Like any other sector, the animal health industry has unique human resource problems that require specialized HR approaches. Animal health organizations hire people from diverse fields and professions with specific skill sets and qualifications. They often face multiple challenges regarding regulatory and safety considerations. Moreover, employees frequently encounter workload issues, high turnover, and seasonal shifts, which demand effective employee support policies to retain skilled talent.
An Employer of Record (EOR) resolves such issues in animal health by maintaining compliance, payroll, benefits, hiring, and safety protocols in various jurisdictions and protecting your workforce from legal conflicts. While you focus on animal care, the complex administrative and regulatory functions can be addressed by EORs with the competencies to deal with these tasks. A comprehensive understanding of why HR in animal health is complicated and how EOR simplifies it helps build a focused, compliant, strong, and effective workforce.
What Makes HR in Animal Health Difficult?
These are the reasons for challenging HR in animal health:
Diverse Workforce
Animal health companies employ veterinarians and technicians, researchers and lab personnel, salespeople, and field employees. Managing HR policies for such a heterogeneous mix of roles and skills is extremely difficult.
Specialized Skills and Certifications
HR teams must monitor compliance with evolving standards, including veterinary licenses, biosecurity protocols, and other required industry certifications.
Regulatory Complexity
Compliance with animal welfare, pharmaceutical, and workplace safety regulations adds complexity to animal health. Each region and job category also has unique regulations, increasing the administrative workload for HR teams.
Safety Risks
Unlike standard office roles, animal health staff face exposure to biohazards and unpredictable animal behavior. Working with live animals and other risky materials increases health and safety hazards.
Emotional and Physical Strain
HR in animal health must manage burnout by facilitating mental health support customized to highly specialized programs. In animal health, euthanasia, animal suffering, and other emotionally stressful events can lead to high stress levels.
Seasonal and Field Work
Livestock vaccinations or other preventative measures, not to mention responding to outbreaks, tend to create irregular and seasonal shifts. These situations demand remote working policies and flexible staffing plans for HR.
Retention Challenges
HR must focus on recruitment, retention, career opportunities, and competitive compensation in a specialized labor market with high turnover and stressful roles.
7 Benefits of EOR in Making HR Simple in Animal Health
EOR benefits HR in animal health in the following ways:
1. Compliance Management
Animal health practices have specific labor laws, certifications, and safety regulations that differ from region to region. An EOR handles legal and compliance responsibilities and maintains the active workforce validation, credentialing, and policy compliance status. This approach minimizes penalties and legal risks.
2. Payroll and Benefits Administration
Managing payroll for a multi-faceted workforce in the animal health field can become overwhelming. The EOR covers employee payment, tax withholding, compensation insurance claim processing, and benefits. Centralized systems streamline processes, reducing compliance risks.
3. Hiring and Onboarding
Recruiting animal health workers requires credential verification, background checks, and license verification. The EOR facilitates hiring by coordinating recruitment, verification of all certifications, and onboarding paperwork, including tax forms and employment contracts. This strategy ensures that new hires are compliant and focused from day one, saving work hours for the HR team.
4. Risk Mitigation
Employees in animal health have unique exposures, such as to disease or injury from animals. The EOR implements safety measures and compliance with biosecurity. They train staff and enforce workplace safety, minimizing liability while safeguarding employee health in high-risk environments.
5. Streamlined Employee Management
The animal health workforce is often field-based, making HR management complex. The EOR properly manages employee records, agreements, and HR policies, enabling consistent management over clinics, labs, and field sites. It simplifies local compliance burdens and enhances workforce control without stressing your team.
6. Sustaining Flexibility with Staffing
In animal health, workloads often shift based on the season or specific projects. EORs enable flexible staffing strategies, which means employing and scaling down staff quickly without payroll adjustments. An EOR ensures that your organization adapts to shifting requirements and stays compliant without the burden of direct hires or layoffs on your end.
7. Focus On Primary Tasks
By outsourcing HR tasks to an EOR, your internal team can focus on delivering quality animal care and innovative programs. EORs allow your organization to offload complex tasks, enabling caregivers to prioritize animal health and execute your organizational mission more efficiently.
Conclusion
The HR functions within the field of animal health have specific issues that require very particular solutions. Companies recruit and train individuals with specific education and credentials who operate in different locations under various strict legal and safety environments. External factors, such as the emotional aspects of the job, seasonal shifts, and high turnover rates, also require flexible employee policies combined with strong support systems to ensure the retention and attraction of skilled personnel.
An Employer of Record Service removes administrative burdens of HR by centralizing and automating compliance, payroll, benefits, recruitment, and safety for multiple locations while ensuring protected personnel. With an EOR managing sensitive compliance and paperwork, you can focus on quality animal care. Knowing the complexities of HR in animal health and how an EOR simplifies these challenges is essential for building a focused and compliant workforce. Partner with HR Options to make this happen!
