Tag Archives: Thinking About HR

The “people” buzzword

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People_readyDon’t know if you’ve caught any of Microsoft’s spiffy, new $500 million business-targeted campaign.  Themed “People-Ready” it asks businesses to consider whether they embody that ideal. Or, in other words, whether they have the tools in place to enable their most important resource – their people. Here’s a press release and an article in AdWeek.

The TV spot I saw had a bunch of business people doing business-y things and talking about differentiation. They ask themselves about operations, about marketing, etc. And they find no opportunity for optimization or advantage. Then, they pose a question that goes something like: “so what IS our competitive advantage?” Then one of the business-y guys nods through the glass to the people working at their desks and says “them.”

It’s no surprise that the push is to convince CEOs and the like that “Microsoft technology can help them get their employees to succeed” in the words of the AdWeek article. But my (obviously skewed and probably simplistic) reaction is to wonder if more word-processing software and an upgraded operating system are really what’s going to help drive people to perform.

As a loyal PC user, I’m excited about Windows Vista and the new Office. They look cooler and seem like they will make some computer things easier and more efficient. But will they “get employees to succeed” in ways they haven’t been able to before? Probably not.

It’s very en vogue these days to focus on people. Companies do it in their annual reports, FastCompany’s “Why we hate HR” article spawned volumes of comment and criticism and software vendors like SuccessFactors are gaining popularity as we help organizations manage talent in new ways. “People” is popular in the business world. But let’s take a minute to understand that people + technology can = many different things.

Spreadsheets, databases, operating systems and word processing software help people do tasks better. Talent management software helps organizations do people better. With all the people-talk these days, don’t get confused. Only one type of technology is truly focused on driving success through people. The rest is just marketing.

Stress this!

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AngrydaceAngryfaceGuess what? Senior executives and managers are stressed at work. No, seriously.

This is an obvious conclusion for many of us, but nevertheless the result of a nationwide survey from last month. The top three sources of stress were “deadlines (52%), interruptions (42%) and conflicting responsibilities (37%)” according to this ground-breaking research.

The last one is the only one that made my ears perk up. Conflicting responsibilities. Certainly we all have things pulling us in different directions. That’s a normal part of any job. Prioritization. But I wonder to what extent it relates to the idea of goal alignment.

If it were clear which actions were in line with overall corporate goals - which work would most drive the company forward – perhaps it would help make “conflicting responsibilities” less conflicting. Perhaps.

The fatal flaw of self-assessments

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SelfevalEveryone thinks they’re above average.

This tidbit found via the Damn Interesting blog where they deconstructed a report by some Cornell researchers on the topic. What they found was that the worst performers in a variety of tested categories often rated themselves on par with the best performers and in most cases far above average. Top performers are of no help either. Even they weren’t able to accurately assess themselves, rating themselves lower than their performance merited.

The reasoning for these behaviors is fascinating. Poor performers lack the skills to perform – which are the same skills required to evaluate their performance. They don’t understand that they don’t understand, and so believe their abilities compare positively to their peers.

On the other hand, Top performers incorrectly assume that their competence is shared among their peers – leading them to rank themselves lower than they deserve.

You can see what this looks like in the chart above. People that fall into the lower three quartiles believe they performed better than they actually did. The highest performers underestimate themselves.

There’s relevance here to self-assessments as the HR world understands them. When asked to evaluate themselves on a variety of competencies, it would seem that people can be expected to incorrectly rate themselves most of the time. Poor and average performers will overestimate their abilities, and top performers will underestimate them.

So what to do? I think that the importance of gap analysis makes itself evident here. It’s only through external feedback that people can understand the difference between what they believe to be true and others’ perceptions of the reality. There’s nothing clearer than a competency gap:

Competency-gaps

 When you can see what you think about yourself right next to what others think about you – there’s simply nothing more compelling to a change in perceptions and ultimately, in behavior.

 

What drives employee engagement?

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Ee.of.monthOur new poll for the next couple of weeks is on the topic of employee engagement. Specifically, what, in your opinion, are the most important drivers of engagement?

The responses are based on a 2003 report from Towers Perrin called “Understanding what drives employee engagement.” (PDF) Based on some statistical analysis, they arrived at 10 workplace attributes that they determined to be the most critical in driving employee engagement.

Of these 10, which are the most important in your organization?

Performance Reviews most pressing HR issue

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You may have noticed a poll in the left-hand column over the past couple of weeks. Though clearly not scientific in any way, the poll has provided some insight into what’s on the minds of our readers.

We asked, “What is your most pressing HR issue?” 

We had 50 people respond to the poll, and the results are interesting. Despite all the talk about succession and compensation, the core issue (28%) for our respondents was Performance Reviews followed followed closely by Goal Alignment (24%).

Poll1Results

To me, it indicates that Performance Management and Goal Alignment are still the biggest pain points for HR practitioners. They represent the heart of talent management initiatives, and Succession and Comp. are just further down in the hierarchy of HR needs.

I’d be curious to hear what you guys have to say about the results. Do you think they’re generally representative, or are they skewed for some reason?

Engagement is core to retention

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A management issues article points out that employee engagement is THE KEY concept in retention:

Rather than working on employee engagement in parallel with staff retention and talent management, a high quality strategic emphasis on employee engagement will as a matter of course positively influence both staff retention and talent management.

Make employee engagement your ‘hub’ not an after-thought.

Note to self: customer success matters most

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As you might imagine, this article on one of our competitors made its way around the office like wildfire today. Why? Well, for one reason it shows that good technology is hard to find and even harder to deploy. There are just a lot of vendors who over-promise and under-deliver. Its a solid and sobering reminder of the challenges we face as we work to continue to deliver for our hundreds of customers and nearly 1.5 million end users who have entrusted us with their success.

By way of background, apparently after months of delay in implementing a jail management system in Arkansas, “There was a last-ditch effort by Softscape to try to get a functional system in, and it didn’t work,” said Assistant County Attorney Amanda Mankin-Mitchell.” So after managing the jail with pen and paper since the end of last year, Pulaski County officials switched back to their old system and are asking for their money back.

The bottom line for me, and really for all of the employees at SuccessFactors, is that the ONLY thing that matters is customer success. In evaluating software vendors, it’s obviously important to make sure the systems can functionally accomplish your goals. But if that system can’t get rolled out, adopted and then used successfully for years to come, it simply doesn’t matter if it can do every single thing on your wish-list down to the smallest piece of custom functionality.

At a Conference Board event in NYC this week, I had the pleasure of watching our customers Tim Toterhi from Quintiles Transnational and Susan O’Connor from Gartner talk about their journeys and successes with performance and talent management to a room of about one hundred top HR professionals. That was another kind of reminder for me: When we work hard at execution and focus on customer success, it actually can and does happen.

That’s the kind of reminder I like. The successful kind.

Let’s keep those coming.

 

 

Stop checking your BlackBerry when I’m talking to you!

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Via Gautam, I came to this Time article about “microinequities” and “microgestures” – fancy talk for the horribly frustrating, inconsiderate, rude and otherwise small but rage-inducing behaviors like using your BlackBerry in the middle of a conversation or saying someone’s name incorrectly or talking on your cell phone during a meeting, etc.

Besides the crass ignorance displayed by such actions, it turns out they may actually have a negative impact on workforce performance as they work to demotivate otherwise engaged employees.

And, of course, there’s a consultant who goes around advising companies on these issues.

Do less, think more

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A Fortune Magazine article discusses the genesis of big ideas and concludes that they don’t come from working hard.  Lightbulb

We all know that when our bodies and brains are overworked, our ability to think creatively is substantively diminished. So why should you care? Mostly because as business shifts to a knowledge-based economy, it is just that sort of big thinking that will ultimately equate to competitive advantage.

Almost 40 years ago, Peter Drucker noted that “All one can think and do in a short time is to think what one already knows and to do as one has always done.”  So in our CrackBerry, Instant Messaging, Multi-tasking universe – doing more little things doesn’t necessarily (or even usually) add up to something consequential.

So if doing more doesn’t get us ahead, what does? How about doing less? If you’ve ever had a great idea while sitting on the toilet or doing some gardening in the backyard, you understand the point. According to the article, a  “team of Dutch psychologists revealed last month in the journal Science that the unconscious mind is a terrific solver of complex problems when the conscious mind is busy elsewhere or, perhaps better yet, not overtaxed at all.”

In other words, big ideas come when you’re not thinking anything that’s obviously productive at all. Maybe the best competitive advantage HR departments can provide for their companies is more flex-time, vacation days and the like. More opportunities to do everything by doing absolutely nothing.

Something to think about, anyway. What do you think?

Managing people as they manage their picks

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With March Madness upon us (college basketball’s NCAA tournament for those of us who could care less) there’s a lot of talk about lost productivity due to workday engagement with the games. This is especially true now that the games are being broadcast over the Internet -making it possible for employees to watch from their desktops.

This Washington Post article explains how some companies are simply shutting them off  by blocking access to the tournament site. But in the cat and mouse game that is workplace recreation, some websites like CBS’s SportsLine are offering a “Boss Button.” A simple click while watching a game will switch the screen to a spreadsheet.

In any event, it’s no laughing matter. By some estimates the economy will lose productivity valued at more than $3.8 billion. 

What are you doing, if anything, to curb the enthusiasm?