How Cinram Hired a Heap of Help—in a Hurry.; Millenium Search Inc. - Cinram Inc. Huntsville, Alabama - Brief Article

Workforce, Dec, 2000 by Victor D. Infante

Cinram has always been good at adapting to new situations. A leading manufacturer of pre recorded VHS video cassettes, audio cassettes, audio CDs, CD-ROMs, and digital versatile discs (DVDs) for major movie studios, music labels, software companies, and publishers worldwide, the company has learned to be flexible in a rapidly changing market. It wasn't too long ago that eight-track tapes went out of fashion, after all.

That flexibility came in handy when the company won an exclusive contract to manufacture video, CD, and DVD products for 20th Century Fox Home Entertainment. The challenge to fulfilling that contract? Cinram had to hire an extra 500 employees in seven weeks.

"We used several strategies," says Peter Hassler, HR manager for the company's plant in Huntsville, Alabama, which would be the site of all the new production. "The first goal was getting a good staff that was capable of working extraordinary hours in a round-the-clock situation. We sourced local candidates for production positions and used referrals and search firms like (Florida-based) Millennium Search, Inc., to identify specific talent required to put together a distribution center. With that, we were able to identify a significant candidate pool, and from that to hire as much of the management team as possible."

In order to fill supervisory positions, Cinram decided that it would promote between 30 and 50 percent from within, then hire the rest externally, as the Huntsville plant had been previously dedicated solely to distribution, not manufacturing. The new role demanded new talent.

To make matters more complicated, the plant didn't have the luxury of hiring a new staff, training them, and then getting down to brass tacks. Instead, work was getting under way while the hiring process was happening.

Faced with a daunting task, Hassler and his team set out to recruit a brand-new workforce. "We had a groundbreaking ceremony that got a lot of press coverage," he says. "That helped us as much as any advertising campaign. We used classified ads, and the Alabama Employment Office helped us screen candidates. We were able to get more than 100 applications a day processed. From those 100 applications a day, we were able to select enough candidates to hire a hundred people a week from the Fourth of July to Labor Day."

No mean feat, considering the current labor shortage and low unemployment. Huntsville's unemployment rate has recently hovered between 2 and 4 percent. Hassler chalks up the success to competitive wages, good benefits, and clean work conditions.

"It's a good work environment," he says. "That all contributed to source enough applicants to fill the bill. Though unemployment is low, we were able to get enough quality candidates. Some positions were tough, though, like some of the more technical areas. We had to search a little bit further, with professional societies and such."

Mike Collaizzi, president of Millennium Search, Inc., was one of the people who had to find someone for one of those hard-to-fill positions. "The biggest challenge," he says, "was finding someone who had technical experience in distribution, and who had experience with multiple products in a high-volume setting. I identified about 30, and spoke to 20 of them. I sent four candidates to Huntsville to interview for the position. The candidate that got hired was from Baltimore. All of this took place in about 10 days."

It's not surprising that local workers found the idea of a job with Cinram attractive: the company has been honored for its benefits before. For instance, the Toronto plant was listed in the recent book Canada's Top 100 Employers.

"Cinram," says the book, "provides a comprehensive employee benefits package that includes dental, eye care, prescription drugs, extended health (including semi-private hospitalization and supplemental medical insurance), personal leave, and group life disability insurance. The company also provides a series of financial benefits, including a share-purchase program, a group registered retirement savings plan, discounts on company products and a year-end bonus." Other benefits include ongoing employee development through in-house training initiatives and tuition subsidies for courses at outside institutions.

One of the problems that Hassler expected to face was high turnover. From the outset, he expected to see 20 percent turnover--which is exactly what he got. "People find out that the type of work isn't suited to them," he says, "or that the 12-hour shift doesn't suit them."

In order to fulfill the contract with Fox, Cinram needed the Huntsville plant to work around the clock, a serious problem for a company that tries to be sympathetic to employees' work/life needs. It took some inventive scheduling to accommodate everyone.

"We work a shift that's composed of four teams," says Hassler, "alternating weekends and four days off at a time. Some people can't do that, but for those who can, it's a great structure. You get a couple days off in the middle of the week every week. What it required of the managers and the HR employee staff was three months of Mondays, no weekends, and 16-hour days. Because the paper flow and the number of people you have to talk to is enormous, just getting them signed up on the payroll was an immense job.