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What does an Employment Supervisor do?
An employment supervisor recruits, trains and assists a company’s workforce. Often working as a member of the human resources department, an employment supervisor is in charge of employee relations. He or she may work as the head of a recruiting team or may work alone. Some tasks may be delegated to a recruiting assistant.
Staff recruitment is one of the duties of an employment supervisor. A person in this position oversees the hiring process and is responsible for determining when a position needs to be filled, creating a job description for that position and posting advertisements for the public. The employment supervisor may be in charge of conducting interviews and choosing the right candidate for the job, along with following up on all applications. The supervisor will be in change of the new employee’s training and orientation. An employment supervisor is also in charge of firing and lay-offs.
A company depends on an employee supervisor to ensure that all departments are properly staffed and running smoothly. Besides employee recruitment, a supervisor is in charge with making sure employees stay at the job and are being utilized efficiently. A person in this position should create a trusting, organized and motivated environment for employees.
An employment supervisor makes sure the company is in compliance with any regulatory staffing concerns or reports. The supervisor will ensure employees are complying with the company’s procedures, whether it’s to submit weekly timesheets or follow safety precautions. The supervisor may be in charge of implementing U.S. Department of Labor Occupational Safety & Health Administration (OSHA) regulations. A person in this career should be committed to creating an injury-free workplace.
An employment supervisor should also be familiar with affirmative action planning and all diversity initiatives. A person in this career should also know about government-mandated employee absences like short-term disability (STD), long-term disability (LTD) and the Family and Medical Leave Act (FMLA), among other employee benefits.
Companies usually require an employee supervisor to have a bachelor’s degree and experience working with human resources. Employee supervisors should be able to work with a variety of people and be trained in conflict resolution and employee management. A person in this career can expect to be put into some unpleasant situations, especially when having to fire people. Needless to say, excellent people skills are a must. A supervisor also must have strong attention to detail and be able to drive consensus on decisions.
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![An employment supervisor recruits and trains a company's employees.]()
By: Alexander RathsAn employment supervisor recruits and trains a company's employees. -
![Employment supervisors are in charge of firing employees.]()
By: antiksuEmployment supervisors are in charge of firing employees. -
![Employee recruitment is one duty of an employment supervisor.]()
By: nyulEmployee recruitment is one duty of an employment supervisor.
Discussion Comments
I got hired as an employment supervisor after years of working in a retail store. I started out as a clerk, then I progressed to sales, and finally, I became manager of the store.
After putting in five years as manager, I applied for an employment supervisor position with another company. They were impressed by my level of managerial experience, and I think that is what sold them on me.
Also, I had a bachelor’s degree in business administration. This let them know that I understood the basics of business.
The salary is a lot better than I was making before. I make about $60,000 a year now.
@shell4life - Firing people is never pleasant, but I do get great joy from giving people the good news that they are hired. In times when competition in the job market is fierce, it’s like telling someone that they have won the lottery!
I interviewed forty people for one position not long ago, and when I finally decided on who would be best for the job, I called the person to come in for a meeting. When I told her that she was hired, she actually screamed, jumped up, and hugged me.
So, not all aspects of the job are negative. I try to focus on the positive and handle everyone with care.
@andee - I have a lot of respect for people with the guts to be employment supervisors. Personally, I avoid confrontation at all costs, so I know I could never do what they do.
I am the senior designer at work, and I stressed out so much when my boss told me that I had to tell the junior designer to work faster. I can’t imagine if he had told me to fire her!
It takes a special kind of person to be able to give people both good news and devastating news. I admire employment supervisors for this.
@John57 - This sounds kind of like one of my husband’s supervisors. His warehouse supervisor oversees employment issues, and he has to keep track of how many days safe the workers have had.
Because there is a lot of heavy lifting involved, everyone had to be trained to follow certain safety procedures. When the department goes a certain number of days without an accident, the employment supervisor will see to it that they are rewarded.
Often, he arranges for them to be fed steak for lunch one day at work. Sometimes it is fish or hamburgers instead, but it is always something nice to motivate the employees to keep up the good work.
The employment supervisor is heralded as a good guy in times like these, but when he has to evaluate someone for poor performance, he suddenly becomes the bad guy. I think that is unfair.
My daughter has spent most of her working career in human resources. There are always changes in policies and procedures that she has to keep up with.
Lately there have been some age discrimination laws that she has had to really brush up on. The company she currently works for had to lay off a large amount of people.
Many of these people were employees that had been working there a long time, so they were not young people. Along with the age discrimination came the accusations that they let go the employees who were the highest paid.
When it comes to legal issues in the work place, thankfully there is an attorney on staff who handles most of these situations.
It can add a lot of stress to my daughter's job, as there are always a lot of factors to take in to consideration when she hires and fires someone.
I have had many good employment supervisors, but I have also had one bad one that really sticks out in my mind.
A good supervisor is one that will motivate employees to do a good job and handles conflict in a positive, yet constructive way.
As long as you have more than one employee, you can count on the fact that you will have conflict. For some reason, this seems to be the case more often with several women than it does working with men.
This supervisor I had was very partial towards certain people. If there was a conflict, she would always side with her favorites, and it became very frustrating for a lot of people.
Usually you think of an employment supervisor as the one doing the hiring and firing. In this case, she ended up getting fired after a few months. There weren't very many people who were sorry to see her go.
He has to attend yearly seminars to stay up to date on this, and once a year all the employees receive instruction and training on this.
His company has an incentive for all of their employees to follow the correct procedures. For every quarter each crew goes without having an accident, they are rewarded a bonus.
Not only does he have to watch out for the big things, but also all the little things that are taken for granted every day. If he sees one of his guys not wearing their hard hat, he has to make sure they put it on and keep it on.
Sometimes something as minor as this can become a big deal. If an OSHA inspector came on the job and saw this, they would receive a fine.
There are a lot of responsibilities that go along with being a construction work supervisor. One of the first things is to know the rules yourself, and then make sure all your employees follow them as well.
I work in the human resources department of an insurance company, and for the most part, I really enjoy my job.
I am in charge of all the new employee training and orientation, and this is my favorite part of my job. This way I get to know all of the new employees and build a relationship with them.
The part of my job that I really dislike is when I have to fire someone or let them go. I never sleep very well the night before I have to do this.
If an employee has not done their job, it is not quite so hard to fire them. If someone has to be laid off because of department cut-backs, that is always tough.
I also have to be very careful about following all the proper rules and procedures. There have been a couple employees over the years who have filed for wrongful termination employment practices against the company.
Even though our company had done nothing wrong, the employees were hoping to get some kind of compensation out of being fired. That is why it is so important I know what the current standards are when I let someone go.
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