our mutual staffing firm, temp agency, and HR team customers easy access to their candidate’s video interviews directly within the Zoho Recruit platform,” says Josh Tolan, CEO at Spark Hire. “We’re happy to offer this added value and convenience for our mutual customers.”

Instant approval from teams

Whenever a candidate needs to be reviewed, you can send their application and interview details over instantly for approval or rejection. Also, you or members of your team can schedule interviews through Spark Hire, submit feedback, and view the status of recorded candidate interviews—all from within Zoho Recruit.

To learn more about the Zoho Recruit and Spark Hire integration, visit our help docs.

Questions? Feedback? Write to [email protected].

Lee Biggins is the CEO of Resume-Library, the fastest growing job board in the U.S. He is also the founder and managing director of CV-Library, the UK’s leading independent job board. With industry experience spanning nearly 20 years, Lee is a pioneer of online recruitment and is passionate about current and upcoming market developments.

Here’s our fourth edition of Expert Corner with the focus on the best practices of hiring remotely, written insightfully by Lee Biggins. 

More people are working from home at the moment than ever before and this is shaping how we hire and push forward with our workloads. If you do have roles to recruit for right now, you’re probably keen to know how you can do it effectively; as well as what sort of jobs people are interested in.

The sad truth is that millions of U.S. citizens will be out of work in the coming months. And this is going to put strain on the economy. As a result, we’re already seeing job searches spike as people desperately look for their next opportunity.

In fact, according to our data, in the last two weeks alone, searches for ‘remote’ jobs on Resume-Library have increased by 271%; while searches for ‘work from home’ jobs have also soared by 188%.

Below, we’ve put together some top tips for hiring when working remotely; ensure that you remain efficient and connect with the right candidates.

Sell the Role and Company

We don’t want to teach you the basics here; but this is more important now than ever before. After all, when candidates can’t come in and meet your teams face-to-face, how well you sell your business and the role on paper is what matters.

This starts with your job adverts. It’s a good idea to acknowledge the current situation in these so candidates can see they’re up-to-date. For example, you might choose to add in something along the lines of:

“Due to the current spread of COVID-19 across the country, all of our teams are working remotely. However, the interview process for this role will involve a number if video meetings so you can get to know our employees.”

Alongside this, you might want to mention any benefits that employees can access remotely, or anything that the company is doing to keep people engaged during this challenging time. This will help you to stand out and present you as an employer of choice. 

Make the Most of Video Interviews

These will be your best friend right now. And you might find that you schedule in multiple rounds to really get to know your candidate and see if they’re the right fit for the job.

There are lots of different platforms to choose from. Whether you use Zoho Meeting, Skype or Google Hangouts, make sure you’re familiar with the technology and how it works.

At Resume-Library, we’re actually going to be offering clients the functionality to schedule and host video interviews with candidates directly through our site; helping to save a lot of time and effort throughout the hiring process.

When it comes to hosting the interview, make sure you’re in a quiet room, with no distractions. Ideally, you want your background to be plain and to turn off any email or phone notifications.

Keep the Lines of Communication Open

As well as the above, it’s really important to keep the communication going with candidates right now. Remember, everyone is in a vulnerable position and there’s nothing worse than being ghosted completely by an employer or staffing agent.  

There may well be delays in your hiring process at the moment, as businesses hold back on making any final decisions. And if this is the case, make sure you let applicants and candidates know.  

Try to pick up the phone if possible as they’ll appreciate it; and follow it up with an email clarifying what you spoke about. How you communicate now will be remembered later down the line.

Making Your Hire & Onboarding Them

It’s important to note that your time to hire may well increase right now. After all, businesses are taking longer to make decisions and you may need to host more interviews to get to know someone in the absence of meeting face-to-face.  

If you are able to make a hire – that’s great. You’ll need to think about how you’re going to onboard them remotely and get them up-to-speed with your business. Video conference calls will help out here and it’s worth putting together a strict training plan for their first couple of weeks.

Hiring Remotely

When it comes to hiring remotely, it’s not really that different to normal hiring. However, there are some key factors to be aware of. In some cases, you may be able to hire quicker as there may be more job seekers in the market. On the other, it may take more time as the business mulls over every hiring decisions.

If you need any help with your recruitment efforts, please do get in touch with the team at Resume-Library or Zoho Recruit.

The coronavirus outbreak is foremost a human tragedy, but it is also having a growing impact on the global economy and the way businesses function. While productivity can be allowed to dip in some areas, payroll is one business-critical function that cannot afford to be delayed and is even more important during a crisis. This article is intended to provide payroll professionals with some tips on how they can continue to deliver accurate payroll on time, and how cloud technology can help payroll departments hold things together and support their employees.

 

Bridging the communication gap

Wherever we are, is our workplace now. Organizations have already planned for employees to be unable to return to work for significant periods of time, whether it’s due to personal illness or caring for sick family members, or just working remotely from home as a precaution. No matter how far away they are, it is crucial for employers and their employees to be on the same page. Here are some top priorities for HR and payroll staff when communicating with their employees.

• Know the whereabouts of your employees to ensure they’re okay, and communicate organization best-practices promptly. When your employees reach out, it’s important for the HR or your organization’s spokesperson to be available for help. It’s important to be compassionate now, more than ever.

• Communicate organization-wide policy changes where everybody can see. It is important for you to choose a platform that is usually preferred by your employees, and ensure to follow-up promptly.

• Inform your employees proactively if you think paychecks might be delayed. Give employees enough information to plan their finances, and be prepared to respond to questions and requests for emergency advances.

• Keep your employees informed about Government initiatives that help them reduce taxes or defer taxes for a certain period or any other relief measures that can be of help.

Cross-functional collaboration

We all know that payroll is a methodical process, and highly dependent on inputs from multiple teams. Cross-functional collaboration can be difficult even during normal scenarios, and it is even more difficult to pull off during emergency situations. While there’s no replacement for face-to-face communication, the next closest thing is to leverage cloud technology that allows your HR, finance, and payroll staff to collaborate productively from wherever they are.

Creating group communication channels among all these departments can help them see through the clutter and get the inputs they need quickly. If any one of them hits a roadblock in their work, a quick video conference is the fastest way to get all the people involved on the same page. Cloud-based software gives you the advantage of connecting quickly from anywhere.

Managing employees’ leave and attendance

Perhaps the most important aspect of managing payroll remotely is collecting employees’ leave and attendance data. This ultimately decides how many days the organization is going to pay each employee for, and it may be even more variable than usual right now. To keep up, your system needs to be agile.

Cloud-based systems offer an advantage, as they are inherently capable of allowing people to work from where they are. HR and payroll systems based in the cloud also come with features that are specifically useful for remote work, like web check-ins and geolocation-based attendance tracking that gives HR staff the up-to-the-minute attendance data they need.

Trusting software that is compliant by design

Managing your business compliance can be tough during this time. In some countries, there will be temporary regulation changes, some countries propose to defer the tax payments to a later date. All these timely measures are definitely helpful for the business owners but those compliance policy changes are still rules that has to be followed.

Having a payroll system that is compliant by design or with ability to quickly adapt to changing regulations can make a big difference. While any good payroll software makes it possible to calculate taxes accurately and keep your business on a legal footing, cloud-based software offers the extra advantage of swiftly adapting to changing tax laws. Because it allows the payroll staff to work from where they are, data validation, tax-reports generation, and secure collaboration are a cinch.

Digitizing processes through self-service

HRs always have many priorities to work on, so it helps when they can delegate some of the routine work to employees. This is the perfect time to give the traditional pen-and-paper systems a break and start digitizing operations wherever possible.

Some cloud-based payroll systems come with self-service options where the information collected is inherently digital, freeing up HR time. Employees can submit investment proofs and reimbursement requests online, from wherever they are, for the HR department to validate. This helps to get employee expenses reimbursed as quickly as possible, which is especially important right now.

Digitized systems can also automate post-payroll activities like payslip distribution and payroll accounting. In turn, this can speed up your payroll, reduce enquiries to your HRs, and create space for HRs to focus on their top-priority communication tasks.

The way forward

Many organizations are currently planning for their employees to work remotely for significant periods of time. While there are plenty of business priorities to address, payroll is vital for businesses to continue their operations and maintain their staff. Fortunately, payroll departments can depend on cloud technology to help them navigate this situation, sustain their spotless compliance records, and future-proof their payroll processing operations.

Durante la crisis ocasionada por el COVID-19, Zoho Corporation ofrecerá de forma gratuita Remotely, su completa suite de aplicaciones en la nube de colaboración, asistencia remota y productividad. Así, se une a la iniciativa del Gobierno Nacional, INNpulsa Colombia y Fedesoft, para apoyar a las empresas locales.

En las últimas semanas, el mundo ha tenido que enfrentarse a los estragos sociales y económicos que ha ocasionado la llegada del COVID-19. La necesidad de que los ciudadanos permanezcan en sus hogares, está afectando directamente la operación de miles de organizaciones en el país.

En muchos casos, la crisis económica las está llevando a cerrar sus operaciones al no contar con los recursos para adquirir soluciones en la nube que les permitan adoptar esquemas de trabajo remoto.

Por esta razón, Zoho Corporation ha decidido entregar completamente gratis Zoho Remotely, una completa suite de diez aplicaciones en la nube para comunicarse y colaborar con equipos, hacer seguimiento del trabajo y dar soporte remoto a sus clientes desde cualquier parte del mundo. Esta suite estará disponible sin costo para todas las organizaciones interesadas, hasta el próximo 1 de julio.

Para acceder a este beneficio, los interesados solo deben registrarse en el sitio web de Zoho Remotely: https://www.zoho.com/es-xl/remotely/. En este sitio web también podrán encontrar una descripción detallada de cada una de las aplicaciones que componen la suite.

Nos unimos a la iniciativa de Gobierno Nacional, INNpulsa Colombia y Fedesoft para aportar de forma gratuita

Acceso ilimitado a la suite Zoho Remotely, hasta el 1 de julio de 2020, cuando esperamos que haya pasado la emergencia causada por COVID-19. Este producto está compuesto por las aplicaciones de Zoho: Cliq, Meeting, ShowTime, WorkDrive, Projects, Sprints, Assist, Writer, Sheet y Show.

#EsAhoraColombia momento de unirnos porque #ColombiaEmprendeEinnova

¡Todos somos parte de la solución!

Para conocer más de Zoho Remotely, por favor dé clic en el siguiente enlace: https://www.zoho.com/es-xl/remotely/

From a business point of view, the coronavirus pandemic has made it more important than ever to stay connected with customers. It’s crucial to have clear communication strategies in place to answer the questions our customers are bound to have when faced with such a large-scale change. While the coronavirus is obviously an extreme example, this change could also be something far simpler, like a new industry-wide policy announcement. During such times, customer relationships are all about maintaining your customers’ trust in your business.

Mass emails are the go-to medium for communicating critical information during such times. Don’t let the word “mass” confuse you, though. Even a mass communication strategy requires a scalpel approach, and you should keep the following points in mind when creating a plan tailored for your customers’ needs.

Be clear in your message content

Naturally, customers would like some reassurance that you have everyone’s best interests at heart. However, vague platitudes can only get you so far. Include concrete answers on how your business has or will be affected. Are your offices functioning on a reduced capacity? Will your shipments be delayed? Has manufacturing been paused? Even if your news isn’t positive, being upfront about it will earn your customers’ appreciation. If you have new business processes in place, explain them clearly. For example, if you run a food delivery service, continually emphasize that you now offer zero contact delivery—provide a step-by-step breakdown of what it is and how it works. Finally, make it easy for recipients to engage with or respond to your emails. Highlight any dedicated hotline numbers, lead them to a dedicated landing page with relevant business updates, or provide links for them to track their orders. Simplicity and clarity are key in times of confusion.

Put in some thought about your target audience

Mass messages don’t necessarily have to go out to your entire audience base. Your content can vary with different customer segments. You should tailor your messages based on geography, lead type, product interest, or any other relevant differentiating factors. You can even go deeper, and segment them based on their volume of business, how engaged they are with your brand, and so on. Choosing the right niche within a wide lead or customer base helps make your content appear more personal, and therefore relevant, to each recipient.

Decide who your messenger is, and who receives customer responses

Messages are best received when they come from a trusted source. Obviously, a note from the CEO will have a higher open rate than one from a generic support ID. A message from the sales rep a lead or customer has had contact with in the past will appear more personal. Select your messenger with care to increase the chances of your message being distributed effectively. Conversely, you should also be deliberate in choosing who will receive your customers’ responses. If you expect your customers to respond with standard questions, you can redirect these to your support team. If you are expecting high level, non-standard responses, you can opt to send them directly to a concerned manager.

Schedule messages and follow-ups at appropriate times

Aiming for high open rates, impressions, or engagement is a standard priority with any message you send out. In times of change, however, it becomes even more critical that your message is seen by a majority of your customer base. While you may have an idea of the best time to send out an email, these times may vary if your customers are going through a period of change as well. You should take the opportunity to monitor open rates more closely. It’s okay to send out messages a bit more frequently, since message distribution is a higher priority. Finally, if you have several distinct updates to share, you can send out multiple follow-ups. You can plan a series of three to four short emails and send them out in a clear flow based on those who have received or opened the previous messages.

Automate response steps and track message performance

Sending out a high volume of emails might result in a high volume increase of redundant manual tasks like data entry, call scheduling, and so forth. Where possible, you should automate these response actions. For instance, if you send out a mail asking your customers if they would like to speak to a company rep, you can schedule calls with those who respond. You can also schedule calls with customers in case of an email bounce. Or, you could create follow-up tasks to check personally on their order status if they engage with mails talking about shipment changes. Doing all of this automatically reduces a substantial amount of overhead and streamlines business operations. Finally, you should regularly track the statistics for all of these emails and refine your messaging or targeting if needed.

To reach out to your customer base, you may also choose to disseminate critical information via SMS, social media, advertisements, and other mass communication channels suitable to your business. While the majority of this article applies to email communication, it can be relevant to other channels as well. Zoho CRM comes with features to manage and track both mass emails and social media communications. CRM also includes a host of useful integrations for SMS communications. You can use all of these features to implement your mass communication strategy remotely and analyze its performance.

Mass customer communication is just one element of your sales framework. The upcoming posts in this series will highlight various other such elements. With Zoho CRM, you can build and implement your sales strategy all from the comfort of your home. Visit our website to gain a holistic look into how Zoho CRM is the perfect remote sales software.

These are unprecedented times which have dramatically changed our daily lives. Schools and colleges are suspended, and students and trainees are losing precious time in classes. This is impacting their academic and skills development progress.

While we know the situation in the world can feel unsettling, virtual classroom software is here to help. The most asked question about online training sessions is about interaction with students since the teacher is not physically in front of the class. Most people think that engagement and satisfaction go down significantly when the face to face element is lost. We however, emphatically disagree.

Read on to see how Zoho ShowTime can offer a comprehensive training platform for your employee training and student education exercises—just like you’d do in a brick-and-mortar classroom.

Virtual classrooms offer incomparable convenience and flexibility!

Virtual classrooms can be attended from anywhere—a bedroom, garage, backyard, or any other place deemed fit—all anyone needs is a laptop or smartphone with an internet connection. Even better? There’s no traveling involved—the class comes to the trainee. Brilliant!

Given the current crisis, it’s adviced to self-isolate and work from home. With virtual classrooms, you get the benefit of safety and defense from the virus, while still getting access to outstanding learning experiences on your schedules. There is no physical classroom that can match that.

Student-trainer interaction takes the spotlight.

Let’s address the elephant in the room—real-time classroom interaction. In a traditional brick-and-mortar classroom,  opinions are shared, questions asked and answered, examples described, and naturally high levels of engagement and interaction among students, peers and trainers. But this engagement isn’t a result of physical proximity.

Showtime is the perfect tool for delivering classroom style, face-to-face sessions, full of features to that ensure every virtual session is engaging and interactive—just like the real deal. The trainer can keep the students engaged mid-sessions with polls. Rich chat features allow for real-time communication between peers and trainers, while screen-shares, shared learning materials, handouts, and whiteboards make the online classroom a complete substitute for the traditional experience. You can also use Zoho ShowTime’s co-trainer option to introduce l subject matter experts from around the world to your students.

Trainers can also assess the trainees’ participation in the session, share great questions with the class, and record the session as it unfolds. The recording can later be sent to the participants who missed the session or want to review it, making sure that everyone can get the information, at their own pace, as many times as they’d like.

Every student is unique—curating on-demand content for self-paced study.

Want to train employees abroad? Finding it a challenge to keep up with time zones? Does your institute provide self-study material or offer certification courses? If the answer to any of those questions is a “yes”, then Zoho ShowTime is the solution for you.

You can upload course videos for employees and trainees to watch at their convenience. As a trainer, you can also share hand-outs as reference material. And you can follow up with tests and quizzes to make sure the information is hitting home. 

Virtual or physical, learning is always taking place.

In conclusion, virtual classrooms leverage the best of remote teaching technologies to make learning an easier and more convenient experience. They also help significantly lower training costs while providing vastly superior reach for students and teachers both.

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Zoho ShowTime is a single comprehensive tool for all your remote teaching needs. If you’d like to experience ShowTime for yourself, please sign up here. Follow ShowTime’s Twitter handle to stay updated about the product, as well as receive tips and tricks on how to become a successful trainer.