An employer seeking to recruit new staff may favour a candidate who already has university qualifications or relevant work experience, yet there can be advantages in employing undergraduates.   Elissa Lippiatt, Associate at Ecovis Clark Jacobs, believes her workplace has benefited from hiring undergraduates.

“I have found that undergraduates are usually highly motivated, keen to learn and enthusiastic about their chosen career. As everything is new they aren’t afraid of change, such as using new software programs and adopting new office processes.”

Ecovis Clark Jacobs actively seeks talented commerce and accounting students, and hired two new undergraduates at the start of 2015. “Cadetships and undergraduate programs are embraced by high achievers and this is a great time to hire them”, says Elissa. “Although working in their field of study isn’t something all students think to do – or want to do – those who chose this option enjoy implementing what they learn at university in the workplace. They also recognise that the skills they are learning at work help with their study.”

When hiring undergraduates, Ecovis Clark Jacobs staff look for certain traits. “An interest in learning new things is important, as well as an interest in their chosen career”, says Elissa. “We also look for a great attitude: someone who is happy to work in a team and to help out wherever needed.”

Elissa found her own experience as an undergraduate extremely valuable. “The firm that I started with was incredibly welcoming of undergraduates. Everything was new and I quickly realised how much I didn’t know, but what I learned at work definitely gave more relevance to my studies.”

“Creating a supportive environment for undergraduates is key to their success in your business. The best situation is where each team member – regardless of level – is encouraged to help train and answer the cadet’s questions. I certainly had this support.”

Early in her career Elissa was also fortunate to be mentored by a director of her firm, who invested a large amount of time teaching her in both a technical and professional capacity.

“Working in my chosen field whilst studying gave me a huge head-start in developing both technical ability and confidence. I completed a double degree so essentially ended up working professionally five years earlier than my peers.”

For employers thinking of introducing an undergraduate program, Elissa believes it is certainly worth considering. “Undergraduates haven’t sat through years of theoretical knowledge and so don’t enter the workplace with preconceived ideas. Their technical abilities are initially lacking but they compensate with other skills. It’s amazing to see the solutions they come up with when problem-solving, and it’s really rewarding to help develop and hone talent.”

For information on employment at Ecovis Clark Jacobs visit our Careers page.

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Tamara Blythman – Recruitloop

1. Written job description – essential to have in writing exactly what you are seeking in your new employee.
2. Writing an ad for the internet – make it powerful and punchy!
   It must be visually appealing, factual and informative and don’t forget the WIFM – what’s in it for me? Use the ad to sell the opportunity and your organisation.
3. The F2F interview – listen more than you talk, ask open ended questions and have an interview questionnaire check list to ensure you ask consistent questions to compare ‘apples to apples’.
   With careful planning and preparation you will increase the likelihood of successfully hiring!

For further assistance contact Tamara at RecruitLoop at:
tamara.blythman@au.recruitloop.com or www.recruitloop.com.au/recruiter/tamara-blythman

Alison Lacey – Clark & Jacobs

1. Contractors v Employees – Just because someone has and ABN does not mean that they are a contractor. Be aware that there are different definitions for contractors depending on what area of employment you are dealing with. Tax, workers compensation insurance and payroll tax all have different definitions for contractors.
2. Superannuation – As an employer, make sure you know your super obligations such as contribution rates, paper work, choice of super and timing of payments. In particular, note recent changes to the details you need to give employees on their payslips. Also be aware that super payments are due quarterly, but monthly if it is an employee salary sacrifice amount.
3. Documentation for employees – Take the time to get both your initial and ongoing employee documentation right. Things like employment declarations, choice of super forms, time sheets and payslips along with other employment records must be kept for 7 years in case of audit.

For further assistance contact Alison at:
alacey@clarkjacobs.com.au or www.clarkjacobs.com.au

Aaron Dearden – Duncan Cotterill

1. Keep it simple. Don’t over complicate your employment contracts or policies by well-intentioned promises that don’t work in practice. For example don’t promise an employee will be given a three warnings before being terminated. This won’t always suit you or the circumstances you face.
2. Keep contracts of employment up to date. If an employee receives a promotion or their duties change then make sure you update their terms and conditions of employment particularly their notice period.
3. If you have concerns about an employee’s performance during the probation period then experience suggests that the employee will only ever be an ‘average employee’. Therefore take action during the probation period to terminate the employment while you are protected from unfair dismissal.

For further assistance contact Aaron at:
aaron.dearden@duncancotterill.com or www.duncancotterill.com

Kristie De Robillard – Dental Corporation

1. Ensure you are aware of the 10 basic minimum entitlements as stated in the National Employment Standards (NES). You can find the Fair Work Information statement containing the National Employment Standards on the Fair Work Ombudsman Website: www.fairwork.gov.au
2. If you end up with an official claim, ensure you research what actual entitlements are owing to the complainant and attempt to find a mutual resolution where any alleged breaches of the Fair Work Act are rectified as soon as possible. The Fair Work Ombudsman website provides a wealth of resources, you can also call the Fair Work Infoline on : 13 13 94
3. If you have a poor performing employee, it is best practice to follow a formal performance management process which involves:

• Making the employee aware of what the issues are
• Advising them about the impact on the business
• Advising them what they need to do to improve
• Offer any assistance or training required to improve
• These conversations should be documented, and a formal warning letter issued

For further assistance contact Kristie at:
KdeRobillard@dentalcorp.com.au or for more information on Dental Corporation www.dentalcorp.com.au

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We also discussed the following tax tips to get you organised for the end of financial year:

1. Check your private health insurance – Depending on your family income, you may no longer qualify for the full 30% rebate. You can still choose to claim the rebate by way of reduced policy amount however if your family income is greater than $168,000 your rebate entitlement will be reduced. The ATO will adjust your tax return and you will need to pay back any rebate over-claimed as part of your year end tax. Make sure you check your policy to know exactly what you are claiming and what you are entitled to so that you don’t get a nasty surprise at tax time.
2. Prepay expenses – If you are thinking of replacing your computer, iphone, equipment in your small business – then before 30 June is the best time to do this. Small businesses can claim an outright deduction for assets costing less than $6,500. Additionally, if you have any work related travel coming up, consider paying the airfares before 30 June – even if you aren’t travelling until the next financial year, you can still claim the deduction for 2013.
3. Keep your paperwork! You need the tax invoice to claim the deduction in your return – so keeping track of the invoice could effectively halve the price of whatever you have just purchased for your work or business. Now is a great time to ‘clean out’ and check for everything you have spent in the last year and to implement a new way to track our spending for the coming year.
4. Review and Document Trust Distributions – If you are the trustee of a discretionary trust then the ATO requires that you determine who is entitled the 2013 income of the trust by 30 June 2013. We will be talking with all Clark Jacobs clients in the coming days to ensure you have this in place. If you don’t have this organised by 30 June, the trust deed determines who is taxed on the distribution and this could potentially be at the top marginal tax rate. Not a good result!
5. Make your Superannuation Payments – If you are planning to claim a tax deduction for either a member superannuation contribution or a contribution made for your employees; it needs to physically be paid to the fund by 30 June 2013 for you to claim a deduction in the 2013 financial year. 30 June is on a Sunday this year, so make sure you don’t get caught out!

If you have any questions on any of the organising tips from the night, please contact Emma from Kikki K on 0413 230 834 or EmmaGriffin@kikki-k.com.

If you have any questions on the year-end tax tips, please contact us on 02 9264 1111 or flourish@clarkjacobs.com.au.

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1. Good media makes for good social media. Great photos, well-designed typography and graphic design, engaging and consistent writing, charismatic points of view, interesting reposts – these things need to be so good you want to share it with friends. Otherwise, it won’t be effective because no one will be interested.
2. Refine a writing style or tone of voice for your Social Medias and try to be the same personality across them all. However, just like you would change your own diction around your parent, your best friend, and your boss, your social media language formality can (and should) shift too. For example, it might be appropriate to be a best friend on Instagram making jokes and being whimsical but you’ll need to be more informative and polished in your newsletters. Determine these standards for yourself depending on your market. All of these tones should still add up to sound like one person… A like-able, charismatic person, preferably.
3. Don’t bog yourself down with media strategies, KPIs, data or analysis UNLESS you’re expecting one of these measures to change how you post in the future. Otherwise, you’re wasting your valuable time tracking them. It is good to use the numbers now and then to get an overall idea about your audience and their behaviours, but there’s an overwhelming abundance of numbers out there you can access. Be thoughtful and start small on which information you’ll track and use the knowledge to direct your decisions.

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1. Personalisation / consistency: People will relate more if marketing is personalised and there is a customised feel to the eDMs. Also ensuring a consistent look and feel is important, particularly in line with your business branding. This will allow easy connection across all marketing and communications that are patient/consumer facing. Remember ‘the brand glue is what turns a customer into a friend’.
2. Always assume that embedded images won’t be downloaded: when putting together your eDM make sure you can still get your point across if all images were replaced with a small X indicating it has not downloaded. Make sure the most important key messages are in the copy of the email. In addition make sure the email still looks good even if the images don’t appear.
3. Clean your database: when reviewing your post analysis reports from executed email campaigns make sure to learn from those results, clean up the database. Investigate further into the bounced emails, what initiatives do you have in place to retrieve accurate emails for those consumers? What processes do you have in place to get accurate emails from the beginning to avoid future bounces?

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