It's All About the Fit!
Melissa Front Cain, HR Business Partner

Hiring is becoming more competitive in the local market again. Local unemployment figures for February 2011 showed a slight decrease from January 2011. According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, the February 2011 unemployment rate for Washington, D.C. was 9.5%, while the unemployment rates for Virginia and Maryland were 6.4% and 7.1%, respectively. Job growth continues to be a leading factor in the overall decrease in unemployment. While this is great news for individuals looking for employment, companies remain charged with the critical task of finding the right talent. At the same time, employers must realize that the decrease in unemployment is causing the workforce to change.

Filling your open positions requires a great match of both skills and cultural fit. Rightly, companies want to search for that "perfect fit," but they may have limited time to conduct a thorough search. The result: weeks and months can go by, existing staff become overextended and the company falls victim to the short-staffing phenomenon of hiring a 'warm body' that seems to meet the basic needs. This type of pressured hiring nearly always results in mistakes.

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Culture by Design
Melissa Front Cain, HR Business Partner

In anticipation of the upcoming 5th anniversary of the Apollo Awards™, Helios HR checked in with some of the previous winners to see what they have been doing to continue to foster a culture of learning and development. Stay tuned each month as we highlight different organizations and count down to the annual awards breakfast ceremony at the McLean Hilton on June 1st, where we recognize the finalists and winners for 2011.

"We focus on building an ownership mentality with our employees. We have really emphasized this over the last few years." — David Baxa, President & CEO, Vista Technology Services, Inc.

"At Vista Technology Services, Inc., we want employees to feel that they are part of the business and to understand that we are all looking at the same things. We continuously look at our goals and the mission of the company in relation to client satisfaction. Our growth as a company should provide opportunities for our employees. We focus on building an ownership mentality with our employees. We have really emphasized this over the last few years. What has been rewarding for us has been the extent to which employees have embraced the concept of ownership. We formed an employee-run committee as part of our ESOP program and the employees have really taken off with it. It's exciting to see them in action!"

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