Category Archives: Performance

Losing Your Job – Tebow Style!

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By now most of the free world knows that Peyton Manning accepted the quarterback position with the Denver Broncos who already had a quarterback in Tim Tebow. Ouch.To be honest it was really the only way that the Denver Broncos were going to get out of this Tebow mess.  I like the kid, but he isn’t one of the better NFL quarterbacks, and he certainly wasn’t going to take them to the Super Bowl.  Now they have a Hall of Fame caliber quarterback in Manning – who, if he fails, will have at least accomplished one thing for the Broncos – he got rid of Tebow without the fans losing their minds!  Tebow is a fan favorite, which is like saying, fat kids slightly like cake – Bronco fans, heck, NFL fans in general, lost their minds about Tebow run last season.  Getting rid of him wasn’t an option for the organization – until something so good came along it made everyone forget how much they loved Tebow.

You see great Talent has a way of doing that – making you forget about your favorites.  Do you have a Tebow in your organization?  I bet you do – and you know if you tried to get rid of them, your employees would lose their minds, culturally it would be bad, productively it would be bad, moral-wise it would be bad.  So, you don’t do it – even if the person really isn’t holding up their end of the bargain any longer.

So, what do you do?

You do what Elway did with the Broncos – you bring in better talent and cut bait with your employee favorite!  You have to do this.  You have no choice.  To keep an under-performing employee, just because everyone likes that person – is HR death!   But, what do you do if the person is an average employee and well liked, but you get a chance to bring in superior talent?  You do the same thing – but you you have to very careful on how you make that transition.  Unfortunately, the talent that you and I bring into our organizations usually isn’t as highly publicized as a Peyton Manning!  So, we, as HR/Talent Pros, have to do some of our own internal PR work on the new talent.

What does internal PR on a new hire look like?  It starts with getting your leadership team all on the same page – they need to be excited and 100% supportive of the new person.  Then focus on the new person’s direct team/department.  They don’t have to be excited – remember they just lost someone they love – but they have to be supportive.  The best way to do this is through a structured transition meeting – where they get to learn about the new person, but also voice their pain of their loss – it’s good for both parties to be on the same page. The final step is to get of the news release to the rest of the organization if all the high points of the new talent. Be careful not to do this first, because people will instantly run to the new group and ask about it.  A transition meeting has to be done, so they a ready to respond and be supportive of the new person.  To often in our organizations we rush to “tell everyone” before the person starts, or soon after, it’s more important to wait on this communication and get those closest up to speed first.

No one ever wants to let go of an organizational favorite – but in HR it’s our job to increase the talent of our organizations – sometimes that means making an unpopular decision.  The best HR Pros find ways to move the organization forward quickly and while be supportive.

 

 

 

Trying Not To Lose in HR

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I love March – primarily for March Madness and because I love basketball.  I spent the weekend watching as many NCAA Tournament games as possible, including a trip to Columbus, OH to watch my Michigan State Spartans compete in the 1st and 2nd rounds (which technically is in accurate – it was actually the 2nd and 3rd rounds because of those stupid play in games on Tuesday and Wednesday are “really” the 1st round – but they’re not, we all know it – the only people who truly think that is the 1st round is the NCAA and the parents of the kids playing in those games – which BTW are the only people in those stands watching!).

While enjoying this pastime I heard very often the sports cliche: “They are playing not to lose versus trying to win”.

For those who have competed in sports (and for many in business), you know exactly what this looks and feels like.  It’s playing keep away with the ball when you’re up 3 in the first half!  No! Stop! Run your normal offense. It’s your favorite NFL team going into a prevent defense up 10 points with 15 minutes to play (Don’t do it – it’s going to “prevent” you from winning!).  Playing not to lose is being conservative – maybe to conservative – to the point of you stop doing what it took that got you in the position to win.

We do this in HR.

Too many times we tell managers “No”, when we should be telling them “Yes” – we become some risk avoidant they we miss out on some very good opportunities for our organization.   It’s not HR’s job to avoid risk – it’s HR’s job to measure the level of risk and work with our organizational partners to determine if they are comfortable with the level of risk we are about to take.  Those are to very different things – many HR Pros misconstrue this issue.   They try at all costs to avoid all risk, which isn’t necessarily the right thing for the business.  They aren’t trying to win, they’re trying not to lose.

The next time you find yourself in a position of giving advice to your operations partners at work, ask yourself this one question –

  • Am I trying to make the company/organization better right now, or am I trying to eliminate risk?

Then determine, what should I be doing?  For some of you the right choice will be to say – at this point, right now, I have to eliminate risk – it’s the right call.  But for many of you, you will have to circle back and truly try to make your organizations better by managing the risk that is presented.

Spend today trying to win.

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

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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.

or

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

or

  • 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

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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.

Essential vs. Non-Essential Employees

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I’ve had many conversations in my career with employees who “essentially” felt they were probably more important to the business than they really were.  You know who I’m talking about!   The ones who at some point let it slip: “This place would shut down if I wasn’t here” or “Let’s see how you do if I leave” or “I made this company what it is today”.  It’s usually a sales person, or technical person who have had big roles, no doubt, but they begin to get a little to big for their own britches (as my grandmother would say).  Over time I’ve developed a good two point test to determine if someone is Essential or Non-essential to your business:

1.  In a snow storm, is this person required to make it into the office/facility no matter what? (think large storm – more than one day)

Example: I worked in a large Health System – Doctors & Nurses had to get in – we actually had plans on how to get them to work in an emergency.  I on the other hand, being in HR – didn’t have anyone coming to pick me up in a 4 wheel drive SUV.

2.  Does the person in question spend way too much of their time trying to convince you of how important they are to your operation?

Examples:  “Without me are largest client wouldn’t be here.” ; “Our department (a non-revenue generating department) saved the organization over $500K last year.” – on a budget of $3.7M…

You know what is really interesting about looking at the life of an organization – when they start out, in their infancy, there is only Essential employees.  We make widgets, all you need is someone to get widget material, someone to make widgets and someone to sell widgets and someone to collect the cash and pay the bills.  Pretty basic.  No HR, No Marketing or Finance, No customer service – it’s a very straight line organization.   Most companies don’t even add an HR element to their organizations until they get over 100 employees – usually an office manager/payroll/accounting person or the owner takes on this responsibility.

I always like to remind myself of who is “really” essential in my organization.  It’s important.  It’s important that as a “client” to those people, I make sure I focus what I’m doing on things that will help them do what they are doing.  That only happens when I actually talk to them, face-to-face, and ask them – “What can I do, to help you do what you do?”  Doesn’t seem overly complicated – but somehow we try and make it harder than that.  You see, that’s what non-essentials do – we convince you that what we do is really important!

I like to look at organizations the same way you pick a team on the playground.  If you had the most essential person in your company begin picking a team – where would you get picked?  First, 10th, last?   It’s a good exercise to go through.  What you’ll see is your most essential person will pick individuals who will/can help them get the job done – without hassle, without issues, without extra work.

Are you Essential to your organization?

How are you treating your Muse?

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I stumbled upon a really cool site a while ago called, Letters of Note – Correspondence deserving of a wider audience – check it out.  While picking through the posts/letters I found one that was awesome written by Nick Cave regarding his rejection of his 1996 MTV Video Music Awards for Best Male Artist. This is the full letter:

21 Oct 96

To all those at MTV,

I would like to start by thanking you all for the support you have given me over recent years and I am both grateful and flattered by the nominations that I have received for Best Male Artist. The air play given to both the Kylie Minogue and P. J. Harvey duets from my latest album Murder Ballads has not gone unnoticed and has been greatly appreciated. So again my sincere thanks.

Having said that, I feel that it’s necessary for me to request that my nomination for best male artist be withdrawn and furthermore any awards or nominations for such awards that may arise in later years be presented to those who feel more comfortable with the competitive nature of these award ceremonies. I myself, do not. I have always been of the opinion that my music is unique and individual and exists beyond the realms inhabited by those who would reduce things to mere measuring. I am in competition with no-one.

My relationship with my muse is a delicate one at the best of times and I feel that it is my duty to protect her from influences that may offend her fragile nature.

She comes to me with the gift of song and in return I treat her with the respect I feel she deserves — in this case this means not subjecting her to the indignities of judgement and competition. My muse is not a horse and I am in no horse race and if indeed she was, still I would not harness her to this tumbrel — this bloody cart of severed heads and glittering prizes. My muse may spook! May bolt! May abandon me completely!

So once again, to the people at MTV, I appreciate the zeal and energy that was put behind my last record, I truly do and say thank you and again I say thank you but no…no thank you.

Yours sincerely,

Nick Cave

In the last line of the 2nd paragraph he says, “I am in competition with no-one”.  That wasn’t meant to be a cocky statement in any way – it was meant to be humble.  He does his music for him, not for recognition, not for awards – he would be doing his music if no one paid him.  Now, because someone is paying him, he’s not going to change his feelings.  That is integrity!

Do you feel this strongly for anything in your life?  You would be fortunate if you did.

 

Bad Hires Worse

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If I could take all of my HR education, My SPHR and 20 years of experience and boil it down to this one piece of advice, it would be this:

Bad Hires Worse.

In HR we love to talk about our hiring and screening processes, and how we “only” hire the best talent, but in the end we, more times than not, leave the final decision on who to hire to the person who will be responsible to supervise the person being hired – the Hiring Manager.   I don’t know about all of you, but in my stops across corporate America, all of my hiring managers haven’t been “A” players, many have been “B” players and a good handful of “C” players.  Yet, in almost all of those stops, we (I) didn’t stop bad hiring managers from hiring when the need came.  Sure I would try to influence more with my struggling managers, be more involved – but they still ultimately had to make a decision that they had to live with.

I know I’m not the only one – it happens every single day.  Everyday we allow bad hiring managers to make talent decisions in our organizations, just as we are making plans to move the bad manager off the bus.   It’s not an easy change to make in your organization.  It’s something that has to come from the top.  But, if you are serious about making a positive impact to talent in your organization you can not allow bad managers to make talent decisions.  They have to know, through performance management, that: 1. You’re bad (and need fixing or moving); 2. You no longer have the ability to make hiring decisions.  That is when you hit your High Potential manager succession list and tap on some shoulders.  “Hey, Mrs. Hi-Po, guess what we need your help with some interviewing and selection decisions.”  It sends a clear and direct message to your organization – we won’t hire worse.

Remember, this isn’t just an operational issue – it happens at all levels, in all departments.  Sometimes the hardest thing to do is look in the mirror at our own departments.  If you have bad talent in HR, don’t allow them to hire (“but it’s different we’re in HR, we know better!” – No you don’t – stop it).   Bad hires worse – over and over and over.  Bad needs to hire worse, they’re desperate, they’ll do anything to protect themselves, they make bad decisions – they are Bad.  We/HR own this.  We have the ability and influence to stop it.  No executive is going to tell you “No” when you suggest we stop allowing our bad managers the ability to make hiring decisions – they’ll probably hug you.

It’s a regret I have – something I will change.  If it happens again, I won’t allow it.  I vow from this day forward, I will never allow a bad hiring manager to make a hiring decision – at least not without a fight!

The 8 Man Rotation – 2011 Season

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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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Do You Have a Jeremy Lin on Your Staff?

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“Linsanity” has taken over New York and the NBA!  Do you even know what it is?

Let’s begin with some background – Linsanity refers to Jeremy Lin the up-start Point Guard for the New York Knicks which seems to have materialized out of thin air.  How up-start? In his first 4 NBA starts, with the Knicks, he has scored more than Allen Iverson, more than Shaquille O’Neal, more than Michael Jordan, tops since the NBA and ABA merged in 1976.  Where did he come from?  Harvard – was a good player in college, but not a star.  Was signed and released by both Golden State and Houston, spent some time in the NBA Developmental league, before signing a 10 day contract with the Knicks (which has turned into a longer term deal).

Jeremy Lin coming onto the scene in the NBA is keen to you knocking down a wall in your house and finding $50 million.  It doesn’t happen.  Professional sports are professional because they have and find the best – they scout talent 24/7/365 – they do make mistakes – but rarely does potential get missed.  So, how did this Asian-American Ivy League educated Point Guard fall through the cracks?  No one really has a good explanation.  I can assume being on the only Ivy League educated, Asian-American in the NBA didn’t help him get noticed – for the simple fact – that wouldn’t get you noticed in the NBA.  He didn’t have Duke, UConn or UNC on his resume, the NBA doesn’t care that he’s smart, and so few Asians (under 7 foot) actually ever get looked at for their basketball talent.  He was a plow horse hidden behind a stable full of race horses.

While this type of thing doesn’t happen in the NBA – it does happen in your organizations all-the-time!

The majority of HR Pros just don’t have the background and scouting ability professional sports teams have in tracking potential talent.  We give it our best shot, instituting Employee Development Programs, Succession Programs, etc.  But our reality is, we still have a very long way to go to be truly effective.  So, how can you ensure you don’t have a Jeremy Lin sitting on your bench, that you aren’t utilizing, or worse yet, you allow your competition to have?  Look for some of these traits on your staff:

1. Smarts.  There is a common saying in athletics, you can’t “coach” size. Meaning no matter how good of coach you are, it is still very hard to overcome a team with superior size and athletic ability.  Smarts is the same way in business.  You can hustle your way out of a lot of situations in business – but eventually Smarts will get you!

2. Desire. Give me someone with a desire to be the best, and I’ll take them a long way.  Too many of our employees have the components to be great, but lack the true desire to be great.  Doesn’t matter if your an engineer, accountant, software developer, teacher – little or no desire will kill your talent every time.

3. Love. You’ve got to Love what you do, Love your organization and Love your team.  Those people are set up for success, because there is no place else they would rather be, and they’ll fight to keep themselves in that position.

Just because you have one or two of these doesn’t make you great, or even good – you need a lot of all 3.  To often HR Pros hang onto people way to long because “they work so hard” but lack core talent (smarts), or “they have more talent than anyone else on team”, but lack the desire to do the job anymore.  Stop that!  You’ve got too many good people sitting on the bench, waiting for their opportunity, like Jeremy Lin.  Open up your mind, really look for the combination of talent, desire and those who want to be with you – and put them into the starting lineup!  You won’t be sorry.

The Only Interview Questions You’ll Ever Need

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About a year ago Forbes had an article, Top Executive Recruiters Agree There Are Only 3 True Job Interview Questions, that shared the “wisdom” of a handful of Executive Dinosaurs Recruiters on the only things that you should really have to ask a candidate.  There 3 questions where:

1. Can you do the job?

2. Will you love the job?

3. Can we tolerate working with you?

Simple enough – straight to the point – and you can assume for the $75,000 you’re paying, this is probably the extent of their screening as well!

In my Recruiting/HR career it’s probably the single most often asked question I get – from other Talent Pros, Hiring Managers, random people who know I’m in HR – “What are your best interview questions?”  Then you get to hear their questions, and how Google has some really great ones, and I even heard once about a company that asked people if they were an animal which animal would they be, and if you only pick one vegetable to eat the rest of your life, would it be carrots?  It goes on, and on – until you want to vomit!

The actual interview questions have very little impact in the success of the interview.  If you are interviewing anyone with some decent smarts, they are going to be able to ace your questions with little effort.  What is important in interviewing is what you allow the candidate to get away with.  I find that most recruiters and hiring managers to be way (I mean WAY!) to easy when it comes to questioning candidates.  See if this example sounds familiar:

Interviewer: “John, looks like you left your last next to last company in May, but didn’t start your current position until July. Can you explain that gap?”

John: “Sure, you know I was doing a great job and I didn’t see myself moving up in that company, so I wanted to go find somewhere I could move up the ladder.”

Bam! At this point – most – interviewers move on to the next questions.  When clearly, John deflected, and someone needs to rip into some Gestapo interrogation tactics and find out what’s really going on.  But they don’t, it would be conflict, he might think we are rude – we’ll move on…

Follow-up questions to original answers during an interview is a skill in itself.  The only interview questions you really ever need are the questions a Jealous Girlfriend asks when you come home on a Saturday morning around 3am.  Shoot – just hire Jealous Girlfriends as your interviewers – they’ll get to the bottom of a candidates background!  The hardest interview I ever had was with a woman that was eventually my boss, who was a former U.S. Army interrogator – it was exhausting, it was painful, it was Awesome – I actually lost my voice (after the 7th hour – True Story!).    She was the ultimate Jealous Girlfriend, in fact I think she trains Jealous Girlfriends in her spare time.  There wasn’t an answer I could give her that she was satisfied with, she just kept at it, until I would slip and say something I really didn’t mean to, and once she smelled the blood, it was over.  The result – she hired the best talent (excluding me) in the entire organization by far!  Bad hired did not make it past here interviewing technique.

So, don’t worry about having the “best” interview questions – really any will do – just don’t accept the first answer you get!