Tackling the Challenges of Recruitment and Retention

The city of Rockmart participated in GCS's Jobs with Purpose Initiative and, with the guidance of a consultant, came up with creative ideas to solve the problem.

Like many small communities, the city of Rockmart was having trouble recruiting and retaining employees, especially in the police and fire departments. With a high turnover rate and an aging workforce, Rockmart needed some help.

Stacey Smith, Rockmart's city manager, applied for a grant from the Jobs with Purpose (JWP) Initiative, a program from Georgia City Solutions designed to assist cities in proactively addressing their workforce needs through investment, planning and strategy implementation.

"We didn't really know where to start," says Smith. "We didn't know how to advertise or how to attract new employees."

In March 2023 Rockmart, a small city of 5,000 located about an hour northwest of Atlanta, received word that they had been selected for the JWP Initiative. Within a year, they had worked through the process and had a plan.

First Steps

The program works in two phases. The first involves a GMA municipal consultant meeting with a team of city employees and helping them identify the workforce challenges the city faces and determine which ones should be addressed. They then create action steps to achieve those goals. During the second phase an outside marketing firm works with the city to create collateral pieces to help with recruitment.

After meeting with the consultant, Pete Pyrzenski, and providing him with preliminary data in September 2023, Rockmart formed a project team to help in the process. The group of 11 employees comprised both veteran and new employees with representation from all city departments. io

"We wanted to get a mix of different ideas," says Delmos Stone, Rockmart's director of planning, who headed the project team. "We knew we would benefit from all views. Newer employees could tell us what attracted them to Rockmart and those with more seniority could give us reasons for why they stayed."

Pyrzenski met with the group twice, facilitating their discussions and then helping to lay out a strategy. The group evaluated the current situation, what was working and what challenges the city faced. The second meeting generated solutions.

Implementing the Plan

Pyrzenski came back with five action items based on the project team's feedback and ideas:

1. Develop and finalize a Succession Plan for each department.
2. Implement a performance evaluation system to evaluate job duties and performance regularly. This had never been done before - the city just gave raises. "The committee suggested using evaluations not just for pay increases but also as a way for employees to learn what they are doing well and where they need to make improvements," Smith says.
3. Complete a professional pay study and benefit review for city employees and departments. The study found that Rockmart had one of the lowest starting pay scales across the region. As a result, the city has increased salaries for every employee to make them more competitive.
4. Evaluate the city's IT systems and capabilities to make them more efficient.
5. Develop and formalize a cross-training program across departments that addresses core function duties and responsibilities. Employees now have the option to spend a day in another department to learn what their colleagues do. Smith says this will eventually help improve communications between the departments.

Each action item had a time frame and steps for completing each one.

Smith, who calls the process "eye-opening" and "amazing" says that one thing that surprised her was that salary was not the number one priority for taking a city job.

"An employee survey found that the work environment and work culture were the most important things for new and veteran employees," she says. "They wanted a stable work environment. That was shocking to me."

[Link]

Rockmart's New Employee Newsletter

Implementing Creative Solutions

One suggestion that came from the project team was to create an employee relations committee to build rapport among all employees and departments. Some of the ideas that have been implemented:

• A monthly newsletter that lists upcoming events, new businesses, new projects and employee birthdays
• An employee appreciation lunch
• A reward program recognizing years of service
• A family day

"This was the best thing that came out of the process in my opinion," says Stone. "It helps with employee morale, and also will help us attract new employees and keep our existing employees."

Another idea that was generated out of the committee was providing a welcome packet for new employees.

"We didn't really have an onboarding process," admits Smith. "But we've now created a packet that says 'Welcome to the Family' and it contains an overview of the city, a list of departments and what they do and other helpful information. We didn't have that before and now we realize how important that is."

During the second phase, Mopdog Creative + Strategy developed recruitment materials that the city could use to advertise job openings. The agency created a series of posters and cards that illustrated opportunities in each department using photos of actual city employees. For the first time, the city has materials that can be used for recruitment efforts at job fairs, the local technical college, the library and on its website.

"It is really helpful to have something we can give people to take with them at job fairs," says Stone. "We didn't have any kind of collateral. It really benefits the city and it's another great thing that came out of the JWP Initiative."

Smith presented everything to the Rockmart City Council, and they were very supportive. They didn't have to approve any initiatives the project team implemented, but they did need to vote on the salary increases, which passed unanimously.

Now the city is fully staffed and Smith is grateful for the entire process.

"The biggest thing I learned was the importance of communicating with the employees," Smith says. "It goes a long way in boosting morale and making the city a good place to work. I am so grateful for GMA and Georgia City Solutions for this opportunity."

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