HR Consulting in Sarasota, Florida

Sarasota is the largest city south of the bay and the one with the most distinct character: a coastal city whose economy runs on arts and culture, tourism, healthcare and the professional firms that serve an affluent, older population. That gives it a nonprofit sector out of proportion to its size — museums, theaters, the opera and ballet, foundations and social-service agencies — alongside medical and specialty practices around Sarasota Memorial, the hotels, restaurants and outfitters feeding Siesta Key and St. Armands, and the law, wealth-management and advisory firms along Main Street and the bayfront.

The HR problems are the problems of mission-driven and service organizations. Nonprofits where the executive director is the HR department and the board has opinions about personnel policy. Practices where the office manager handles hiring between patients. Hospitality teams with tipped staff, seasonal swings and high turnover. And firms built around a few senior people who have never had to manage anyone through a performance problem.

Sarasota is about 50 minutes from my St. Petersburg base down I-275 and I-75, so most of my work with Sarasota organizations runs by phone, email and video, with on-site visits for first meetings, board sessions, investigations, terminations and training. Sarasota County has no employment ordinances of its own, so Florida and federal law are what we work from — and the nonprofit-specific rules on volunteers, interns and grant-funded positions are where most of the questions land.