Category Archives: influence

HR Never Wins the Dress Code Game

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You probably saw this last week when the internet got all hot and bothered over a 17 year old girl who worked at JC Penny got sent home for a dress code violation. She tweeted out a picture of herself dressed in JC Penny bought ‘career’ apparel that she was wearing at the time (see pic above). The only place where I see this being dressed appropriate for work is probably Hooters, but you know me, I’m super ultra conservative right winged nut job, so what the hell do I know…

Many wanted were angry over what they saw as a double standard, although I’m not sure what that double standard is. I would have been more upset over a 17 year old boy wearing this outfit to work than the girl!  I would have sent both home, so there goes your double standard.

The real issue here is that JC Penny labeled this outfit ‘career apparel” to the customers, but didn’t find it career appropriate for their own associate. If JC Penny is labeling this outfit on their shelves appropriate work wear, why is it inappropriate work wear for their own employees?

Well, I have some reasons:

1. It’s tight and revealing for the average customer of JC Penny.  The average age of a JC Penny shopper is 103 years of age.  The last thing an old person wants to see is a fourth of July wannabe stripper.  That’s knowing your customer base.  I’m sure if she was working at Hot Topic, she wouldn’t have been sent home.

2. There a difference between marketing and operations.  Just because marketing is calling something ‘career appropriate’, doesn’t mean your HR and Operations folks will feel the same way.  Welcome to the reality of working in a corporation. People aren’t always on the same page, and that is a bad thing.

3. 17 year olds have no ability to understand the broader picture of the corporate politics at play here.  It’s too bad someone couldn’t have better coached this young lady on how to handle this situation to have a better impact for herself and fellow employees. Going nuclear wasn’t the best option for her.

4. HR never wins when it comes to dress code, because of these kinds of issues.

HR should give up the dress code policy whenever it’s an option and let your operations team own it. They know their customer base. They know their work environment. They know their employees.  Let them build a dress code that works for them, and trust they’ll do what’s right for the organization.  I’ve done this three times in my career, and all three times it worked out wonderfully, and I didn’t ever have to deal with dress code ever again!

Checking Work Email, Isn’t Working!

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For most of their careers, my parents could never check their work email at home.  It did mean that they probably stopped working when they got home, unlike most professional employees today.  My parents also rarely made it home at 5pm, and worked in the office many Saturdays and Sundays when the work needed to get done.

When did we start defining work as sitting in the bathroom at home and replying to email in five minutes as work?

Let’s face it, most people aren’t really working when they are home.  They like to believe that what they’re doing is real work, but if can also wait to be done the next morning when you arrive at the office, you’re not doing real work, you’re just narcissistic.  Oh, I better immediately get back to John and tell him I can definitely do that interview at 8am, next week Friday…

We act like checking work email at home is like we’re donating a kidney, or something.

CareerBuilder released a new survey today that shows that 59% of males and 42% of females respond to emails when out of the office.  Those numbers actually sound low to me. The survey also shows that younger workers are more likely to think about work when going to bed and when waking. Just wait! Pretty soon thinking about work will be the same as work!

Are we losing our minds!?

Seriously! I want to know.  Having the ability to check and respond to emails outside of the office increase your work-life flexibility, but we talk about it like it’s an anchor.  That iPhone is only an anchor if you make it an anchor!  Tomorrow I’m taking a half day to go watch my son play baseball.  In between innings I always check my email and respond if necessary.

Making the decision to take a half a day to watch my son play baseball is easy, because I know I can balance both jobs I have, running a company and being a Dad.  Does my son care that I’m checking email while he’s warming up in between innings?  No. He doesn’t even notice.  It’s not like I’m behind the backstop giving a performance review over the phone while he’s up to bat! I’m just checking and following up on some emails.

If you decide you want to stay connected to your job and organization while you are out of the office, that is a personal decision. Don’t act like you’re going above and beyond by keeping up on your emails.

If keeping up on your emails is the real work you’re doing, you’re way overpaid!

The Most Important Question You’ll Ever Ask a Hiring Manager

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How are those hiring manager “intake” meetings going?

You know, those meetings you have with a hiring manager every single time they have an opening.  You sit down with your hiring manager, face to face, and ask them a page full of questions.  Why is this position open? What would make a candidate most successful in this role?  What color of skin would you like this candidate to have? Boobs or no boobs? Whoops! Scratch those last ones, we would never ask those…

The reality is Talent Pros really only have one question they need to ask hiring managers. That question is this:

“Do you trust that I can find the talent you need?”

Ultimately, this is all that really matters for your success.  If they trust you, they’ll give you all the information you need to be successful.  If they don’t trust you can find the talent they need, they tend to hold stuff back.

Yes, I know that doesn’t make sense, but that’s real world talent acquisition stuff! Welcome to corporate America, a lot of stuff doesn’t make sense!

Most hiring manager have no faith you’ll find them great talent.  They have this belief because so many bad Talent Pros before you failed them.  So many before you didn’t really go out and find the best talent, they just delivered whatever warm body came into the ATS.

I just come out and ask the question.  The first answer you’ll get from 99% of hiring manager is a weird, “Well, sure, I do.” If you really dig into this answer, you’ll get the true answer which 90% of the time is, “Hell no! Why would I?  Your department has really never gotten this right!”

Thank you! That’s what I really needed.  I needed to get that out in the open, so now we can really build trust, and make great things happen.  They’re mostly right. Talent Acquisition fails many of our hiring managers for a number of reasons. Right now, your hiring manager doesn’t need to hear those reasons, they need to hear why this time will be different.

Then, you have to live up to ‘different’! You have to be better.  You have to get it right. Getting it right earns trust.

Once they trust you, great things will happen. Earn that trust.

The Power of Written Notes

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My oldest son graduated from high school this spring and we had one of those big old traditional open houses with a tent and tables and a slushy machine.  It was a nice gathering of 200+ family, friends, neighbors, teachers, coaches, people I don’t recall ever meeting, kids looking for a free desert, bums looking for a free drink, etc.

The whole idea of an open house is so your kid can get cash to start off their life in the ‘real’ world.  Invite as many people as you can. Update and clean your house for a year.  Decide on a menu that won’t break your bank account, but will impress all the other moms in attendance who are also throwing open houses.  Put up a lot of pictures and awards.

Side note: My wife won the 2015 Open House competition.  It wasn’t an unanimous vote, but she pretty much ran away with it. Also, she is a front runner for 2016 and my middle son’s graduation open house. We’re Sackett’s, we only get bigger and better!  I’m already having the back-2-back Open House Champs shirts printed up! #Confidence

We got lucky.  His real world consists of a college scholarship to play baseball.  The big expenses like tuition and books will be paid for, he has to pick up some living expenses, but his hard work paid off.  He now feels what it’s like to have more than a few hundred dollars in his bank account.  Which basically means he eats out almost every meal. He’s ghetto rich.

One really cool thing happened from having the open house.  Our son had to write thank you notes to all those who came, and all those who sent cards and cash.  He was lucky to have to write a ton of thank yous!

I voted on just getting the preprinted Thank You notes.  I bet half of the thank you notes we received of were this variety. Thanks for coming. I’m so grateful! Here’s a post card that was preprinted and my mom addressed the envelope. I probably would have went with a 10% off your next appetizer at Applebee’s or something to make it more special, but again, Sackett’s go big!

My wife is a traditionalist, he was going to be hand writing his notes.

It took some time to get them done, but to his credit, he really put in some time and thought into writing these notes.  I’ve heard from so many people congratulating me on his thank you notes!  Most commented on how much detail he added, and how he made it personal to them specifically.  That definitely makes us proud parents!

The entire experience just reminds me of how important it is to sometimes take the time to write a note out by hand.  In our world of messaging and emails, it just gets so easy to tune out so many of these communications.  Rarely, does a handwritten note get tuned out.  Remember that kids when you go looking for a job.  Your resume might get eaten up by an ATS, but most handwritten notes and cards get passed on directly to decision makers without being opened by a gatekeeper!

It’s Always Someone’s First Time

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Sometimes I forget that many other HR and Talent pros aren’t as geeky about the profession as I am.  I like to break down the profession of HR on the following scale:

1. The 1%ers.  These are the people who really get HR and Talent. They are the ones who actually decide what the future of the profession will look like, because they are smarter than all of us.  I am not one of these folks. I love to hang out with these folks, and I’m happy to call some of them friends, but I’m sure I annoy them with my questions and trivial insights.

2. The First Ten. The top ten percent of our profession.  Most of these are folks are the people you see running big HR shops, HR thought leaders, pundits in the space.  Smart folks to be sure, but also folks are involved beyond just doing the job of HR. They are the foot soldiers of the one percenters. They carry the message. I like to think I’m here most days.

3. The Masses.  These are the good men and mostly women who do the work of HR and Talent Acquisition on a daily basis. These are SHRM members, who might go to a national conference, state conference and definitely attend local meetings every once in a while. They are in the trenches every day, fighting the good fight, trying to make organizations better through great people practices. Sometimes it works, sometimes it doesn’t.

4. The Why We Hate HR pros. These the bottom ten percent folks.  These are the HR and Talent pros that make the organization hate HR. They use their power in HR for bad, not good.  They take out their crappy, meaningless lives on unsuspecting employees.  These folks should be hung publicly. They work to bring down the entire function of HR as a whole, but think they actually do good HR work.

I try to remember this scale when I talk to HR and Talent pros around the world.  Most just want to do better, and most are seeing problems and issues for the first time.  It’s not that they “don’t get it”, they have never seen it.  It’s there first time.

Someone might be very experienced in HR and Talent, but seeing something for the first time, or have made the decision to try something they have never tried.  As a first ten it’s my role, I believe, in the industry to help those folks in any way I can to get better.  That helps the entire profession to get better.

So, what does this all mean?

I want to encourage HR and Talent pros to reach out.  If I can’t help you, I’ve got great friends who can.  The community will help you get better, if you really want to move your organization forward.  We love success stories!

At one point in time we were all first timers doing this HR and Talent thing.  We either learned through trial and error, or through someone helping us that had already experienced what we were trying to do.  The cool part about the community I hang out with, is we all remember our first time, and want to help you with yours.

No One is Going to Remember How Much Money You Saved!

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When I first started my career in HR on the corporate side of the fence I was always very concerned about my budget.  I spent a long time making sure I developed a good budget and I worked even harder to stay on or under budget.  Ultimately, it was the biggest waste of time I ever spent as an HR professional.

What I learned over the years was that budgets are important, but succeeding at your functional area is more important!

No one cared if I came in 7% under budget, but I had critical positions open for way too long, and projects were behind or failed as a result. No one cared that I came in under salary budget if our turnover increased.  No one cared that didn’t use all of my HR technology budget if they continued to be frustrated with processes that caused them more work.

I didn’t learn this until I spent so much money I thought I was going to be fired, and ended up getting praised!

I was working on a project to open up 40 pharmacies in a year. That meant we had to find a lot of pharmacists.  For those in that game, you know finding 80 or so Pharmacists isn’t something you just go post on CareerBuilder.  We had to market. We had to go to a ton of schools. We had to ‘buy’ some folks. Sign on bonuses. Relocation bonuses. Tuition guarantees. Whatever it took!

I was so far over my budget I took on this thought process, “well, I might as well fill them all, I’ll be fired next year at budget time!”  So, I did. I got a sourcing company to help me. I got my team on the road. We threw parties on campuses for new pharmacy grads. We killed it!

In my year end budget meeting, the VP of Pharmacy congratulated me and my team.  We were over our budget by almost a half a million dollars. The one factor I didn’t know, which I should have, was each pharmacy that we didn’t open cost the company about three million.  My overage, wasn’t peanuts!

There are times to save money in HR.  Anything you can give back at the end of the year will always be appreciated.  I learned, though, that being over for the right reasons is looked upon almost more strategic than the times I gave money back.

I faced more questions giving money back, then spending more than I had. Executives wanted to know why I didn’t spend all the money I had in my technology budget.  Were we going to fall behind? What my plans were in the future? Etc.  Not spending my money to get better, was looked at as a sign of I didn’t know what I was doing.

I learned that no one is going to remember how much I saved if I’m not making my function better. Staying status quo isn’t a good answer.  They gave me money for a reason, and it was up to me to use that money to make us better.  Giving it back just showed them I wasn’t strategic enough to find great ways to use those resources.

Live From #SHRM15 – Everyone Wants Priority Status

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Next week I’ll be speaking at SHRM’s Annual National Conference in Las Vegas with my good friend Kris Dunn.  Come check us out!  Our session is titled: We’re Bringing Techy Back!  It’s on Monday, June 29th at 2pm in rooms N228-N230.

In this session we’ll discuss everything you need to know, as an HR and Talent pro, about selecting your next HR technology, what HR tech companies are saying, and what it really means. We’ll also give you some great tips on negotiating the price! Our hope is to take the fear and confusion of HR Tech and make it simple and clear.  We’ll also have some fun and probably be a bit snarky about the HR Tech industry!

Also, check me out on Periscope (TimSackett) as I’ll be attempting to do some live video feeds from the Expo floor and maybe, just maybe, live from our session at SHRM.  It’s super easy, just download the app to your phone and you can watch whatever it is I’m videoing, live, in real-time. You can also ask questions and make comments.

As I get ready to take off to Vegas I started thinking about checking in to my flight and hoping I’ll get a good status so I can find some space in the overheads and not have to wait at baggage claim.  I hate the concept of priority status, because I hate the way it ‘classes’ individuals.  I get it. Delta wants to take care of those passengers who are most loyal. I actually like that part.  After that, it all becomes a little hairy!

First comes the needs of those who need extra time and help boarding. Usually, elderly, injured and families with babies and strollers.  I’m fine with this, but the family thing has gotten out of control. I mean, look, your kid can walk by themselves, you don’t need extra time! You’re just gaming the system.  If I was smart I would befriend a really old person and offer to carry their bag!

First Class is next. Okay, they pay the most, I can buy into that.  I’m a capitalist. I can fit my brain around that.

Next, comes those skymile frequent flyer types.  Again, I’m all for loyalty programs, and would argue these folks should probably get on before first class, but they are both getting on early, so all have no real issues.

This is where all hell breaks lose.  Seating Status 1, or 2, or 3, etc.

There doesn’t seem to be any rhyme or reason behind the rest of us get on the plane!  They claim that ‘zone’ seating is done back to front, but if you’ve flown anytime recently you know that isn’t true.  You can buy into zone 1 if you want to pay a little extra to jump on early, but not as early as about 50% of the plane listed in the above classes.

Basically, Delta has created this entire system where people just all push towards the gate and wait for their zone, but try and get in early on their zone. It’s chaos!  And their is no reason for it.

Can you imagine if you did this with your employees or candidates?  It’s dysfunctional at best, and creates ‘fans’ who end up hating you at worst.

I fly about 12-15 times per year, not anywhere close to the real frequent travelers I know.  But each time I question the boarding process and what a bad process it is, on all airlines, not just Delta.

What’s a better way?  I like the pure capitalist play of seating by ticket price! Those who paid the most, get on first, all the way down to those who paid the least or got ‘free’ travel with miles. I’m even willing to have this take longer. It might not be ‘better’, but at least I can justify why I’m getting on last!

See you in Vegas.  Make sure you hit me up on Twitter (@TimSackett). I would love to meet you in real life while I’m at SHRM, unless you’re creepy, then please hit up Kris Dunn (@Kris_Dunn)!

The #1 Way to Communicate Success of a HR Change!

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Adobe recently changed their annual performance review process of the traditional once-per-year review to a more modern design of having frequent feedback throughout the year:

So, based in part on ideas crowdsourced from employees, Morris and her team scrapped annual evaluations and replaced them with a system called Check In. At the start of each fiscal year, employees and managers set specific goals. Then, at least every eight weeks but usually much more often, people “check in” with their bosses for a real-time discussion of how things are going. At an annual “rewards check-in,” managers give out raises and bonuses according to how well each employee has met or exceeded his or her targets. “Managers are empowered to make those decisions,” says Morris. “There is no ‘matrix.’ HR isn’t involved.”

A big change for any organization, for sure, but that’s not what this post is really about.  You see, Donna Morris, Adobe’s Sr. Global VP of People and Places could have easily just said it’s been a great success and shared stories from employees and hiring managers about how much they loved it. She could have shared retention metrics and employee engagement scores to show its success, but she didn’t. What shared did was absolutely brilliant! She shared this:

Getting feedback in real time, so everyone stays on track and is pulling in the same direction, has helped make Adobe’s 13,000 employees far more productive, Morris says. Adobe’s stock price has increased from about $30 to over $80 since Check In began.

Drops mic, walks off stage.

You want to really communicate the success of HR change, tie it to direct financial outcomes!  Yes, it’s a major leap to say “Check In” created $50 per share of shareholder value.  Let me say that again, MAJOR LEAP!  In fact, I don’t even think you could scientifically correlate this one HR change to the raise in shareholder value, but she did!  What she did would be similar to saying global temperatures have risen 3 degrees on average since they started making Krispy Kreme donuts, so Krispy Kreme is responsible for global warming!

You see, success of a major program has little to do with fact, and ton to do with perception.  Here is a senior HR executive who gets it.   She wants to do other cool and innovative stuff at Adobe, and now she has her big-win to go back to when someone pushes back that it won’t work, or it’s not needed.   In the minds of Adobe employees, this program has increased shareholder value, and we need to listen to her other ideas!

Take note HR Pros!  If you get this opportunity, you take it 100% of the time! Because you won’t get it often.  How do you communicate your success of a HR program?  Wait until you have favorable financial data in your organization, then connect the dots for people!

Do Demotions Work?

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Quietly, Brian Williams returned to NBC last week. Not in his usual spot of nightly news anchor, but in a demoted spot, for less pay:

The embattled former NBC Nightly News anchor has been demoted and will receive reportedly less money in his new role, The New York Times reported Thursday.

Williams is being replaced by Lester Holt, who took over for him after he was handed down an unpaid six-month suspension for making factually incorrect comments and “misremembering” details spoken about on-air.

The newspaper reported that Williams will receive “substantially” less money when he returns to the network as a breaking news and special reports anchor for MSNBC, a division of NBC. He had been making at least $10 million a year for the last five years.

It begs the question, do demotions work?

They certainly aren’t popular. Both, employers and employees, dislike demotions.  Employers feel like if they demote an employee they are just giving them notice to go find another job.  Employees feel like a failure and that the organization is probably just trying to push them out the door. In my experience demotions rarely work.

What kind of demotions work?

There are times when you promote a good worker into a new role, a promotion, and both you and the employee think it will be great, but then it ends up not being great. The employee can’t handle the new role, you did a bad job preparing them, there were other organizational issues at play, whatever the reason, it’s not working. This happens more than you realize, but we usually just end up firing the employee for performance, or they see the writing on the wall and take off before you get a chance to shoot them yourself.

I always find it ironic when I hear about this type of turnover. I’ll ask, “was this person a good, solid employee before they got promoted?”  The answer is always yes.  They wouldn’t have gotten promoted if they weren’t. So, then, why did this person have to be a turnover statistic? Why couldn’t we figure out how to get them back to a position where they were productive and successful again?

Modern organizational theory doesn’t allow for this.  We don’t believe that a person will ever want to go backwards in their career. Once they have been promoted, they will not want to go back into a position they had prior, and they definitely don’t want a pay cut!  We assume this to be true. Also, it might be true in many cases. So, we take a ‘good’ employee and terminate them or let them just go away on their own.

I think the only way you make a demotion work is if you set it up within your organizational culture that this ‘demotion’, going back into a very important role in the company, is something that happens here.  We want to challenge people, and sometimes those challenges won’t end well.  That’s okay, we still love you, and respect you, and we want to get you back on a path of success.

This conversation has to happen, not after failure, but before the person is ever promoted.  That moving along the career path here, at our organization, isn’t just up, it’s down, it’s sideways, etc.  We are going to constantly want to get you into a ‘role’ of success.  Yes, failure happens, but we will want to get you back to success as fast as possible.

The reality is, people don’t stay around if they’re failing.

Brian Williams is damaged goods, so he accepted the demotion.  He’s talented. He’ll get back on the horse, show his value, and then he’ll go someplace else.  NBC is giving him an opportunity, but this kind of demotion doesn’t usually end well, for the employer.

What Not To Eat: Work Edition

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We are constantly bombarded in the media about what we should be eating and what we shouldn’t be eating. Just last week the FDA came out with it’s new ban on Transfats starting in 2018.  While this is a good thing for the health of our society, it’s just one example of how we are being told what to eat and what not to eat.

While I don’t want to get into an argument here about whether or not you should be eating more protein, or fruits and vegetables, etc. I do want to give you some insight into foods you just should never eat at work.  Here’s my list:

1. Bananas.  No one wants to say it, so I will. There’s no good way to eat a banana at work and not have some fourteen year old comment come out. Male or female, eating a banana just isn’t a good look for anyone at the office.  I know, I know, you just break off small pieces and it’s fine.  It’s not. Stop it. Eat that home before coming in. (Also see: Twinkies, foot long hot dogs, those cream filled long john donuts, a full carrot)

2. Beanitos Chips.  The name pretty much tells you why.  Really, any “Beanito” product isn’t a good office product if you’re within fifty yards of a co-worker.  Yeah, they taste great, I’ll give you that!  But, an hour down the road we hate you, and that Fabreeze isn’t helping.

3. Sushi.  I love sushi.  The one problem with sushi is similar to bananas, you have to open your mouth so wide that you look gross eating it!  Sushi is a bad date food of choice as well, it’s just not a good look.  Any time you have to shove something the size of a golf ball into your mouth in one bite, you’re in trouble.

4. Raman Noodles. Again, love noodles, but I don’t want to see or hear you eating them. The slurping of noodles, while respected in Asian countries, is not respected in my office.  I don’t want to hear you eat, or slurp.

5. Anything cooked in the microwave in the break room that stinks up the entire place. Usually, this means fish. While it tastes great, fish does not smell good warmed up, and lingers.  I actually have a policy in our employee handbook at HRU that if you cook fish in the microwave you get fired.

6. Microwave Popcorn.  I actually love the smell of fresh popped popcorn! I worked in movie theaters growing up and can kill a large bucket by myself. The problem is, most people can’t quite grasp the concept of cooking popcorn in a microwave.  You have to watch it, listen for it. You have about a three second window to get it out before you have incinerated microwave popcorn. You just can’t push the “popcorn” button on the microwave and walk away, that is a recipe for disaster!

7. Any Vegan Food that looks like poop. Vegan’s know what I’m talking about. Let’s face it, most vegan food is gross and tastes like dirt, but God bless those people, they’ll probably live a lot longer than I! Like into those great 90s and 100s years! Yeah, can’t we all wait for those years…

What are the foods you don’t think people should eat at the office? Hit me in the comments!

*Shoutout to Jacks in my office for the idea for this post!