About
An independent publication about employing people
No vendors, no advertising, no recruitment services — and no connection to any organisation that previously used this domain name.
The Hiring Bench publishes editorial guides on the practical mechanics of employing people in a small organisation: defining and filling a role, getting someone productive, keeping the administration in order, and understanding why people stay or go.
Who this is written for
Employers below about fifty people. A founder making their fourth hire, an office manager who inherited HR alongside three other jobs, a director who signs the contracts and has never read one closely.
Most published guidance assumes a recruitment function, an HR business partner and an employment lawyer on retainer. Very little of it translates to an organisation where the person hiring is also the person doing the job, and where a single appointment going wrong is a material event. This is written for the second case. For broader independent guidance on this point, consult U.S. Department of Labor.
Nothing published here is sponsored. No software vendor has paid for a mention and there are no affiliate arrangements. Where products are named, they are named because they illustrate a category, and they are not linked.
What this site is not
This is a reference publication. It is worth being explicit about what that excludes:
- It is not a recruitment agency, an employer or a job board. There are no vacancies here and no applications are accepted or forwarded.
- It is not a consultancy and sells no services.
- It does not sell, resell or earn commission on software.
- It is not a government body, a public agency, a charity or a publicly funded programme, and it does not administer, represent or speak for one.
- It is not affiliated with, endorsed by or connected to any organisation that previously used this domain name. No previous project's name, materials, documents, staff, partners or contact details are continued here in any form, and none of the material published on this domain before was written by us or is available from us.
On advice and jurisdiction
Employment is heavily regulated and the rules differ substantially between countries and often between regions within them. Notice periods, leave entitlement, contract requirements, record retention, worker classification tests, monitoring rules and dismissal procedures all vary.
Everything here is written in general terms and is not legal advice. Where an article refers to a rule, treat it as a prompt to check the position that applies to you rather than as a statement of it. Anyone making a decision with legal, tax or payroll consequences should confirm it against local law and take professional advice on their own circumstances.
How the guides are put together
Each guide deals with one problem and tries to answer it at a level someone could act on: what to decide, what to write down, what it costs, and what happens when it goes wrong. Where a recommendation carries a cost — and most do — the cost is stated rather than omitted.
Guides are revised when practice changes rather than on a schedule. The full list is in the index.