Human Resource Insight-Changing Working Environments
Today, employers are finding that attracting and retaining the best qualified candidates is getting harder and harder. It is more important now, than ever before, to begin thinking out of the box and distinguishing your company from the masses.
In the Las Vegas area, employers such as Amazon.com, Extreme Networks, The Nature Conservancy, PetsMart, Softchoice and Quality Towing have all identified a new perk in the workplace. In their quest for Area Managers, Loss Prevention Managers, Associate Directors, Legal Counsel, Senior Engineers and Sales and Marketing Representatives, they are offering a very unique employee benefit. They are “Fido Friendly” businesses.
Dogster (www.Dogster.com) and Simply Hired (www.SimplyHired.com) have partnered together to make it easy for people to search millions of jobs at thousands of companies to determine if they are dog friendly. With their search engine, over 44 million U.S. dog owners can instantly discover their dream job at dog-friendly companies.
In a recent survey by Dogster and Simply Hired, 66 % of dog owners said that they would work longer hours if they were allowed to bring their dogs to work, 55 % would commute a greater distance to their job if they were allowed to have their dog at work, and another 32 % of respondents said that they would take a pay cut to bring their dogs to work. Survey respondents believe that dogs help lower stress levels and build camaraderie amongst employees. Ted Rheingold, CEO of Dogster, commented that “companies with dog-friendly policies just get it. And they are breeding a class of happy and loyal employees. After all, who wouldn’t be happy working with their best friend?”
Simply Hired operates the world’s largest search engine for jobs. The company aggregates and indexes over 4,000,000 jobs from a wide variety of sources including job boards, newspaper, classified listings and company websites. It is now so simple for dog-friendly employers and employees to sniff each other out. An overwhelming 70 % of dog owners believe a dog-friendly work place is an important employee benefit. A whopping 49% of dog owners revealed they would switch jobs if the hiring company allowed their canine companion to accompany them to work. Statistics show that dogs drive many of their owners’ lifestyle choices- from daily routines to purchasing decisions for things like travel and homes.
There are more than 400 companies on the list of dog-friendly employers gathered by Dogster and Simply Hired, including notable internet giants Amazon and Google. Small companies of less than 50 employees make up the majority of the list, with California being the most dog-friendly state. Autodesk, a San Rafael-based software company, recently made headlines for being dog-friendly and making it onto Fortune magazine’s 2006 list of the nation’s 100 Best Companies to Work For.
In a survey by the Society for Human Resource Management, only 4 percent of the 386 HR professionals surveyed indicated that their organizations allow employees to bring their dogs to work. Dogster and Simply Hired hope to see that number increase over the years. According to the American Pet Products Manufacturers Association, more U.S. households have pets than children, 63% vs. 31%. They suggest organizations interested in the idea of allowing dogs in the workplace but hesitant to institute the practice on a regular basis may want to get a feel for the experience by participating in the ninth annual “Take Your Dog to Work Day” on June 23. The work environment is constantly changing and dog lovers find Fido-friendly businesses fetching.
