New and aspiring entrepreneurs often are concerned about how to manage HR issues, such as payroll tax, labor laws, benefits/retirement plans when they've reached a point where they need to start hiring employees. Here are 3 tips on how startups should handle HR issues.

1. First, for very small employers (under 10 employees) you don't really think in terms of "HR." You really are thinking more in terms of functions: payroll, hiring talent, paying taxes, etc. As a small business owner I personally think the best thing to do here is outsource as much of it as you can. Any good payroll service can handle all the payroll and tax issues. Keep the hiring in-house, but if you can outsource some of the on-boarding to your payroll service that is a good practice.

2. A lot of the big federal discrimination issues don't kick in until you are up to 15 employees (however, many state requirements kick in much earlier). From a legal compliance standpoint even the smallest employers must be up to speed on minimum wage and overtime rules (especially the independent contractor rules and white collar exemptions from overtime - these really can kill a small employer if done wrong). And if employees are unhappy even a small employer may have to worry about unions.

A lot of firms assume that because they are small they don't have to worry about a unions. Most employers are surprised to learn that the average union election today occurs in units of around 25 employees - many occur in very small units (10 or fewer employees). Thus it is never too soon to start thinking about union avoidance.

A great place to start your union avoidance plan is to conduct an employee satisfaction survey at least once a year. Opinion surveys are a great way to get a handle on employee relations problems before they get out of control and to improve employee engagement and morale.

As you approach 15 employees it is a great idea to have a regular relationship with a labor/employment lawyer. For a firm this size you probably should consider a boutique firm that specializes in labor/employment law (do not use your general practitioner for these issues - a very common mistake).

3. Don't re-invent the wheel. Get some examples of what bigger companies in your area are doing and pick out the things you think apply to your business. I have a bunch of free resources and tools available in my "Open Source HR Department" where employer exchange things like policies, procedures and a lot of other tools.