Hiring, keeping workers difficult

To woo hires, many area small firms highlight work culture benefits.

Pete Marte’s solar installation and maintenance business started the year with a staff of 99. But, as 2018 draws to a close, that number has shrunk to 80.

The company, Hannah Solar, underwent restructuring, which led to some of the decrease in staff. Another reason for the Atlanta company’s drop in employees? Poaching by competitors.

With the unemployment rate at a 50-year low, employee retention in this ultracompetitive job market is likely to continue being an issue for Hannah Solar and other small businesses across the nation in 2019, according to the recently released Bank of America Small Business Owner Report. And that could be a problem, because more than half of business owners said that they had difficulty finding qualified candidates for job openings in 2018, in some cases hampering growth.

Overall, the report’s outlook for small businesses was positive: Four in five entrepreneurs anticipate year-over-year revenue growth, and many say they plan to expand.

But, while small business hiring is at its highest level in three years, the tight labor market presents a challenge in employee retention and hiring.

Hannah Solar lost several highly experienced employees to a competitor this year, said Marte, the company’s owner.

“They were great people. I hated to lose them,” he said.

Compared to 10 other major metropolitan cities, Atlanta’s small businesses had the lowest turnover rate, with only 21 percent reporting losing an employee in the past year, the Bank of America report said, while Washington, D.C., had the highest, with 34 percent losing at least one worker.