Blog Posts

7 Fundamental Factors to Enhance Your Company’s HR Approach

Besides managing properties and taking care of residents, when it comes to having a solid property management plan there is nothing more critical than taking care of our greatest asset – our employees. Even as times change, cultural shifts take place, and technology advances in new directions, our priorities shouldn’t change when it comes to developing and utilizing a solid approach to human resources (HR). At FOURMIDABLE, the HR role, like many positions in our company, will evolve over time. That said, we remain focused on these seven fundamental considerations. Recruiting - Our economic climate calls for HR professionals to be even more in-tune with the latest methods of recruiting than ever before. Placing high-level talent goes well beyond the old methods of placing a print advertisement or an online listing. Be creative in your thinking and relentless in your efforts if you want to be successful recruiting. Training - Continual training on safety and best practice policies is vital to protecting our employees, the company, and the properties being managed. Developing a network to help with a wide range of training topics and instituting continuous training methods is a must. Company culture - A major shift has taken place in recent years with many companies realizing the importance of cultivating culture in their organizations. Ensuring employees are recognized for their achievements is only one piece of the puzzle. Companies must develop ways to engage their staff and explain the cultural values that are most important to the organization. Employee initiative programs need to be comprehensive and focus on developing employee unity, cultural understanding, and ongoing recognition efforts. Benefit planning - It is essential that the HR staff focus on providing the best access to benefits. Helping employees take care of their families through health benefits and plan for their financial security in retirement are closely connected to finding and retaining top quality talent. Compensation analysis - Know what your competitors are doing. Understanding what the job marketplace looks like is not to be underestimated. It is essential to know the base lines that impact your company and stay current with local compensation trends. Equal Employment Opportunity (EEOC ). The world of regulation is a fact of life and any good HR approach. Work hard to maintain a thorough understanding of these rules to ensure every effort is made to provide a fair, safe workplace. Technology advancement. Working with IT managers, and being focused on what technology can offer, is a great way for the HR staff to find new avenues to assist employees. By allowing employees access to information in an easy and efficient manner, you will enhance your company’s culture.

Keeping in Touch Through Good Communications

Stressing the importance of good communications with residents is a must in this fast-paced information world we live in. Keeping residents informed and responding to their needs is critical. It plays such a key part of maintaining a good property, that your communications efforts should not be taken lightly. In fact, it requires we plan and organize our approach as much as any other aspect of taking care of the property. Personal involvement in ensuring great communications at all of our properties is a hallmark of FOURMIDABLE and guides us in our efforts to work closely with management, staff and residents. There are several essential aspects to a solid communications game plan I would like to cover briefly. Have a good response plan for resident requests Sometimes we forget to prioritize our response to the needs and requests of residents. To make sure there’s a focus on great customer service, and to help protect a property, FOURMIDABLE uses a service that monitors phone calls around the clock, including emergency calls. During closed business hours, residents who call the office will hear a recording that allows them to choose an option for emergencies. The calls are monitored, and appropriate responses are implemented, escalating, if necessary, directly to me. How we respond to calls and requests from residents are always discussed with new residents during their move-ins. The communications policy is written into the lease as well as posted on our property website. Respond to complaints or concerns You must absolutely respond to concerns, questions, problems, and complaints in timely manner. This is not always a fun part of the job, but there are no excuses for not responding. If the issue is not an emergency, I highly recommend a one-day response for any residents’ concerns. How the response is made depends on what works best in the moment. This isn’t rocket science, there are multiple ways to reach out and respond - a phone call, an email, even a text sometimes, just to show you received the message and are working on a solution. Often people just want to be heard and have a chance to explain an issue from their perspective. It’s our role to be gracious under fire and respond in a personal and non-confrontational way. Try various ways of communicating Good communications can take many forms, and often times I suggest using several approaches, through things like letters direct to residents, notices throughout the property (bulletin boards can be a big help) and even on a website or Facebook page. Most communities have monthly newsletters for residents that can be emailed, printed and distributed on the property or published on a website. Newsletters allow you to share important dates, updates to procedures or policies, news from the community, staff changes and anything else unique to your property. Another great venue for encouraging communication is during resident events and activities. Communities who host regular meetings or social parties, like game or movie nights, have a unique opportunity to let everyone connect and share information. It’s even a chance to respond personally if you are in attendance. Be available and flexible Ultimately, the goal is to respond in a timely fashion, communicate in a regular manner and ensure you’re available when residents are available. If you have to, adjust office hours to what works best for the most residents. Learn to be flexible and accommodate the needs of residents. It will pay off with residents who, in being well informed, also become highly-satisfied, long-

Make Your Capital Needs Assessment A Top Priority

Conducting a Capital Needs Assessment (CNA) is an excellent tool to help property owners and managers understand their potential capital improvement needs over both a short and long-term timeframe. In fact, Fourmidable believes a thorough CNA is so critical to operational success that we highly recommend you make it a top priority in the upcoming year. This analysis is well-worth the time and resources needed to complete it. More importantly, it will help set your team on the right course for the future. So, what is a Capital Needs Assessment? Essentially, it is in-depth property inspection that will provide a cost roadmap over whatever effective timespan you may want to consider. Most CNAs cover anywhere from five to 20 years and create a foundational base of data that helps when it is time to budget for major improvements or changes to the property. The goal of a Capital Needs Assessment is to collect enough information through detailed inspections to help determine the remaining lifespan of important “big ticket” items like roofs, windows, HVAC systems and more. For example, by working through a CNA you can determine the number of doors or windows that may need to be scheduled for replacement sooner than later. You can develop a renovation plan to protect building roofs and equipment, even the property grounds and items like sidewalks and drive ways. Most important, it allows you to identify potential urgent needs before they become an expensive and unexpected problem. Most needs assessments can be handled by the property team, but there are also plenty of firms qualified to assist. If you hire an outside company and their team of inspectors, they will need your cooperation. In the end, you will receive an in-depth review with detailed estimates of costs and a project schedule for the coming years. Evaluating the property from this physical standpoint will help in the next step, which is to focus on identifying the resources and potential vendors that will be needed and to develop a project timeline to carry out the improvements in a timely and cost-effective manner. Once the “what” is completed, it becomes easier to focus on the “how”; how to improve your property in way that sets it apart from others. Think of a Capital Needs Assessment as another important way to focus on long-term, strategic planning. This is a fundamental step to ensuring a high-quality property that meets both residents’ and owner’s needs.

Effectively Transitioning Property to New Management Agency

When it comes to successfully transitioning a property to a new management agency there are a series of important steps that need to be taken to ensure a smooth changeover with as little disruption to the residents and the property itself. Our role in ensuring a successful transition of our properties is a hallmark of Fourmidable. Essentially, it begins with basic steps, each of which cater to the specific circumstances of the property and residents and helps head off any problems that might arise during the changeover process. The goal is to follow these steps and in an order that makes the most sense. First is communication. We communicate with the residents, notifying them of what is happening from the very beginning so that everyone has the same information. This can take several forms (and often using several approaches is recommended) such as letters to residents, notices throughout the property and potentially the website or Facebook pages. Host a resident gathering or meeting to explain who we are and how we work. Introduce our key people. Encouraging everyone to connect is a great approach to sharing information and meeting people. Besides communications, evaluating the physical needs of the property is an essential part of any good management agency turnover. Following a preliminary inspection review of 100 percent of the units (both occupied and vacant), it is important to develop and implement a strong preventive maintenance program. Understanding the current conditions of the property is a must. This includes the common areas and overall grounds as well as the units themselves, roofs and overall structural conditions. This allows for a thorough assessment of what work needs to be done immediately and work that can wait for the long-term. It also allows a preventive maintenance program to be focused on the proper issues. Like the property, it is critical to perform a resident file audit – determine whose name is on each unit, who lives in the unit, what their rent is and when their lease expires. At Fourmidable, we look to see if the rent roll matches up with leasing paperwork in the file. Sometimes we find that the resident’s lease is expired or maybe they were paying the wrong rent per month. Lastly, it’s a good idea to do a technology evaluation and upgrade. Quite often there are old computers, fax machines or phone systems that don’t work and need to be replaced. And they certainly won’t have Fourmidable’s software. Helping with this is Sheldon Olson and his IT team at Fourmidable. They evaluate the existing tech/phone systems and make recommendations to the property owner. Our focus is to provide them the latest ideas, trends and software to make sure the property is running in a 21st century mode. Ultimately, thorough and orderly preparation following a logical step-by-step process goes a long way to ensure transition to a new property management agency that is both smooth and without disruption for the property and the residents living there.

Bridging the Gap

The issues of diversity and inclusion are essential to developing and extending the value of people with different backgrounds. One area where FOURMIDABLE is making a difference in the lives of our residents is through the strength and diversity of the people who make up our workforce. Taking care to extend the opportunities that exist at FOURMIDABLE is just one step in a process. Our hiring efforts extend to recruiting employees that are racially, ethnically and generationally diverse as well as hiring multilingual staff to better communicate with our residents. Closing language barriers is one area where we’ve been able to get closer to meeting the needs of our clientele. We’ve accomplished this at Schoenherr Towers by reaching out to resident translators for help when needed. The Sterling Heights Housing Commission and Schoenherr Towers worked together to take specific steps to extend that help through a series of English as a Second Language classes. Diversity in the area of language as well as ethnicity is important when the goal is to create a stronger society. We begin by having conversations with our residents and implementing their specific needs to the best of our ability. At FOURMIDABLE, we recognize the challenges and we are continually taking steps to become more diverse at the properties we manage and the employees we hire. The benefits are priceless, and the effort is more than worth it.

Company Culture Critical to Engaging Your Team

Creating and sustaining a company culture that invites employee initiative, engagement and participation doesn’t just happen. It requires a commitment by the president, CEO, office managers and HR team to collaborate and share a vision for what the work place should be like for everyone At Fourmidable, there are cultural values essential to our success and building a successful staff who will go above and beyond when assisting our clients, giving back to the community and developing an attitude that is focused on inspiring each other every day. First, we strive to be a place where people can feel free to share ideas openly and with the knowledge that they will be heard. Next, Fourmidable is a place where people are willing to pitch in and foster an environment where everyone helps out their coworkers. We call it an “All for one, one for all” mindset. Third, it is critical that our people understand the goals of the company so that we can work together to reach those goals in a fun and fulfilling way. Last, but far from least for us, is the idea that everyone should enjoy life at Fourmidable, and have a bit of fun while doing so, especially since there are times when we spend more time together than with our families. For an employee-focused culture to work, you have to both secure leadership’s backing and develop a budget for what we call an “employee initiative plan,” setting aside the resources each year for the things you want to do. So, in practical terms here are some examples that have helped Fourmidable perfect this highly important idea of engaging our team. It all begins with employee recognition. This is so important, it should be a top priority for everyone. We use thank you boards to recognize people going above and beyond their normal job duties. Various forms of public recognition for the team, with a client, a resident or across the company, helps make the recognition special. Every month we seek out an individual who went above and beyond and recognize them with something like a gift card. We also encourage peer recognition and sharing success among the team. In the works is another way to recognize someone through our new “lunch with the president and CEO” program where we will take an individual to lunch, creating a way for us to get to know each other better. On a quarterly basis we host activities and events , like a cruise on the Detroit River with the corporate office. We have hosted bowling outings, trips to mystery/escape rooms, picnics, and even visits to the office from an ice cream truck. Monthly yoga sessions in the office are not unusual either. Another interesting effort is arranging for an “offline” space in our office where people can go to relax. This corner pocket is designed with a dart board, massage chairs and a ping pong table. When it comes to giving back , our team has raised money for the Wounded Warrior Project, been involved in walk/run events raising money for a local park and started a competition called “Pushups for a Purpose” to raise money. We also seek out employees who have a relative or family member currently serving in the military, whether home or aboard, and created care packages to send them. In the end, things like procedures, processes, and quotas can only go so far. More important is developing an underlying culture of engagement, participation and fun, and honest company values that attract and hold onto talented people who are the face of the company and connect with clients every day.