SHRM Blog

Poorly run, ineffective meetings frustrate everyone except the people running them.

Recently, I interviewed Robert Herbold, former chief operating officer of Microsoft and author of “What’s Holding You Back.” Bob’s quiet, gentlemanly tone shifted toward disdain when I brought up wasting time in poorly run meetings.

I loved hearing him explain, “Many meetings are useless religious ceremonies controlled by highly organized, meaningless ritual after meaningless ritual.”

Effective structure:

I asked Bob how he ran meetings and he mentioned Bill Gates’ method at Microsoft.

1. Have short agendas. Leave plenty of room for discussion. In general,
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If you’re doing the obvious stuff when it comes to social media recruiting or engagement (Facebook fan pages, branded Twitter account, blog, etc.), you’re fighting an uphill battle. 

It’s a crowded space out there: after all, if there’s a fundamental reason for social media’s appeal as a business and marketing tool, it’s the truism that everyone’s on it. 

And with upwards of a billion users speaking dozens of languages updating millions of closed, interdependent communities (which is, pretty much, the definition of that ‘network’ part...

The Society for Human Resource Management (SHRM) is proud to congratulate the 50 winners of this year’s AARP Best Employers for Workers over 50 Award and the great HR teams behind them.

We at SHRM, the world’s largest association devoted to human resource management, applaud the winning organizations as models for all U.S. businesses, many of which face the challenge of competing in an increasingly global marketplace. The organizations being honored by AARP appreciate that engaging and retaining older workers is crucial to succeed over the next decade.

More broadly, inclusive people management strategies will...

Let’s imagine for a minute: You’re the new CEO of an established company. Its performance has been average, customer loyalty is falling and your best employees are leaving every week. The previous CEO subscribed to a command and control management style allowing for little flexibility and no room for mistakes. The employees lived under an ever-present fear of doing something wrong.

As the new CEO, how do you transform the culture of this organization? How do you turn a fearful environment into a company considered a great place to work? Here’s six steps that will prove imperative in...