Benefits of Partnering with a Professional Employer Organization (PEO)

Some business owners may not know about all the benefits a Professional Employer Organization (PEO) can provide their organization and employees. PEO’s provide HR services for small to mid-sized businesses in almost every industry. An increasing number of growing companies are seeing the benefits of working with a PEO, most notably to relieve the stress and burden of Payroll and HR administration.

Why a PEO? Simply put, PEO services can relieve your organization from having to manage time- consuming non-revenue HR tasks that can distract from your core business. Tasks handled by PEO companies include:

 

A PEO can manage your benefits offerings as well, which is a complex and demanding task given the changing marketplace for renewals and the introduction of new products and regulation to the market.

Your staff’s time is extremely valuable
As businesses grow, so do the frequency and complexity of non-revenue HR issues. A Professional Employer Organization like Trion Solutions can handle the time-intensive and repetitive HR tasks that take focus away from a business’ core business. Knowing your HR issues are handled by an experienced and reliable PEO is a great relief for both business owners and their employees. Here is how:

1- A PEO can help your business focus on what it does best.

HR functions are not a profit center for your company. So why should they be the recipient of such a large measure of time, attention, and resources? Repetitive, daily HR tasks consume resources your company could use in advancing its core-business functions and driving revenue growth. A PEO lets your company maintain its focus on tasks that matter—strategy, product development, sales and marketing, and other endeavors that contribute to profitability and institutional strength. The PEO can handle payroll tax services, HR administration, benefits, workers’ compensation regulatory compliance, and more.

2- A PEO helps you strategically build your workforce and grow your business.

The bottom-line objective of HR is to engage and motivate your workforce. Employees with access to professional HR services and expanded benefits offerings are more effective, efficient and loyal. An experienced PEO partner helps you attract and retain top talent, which is a powerful competitive advantage. Research shows that employers who partner with PEO companies grow at an average of 7-9 percent faster than their counterparts who handle the burden of HR on their own.

3- A PEO helps safeguard your business.

Risk management is one of the most difficult, and most inevitable, issues a business can face. Having a PEO service firm helps manage your risk by sharing employment-related responsibilities including complex reporting requirements such as payroll tax reporting.

A PEO enables Workers’ Compensation risks to be amortized across a large labor pool, minimizing the adverse effects of any single claim. A well-run Professional Employer Organization will also guide your company through other complex regulatory compliance requirements and will be an advocate for your company in resolving HR issues.

4- A PEO can help your business contain costs.

By leveraging large employee pools when purchasing products in large quantities, a PEO can pass savings onto their clients. Benefits offerings and Workers’ Compensation insurance, for example, are two products where a provider of PEO services is well positioned to provide companies with significant—and sometimes critical—savings.  The size of the PEO’s employee pool and its bulk buying power also enable access to a broader range of benefits offerings, helping you maximize your investment while holding costs in check.

5- A PEO can help you attract and retain top talent.

Finding top-performing talent is harder than ever in nearly every industry—coupled with increased employee expectations when it comes to HR and benefits offerings. A top PEO always stays ahead of these trends, calibrates services and benefits offerings to meet evolving expectations, and enables client companies to deliver the HR experience that premium talent demands. And a PEO helps “level the playing field” between small- to mid-sized companies and large corporations by providing a similar suite of benefits that enables them to attract and retain top talent.

Understanding the Efficiencies and Value of a PEO

We all have day jobs and responsibilities preventing us from completing projects that take time and research. One of those projects may be streamlining HR functions and employee information utilizing – or even investigating proven platforms. This can be extremely time-consuming, and time is money.

A top-level PEO will have a long established and up-to-date service model executed by experienced staff. As a PEO client, you can leverage the technology infrastructure of a PEO service provider, creating efficiencies and improving the employment experience for your employees. Many companies turn to a PEO for relief from employer risk and burden. Fines and penalties for non- compliance also create exposure from the ever-growing list of regulatory agencies. These unforeseen expenses can create financial stress and uncertainty for your business.

A PEO can help prepare your business to handle unexpected HR and regulatory compliance issues. Simply put, partnering with a reputable PEO company will make it easier for your business to handle all HR issues, effectively and efficiently.

Streamline Your HR Services with a PEO

As your business grows, so will your HR needs. Top talent has high expectations in this hyper- competitive employment marketplace, especially given how workplaces have changed since the COVID- 19 pandemic. Selecting a Professional Employer Organization with the capacity to grow with your organization like Trion Solutions is key to continued growth.

Learn More about Trion Solutions
We are one of the nation’s largest and most respected Professional Employer Organizations. Contact us today for answers to commonly asked questions about us and learn how a PEO relationship can fit your business. You can also read our blog for other tips and guidance.

When COVID-19 is over … then what?

by Jeff Caponigro, APR, PRSA Fellow

The COVID-19 pandemic has exposed worst-case scenarios beyond comprehension for individuals, business, non-profit organizations, schools and universities, government units and the sports and entertainment industry.

We have seen the tidal wave of emotions surge from shock to denial to disbelief to frustration to fear. As we have tried to stay safe and well, we now seek the beacon of light and optimism as we look forward to the “new normal.”

From a crisis-management standpoint, what happens when COVID-19 is over?

It is surely more complex but really no different than after any other crisis situation that requires an answer to a fundamentally important four-word question: “What have we learned?”

In my book, THE CRISIS COUNSELOR: A Step-by-Step Guide to Managing a Business Crisis, I describe a seven-step process to effectively manage a crisis situation. The first step is to “identify the vulnerabilities.” Just as we recognize a new normal is on the horizon, we also see how a pandemic has now been added to our vulnerabilities like others in recent years – terrorism, opioid abuse, cybersecurity and a new threshold of discrimination and harassment.

Other than Bill Gates and a few Hollywood movies, no one would have imagined a global pandemic that would have so swiftly and severely led to the deaths of 120,000+ people around the world and abruptly slammed the brakes on economic prosperity and financial security. COVID-19 has shown us that business and commerce are far more fragile and vulnerable than ever imagined – where once thriving and prosperous businesses and industries can be crippled in the matter of days and weeks.

I mentioned in THE CRISIS COUNSELOR that nearly every crisis is preceded by a warning sign – and history has shown that COVID-19 was no different. The signs from previous pandemics warned us: The Bubonic Plague (1346-53), the Third Cholera Pandemic (1852-60), Flu Pandemic (1889-90), Sixth Cholera Pandemic (1910-11), Spanish Flu Pandemic (1918-20), Flu Pandemic (1968) and HIV-AIDs Pandemic (at its peak, 2005-12). We may not have realized that COVID-19 would be so far-reaching or what kind of virus it would be, but it wasn’t inconceivable that such a pandemic could occur again in the world and United States.

But what about Small Business?

The COVID-19 pandemic revealed the inherent fragility of small businesses with vulnerabilities that included the granddaddy of them all – the fact they could be forced to stop production and serving customers at a moment’s notice. The blackout of 2003 that pulled the plug of technology and communication to many Northeast and Midwest states, now looks in hindsight like a mere inconvenience compared with the guillotine-like devastation Small Business has endured with COVID-19. What can be learned? Start with adding the “new vulnerabilities” to the “new normal.”

Small Business now knows it has a workforce with which it must communicate, inform, empathize, assist and encourage. It can face fast-changing and complex regulations and compliance issues to manage. And, it may need to rely more than ever on outside advisors and companies in the areas of HR, I.T., accounting and law, so it can stay focused on its core business. Small Business also has learned now how easy it is to be overwhelmed in a crisis and how there are often more questions than answers but that you still need to control the messaging – failing to do so is at its own peril, leaving the narrative for others to express.

As we see the proverbial light at the end of the tunnel, let us take a look forward by learning about what is (or soon will be) behind us. Where is my business most vulnerable to a crisis? For what do I wish we were better prepared? In hindsight now, what do I wish we would have done better or different? In what areas could we have used the help and which functions should we partner with someone for the future? What do I most want our employees, customers and other stakeholders to know about our business and how I feel about them?

What else have we learned? COVID-19 reinforced to us that nothing is more important than the health and well-being of our families, friends, employees and business colleagues. We also learned the five tenets of communication: honesty, information, empathy/compassion, opportunities for input and questions, and a call to action (i.e., what we can do going forward).

From a crisis standpoint, COVID-19 is an ultimate test, but it won’t be the only test. I wrote in my book that “all businesses have one thing in common – all have vulnerabilities, and all can and will experience crises.” The strong survive in business and the strongest are prepared to move decisively and confidently in a crisis by being prepared heading into the crisis.

For those small businesses that survive COVID-19, a rebirth and renaissance can occur that will turn them into a more effective and robust business by examining and re-examining their vulnerabilities, how to prevent them from turning into a crisis, and what can be done to prepare now for the next time the legs are cut out from under the business.

Let’s make sure that we answer, “What have we learned?” with not simply a historical perspective of the past, but the sense of empowerment and action going forward.

For Small Business, the experience gained has provided a new meaning behind the mantra, “We can. We will. We must.”

The Top 5 Reasons to Partner with a Professional Employer Organization (PEO)

It’s no secret that business is changing. Changes in technology, a shifting economic outlook and a rapidly-evolving regulatory environment all call upon today’s businesses to be flexible, responsive and always ready to adapt to new realities. For an increasing number of businesses, working with a Professional Employer Organization (PEO), is becoming an indispensable way of making sure that their companies are ready for any eventuality – and well positioned to take advantage of any opportunity.

Here are a few reasons why a PEO can be your company’s best friend:

  1. A PEO can let your business focus on what it does best.

HR functions aren’t a profit center for your company. So why should they be the recipient of a large measure of its time, attention, and resources? Repetitive, daily HR tasks consume resources your company could use in advancing its core-business functions and driving revenue growth. A PEO lets your company maintain its focus on tasks that matter­—strategy, product development, sales and marketing, and other endeavors that contribute to profitability and institutional strength.

  1. A PEO can help you strategically build your workforce and grow your business.

The bottom-line objective of HR is to engage and motivate your workforce. Employees with access to professional HR services and expanded benefit offerings are more effective, efficient and loyal.  An experienced PEO partner helps you attract and retain top talent, and that can be a powerful competitive advantage. Research shows that companies who partner with a PEO grow at an average of 7-9% faster than their counterparts who handle the burden of HR on their own.

  1. A PEO can help you safeguard your business.

Risk management is one of the most difficult, and most inevitable, issues a business can face. Working with a PEO means they don’t have to face it alone. A PEO partner will share risks and responsibilities, relieving the client from some considerable employer risks and complex reporting requirements (such as payroll tax reporting). A PEO enables Workers’ Compensation risks to be amortized across a large labor pool, minimizing the adverse effects of any single claim. And a well-run PEO will also guide your company through increasingly complex employer compliance requirements and, as a responsible party, will be an advocate for your company in resolving HR issues.

  1. A PEO can help you contain costs.

By leveraging large employee pools when purchasing products in large quantities, PEOs can pass savings onto their clients. Benefit offerings and Worker’s Compensation insurance, for example, are two products where PEOs are well positioned to provide companies with significant—and sometimes critical—savings.  The size of the PEOs employee pool and its bulk buying power also enable access to a broader range of benefit offerings, and help companies maximize their benefits investment while holding costs in check.

  1. A PEO can help you attract and retain top talent.

In an era of nearly full employment, competition for top-performing talent is fierce in nearly every industry—and that raises employee expectations when it comes to HR and benefits offerings. A top PEO always stays ahead of these trends, calibrates services and benefits offerings to meet evolving expectations, and enables client companies to deliver the HR experience that premium talent demands. And a PEO helps “level the playing field” between small- to mid-sized companies and major corporations by providing a similar suite of benefits that enables them to attract and retain top talent.

In the coming weeks, we will explore each of these five key PEO advantages in greater detail, illustrating the considerable benefits to be achieved through a well-considered partnership with a reputable PEO. As one of the top Professional Employer Organizations in the nation, Trion Solutions is committed to creating and highlighting advantages for our client partners, and we have seen firsthand the big difference a PEO can make in the fortunes of growing businesses.