Though many of us are energy conscious when home, we are less likely to take measures to cut down on wasteful practices as the office unless we are small business owners.
One way to "go green" at the office is to incorporate the services of a company offering applicant management, personnel management, on-boarding, talent management and HR services on-line. This also cuts cost when an employee is able to multi-task and engage in employee assessments on-line which reduces paper, time and lessens the human footprint we are leaving behind.
Read more ideas of Operating in the Green
here.
Before interviewing, you researched the company, donned your best clothes and practical shoes the day of the appointment, planned your route to be early, tucked your updated resume in your portfolio and left for your interview with Human Resources.
In the next hour, you do everything in your power to acquaint them with your skills, explain why you fit the job and why they should hire YOU!
But then, the regret letter arrives saying although they were impressed with your credentials, they have decided to go with another candidate.
You think, what could have I done better in the interview and why wasn't I hired?!!
Well if the company did its job right, it used applicant tracking software system to better refine candidiates and subjected you to taking some employee assessments so they knew more about you before the interview. So if they didn't pick you, maybe they did you a favor? If there was no job fit, how long would you have lasted. Companies need to spend more time focusing on talent acquisition.
On your next job interview if a company using applicant management and pre-employment testing make sure you ask them how they define job fit. It will give you better insight into whether this is a good decision for both of you.
Whoo, man. The flood is coming.
First, let me stress that the more than 90 out of 100 people who want to work in this country are working. Second, most organizations are surviving, and will make it into 2010 with their businesses intact.
That said, the flood is coming. I just read the Bureau of Labor Statistics report on the subject, and it isn't pretty. You can read it
here.
"Among the unemployed, the number of job losers and persons who completed tem-
porary jobs increased by 547,000 to 8.2 million in March. This group has nearly
doubled in size over the past 12 months." Yikes.
So...what? It means that the businesses that are hiring are going to get flooded with applicants, and at a time when HR departments are slammed with too much compliance, employee relations and harassment stuff. It means the hiring processes will be quickly overwhelmed, and two things will probably happen.
1 - The best candidates will be drowned in the clutter of all of the volume. Lots of lost opportunities from hiring the first one that fits, rather than the best.
2 - The ability for people who are not a fit to sneak through and get hired is up - because the time to do a good screening job just isn't there. If HR is overwhelmed and understaffed, then bad decisions can sneak through.
What to do? Leverage your technology and raise the standards. Implement a well-thought out talent acquisition strategy, use pre-employment assessments, and focus on metrics that indicate job fit. Then you will have a process that supports good HR and can drive employee engagement.
Then you have a swimming chance against the coming flood...
I presented this morning on Employee Engagement to a great group of HR professionals. The coffee was fresh, the coffee cake was tasty, and the issues were predictable.
"What metrics really work in today's business environment?"
We worked through what metrics they were using, and got into what metrics they SHOULD be using, and ended on how to measure and project the impact of good employee engagement. We talked about Lean HR, about applicant tracking, and HR services that are aligned with the organization's vision. All good.
As I drove away, I reflected on the wish of everyone in the room for a "silver bullet" that would fix tough employee relations issues and solve the talent management problems of the future.
There is a great first step. Train all of your managers in the skill of active listening. If the managers start to listen better to their staff (or at least appear to) and if they can know more about their staff through the use of valid assessment tools, then the staff will feel well-managed and deliver the goods. Whatever the goods are.
So, there you have it. As an extrovert who does not like to listen, this is tough advice. Just listen to it...the answer is out there.
Just saw some scary data from a global Engagement consultant. There were several data points that predict either pain or opportunity, depending on your actions during the slowdown.
Scary things -
The percentage of highly disengaged employees has increased by more than 25% since 2007. These are "hostile passengers" that are actively hurting you in productivity levels and quality, all of which translate to numbers that matter.
The decline in overall productivity is huge - 3 to 5 percent.
There is a second "time bomb" with this. The disengaged are itching to leave - and will leave when the economy starts picking up...which is exactly when you will want them as high performing employees.
The moral is simple. Get your talent acquisition in place before the green flag is waved. Use employee assessments to better manage the staff, and use fair and consistent methods, as a part of a Lean HR system, to keep the good ones engaged.
Then, engagement will work for you...and be a competitive advantage.
I was reading a resume for a client last week, and hit a phrase I had not seen before - "top to top selling". Since I work in sales, I "got it", but others might not. I realize that there have been several new words cropping up that were not there before...
Joining the Twitterverse
A "torch and pitchfork" group
Nanoblogging
WILB - Workforce Internet Leisure Blogging
...and so on.
Those of us that need to keep up (and we all do...) need a simple resource to look these words up. That way, our performance management systems and Applicant Tracking Software can be capturing meaningful words, and we can guide better talent management decisions. If we keep up with the words that are used, we can keep up with the people.
Here is a secret weapon -
WordSpy.com. I love it - you can quickly find out what it REALLY means. The last one I came across on a tech resume was Ubicomp. Huh?
I looked it up. It is short for ubiquitous computing. And, now I'm current. Word.
Working on a Applicant Tracking site this morning for a client, I realized how much I dislike job descriptions. If the goal of a hiring system is to source and select high performers, job descriptions can work against you.
Top people don't need or want a job description to begin exploring an opportunity with an organization. With good candidates going online, the objective of a job description should not be to pre-qualify the person, but rather to generate interest in the position and company.
A job description seldom does this. It's the "buzz" that does - the marketing, the branding, the word on the street. An opening page summarizing a group of jobs with some facts about the company values and attitudes is a good start. These pages should describe the company culture, the importance of high performing talent in the company, something about career opportunities and a few reasons why these open jobs are important to the company's future. By the way, these statements need to be true.
Once you interest a candidate in a class of jobs and the company, then you can begin a the dance of selecting and screening. This is where good career personality tests and job performance metrics can come in - and pay off.
On job descriptions - less in the way of task and responsibility lists can produce better hires. That is, after all, our goal, right?
People who are thinking of installing an Applicant Tracking System (ATS)need to step back and think for a second.
An ATS is a system that is built to manage resume flow and gives the recruiters the ability to sort, sift and prioritise candidates on the basis of keyword searches. Great technology, perhaps… but built to speed up a flawed process. The same hiring answer is arrived at, just faster.
What people should want is an Applicant Relationship Management system. An ATS, if you will, that has ties to social networks and a database of interested people. It would give the candidates a chance to interact in an uncommitted way with the company – register to get cool stuff and targeted communication – then give them a chance to get interviewed online when they are ready to do so. Meanwhile, the company learns a huge amount about their various demographic target groups and gets a chance to grow relationships over time. Then, good human capital management can start happening, with job fit and Lean HR principles in place.
That is when the front part of hiring gets really interesting, and high quality candidates start emerging from the sourcing process. None of this has ties to the expensive world of the online job boards...which is why it is even more interesting.
Does anyone know of someone already doing this? Let me know...
"The future is already here. It's just applied unevenly"
Want a competitive advantage in HR? Categorize your current recruiting efforts into one of these three groups to see your strategic progress versus your competition:
1. Doing what everyone else is doing. Safe, incremental changes. These types of changes are not significant enough to allow an organization to keep up with the rapid changes taking place in the global employment marketplace. If you’re doing what everyone else is doing, you’re falling behind.
2. Big steps. Significant changes that take months to implement, such as a major ATS upgrade, rebuilding your career website, adding assessments or systemic training for managers. These are essential if you want to maintain your current position in the marketplace.
3. Bigger steps. These are changes and opportunities designed to increase an organization’s market share of top talent. This requires a rethinking of everything currently being done, including an employer re-branding effort and a reorganization of recruiting.
My advice? While you need to be implementing lots of level 1 changes, you’re not going to see significant improvements unless you move to level 2 and 3, the major steps. This is where you get real traction. Staying busy in level 1 might seem satisfying, but it won’t get you the competitive edge needed for 2010 and beyond.
Kick it up a notch and get ready for the future. What are you doing to get ready?
People are under pressure, and wanting simple answers to complex questions. A silver bullet, if you will. In the past week, I have received several phone calls from prospects that have bothered me.
I have set up employee assessment systems in a lot of different situations. I know the amount of work needed to build a talent acquisition system that produces good job fit. I have set up the feedback loops that are needed for a good Lean HR system. All of this makes sense.
The problem often comes from the corner office. It happens when the CEO or somebody on the senior team goes to a board retreat and falls in love with some particular assessment tool. As this is often the first assessment tool that they have personal skills with, it becomes the window that they start looking through for all HR matters.
As my grandfather said, "When the only tool you have is a hammer, every problem looks like a nail." When the CEO hears of other assessments that are different than the one they know, they push back. The project stops.
There are more than 3000 assessment tools out there, all measuring different things. Many are only suited for one or two specific tasks. Many are not suited for organizational use at all, but are for clinical settings. My task is to work backwards from the need, and recommend the tool for the job. Not just the hammer.
So, if you are considering an assessment tool and someone in the "C-Suite" recommends an assessment that they know and love, go ahead and examine it, but be very careful about the validity and reliability of how it measures what you are looking for.
If you need help in selecting or with strategies on how to push back without getting fired, give me a call or ping me with an e-mail. Part of my passion is finding the right tool for the right job fit. Not just the hammer or the silver bullet....
There we are planning to move our company with three days notice which I discussed in my last blog.
I'm asking myself, where can I find a mover with 6 hours notice?!! Well one of our employees came to the rescue with a referral to a mover who he knew delivered great customer service. One phone call and the move was on the schedule!
Lets face it, we all have moved at some point. Don't you wonder what kind of moving crew is going to show up, especially with such short notice? Well, the reputation of this mover came through. The team that came was great. What made them great you may ask? They delivered shining service beyond our expectations.
They were professional, accomodating, and kept their cool when the job grew to be twice what was antipicated. They evaluated the situation, called in back-up and finished the job with a smile.
There is no question that when the owner hires employees he ensures they have good Job Fit. However he does employee assessments at hiring, it is working. These employees had been with him for a while. It is clear the owner understands talent acquisition and talent management; remember this is a moving company.
Whatever they do, it was great service. And you know, if anyone asks us about a mover to use, their name will be passed on. If you want their name, feel free to ask!
Talent acquisition is changing. A recent survey reveals that 43% of the companies polled are pulling their spending from Internet job boards and re-directing those resources to better showcase their brand to potential employment candidates. The shift away from job boards is a response to current market conditions, which have made more high-value candidates available to companies looking to capitalize on the market's turnaround with strategic hires.
There is hope. While the current business environment remains grim, optimism still dictates many of the respondents' near term hiring plans, with more than 30% planning to increase hiring during the second and third quarter of 2009: adding the fourth quarter raises that number to 41%.
Referrals are still the most popular avenue for sourcing jobs, but the companies polled indicate their Web site or career page as being the next most valuable vehicle for finding candidates. Job boards, while useful for generating a higher volume of resumes, are being criticized for not delivering qualified candidates, which are seen as the key for surviving the tough current economic climate and building future organizational strength.
There is another factor. In the effort to build a Lean HR hiring process, I have been simplifying the hiring process and getting better results. This is partially driven by creating new channels for sourcing by using RSS feeds and opt-in email channels, and ties to social networking. These new channels - especially the RSS one - has big implications for the future.
If you can post for free on a RSS-enabled job board and get good results, why spend big dollars on a formal site that is focused on value?
Question - who has abandoned the big job boards, and why?
For extra credit, how have you tied your applicant tracking system to the new sources?
Social networking is requiring me to say "no" more than I prefer. At the start, I was happy to add anyone who would have me. Kind of like dating in Junior High. With the current business climate, I have been getting requests from a large number of strangers.
I'm saying "no" to the guy from Utah who is looking for a "new calling" and wants to be a part of my network. No to a guy with a vaguely familiar name who, from what I can tell, is doing nothing but sending invitation requests to the world. No to the intern with the perky picture who wants a few minutes of my time to demonstrate a knife set that she is going to be selling as a summer job. Nothing about what I am interested in, like Lean HR, employee engagement or talent acquisition.
I am a nice guy. Let me make it clear - I am accepting initiations from interesting people in my world, people that I can help in a reasonable way or people that are a part of my life.
I am not a cranky isolationist, by nature. In the work I do with hiring processes, applicant tracking and assessment work, I help organizations screen out applicants that are not a fit for their culture, and screen in those who will probably be high performers. My clients say that they are having the same problem with their hiring - an overwhelming volume of applicants that do not care about the job description, only that they get in.
So, what have I learned? Apply your rules of friendship to your in-box - accept those that will benefit from friendship, and will be of benefit to you. For the others, don't dilute your time and just say "no"
There he was. A nicely dressed man in a necktie on the main corner in town. I couldn't tell the color of his suit because he was wearing a sandwich board that was almost as tall as he was, saying "Hire ME!" He had his profession and his phone number on the sign, and he was waving at me with a hopeful sign as I drove by.
Wow. I realized that these are strange times. Even stranger, less than a day later, I got a call from a local journalist, doing a story about hiring in general, and about the guy in the sandwich board in particular. "Had I seen him? " Yes. "What did I think?" Hmm.
I said that I had two opinions. First, he would probably be successful for a variety of reasons - that nobody else was doing it so he would stand out, that he was showing determination and a willingness to try new ideas, even if the concept of holding a sign in public is certainly 100 years older than the Internet.
Then, I said he was a shining example of how flawed and overloaded the current job search process is. Organizations are overwhelmed by the sheer volume of applicants, and job seekers are willing to do WHATEVER it takes to get past the screening and get a job. Any job. He was certainly giving up on the Internet.
Savvy organizations are using this time to redo their core processes, putting in assessments and applicant tracking, using human resources software and talent management concepts to predict good job fit.
If not, when the economy turns (and it will) the organizations that did not focus on job fit will have their high performers leave and their mediocre people stay. What you want is to have the high performers stay. That requires good talent management.
I hope your filters and systems are in place, and that you will be rewarded by a sustainable culture of high performance. And, if the guy in the sandwich board is reading this, call me. I would be happy to help with your search.
Change is the mother of invention. In my work on changing how HR Services are delivered and how assessments are used, I have found some secret methods for making change happen.
There are a lot of self-help books out there with all sorts of advice, and more motivational speakers with messages of treating each other nice and getting things done. I have a better idea.
Move your office. All of it. Get some boxes, and take all of the stuff that is in your desk and on your desk and so on and get busy. Mark the "keep" and "pitch" boxes and start sorting. If you don't have a different space to move to, just haul everything out into the hall and only move back in that which is useful.
Do the same with your processes. Find ways to simplify, find ways to use technology better, and even find ways to stop doing things altogether if they are not aligned with your strategic goals. This, in a real sense, is how you apply Lean Theory to HR, and make Lean HR. Eliminate Waste, and rethink the processes at the core of your work.
By taking all of the flotsam and jetsam of your office and sifting through it, boxes and boxes of waste will be generated. This is good - you will be amazed at how liberating it feels to have a new, clean focus. Now, do the same with your Human Capital Management processes. All of the talent management ideas, all of the job fit efforts, everything.
If you need some help after you get everything out in the hall - give me a call. I'm happy to be that ruthless, objective friend that can help clean out the closets...and, also, I have just moved my office, so I'm an expert.
My question is this: if you could change one part of the hiring process, what would it be?
Okay, bear with me as this story takes some imagination and introspection.
Over the course of the last days watching the snow come down, working from my home office because it was too difficult to drive to the office, I was struck with the thought of how satisfied one can be when their job fits what is important to them.
What really is job fit? Some of us are fortunate enough to have experienced it. Some say it is when your job truly aligns with your core values. While that is true it may be hard for us to grasp that concept. More specifically I think it is when the requirements of the job and the core values of the company align with your skills and values. This seems to make sense and most of us agree with this statement.
However, during the interviewing and hiring process it seems to be that neither the company or the candidate spend enough energy on making sure it is there. For the most part companies get very tied up in skills and work experience and than wonder why the employee fails. At the same time the candidate is trying to land the job and does not do their homework either.
When job fit exists, employers end up with engaged employees who are loyal, like what they do and enjoy their chosen occupation; it not just a job. Everyone can tell the difference especially the customers.
In my next blog I will discuss how this can be accomplished by using applicant tracking software and employee assessments to gain more knowledge much sooner in the process.
I knew she was going to make the top 5. I just knew it. The selection of a Hoosier as Miss America came a surprise to many, but I was an early predictor. With all of the work I do in assessments and applicant tracking, I have a more than passing acquaintance with how to pick a winner.
The importance is gaining family bragging rights. I have a daughter and sister-in-law that are big into watching the pageants and guessing the outcomes, and I have gained quite a bit of street credibility in the family by doing very well at their game. The rules are simple - at the start of the telecast, all contestants make a brief statement and wave. At the end of this, each family member text messages the others their top choices, and these are compared to the top 5 and, of course, the winner. No formal scoring is done, but bragging rights are big around here.
So I take this seriously, and use my Human Resources and Selection skills for an important purpose. Since I can't use recruiting software and get each applicant to fill out assessments, I work with what I have. I pay attention to the last few winners, and project from that what the "job fit" issues are. What is important? Athleticism? Volunteerism? Diversity? I listen to the interviews and promotions leading up to the event, and try to figure out the "job fit" model that the judges will be working toward.
The big clue was a news story on how the contestants were a more toned and athletic group than previous years. I saw this as a message that the swimsuit portion of the contest would have more importance than the evening gown or the talent portions. I then noted in a press release that the winner of the preliminary swimsuit competition, announced a week early, was Miss Indiana. Hmmm.
So we popped a bowl of popcorn, and I entered my choices early - Indiana, Hawaii and Tennessee. While I was lukewarm about her chances after the evening gown moment (Looked like a tablecloth to me) and the talent portion (OK but classical music is often lost on younger judges) I was proud of the selection. Happy that Indiana finally got out of the "never won" column, and even happier that my ability to predict job fit has a payoff in bragging rights within my family.
The pageant has updated the selection process to include 10 choices from viewers, with an on line survey. I propose that next year they have all contestants fill out a thorough application form using applicant tracking software, and have the results on-line for all to see. Then I can really make some predictions based on solid data. In HR, that's what we need these days...
In two days, we swear in a new president. The top job of our complex economy. The selection process, while flawed, has taken two hundred years (and more) of democratic rule and has emerged relatively unchanged. While we are lucky to have a culture that allows a governmental change that is smooth, we could be doing a better job. May I make a few suggestions?
Why not use pre-employment testing on the candidates? Give each one a simulation of a day in the oval office, and treat it like a reality show. The apprentice, without The Donald. Use some career personality tests and share the results with the voting public. THAT would be a good use of technology.
In short, if talent management and job fit and assessment are good enough to run organizations, why not use it for our government?
I wish you could have been with me at the store last night. I was picking up some essentials for dinner and making a dash in a hurry. With the grey skies and grey parking lots and foggy complexions of my fellow shoppers, I was a grouchy as I shopped. That ended when I hit checkout.
"How are you?" A simple question - but with the power and inflection behind it, I stopped and told the clerk the truth.
I'm cranky.
She made strong eye contact and said "You are choosing your mood. Everyone here is choosing to be cheerful, and you should join us."
Really. I looked around and she was right - there was perkiness and a happy vibe everywhere. It was in the air. I was irritated because I don't get grouchy often and I kind of enjoy it when I do. My irritation at the world was falling away. Grr. Hm. Hah.
Then I went into HR mode, trying to figure out how they did it. Did they use career personality tests? Did they interview for job fit? Did they train their managers in Employee Engagement techniques?
I sought out the manager and asked how he staffed. "I make sure my best people bring their friends in for an interview. That, and we subscribe to fish philosophy, where we encourage fun and "being in the moment". If we do that, the success of the store will follow."
Well said. If the store's customer service levels are important, then a happy shopping experience will surely follow...
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