Category Archives: Culture

Your Dreams Are Adjustable

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I once wanted to be a teacher.  In fact, until I was about 23 years old, I thought that was going to be my future.  Then I taught and found it wasn’t for me.  Not the teaching part, the public education administration political part.  It only took one example to show me public education was fundamentally broken.

The local museum in town had this great exhibit in for only two weeks, by chance my class was studying the same thing, what luck, I thought to myself, the kids will love this! I went to my principal and told her I wanted to take the kids to the museum instead our annual trip to the zoo.  “Can’t do that”, she said, “had to be approved a year in advance, but you can do it next year”. “It won’t be here next year, it’s a traveling exhibit, it’s only here this year.”, I explained.  “Sorry, won’t happen”, she replied. “What if I got parents to do this after school, or on a weekend, and it wouldn’t cost anything?”, I pleaded. “Nope, can’t let you do it, don’t waste your energy on this”, she could see my rising frustration on something that made no sense.

So, we went to the zoo. The same zoo the kids went to every year, for the same tour, same learning, same cage animals, not even trying to get out.

The writing was on the wall for me, right then and there.  These people didn’t really care about educating kids. They cared about following process and procedure. Even if it didn’t make sense.  My dream of being an educator needed an adjustment.

My dream didn’t die, I just found a new way to scratch that itch.  So many people believe if they didn’t reach their dream, that it dies.  I think that’s just an easy way to getting out of doing the hard work.  The hard work isn’t all that you put into reaching your dream. That it actually work you enjoy, you’re chasing your dream.  The hard work starts when you can’t reach your dream, or you decide the dream you had is no longer the dream you want.  The hard work starts the moment you adjust your dream to something else.

I truly believe people should chase their dreams for as long as they’re appropriate. Awesome, you want to play football in the NFL, that’s great! You’re now 38 years old and never made a roster, time to make an adjustment!  How about working in some capacity in the NFL? Coaching? Marketing?

We give people a false sense that it’s alright to chase your dreams forever.  We even give them examples of some 90-year-oldd lady who ran her first marathon, or something like that. We encourage it. Never do we feel it’s appropriate to tell someone, “Hey, maybe it’s time to think about something else”.  Maybe it’s time to adjust your dream.  It’s okay. You won’t shrivel up and die.  It’s just a dream, they’re adjustable.

Reindeer Games: How Santa Ruined Inclusion Forever

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I’m a big fan of what Jennifer McClure is doing with her DisruptHR events! 5-minute presentations that challenge the audience to think about things differently. It’s fast paced, it’s fun, it’s unlike anything else in HR and that’s awesome! If you want to bring a DisruptHR event to your city contact Jennifer through the DisruptHR website and she’ll answer all of your questions.

I can tell you from going up on stage and doing these 5 minutes is way harder to do than a full hour! In an hour you can wander around and come back to stuff you forgot. In 5 minutes you need to have a narrow topic and be tight! It’s so much fun!

This is one my most recent DisruptHR talks. It’s the story of Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer and how Santa is like most old white guys when it comes to hiring and selection. I will guarantee you’ll never watch that movie again without thinking about this! Enjoy.

Reindeer Games | Tim Sackett | DisruptHR Talks from DisruptHR on Vimeo.

The One Conference HR Pros Need to Go to in 2017 #WorkHuman

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So, I’ve been on the record that my favorite conference to attend is the HR Technology Conference. It’s my favorite because I geek out on HR and TA Tech and I’ll send three days on the expo floor demoing every product under the sun. That’s me. That’s not most HR pros.

I’ve actually had HR pros read my stuff and go to HR Tech and then come back to me and said they weren’t too happy with my recommendation. When I asked them why they went, it was because it was my favorite conference. To which I needed to ask, but are you even into HR Tech or have a need to buy? It was always no!

The one conference that I really like and I’ve yet to find someone who didn’t get a ton out of it, has been Work Human. Work Human is really unlike any HR conference you’ve gone to. It’s as much about making you a better person, as it’s about making you or your organization better at HR. You leave feeling positive, refreshed, ready to go back and make things better. Let’s not kid ourselves, that’s really hard to do for a conference!

At the end of May in 2017, I’ll be heading back to Work Human for my third straight year. The content stream is unique. Don’t think you’ll be sitting through non-stop hour and fifteen-minute sessions, Work Human is not that! You’ll find twenty-minute sessions, hour sessions, A list keynotes, time to meditate if you’re into that, or time to have a cupcake, if you’re into that (I was way more into the cupcakes!).

The Work Human folks are actually offering my readers a $100 discount off the early-bird pricing of $895, if you register before the end of 2016 (December 31st). All you have to do is visit the Registration page and put in the code – WH17INF-TSA. 

For what you’ll get for $795 there isn’t a better conference value on the planet for HR! So, here you go, this is how to use up that last little bit of budget money you have left and before finance will take away unless you use it. Plus, we can sit down and share cupcakes!

Check out the conference site and I hope to see you in Phoenix in 2017!

The Sackett Rules for your Annual Holiday Office Party

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Oh, it’s beginning to look a lot like Christmas, err, office party time! And you know what that means, inappropriate behavior and awkward moments! But don’t fear, Uncle Tim is here to save you with a few simple rules.

Each year at the greatest technical recruiting company on the planet, HRU Technical Resources, we throw an annual holiday party.  They’re kind of legendary and I can neither confirm nor deny that we have our party in a bar next to a strip club. Next to, not in.

As you can imagine, we’ve had to set up some rules over the years. Feel free to use these or adapt them for your own office party:

  • The company will pay for your ride home if you’ve been drinking. Don’t use the force, that only works if you’re a Jedi and no matter how much you drank, you’re not a Jedi.
  • Don’t talk shop, unless there’s money to be made, then talk all the shop you want.
  • If you don’t show up and claim you weren’t feeling well, but you were actually at work that day, we’ll basically make up stories about the real reason you decided not to show up.
  • Attendance isn’t mandatory, please don’t come if you don’t want to come. We want to have fun and if feel you have to be there for some odd reason, you’re not fun.
  • Former employees are welcome to attend unless I hate them, then don’t have them attend.
  • Don’t corner your boss when you’re drunk and ask for a raise, unless they hit on you in an inappropriate manner, then completely ask for a giant raise.
  • Talk the newbies. It sucks bringing your spouse or significant other to a company party and then no one pays attention to you. Go out of your way to involve the new folks into your conversation and get to know them.
  • Don’t be the last to show up, or the first to leave. Wait, what?
  • Drink all you want. Remember, everyone is always watching.
  • Don’t hook up with a co-worker at the party. None of us want to see that, at least wait until you get in your Uber and give the driver a show.
  • The company will pay for your ride home. Don’t be an idiot.

Many HR leaders and pros don’t feel it’s appropriate for a company to have a party and provide alcohol. I get it. I’m good either way, you have to know your culture and what they want and be willing to set limits.

I’ve worked in giant companies and small companies and all of those companies had holiday parties with alcohol. You’ll have issues. Be prepared on how you’ll handle them. Help your employees out before they get themselves in trouble.

I always felt it was my job as an HR leader to take on that role within the business. I didn’t want my leaders being the ‘bad’ guy, so I took on that role when it was time to pull someone aside. They appreciated and they knew I wouldn’t hold a grudge on the employee who maybe went a bit too far.

Have an enjoyable holiday office party season!

 

Pretty People Make the Best Employees

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What do you think of, in regards to smarts, when I say: “Sexy Blond model type”?

What about: “Strong Athletic Jock?”

What about: “Scrawny nerdy band geek?”

My guess is most people would answer: Dumb, Dumb, Smart – or something to that context.

In HR we call this profiling and make no mistake, profiling is done by almost all of our hiring managers.  The problem is everything we might have thought is probably wrong in regards to our expectations of looks and brains.  So, why are ugly people smarter?

They’re Not!

Slate recently published an article that contradicts all of our ugly people are more smart myths and actually shows evidence to the contrary. From the article:

Now there were two findings: First, scientists knew that it was possible to gauge someone’s intelligence just by sizing him up; second, they knew that people tend to assume that beauty and brains go together. So they asked the next question: Could it be that good-looking people really are more intelligent?

Here the data were less clear, but several reviews of the literature have concluded that there is indeed a small, positive relationship between beauty and brains. Most recently, the evolutionary psychologist Satoshi Kanazawa pulled huge datasets from two sources—the National Child Development Study in the United Kingdom (including 17,000 people born in 1958), and the National Longitudinal Study of Adolescent Health in the United States (including 21,000 people born around 1980)—both of which included ratings of physical attractiveness and scores on standard intelligence tests.

When Kanazawa analyzed the numbers, he found the two were related: In the U.K., for example, attractive children have an additional 12.4 points of IQ, on average. The relationship held even when he controlled for family background, race, and body size.

That’s right HR Pros, pretty people are smarter!  I can hear hiring managers and creepy executives that only want “cute” secretaries laughing all over the world!

The premise is solid though!  If you go back in our history and culture you see how this type of things evolves:

  1. Very smart guy gets great job or starts a great company and makes a ton of money.
  2. Because of his success, this smart guy now has many choices of very pretty females to pursue as a bride.
  3. Smart guy and pretty bride start a family which genetically result in Pretty-Smart children.
  4. Pretty-smart children grow up with all the opportunities that come to smart beautiful more affluent families.
  5. The cycle repeats.

First, this is a historical thing so my example of using a male as our “Smart guy” and not “Smart girl” is just how this originally developed in society. I’m sure in today’s world this premise has evolved yet again adding women as breadwinners, but attractiveness probably remains. We are talking about how we got to this point, not where are we now.

Additionally, we are looking at how your organization can hire better.  So, how do you hire better?  Hire more pretty people. White, black, male, female, American, Hispanic, gay, straight, it really doesn’t matter, just make sure they’re attractive!

Seems simple enough. Heck, that is even a hiring process that your hiring managers would support! The one thing I’ve never had a hiring manager tell me, male or female, is “hey, you know Tim, they’re just too pretty, they won’t work here.” Never happened. Never will.

Want to increase the talent in your organization? Just hire pretty people!

Officially Announcing My Candidacy for the 2020 Presidential Election #ACatInEveryPot

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Apparently, we will now campaign for four years to become the President of the United States for four years. Makes sense. I like the Canadian system of campaigning way better than what we have here! 90 days or less and we’re done! Doesn’t that sound like a smart law?

Until then, I’ll have to live with what we have. So, since I’m a U.S. born citizen, over the age of 35, and I would prefer to run under a third party as neither the Republicans or Democrats come close to meeting my needs, I’m officially running under the HR Party!

If I know anything, I know HR loves a good party!

Here is my platform, as of right now, but there’s a good chance I will change often depending at which conference I’m at and what part of the country I’m in at the time:

  • The only way you can now vote for any office is to first fill out a change of address form, completely (even if you haven’t recently changed your address), in black or navy blue ink, and you also must have completed your annual open enrollment.
  • Wine and Chocolate will no longer be taxed, and companies selling these products in the United States must sell them at cost. That should get me at least 51% of the popular vote!
  • By law, you will now not be allowed to talk to anyone before 9am on Monday mornings at your workplace.
  • If you miss an interview due to “car trouble” you will be publicly hanged. This is the single most overused excuse for missing an interview, get more creative or die.
  • If you are a no-call, no-show for an interview, or your first day of work, you will be deported to Siberia or Fargo (they’re basically the same).
  • Grammatical errors on resumes will now cost you a hand. You can pick which hand. I actually think this is dumb, but I need to pander to my electorate.
  • By law, you will no longer be able to call in sick for work on Mondays or Fridays. Because we know you’re lying.
  • Organizations caught paying less to women, for the same position, same skills, will be forced to fire every man that works for them.
  • All colleges will now cost the exact same amount. $10,000 per year for full tuition and books. Living expenses depends on where you can get in – i.e., it costs more to go to college in New York then Omaha. Private or Public. You still have to get accepted based on their admission policies.
  • Cats and dogs will now be allowed in all workplaces where there is not a health concern. No, you can’t bring your pot belly pig, or your snake, or your fish. Cats and dogs, we’re in America.
  • You will not be able to manage other people until you have worked for a minimum of five years in real jobs. No, going to school that mommy paid for and working four hours per week in the library doesn’t count as work.
  • We will now have CEO pay be directly paid in proportion to that of the average worker salary of the companies they lead. That proportion will be 25 times the salary of your employees. If your average salary is $45,000 for employees, the CEO can make $1,125,000. Don’t worry the 95% of white guys in those roles will be just fine. The extra corporate profit will be paid to the shareholders and employees in equal amounts.

I think that’s enough to get started. The HR Party will be huge! What do you think HR Pros? What platform items would you add?

 

HR’s “You” Problem!

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Did you know 67% of second marriages fail?

That seems high to me.  You would think conventional wisdom would teach us that those folks failing the first time what they did wrong, and what they need to differently the second time to make a marriage successful.  But it doesn’t work that way.  By the way, 73% of third marriages fail.  We get worse, not better!

Why?

It’s because of you.  You suck at marriage.  Stop getting married!  Now, no one really wants to believe this, which is probably the foundational

Now, no one really wants to believe this, which is probably the foundational problem to begin with, but the one common denominator in every failed second and third marriage is you.   You are the problem.  For whatever reason that might be, you’re just bad a picking a spouse that you are compatible with, and the more times you do it, the worse you’re going to get.  Buy a dog, there great companions.

HR has ‘You’ Problems.

We tend to want to think it’s everyone else.  It’s not us!  We get it.  It’s those damn idiots over in sales, they’re morons!  The stupid folks in operations never do anything right!

Yeah, it’s them, not us.

We have ‘you’ problems because we refuse to believe that maybe, just maybe, we are the ones who don’t get it.  Maybe it’s us, that needs to change.  Maybe, all this time, the reason we haven’t gotten that seat at the table, no respect, lacked influence, had nothing to do with everyone else, it had to do with us…

No way, can’t be.  We get it. Right?

Happy Thanksgiving, HR and TA Friends!

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I’m super thankful for 2016. I have to say in 2016 I honestly believe I’ve met more HR and TA leaders and pros in this year than any other single year in my professional career!

I’m constantly told, by well-meaning folks, when I go to a new place something like, “Well, Tim, the people here are great, but from an HR (or TA) perspective, we’re probably 3-5 years behind!” Almost every single place I go! Big city, tiny country town, foreign countries, big company, small company, startups. Everyone says the same thing!

What I find is really two things:

  1. You think you’re way more behind than you actually are.
  2. Those who are actually behind, really don’t care or have given up on their profession and/or their organizations.

Those who really care about HR and TA are rarely ever behind. They might not have the same resources as other companies, but their thought processes on what is great HR and TA is spot on. Also, I rarely find HR or TA professionals or leaders who truly feel they’re on the cutting edge of innovative HR and TA practices.

The fact is, those who are on the cutting edge of HR and TA are less than 1%. If you go to HR and TA conferences you probably get to hear from these folks, and that makes you feel behind, but 99.9% of those sitting with you in the audience are right where you are! Also, just because someone is from a big, popular company, don’t think they know about HR or TA than you do!

Most of the truly great HR and TA leaders I meet aren’t from giant brands. They’re from medium to smaller organizations and they’ve had to hustle to get their shops in order, they’ve had to be innovative to compete, and they’re much more willing to push the envelope of technology to move their organizations forward.

So, today I’m giving thanks. I thankful for all the new friendships I’ve created over this past year. I’m thankful for all the old friends who call me out on my bullshit. I’m thankful for having this community of people who care so damn much about their organizations and their people. It’s uplifting to work in this world every day.

Happy Thanksgiving!

Do Your Leaders Need to be Technocrats to be Successful?

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With the U.S. Presidential elections behind us, we’ll continue to see fallout for some time.  Hillary Clinton was considered by many in Silicon Valley to be a “Technocrat“. What’s a technocrat you ask?

A technocrat is someone who’s an advocate or proponent of a Technocracy, and part of the technology skilled elite. A technocracy is a theoretical organized structure of governance where the leaders are actually selected based on their technological knowledge. Like most things, though, the media has used the term to describe an individual who is pro-technology, for the most part.

On the flip side, President-elect Trump (boy that was odd writing!) is not considered to be a technocrat.

One of the reasons millennials voted for Clinton in such huge numbers was she was considered to be more technology savvy than Trump and advocated for technology more than her opponent. The reality is both are 70-year-old baby boomers, who probably couldn’t set up their own email on an iPhone, but one had a better marketing team than the other!

Regardless of actual technological skill, I still believe it comes back the mindset, not age, that you’re either pro-technology (technology is good and will help us be better), or you see technology as fine, but it’s not life-changing (yeah, I can see what you’re saying, but the old way works as well). So few are now anti-technology that it’s not even worth talking about.

It begs the question, though, that if a younger workforce has shown they prefer leaders who are Technocrats, should you be looking for that trait when you go and select leaders?

I believe we should be selecting leaders who are Technocrats and here are some reasons why:

1. A younger workforce is more likely to follow a leader who is pro-technology.

2. We need our leaders pushing our organizations forward and one of the best ways is through technology advances.

3. Having a technocrat mindset is more akin to having a strategic mindset. If you’re constantly thinking about how technology can advance your business, you’re being strategic, as compared to just running your operations the same way they always have been.

The hard part of selecting technocrats is almost anyone in today’s work world under the age of sixty will tell you, “of course, I’m pro-technology!” When in fact, most have no idea what that even means. Saying you’re pro-technology and being pro-technology are two very different things.

Yeah, I use Netflix. No, I have no idea how my kids set it up. Just because you watch Netflix doesn’t make you pro-technology. Liking technology and taking a keen interest in how it works to make your life better are two different things. Technocrats want to know more. They might not be able to write code, but they dig in beyond just the surface.

The key to selecting technocrat leaders is to have them give you specific examples around how they’ve used technology to push their organization or department forward? What was their role in the selection process? Why did they select one technology over another? Technocrats will love these questions and will really take you into the weeds with their answers.

Just being a technocrat won’t make a leader candidate a good leader. We all know all of the other leader traits we are looking for in selecting our next leaders. It’s my belief, though, that as we move forward, our leaders need to be technology savvy if they truly want to connect and lead a younger workforce.

 

How focused Are Your Leaders In Making Your Organization Successful?

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We all like to think we have a leader or two that is freaking dialed in at a level far superior to everyone else. They’re freaks. In early, usually, one of the first ones, out late, if not last. They seem to know what’s going on in every part of the organization before you do.

Our top leaders are ultra-focused on making their organizations great. Nothing seems to distract them and throw them off their game. So much so they probably have very questionable work-life balance, if they have any at all.

Want a real-life example of one of these freaks!? Let’s take a look at Alabama head football coach, Nick Saban:

Nick Saban said he wasn’t aware that millions of Americans went to the polls on Tuesday to vote for the next president of the United States.

“It was so important to me that I didn’t even know it was happening,” Alabama‘s head football coach told reporters in Tuscaloosa on Wednesday evening. “We’re focused on other things here.”

To be fair, news media isn’t part of Saban’s routine.

The 65-year-old coach typically wakes up every morning, has a Little Debbie Oatmeal Creme Pie and a cup of coffee and watches about 10 minutes of The Weather Channel, which promised no political coverage on Election Day…

Nick Saban wasn’t aware there was a Presidential election going on! Brother! That’s focus!

I’m not sure I buy into the fact he had no idea. Most leaders, especially leaders of 18-22-year-old young men, would have made a very specific point to encourage those men to be a part of the American process. To show their leadership within the community by voting. But, Nick is a freak!

Nick Saban is not like most leaders, he’s an outlier in every definition of the term, which makes him extremely good and extremely successful at what he does.

Do you think you have a leader in your organization that is so focused on making you successful that they didn’t even realize there was a Presidential election going on?  I doubt most of us have one of these folks in our organizations, but if you do, you need to pay attention to that person! I’m not saying it’s healthy, all I’m saying is success is hard, and sometimes you have to have unhealthy habits to get it and maintain it. We all face that balance

We all face that balance. Don’t judge Saban for his choices, they’re his to make. He’s addicted to success, even if it means not knowing what’s going on in the world around him.