Depends on who you ask.

Via digg.com, I came across an article from the WSJ entitled “Employers increasingly favor bonuses to raises” – which discusses the whole concept of performance-linked bonuses. According to the article, 80% of companies will offer some from of bonus program this year up from 78% last year and 67% in 1997. The article discusses the pay-for-performance initiatives of Whirlpool, which has made more employees eligible for bonuses and increased the maximum bonus that can be achieved.

According to the article “Whirlpool also awards merit raises based on performance. But it considers bonuses a more powerful motivator. “It starts breaking away at the notion of entitlement,” says David Binkley, Whirlpool’s human-resources chief. With merit pay, “if you just spread it around, it just raises your costs.” Across corporate America, he notes, “those days are coming to an end where everyone just automatically gets this 3.6%, 3.7%” merit raise.”

In case you were wondering, the average raise for 2007 is projected to be 3.7%, up from 3.6% this year  – according to data from Hewitt.

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A Note: this post was written by a guest writer, and does not necessarily represent my opinion. That said, I think it’s important to host a variety of thoughts and perspectives on the blog and thus, I give you the following article written by Frank Lynn, Proposal Manager at SuccessFactors. As always, please feel free to comment.

Imagine this nightmare – You leave your house in the morning juggling your keys, your coffee and your cell phone as you set off for work where you are the Director of HR at a growing, global organization. As you approach your car you notice your windshield is smashed to pieces and you realize instantly that your laptop is gone, along with a spreadsheet you created last week containing payroll information on your 1,500 employees.

Many companies understand the risk associated with sensitive customer data, but they don’t realize that an employee data breach could be just as serious. In today’s post-HIPAA, post-Sarbanes-Oxley environment, implementing controls to safeguard information such as financial statements and medical records is top of mind. CIOs and Risk Management professionals are under a lot of stress. All it takes is one lost or stolen laptop to put an entire organization at risk – and generate a barrage of negative publicity (e.g., the recent Dept. of Veteran Affairs mishap that exposed 26 million patient health records).

The European Union led the way in protecting employee data privacy with its 1995 directives regarding collection and use of employee data; which included giving employees rights to access and correct data concerning themselves. This means EU residents can check their personnel file for errors like you’d check your credit report. The EU also restricts transfers of personal data to countries that do not ensure “an adequate level of protection.” Many EU nations impose strict fines and penalties in the event of an employee data breach.

Canada has also followed suit with the Personal Information Protection and Electronic Documents Act (PIPEDA) that states companies in certain sectors such as banking and aviation must have a legitimate purpose for collecting, using and disclosing employees’ data records.

In response to foreign data privacy laws, the US Department of Commerce created the Safe Harbor Certification process. Safe Harbor Certification is comprised of an annual self-certification process where companies are required to abide by seven principles of data security. This takes navigating the legalese of foreign laws out of the equation, by adhering to a data privacy standard that is universally acceptable.

This issue is upon us and it is here to stay. Make sure your internal systems and processes are safe, your data is restricted appropriately and your application vendors can live up to the highest security standards.

For more information about data privacy laws, take a look at these sites:
http://www.export.gov/safeharbor/index.html
http://www.privcom.gc.ca/legislation/02_06_01_01_e.asp

Sometimes I read these articles and wonder who benefits from all this fear-mongering. Clearly, someone is out to scare the heck out of us. In any event, Forbes presents “Where have all the leaders gone?,” a rather sanguine look at the looming talent shortage at the C level.

In the article, commentator Kevin Cashman (CEO of a leadership development firm) responds to reader questions. One reader asks “…what practical measures can senior leaders take to deal with potential crises?” Cashman responds:

It may sound simplistic, but the best thing a top leader can do is be a great coach, boss and mentor. After conducting 19,700 exit interviews of key employees leaving companies, the Saratoga Institute found that 85% of bosses thought their top people left for more money and opportunity. But the real reason behind the turnover: 80% said they left due to poor management and leadership or because of a dysfunctional company culture. If you’re a board member, a CEO or a leader on the front lines, paying more attention to the development of your people and teams is the crucial variable for retaining key people.

It’s a point well made. Talent shortages are far more acute for companies that don’t actually work to develop their employees. Keeping the top performers you already have is far easier and more efficient than going back to the well.

Though perhaps a bit risque for an HR-related blog, one of my colleagues sent me this link and I thought I would pass it along. I figured it might be good for a Friday afternoon chuckle at the very least.

I wont get into details - if you want to know, you can click the link and listen – but suffice it to say that this radio DJ is not going to take it anymore, and she wants all her listeners to know. I bet she’d vote yes on the open salaries question, too.

(Related thought: I wonder if such public outburst are cathartic. I’m sure there are plenty of people who wish that they could tell their employer off, but when it’s over, do they feel better? Would you feel better?)

Though it’s always true with anything on this blog, i should note here in particular that this post represents my personal opinion on this matter, and not necessarily that of SuccessFactors.  – Max

Why public disclosure of vendor selections will make analysts and vendors more accountable to customers.

Gartner’s Jim Holincheck poses an interesting question. He wonders:

The reality is that industry analyst firms are also customers. We need technology to run our business. It does not make sense for us to build it all ourselves. So, like our clients, we use packaged applications. How transparent should we be about what vendors and products we use?

It’s interesting because Gartner, like most analyst firms, has very specific rules and regulations about when and how vendors can use Gartner’s name in marketing materials. That is to say – basically, never.

It’s not that I don’t understand the dilemma. Surely, in any competitive market, most vendors will be left unhappy when a 3rd party firm (whose value resides in their presumed objectivity) chooses one over all the rest. It can be construed as an implicit endorsement. How can Gartner (and others – like Forrester, Bersin, etc.) be considered objective once they have made a purchase decision for themselves?

But I’m honestly not sure there is a real conflict here. As a professional services firm, Gartner represents a very specific type of company. And, there are other factors that differentiate them as well – like size (medium), industry (technology) and geographic distribution (global). Those factors account for some of the most important considerations in the choice of a vendor for just about anything.

Therefore, the only realistic conclusion is that analyst firms choose vendors that are right for them; for their situation, specifications and needs. Its not logical to assume that the same situation, specifications and needs are shared by every company that might be influenced by a Gartner report. To put it another way, companies that follow in Gartner’s footsteps purely on the thinking that “whatever is right for Gartner is right for me” are probably making an ill-informed decision.

In that way, it can be argued that analyst firms are doing a disservice to their clients by hiding their own choices. By allowing customers the illusion that those choices are the only correct ones, they miss an opportunity to say “here’s why we picked vendor X, but your company is different in this way and so the choice of vendor X may not be right for you.”

Funny enough, Jim makes an innocent but telling misstep at the end of his post. Having apparently posted to his blog from his mobile device, the post is appended with the line: “Sent via Cingular Xpress Mail with Blackberry.” Clearly we all now know that Gartner (or at least Jim) is a customer of both Cingular and Blackberry. They have opened the proverbial kimono. Gartner’s choice of wireless vendor and wireless email service are now public information: Gartner chooses Cingular and Blackberry.

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The Chief Happiness Officer does. And he’s got good reason for wanting to know. Among other things, he thinks it might make salaries more fair, make it easier to retain the best employess and keep pressure on the highest earners to earn their keep.

The idea of open salaries is contentious. It’s throught provoking. It’s also downright brilliant. I’m a strong believer in the power of transparency to right wrongs, reduce red tape and eliminate waste –and I don’t see any reason why it wouldn’t work for salaries. Except one. it would require that employees be willing to accept their status in the corporation. For those at the bottom to understand that and be okay with being there.

To a certain extent, everyone knows their status already – people know how much they make and have a general idea of what others pull in. But to whatever extent they’ve justified those salaries to themselves, they would be forced, in this new world, to justify them to everyone else, too. “I’m okay with being worth $X.” That may just be too painful and demotivating to be productive for the organization.

The post is a rather fair dissection of both sides of the open/closed salaries argument – a worthy 5 minute read – even though we know which side wins.

From AOL/CareerBuilder comes this list of 12 signs you’re getting fired. Everyone loves lists, but perhaps this one is somewhat overzealous in its paranoia.

#4 on the list is “You had a bad review.” Certainly most companies don’t fire you for a bad review - even if you’re on a performance improvement plan as the article implies.

#12 is “You’re hearing rumors.” Yeah, that one is the key. ‘Cause as we all know, rumors are the source of all truth. Come on.

Though I’m frowning on parts of the execution – the concept is good (and there are some legitimate points in the article). So what are some REAL signs you’re about to lose your job? If I get enough comments I’ll post a list from the real experts – you!