SHRM Blog

Global Leadership: Why Such a Struggle?

There are 9,497 books with ‘global leadership’ in the title on Amazon.com, as of January 12, 2012.  Yet multinational organizations continue to struggle with how to develop their global leaders.  We see that daily in our work with these organizations at the Najafi Global Mindset Institute at Thunderbird School of Global Management.   
 
Why is global leadership development so difficult to figure out?  
 
There are many reasons, and chief among them is that global leadership is complex.  It encapsulates management, leadership, diversity, intercultural competence, and strategy, to name a
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Five Reasons Performance Reviews Suck

Every performance review I ever had was a colossal waste of time.
 
The dust laying on yours indicates it’s not worth the paper it’s printed on.
 
Performance reviews are like Santa Clause, they don’t really deliver. Yet, organizations are filled with true believers who persist in wasting time, demotivating employees, and creating more paperwork.
 
You’re in the minority if your evaluation produced lasting benefit.
 
5 Reasons Performance Reviews Suck:
 
  • You’re never really sure how they’ll turn out.
  • The time between reviews is
  • ...
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Social Media Policies: Promoting vs. Regulating Use

Fact: most employees occasionally use social media tools at work for personal reasons, anyway. Unsurprisingly, business leaders want guidelines in place for regulating employee use of social media outlets--and protecting against misuse--on personal and company accounts alike. Many 2012 corporate to-do lists include creating an official policy for regulating employees’ Tweets, Likes and Shares while at work.
 
One thing that I've noticed, though, is that while regulation-focused policies protect an organization against any potential social media blunders, they cast a shadow over the shoulder of every employee who uses the internet on a daily basis (shudder)....
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SOPA & PIPA: Coordinated Advocacy

Social media sites Wikipedia and Google held a blackout day on Wednesday, January 18, 2012 to highlight their opposition to the "Stop Online Piracy Act" (SOPA) and the "Protect Intellectual Property Act" (PIPA) bills in Congress. Wikipedia claimed that over 162 million people saw the blackout message on its website. One day later on January 19, the unofficial vote ledger switched from 80 members of Congress supporting SOPA/PIPA and 31 opposing to 65 supporting and 101 opposing it. This was a net loss of 85 votes for the SOPA/PIPA advocates in only one day!
 
How did...
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What Makes P&G Great

I could talk about their brands, their global clout, their sales growth or their stock market value. Not today. The mystical factor that distinguishes Procter & Gamble from everyone else is people. From 1837 to the present, P&G people have been the company’s sustainable success factor. To many in the consumer packaged goods industry, this isn’t an epiphany. But what is it that makes the people at P&G stand out from the rest?  
 
 
1. The character of P&G can be summed up in one word – Exploration. Throughout its history, P&G has exemplified...
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The Challenges and Rewards of Recruiting Gen Y

The first thing you should know about recruiting Generation Y? According to pioneering generational researchers William Strauss and Neil Howe, workers born between 1982-2000 actually prefer to be called Millennials

That nuance illustrates the essential element to recruiting and attracting the best Millennial talent -- effective communications that speak to and understand their language and values. 

Millennials and Social Media Use

While it’s no secret that communication is increasingly facilitated by social tools and technologies, social networking is particularly relevant for Millennials. 

According to the Pew Internet Foundation’s 2010 Future of the Internet...

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Creating Our Own HR Standards

As 2011 draws to a close and a new year begins, SHRM is pleased to report that the global HR standards initiative has not only successfully launched but also continues to gather steam across the world.  As of the end of December, there are 13 participating countries and 19 observing countries from around the globe that are involved with ISO Technical Committee 260 for Human Resource Management.  Additional countries are expected to join the effort in 2012.  This assembled body will propose and develop global standards for topics within the purview of HR.  
 
Why do...
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HR Advocacy: Help Shape the Workplace

Numerous employment, labor and employee benefit laws regulate the American workplace.  Human resource professionals conduct business daily within this framework. But what if HR professionals helped shape these very laws and regulations?  
 
Given HR’s unique knowledge and experience of implementing these laws within their organizations, wouldn’t their influence make for better HR public policy?  The answer is unequivocally YES, which is why the role of an HR Advocate is so important.
 
But what does being an HR ADVOCATE entail?  Consider these key elements of the job:
 
  • Activism
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Why Do Companies Go Green?

What’s more important? Looking good or doing good?

An increasing number of businesses are responding: Why not do both?

Recent articles, including a McKinsey & Co. global survey report and a column in The Economist, have laid out the advantages that many organizations seek, and some organizations find, when they commit to environmentally friendly and sustainable practices. There are a variety of approaches to sustainability, and some of them depend upon the industry in which the company competes. For example, companies in the energy, transportation and extractive (or mining) industries have a greater incentive to be environmentally...

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Washington Wrap: SHRM's 'Top 8' List for 2011

Between now and New Year’s Eve, just about everyone — from late-night comedy show hosts and newspaper editorial boards, to individual families — will be compiling their Top 10 lists for 2011. SHRM’s Government Affairs Team has taken a slightly different approach and compiled its Top 8 list of HR public policy accomplishments for this past year.

As Thomas Jefferson once said, “America is not governed by the majority, but by the majority of those who participate.” 2011 saw a huge uptick in the level of advocacy engagement...
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