LIVE from SuccessConnect
Friday June 19th - SuccessConnect NYC!
Thursday June 18th - SuccessConnect NYC!
Thursday June 18th - Opening the NASDAQ!
This morning we had the opportunity to open the NASDAQ, so we took some of our wonderful customers along to share the experience! Take a look at the video of the opening along with a few pics.
Tuesday June 16th - SuccessConnect Chicago!
Tanzy Lawhorn from Briggs & Stratton won the People Performance Radio Podcast drawing for a iPod Nano loaded with a whole archive of Talent Management Thought Leader podcasts!
More great sessions!
Monday June 15th - SuccessConnect Chicago!
June 8-9th - SuccessConnect San Francisco!
Free Makes Me Happy!
By Hilary Salazar, Community Manager
Free grilled chicken at KFC. Free tote bag with purchase. Free samples at Costco. Free….conference? Now THAT is rare.
Each year, SuccessFactors hosts our user conference with our customers from around the globe. Last year, we had tremendous attendance at our conference in San Francisco. But this year, we’re changing it up. For the first time, SuccessConnect is coming to 4 different cities—San Francisco, Chicago, New York, and Melbourne. And—it’s completely free this year! Yes, I too am pleasantly surprised.
To quote our CEO, Lars Dalgaard:
In an effort to meet the needs of our customers and this ever changing economic environment, SucccessFactors has made two important changes to our customer conference. First, we are bringing our customer conference to you! We realize that in times like these travel budgets are tight and every penny counts. Secondly, each event will be one and a half days of fantastic content for FREE! We plan to deliver as we always do with customer lead sessions, ask the experts, product demonstrations, executive 1:1 meetings, industry breakouts, networking time and much more. This is unprecedented in a time like this, but we know how important it is for you to have the opportunity to listen, learn and share with your peers in this environment.
So despite tough times, we wanted to make sure that this important event was accessible to more customers across all regions and industries. With a record number of submissions for presentations by our diverse and global customer base, we are excited to still bring this event to our growing customer base. “What are the dates?” you ask?
San Francisco, CA - June 8 - 9, 2009
Chicago, IL - June 15 - 16, 2009
New York, NY - June 18 - 19, 2009
Melbourne, Australia - August 13 - 14, 2009
In each city, you can take advantage of all you have come to know about SuccessConnect, from industry keynotes to customer lead sessions; from product and partner demonstrations to ask the experts; from industry breakouts to networking galore. And, as usual, we are adding some new and exciting parts to SuccessConnect Local. We will be offering one-on-one meetings with our executive team throughout the event. If you want to spend 20 minutes with a SuccessFactors executive to get to know our business better or share your company goals, we will assist in setting up the appropriate meeting for your needs.
Row, row, row your boat gently down the stream…
By Philip Carty, Vice President, Eastern Area, Canada and Latin America
We are all familiar with the popular children’s song, “Row, row, row your boat”:
Row, row, row your boat
gently down the stream,
merrily, merrily, merrily, merrily
life is but a dream
Why do I begin my post with this? In this song, the Stream is consciousness and the Dream is our goal and our passion. In these times of challenge and bad weather it’s very easy to become less mindful, more distracted and to row furiously in no particular direction. In some cases, we’re not even in the boat.
So what are we to do?
At one of our recent company All Hands meetings, our CEO Lars asked me to take 5 minutes to share a story or insight about what we can do in times like these to be more mindful, more clear. This is a subject that I am passionate about, and I wanted to share it here on HappyFactors as well.
We all have to contend with a lot of noise these days. The papers – ugh! The news – ugh! The pundits – ugh! Recession, depression, foreclosure, job loss. Sir Allen, Thain, Geithner and Madoff. Yuck! In these times, we don’t know if we should plug in, tune out, turn off or just give up. What are we to do?
“Go gently, quietly, merrily down the stream….”
I have had the benefit of having some great teachers who turned me on to some great writers and speakers and leaders who taught me some great stuff. In particular, one who comes to mind for me these days is a guy named J. Krishnamurti. He said that meditation and mindfulness is not sitting cross legged on the floor, but rather a moment to moment thing all day long.
His view is that what comes at us, the external stimulus, is usually reacted to out of our memory. This works well with most of what we deal with every day. However, there are some things that come at us where the reaction out of memory is completely wrong. The external stimulus brings up a memory of pain, or fear, or anger or what have you. I believe a lot of what comes at us today brings up fear.
What Krishnamurti said was to “be mindful in the moment, see the reaction come up, go with it if it’s right, let it pass if it’s wrong, and if you let it pass – then act mindfully.” With quiet mind. Perhaps instead of fear, courage will come up.
Breathe deep and act mindfully in the moment. What this leads to these days is less stress, more effective communication and relationship and a knowledge that in the times of challenge great insights can be obtained, obstacles can be overcome, and our mettle is tested and affirmed. Necessity is the mother of invention; necessity can be the mother of invention – mindfully done.
I have worked for twenty years on this. It has led me to behave actively rather than reactively, most of the time. It has led me to enjoy the moments, most of the time.
This morning, I got up before dawn with my daughter and watched both the moon set and the sun rise– a great full orange moon followed by an amazing sun rise. Talk about a moment of connection both with my daughter and with the grander reality. Very inspiring and something I will carry with me all week.
I think that in these times we need to work at being mindful, at enjoying the moments and recognize our connection to each other and the grander world. I think the clearer we get, the bigger our dreams, the greater our chances are to be the outlier that wildly succeeds in this environment. Merrily, indeed, down the stream!
Good luck everyone.
Welcome, 2009!
By Hilary Salazar, Associate Product Marketing Manager/Community Manager
Man am I glad you’re here. I think we’re all relieved to have the fresh start, clean-slate feeling that a new year like yourself brings. He was a tough one, that 2008, but I think we came out on top and proved just how resilient we can be. 2008 brought us financial turmoil, tighter budgets, apprehension about what was ahead for the markets, doing more with less, but at the same time instilled us with more razor-sharp focus, renewed creativity to deal with new challenges, and the drive to survive. It’s in the toughest of times that our fight instincts emerge, and this business environment is surely one of those times.
2009 is here and with it change is a-comin’—no matter what your political, economic, or professional views. While it’s nearly mid-February and yes this is the first HappyFactors post of 2009 (I know, I know!), I would like to nonetheless offer up the following insights on how to keep plugging away this year, no matter what changes come our way in the world of work.
Ways to keep you—and your team—motivated (dare I say happy?…) in tough times:
Deflect the negative. In difficult times—nay, at any time—you will always find people around you that focus on the negative and like to share their downbeat messages to anyone willing to listen. Take their messages with a grain of salt, don’t let them cloud the image you have of your company with biased opinion, and stay grounded in your own professional goals. Easier said then done, I know, but at the very least be mindful of the negative nancy’s around you.
Don’t pull back on communication with your team. Even if it’s news of scary things to come or uncertainty for your team, more communication is always better than leaving your team in the dark. Continue to include them on relevant team meetings, brainstorming sessions, quarterly planning, updates after management meetings, impromptu weekly updates, you name it. You’ll earn (and keep) their trust, and help to prevent your top talent from a frenzied job search out of fear that their position may not exist come next quarter.
Manage expectations appropriately. Echoing the point above, manage the expectations of your team in the best ways that you can. When performance review time comes around this year, be sure that you’re rewarding them for the work their doing amidst difficult circumstances, and make sure that they know that they have a career path within the company (if this is the case) and are highly valued. If someone’s professional goals aren’t matching up with the opportunities available in your organization, communicate this appropriately and help them to map out the best path for them to excel professionally.
This is a chance to excel professionally in brave new ways. If you can prove your worth in tough times, your value is recognized ten-fold within your organization. This is your chance to truly make an impact at your company (and in your career), to prove that you can do more with less, to exhibit innovative ways to bring in more revenue, to shake up the status quo and do things differently to dramatically rewarding results. Don’t use these uncertain times to safely stand on the sidelines and continue doing things they way they’ve always been done.
Take ownership of your professional roadmap. Who ultimately determines your level of motivation (and happiness)? YOU. Own it. Tap into what gets you excited at work, what gets you up in the morning, what brought you to your organization originally, what drives you to perform, and align that with the work you’re doing each day. If what motivates you and the day-to-day of what you do at work are completely unaligned, I can guarantee that 2009 will be an even tougher year.
Have more suggestions for staying motivated? Share them here on HappyFactors! We’d love to hear from you.
Motivation in Trying Times
By Brendan Delumpa, User Interface Engineering Manager
A look at the lay of the land may cause most to pause. It certainly causes me to. The economy is clearly in a recession. The mortgage industry is busted. Global markets are experiencing some of the worst downturns we’ve seen in our lifetimes. But you know what? Despite how dreary things may be, I’m still incredibly motivated. Why talk about this anyway? Simply because getting motivated during times of adversity is oftentimes an incredibly difficult thing. Our instinct tells us to flee or withdraw. That’s the “flight” side of the fight or flight instinct that is part of our very nature.
What about the “fight” side of the equation? This is where our reason and, for lack of a better term, moral sense come into play. These are the personal traits that make us stand up to adversity, stare it in the face, and say, “Bring it on!” What I’m going to share with you here are not ways to get yourself motivated, but a couple of reminders, if you will, that form the basis for getting yourself motivated.
To start with, I’d like to share a concept with you that I learned several years ago that has its roots in the following saying:
The difference between dreams and reality is a fine line. That line is called Willingness.
That is such a powerful phrase. Nothing we do, nothing we choose, nothing we accomplish gets done without our willingness to execute. And mind you, this has nothing to do with whether or not we like what we’re doing. We are where we are because we’ve made the choices to be where we are, and those choices are the result of our willingness to make those choices.
How does this relate to motivation? In order to get motivated, we simply have to be willing to get motivated. Once you’re willing to do anything, you’ll do the things to make what start out as dreams or concepts and turn them into reality.
Next, there’s a Latin phrase that I’ve told myself over the years in times of adversity: Illegitimi non carborundum. This is an aphorism for “don’t let the bastards grind you down.” For me, it’s a rather humorous phrase I’ve used to remind me of a much more serious topic: Integrity. Forget about your duty to the company. Forget about whether or not you’re living up to whatever image you have of yourself, or whether or not you’re living up to what others may expect of you. When it’s all said and done, all you have is your integrity, which can be summed up with some simple phrases:
Integrity is blatant self-honesty, folks. It’s also a measure, albeit subjective, of how we all show up in a given situation. It’s greater than duty, and it is certainly greater than loyalty. And frankly, integrity is something we should never sacrifice – for anything. If that means you go elsewhere to ensure you maintain your integrity, so be it, and good for you for sticking up for your integrity! I applaud you.
For myself, within the context of my job here at SuccessFactors, I made a personal commitment to not only perform my duties here, but to do my best to excel in those duties – every day. My integrity demands that I live up to that commitment. In times of seeming turmoil like this where it’s so easy to say, “Screw it all!” I can fall back on my personal integrity to help see me through the troubling times.
Finally, despite whatever internally or externally triggered turmoil you’re experiencing or have experienced, put that stuff aside and what are you left with? Basically the same vision and objectives our company has had from day one. Folks, our collective goal of “changing the way the world works” hasn’t changed. From my perspective, I may be a small cog in the wheel, but that very phrase is what attracted me to this company in the first place, and it plays a large part in continuing to push me to contribute to the realization of that vision.
So I urge you all—focus on the vision. Another way I’ve heard this put is: “Focus on the goal, and let the universe take care of the rest.” It’s also a reminder to not fall back on the little irritating details that might drag us down. Let’s face it. Irritations are a fact of life. We can’t avoid them, but we can rise above them by focusing on what’s important.
I’m not saying anything new here and frankly, this was never intended to be a guide to motivate anyone. As you’ve noticed, I haven’t provided any step-by-step procedures to get motivated. Each person has their own methodology. But just remember these three points:
What Motivates You in Tough Times?
There’s no question about it—times are tough and we’re all making adjustments. Ok…that’s an understatement. So I was curious—what keeps my coworkers motivated and energized in times like these? I asked this question of my SuccessFactors colleagues and got a fantastic variety of answers and insight.
In no particular order…
• Tough times naturally lead to more creativity. Things can’t be done as they’ve always been
done, so take the opportunity to do things in a totally new (dare I say better) way.
• Enjoying time with my family—my nieces and nephew, especially.
• You should have seen it in the 30s! OK, so maybe I don’t go back that far…But I remember lining up to put gas in my parents car in 1974, getting laid off multiple times, being acquired, and seeing my investments (all $11,000) tank in 1987. I have a wonderful family, wonderful friends, wonderful co-workers, and a wonderful cellar full of wine! Tough times, scmuff times…
• What gets me up in the morning is knowing that if I keep putting my best foot forward I’ll
eventually climb to the top, and the view will be magnificent.
• Top employees are rewarded in tough times. Put on you’re A-game and your efforts won’t go unnoticed.
• Gas prices are down!
• Faith and action. The ‘law of averages’ will always catch up with us. We had our good times. Why should tough times be any different? Things can only get better from here so have faith, be positive, and continue working!
• My Children. First, it is great having my girls around and watching them grow. Plus, there is guidance to provide non-stop. Second, they wake up at about 6:30am and usually come into the bedroom and jump on us. That’s motivation.
What motivates YOU? I welcome you to post a reply to this post and share your own insight with readers as well.
Gobble Gobble.
My Awesome IT Job
Check out what Bil Harmer, VP of Security at SuccessFactors, had to say to ZDNet about his job here!
Movin’ On Up
By Gabriel Marusic, Account Manager
I joined SuccessFactors in August of 2006 as a Lead Gen rep serving the mid-market (Lead Gen, or Lead Generation, is our team that calls companies and introduces them to SuccessFactors). I interviewed at a number of different companies but really had my heart set on joining SuccessFactors from the get-go. I felt that SuccessFactors’ products enabled companies to better apply top-notch management practices that I learned in college, and I knew that I wanted to be involved with this company. So I was thrilled when asked to join the mid-market Lead Gen team as a starting point in my new career in sales, and was pumped with ambition to learn and grow. Since then it has been a fantastic experience for me both in personal and professional growth. While in Lead Gen I had the opportunity to learn about our products and the needs of our potential customers prior to them coming on board. This really created a very solid base for me and provided an introduction to the workings of sales and marketing which would facilitate my growth here. I also had the honor of attending President’s Club for 2007, which recognizes top performers in sales, and was able to go to Mexico! After a successful two year position in Lead Gen, I was able to take part in a development program that SuccessFactors was offering, which provided training and mentoring to allow me to move up into an account management role here on our small business team—what an opportunity. Now I’m in a new role working with our existing customers and I’m happier than ever. I’ve got a great manager who started in sales and like many others here was able to take his career up a notch and now leads his own team.
In addition to my professional growth, I’ve also enjoyed some great personal moments here at SuccessFactors. I’ve made some lifelong friendships along the way–one of my fellow Lead Gen team members who was promoted with me was also a groomsman at my wedding. I get to play on our company soccer team and join other SF’ers on amazing company events (did I mention Mexico?). Without a doubt, this is a fantastic place to work and I’m looking forward to the road ahead here.
Don’t Color Outside the Lines
By Hilary Terrell, Associate Product Marketing Manager
Picture this…
You’re a 28 year old HR associate at a prestigious academic institution. You’re young and energetic, and eager to influence the people you work with in a positive way. You send out a friendly email thanking employees for turning in their timecards on time, because you appreciate their efforts and, well, what’s wrong with saying thank you. Your boss, however, does not appreciate your efforts. You get reprimanded for sending out an email that is outside of the standard bureaucratic emails that usually come from this HR department—a department that is very set in its ways and with employees that have been there for years, many for decades. “I can’t say thank you??” you think, “and try to boost people’s moral?” You are left baffled and frustrated by an institution and department that does not seem to embrace gratitude, change, or individuality.
This isn’t a fabricated example, but something that happened recently to a very close friend of mine. When she told me about it I thought it really touched upon two timely topics in the world of work—embracing change, and the clash of generations in the workplace.
The former is something I’ve seen numerous articles on recently, from NPR to BusinessWeek. As a recent BusinessWeek article put it,
“…every generation is different and shaped by the events of their formative years. Yet every generation is alike, as they all bring new energy, new ideas, and new beliefs about work and life in general. Historical and technological forces have always combined to bring the generations together in some ways and to draw them apart in others.”
“Generational” gaps are a natural occurrence in the workplace, but not something to be wary of or to apply an “us vs. them” mentality to. I believe it’s less of a clash between generations—a fuzzy generalization at best—and more of an issue of differing beliefs about work and the way things *should* be done on a day to day basis. In the example above, the older manager felt that the HR associate’s thank you email was not something that they, or the other employees of their experience level, would have sent out. So was the email flat out wrong to send, or did it rub the manager the wrong way because it was atypical?
Right or wrong, younger employees crave independence and creative thinking—and discouraging this at all turns will turn them off from a work environment. And when a younger employee is discouraged at work, they’re also of the mind to believe that other opportunities are within their grasp and won’t put up with a culture that stifles them. Right or wrong, younger employees crave feedback and constructive criticism, and a slap on the hand when you’re displeased with their work won’t do the trick. Perhaps in the story above, the manager could have acknowledged, even praised, the HR associate for doing something outside of the norm by personally thanking other employees. And if this was not protocol for the institution, aside from evaluating why this would be, perhaps the manager could have suggested what would be more appropriate in the future. Instead, she got a firm “don’t-color-outside-the-lines-again” warning and nothing more. Now she walks, and emails, on eggshells each day.
This leads to the second issue the story brings up—the unwillingness to embrace change. HR departments (the only department with word ‘human’ in it!) have the opportunity to be some of the pioneers of embracing change in a company, as they have their pulse on the kinds of employees the company is hiring and nurturing, the direction the company is generally headed in, and a direct hand in shaping a company’s culture. A company that fails to adapt to change at the HR level seems doomed to hire the same kinds of people over and over again until they’re scraping the bottom of the barrel, and doomed to do things the exact same way they’ve always done until someone at the C-level trickles down the necessary changes (or worse). HR departments have the ability to influence the corporate culture, the morale of current employees, the interest of potential employees, and much more, in a very powerful way. And doing things the way they’ve always been done just doesn’t seem to cut it anymore. The HR associate in the example wasn’t asking her manager to change the corporate communications policy—she was trying to connect with the employees she communicates with in a more human way than she had seen up until that point in her department. Change in that direction could be quite good.
I’m happy to say that this is something that would never happen here at SuccessFactors—quite the opposite. We are all lucky to work in a place that embraces individuality and doing something against the status quo, especially if it achieves great results. We aren’t the small startup we were 6+ years ago, as we now have hundreds of employees around the globe and sound business processes in place. But we’re still a company where doing something in a new way—whether it’s through email communication, marketing strategies, the design of the product, or the ways that we interact with our prospects and customers—is encouraged and rewarded. We’re coloring outside the lines and proud of it!
We are also a company where I have yet to see any clashing of generations in the workplace, and I believe this is in large part due to our open, collaborative culture. We have employees that range from fresh and green out of college to seasoned professionals, and are fortunate that everyone is able to learn from the range of people they work with each day, and that we can truly find the place where we fit best in this company—no trying to fit square pegs into round holes here. No matter you’re position, you’re going to work closely with employees with varied backgrounds and from across the organization, whether they sit right next to you or on the opposite coast. And with close connections fostered each day between employees—be it through our Employee Directory, or a cross-departmental project—we are all the more prepared to deal with change as it comes our way and ready to face the future as a cohesive SuccessFactors team. Q4, here we come!
Reply to this post—tell us how your organization is prepared for change and/or embracing generational gaps in the workplace!
The Race
By Chris Lozaga, SuccessFactors Research Analyst
It’s 8:15 in the morning. Half strained from a restless night, my eyes dart right to left and back again, pouring over pixels, as I sort through my inbox. The bitter aftertaste of bergamot and artificial sweetener are the only noticeable effects of my hastily made morning tea, which hasn’t kicked in yet. Outlook tells me that aside from the 30 plus legitimate messages waiting for my response that I have 11 junk e-mails - maybe I’ll peruse them later for a quick laugh. Finally, I get to “clickin.” This is what I call my two-handed method of speed sorting e-mail, one on the mouse, one on the keyboard. I am sure I could do it all with hotkeys, but once you learn something one way… 30 messages become 15 in no time. “What’s this?” My vision sharpens suddenly and I can feel my heart beat just a little bit faster. My morning caffeine actually working now? Maybe. More likely it is “the race.”
Someone needs help, sent an email out to the entire company - pretty rare in other workplaces, but it happens here every day (hey, I could peg the CEO in the back of the head with a paper airplane from my seat if I wanted to, we have an open culture here. Not that I would ever actually do that, or even think about it… ahem). This is how “the race” begins. Anywhere else, helping out this person would be the last thing on everyone’s priority list. At SuccessFactors, helping your coworkers is priority number one, well unless a customer needs something. In fact, being the first person to help is sort of a badge of honor. The race is on!
I do research at SuccessFactors, meaning I have folders full of PDFs, whitepapers, and research projects that I know could help. The trick to winning the race is making an impact. It is no good to be the first responder if you don’t actually help. Before I know it my previously tired eyes have read through six surveys, blood is coursing to my hands. I always like the mechanical clatter of a keyboard when you are going at it full bore. I can’t type more than 25 words per minute, but it feels good.
“Damn!”
You know that little bubble that pops up when you get an e-mail? Someone beat me to the finish line. I will finish my e-mail and send it anyway, I have unique insights into the problem that could also be helpful.
That’s the real difference of working at SuccessFactors. Helping your coworkers is addictive and everyone’s input is valued. Anywhere else, this level of communication would be considered noise. In this office, it’s the soundtrack to an exciting race to make a difference.
Well, I may have lost this one, but I will be ready for the next “race.” At least I am charged up and ready to work now. I’ll just take a minute to flex my fingers, stiffened up from maxing out my keyboarding skills, crack my knuckles, and start working my way through the rest of my morning e-mail.
