Category Archives: Communication

Is There Really a Problem with the phrase – “Ok Boomer!”?

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You’ve probably heard it by now, the phrase “Ok Boomer!” Which blew up (cool graph showing how fast here)recently when Chloe Swarbick, a 25-year-old MP and spokesperson for New Zeeland’s Green Party. She was speaking to New Zeeland’s Parliament about climate change when she got heckled by an older member. Her response is below in the video (it happens at- :31 on the video) –

So, let me start by saying Ageism is undoubtedly a very real and serious issue we are facing in workplaces! I’ve written many posts on Ageism in hiring and selection, and I’ve witnessed hiring managers, executives, TA pros, and HR pros who show their ageism bias time and time again at organizations large and small.

The only people we hate to hire more than fat people are old people!

So, on the outset, you would feel that this is just one more form of Ageism. It’s definitely a slam and derogatory towards older thinking for sure! “Ok Boomer” is the same thing as saying “Ok Kid” when someone younger says something you think is naive at best. Chloe is talking science and she’s passionate about the climate, and she knows she’s surrounded by older members who don’t have much care for this issue.

Also, let’s put into the context of how “we” (media, speakers, leaders, trainers, etc.) basically spent the better part of a decade talking down to Millennials for believing their snowflakes (another trigger word) and not having a clue about real life. Gen Z comes along and they are just getting thrown into the Millennials bucket by most folks that don’t have a clue these are actually two very separate generations.

So, Chloe and Gen Z are fed up! When we get fed up, when we feel like no one is listening to us, we usually react in frustration and most of us say stuff that we believe will get the attention of the audience that we want to listen. Many times what we say is offensive to some, like, “Ok Boomer!” Okay, you dumb old person who won’t listen to real science and facts and you keep pissing away the future because you’re almost dead and don’t care!

I’m not a fan of name-calling, on either side. I don’t like it when we try to throw an entire generation into a bucket, because the moment you do that you meet someone from that generation that believes in the exact same things you do, and might even be doing more to fight for those beliefs than you are. Chloe knows this, but she was in a passionate speech to save her planet and some stupid person decided to interject and interrupt her and she came after them in a brilliant way to shut them down immediately and return to her speech. Go for her!

If you’re going to play the game, you better come ready, because the person you try to embarrass might come back on you in a much better way! That “Boomer” wasn’t ready and like “the kids” like to say, he got “served”! Okay, the kids haven’t said that for about a decade, but I’m GenX I basically only use historical pop culture references.

Good News, Bad News, and Important News. What’s your strategy?

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It’s been a common strategy for corporations and their PR and Communications teams to send out bad news around 4 pm on a Friday. Why? Because it dies almost immediately. No one really pays attention to the news cycle on the weekends and by Monday morning something else happens – we release all of our great news because we want it to run all week!

So, bad news gets released on Friday afternoon, our good news gets released early on Monday, when do you then release your “important” news? The news you need your employees, customers, clients, stakeholders, etc. to pay attention to?

A recent study showed that late in the week isn’t the time because you’ll get these results:

  • 34% less social media mentions
  • 23-66% less mentions in articles
  • Up to 51% are likely to never receive the information at all.

The problem is we tend to work all week to make communications perfect and typically release important news late in the week when it’s going to find fewer people. The better idea for important news and information that you need people to pay attention to is to release it first thing on Monday, and then trickle out bits of information about the main message all week to gain more and more viewers of your message.

It takes most people five to seven times of seeing and/or hearing the information you need them to know before it clicks, so you can’t just do one main release and hope that everyone gets it. They won’t and you’ll be frustrated that your message didn’t have the impact you wanted.

Right now, so many organizations are doing their Open Enrollments around their health insurance for next year. Most will spend weeks preparing the communication, but put very little thought into how do we best amplify this message so everyone gets what we need them to get.

The strategy should be one big splash announcement, and then highlight announcements on an ongoing basis over the next 7 days for so. It might look something like this:

Day 1 – Big message!

End of Day 1 – A “USA Today” version of the big message. “What you really need to know about “X”!

Day 2 – 1 really important fact about “X” you have to know, or you might die (or something almost as dramatic!)

Day 3 – “Did you know…The top 3 things that are changing”

Day 4 – Story from the field, the most asked question of “X”

Day 5 – Before you leave for the weekend, Are you sure you and your family will have insurance this weekend?

Day 6 – Probably the next Monday – A message from our CEO on “X”

Day 7 – Last call – the final things you need to know before “X” runs out (aka – At this point, it’s your fault you’re not covered!)

This example is mostly about open enrollment, but it can really be used for any big change you’re trying to make internally or externally within your organization.

The other side of this has to be how and when you release these messages. In corporations we tend to rely on email, but we have to send out more than just email. Leverage text messages, social media messages, signs where you get the most employee traffic, etc. Think about the one thing every employee would do each week and try to wrap your message around that.

What is the biggest driver of Employee Engagement?

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I got to see Marcus Buckingham speak at the HR Technology Conference in Vegas a couple of weeks ago. I think it’s the 2319th time I’ve seen him speak. I’m not sure if I’ve seen Marcus or Josh Bersin speak more, it’s probably almost a tie. Basically, if you go to HR conferences, you get to see those two dudes speak, a lot!

That’s not a bad thing. Both bring great data and are strong presenters, Marcus has the English accent which all American’s love. Marcus and ADP’s Reseach Institute released some new data on Engagement and that was the main focus of the talk. The research shows that 85% of employees are just showing up to work, because only 15% are ‘fully’ engaged, and if you’re not fully engaged, you’re basically showing up to collect a check.

That was pretty shocking, but the most shocking piece the research showed was the number one driver of engagement in any organization had to do with one simple thing: Are you a part of a team.

The research shows that being a part of a team is the strongest predictor of full engagement. There are others, like being new to an organization is fairly strong and makes sense. When we first start working at a new job, we are usually more engaged. Do you trust your team leader is another strong predictor, but first you better be on a team!

Being a member of a team.

It seems fairly simple, but for those of us who are constantly working on teams, we know it’s not. You could simply just throw everyone who works for you on teams and think, “okay, I just fixed engagement!” It’s really more about the dynamic of being on a team where you feel you belong and have a role that is valuable to that team.

Belonging is a big part of being on a team and being fully engaged. There are plenty of people who are on teams but don’t feel like the team they’re on needs them or wants them. Or you are on a team that isn’t successful. Turns out, failure is a big deterrent to engagement as well.

Once you are on a team, it then becomes critical that you trust the team leader. Lack of trust of the team leader is another negative driver to engagement. This then becomes more about the leader themselves establishing trust, and having team members who are open enough to first assume trust. Too often we get on teams and immediately believe the team leader is keeping things from us, probably because many times they are.

In any team, in the beginning, or when new team members come in, they should do a transition meeting. A meeting designed to establish trust from the beginning. It’s a time to get everything out in the open, at the beginning (or when it’s new for someone else) and do things like ask all the questions that usually go un-asked but then become issues down the road, establish communication likes and dislikes, share items that you should know, but might not, etc. I always have this facilitated by someone outside the team, so the leader doesn’t try and control the outcomes.

Go download the research paper, there’s great information about how to drive higher engagement in your organization and more information about the importance of the team dynamic.

The 7 Words That Turn Candidates Off!

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Communication is a tricky thing. It’s so easy to turn off another party by simply using just one wrong word, especially when you’re trying to build a relationship with a candidate you potentially want to hire.

I think there are some words and phrases that have a high probability of turning off a candidate to want to come work for your organization. I speak to students a few times a year about interviewing and I tell them something similar, which is what you say can automatically make a hiring manager not want to hire you!

Think about being an interview and the candidate starts to tell you why they’re no longer working for ACME Inc. “Oh, you know it was just a ‘misunderstanding’, I can explain…”

“Misunderstanding” is a killer word to use while interviewing! It wasn’t a misunderstanding! You got fired! The ‘misunderstanding’ is you not understanding the crap you were doing was wrong! 

So, what are the 7 Deadly Words you should never use as a recruiter? Don’t use these:

-“Layoff” – It doesn’t matter how you use it. Even, ‘we’ve never had a layoff!’ “Layoff” isn’t a positive word to someone looking to come to work for you, so why would you even add it to the conversation!

-“Might” – Great candidates want black and white, not gray. “Might” is gray. Well, we might be adding that tech but I don’t know. Instead, use “I’m not sure, let me check for you because I want to get you the truth.  Add

-“Maybe” – See above.

-“Unstable” – You know what’s unstable? Nothing good, that’s what! If something isn’t good, don’t hide behind a word that makes people guess how bad it might be, because they’ll usually assume it’s worse than it really is!

-“Legally” – “Legally” is never followed by something positive! “Legally, we would love to give you a $25K sign-on bonus, but…” It’s always followed by something that makes you uncomfortable. When trying to get someone interested in your organization and job, don’t add “Legally” to the conversation!

-“Temporarily” – This is another unsettling word for candidates. “Temporarily” we’ll have to have you work out of the Nashville office, but no worries, you’ll be Austin soon enough! Um, no.

-“Fluid” – Well, that’s a great question, right now it’s a fluid situation, we’re hoping that hiring you will help clarify it! Well, isn’t that comforting… Add: “Up in the air” to this category!

We use many of these words because we don’t want to tell the candidate the truth. We think telling them exactly what’s wrong with our organization, the position, our culture, will drive them away. So, we wordsmith them to death!

The reality is most candidates will actually love the honesty and tend to believe they can be the one to come in and make it better. We all want to be the knight on the white horse. Candidates are no different. Tell them the truth and you’ll end up with better hires and higher retention!

College Students: Are you adding your side-hustle to your resume!?

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I got killed a few weeks ago by some trolls on Twitter over posting this tweet:

I get that many people need to work side hustles to make ends meet in today’s world. I wasn’t talking about these folks working their butts off to make ends meet. I myself work side hustles.

In today’s #outrage culture, this tweet was seen as insensitive by some folks who spend way too much time on Twitter and not enough time on their professional role! Also, I’m clearly not Gary Vaynerchuk, the king of hustle porn, who could tweet this exact tweet and get 5 million likes before the end of the day!

Turns out, Recruiters are now encouraging college students to put their side hustles on their resume and profiles. Why? Because employers actually really like candidates who aren’t afraid to work! It’s the #1 thing that executives tell me when we talk about their pain points around hiring. “Tim, we just need people who want to work!”

So, what are the top side hustles you should be adding onto your resume and profiles? The folks at The Knowledge Academy did a survey and found these were the most popular:

  • 85% of US recruiters recommend those college students who buy items from garage sales and then sell them online for a higher price, to include it on their resume/job applications
  • 67% of US recruiters believe college students that create/modify products to sell online, should have it on their resume/job applications
  • 60% of US recruiters think college students who offer photography services for hire, encourage stating it on their resume/job applications

I really think as a candidate, any skill you believe adds to your overall value as an employee should be something you add to your resume and/or profile, but just know that some HR/Talent/Hiring Managers will look at this in different ways. If you’re an engineer and you’re also driving for a ride share service, you probably need to explain why the full-time gig isn’t enough. “I’m also supplementing my income with weekend and evening ride share to help pay off my student loans quicker!”

The survey found that –52% of recruiters feel companies who know an employee has a growing ‘side hustle’ should take an active approach to support them (i.e. offering flexible working hours). Um, what!? So, Mary is our accountant and we love her, but she also has a growing cupcake business on the side and I should give her time off to go do that and not fulfill her duties in a full-time role? I’m not sure I 100% can buy into this philosophy from a business standpoint!

I would probably go back to that employee and ask them if they started their own business, like this side hustle, and had to hire folks, who then wanted to not work their ‘real’ job, but put more time and effort towards their own thing, how would that sit with them? I already know the answer. They want and need workers who are committed and get their jobs done like everyone else.

It’s definitely a different world we live in. Side hustles become full-time hustles for so many folks. I definitely see this when someone is working a full-time gig that they hate, and a side hustle that they love. Like Gary V would say, you need to then adjust your lifestyle to fit your side hustle, and not your full-time gig if that’s what you desire to do. What you can’t do is think just because you love petting puppies, doesn’t mean you can do it full-time without giving up some stuff. It’s hard to make those Tesla payments on a puppy petter salary!

Want to build a community?

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I get asked quite often by folks who want to build a community and/or are already starting a community to be apart of their community. My first question is always, “Why do you want to build this community?” It’s pretty straight forward. It should be simple to answer.

Most will go all guru-like about wanting to get like-minded folks together, etc., but in the end, it’s mostly about starting a group so they can sell them something. Almost 99% of the time this is the reason. Which is actually fine, if you follow the steps and don’t actually sell!

Here is really the only way I’ve found to build a successful community:

Step 1 – Find some folks who are like you.

Step 2 – Announce that you are starting a community together.

Step 3 – Draft the purpose and some ground rules around that community.

Step 4 – Show up every day, even Saturday and Sunday.

Step 5 – Never sell your stupid shit.

Step 6 – Give.

Step 7 – Go to Step 6

Step 8 – Eventually the community will give you more than you ever gave it.

It’s super simple, and super hard, to build a community, because it’s all about you giving, and giving, and giving, with absolutely no expectation that you’ll get anything back from the community. Those who go into building a community with this mindset and action, though, almost always get more out of it than they put in it.

 

The Employee Walk of Shame

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I’ve lost jobs and I’ve called old employers to see if they would want to hire me back. I’ve usually gotten a response that sounded something like, “Oh, boy would we want you back but we just don’t have anything. Good Luck!”  Many of us in the talent game talk about our employee Alumni and how we should engage our Alumni but very few of us really take true advantage of leveraging this network.

I was reminded of this recently when a friend of mine took a new job.  You know the deal, shorter drive, more money, growing company and oh, boy, just where do I sign!?  The fact was, it was all they said, shorter drive, more money and they were growing, but they forgot to tell him was our operations are broken beyond repair, you will work 7 days a week and probably 12-14 hours per day because of the mess we have, but keep your head up it’s the only way you won’t drown here!

So, now what does he do?

He already had the going away party, bar night out with the work friends with the promises to do lunches and not get disconnected, packed up and unpack the office into the new office.  Let’s face it, big boy, you’re stuck!  Not so fast.  He did the single hardest thing an employee can do he called his old boss after 7 days and said one thing, “I made a mistake, can I come back?”

Luckily for him, his past boss was a forward-thinking leader and so this past Monday he did the 2nd hardest thing an employee can do he made the “Employee Walk of Shame“.

You can imagine the looks from people who didn’t know him well, “Hey, wait a minute, didn’t you leave?” Having to tell the same story over and over, feeling like he failed, like he wasn’t good enough to make it in the new position.

HR plays a huge part in this story because it was HR who can make this walk of shame a little less rough.  Let’s face it, it is different.  You just don’t leave and come back as nothing happened. Something did happen, there was a reason he left and that reason isn’t going away.  A transition back needs to be put into place even though he was gone seven days.  It’s not about just plugging back in, it is about re-engaging again and finding out what we all can do better so it doesn’t happen again.

It’s also about making sure you let those employees who you truly want back, that they are welcome to come back (assuming you have the job) and not just saying that to everyone.  There are employees who leave that you say a small prayer to G*d and you are thankful they left!  There are others where you wish there was a prayer you could say so they wouldn’t leave.

Make it easy for your employees to do the Walk of Shame, it helps the organization, but realize they are hurting, they are embarrassed, but they are also grateful!

Life is better when you have cheerleaders!

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I’ve got some great friends in my life. People who support me in my professional field. I’ve got cheerleaders that are on my side hoping I succeed in everything I do.

Do you have cheerleaders? Do you have a cheerleader?

I think if you have one your life is richer. It’s not about who has the most cheerleaders, but I do think it is critical for your success to have a cheerleader or two in your life.

What’s the role of a cheerleader in your life?

  • Support you in the community when you are not present.
  • Support you in your professional and personal positive endeavors. Sometimes in person. Sometimes from afar.
  • Pick you up when you are having a hard time picking yourself up.
  • They believe in you, and they’ve let you know they believe in you through their words and actions.
  • To let you know what you do matters. Maybe only to one other person, but it still matters.

Just because someone is your cheerleader doesn’t mean you need to be their cheerleader. I have people in my life that I cheer for, that they don’t cheer for me. It doesn’t mean they dislike me, it’s just they aren’t one of my cheerleaders, and that’s okay. I also have cheerleaders that I don’t return the favor for, again, not because I don’t cherish them, I just don’t know them enough to return that favor.

I think cheerleaders get a bad rap in our society. Why would someone want to stand on the sidelines and just cheer for someone else? Go do it yourself!

Yeah, I get that, but also what’s wrong with wanting to help someone else succeed? It’s a very selfless and endearing feature to want to help others succeed and cheer them on in their success. I don’t think cheerleaders get enough credit for what they do. When a team loses or an individual loses, people feel bad for them, but no one feels worse than those who cheered them on the most.

Here’s what I know.

I’ve been in places in my life when it felt like I didn’t have any cheerleaders in my life, and I’m in a place where it seems like I’ve got a tremendous amount of cheerleaders in my life cheering me on daily.

Life is way better with cheerleaders.

If Someone Apologizes for Something, You Should Accept it.

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Stuff happens. We make bad decisions. We do stupid stuff. Sometimes it all ends with us having to apologize for being dumb or just not thinking straight at that moment.

So, we apologize.

For a while now I’ve been watching people do stupid stuff, apologizing, but those who are receiving the apology are not accepting it. Instead, they refuse to accept the apology and something weird happens. Everything just stops.

I get that you might not feel that an apology is enough. You want more. You want ‘justice’ of some kind. You might feel the apology isn’t authentic. For sure, that’s all possible.

Here’s the thing: Just because you accept an apology, doesn’t mean you are okay with what happened.

Accepting allows you and the other party to actually keep moving in the direction of positive interaction. Closing that down and stopping that movement does nothing for anyone. You’re still upset, the other party is still upset and doesn’t know what to do to help the situation, and we are now moving backward with the relationship.

One problem that happens frequently is that someone tries to apologize too soon. You are upset and not in a position to want to accept it. At the same time the person does want you to know they are apologetic for what happened, and while you might not be ready, it’s good to accept the apology and tell them “thank you for that, I’m not ready to talk about this just yet, can we do this another time?”

99% of the time this will work and buy you the time you need to work through it and get yourself into a better position to actually discuss or determine your course of action.

Every apology we get we have to put into context. Is this about the other person, is this about ourselves, or is it about both? Sometimes someone does something not even thinking about you. They are thinking about themselves and probably someone else, and you get caught in friendly fire that no one thought of. Doesn’t change the ultimate ending and it still sucks, and you still need an apology.

It’s really hard for me, personally, to not apologize if I think I’ve done something wrong. I want to work on fixing it immediately! It drives my wife crazy sometimes. I want immediate fixing and she might just need to digest what happened and determine what she needs. At that moment, it might not be an apology, it might just be some space.

Communication is a two-way street. Both sides have something to say and something they are trying to do. We live in this modern world where people have decided that it’s not okay to screw up, but we “celebrate failure”, and you can apologize, but I won’t accept it. Um, what?

Life is hard. Let people apologize. Accept it. If that’s not enough for you, let them know. If you want to end the relationship, and an apology isn’t enough, let them know that as well.

 

 

Should You Measure a Candidate’s Desire to Work For You in Response Time?

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I have expectations as a leader in my organizations for other employees who are in a leadership position in my company. One of those expectations is, if I call or text you on off hours, weekends, vacations, etc., for something that is urgent to the business, I expect a reply in a rather short time frame.

Some people would not like that. I don’t care. You’re a leader, the business needs you, there’s no time clock for that.

That expectation is set for someone at a leadership level in my organization. They know this expectation before taking the job. Also, I’m not an idiot about it. I can probably count on one hand the number of times in the past five years I’ve reached out to someone on weekends or vacations expecting and needing a response.

But, what if you measured candidate quality in the same manner? Seems unreasonable, doesn’t it!?

Well, check this out:

Nardini is the CEO of the sports and men’s lifestyle site Barstool Sports. In a New York Times interview, she detailed her process for vetting job candidates. After saying she was a “horrible interviewer” because of her impatience, she explained a unique process for gauging potential hires’ interest in the job.

“Here’s something I do,” she said. “If you’re in the process of interviewing with us, I’ll text you about something at 9 p.m. or 11 a.m. on a Sunday just to see how fast you’ll respond.”

The maximum response time she’ll allow: three hours.

So, Erika believes if a candidate doesn’t reply back to her on a Sunday at 9 pm within three hours, they are not interested in a job.

This is why recruiting is hard.

You have moron leaders who come up with stupid ideas of what they think is ‘important’ and then they make you live by these dumb rules. This rule is ridiculous. Erika’s assessment of why this works is ridiculous. But, she’ll get a pass.

Why?

She’s a she. If some dumb white dude came up with the same rule the New York Times would write an expose on how this guy is a complete tyrant and out of touch with today’s world, and how crappy this candidate experience is, and how bad leadership this is, etc. But, no one will. She’s just leaning in and doing what the guys do!

Yes, she is. She’s being an idiot.

Now, I’ll say I actually agree with her on her assessment on response time, assuming the roles she is expecting a reply from in three hours are time critical roles. She runs a media site with breaking stories. Twitter has these things up in seconds, media sites need replies to what is happening within minutes and hours. So, there could be some legitimacy to something as arbitrary as measuring candidate desire by response time.

It’s fraught with issues, to be sure, but for certain roles, it might find you some good talent. Should it be a golden rule of hiring for your organization? No, that’s just dumb.

If you really want a silver bullet I ask every candidate if they’re a dog person or cat person. Works every time!