CareerCurve™

In a previous post I listed a few of the challenges for both hiring managers and ex-military when it comes to transitioning to civilian work life.  I also very lightly touched on whether or not there is any responsibility on corporations to make extra efforts to bridge the language barrier that exists between the two so that it is easier for veterans to get hired.  Rather than get bogged down in a debate about corporate responsibility, I thought I’d just list some of the personality traits of those formerly in the military. Then you can decide for yourselves whether or not it’s worth it to make some extra effort at learning how to communicate with and understand what these candidates have to offer.

Understands Leadership.  Those in the military have witnessed the dynamics of leadership and understand how to manage people in order to achieve results, even in the worst of circumstances.  A lot of their training was lead by example which means that whether  they did the leading themselves or followed their leaders, there is a healthy respect and understanding for leadership in general.

Team Players.  Although there is a huge difference in the command and control culture of the military versus the collaborative culture of corporate America, military personnel are still ingrained with a huge sense of responsibility toward their colleagues.  This means these candidates can be natural team players.

Quick Learners.  Those in the military are often forced to learn things very quickly and under high pressure.  This can result in the development of an accelerated learning curve.  A faster learning curve means less time training.

Efficiency.  Similar to the way these candidates have learned, they have also had to perform effectively under high pressure.  This translates into efficiency.  Military personnel have had no choice but to get the job done not only correctly, but also quickly.

Tolerance.  Those in the service have a familiarity with diversity.  They’ve had no choice but to work with and for whoever happens to be serving next to them.  This experience makes these candidates sensitive to cooperating with different individuals.

Tenacity.  Veterans have the experience of performing their duties in less-than-perfect circumstances.  This means they have most likely overcome and experienced success even under the worst of conditions.  Having experienced triumph over adversity can make them great employees when things are difficult because they are less likely to give up or give in.

Appreciate Receiving Feedback.  Former military personnel are used to receiving direct feedback.  They have learned to absorb what they are told regarding their performance without taking it personally.  Because of this, they not only handle the feedback well, but appreciate being told how their performance aligns with expectations.

Give Honest Feedback.  Because of the experience explained above, you may also be more likely to receive honest feedback from veterans.  The culture in which they’ve been taught means they won’t have qualms about telling it like it is.

Yes, it can be challenging to interview former military and understand both what they’ve done before and why it is relevant to the current role.  Often, the difficulty in understanding is only matched by their ability to explain it in non-military terms.  But before you even get into detail on background, consider what personality traits you will see from a former service person that match what you look for in a future employee.

When you sit down and think about the characteristics you’re searching for when looking to hire top talent, how many of these fit the bill?  Are these traits valuable enough to make it worthwhile to do a little extra work when it comes to interviewing ex-military personnel?  Are there other positive attributes you’ve seen when hiring Veterans?

Who would have thought that commuting costs would figure into a person’s decision to stay or leave a company?  Unfortunately, this is a fact now.  In my area of the country, I’ve seen gas prices of $4.35/gallon.  Most of the country has hit $4.00 and prices are expected to go up higher still.    Workplace studies show that the average commute for an employee is about 30 miles. Depending on the car the employee owns, this will really add up for some of your employees.  It reminds me of the question stay at home moms consider when deciding whether or not to reenter the workforce – does the cost of child care outweigh the salary and benefits?  Is it worth it?  HR departments need to explore ways to assist employees with these costs in an effort to retain and attract top talent. 

If you have employees who travel a significant distance to come to work, you can bet they will be considering a position closer to home.  They almost have to.  However, there are things your company can do to try to help your employees.

Change the schedule.– One example of this would be to lengthen each day and take Fridays or Mondays off the schedule.  Many employees would jump at the chance to work four, 10 hour days and have a three day weekend.  This also removes a roundtrip, saving a whole day’s worth of gas. 

Coordinate car-pooling. – You can do this yourself internally with carpool boards or on your intranet, or you can recommend employees go to a site that will do it for them, such as erideshare.com.  Encouraging your employees to get involved shows you are aware that gas prices are affecting them.  If differing schedules are an issue, be open to considering assisting multiple employees to get on the same schedule in order to make it work.

Offer on-site lunches.– Explore ways to feed your staff and keep them at work during lunch.  You may be able to negotiate special pricing with restaurants and catering businesses to make it more cost effective for employees to remain on-site.  This is also a great engagement tool, especially if once a month or so the company springs for the lunch.  Your employees get to socialize with other people in the company.  As with many of the other suggestions, this doesn’t have to be an every day event.  Offering the ability o order and buy lunch once or twice a week still helps.

Consider telecommuting where possible.- How many of your employees could work from home?  If you don’t want to make it permanent, be non-committal about the timeframe and relay to them that this is a program you will try temporarily, in order to help them get through this.  It doesn’t have to be all or nothing either.  Maybe some employees could work from home 1 or 2 days a week and be in the office the others.

Look into subsidizing public transportation.-  Are you familiar with public transportation in your city?  Can you offer incentives for employees to use it?  Or can you offer to pay for it?  This may prove to be a minimal cost compared to the cost of turnover and hiring and on-boarding.  Many times there are incentives offered by the public transportation authorities themselves such as group discounts or pre-tax savings for those who purchase passes through your company.  If your company is large, your organization may actually be able to negotiate an incentive program with the public transportation authority.

Work these solutions into your “green” program, too. – Many employees, particularly Gen Y, are interested in working for companies who care for the environment.  Going green is where it’s at, so you can use some of these solutions to demonstrate how you not only want to help your employees, but do your part to improve the environment as well.  You could roll the programs out as something you want to try to help with gas prices and want to keep in an effort to cut down on pollution. 

My best recommendation on all of these suggestions would be to take a vote.  If you’re not sure which program might be effective, ASK.  This situation provides your company with the ability to be transparent, which builds trust.  You can let them know you’re not sure what will work but you’d like their input and will explain any reservations.   The simple act of asking your employees what would help them demonstrates that you are aware of the impact that gas prices may be having on them and shows them that you want to do what you can to ease the burden.  Proving to them that you care will do wonders for your employer brand, engaging your employees, increasing retention, and attracting top talent.  Happy employees are productive employees, so putting in the effort means a win for everyone.  

Is your company currently offering any programs to help your employees deal with rising gas prices?  Do you plan to?  Please share any other examples in the comments.

Attracting and retaining top talent has been a key conversation in HR for a while now and it is not going away.  Our economy is improving and unemployment is dropping, but the rate at which this recovery is happening depends a lot on who you ask.  One thing that can’t be denied though is that it is happening slowly. 

Businesses are finding themselves in a situation where they want to staff up so they can support recovery but they don’t want to be overstaffed if the recovery slows down even more.  Ultimately, this means that talent optimization is not only a cost effective solution to this conundrum but it is also the safest solution.  And caution seems to be the word of the times.

Talent optimization is a concept that in its broadest definition means making the most of the talent you have.  But what does that mean in a practical sense?   And how do you not only achieve it, but know you’ve achieved it when you do?

Effective talent optimization requires a well thought out and deliverable strategy.  This concept cannot be some pie in the sky theory that is discussed ad nauseum with no executable game plan.  Talent optimization can easily fall into the category of when is a strategy not a strategy?  (Great article, by the way!)

Here are some key components to creating a Talent Optimization Strategy:

Strategic Alignment – Leadership, culture and business goals must be in alignment.  Without this, there is no hope that any strategy will succeed, especially one involving human capital.

Talent Assessment – There must be metrics in place to accurately assess performance in your people.  And high-level measurements and data analytic tools with which to do that.  You can’t optimize talent if you don’t know what that talent is.

Programs – Learning, development, and succession planning programs that take the defined talent and move it to the next level.

More Metrics – As important as it is to measure talent, you also have to be able to asses the results of any programs you do implement.  How else can you tell if your talent optimization strategy is having any effect?

These are obviously high level suggestions for what needs to be a very detailed and cohesive strategy.  But you do need a strategy.  Companies that are aware of the importance of this are creating organizational development roles internally and/or working with firms such as ours, or other consultants to achieve these goals. 

What are you doing to optimize your talent?  Do you have a set strategy?  Do you see the need for one?

Given the economic conditions, it is highly likely that you have employees currently experiencing the stress of an unemployed spouse.  Unemployment ranks near the top of the list when it comes to most stress-inducing life experiences, along with divorce and death.  If an employee is living with someone who is going through this doesn’t it stand to reason that this is affecting your employee as well? And does this stress decrease your employee’s productivity?  According to a recent study, yes it does.

Associate Professor Maw-Der Foo and lead author Professor Zhaoli Song of the National University of Singapore co-authored a paper called “Unraveling the Stress Crossover Between the Unemployed and Their Spouses”.  To summarize part of what they discovered, an unemployed spouse can mean a less productive employee.  According to Foo, “our findings call for more attention on the family as an integrated system in responding to the unemployment situation.”

Can and should your organization do anything to assist?  I can think of a few reasons that you should: 

• A calmer and happier employee will be more productive.
• Engagement and retention rates will be higher for those who feel supported by their organization.
• Demonstrating that you care for your employees will positively influence your corporate culture and brand, making you attractive to top performers when you are hiring.

Learning how to support an unemployed spouse in a healthy way could really make a difference to an employee who not only has the added burden of being the sole bread winner, but also has to navigate the emotional terrain of their partner.   But what can your company actually do?

Offer stress management information.  This could be in the form of newsletters, literature, webinars or a counseling session on site.  This could also be as simple as sending a mass email with a link to a relevant article every Friday.

Provide coaching for the employee.  These employees may find themselves stuck between being so compassionate they end up enabling and pushing so hard they seem uncaring.  A healthy balance makes all the difference in successfully supporting their spouse.

Schedule financial management workshops focused on suggestions of how to save money.  Most people have experienced the fear of instability in one way or another over the last couple of years.  As a result, more people are thinking of the future.  This means that practical suggestions on how to live on less money would be very useful, not only to employees with an unemployed spouse but to all employees.

Create a support group within the organization.  This could be done using social media or your intranet.  You could also provide resources to external support groups that already exist.

Taking a little initiative to understand and assist this employee challenge can mean a big payoff for your company.

I am fascinated by ROWE, which stands for Results Only Work Environment and is exactly that - an environment where how, when and where work is accomplished is completely irrelevant. 

Most managers say they evaluate employee performance on the results produced, but is this true?  Don’t things like showing up for work, being available for and attending meetings, and managing corporate politics play a large part in how an employee is evaluated?  With ROWE all of these things are thrown out the window and employees are  evaluated strictly on the quality of work produced. 

ROWE, quite simply, revolves around trusting your employees.  And trusting employees increases engagement and motivation which increases productivity for the company as a whole.  As you know, I am all about instilling trust and the benefits of it, but is it realistic?

This article does a nice job of summarizing the components of creating this type of work environment as well as the types of businesses where it could be successful and the industries where it could not.  I personally find the whole concept very appealing and can see how it could create the type of corporate culture that would not only attract the best and the brightest, but would be a great retention tool as well.  Then, when I stop to think about the details involved in actually running a company this way it’s hard to wrap my head around the fact that anything could actually be accomplished in a timely manner.

Doesn’t a successful company revolve around commitments and deadlines managed by numerous people to accomplish the business objectives?  How do you manage that without meetings, set availability of team members and mandatory updates on progress?  And legally, are the complications it presents worth the rewards?

Have any of you encountered this type of management philosophy?  Was it difficult to implement and do you see better results than a traditionally run organization?  Are your employees happier and more productive and is the quality of their work higher?  Please share real-life experiences in the comments.

I’ve been reading an interesting conversation on LinkedIn regarding the differences between talent and competency.  What are the differences and what is more important when building a team? 

In my opinion, talent is something innate – a particular strength or instinct that can’t be learned, at least not easily.  It is almost a certain mindset or way of looking at things.  A competency is more task-related – an ability one possesses that has been learned, studied, or practiced, and ultimately mastered.  How easily this was accomplished probably has a lot to do with the level of talent.  Do you agree? 

When searching for great employees, which matters more?  Does it depend on the type of job?  When interviewing, what tools do you use to evaluate the difference?  Does is matter whether or not there is potential growth opportunity, and if so, do you seek candidates with competencies if there is not much growth potential and those with talent if you’re hoping to expand their role?  Would you hire someone who can get the job done but may not have other talents your company could use to grow?  Or do you specifically seek employees who can not only get the job done, but bring more to the table?

In my mind, a competency can be taught (and learned) but a talent is a little something extra that should be encouraged and cultivated.  I would think this is where you get your “star” employees.  Is it a coincidence too, that people tend to be good at the things they love?  Is talent then related to passion and how does this fit in with recruiting great employees?  If an employee has a passion and talent for something, wouldn’t you imagine that they would be more motivated, engaged and generally happier doing their job?  And doesn’t this minimize some of the concerns HR has to address with the employees thereby making your job easier?  Couldn’t you also assume competency?

What do you think?  Please share your thoughts in the comments.

I came across an interesting quote the other day from David Fairhurst, chief people officer at McDonald’s.  He said, “The more you give your people transferable skills, the less they want to transfer.”

Have you ever approached Career Training and Development in this way?  Now these things are more important than ever.  Many organizations have had to reallocate job responsibilities due to cutbacks so providing training is crucial just to get the job done productively.  But beyond that, this is a great engagement tool!  This is more important than ever as one of the biggest HR concerns is losing top talent.

In this day and age, there is as definite lack of loyalty both on the part of employers as well as employees.  It is incredibly rare to find employees who believe they will work for an organization for decades or have found their home, but ironically, offering employees options to move on tends to increase the likelihood that they will stay.  Why?

Career development and training keep employees focuses on internal opportunities.  It also makes them feel heard and valued as an individual with needs, one of the top job motivators.  It develops trust that there are growth opportunities and their potential to advance is recognized.  Investing in employees’ futures can remove the mindset that an employee would prefer to get a new job rather than deal with issues or concerns in their present role.  In short, it builds a sense of loyalty – if you do for them, they want to do for you.  It also increases their interest in going to work each day.  Being excited about the job equals engagement and engaged people want to stay.  They are also far more productive and will be a genuine benefit to your organization.

Think about this quote by Walter Chrysler.  ““I feel sorry for the person who can’t get genuinely excited about his work. Not only will he never be satisfied, but he will never achieve anything worthwhile.”  Don’t you want your employees achieving worthwhile things for your business?

How do approach training and career development?  Do you have the mindset that you need your employees to learn things just to help the company or do you approach it as a way to view your top talent as people with needs?  Do these things fall under the category of retention tools in your organization?

It’s no secret that turnover in your organization costs a lot of money.  Estimates on what those costs are vary widely from 50% of the employee’s salary to 400%, depending on the nature of the job.

The projection is that a turnover storm is on the horizon due to layoffs, cutbacks and stress during the economic downturn.  Have you spent time preparing for this?  Do you know what to expect? 

The impact of turnover has another result that you may not have considered carefully enough.  It is very difficult on the remaining employees – the ones you NEED to keep.  Many times these employees are the ones who have to take on the burdens left behind when a colleague quits.  They have to deal with staffing shortfalls and absorb more responsibilities.  They have to communicate with dissatisfied customers due to quality concerns, slower production, and reduced customer service. They have to manage the stress that comes with watching co-workers leave the company and questioning whether sticking with the organization is the right move for them.

These things can quickly lead to a mass exodus. This will leave you with a weak employer brand which means you not only lose many good employees, but you are unable to attract quality replacements.  The cost for this damaging scenario is impossible to calculate. 

How do you prepare for market conditions suggesting you are primed for this? What can you do to reduce the amount of employees who leave and to support the employees who stay?  What steps will minimize the damage?

Become more human. 

If you recognize that your employees have aspirations, concerns, needs, and wants you can direct your interaction accordingly.  You can become more appreciative, more communicative and ultimately be more connected to your workforce.  You will be amazed at the loyalty that can be generated just by approaching your employees as human beings.  In addition, as you try to replace those that have moved on, you can be responsive, respectful of candidates’ time and need for feedback, and just generally kind.  This will do wonders for your employer brand.

It is easy to forget during tough times that not everything boils down to dollars and cents.  You can get so caught up in the daily numbers needed to survive that you ignore the big picture.  Yes, your employees are either assets or liabilities, but they are also human beings.  If you would like to generate loyalty, have some consideration for the fact that they are much more than machines that simply produce or don’t produce and interact in a way that makes them feel valued.

Human Resources is accountable not only for keeping the top talent in an organization, but also for finding it.  So how do you know it when you see it? 

Back in the days of the command and control hierarchy the definition of a great hire was probably someone who paid attention, followed directions well, understood the position, and had the background to jump in and do the job.  The interviews you conducted probably reflected this by you asking questions that revolved around past experience and job duties.   

Business has changed.   Job evolution has created a need for talent that is creative, adaptable and free thinking.  Employees need to be able to add new responsibilities that may be outside of their specific knowledge base as well as having the power to extrapolate their experience to address the responsibility at hand.  Great hires need to be quick learners, problem solvers and most importantly, ambitious. 

To bottom line it, before you can determine if someone is a great hire, you have to understand how the candidate thinks.  You have to be able to tell if they will learn quickly and enthusiastically and whether they have the ambition to want to.

So how do you do this?

Behavioral interviewing can be very effective at ferreting out those personality traits and lines of thought that will demonstrate adaptability, creativity, and ambition.  There are great lists available of example interview questions.  

Describe a problem you are really encountering and ask for thoughts on a solution.  Pay attention to how many questions the candidate asks, whether they think outside the box, and if they commit to a solution without enough background.  Those that ask questions and offer insights without a set solution are probably creative thinkers.  Those that bail out by saying they don’t know the job yet or don’t connect with the problem are not creative.

Ask them to explain how a past role grew during their tenure.  Those that didn’t experience growth are not as ambitious as those who explain the way they grew their role into one with increasing responsibility.

Give them some crazy exercise to do, like a puzzle or a word problem.  Watch how they approach it and ask them to communicate their thought process.  If they are irritated by the request or think it’s silly, they are probably not very adaptable and will become disturbed by things going differently than expected.  This will also give you some insight into their communication skills, which is very important in a world that increasingly requires collaboration. 

What interview techniques do you use?  Have you adapted them to find the new type of talent your organization requires?  Do you have any tricks you use to dig deeper in an interview?

In my experience, everyone is motivated by different things.  In order to effectively manage people in any role, you have to first identify the key motivating factor for each individual.   There are all kinds of ideas and programs available to help managers motivate their teams but I think you have to back up first in order for any of these to work.  If you don’t have a clear understanding of what motivates each employee, how can you determine which program or idea will be effective?  In fact, if you don’t understand the individual, there is a good chance the program will actually de-motivate your workers.

Here are some examples of different drivers you will see in each individual employee that can help you determine how to effectively motivate them.

Accomplishment:  These employees are motivated from within and respond to the satisfaction of achieving their goals.  They will assess their job requirements, analyze what they need to do to be a valuable employee and usually try to go above and beyond. They will stay with an organization as long as it is realistic that they can reach that sense of accomplishment.  They will probably not be very responsive to outside influences such as contests and awards.

Challenge:  These employees love to learn and grow.  They are probably easily bored and once they have mastered their job, they will move on if new challenges are not offered to them.  These employees are more likely to stay in their roles if there is an opportunity for advancement.

Recognition:  These employees strive to be recognized for their contributions.  This could be as simple as a mention in the corporate newsletter or a company-wide email noting their accomplishments.  If they feel their successes are not noticed, they will go work somewhere where they will be noticed.

Compensation:  These employees are driven by a bigger paycheck.  Bonuses, raises, gift cards, and other monetary results for their efforts will keep them happy and performing. 

Independence:  These employees are driven to perform by the knowledge that if they do, they will earn more freedom.  They will stay with a company who not only recognizes their efforts but rewards them by leaving them alone to do their jobs.  They will leave an organization where they feel micro-managed.

These are just a few examples of the many personalities that make up your team of employees.  Most people are motivated by a combination of these factors but you can see how if you happen to have a team who is mostly made up of people motivated by compensation, putting together a program that promises an article on the company intranet is not going to do much in getting your team to want to achieve their goals.

In some cases, you can hinder the performance of your employees.  If you have a team made up of people who want to be challenged and you continually reward them with time off instead, this could de-motivate them.  Why would they want to work hard if the effect is that they get to coast?

There is so much talk surrounding the implementation of programs to optimize your workforce but I challenge that you must KNOW your workforce first.  If you don’t assess the personalities involved you could wind up implementing programs that could ultimately cause your top talent to go elsewhere.