Day three of the conference started off with a keynote address by Patrick Lencioni, the author of the book The Ideal Team Player and founder of The Table Group. His presentation was very interesting and I have tried to capture the high points below.

The old model

Beignets from Sunday brunch at Blake’s on Poydras. DELICIOUS!

There’s a popular saying in some HR circles today: “The ‘war for talent’ is over—and talent won.” 

We have seen this so-called war wax and wane with economic cycles, evolve with new technology, and intensify under globalization. It should now be clear to everyone that, whether we’re in good economic times or bad, in a period of stability or disruption, the skills shortage is an ever-present challenge. 

The following article is a summary of the CFGI 2017 Symposium session titled “Emerging Challenges and Strategies for Recruitment, Hiring, and Retention of Foreign Nationals in 2017.” Scott Fitzgerald of Fragomen Worldwide, Justin Storch of CFGI, and Allyson Gonzalez of AT&T addressed the challenges of hiring qualified applicants in today’s turbulent political environment.

For HR professionals, “friending” employees on Facebook or connecting on other social media sites is far from a simple decision.

That’s what Chelsea Wheeler discovered after she posed the question “Do any of you accept friend requests on social media from employees?” to the HR Department of One group on SHRM Connect, the Society for Human Resource Management’s online community.

Everyone benefits when great organizations work together to maximize the services and information they provide. This has been the case since we partnered with the Society for Human Resources Management (SHRM) to ensure all employees are well informed about the Social Security benefits and information available to them.

I’m not an HR professional, I’m a business owner. But I’ve worked with HR solution providers for 20-plus years on the marketing side, so I’ve attended the SHRM Annual Conference many times. And from my viewpoint, SHRM17 was perhaps my favorite yet, for a variety of reasons. Here are some things I loved about this year’s event in New Orleans.

On June 21, @shrmnextchat conducted a #SHRM17 Wrap-Up #Nextchat with #SHRM17 attendees and those #NotAtSHRM17 about what they learned, who they met, and how the overall experience contributed to their personal and professional growth.

If you missed this super-fun and informative chat, you can see all the tweets here: 

Day two of the annual conference is intense. You’ve got people rushing to make it to their favorite session, the popular sessions have overflows and to a newbie, that’s overwhelming. Or you could think about it in these terms:  since we’re in Louisiana, the gumbo pot has been mixed and slowly starting to boil.

At the SHRM Annual Conference there is a lot going on.  You can see most of it right in front of you. The sessions, the exhibit hall, the SHRM Store and the like.  But what you may not know, because you don’t see it is this. Pretty much every day the SHRM Government Affair’s team is working to represent our collective business interest in Washington D.C.

How often do we hear that HR doesn’t get a seat at the table, or that they aren’t seen as adding value at an executive level?

The 2017 Society for Human Resource Management Annual Conference and Expo is well underway.  This year’s edition in New Orleans, LA boasts the second largest in history from an attendance perspective with well over 17,000 attendees from across the country and world. 

The Monday of any SHRM conference is usually jammed packed and high energy. It’s the first full day of sessions. People are excited to check out the sessions they mapped out for the day, and they aren’t yet exhausted from talking to the 18,000 attendees at #SHRM17.

When you think of Sunday in New Orleans many things come to mind.  The heat rising off the worn streets of the French Quarter, an interesting mix of pagan and penitent moving about slowly round the Jackson Square, or the line for café and beignets crowded with tourists struggling to find shelter from the mid-morning sun.  Oh and then there’s that conference of over 17,000 HR Professionals over by the convention center.

It’s Day 2 here at #SHRM17 and I just attended the General Session. While I enjoyed Laszlo Block’s presentation and believe he has tremendous talent, he offered something that I just can’t stand behind.

He offered that we shouldn’t let Hiring Managers make hiring decisions.

Think about this message. It got a good laugh and I respect that, but please think about the meaning of those words. And then contemplate this…

Today saw the beginning of #SHRM17 in New Orleans, where 18,000 HR pros have descended upon the city for learning, fun, and reconnecting with old friends.

The shenanigans kicked off early in the morning with pre-conference workshops, but the sessions began in earnest after lunch, with concurrent sessions and SmartStage speakers. But the main event REALLY kicks off late in the afternoon, with the appearance of Juana Hart and our first keynote of the conference.

There are a thousand stories in The Big Easy. This is just one…

…of the thousand.

To say it is “humid” in New Orleans is an understatement. It’s ridiculous.

If large groups of people, lots of activity, sound, noise, and light feel overwhelming, you may be an introvert. Let’s just say that SHRM National is an extrovert’s delight.

Yet, the conference is full of interesting people, opportunity, valuable information, and things that promise to make your life easier, people happier, and decisions easier. There is so much to learn and explore.

This blog is going to give you the low-down on sessions you need to attend to be a #Boss. Whether this is your first time attending a national conference for work or you’ve been around the block a few times, there is quite a bit to learn if you pick the right sessions at SHRM17. With hundreds of sessions and thousands of people, the conference can seem intimidating but fear not!

#SHRM17 Bound: Get the most out of your NOLA experience!

Whether you’re a first time attendee or a SHRM Annual Conference veteran, it can be a little overwhelming stepping into a big city full of jazz, Cajun culinary adventures, and now – HR professionals! If you want to make the most of your #SHRM17 and #NOLA experience while also keeping your stress to a functioning minimum, read on, intrepid #HR pro!

Don’t let FOMO take over

On Sunday I will awake at 5:00 a.m. to make my way across country to the city of New Orleans. Many will already be filling the conference center halls at SHRM17 in celebration of our great profession.

The majority of HR professionals give their employees a financial health rating of “fair” and nearly 20 percent report that their employees are “not at all” financially literate according to a national SHRM survey.

Everyone is talking uncertainty these days, and it's not just a U.S. phenomenon! While attending the EY World Entrepreneur of the Year Forum in Monte Carlo, Monaco, I had the chance to speak with EY Global Vice Chair for Talent Nancy Altobello along with neuroscientist Vivienne Ming and social entrepreneur Auddette Exel about dealing with rising uncertainty in today's workforce.

Nearly four years ago, I blogged here about a complaint that the U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission had filed against a West Virginia coal company. The lawsuit alleged that the employer failed to accommodate an employee who requested not to use a biometric hand scanner to track time and attendance.

On June 14, @shrmnextchat chatted with labor and employment attorney Louis Lessig and played a #Nextchat game of FLSA Jeopardy.

If you missed this fun and informative chat, you can see all the tweets here:

If you suggest to Marissa Afton that she has beautiful red curly hair, she’s likely to give you a quizzical look. There is no denying she’s got some curls but she doesn’t consider herself a redhead.

Perhaps being a redhead is a state of mind. 

Mindfulness - that’s also a state of mind.

It’s been a decade since I first attended The Society for Human Resource Management Annual Conference. While there are always new buzz words and evolving trends, many of the HR related topics from 2007 are still on the #SHRM17 agenda.

If I may voice my concern:

1.       Why haven’t we mastered social performance management?

2.       Why is external recruiting more important than Leadership development?

I like to think that I’m basically a good person; but then I think about what I’d do in a zombie apocalypse, and I realize I’m actually horrible and selfish. How do I know this? The first thing I’d do if I was scratched by a zombie is scratch my friends and a select few family members. I’m not going through that alone!

This is version v9.0 of this post. As best as I can come up with this will be my ninth SHRM annual conference. In front of many of these events, I have written a post about what I have learned along the way and tried to share some of the things I have learned and share how to get the most of the event.  I am sure others have covered this, so all I can tell you is if you read something repeatedly it’s probably pretty close to the truth.

With the annual SHRM conference just around the corner, the time has come to start planning what sessions you’d like to attend. As part of the blogging teams continuing coverage of the annual conference, I had an opportunity to interview Ms.

As sometimes does, life has happened to me over the last few weeks and I had to back out of attending SHRM17. Personal and work commitments combined with a pretty brutal travel schedule over the last few months have made it clear that I need to slow down a bit. Unfortunately, SHRM was one of those things that had to take a back seat this year. It was a tough decision, but the right one for me in the is moment.

A wealth of opportunities awaits SHRM-certified professionals at the SHRM 2017 Annual Conference & Exposition in New Orleans, to be held June 18-21. Special events and resources will enable certificants to earn recertification credits, learn, network—and even take a moment to relax amid the hubbub. 

Low-Cost Employee Engagement Inspiration For Millennials, By Millennials!

It's time to make final plans for #SHRM17 in New Orleans. SHRM has an amazing experience ready for us this year! If you have attended before, then you know that just a little bit of planning on the front end will ensure you capture all of the many benefits of the conference. Follow these ten tips to help you get the most out of your #SHRM17 experience.

New workplace laws on minimum wage, paid sick leave, criminal background investigations and more are popping up all the time—and they don't always take effect at the beginning of a new year. HR professionals need to communicate these changes with their workforce as the laws become effective, but how often should you revise your employee handbook? Employment attorneys told SHRM Online that the answer depends on a few factors.