RFL: Guest Author Margaret Hansen - Reducing Anxiety!

Another great read from guest poster, and RecruitingReview author for JobsInTheUS, Margaret Hansen! This is a reprint from the January 29 RecruitingReview:

How To Reduce Employee Anxiety In A Downward Economy

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By Margaret Hansen, JobsInME.com

Calming The Storm

With nearly 3 million jobs lost in 2008 and more to come, a new bag of management tricks is needed in today's workplace to calm the storm.

According to the American Psychological Association, today's employees face obstacles that increase stress and bog down productivity, including:

• Shifting to unfamiliar tasks within their companies
• The uncertainty of how much longer they will be employed
• New bosses
• Computer surveillance of production
• Fewer health and retirement benefits
• The feeling they have to work longer and harder just to maintain their current economic status

Tension and uncertainty are affecting workers at all levels, and most are updating their resumes.

Whether these conditions are real or perceived in your workplace, there are some ways you can change your work environment to keep stress at bay and improve productivity in a recession.

Keep lines of communication open with your staff

Know what's bugging them on the job and take steps to remove those roadblocks and other stressors.

Create written job descriptions for every employee

A specific, written job description creates clear, agreed-upon expectations and provides a sense of pride and respect in one's work. Reviews and raises should be tied to this.

Provide self-help opportunities

According to Forbes magazine, forecasts predict that the self-help industry will experience a 6.2% annual growth rate through 2012. Why? They offer hope. Securing a few dollars to provide financial counseling, career counseling, ways to budget, or weight loss strategies can offer solutions that reduce stress. If your budget is dry, try seeking out volunteers within the company who'll offer helpful sessions to your team.

Use empathetic responses when talking about problems

Just a few words of empathy can take the pressure off of someone whose spouse has been laid off, or who is going through a financial crisis.

Encourage staff to use their vacation time

According to Mel Borins, M.D. and author of Go Away Just for the Health of It, taking a vacation can improve physical ailments and, in turn, improve self-motivation, job interest and job efficiency while lowering absenteeism.

Recruit for keeps

Effective recruiting and retention means ensuring employees are the right "fit" for the job and the work environment. Job hunting can be stressful, particularly in times of high unemployment, but being ground down day after day by work is far worse, says Lyle H. Miller, Ph.D. and Alma Dell Smith, Ph.D., authors of The Stress Solution.

Make sure you don't have any square pegs in round holes on staff. Hiring superstars may seem like a good idea in a downward economy, but retaining them on the way up may prove to be more difficult than originally thought.

Deal with Trauma

Post-layoff workplaces are vulnerable to more stress. Be sure to give those remaining time to grieve and digest the news, perhaps in an off-site meeting/luncheon to come together for support and some time off.

Remember, everyone in your organization will go through the same stages of loss, but since management will undoubtedly know about disruptive events in advance, they may be beyond denial, and anger before the news hits the floor.

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Recruiting Review Newsletter

RFL: Staffing Strategies for a Recession

Another reprint from the RecruitingReview and from an earlier RFL post...

Employer Bright Spots

Staffing Strategies for a Recession

By Jason Blais, JobsInMA.com

Battling The Storm

Recruiting may seem like a low priority for businesses today facing hiring freezes, or worse. But a recession requires a different way of thinking. Employers who take advantage of this market will come out stronger and more diverse when the economy finally turns around. In an environment where companies are forced to do more with less, it is critical that employers leverage the skills and talents of their existing workforce, and make sound hiring decisions based on this new climate.

Provide Key Strategic Input

April 2008 saw total employment reach its highest level ever in many areas. In the second half of 2008, everything changed. It's no surprise that the instability of the economy will continue to have dramatic affects on the labor market for the next several months as businesses tighten their belts.

Take a slow, deep breath in, and let out a long, collective sigh of relief. That's right, relief. We can stop hiding from the issue and begin to tackle it head on, together. After all, it's not just your business experiencing hard times.

As an HR professional, you're truly on the front lines of this battle, balancing productivity, quality control and consumer confidence with slashed overheads, reduced staff and increasing costs of employee benefits.

Don't be discouraged. You can unveil the true power and business acumen hidden within Human Resource Management. Use your knowledge and experience to provide key strategic input to the rest of the management team and you'll navigate your business successfully through these dangerous waters.

Adaptive Staffing

In the months to come, employee productivity and personnel decisions will weigh heavily on bottom lines. Through better recruiting and staffing techniques, businesses can significantly reduce turnover costs, resulting in increased quality of work, productivity, and, ultimately, profitability.

Get Creative

You can survive the recession while positioning your company for tremendous success when the economy rebounds. Analyze and organize your labor force to increase quality, productivity, and flexibility. Install processes to increase your employee retention, engagement, and job satisfaction through new and innovative methods.

Do More with Less

With a potentially shrinking workforce and tightening budget, it's more important than ever to make sure you have the right people to keep your company thriving. In most cases, that will mean expanding job descriptions, increasing responsibilities, and cashing in on a greater variety of skill sets required to fulfill those needs.

It's easy to see the negative ramifications of the situation: over-burdened staff with no potential increase in compensation, resulting in a lack of employee engagement. But there is another perspective.

Give Employees What They Want

• As the many colors of a kaleidoscope mix to create beautiful combinations of light, a variety of job functions can create a fulfilling and rewarding combination of experiences to keep your employees engaged and growing.
• Don't just heap the workload left behind by reduced staff onto department survivors. Consider exploring opportunities for cross-departmental and cross-functional solutions and roles.
• Take a skills inventory of your entire labor force and uncover latent talents. Identify occasions to distribute job functions across the company, beyond the traditional departmental structure.
• There are countless reports and studies that indicate job satisfaction and employee engagement are directly affected by boredom, variety of job function, and interdepartmental involvement.
• By applying your own knowledge, talent, and experience in an innovative way, you'll develop organizational excellence despite the economy.
• Talk with peers at local HR Association chapter meetings, find social networking sites for like-minded professionals, and use the research and case studies provided by The Society of Human Resource Management (SHRM) to increase your knowledge base.
• Now is not the time to give up - now is the time to step up.

Staffing Expertise

JobsInMA.com assists local businesses in leveraging their workforce and identifying internal solutions to seize these opportunities, by offering educational webinars and seminars through JobsInMA.com University.

For several years, JobsInMA.com has presented internet recruiting and employment advertising workshops across the state. Accredited by the Human Resource Certification Institute (HRCI), these programs help businesses to better understand the recruiting market, providing timely content and pragmatic approaches to identify, attract, and retain the best employees.

In 2009, employers will have access to several new accredited programs developed and presented exclusively by JobsInMA.com University. From understanding social media's impact on the workforce, to developing strategies to optimize staffing during a recession, employers can choose from an array of educational content.

One session, Employment Branding 20/20, was recently presented. It provided HR professionals with techniques to decrease recruiting costs while increasing employee retention by creating best in class employment branding. All of the programs presented by JobsInMA.com University will give employers the specific tools and guidance they need to achieve results using their own in-house resources.

Employers can find more detailed information about these programs, and register for upcoming sessions at JobsInMA.com.

Recruitment Review Newsletter

RFL: Recruiting Metrics- Beyond Cost Per Hire

Reprinted from an article in the RecruitingReview and an earlier post in RFL... (but it's much prettier now!)

Recruiting Metrics:
Beyond Cost Per Hire

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By Jason Blais, JobsInNH.com

Cost Per Hire

It's no surprise that a recent JobsInNH.com poll showed Cost Per Hire as the most commonly analyzed recruiting metric. It's easy to count the number of applicants and hires per advertising source. It's also a relatively easy process to calculate how many advertising dollars were spent to fill a position.

But these are second-level metrics, focused on the actual process itself. And they can often be short-sighted.

Measuring Value

A better recruiting analysis question is: how valuable are the hires to the business? To answer this, you have to look at how long it takes for each hire to become productive and how long they stay with your company. Employee retention affects quality of the work being done by your company and your turnover costs.

Example

Let's assume that an entry level position at your company earns $25,000 in wages, and has an average annual turnover of 30%. While the costs related to turnover vary greatly, a conservative estimate is approximately 1.5 times the employee’s salary. Therefore, each time you have to fill that entry level job, it costs the company $37,500.

If you can reduce your turnover to 15% annually by attracting better candidates, then the potential value of your recruitment advertising is significant. In a department of 10 (of these entry level positions), you're reducing your average annual turnover costs from $112,500 to $56,250.

Improving Your Bottom Line

Defining the success of recruitment advertising is an important first step to developing more effective strategies for talent acquisition. Ensuring that you're attracting the best person for your company for all of your job openings is absolutely critical to your long term success, particularly when employers are forced to do more with less.

In 2009, I fear that more employers will be too focused on bottom line or second level metrics, such as Cost Per Hire. Through this strategy, businesses will end up sacrificing future growth opportunities as they focus on costs only. The most successful companies, however, will refuse to compromise their long term goals for short term gains, and will continue to analyze and invest in their recruitment advertising, adhering to the principles that great businesses are built by great people.

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Recruiting Review Newsletter

JobAngels on Twitter

Thanks to Mark Stelzner for passing this on and for everyone else with the RT's for this noble effort. For those who haven't joined the initiative yet, there's a new profile on Twitter, called JobAngels. By joining them, you're joining a "movement where we ask you to simply help one person find a job."

I'm all in, and started today to make a difference. Here's my story of how I'm trying to be a JobAngel:

After seeing the tweet from Mark this morning, and the following retweets, I really began to feel the value and power of this type of initiative. I decided to throw my cards on the table and see if I could help one person find a job. This may sound like a strange goal for someone who works for the largest job boards in Northern New England. Indeed, we attract hundreds of thousands of job seekers to our sites, and help thousands of people find work every month. But this movement is different. It's about people. It's about connecting with one person at a time to build a better community.

I had recently joined a few new LinkedIn Groups, and throught that, the opportunity to do something actually found me. Just after reading the twitter message, I saw an email update of discussions for the STC-NNE group. Coincidentally enough, there was a new discussion to post job openings to help group members find work. I immediately went to the job boards I work for and searched for matching posts. I identified and posted 4 links to jobs that would be relevant to members of this group. A few minutes later, I recieved an emial with a resume specific to one of the jobs.

I'd actually done business with that employer before, so was pretty familiar with them. I decided to go ahead and call the HR director. I told her about the initiative, and what I was doing, and asked how I could send along this resume to ensure someone would take a good look at it. She agreed to take a look, and gave me her direct email. I forwarded on the email to her, and replied to the contact in LinkedIn.

The total amount of time that this took me was less than 15 minutes. I have asked my contact at LI to let me know what happens next. Best case scenario: I helped one person find a job today. Worst case scenario: I let someone out there know I was trying to help.

Thanks to JobAngels for the push.

RFL: The Recruiter / HR Relationship

Let's go everyone. The current is against us, and it's time to make sure we're all paddling in the same direction. No more name calling. No more insidious comments behind each others' backs. No more jokes at the other's expense. Now more than ever, HR Professionals and Recruiters must get along for the betterment of our businesses and our economy. If, as a whole, business in the United States cannot become proficient at doing more with less, we are all in grave danger. This starts with our people.

Attracting the right people. Hiring the right people. Managing the right people the right way. This is how we become adaptive, flexible, and powerful. This is how we build sustainable businesses. Your sheet-fed, 2 color printing press is not going to adapt and become a digital laser printer. Your gravel sorter is not going to adapt and become a concrete mixer. Your blood pressure monitors aren't going to adapt and become CT scanners. However, your press operator can become a graphic designer; your gravel sorter mechanic can become a concrete mixer tech; your CNA can become a Radiology Technician. The ability for businesses to grow and survive is dependent upon their ability to evolve and adapt to the changing environment. Change is a human aptitude.

As we embark in the most difficult labor environment of this generation, we must have cohesion between Recruiters and HR Professionals. While both sides must work a little harder to come together, I believe the first big step must be taken by the Human Resources side. While I work in recruitment advertising, I somehow feel more closely aligned with HR Pro's than Recruiters, so I hope this doesn't come across as HR-bashing. HR must take responsibility for educating recruiters on our businesses and our needs. It's important to understand and remember that recruiters inherently want to deliver the best candidates to us. Often, failure on their end to do so can be traced back to vague, porous, or simply false information provided by HR. This can sometimes be attributed to our view of what we want our business to be, instead of what it truly is. We must take a hard look at the ugly truth of our business, with all our foibles and all our hidden treasures. Only when we face the hard reality of who we are, can we hope to identify and attract the best long-term candidates for our business.

Now, HR friends, please don't vilify me yet. Recruiters also have a very big part to play in this paradigm. Recruiters must be willing to put themselves in the seat of the student, asking questions, and constantly increasing their knowledge. This can be done by pushing further with your clients, and working a little harder to uncover the essence of their business and culture. Meanwhile it's also important to delve further into the core of your candidates- what makes them tick, which environment are they better suited to work in, where do they derive pleasure and satisfaction from? Delivering the right candidates for a company, as I know you all know, requires more than simply matching sets of required skills. When you dig further into an employee's long term value, you invariably run into employee retention and engagement. Two immensely important factors that are connected to SOFT skills. For those who are Dale Carnegie Training graduates, you may be familiar with the concept of the Innerview, in place of the Interview. While I don't exactly drink the Carnegie Coolaid, my experience has shown me that this practice reaps substantial rewards.

Together, HR Professionals and Recruiters can and must take steps to build stronger relationships for the betterment of our employers, our workforce, and our economy.

HR Professionals, are you willing to make a promise to yourself to engage more deeply with recruiters? If so, read this out loud:

I, (state your name here), will make a good faith effort to educate both internal corporate recruiters and third party recruiters about the reality of our business and our needs. I acknowledge and will remember that these recruiters have my best interests in mind, and that their goals are aligned with my goals. Starting today, I will see them as partners and as peers, working toward connecting the right people with the right career opportunities.

(now doesn't that feel better?)

Recruiters, that's right. It's your turn. Are you willing to make a promise to yourself to engage more deeply with the HR Professionals you work with? If so, read this out loud:

I, (state your name here), will make a good faith effort to learn more about the businesses and candidates that I work for. I acknowledge that the businesses that I work with are looking for the best people for their company and that their hiring decisions are made with great care. Starting today, I will see them as partners and as peers, working toward connecting the right people with the right career opportunities.

Now, let's do our part to get America working.

RFL: Which Recruiting Metrics Matter?

With employers across the United States tightening their belts, more and more HR and Recruiting professionals are focused on the value of their talent acquisition practices. Recently, the largest job boards in New England posted a micropoll for employers, asking them which recruiting metrics they were analyzing...

The following poll results were aggregated from JobsInMA, JobsInME, JobsInNH, JobsInRI, and JobsInVT. This poll and other information can be found in their monthly newsletters, which you can view by clicking the following links:
MA Recruiting Review | ME Recruiting Review | NH Recruiting Review | RI Recruiting Review | VT Recruiting Review

I don't think it's a surprise to anyone that Cost Per Hire is the most commonly analyzed recruiting metric. What we see from this graph, in my opinion, is that most people are looking at the metrics which are most easily measured. It's very easy to count the number of applicants and hires you get per advertising source. It's also a relatively easy process to calculate how many advertising dollars were spent to fill a position.

Unfortunately, those are second level metrics, focused on the actual process itself, which don't actually reflect the value of your recruitment advertising. First level metrics, which measure the results of the processes, provide a much more accurate analysis. As is the case in many situations, the more valuable information is generally the harder to capture. When the success or failure of recruitment advertising is boiled down to a dollar amount or a number of hires, you are left with a very short-sighted analysis.

A truer indicator of the value of recruitment advertising is how valuable the hires are to the business, given their prospective roles. To understand this value, you have to look at how long it takes for this person to become productive, and how long they stay with your company. Employee retention affects quality of the work being done by your company and your turnover costs.

For example, let's assume that an entry level position at your company earns $25,000 in wages, and has an average annual turnover of 30%. While the costs related to turnover vary greatly, a conservative estimate is approximately 1.5 times the employees salary. Therefore, each time you have to fill that entry level job, it costs the company $37,500, when all is said and done. If you can reduce your turnover to 15% annually by attracting better candidates, then the potential value of your recruitment advertising is significant. In a department of ten of these entry level positions, you're reducing your average annual turnover costs from $112,500 to $56,250.

I include this example as an illustration of the importance of recruitment advertising to your bottom line. Defining the success of recruitment advertising is an important first step to developing more effective strategies for talent acquisition. Ensuring that you're attracting the best person for your company for all your job openings is absolutely critical to your long term success, particularly when employers are forced to do more with less.

In 2009, I fear that more employers will be too focused on bottom line or second level metrics. Through this strategy, businesses will end up sacrificing future growth opportunities as they focus on costs only. The most successful companies, however, will refuse to compromise their long term goals for short term gains, and will continue to analyze and invest in their recruitment advertising, adhering to the principles that great businesses are built by great people.

RFL: Your Recruitment Advertising is Failing If...

I just can't hold it in any longer. Through dealing with hundreds of employers over the last few years, providing guidance and education on recruitment advertising and employment branding, I have become a rather tough critic of the job ads that I see. I've developed and presented programs on these topics to employers, providing very specific steps to build more effective postings and sharing data we capture from surveying job seeker. I can't tell you how many times the audience members have come up to me and told he how much they've learned and how they're looking forward to rewriting their postings, then a week or two later I see one of their ads online somewhere and it looks like this:

Mech engineer. 5 yrs exp. req'd, project management a plus. Competitive benefits and salary. Send resume to Human Resources, XYZ Company, 123 Commercial St, whoville, USA, or email to hr @ xyzcompany.com.

So, what's so wrong this ad? Here's just a cursory summary: abbreviations, "competitive benefits and salary", no contact person, a lack of key words, no discussion of perks, no content for culture or environment, no salary info, and no promotion of the company itself. I've come to understand that while creating a compelling and effective recruitment ad doesn't require any special talent or skill, it DOES take a little extra time, focus, and effort. So, in the midst of a busy day, it's natural for humans to neglect this activity.

So, after reviewing another swath of poor attempts that I have no doubt will fail to generate any quality candidates, I couldn't help but to jot down the following list. If you're not certain how successful your recruitment advertising is, here are some of indicators that your online recruitment advertising is FAILING.

1. 1/3 or more of the applicants you receive are completely unqualified for the job you're trying to fill.
2. More than half of the applicants you contact fail to return your call.
3. Your ads are being opened fewer than 200 times in a week (no matter what the job is!).
4. More than half of the people you invite for interviews are unwilling to work for the salary you're willing to offer.
5. More than 1/3 of the people you make job offers to decline them.
6. On average, your hires stay with the company less than 2 years.
7. The onboarding process is getting longer and/or more expensive.
8. No applicants come in when you aren't posting job openings.
9. Your turnover rate is not decreasing over time.

That's where I'll draw the line for now. Poor recruitment advertising affects virtually every aspect of your business. Despite the advances and maturation of technology in our business processes, the foundation of sound businesses will always be your people. More time, care, and focus needs to be placed on identifying and attracting the right people, than choosing which equipment to buy, which vendors to work with, 0r even which property to buy. If you have better people than your competition, your company will be successful.

That's how it looks today from the Recruiting Front Lines!

Think some of those indicators are wrong? Did I miss any indicators that you feel are results of bad recruitment advertising? Share your comments here!

RFL: Guest Poster Steve Balzac

I recently posted a question about the business case of cutting management training budgets during economic downturns. A number of excellent responses came back from experienced professionals across the country. Through this discussion, I decided to invite a few guest posters from the training region of the Human Capital ecosystem. Enjoy this read from Steve Balzac, "Business Sensei" and President of 7 Steps Ahead, LLC in Stow, MA, as he discusses how well trained staff can ensure that your business can take advantage of lucky situations...

Just Lucky I Guess...

A great deal has already been said about the plane landing in the Hudson River last Thursday. What's amazing to me is how many people have ascribed to luck the happy ending to what could have been a major disaster.

Was luck involved? Certainly!

It was lucky that the plane went down at a time of day when there was very little commercial shipping on the river.

It was lucky that the ferries were out at the time the plane went down.

It was lucky that the particular pilot just happened to have the necessary and appropriate training to recognize what had happened and not panic. Instead, he remained calm and relied on his training to glide a passenger jet down to the river.

As the old saying goes, luck is when 10,000 hours of preparation meets a moment of opportunity.

The lack of shipping and the presence of ferries wouldn't have helped much if the pilot had lacked the skill to bring the plane down safely. It's doubtful that he ever really believed that all that time he spent training, flying, and in a simulator would matter, other than for his own growth and development. What are the odds of a double-bird strike? What are the odds that just the right person was in the right place at the right time? Who could have known what would happen?

No one.

And this is the lesson for businesses. It's easy to see what skills and knowledge are useful today. No one knows what skills or knowledge will prove useful tomorrow. Trends can change in a metaphorical heartbeat. When businesses cut training and development, or restrict the courses an employee can take (refusing to pay for a course unless a "clear" business need exists), that business is focusing entirely on the problems of today. It is not creating a workforce that is ready for the problems of tomorrow. Ready, in other words, to face unpredictable situations, unexpected problems, and unplanned for or unlikely circumstances.

On the other hand, those who have had the opportunity train and develop their skills, who have the freedom to explore their interests and learn the things that may or may not be obviously useful, are the most likely to come up with a good solution to an unexpected problem.

In the end, luck really does favor the prepared mind.

"The Business Sensei"

URL: http://www.7stepsahead.com
Blog: http://blog.7stepsahead.com
RSS: http://www.7stepsahead.com/7saarticles.xml

RFL: 2009 Human Capital Summit, Building Awareness through Social Media

As Social Media and Social Networking resources grow and mature, they are becoming more valuable to Non-Profit organizations. These services provide them with the ability to connect with the community to promote activities, share information, and build awareness.

As a first-year volunteer on the Board of the Granite State HR Conference, I hold the Information Management chair. I have been focused on finding ways to provide the community with access to information about the 2009 Human Capital Summit, which is the name of our conference for '09. Thanks to tremendous support and encouragement from the rest of the board, we've developed the first conference blog space, and are continuing to build awareness through the internet-based networking resources.

I believe that online social media and social networking platforms can generally fit into one of three buckets: Information Sharing, Professional Networking, and Personal Networking. While the greatest volume of content on the web is currently in the Personal Networking bucket (see myspace and facebook), the other two are growing rapidly. As a professional working in an ecosystem that includes recruitment advertising, marketing, public relations, and partnership development, I have been putting in my time to really understand the potential value of all these platforms for professional gains. While I was originally hesitant about the idea of pushing networking and promotion to web-based platforms, fearful of the potential decline in interpersonal relationships that are the real key to business, I've found that the opposite is actually true. When used with careful consideration and a focused philosophy, these platforms greatly increase an organization's ability to build meaningful connections within their local communities.

Enter the 2009 Human Capital Summit. Through our blog, we can share the work being done by the board with professionals around the state and the surrounding areas. We will also be sharing guest posts by many of the 2009 presenters. This will help them build an audience in the state, help our conference generate interest and engagement, and help the human capital professionals decide on which sessions to attend and have access to more shared industry knowledge.

We'll also be promoting the event through various networking sites, such as HRM Today and TalentBar, which connect human capital professionals. Through partners with other bloggers who are working in human capital, we'll also increase our reach and awareness. Ultimately, by utilizing these resources we can disperse more information, faster, to larger audiences of interested professionals than ever before. Additionally, the community accessing this information also has the ability to provide feedback and input, sharing in the value and excitement we're generating.

We'd love to hear your feedback on how well we're doing integrating our event into the social media ecosystem! Click here to share comments on our Granite State HR Conference Blog today!

Thanks for checking out the view from the Recruiting Front Lines!

Jason

Transcript of Obama's Inaugural Address

For those that were unable to watch the entire Presidential Inauguration Ceremony today, here's a link to the full transcript of Obama's Inauguration Speech.

OBAMA INGAUGURAL ADDRESS

RFL: Strategic HR: Calgary: Marcus Buckingham!

Check out this AMAZING Strategic Human Resources Event featuring Marcus Buckingham!

I've agreed to post content to help build awareness and generate interest for an amazing HR event being held in June in Calgary, Alberta. A Fresh Approach will feature presentations by Marcus Buckingham, best selling author of First, Break All The Rules, Ann Rhoades, former VP of HR at Southwest Airlines, and Cameron Herald, former COO of 1-800-GOT-JUNK.

I am truly very excited about this event and appreciate the opportunity to help promote it. The following is an excerpt of a blog post from the Fresh Approach website. It's a very good read, please enjoy:

6 Secrets Everyone Knows but Always Forgets

Published

by

roger

on January 19, 2009

in Human Resources

. 1 Comment

The world is in a state of flux. That’s a given.

Business is driving this change. That’s news to some people, old hat to others. And while the Harvard MBAs drone on about business models and healthy bottom lines, the savvy business owner knows one thing for certain.

Business is about people.

And the most important people in any business are the ones who collect a paycheck from your HR department every month.

Your employees.

So how do you find good ones? How do you keep them? Simple questions, but if the answers were easy, every business would have energized worker bees, competent managers and brilliant leaders. Success would be all but assured.

But that doesn’t happen. Here’s six reasons why, and what to do about it.

Not-so-secret #1 – Employees are little gold nuggets

Employers love to pan for gold, to look for the next Warren Buffet for sixty grand a year, but what they consistently forget is that their pans are already loaded with nuggets. Stop looking at the rocks in the riverbed and check what you have in-house.

There was a reason why you hired your staff. Most of the time, it was a pretty good reason. They were qualified. Still are. And when they started, there was a deep desire to find real value in their job. To connect.

So what happened? Did they build a solid foundation in your company? With other staff, managers, and clients? How were they motivated to accomplish this? By command and control, or by encouragement and team-building. Big difference.

Cherish those little nuggets. They truly are gold.

Not-so-secret #2 – Knowledge breeds knowledge

Your employees are all experts at something inside your business. That has come with tenure on the job. The key is to have them share what they know. The result is a workforce with a greater understanding of the big picture. Once they see that every position is an important cog in an ever-moving wheel, trust and appreciation are not far off. And that appreciation isn’t confined to other employees – it extends to the company itself. The giant becomes a benevolent one.

The greater their respect for the place they work and the purpose it serves in society, the more they want to share what they know. And learn what the person in the next office is up to. Sometimes, chatting at work can be a really good thing.

Not-so-secret #3 – The well is bottomless

Continued here...

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RFL: Long Term Recruitment Strategy Video

I'm glad to announce that with this post, I am taking the first step in completing one New Year's Resolution: Begin posting video in this blog space. At JobsInTheUS, the company that I work for which hosts JobsInME, JobsInNH, JobsInVT, and JobsInRI- the leading job posting resource in each state, we've been working on developing a video program that will run regularly and will have two focuses- Recruitment Advertising Tips for Employers and Job Hunting Tips for Seekers. Through this process, I have been capturing Gigs of video and playing around with various video editing programs.

In the video below, I am discussing my view of long-term employment branding initiatives. I feel that most employers see recruiting and employment branding (by the way, I'm tired of people using "employer" branding as a term- if consumer branding is focused on branding to attract consumers, what does employer branding mean? Anyway, that's a rant for another day... where was I... oh yes) in the same light as copier repair and fuel expenses. Yes, all these things do affect the expense budget, they all affect the operation of the business, and they are all necessary to keep the company growing.

However, Recruiting, and specifically Employment Branding, has the potential to dramatically affect your business's ability to compete in the marketplace, develop new revenue streams, build and maintain long term customer relationships, to name just a few of the short and long term strategic benefits. Business is really all about people, regardless of what you read in the WSJ or Michael Crichton novels (a tremendous artist who made a huge impact on media of his time). Whether it's Jim Collins' identification of the "First Who, Then What" concept in Good to Great, or the Dale Carnegie principles of human relations in business, you can find numerous resources to support this idea. That is, until you are sitting down with the controller working on the recruiting budget. This area is often cut early when faced with slow economic conditions.

I'm off on a bit of a tangent, so allow me to pull back. If any business continually makes terrible hires over a long period of time, I think it's clear that the business would suffer greatly, if not close down all together. I don't believe there's any question to that assertion. Therefore, in the video below, and in the coming segments, I'll be exploring the other side of that statement- if any business continually makes terrific hires over a long period, their success (spelled p-r-o-f-i-t-s) will increase greatly.




As this is my first ever video, I would LOVE any feedback!

Thanks,

jason

RFL: 2009 Human Capital Summit Registration Open

Registration is now OPEN!

The Granite State HR Conference presents the 2009 Human Capital Summit! On May 12, join professionals working in human resources from across the state for this annual conference focused on professional development. Check out the official conference website at www.gshrconference.org.

Just like every year, this is a great opportunity to learn best practices from industry leaders... Continued at the Granite State HR BLOG!!!

RFL: The Skinny on the E-Verify Issue

Here is a lay person's take on the E-Verify issues currently at hand. As reported on January 9, the US Department of Justice has delayed the effective date for regulations requiring federal contractors and subcontractors to use E-Verify. The delay effectively pushes back the effective date from Jan 15 to Feb 2o. If it's just a 6 week delay, what's all the noise about?

In truth, the business groups that mounted legal resistance to the new regulation are seeking more than just a simple delay. They are seeking a summary judgment to rescind the rule entirely, based on their premise that it causes undue burden on employers. This group of co-plaintiffs is comprised of significant Capital Hill heavy weights: the US Chamber of Commerce, the Society for Human Resource Management, the Associated Builders and Contractors, the American Council on International Personnel, and the HR Policy Association.

• I just need to go off on a brief tangent here. During the US Presidential election campaign, the word Lobbyist took on a very negative connotation, a four letter word of US politics, if you will. At no time did either candidate, or any of the reporter covering the race, stand up and remind us that lobbyists are CRITICAL to a democratic process. Lobbying groups, such as those mentioned above, give voice and action to thousands and thousands of individuals who have neither the resources nor the access to drive change in the government. Lobbyists are groups that represent the needs and wants of differents groups of American citizens, to bring the voice of those citizens to the government that is supposed to be of the people, by the people, and for the people. We can't brush all Lobbyists or Lobbying groups with the same brush. Let's try to remember that. Okay, back to E-Verify-

So what is this regulation and why are they trying to rescind it anyway?

Essentially, the regulations place much more responsibility on some employers to verify citizenship and legal identities of the people they hire. That doesn't sound like a bad thing, right? The regulations only affect employers who hold any government contracts, and would amend the government’s acquisition processes by requiring federal contracts to stipulate that businesses must use E-Verify to determine if all new hires and existing employees performing work on federal contracts are authorized to work in the United States. Businesses contracting with the federal government would be required to enroll in E-Verify within 30 days of the contract award date.

Let me just say, in my opinion E-Verify is a generally good thing. It replaced outdated paperwork systems, and has been developed to a point now where about 94% of all verifications completed INSTANTLY, and, based on recent labor statistics 1 in 8 new hires in the US are now checked through the system. This process was developed, however, to be voluntary for organizations, and was designed to ASSIST in HELPING companies avoid hiring illegal workers using false identifications. Our ability to protect US jobs and US companies from illegal workers is important because it leads to our nation's tax base. This isn't an opinion on immigration laws or work visas, merely a statement that we must make sure that we know who is working in the US, and are taking our income tax fairly from all.

The problem arose when the Bush administration, by executive order, bypassed existing immigration law provisions, and mandated this E-Verify process for all federal contractors. Further, it states that the verification process is not only for new hires, but that any current employees that will work on the federally contracted projects would also need to be re-verified through the system. Additionally, while 94% instant verification is very good, the amount of work and time created by the other 6% is creating an undue burden on the employers. Look at it this way, IF this goes into effect, every company that is covered under this regulation would essentially need to hire AT LEAST one extra body to simply handle the extra work created. Think about that. The government is mandating that all these businesses ad $50k to their overhead. (yes, the salary for these folks won't be $50k, but when you account for benefits, insurance, and cost of regular turnover, the cost for a $30 salary can be over $50 annually.)

So, here we are. Employers don't want to take on this additional expense, and feel that the US government has unfairly pushed off the enforcement and oversight of immigration labor laws to the private sector. The US Government is trying to cut back on the volume of illegal workers in the US unidentified. Everybody wants what's best for the country. The question on the table is how to do it fairly without hurting the now fragile economy. Good luck to those making these types of decisions.

E-Verify Federal Contractor Rule postponed until February 20, 2009

E-Verify Federal Contractor Rule postponed until February 20, 2009

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RFL: Tired of Informercials @ Trade Association Meetings!

I attended an HR association meeting today at a chapter that I think is well run and well attended. In the 4 months that I've attended, around 40 Human Resources Professional attend, and the structure and organization seem to be top flight. But after sitting through 2 sales pitches for the last two meetings I attended, decided it's time to complain about it formally! As I began to think about this post, it occurred to me that maybe, just maybe, the world of social networking and social media is impacting the way we act in real life.

In the two meetings I attended, the monthly topics were to be diversity training and managing workplace conflict. Both good topics for a professional association meeting. However, in each presentation, the speakers spent nearly 10 percent of their time discussing their extensive background- who they've worked with, what services they provide, how they serve their clients needs, etc. After the 10 minute "personal branding" segment, we were lead into an infomercial that tied the core training ideas to the solutions that these presenters sell. It makes me feel bad for the monthly meeting "sponsors" who have to pay a couple hundred bucks for the opportunity to promote their goods and services, but only get 5 minutes.

As a professional who has spoken at many hr and trade association events, I know how alluring the sales potential of this activity is. I realize that the opportunity to speak to 40-100 potential customers for 90 minutes is rare, at best. And, as with any consultants, there's the business 101 voice in the back of your head telling you that you have to promote yourself to keep you business running. Really, though, don't you understand the professional courtesy here and the role you have been brought in to play? If you had asked to present to the group and told the programming committee that you had a great 90 minute sales pitch for employer services, do you think you'd get the gig? And once you're in, do you think the audience somehow doesn't realize that they're being sold to?

I am always turned off by this brazen salesmanship. I physically become uncomfortable and agitated. When I speak to the HR groups, I always feel that the best way that I can build long term career success is by building trust and confidence. I believe that's done through providing educational and informational content that people can use, when you're brought in to educate and inform. That you don't only provide solutions that meet your own needs, but provide your audience with a range of options and ideas and opportunities. Okay... it's true. I'm a New Englander, and I'm an old-school sort of a guy. I do have faith in the Universe, and do believe that if I maintain my personal integrity and professional courtesy, success will find me.

My company, JobsInTheUS, which hosts JobsInME, JobsInNH, JobsInVT, JobsInMA, and JobsInRI, will be providing numerous educational webinars and seminars in 2009, and while I am often defending myself against the sales and marketing folks, I will continue to make sure each event is educational in nature, and certified by the HRCI. Our goal is simple, do our best to make sure that every webinar and seminar attendee leaves our events feeling not only that they've learned something, but that they now have more tools to implement that knowledge.

That's how it looks on the Recruiting Front Lines from the HR Association of Central MA from one stodgy curmudgeon!

RFL: Life Imitating Social Media, or the Other Way Around?

Life Imitating Social Media or Social Media Imitating Life?

OR: Social Networking and Real Life: Which is the Dog and Which is the Tail?

It has occurred to me recently that life may indeed actually be imitating social media and social networking in many ways. It may sound ridiculous, but have we actually created and fed a resource that is controlling the our behavior and personal development- making us dumber in the process? Here's some examples:

• In general, more people have less regard for spelling, grammar, or professional communication than a decade ago.
• Consumer Branding strategies are now being implemented by individuals in what's called "personal branding".
• People are generating greater numbers of shallow relationships and fewer deep and meaningful relationships.
• What is written on MySpace Facebook LinkedIn etc, is being quoted in reputable news channels.

And that's just the tip of the iceberg. I have noticed a growing commercial footprint within the social media. People are becoming willing to exaggerate themselves and the products, services, or companies they are connected to. There are more "FRIENDS" trying to sell each other services than in real life. It reminds me of the movie GROUNDHOG DAY with Bill Murray. OR, more specifically, the insurance sales person on the street trying to sell Bill Murray insurance. Yes, they once knew each other vaguely, and now the insurance rep feels like it's perfectly okay to leverage that relationship to his benefit. In fact, this is a caricature of insurance sales people that has been lampooned for decades. This dynamic has become the norm in the social media outlets, and appears to be spilling back out into the real world.

See my next post on informercials for a good description of what I mean.

I'm interested on what others think about this premise- does the online social world reflect the behaviors of the real world? Or has the real world changed it's behavior based on the success of online worlds?