magazine from the eyes of industry leaders intellectual...

FUTUREINTELLECTUAL CAPITALAND THE

OF HR

Why Every CEO Should Participate in Hiring

How to Create a Data-Driven Workplace

New Year New You: 9 Steps to Get that Promotion in 2016

4 Ways to Navigate the Skills Gap

Churnover: When Turnover Gets Out of Control

In This Issue

JANUARY/FEBRUARY 2016

HR INSIGHTSf rom the eyes of industry leadersMagazine

Abraham Lincoln’s words carry as much weight in today’s corporate world as they did in the Kentucky and Indiana forests of his childhood. After all, if you try to do any job without the correct tools you won’t be able to do your job well (or even at all!). In particular, HR and staffing professionals need to understand industry expectations and trends, know how to meet their organizations’ needs, and be able to find top talent (and match them to the right positions). Fortunately, the issue of Imprimis Group HR Insights in your hands right now contains the information and insights that can help you maintain and improve the tools critical to your success. In our feature article, “Intellectual Capital and the Future of HR,” Linda Brenner discusses the need for HR to evolve beyond the industrial-age skills that were vital in past decades but are now overshadowed in importance by intellectual capital. “If HR can’t find a way to innovate and produce real, measurable business value,” she warns, “then it risks being forced to change or being overtaken by other, more strategic functions.” How do you find good people for your company? And once you bring them on board, how do you keep them? Several other articles focus specifically on some of the hiring- and retention-related challenges that many organizations face today. Rachel Cook and Scott Kinnaird (in “4 Ways to Navigate the Skills Gap” and “Why Every CEO Should Participate in Hiring,” respectively) suggest new strategies for improving hiring practices. And Brian Formato, in “Churnover: The Repetitive Position Turnover Problem,” explains the four-step process that can help organizations decrease their rates of financial- (and morale-) sapping churnover.

These articles and the others in this issue highlight some of the themes now trending in the HR and staffing fields. Our goal at Imprimis Group is to help you identify ways in which this information can help your organization sharpen its axes and always have the best tools ready for the job at hand!

Best regards,

Valerie FreemanCEOImprimis Group, Inc.

FROM THECEO“If I had six

hours to chop down

a tree, I’d spend

the first four hours

sharpening the axe.”

—ABRAHAM LINCOLN

J A N U A R Y / F E B R U A R Y 2 0 1 62

FEATURES

DEPARTMENTS

4 Cover Story Intellectual Capital and the Future of HR

By Linda Brenner

8 New Year, New You: 9 Steps to Get a Promotion in 2016 By Valerie Grubb

10 How to Create a Data-Driven Workplace By Charles Coy

Workforce Management12 4 Ways to Navigate the Skills Gap

By Rachel Cook

14 Churnover: When Turnover Gets Out of Control By Brian Formato

Leadership16 Why Every CEO Should Participate in Hiring

By Scott Kinnaird

18 Centered Leadership By Stephanie Reyes

Talent Management19 To Boost Loyalty, Unlink Learning and Performance Goals

By Stephen J. Meyer

20 The Top 5 Ways to Drive Your Millennial Employees Away By David Sturt and Todd Nordstrom

Ask the Expert21 Termination: Put It in Writing?

& Making an Exemption to Drug-Free Workplace Rules By Strategic Human Resources, Inc.

Water Cooler Chronicles22 When Bad Can Be Good

By Mike McKerns, SPHR

Recipe of the Month22 Ward Off Winter’s Chill with Homemade Hot Cocoa

4

8

1914

HR INSIGHTS 3

FUTURE

Publisher & EDITORIAL DIRECTORS

Mamu Media, LLC

Editor in Chief Mike McKerns

Managing Editor Addy Fillman

Contributing Editor Marsha Brofka-Berends

Associate Editor Lindsay Brockway

director of Sales Robert S. Herbein III

Contributing Writers

Linda Brenner

Rachel Cook

Charles Coy

Brian Formato

Valerie Grubb

Scott Kinnaird

Stephen J. Meyer

Todd Nordstrom

Stephanie Reyes

David Sturt

Strategic Human Resources, Inc.

Design

The Office of Kristian Bjørnard

HR INSIGHTSf rom the eyes of industry leaders


FUTURE

There’s been a great deal of press recently about the role of HR within organizations, with two recent Harvard Business Review articles causing quite a firestorm and reopening the debate about what HR must do to remain relevant in a fast-changing business environment. In “It’s Time to Split HR,” Ram Charan proposes dividing HR into two parts: one reporting to the CFO and focusing on administrative functions; and one reporting to the CEO and focusing on more strategic leadership and organizational concerns.1 On a similar note, Peter Cappelli’s more recent article, “Why We Love to Hate HR . . . and What HR Can Do About It,” explores the history of HR, its current function, and the steps it can take to reform its reputation.2

1. Ram Charan. 2014. “It’s Time to Split HR.” Harvard Business Review, July-August issue. hbr.org/2014/07/its-time-to-split-hr.

2. Peter Cappelli. 2015. “Why We Love to Hate HR . . . and What HR Can Do About It.” Harvard Business Review, July-August issue. hbr.org/2015/07/why-we-love-to-hate-hr-and-what-hr-can-do-about-it. HR INSIGHTS 5

Neither of these articles (nor any other “solutions” out there) addresses the fact that HR strategies fail because they are not linked in any meaningful, measurable way to the business strategy and to the creation of value for a company. Even in HR environments that purport to be “transformed” (often simply because they have stream-lined administrative work and reduced costs), HR professionals are not held accountable for business results or the organization’s success. Regardless of how much knowledge and data HR may have about a company’s people or how honorable its intentions may be, as long as HR is disconnected from—and experiences no consequences for—a company’s business value, no amount of cajoling or cheerleading will lead business leaders to view HR as a value-adding part of a company.

TALENT RULESWithout a doubt, talent rules in the new knowledge economy. Com-panies now derive more value than ever before from the intellectual capabilities of their teams, and companies with the greatest share of smart, high-performing employees are coming out on top. Knowl-edge workers are to 2015 what manufacturing assets were to the 1970s—except that the new talent resource is in much shorter supply and is much more portable than the assets of a few decades ago.

In an economy so dependent on talent, the financial implica-tions of effective talent management—literally, a company’s market value—are enormous. Yet there seems to be scant attention being paid to connecting value creation and talent strategy as it relates to hiring, talent development, and employee retention. Despite the huge investments made in human capital technology and consult-ing, companies fail to quantify the true value, worth, or results of those investments. In the absence of a new orientation toward value creation, HR finds itself continuing to focus on the value drivers of a different age (manufacturing assets) instead of adjusting to the new context of today’s economy, in which intellectual capital (IC) is the primary value driver.

HR’S LIMITING FACTORSEverything we see today tells us that HR needs to evolve. Despite the changing role that people and intellectual capital now play in driving organizational value, HR has not experienced a correspond-ingly dramatic shift in its understanding of and approach to these new relationships. Experience and research indicate that talent manage-ment efforts, outcomes, and predictability have been limited by three primary factors:

· Lack of HR capability. Overwhelmed with personnel-related administrative responsibilities, HR professionals often struggle with establishing credibility, assessing strategic opportunities, and driving results-based change.

· A support function mindset. Companies have historically posi-tioned the HR function as an administrative one—an approach that attracts individuals who like more tactical work, thus result-ing in a team of task-driven workers.

· The inability to link business value to HR work. Without a burning desire to perform strategic, data-driven work, HR leaders are unable (and, in some cases, unwilling) to gather and use data to create a business case for change in a company’s talent strategy.

As outlined here, HR talent itself is clearly the biggest barrier to HR’s ultimate transformation. The administrative skills and attri-butes that were valued in an industrial age are no longer appreciated or needed. Now, in order to define and lead organizational change, HR must focus on developing a measurable talent strategy that re-flects a clear understanding of how to link talent with value creation for a business.


THE WAY FORWARDThe road to the future is paved with intellectual capital. To increase its value, a company must maximize its relevant IC. In order to do that, a company must establish a new model for talent management that incorporates traditional HR and finance capabilities with exper-tise in analytics and measurement. A company also needs a deep un-derstanding of how critical assets are allocated to power the business and of how the attraction, selection, and retention of the right talent can deliver a high-performing, diverse workforce.

With those needs in mind, I propose a new model, called the IC Strategy Team, to help a company refine its human capital focus through five critical steps:

▷ Gain agreement among senior leaders about how IC is pro-duced and then design a strategy to maximize its production

▷ Examine where IC exists within the organization and estimate the relative value of each IC component

▷ Understand the talent implications of the most valuable IC components by comparing where the organization currently is to where it needs to be

▷ Commit to the concept of overinvesting in talent for critical roles in order to avoid gaps

▷ Identify specific organizational goals related to future IC

The IC Strategy Team and its human capital approach is not a mere tweak of the current HR or finance model; rather, it’s a complete overhaul of the processes and strategies necessary to achieve success in a knowledge-driven economy. The question now becomes “Who will take the lead in this effort?” If HR can’t find a way to innovate and produce real, measurable business value, then it risks being forced to change or being overtaken by other, more strategic functions.

Linda Brenner started Designs on Talent with the vision of helping HR leaders drive faster and better results in talent acquisition and talent management. Visit Designs on Talent at www.designsontalent.com or contact Brenner by e-mail at [email protected].

HR INSIGHTS 7

If “get promoted” is one of your goals for 2016, it’s time to make that dream a reality (especially if it’s an unfulfilled carryover from your 2015 list). You owe it to yourself (and to your company) to focus on the attitudes and actions that will enable you to excel at your job and achieve the recognition that can lead to a promotion in 2016.

1. Don’t be merely good—be excellent There will always be people who are promoted because of their connections and not because of their performance. Unlike them, however, you actually want to lead your company and your human capital efforts to greater success. So don’t do your job just adequately—excel at it so that you build a strong body of knowledge and experience to bring with you as your career advances. Make your work ethic the gold standard by which everyone else’s performance is measured.

2. Develop talent To move up, you need a successor—someone to do your current job while you assume greater responsi-bilities (or take on an entirely different role). So do your best to develop the talent around you. If you establish a reputation for creating talent in your wake, the brightest and best will want to come work for you. Then when the time comes for you to move up, you can focus on your new responsibilities, knowing that your old department will be in good hands. And if you’re a “department of one,” determine how you can add value beyond fulfilling your usual responsibilities, then train your successor after your promotion.

3. Hire smart people Don’t just hire smart people—hire people who are smarter than you. Jack Welch famously said, “If you’re the smartest person in the room, you’ve got real problems.” Learn not to be intimidated by people who are smarter than you, because hiring them will only make you look more brilliant! And smart people bring with them great ideas that not only benefit the organization but can help you, too, as you ascend the corporate ladder.

4. Be vocal Doing great work won’t get you promoted if your boss and other senior leaders don’t know about it. You don’t need to toot your own horn excessively, but you do need for others to see what you’re capable of and how your talents can enable you to take on more responsibilities. And don’t rely just on your boss to hand you a promotion, because he or she may not want you moving anywhere. So get the word out to other senior leaders, too, about how good you are.

New Year, New You: 9 Steps to Get

a Promotion

in 2016BY VALERIE GRUBB


5. Find a mentor No one gets promoted solely on his or her own efforts and merit. Everyone has some outside help. Find a mentor—someone senior to you who can act as your internal champion—and figure out what you can offer that person to make it worthwhile for him or her to take an interest in you. Don’t rely solely on your mentor to get you promoted, though: continue to network throughout the company, so that many people know just how good you are and how you can help them achieve their goals. (Remember, network-ing and mentoring are always two-way streets.)

6. Expand your skill set If you’re not learning, you’re stagnating. So keep pushing yourself to learn new things, both inside and outside your company. It’s critical to understand how the organization makes money, for example, so learn about this by finding a project in an area that you’re not familiar with, figuring out what value you bring to it, and volunteering to help. Find ways to get exposure to different departments so you can learn how they function.

7. Be bold and be fearless Speak up! Be a creative problem solver and build your reputation as someone who adds value across the or-ganization, not just in your department. In corporate America, people tend to be either part of the problem or part of the solution. If you focus on the latter, the company leadership will recognize that promoting you is imperative to the organization’s growth and success.

8. Ask for that promotion Never assume that your boss knows you want a pro-motion. Explicitly tell him or her that a promotion is a requirement for your continuing with the company. If your boss (or your boss’s boss) doesn’t think you’re ready for a promotion right now, ask “What do I need to do to be ready for one?” Get specifics—then work hard to meet those expectations.

9. Be prepared to leave Sometimes the only way to get a promotion is to jump ship and go elsewhere, particularly if you’ve made it clear that your staying with the company depends on your eventual promotion. Ultimatums can be tough (and you need to be prepared to follow through with them), but if your company either doesn’t recognize your talents or isn’t big enough to support a promo-tion, then move on.

Getting promoted not only enhances your reputa-tion but also elevates the credibility of HR within your company. So plan to make a commitment to make 2016 the year you get promoted! Good luck!

Valerie Grubb of Val Grubb & Associates Ltd. (www.valgrubban-dassociates.com) is an innovative and visionary operations leader with an exceptional ability to zero in on the systems, processes, and personnel issues that can hamper a company’s growth. Grubb regularly consults for mid-range companies wishing to expand and larger companies seeking efficiencies in back-office operations. Her expertise and vibrant style are also in constant demand for corporate training classes and seminars. She can be reached at [email protected].

9HR INSIGHTS

Most people agree that employees are a company’s greatest assets. But employees can be even more valuable when they have good data in their hands. With workforce data and people analytics, employees can make informed decisions, develop strong strategic initiatives, and achieve measurable goals.

The far-reaching impacts of a data-driven culture can include increased leadership effec-tiveness, analyses of employee performance, and the development of training to increase customer loyalty. But creating such a culture is no easy feat: it requires not only building an internal analytics team, but also getting buy-in from employees across the organization.

For many organizations, simply getting off the ground with an in-house analytics team—much less forming a culture around big data—presents a big challenge. I talked with Teri Schmidt, the manager of the assess-ment, measurement, and evaluation (AME) team at JetBlue, about how her group has led the way in the use of evidence-based decision making from within. She offered her best advice for other organizations interested in putting analytics at the center of their cultures and strategies.

START SMALLWith analytics, you have to crawl before you can run (or even walk). When you’re just beginning a data program, focus on a single metric or goal that can prompt a larger conversation about the impact of analytics, Schmidt advises.

“If you can come up with even one metric that people can understand, talk about, and utilize, that will have a huge impact,” she says.

“As people begin to see value in using data, you can continuously improve your metrics, gain more access to data, and get people interested in collecting new data.”

LEAD BY EXAMPLEOnce you succeed in creating an interest in analytics, expand the conversation by sharing anecdotes and case studies with the company. If people see the results of a data-driven decision, they are more likely to trust in the potential of evidence-based decision making themselves.

“We started our conversations in a quar-terly meeting where people shared success stories about where they had utilized data,” Schmidt says. “Getting people talking can help get the ball rolling and take you to a point where you can build and improve.”

OFFER LEARNING OPPORTUNITIESThe real key to instilling a culture around data, however, is to create opportunities for people to engage with analytics themselves. Once conversation and success stories generate intrigue, the next step is to dedicate resources to transforming that intrigue into action. For JetBlue, that step entailed creating

a mentorship program for other employees to learn from AME team members.

The AME certification is a performance-based program that educates employees organization-wide about applying analytics. After learning effective data collection, analy-sis, visualization, communication, and use in performance improvement, participants apply those processes to real-life projects. Along the way, Schmidt explains, AME mentors teach participants how to involve stakeholders in data collection and how to communicate their results effectively. The cumulation of these efforts is company-wide engagement in data analysis. In addition to making smarter and better informed choices, JetBlue employees are now proactively seek-ing opportunities to use data to improve the company.

“A big part of what we’ve seen—beyond making improvements that I don’t think would’ve been made without the evidence provided through data—is a big growth of culture where people look to find and use data when they have a decision to make,” Schmidt says. “They get excited [when they’re able] to say they improved a certain program because they had the data to back it up.”

Charles Coy is the senior director of analyst and community relations at Cornerstone. Responsible for evangelizing about Cornerstone’s innovation in talent management technology solutions, he is interested in the ways that technology can affect how organiza-tions evaluate, motivate, and value their employees. He can be reached via Twitter at @oleskoo.

This article originally appeared at www.cornerstoneondemand.com/blog.

HR INSIGHTS 11

BY RACHEL COOK

WORKFORCEMANAGEMENT


Go Straight to the SchoolsCreate direct relationships with colleges and universities, particularly those with programs or majors that produce people with the skills needed in your industry. Such

relationships can be mutually beneficial: when schools add curricu-lum that help students develop the skills necessary to thrive at your company or in your industry and you hire those graduates, those schools’ reputation and enrollment also increase as students see the employment value of their programs. The result will be a qualified, eager group of graduates who will naturally thrive at your company.

Some schools already have such arrangements in place. For example, Carnegie Mellon University’s Tepper School of Business

“offers partnership opportunities targeted to meet [a] company’s goals and objectives” by training students and matching them to intern-ship and employment positions.2 Stanford University has a similar relationship with Silicon Valley, and the University of Southern California has a longstanding connection to the film industry. In all of these cases, well-trained students feed right into industries that are already waiting for them.

Leverage Professional Development ProgramsA 2012 report from the American Society for Training and Development found that the dynamic nature of

certain industries is a primary cause of talent shortages and listed the lack of resources for professional development as a significant con-tributor to the skills gap.3 To address this concern, employers in many fields have increasingly turned to training and certification programs and massive online open courses (MOOCs) to help their workers sharpen their skills. Because of the strong link between career growth and employee retention, companies would do well to focus on profes-sional development to keep existing talent on board and to attract new, skilled employees. Developing a current employee’s skill set can be faster and cheaper than hiring a new person to fill that skills gap.

Partner with Training Facilities and OrganizationsTo make it easier to source talent with the skills you need, partner with facilities that provide important

technical training in those areas. Also consider working with organi-zations such as Code for America, for example, which offers fellow-ships that attract talented candidates to work on ambitious govern-ment projects. Such partnerships allow you to tap into a robust talent pool whose members have already garnered experience and proven themselves to be qualified candidates.

Make Data Do All the WorkOne challenge in overcoming the skills gap is that po-sitions often have many varied requirements. Because you’re usually not looking for a single skill as much

as a layered set of experience and knowledge, finding a candidate with the right mix of education, work history, and intuition can be particularly difficult. In this situation, the ability to analyze a large amount of data can be a huge advantage by allowing hiring managers and in-house recruiters to get a complete picture of each candidate. Big-data tools (such as those available from CareerBuilder and Jazz) can make streamlining comprehensive candidate profiles simpler, more collaborative, and more constructive.

The skills gap isn’t going away any time soon. Even though more initiatives and programs are popping up to address this hiring chal-lenge, the rapidly changing needs of the workplace mean that this problem won’t be solved overnight. Fortunately, though, there are steps that your company can take to make it well positioned to navi-gate the skills game and find the talent it needs.

Rachel Cook is a customer advocate at Jazz, the first performance recruiting platform. Jazz is on a mission to make recruiting and hiring easy, effective, and scalable no matter what growth looks like at your company. For more information, visit www.jazz.co.

Imagine you’re a recruiter at a successful, growing company, and your boss tasks you with hiring for several new positions. You’re thrilled to get started, but during the process you struggle to find applicants who have the precise skill set you’re looking for. Do you settle or keep hunting? Do you poach passive candidates or stick with active job seekers?

If you’ve faced this challenge, you’re not alone. The current skills gap is making it more and more difficult for recruiters to find the right people with the right skills. According to a PWC report issued in the first quarter of 2015, nearly 70% of businesses surveyed said they were hiring in 2015 and nearly 40% of them cited the mismatch between skills and open positions as a significant concern.1 In fact, the skills gap is such a serious issue that President Obama even mentioned it during his 2014 State of the Union address.

Fortunately, it is possible to navigate the skills gap successfully. The four suggestions below are proven strategies that can help you make the right hire.

1. PWC. 2015. “Trendsetter Barometer: Business Outlook.” www.pwc.com/us/en/private-company-services/publica-tions/assets/pwc-trendsetter-barometer-q1-2015.pdf.

2. Carnegie Mellon Universtiy Tepper School of Business website, tepper.cmu.edu/recruiters-and-companies/partner-with-the-tepper-school.

3. ASTD. 2012. “Bridging the Skills Gap.” nist.gov/mep/upload/Bridging-the-Skills-Gap_2012.pdf.

HR INSIGHTS 13

Churnover: When Turnover Gets Out of ControlBY BRIAN FORMATO

Organizations have the ongoing task of attracting, retaining, and developing their talent—a task that’s become more difficult as employees increasingly view their jobs as temporary. Gone are the days when it was common for someone to join an organization and stay with it for his or her entire career. Although that does still happen occasionally, most of today’s employees tend to change jobs and companies many times throughout their careers. The result is higher turnover than in the past.

Companies that recognize the inevitability of turnover try to mitigate its effects by building talent pipelines and bench strength for each and every posi-tion. They evaluate their turnover monthly, dig into the reasons why people leave, and try to improve their organizations’ ability to attract and retain great people. Although turnover is often seen as a negative, it can sometimes be a positive as well. For example, it can create advancement opportunities for an organization’s other employees. Or it can give hiring managers a chance to improve the quality of their teams by filling open positions with hires who are stronger than their predecessors.

When turnover takes places in the same position multiple times, however, it becomes churnover—and unlike turnover, churnover never has an upside. Or-ganizations that fail to address the causes of churnover (which can include poor working environment, low pay, bad manager, bad hours, and job fit mismatch, among others) cannot eliminate it completely and are doomed to be trapped in the churnover cycle. Fortunately, taking certain steps can help an organization eradicate its churnover problem.

WORKFORCEMANAGEMENT


STEP 1: Analyze the data to find patterns that could identify root causes of churnover. For example, does it occur more often after certain durations of employment? Is there a gender, age, or ethnic bias in the data? Is the churnover voluntary or perfor-mance based?

STEP 2: If the churnover is voluntary, conduct exit interviews with those who left the organization. Ask not only about why each person left, but also about what had initially attracted him or her to the company and the job. Such questions—and their answers—can often shine a light on where things went sour.

STEP 3: Identify the knowledge, skills, abilities, and behaviors of your most successful employees. Work to understand what differentiates those who are engaged and successful in an organization from those who leave it.

STEP 4: Adopt a new approach to hiring and retention. For example, hire people who fit a different mold from the ones who’ve left the organization. Provide realistic overviews of job duties and responsibilities before making hiring decisions, so that candidates will know exactly what they’re getting into and will be less likely to leave when their new positions don’t align with their expectations. Create incen-tives and implement tools to recognize and reward employee performance.

Implementing these four steps can help most organizations reduce their churnover rates. The cost of any turnover can have a dramatic impact on the bot-tom line, but churnover is by far the most expensive type of turnover. It behooves all organizations, therefore, to work their hardest to eliminate it.

Brian Formato is the CEO and principal at Groove Management, an organizational development and human capital consulting firm focused on helping individuals and organizations maximize their strengths in order to achieve superior performance. He can be reached at [email protected].

HR INSIGHTS 15

My response was simple and immediate. I replied that if he could potentially represent us to our clients (or have his hands in our source code or in our financials), there’s probably not another 30-minute con-versation I would have that day more important than the one I was currently having with him.

Unfortunately, too few CEOs recognize the value of participating in the hiring processes at their organizations. Every CEO (and every other “suite-level” business leader, for that matter) should regularly set aside time to interview candidates for important positions. Those who do will reap four huge benefits.

UNDERSTANDING (AND SHAPING) THE EMPLOYER BRAND AND THE CANDIDATE EXPERIENCEWho can tell the company story better than its CEO? The difference between your company and the others could be

the 30 minutes you block out one morning for coffee or a quick chat on the phone with a prospective employee. Which of your competi-tors’ CEOs will take the time to meet candidates for their critical openings?

When the wrong hire can cost a company tens of thousands of dol-lars and the right hire can yield plenty of blue sky, few chunks of time are better investments than those spent courting candidates for key positions. When a company’s recruiters can add the CEO’s unique accessibility to their pitches, that feature becomes a key component of the company’s employer brand—and a bonus in the eyes of candi-dates who are comparing multiple opportunities.

REMEMBERING HOW TO ASK QUESTIONS—AND TO LISTENIt’s difficult to ask experts questions about their work experience when you have little (if any) expertise in their fields. But it’s not hard to ask people what they’ve worked

on, why they enjoyed it, and what they accomplished. Anyone—whether a CEO or a first-year intern—is capable of putting forth the effort to ask detailed questions and listen with intention to the responses.

When a candidate describes a project, ask her what tool she used for it. Ask if she contributed to a team or if she worked on it alone.

Ask if she’s done the same work at other places. When a candidate gives you details, listen for opportunities to ask follow-up ques-tions. If you keep requesting more information, you’ll very easily be able to discern if she’s telling the truth or just making stuff up. With this technique, you’ll uncover the fakes as quickly as you’ll uncover genuine talent. You’ll also be able to focus on culture fit and attitude in your conversation (leaving the “technical proficiency” discussion for a separate interview between the candidate and an expert in that field).

GAINING INSIGHT INTO FAILING COMPANIESNo CEO should ever be in the dark about the health of his or her company. I once spent 20 minutes listening to a candidate describe in incredible detail his company’s lack

of succession planning. As his employer’s sole software developer, he was responsible for the maintenance of an application critical to the company’s ability to operate—which meant that if he left his job, the company would experience a serious business outage. The scenarios he described were so dire that I found myself hoping he would speak to his boss about his unhappiness so the company would understand the substantial risk it assumed by not keeping this employee on board. When I hung up the phone, I made a list of questions to ask my man-agement team and vowed that a lack of succession planning would never cripple a business on my watch.

REDISCOVERING YOUR COMPANY’S UNIQUENESSEveryone has his or her own particular motivations—and a savvy CEO knows how to connect the motivations of high-caliber prospects to how the company can fulfill

them. For example, I recently spoke with a sharp young engineer in New Jersey who was in the process of moving his parents from India to the USA to live with him. Because he knew they would hate the Mid-Atlantic winters, he had decided (after doing research on cost of living, climate, and opportunities for startups) to relocate to Okla-homa City. He was eager to interview with my company, and because I understood his motivations I was able to speak directly to them.

Why Every CEO Should Participate in HiringBY SCOTT KINNAIRD

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During my company’s recent search for an executive to fill an important role, I scheduled some time to visit with a candidate. As our conversation wound down, I asked him if he had any other questions. He said that he’d interviewed with multiple companies but our conversation was his first with anyone above the VP level. How is it, he wondered, that a person in my role could afford the time to interview people like him?

WORKFORCEMANAGEMENT


A CEO’s responsibility is to oversee everything that happens in a company. So make sure you know what’s happening by keeping a hand in the hiring process. Talk to the candidates yourself—listen to them tell their stories, and figure out how to align their skills and passions with your company’s goals.

Scott Kinnaird is the executive chairman of a la mode, a pioneer in real estate workflow technology. He has been a technical recruiter, staffing company founder, and recruiting division president for a publicly traded IT consulting firm. He loves to write and talk about applying uncommon corporate empathy to key segments of the talent life cycle in order to increase employee engagement and corporate profits.

HR INSIGHTS 17

Anyone interested in cultivating leadership should take a look at an inspiring book called How Remarkable Women Lead: The Breakthrough Model for Work and Life, by Joanna Barsh and Susie Cranston (both consultants at McKinsey & Company). To better understand her own experience with personal leadership, Barsh embarked on a journey of self-reflection that culminated in this exploration of exceptional female leaders around the world. Through five years of research, Barsh and Cranston identified the five elements of what they call “centered leadership,” which are practiced by the successful global leaders discussed in this book.

PRECONDITIONSBarsh, Cranston, and their McKinsey team interviewed more than 85 successful women leaders from around the world. Those leaders discussed their professional experiences and how they successfully forged paths to leadership in spite of many obstacles and challenges. Based on these conversations, the researchers identified characteris-tics common to all the women they interviewed:

· Desire to lead · Talent and knowledge · Capacity for change

But these characteristics alone don’t necessarily guarantee the ex-istence of leadership ability. Rather, they are preconditions that form an essential foundation on which the structure of centered leadership can be built.

FIVE COMPONENTS

Without meaning, even the most presti-gious and lucrative job becomes a repeti-tive and empty chore. Centered leaders know what motivates them to push for-

ward—no matter what life and leadership throw in their way. Making a difference and achieving something that matters inspire passion and bring purpose to the leadership journey.

How we mentally frame the world makes a significant difference in how we deal with our experiences. Positive framing is not the same as having a Pollyanna perspective

on the world (i.e., everything is positive), though. Rather, it entails reframing difficult circumstances in a positive light, acknowledging the challenges, and then tackling them with all the resources at hand. Centered leaders understand the power of positive framing and use it to meet obstacles head on.

No one succeeds alone, and those who learn the value of connection will more effectively weather the storms of leadership and achieve long-term

success. On the road to leadership, seek out mentors and sponsors (“powerful people who take a risk on us”1) who are invested in your success. Once they’ve attained leadership, centered leaders recipro-cate and use the power of connection to help those who would follow in their footsteps.

Those on the path to centered lead-ership recognize the need to “lean in” by embracing more risks and taking on more challenges. It’s not enough to do good work—you must be seen

doing good work. So contribute to the conversation, put your name forward for opportunities, bring new ideas to the table, and always strive to improve yourself. Centered leaders learn early on to engage at all levels.

Energy is a finite resource. Cen-tered leaders know this and manage their energy accordingly. They take the time to identify what drains

them—and what recharges them—and limit their exposure to the former through delegation and the careful allocation of resources. They carve out focus time and work from their strengths to take ad-vantage of the energy boost that comes from working in flow, “a state in which people are so involved in an activity that nothing else seems to matter.”2 And they know when to step back and recharge.

THE PAYOFFThe exceptional achievements of the women in Barsh and Cranston’s study reflected a high degree of leadership effectiveness and success. In their interviews, the subjects emphasized their attainment of satis-faction and happiness—and their resilience—in the face of adversity. Although the concept of centered leadership arose from a quest to understand how exceptional women lead, it has since evolved into a leadership model “that responds to the specific needs and experiences of women and men who aspire to a more fulfilling and conscious realization of what leadership can be in their lives.”3 In other words, centered leaders lead because leadership allows them to use their strengths in the pursuit of an inspiring vision.

Stephanie Reyes writes for TribeHR, a NetSuite company, the first truly social human resources management software. Its easy-to-use tools are used by busi-nesses worldwide, allowing companies to focus more on what they do best and less on things that get in the way. For more information, visit www.tribehr.com.

1. Joanna Barsh. 2014. “Your Centered Leadership Journey.” LeanIn.org. cdn-media.leanin.org/wp-content/uploads/2014/03/Centered-Leadership-Chapter-1.pdf.

2. Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi. 1990. Flow: The Psychology of Optimal Experience. Harper and Row: New York.

3. Description for program on centered leadership to be held at the Banff Centre in October 2016. www.banffcentre.ca/programs/centered-leadership.

LEADERSHIP


Many organizations combine learning with performance goals, as in “learn x so you can accomplish y.” But research shows that connecting those two domains can actually have detrimental effects. In fact, organizations would be better served by keeping learning and performance goals separate from each other.

THE RESEARCHIn a recent study of 158 professionals in IT (a field chosen because its workers must constantly learn in order to keep up), researchers interviewed participants about the training they received from their companies.1 The IT professionals were asked about the overall quality of the training, whether it met their expectations, and how loyal and positive they currently felt toward their employers.

The study found that the more training opportunities the workers received, the more satisfied and committed they were to their com-panies. Such findings suggest that organizations that provide career development opportunities aren’t just benefiting from a more skilled workforce—they’re also increasing employees’ commitment to the company. And increased employee loyalty can translate into workers who commit more discretionary effort, are more productive, and are less likely to leave.

1 Rita Fontinha, Maria Jose Chambel, and Nele De Cuyper. 2014. “Training and the Com-mitment of Outsourced Information Technologies’ Workers: Psychological Contract Fulfill-ment as a Mediator.” Journal of Career Development, 41 (4), 321-340.

BUT THERE’S A CATCH . . .The loyalty boost didn’t follow every training opportunity, though. The study found that some training programs had no effect whatso-ever on loyalty. What made the difference was whether the training was connected to performance goals. If employees felt that training opportunities were all about hitting certain goals, goodwill and com-mitment went right out the window. It was only when employees felt that the organization was investing in them—and was interested in keep them around for the long term—that loyalty shot up.

IMPLICATIONSThe study suggests that “no strings attached” training opportuni-ties communicate a valuable message: that the employer cares about employees’ careers and sees them as people worthy of investment. This perceived commitment from an employer leads to the increase in loyalty. By tying performance goals into the training process, organizations muddy the waters and turn a perceived benefit into a requirement with consequences.

Stephen J. Meyer is the CEO and director of learning and development at the Rapid Learning Institute, where he developed the concept for six-to-ten-minute

“Quick Take” rapid-learning modules. He is currently a regular speaker with Vistage International, the world’s largest executive forum group. Meyer received his MBA from the Wharton School at the University of Pennsylvania, and prior to starting the Rapid Learning Institute (and its parent company, Business 21 Publishing) he was the director of publishing at the Hay Group, a leading HR, benefits, and compensation consulting firm. He can be reached at [email protected]

To Boost Loyalty, Unlink Learning and Performance Goals

By Stephen J. Meyer

TALENT MANAGEMENT

HR INSIGHTS 19

Termination

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“ADAM” USED TO WORK AT A COMPANY that provided a catered

lunch (daily!) for everyone. The office basement housed a brand-new

gym facility with free fitness classes, and his employer offered

fun, offsite, team-building activities every month. Employees even

had a lot of say about their workspaces: they could choose between

traditional desks or standing desks, and between cubicles or desks

in open offices. In short, the company was saturated with workplace

perks. But Adam, a Millennial, stayed there for just over one year—

and then left. Sound familiar?

Take a look at the numbers. Over one-third of Millennials self-

report that they change jobs every one to three years.1 At the same

time, most companies say that the cost of replacing each Millennial

who leaves ranges from $15,000 $25,000.2 Together, these figures

point to a looming—and costly—retention crisis.

And although plenty of employers are following the trend of

offering workplace perks to attract Millennials, many companies have

found that perks alone won’t retain the members of this generation.

These workers aren’t leaving jobs because they think they’ll find

better perks somewhere else. They’re leaving because companies are

engaging in practices that drive them away. In particular, using any

of the five strategies listed below is a surefire method to decrease

the number of Millennials in your organization’s ranks.

COMMUNICATE POORLY

Millennials prioritize timely, constructive communication with both

their managers and their teammates. They constantly crave feedback

(and much more than just the annual performance review) on how

they’re doing, how they can improve, and how they can grow. Be open

to communicating with your Millennial team members, and be clear

and concise in your feedback to them. If you’re unable to get on the

same page with them, don’t be surprised when they leave in search

of a manager who can give them the communication they want.

GIVE RECOGNITION SHORT SHRIFT

Recognition really matters to Millennials—it increases their drive

and determination, improves their connection to the company, and is

their top motivation to produce great work. But simply dropping off

a gift card in an envelope isn’t enough. Research by the O.C. Tanner

Institute found that for recognition to resonate with Millennials, it

must be personal and sincere.3 So provide a meaningful recognition

experience to show your Millennials how much you value them.

LACK VISION AND EXECUTION

Millennials are inspired by incredible leaders, purchase brands they

believe in, and volunteer time and money in support of causes that

speak to them. So it should come as no surprise that they expect their

careers, too, to be driven by a powerful purpose that is communicated

and supported throughout the organization. Unless you take the time

to explain to Millennials what the company’s mission is and how

employees can contribute individually to it while living their values,

you’ll lose valuable talent as they head elsewhere for inspiration.

EMBRACE ARCHAIC POLICIES AND PROCEDURES

Millennials have no problem following the rules that make sense

and have a purpose. But if your company still upholds policies left

over from days of old (forbidding any social media use at work, for

example, or implementing yearly performance reviews instead of more

frequent check-ins), any Millennials who come on board will soon head

for the door. So make sure your company regulations fulfill a clearly

communicated and contemporary purpose. Otherwise, Millennials will

see right through your outdated practices and head to more modern

workplaces that have relevant and well-thought-out policies.

PROMOTE STAGNATION

There are two main areas in which stagnation can affect a company:

in employees’ lack of enthusiasm for their day-to-day work, and in the

lack of employee development opportunities. More often than other

generations, Millennials will change jobs when they fail to find purpose

and diversity in their everyday tasks. So make sure they know how their

jobs fit into the bigger picture and highlight the value of their roles by

encouraging them to weigh in on important business decisions.

Provide development opportunities, too, because 75% of

Millennials who leave their jobs do so because their current positions

“lack . . . advancement opportunities.”4 Offer avenues of growth (such

as training via online modules and participation in speaking events or

industry conferences) and encourage employees to take advantage of

them. Also, match each employee with a mentor who can help him or

her achieve personal and professional growth.

In 2015 the Millennial generation became the largest segment of the

workforce. In order to retain Millennials and engage them to produce

great work, make sure your company isn’t guilty of following practices

that alienate them. Then ask for their feedback on your management

and policies and listen to the real reasons they want to leave.

You’ll know when you’ve fully addressed their concerns, because

performance will rise, turnover will fall—and your company will have

a great group of happy and productive employees.

David Sturt is the executive vice president of marketing and de-velopment at the O.C. Tanner Institute and the author of Great Work: How to Make a Difference People Love. Todd Nordstrom is the director of institute content at the O.C. Tanner Institute. Throughout his career he has been a driving force and voice of business publishing and management sciences, reaching millions of readers in print and online. This article comes to us from our friends at O.C. Tanner and originally appeared on Forbes (www.forbes.com)

BY

DAVID S

TURT

AND

TODD NORDSTROM

1. Jobvite. 2015. Job Seeker Nation Study: Inside the Mind of the Job Seeker. www.jobvite.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/01/jobvite_ jobseeker_nation_2015.pdf.

2. Dan Schawbel. 2013. The Cost of Millennial Retention Study. millennialbranding.com/2013/cost-millennial-retention-study/.

3. See these two reports from the O.C. Tanner Institute: 5 Best Practices for Managing Multigernational Workforces (www.octanner.com/landing/multigenerational-workforces.html) and What Causes Great People to Produce Great Work (www.octanner.com/landing/offers/drivers-of-great-work.html).

4. Alan Goforth. 2015. “Why Millennials Quit Their Jobs.” BenefitsPro. www.benefitspro.com/2015/05/06/why-millennials-quit-their-jobs.

TALENT MANAGEMENT


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TERMINATION: PUT IT IN WRITING?

&MAKING AN EXEMPTION TO

DRUG-FREE WORKPLACE RULES

BY STRATEGIC HUMAN RESOURCES, INC.

Q. If I am letting an employee go for any reason, is it a good idea to put it in writing?

— A. Yes! Unless there are some extremely unusual circumstances, it is typically a

good idea to put an employee’s termination information in writing in order to clarify the events in process and eliminate any unnecessary confusion. Whether the situation involves a for-cause termination or a layoff, put-ting it in writing (without too much detail) provides closure and important information that the employee may not have fully absorbed during the termination meeting. Such a letter should include a brief description of the reason for the termination (e.g., “You are being laid off due to our current economic conditions,” “You are being terminated for violation of our atten-dance policy”). It should also include information about how and when the employee will receive his or her final paycheck and (if applicable) about when his or her benefits will end.

Q. We have a drug-free workplace policy and recently conducted drug screening across the entire workforce of a company we just ac-quired. One of the new company’s employees did not pass the test, and our policy states that failure to do so could result in “discipline up to and including termination.” However, this employee is a top performer who was highly recommended by the management of the company we acquired. Can we make an exception for this individu-al? If so, what do we need to do?

— A. It is fine to make an exception, but it is important to document it! You

should also let the employee know that you are giving him or her a second chance and encourage that individual to use your employee assistance pro-gram or a rehabilitation service. You’ll probably want to test the employee again, but because certain drugs can take a while to leave the body, waiting at least 60 (or even 90) days before retesting is a good idea.

Strategic Human Resources, Inc., is a national full-service HR management firm based in Cincinnati, Ohio. Its president and founder, Robin Throckmorton, can be reached at [email protected].

hand & m

arker: ©iS

tock.com/kyoshino

ASK THE EXPERT

HR INSIGHTS 21

WHEN BAD CAN BE GOODBY MIKE MCKERNS

WATER COOLER CHRONICLES: WARD OFF WINTER’S CHILL WITH HOMEMADE HOT COCOA When the mercury plummets, few things are as warming—or as welcome—as a steaming cup of hot chocolate. If you’re accustomed to turning to a packet of just-add-water mix to create your cocoa, you’ll be pleased to know that you can make a much better version yourself with just a few minutes at the stove. This recipe is both easily multiplied (cocoa for a crowd, anyone?) and easily customized (see the variations below). Get ready for a homemade treat that’s so delicious, you’ll never want to go back to the instant powder!

Yield: 1 servingTime: about 5 minutes

NUTRITIONAL INFO PER SERVING: Calories: 392 cal

Fat: 15 g

Dietary fiber: 5 g

Sugars: 31 g

Protein: 14 g

What you’ll need:2 Tb Dutch process cocoa2 Tb sugar1 ½ cups whole milk

Directions: 1. In a mug large enough to hold

one full serving, combine the cocoa and the sugar with enough milk (about 2 Tb) to make a paste.

2. In a small saucepan, heat the rest of the milk over medium-high heat, stirring frequently, until it reaches a low simmer.

3. Slowly pour the hot milk into the mug, mixing well to dissolve the paste.

variations: ▷ This recipe uses whole milk

because of its rich flavor and body, but skim or part-skim milk would also work (but yield slightly different results).

▷ Add a dollop of whipped cream or a big marshmallow—or both!—to your full mug.

▷ Sprinkle a dusting of cinnamon or nutmeg on top.

▷ Fortify your hot cocoa with an ounce of spirits. Creme de menthe, amaretto, and Frangelico are all delicious here (though not at the same

time!).

Turnover is typically one of the key metrics that an HR department monitors to track performance in hiring, managing, training, etc. In his article in this issue, “Churnover: When Turnover Gets Out of Control,” Brian Formato mentions that turnover can create opportunities for managers to “improve the quality of their teams” by replacing underperforming employees with superstars. But because his article focuses on addressing chronic turnover in one position, he just scratches the surface of what many consider “good” turnover—a topic that definitely merits further discussion.

The value of good turnover is often underestimated, in part be-cause all turnover is usually measured equally. The reason for this is pretty clear: there are no simple formulas for calculating the positive and negative financial impacts of good turnover and bad turnover and comparing them with each other. Turnover costs, which can vary wildly and range from several thousand dollars to (for senior manage-ment and leadership positions) well over six figures, involve four main areas:

· The cost to separate an employee and process him or her out of the company

· The cost to recruit and hire a replacement

· The cost to train the new hire

· The cost of lost productivity

(The last factor can be quite significant when looking at positions, such as sales, that directly relate to generating revenue for the company.)

Even though good turnover has some up-front costs, it can also have a financial upside in the long term—especially if you’re replac-ing an underperformer. If you take the time to separate turnover into

“good” and “bad” categories before measuring, you may get more ac-curate measurements of HR and management performance. Consider, for example, a salesperson who only hits 50% of his or her annual quota of $1 million. Each year that person stays in your company costs you $500K in new business, but a more skilled salesperson has the potential to boost those numbers dramatically.

Turnover comes in many shapes and sizes. In addition to good turnover (the departure of underperformers), companies also experi-ence bad turnover (the loss of mid-level and top performers), and neu-tral turnover (attrition due to retirement and the end of seasonal work and internships). Bad turnover should be your primary data point, and you should focus your attention on decreasing it by finding and addressing its root causes. Consider its counterpart, good turnover, as an opportunity to examine how underperformers made it into the organization or position in the first place.

Mike McKerns, SPHR, is the editor in chief of HR Insights and cofounder of Mamu Media LLC. He can be reached at [email protected].

Water: ©iStock.com/GrafissimoJ A N U A R Y / F E B R U A R Y 2 0 1 622

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