The Value of Returning Moms to your Workforce

Posted on May 9, 2012 by Tim Sackett

I overheard on the radio about this Australian company who is rewarding returning mothers to their workforce by paying them Double their salary when they return to work, for the first 6 weeks. My first impression was – “Oh hell No – don’t let any of my female employees find out about this!”

For those who don’t know I run a very young company – not young on experience – young on average age of employee. It comes with the territory – most 3rd party recruiting companies have a fairly young workforce. Get new recruiters right out of college, train and grow them into your culture – make them part of the “family”. There’s something else that comes with all the fun and energy of a young workforce – a ton of weddings and a ton of babies! We have the standard punchlines – “Don’t drink the water here!”, etc. But the reality is, in the last 10 years – there hasn’t been a time when someone in the office hasn’t been pregnant. It’s now part of the culture.

The Australian company got me thinking – no, not about paying my returning moms double – that’s crazy talk! It got me thinking about how valuable my returning moms are to my company. It’s a huge worry I have every time one of my employees comes in to share their awesome news. “Hey, Tim I’ve got something to tell! I’m pregnant!” My response – “Awesome! I’m so happy for you! Who’s the father?” The “who’s the father” line is joke – I usually the know the father – remember – we’re a family – not much happens that we don’t know about. I honestly feel so excited for them. Internally, though, I’m going “Oh, Shit!”, because I know I’ve got a realistic 50/50 shot at getting that person back after they deliver. That’s nature – I love my job, but once I hold that baby in my arms – I love it more and I’m finding out a way where I don’t have to leave them all day.

So, now I understand why this Australian company is rewarding returning mothers. Give them a little extra incentive to return – knowing how hard it is to pull them away from their baby and start this new life as a mom and an employee. Life just got doubly hard – we’ll give you double the pay! You deserve it. As HR Pros and Organizations, we tend to struggle to really understand how difficult this transition is. We welcome the people back, we understand the sleep deprivation and the separation anxiety – but we honestly have no idea how hard it is – unless you’ve gone through it yourself.

I love returning moms for these reasons:

– They get hard work and sacrifice!

– They can juggle a hundred things at once!

– They have perspective of what is important!

– They work doubly hard to maintain a balance in their life!

So, what is your organization doing to ensure your returning moms are going to return? I know if I could afford it, I would pay them double, but beyond that what else? Think of what new Moms need – a transition plan to ease back into their “new” life, flexibility, encouragement, understanding and maybe a big bottle of wine and a sitter every so often! When we talk about the cost of retention and engagement – this is what we are talking about. Finding ways to keep your best – in my world – My mommies are my best!

5 Things That Demonstrate You’re Not Getting Paid Enough

Posted on April 16, 2012 by Tim Sackett

I was reading an article recently, it was one of those “Best Places To Work” type of articles. Since I run a company, I’m always looking out for good ideas on how to take care of your employees without spending a dime – unfortunately – “Best Places” companies that make these lists usually don’t give you these type 0f ideas! What you get from “Best Places” articles are all the over the top crap – gourmet cat food for your in cube pet-mate, free liposuction for your spouse and discounted tattoo eyeliner coupons. I would love for my company to be on the top of every single “Best Places” to work article – but we probably won’t. I care too much about my employees to make that happen.

What?!?

Yes, you read that right – My greatest weakness is I care too much!

It costs an organization a ton of money to make a “Best Places” list – not in actually applying to make the list (oh yeah, they are chosen randomly – you have to apply – the Top 100 Greatest Places to Work isn’t really the Top 100 Greatest Places to Work – it was the Top of the companies that applied for the award Greatest Places to Work), but in doing all the silly crap they do, so they sound like a great place to work. Many of the best places to work, will never be on a list, because they are spending their time, money and effort – on their employees!

Here are some things that “Best Places to Work” companies and You Not Getting Paid Enough have in common”

1. If you’re company has unlimited gourmet free breakfast, lunch and dinner provided – you’re not getting paid enough. Cut that crap out and pay me $10K more per year – I’ll bring in my own Greek Yogurt and granola.

2. If your company pays to have your laundry done and your house clean – you’re not getting paid enough.

3. If your company is taking you on luxury vacations and dinners that cost more than your monthly home mortgage – you’re not getting paid enough.

4. If your company spend more on marketing themselves as a great place to work, than on your employee development – you’re not getting paid enough.

5. If your CEO flies to work on a daily or weekly basis – you’re not getting paid enough.

So, how do I show my employees that I care and that we have a great place to work? I don’t waste money on things that ultimately become a negative when I need to take them away because we aren’t making the money for our shareholders. All great places to work, eventually become average or crappy places to work – because sustaining luxury programs that you put in place when your doing well – become negatives to engagement when you tighten your boot straps.

Pay your people fairly. Meet their needs as adults. Treat them professionally and with respect. That’s a great place to work.

Make HR Suck Less

Posted on March 28, 2012 by Tim Sackett

Are you working in a HR department that sucks? You know if you are, it’s alright, you can admit it – it’s the first step of changing it.

I bet I talk to over a hundred HR Pros a year that begin the conversation with – “our HR department sucks!” or “my company doesn’t get it when it comes to HR” or “Our HR department is terrible”. It’s not the outlier, it’s the norm. So, many HR Pros working in HR functions where the organization has the feeling that “HR” sucks in our company. If you’re not in one now – great – but chances are you have either been in one before, or eventually you’ll make a “grass is greener” decision and put yourself into this situation.

You know what? We have the power to make HR Suck Less. Yes, you do. Stop it, you do. No really, you do. Alright that’s enough, just play along with me at least!

Here are the 3 steps to making HR Suck Less:

1. Stop doing stuff that Sucks. But Tim! We have to do this stuff. No you don’t – if your HR shop blew up tomorrow – your organization would still go on. Over time you’ve “negotiated” to do all this sucky stuff – thinking it would “help” the organization, or give you “influence”, etc. Stop that. Give it away, push it out to other departments – start doing stuff that doesn’t suck, more than doing stuff that does suck. It’s not easy, but it can be done, little by little.

2. Get rid of people in HR who Suck. Some people get real comfortable with sucking. They wear their suckiness around like a badge of honor. You need to cut the suck out of your department – like cancer!

3. Stop saying that you Suck. We brand ourselves internally with everything we do – and if you say that you suck at something – the organizational will believe you suck at something. If you say we are the best in the industry at recruiting our competitions talent away from them – you’ll be forced to live up to that – and little by little you will live up to that and the organization will begin to believe it as well. Signs and Symbols!

Every single HR Shop who feels they suck – doesn’t have to suck. If you feel you don’t suck, but everyone else tells you that you suck – you suck. You’re just delusional and you keep telling yourself things like “we have to do this stuff”, “it’s the law”, “we don’t have a choice”, etc. This is the first sign you’re comfortable with sucking – you aren’t listening to your organization. No one has to suck – you can decide to do things in a complete different way. Perception is reality in terms of sucking. You need to change perceptions, not reality. You can still accomplish the exact same things, just do it in a way that people think you rock. Start saying “Yes” to everything – not “No”. “No” sucks.

Sucking less is a decision – not a skill. You all have the skills – you just need to make the decision – to stand up and believe – Today we will no longer Suck!

It’s Back! FOT’s Top 25 HR/Recruiting Blogs!

Posted on March 22, 2012 by Tim Sackett

Fistful of Talent – which I’m proud to be a member of – is releasing it’s Top 25 HR and Recruiting Blogs. What’s really cool about this list – unlike some other lists I have poetically mentioned in prior posts – is this isn’t made up by some random analysis, of random metrics – this thing is totally un-apologetically 100% subjective! That’s right, we (the FOT Tribe) sent in our own Top 25 HR and Recruiting Blogs that we love to read -the blogs we are fans of – and we ranked them 1 to 25. Simple – yet very effective!

I’m not saying that it’s easy to pick the Top 25 – for starters no FOTer blog can be a part of our list – which right there eliminates probably the 10 greatest blogs on the planet! So, I might have to recommend to Kris that next year we call the list – The Top 11-35 HR and Recruiting Blogs! That being said we looked at hundreds of blogs – many of us have our personal favorites – many of us really like and read blogs that our out of the HR world – as our personal favorites. What I can tell you – is the Top 25 – are solid! If you are looking for a list of HR and Recruiting blogs to follow – you won’t go wrong with any of these!

FOT’s own Steve Boese will be doing his thing tonight at the HR Happy Hour – unveiling the winners and talking HR with some of the top HR bloggers in the business – go check him out –

http://www.blogtalkradio.com/steve-boese/2012/03/23/hr-happy-hour-141–the-hr-blog-power-rankings

HR Happy Hour Episode 141 – ‘The HR Blog Power Rankings’

The First Lie You Hear in HR

Posted on March 14, 2012 by Tim Sackett

Many of you are now aware that Peyton Manning, All Pro NFL Quarterback, was released by the Indianapolis Colts (I wrote about here). Long story short – he was injured, he’s the back side of his career, he was due a boatload of money – Indianapolis made a business decision to let him go. There was this really heartfelt press conference with the owner of the Indianapolis Colts, Jim Irsay, and Peyton the day he was released where they both cried and talked about how much they loved and respected each other. But within all that – there was one Giant lie – one we hear all the time in HR.

Jim Irsay stood at the podium and said – This is not about money.

Boom! Liar!

It’s always about money – and this was about money. If Irsay would have kept Peyton on 1 more day – it would have cost his organization $28M. It was about and is about money – you don’t know if he’s going to perform at the level he has over the past 14 years, and you aren’t willing to risk $28M on that decision to keep him.

I can’t tell you how many times in HR I’ve hear this statement from employees who are leaving for another company – and 99.9% of the time they are flat out lying to your face! “Tim, I’m putting in my two weeks notice” “What can we do to keep you?” “Nothing – it’s not about the money – I’m looking for that next phase in my career” “So, you won’t stay if we pay you $100K more!” “Well, wait a minute – you would pay me $100K more?!” “No! I just wanted to show you it is about money – now go – I don’t like to work with Liars!”

That’s exactly how you do it – HR Newbies! When someone tells you it’s not about money – start negotiating and find that price – you’ll get to it pretty quickly. “But Tim, it isn’t about money – I want to spend more time with my kids – I need balance.” “I’ll give you a 50% increase” “You know my kids will sure like going to private schools, much more than public schools.” Everyone has a price – just some prices are more expensive than others – but never let anyone tell you – It’s not about the money – it is.

If Peyton would have went to Irsay and said – “Look Jimmy (I assume he calls him Jimmy) I want to do right by the Colts – I’ll accept the league minimum to stay hear” “Peyton, you got yourself a deal!” would have been the entire conversation. But Peyton is smart – he knows his value – as does Jimmy – so they cut him loose. We do this all the time with our employees. Mary from IT just came in and said she got a new job paying her 20% more – and we calculate how much that will cost to raise up Mary, and everyone else in her same position. We then look at Mary, shake her hand and tell her good luck. It’s about the money.

What would it take to get you to work 80 hours per week?

Posted on March 6, 2012 by Tim Sackett

I’ve interviewed a ton of people in my career. When I ask people what their normal work week looks like – I “often” hear – “Oh, I work 70-80 hrs per week, all the time!” I instantly know they are lying – because no one works 80 hours per week all the time! Do you really know what 80 hours per week looks like? Here’s some examples”

16 hours per day – Monday thru Friday – that’s coming in at 6am and not leaving until 10pm – EVERY day.

12 hours per day Monday thru Saturday with an EASY 8 on Sunday.

Oh, and by the way, the two above examples must be with paid lunches and breaks.

Liars.

The only way you work 80 hours per week is if you own the place. How much would I have to pay you to work 80 hours per week? Would you do it for $10,000 per week? $520K per year? No you wouldn’t – you would quit after a month or two – now you’re lying to yourself. Heck – most owners aren’t even willing to work 80 hours per week. That’s why so many small businesses fail – people underestimate how much it takes to make a business successful!

“Oh, I would work 80 hours per week if I LOVED what I did.” Really? You think you would still LOVE it after working 80 hours per week, week after week, month after month, year after year? I think it’s incredibly awesome when I meet someone who I truly see Loves their job – you know the type – even if they weren’t getting paid, they would be doing what they’re doing. Unfortunately 99.9% of us aren’t in a position where we can “work” for free – no matter how much we Love it. We have bills, responsibilities – we don’t have daddy or a spouse paying our way – we have real life.

80 hours per week – now you’re thinking about it, right? It’s a lot of time to put forth for one part of your life. How do you get your grocery shopping done? Watch your kids play at school? Get the cat to the vet? Get your haircut? Get your teeth cleaned? See your therapist?!

As HR Pros we put so much time, effort and thought into building our rewards and recognition systems. Many of us think we do this so we can get our employees to give us that extra discretionary effort – to work those hours over 40. To get our employees to want to work 80 hours per week. Unfortunately, most of us have rewards and recognition to just get our people to do the job they were hired for – not extra. When this happens – you no longer have a rewards and recognition system – this now becomes part of their full compensation package. Rewards and Recognition shouldn’t be put in place “to get the job done” – it should be put in place to reward and recognize those who do more.

I know what you’re thinking – “Tim if I could just have a rewards and recognition system that would get my employees to actually work 40 hours, I’d be happy! 80! You’re out of your mind!” Believe me, I understand, but that’s what we do, or should be doing for our organizations. Get great talent, keep great talent, find ways to get that great talent to give us everything they’ve got =’s great HR Pro.

So, what would it take to get you to work 80 hours per week?

Bad is Stronger than Good

Posted on March 5, 2012 by Tim Sackett

I spoke at the inaugural TLNT Transform event last week in Austin – my topic was – What Your CEO Wished HR Would Do. One thing that came up during my presentation was a conversation around “Must Do Moves”. Must do moves are those things in your organization that you grab a hold of, as an HR Pro, and make sure they happen. I asked the group a question:

Do you have anyone in your organization that you need to get rid of?

100% – all hands raised – Yes! If you work in an organization that has a decent size – let’s say 100+, you almost always have a least one or two folks you would be better without. (for the record – my staff is less than 100, and I don’t have anyone I need to get rid of – they all rock! Don’t hate, I just follow my own advice!) As HR Pros we hear about this in meetings with your executives and hiring managers – “Oh, if we could only replace John, we would be so much better!” My point to the HR Pros in the audience is this is a value item that we can own in our organizations. Must do moves – especially those that make our organizations stronger, need champions. When it comes to staff moves – we are that champion.

What we realize, but many of our hiring managers fail to realize, is that Bad is Stronger than Good, when it comes to employees. We hear all the time “Addition through Subtraction”, and yet we struggle in our organizations to make this happen. Most likely this happens in your organization because you are trying to make your hiring managers, manage, and have them make this decision. When in reality they have made the decision – they told you. They hate conflict, even more than you do, and this was their cry for help. Take it – run with it – make it happen. It’s the one thing in HR we are all good at – process and planning. Put a plan together to get rid of your Bad and make it happen.

I didn’t just say – go fire. That’s not a plan. Well, it is a plan, but not a very good one. I said make a plan to get rid of the bad. That means working with the hiring manager to determine timing, back-fill options, sourcing, recruiting, progressive discipline – all that good stuff – but make it happen. Really – make it happen. Executives like doers! They like doers that get rid of Bad in our organizations. We own the Bad people in our organizations. Any time you have a Bad person in your organization – you need to take on the persona – this Bad person is my fault, and I’m taking care of it. Bad is Stronger than Good – you have to fight hard against Bad.

Want to look and be better in HR – own Must Do Moves in your organization.

Want me to come and tell you what other things your CEO wants HR to do? Contact me – I’m cheap – not free – but cheap.

The 8 Man Rotation – 2011 Season

Posted on February 21, 2012 by Tim Sackett

In what is probably the most anticipated eBook release of 2012 the The 8 Man Rotation crew (Matt Stollack, Steve Boese, Lance Haun, Kris Dunn and I) today release to the world version two of our most famous HR/Sports related blog posts of 2011: The 8 Man Rotation – the 2011 Season. The forward is written by two of our HR friends and great writers in their own right – Trish McFarlane and William Tincup – who get to poke fun at our obsession with the weird combination of sports and HR that we just won’t give up writing about. Check it out –

The 8 Man Rotation – The 2011 Season

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Burning Down Your HR Department

Posted on January 20, 2012 by Tim Sackett

A couple of years ago my parents house burned down. They were away on vacation and lighting struck the roof. Before the fire department could get there and put it out, most of the house was destroyed. 60+ years of memories and possessions, gone. In hindsight, it was a bit of a blessing, there house was at the age where everything was starting to need replacing, and my father was at the age, where he wanted to retire. Those two things don’t go well together! Major home improvements equals major expense, and a fixed income. So, long-story-short, mother nature, and the insurance company, gave my folks a new house for a retirement gift! All is well that ends well, I guess.

This situation, though, led to some deep emotional conversations about what the wish they could have pulled out, if they new this was going to happen. As you can imagine it was all the stuff you and I would want – our photos, our mementos, some favorite things that remind us of loved ones, or things that we were proud of. I thought about his recently when having a conversation with a friend who just started a new position as the head of a large HR shop. His comment to me was:

“What I really need to do is burn this place down and start over!”

To which I replied, “well, isn’t there anything you would keep?” Bam! That is what he needed – he did need to burn it down, but there were definitely some things he needed to take out before lighting the match.

It’s a common practice that Leaders tend to do when taking on a new position – we tend to burn down our departments. Oh, we say we won’t, as we go around throwing gasoline on everything, and we say we aren’t rebuilding as strap our tool belt on and start hammering away, but the truth is, most leaders want to remake their new departments into what they want, not what it was.

So, I’ll ask you to take a few moments today and think about the concept of burning down your HR department. What would you pull out and save? What would you happily allow to burn up? What would you miss?

Everyday we owe it to our organizations to get better. You don’t have to burn down the department to get better – but you do need to get rid of those things you know you would easily allow to burn up!

Employees: FYI Health Insurance Is Broken

Posted on August 11, 2011 by Tim Sackett

Oh, boy, please don’t get me started on this…

This is the time of year when HR benefits folks get a smile on their face. If you have your stuff together, from a benefits standpoint, it’s around August, early September that you begin meeting with your insurance companies and brokers about 2012 benefit rates – we should just start calling these “Increase” meetings because in 20 years of HR I’ve never been with a company where we met with our insurance partners and the rates went down! (and that is actually factual!) I somewhat envy true Benefit Administrator and Managers because I could never do what they do, or want to. It’s a true life calling. It’s not really HR and it’s not really Finance – it’s somewhere in the middle of hell.

Benefit folks love Open Enrollment time of year – they’ll tell they don’t and they can’t wait until it’s over – but let’s face it, it’s the only time of the year anyone in the organization listens to them – so you know they like it! They get to have the big planning meetings with the finance folks and senior leadership to determine how they’ll pass on the costs to the employees, yet still make it seem like we are giving them more. Many will get to travel to cheap hotels and meet with groups of employees in hour segments – probably the only time they leave the office all year. To be sure – it’s a special time in the Benefits world.

So, this week I got to sit with our insurance broker to see how bad our insurance carrier was going to jack up the rates (picture me sitting with fingers crossed saying over-and-over “please don’t be double digits, please don’t be double digits, please don’t be double digits…”). I like brokers they were the first ones to teach me “under promise and over deliver”, which has worked well in my career. Our broker didn’t disappoint. The day before the meeting he called and said the sky was about to fall and you might have to close your doors, the rate increases were probably going to be around 3 to 4 THOUSAND percent! Then he showed up walked in the conference room and before he even sat down – said “9%” – and I was happy! Who the hell is happy with 9%?! I was – because he did a great job at preparing me for the worse.

Here’s the problem – the current system and health care reforms new system coming – just isn’t sustainable for employers. Insurance is too expensive and too complicated, and unless you’re a Fortune 500 shop – you don’t have the chops in-house to really make sense of it all – so insurance starts to feel less like a benefit, and more like something that is about to happen to you – but not in a good way. Not like the feeling you get as a child when Christmas is about to happen! More like the feeling you get as a child when your newly divorces mom brings home “Uncle” Kevin to spend the night – it just doesn’t seem right.

I don’t have a solution for you kids. It’s broke, it’s broke way bad – and health care reform isn’t going to come close to fixing it. So, HR Benefit Pros – skip the Courtyard, they no longer give you a free breakfast, check out Holiday Inn Express or Embassy Suites – or any place with free drinks at the nightly “manager’s reception”.

The Tim Sackett Project

TA & HR Expert, Dad, Backup Point Guard on my over 40 men's team

Category Archives: Benefits

The Value of Returning Moms to your Workforce

5 Things That Demonstrate You’re Not Getting Paid Enough

The First Lie You Hear in HR

Employees: FYI Health Insurance Is Broken