Archive

The highlight of this year’s Recruiting Innovation Summit, for me, was the Recruiting Tech Startup Competition. Of nearly 50 initial applicants, six innovative recruiting tech startups were invited to compete the grand prize of $10,000 (and some serious bragging rights). Here's how it worked: Presenters gave a live demo their product, took questions from the audience, and then answered questions from the panel of judges--Jason Warner, Steve Boese and Ethel Chen. Each startup was rated based on business model, viability, potential impact on the industry, and other factors.

What started out well for the employer...

On April 29, 2009, Catherine Coffman, an employee of Robert J. Young Company, Inc. ("RJY"), got into a motorcycle accident. RJY provided Ms. Coffman with leave under the Family and Medical Leave Act. Just before Ms. Coffman's FMLA expired, RJY offered to return her to work in a sedentary job that provided the same pay and benefits as her old position. Ms. Coffman rejected the offer because she did not feel that she was able to return to work yet.

Who could possibly be opposed to paycheck fairness? That’s the question some may ask as the Senate likely will consider the “Paycheck Fairness Act” in early June to further highlight the election year pursuit of the women’s vote. The legislation is the best idea some in Congress have to address the gap between men’s and women’s earnings.

The U.S. Senate Committee on Health, Education, Labor and Pensions (HELP) heard testimony May 10, 2012, on the challenges to work and family life for people lacking employer paid leave and other workplace flexibility options.

Society for Human Resource Management (SHRM) member Juanita Phillips, HR director at Intuitive Research and Technology Corp., was among four panelists appearing before the committee that Sen. Tom Harkin, D-Iowa, chairs.

With the two presidential nominees sharply diverging on key policy issues such as the economy, workplace policy and foreign policy, President Obama and Governor Romney will provide the American public with the starkest contrast since 1984 if not 1964.

We Know Next conducted an eye-opening #NextChat discussion on May 23 about "What’s Holding Women Back" with special guest Laurie Ruettimann.

During the economic downturn and continuing post-recession there has been an increased need for career development programs and services as individuals who were laid-off, some after many years in one career, found themselves faced with an uncertain future.  Many began the often challenging task of re-assessing and creating new career patterns and determining how to integrate their work style, their personal needs, their values, and their sense of self as they planned for their future. 

The U.S. Department of Labor’s (DOL) wage and hour enforcement under the Obama administration has become markedly more hostile toward employers, according to Paul DeCamp, former administrator of the Wage and Hour Division under President George W. Bush and an attorney at Jackson Lewis’ Washington, D.C., regional office.

‘New Normal’

In case you missed it, here’s what happened on We Know Next this week.

To attract, retain and engage Hispanics and Latinos, employers need to understand the common—and unique—characteristics of the various cultures that fall under the label of “Hispanic,” according to Di Ann Sanchez, SPHR, president and founder of DAS HR Consulting LLC in Hurst, Texas.

When salespeople at LifeSize Communications, a video conferencing company in Austin, Texas, wanted advice about how to sell a product against a competitor, they didn't turn to formal training or e-learning. Instead, many logged onto an internal online collaboration network to access content posted by a LifeSize partner in South Africa. It describes an approach he used to win business against that competitor.

 Interview by Donna M. Owens

Having witnessed the end of apartheid in his native South Africa, Mark Addleson knows what it's like to see a society undergo transformational change. Perhaps that's why the business professor says it's possible—and necessary—to revolutionize U.S. management practices.

Michael was a Director at a medium-sized company. A self-proclaimed perfectionist, he had equally high expectations of his direct reports. He began with the company when they were first formed and had the luxury of hiring and training his own team. Like so many young leaders, he struggled with delegation. Michael was a work horse. He could crank out work like nobody’s business, and many times, found it easier to do things himself rather than engage the team he had hired. His team of professionals was relegated to less than fulfilling work for much of the time.

We all know that powerful women face Catch-22s.  When Donald Trump exercises control, he is in control. When Martha Stewart exercises control, she is controlling.  Same behaviors; different labels.

A lot has been written about these Catch-22s.  Less has been written on how women with power can handle them.

Here are three of the many Catch-22s women with power face and my suggestions for how to navigate them.

1. Ice Queen

Jason Lauritsen shares how we make the mistake in the employee engagement survey process of treating all employee opinions as equally credible. He illustrates how organizations already know that employee opinions are not equal and reveals the insanity of treating them as such. www.BulletproofTalent.com

We are pretty good at knowing what our point of view is (and we are pretty good at thinking highly of our point of view). We are also good at knowing when someone disagrees with our delightful point of view. We are not quite so good at understanding why they disagree with us.
 

By a 4-1 vote, the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) on April 25, 2012, approved a new guidance on criminal background checks.

Consolidating and superseding previous EEOC guidance on criminal background checks, the guidance discourages blanket exclusions of individuals who have been convicted of crimes and encourages the use of individualized assessments of whether an employer’s criminal conduct exclusion is job related and consistent with business necessity.

Attracting and retaining a skilled workforce is the most important consideration among U.S. chief financial officers (CFOs) in weighing whether to continue offering employee health coverage, according to a survey by the Integrated Benefits Institute (IBI).

Most health benefit plans include some kind of wellness program. As costs rise, plan administrators hope that their wellness programs will help stem and reduce rising health plan costs. Plan administrators might harbor over-optimistic expectations of what a wellness initiative can deliver, however.

We can rank approaches to wellness as low, moderate and high impact.

Low Impact

Gov. Martin O’Malley, on May 2, 2012, signed S.B. 433, a bill prohibiting employers from requesting the social media passwords or accessing the social media accounts of prospective and current employees, making Maryland the first state to pass such a law.

The new provision, which will take effect Oct. 1, 2012, bars employers from requesting or requiring that an employee or applicant for employment disclose any user name, password or other means to access a “personal account or service” through an electronic communications device.

Who would you say are the best rock and roll lead singers of all time? I'm guessing that a bunch of names come to mind for you. In fact, we could probably have a spirited debate over who is the best, even if you aren't a big music fan. Now, name the best back-up singers of all time? You know, those people on nearly every album who provide the harmonies and the depth to the songs. Nothing? The list of the best backup singers is a lot harder to come by.

When trust breaks down in organizations it can impact employee turnover, communication, collaboration, risk taking and creativity—among other things—all of which can harm the bottom line, according to Richard Fagerlin, president of Peak Solutions Inc. in Fort Collins, Colo.

The world of work is a complicated place.
 
Technology, globalization and the great recession have accelerated the pace of change and brought about category disruption, new competition and what can feel like never ending chaos.
 
In a time where we need people to step up and become the very best of who they are capable of becoming, job satisfaction is at unprecedented lows and trust and confidence in senior leadership has plummeted.
 

As work, family and personal demands increase and we are tethered to smart phones and tablet computers to be available instantly to anyone who might need us, our ability to perform at our best diminishes and our physical and mental health suffers. It’s time to revamp the way we approach work, according to Tony Schwartz, CEO of The Energy Project. It’s time to reclaim focus and be more productive, efficient and healthy.

We all talk about high potentials being the next best thing since sliced bread.   They are the employees in our midst that seemingly can do it all and we recognize them for their efforts.   We come to rely on them whenever there is something we need to get done and done well.  They are thought of first for projects and are primed for promotions.  Where does that leave everyone else, though?  High potentials are a small number from a much larger pool of employees.  If you don't engage this larger group, how will you know what their potential even is?

Road trip!

About 75 members of the Charlotte Area Society for Human Resource Management (CASHRM) chapter will be attending the SHRM 2012 Annual Conference in Atlanta June 24-27. Many will arrive on two buses the chapter has chartered.

It is the largest U.S. chapter delegation attending the conference, according to SHRM. The second-largest group is made up of 64 people from AutoZone Inc.

Seventy of the members qualified for another “ride” as well—a significant break on their conference registration fee.

“You cannot build a reputation on what you are planning to do.”  Henry Ford’s words are resonant in a time where HR leaders are tasked with a myriad of planning activities: strategic action planning, performance plans, development planning, succession plans.  Planning is important, but it is how your plans translate into reality that builds your reputation. 

Compensation governance in the U.S. is drawing increased scrutiny as legislators, regulators, shareholders and the news media focus on how—and how much—companies pay employees in general and executives in particular. The attention has been heightened by recent headlines and media stories on perceived abuses in executive compensation, with a specific emphasis on financial services firms.

Programs designed to develop high-potential employees are more likely to succeed if there’s clear agreement on the criteria needed to drive organizational success, developmental options and program outcomes, according to study results by AMA Enterprise, the American Management Association’s research arm.

Senior executives, managers, directors, and HR and training and development functions need to be on the same page when it comes to participants’ selection criteria or there’s a risk that senior leaders will tap only those rising stars that mirror themselves.