What is the right diversity mix of employees for your organization?

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This is a question I think many executives and HR and TA leaders struggle with. SHRM hasn’t come out and given guidance. ATAP has not told us at what levels we should be at with our diversity mix. So, how do we come up with this answer?

Seems like we should probably be roughly 50/50 when it comes to male and female employees. Again, that’s a broad figure, because your customer base probably makes a difference. If you’re selling products and services mostly women buy, you probably want more women on your team.

The more difficult mix to figure is when it comes to race. Should we be 50/50 when it comes to race in our hiring? Apple has taken it on the chin the last few years because of their demographic employee mix, and even as of this week, are still catching criticism for having only 1/3 of their leadership team is female, and only 17% of their entire team being black and Hispanic. 55% of Apple’s tech employees are white, 77% are male.

So, what should you diversity mix be?

The most recent demographics of race in America show this:

  • 61.3% are white
  • 17.8% are Hispanic/Latino
  • 13.3 are black
  • 4.8% Asian

Some other interesting facts about American race demographics:

  • 55% of black Americans live in the south
  • White Americans are the majority in every region
  • 79% of the Midwest is white Americans
  • The West is the most overall diverse part of America (where 46% of the American Asian population live, 42% of Hispanic/Latino, 48% of American Indian, 37% of multi-race)

So, what does this all mean when it comes to hiring a more diverse workforce? 

If 61.3% of the American population is white, is it realistic for Apple to hire a 50/50 mix of diversity across its workforce? I go back to my master’s research project when looking at female hiring in leadership. What you find in most service-oriented, retail, restaurants, etc. organizations are more male leaders than female leaders, but more female employees than male employees.

What I found was as organizations with a higher population of female employees hired a higher density of male employees as leaders, they were actually pulling from a smaller and smaller pool of talent. Meaning, organizations that don’t match the overall demographics of their employee base have the tendency to hire weaker leadership talent when they hire from a minority of their employee base, once those ratios are met.

In this case, if you have 70% female employees and 30% male, but you have 70% male leaders and only 30% female leaders, every single additional male you hire is statistically more likely to be a weaker leader than hiring from your female employee population for that position.

Makes sense, right!

If this example of females in leadership is true, it gives you a guide for your entire organization in what your mixes should be across your organization. If you have 60% white employees and 50% female. Your leadership team should be 60% female leaders.

But!

What about special skill sets and demographics?

This throws are demographics off. What if your employee population is 18% black, but you can’t find 18% of the black employees you need in a certain skill set? This happened in a large health system I worked for when it came to nurse hiring. Within our market, we only had 7% of the nursing population that was black, and we struggled to get above that percentage in our overall population.

Apple runs into this same concept when it comes to hiring technical employees because more of the Asian and Indian population have the skill sets they need, so they can’t meet the overall demographics of their employee population, without incurring great cost in attracting the population they would need from other parts of the country to California.

Also, many organization’s leaders will say instead of looking at the employee base we have, let’s match the demographic makeup of the markets where are organizations work. At that point, you are looking at market demographics to match your employee demographics. Again, this can be difficult based on the skill sets you need to hire.

If I’m Apple, I think the one demographic that is way out of whack for them is female hiring. 50% of their customers are female. 77% of their employees are male, but only 33% of their leadership is female. It would seem to make demographic sense that 50% of Apple’s leadership team should be female.

Thoughts? This is a really difficult problem for so many organizations, and I see organizations attempting to get more ‘diverse’ in skin color without really knowing what that means in terms of raw numbers and percentages.

What are you using in your own shops?

T3 – @Uber is jumping into HR!

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This week on T3 I take a look at the ‘uber’ popular ride-sharing company Uber. Uber for Business made its debut at the HR Technology Conference this year selling itself as a legitimate HR technology company for HR and TA pros. So, how does the Uber we all know, make that jump over to the HR and TA side of technology?

Uber figured that all of us in HR and TA have to get our candidates and employees from point A to point B. One part of the Uber HR platform is a simple interface to help you and your employees manage the expense part of your employees using Uber and getting reimbursed or work-related rides. This side of the platform also allows you to award employees with rides as well.

The other part of the software allows HR and TA to manage candidate rides. You have a candidate coming in from their airport at 9am, it’s easy to schedule an Uber to pick them up and bring them to your office, and well as take them back to the airport when they’re done. Traditionally, this most likely done through a car or taxi service where you called and set this up manually. Now it can be done through the platform.

The industry analysts have panned Uber’s entry into the HR space as basically a non-technology play. I love the analysts, but most haven’t worked a real HR job in years, if ever, so how practitioners would use Uber’s platform is probably very different than what analysts believe HR really needs.

I can imagine most recruiting coordinators will love the Uber for Business platform. It’s a pain in the butt constantly calling and setting up transportation for candidates each and every week. To be able to do this through a dashboard is a significant time saver and it has the added benefit of being charged to one place.

On the HR expense side of the function, Uber of Business might be helpful to some, but probably a little less so, since it’s not just managing your ‘ride’ expenses, it’s about managing all business travel expenses. But, there are other functions for the HR pros like Uber’s ability to help you offer and manage employee commute perks. That would allow you to offer new employees or awards to current employees to pay a certain number of rides per week, month, etc.

Uber also allows HR to set up specific ride rules to match your internal travel policies, so you can be assured those are automatically followed by technology. No, Jimmy won’t be able to tell you he had to take Uber Black when in reality Uber X was available! Also, it allows employees to let you know when a normally non-approved ride is with a client, so it should be approved.

The reality is Uber is branching into many areas outside of just its normal ride-sharing service. Will Uber be a big player in the HR and TA tech space? Probably not, with its current offering, but it’s more intriguing that they are looking at the HR Tech marketplace, to begin with. Uber has the money and resources to do just about anything they want, so they will be someone to keep an eye on.

T3 – Talent Tech Tuesday – is a weekly series here at The Project to educate and inform everyone who stops by on a daily/weekly basis on some great recruiting and sourcing technologies that are on the market.  None of the companies who I highlight are paying me for this promotion.  There are so many really cool things going on in the tech space and I wanted to educate myself and share what I find.  If you want to be on T3 – just send me a note – timsackett@comcast.net Also, I advise HR and TA tech companies. Interested? Let’s talk. 

The Recruiter Name Generator! What’s Your Recruiter Name? @atapglobal

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I’ve noticed that certain recruiters have it easier than others. If you have a ‘unique’ name, you know what I’m talking about! You might spend the first two minutes on your conversation trying to get the candidate to say your name correctly! If you leave a message and they call back to your office it’s often hilarious at what name they ask for.

It’s a real problem for our industry, especially in America, where we tend to only want to respond to names we know we can pronounce. Think this isn’t a problem? Go out on LinkedIn and search for recruiter working for Indian RPO services. You’ll find a ton of these recruiters have changed their name to a more ‘American’ version because it helps get higher responses.

The thought process is, from the candidate’s perspective, is that if a recruiter’s name is “Paul Raja” vs. “Praveen Raja” that “Paul” probably speaks great English, so I’ll call him back, but “Praveen” might not speak as well. Is that dumb logic? Yes! Is that happening? YES! (By the way, this has happened for decades with Chinese engineering students as well, who will take very American first names because recruiters are more likely to call “Joe Lee” then “Huang Lee”)

So, what does it take to the have the perfect Recruiter name to get candidates to call you back?

First, you need a name that is recognizable and easy to say for the population you’re trying to recruit, and usually, one syllable is better. Thus, if you’re recruiting traditionally Hispanic employees, you would want a traditional Hispanic name, etc.

– In America: Mary, Mark, John, Jill, Jose, Maria, etc.

– In England: Holly, Simon, Henry, Olivia, etc.

Second, you shouldn’t have a name from a TV show or movie:

– Theon, Skyler, Tristen, Miley, etc.

Third, you want a last name that is common, but not too common, like it’s made up:

– Smith is out, but Brown is okay, as long as Brown isn’t paired with Charlie

– Bonernose is out, as would be Newbutt.

Finally, you don’t want to be the person with two first names or two last names. It’s too confusing for candidates:

– Kevin Johns or Mary George

– Turner Wilcox or Lee Nelson

That’s why I put together this easy to use Recruiter Name Generator! All you need to know is the month you were born in, and your favorite color, and BAM! You’ve got your very own, easy to use, will probably get a callback, new Recruiter Name:

So, using the easy to use charts above my new Recruiter name is: Mark Wilson!

Wouldn’t you want a call from “Mark Wilson”? Doesn’t “Mark Wilson” sound official, while also being competent and kind? Of course, he does!

What’s your new Recruiter name?

The Recruiter Nation Live Hangout Series – With Jobvite and Fistful of Talent!

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Our first hangout is at 1 pm ET on Tuesday, November 14th 

Google for Jobs/ROI of Recruitment Marketing Spend! What You Need to Know to Look Smart!!

 REGISTER FOR THE HANGOUT BY CLICKING THIS LINK!!!

If you’re a client or follower of Jobvite, you know the Recruiter Nation Live series.  It started with the Recruiter Nation Live Conference in San Francisco last June and continued with the Recruiter Nation Live Roadshow that brought real recruiter talk to 9 cities in North America over the last three months. 

The feedback was great – you loved it, so they are back with the latest in the series – the Recruiter Nation Live Hangout Series.  Once a month, they’ll be hosting a Google Hangout designed to keep the conversation among recruiters going – focused on things you can use, like the best-kept secrets of today’s smartest and most efficient recruiters, Jedi-mind tricks proven to make you more persuasive/ get great candidate response and strategies to hold your hiring managers accountable for their choices–so everyone wins.

I’ll be on the first hangout and it is at 1 pm ET on Tuesday, November 14th and will be hosted by Kris Dunn and me, focused on the following juicy topic:

 Google for Jobs/ROI of Recruitment Marketing Spend! What You Need to Know to Look Smart!!

 REGISTER FOR THE HANGOUT BY CLICKING THIS LINK!!!

Let’s have some fun and learn from each other at the same time.  See you at 1 pm ET on November 14th!!!

LinkedIn and Microsoft launch “Resume Assistant” and it’s a big deal!

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Big announcement today coming out Microsoft/LinkedIn. The two companies are figuring out more and more how to integrate LinkedIn into the Microsoft office ecosystem and their new Resume Assistant is the first major feature announcement.

What’s Resume Assistant?

Microsoft’s Resume Assistant is a Word product integration that brings the power of LinkedIn directly into Word when you’re crafting or updating your resume.

How does Resume Assistant work?

It’s pretty easy. You upload or open an existing resume, made an old resume you have, and Word will automatically recognize that document is a resume and open up the LinkedIn integration. The integration pops up as a right-side window in Word so that your resume is on one side of Word and the LinkedIn Resume Assitant is on the other.

From here, Resume Assistant will do a lot of things but mostly use artificial intelligence to help you craft a better resume that will more likely be selected for jobs by recruiters. Resume Assistant does this through analyzing LinkedIn data of those profiles, work experiences, titles, etc. that are getting hired and moving into new roles via profile changes.

Don’t know how to phrase your work experience? The Resume Assistant will pull in specific examples, similar to you, of people who got hired and show you phrases, skills, and words that will help you get hired. RA will also easily allow you to go directly to other profiles on LinkedIn from Word to see how others have structured their profile.

Why is this a big deal? 

So, Microsoft and LinkedIn shared a bunch of data that led to this product creation:

  • LinkedIn data shows ‘job hopping’ has doubled in the past twenty years
  • LinkedIn is seeing 40% growth in job applies through LI
  • On average 100 candidates are applying for each position on LinkedIn
  • 80% of resume updates in the U.S. happen in Microsoft Word

Okay, and, so?!

Connect the dots! One part of the Resume Assistant is to also show each Word user updating their resume the jobs that most match the resume being created. So, 80% of job seekers will have LinkedIn’s 11 million jobs showing up in Word, right next to their resume while they’re updating and thinking about looking for a new job!!!

I would not want to be a job board today and be reading this. In fact, for how much Google has been swinging its weight around recently, this is also a pretty big punch back from LinkedIn and Microsoft to let them know they are not giving job search away!

Game changer!

Think about how many people use Microsoft Word. 100% of those people will now have a direct link to LinkedIn and the LI jobs when they are doing anything with their resume – Resume Assistant opens automatically when a resume is detected. It’s really a genius move by LI and MS.

If this is the first integration that the two sides have figured out, I can’t wait to see future integrations as well, and from the sound of things, both sides are moving quickly to make these a realities.

One note of importance. Resume Assistant will launch today for Microsoft 365 Insiders, at the beginning of 2018 for all Microsoft 365 users, and soon after for all other Word platforms.

At 4% Unemployment, 2nd Chance Hires are Looking Very Attractive!

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I’m a big fan of 2nd chance candidates. Candidates who were fired, terminated, let go, etc. for many various reasons, most of which come down to wrong job fit, the wrong personality fit with their boss, wrong skill fit, etc.

I don’t have actual numbers, and I wouldn’t believe any study who told me a number because here’s what really happens. An employee gets fired for ‘performance’ because the manager thought the person could do the job, even though the person had never done the job, and both continued to get frustrated. HR puts that down as termination for performance, not poor job fit, or lack of skills, or something else.

Is this person a bad employee? No. Did this person not try hard? No. Did the organization look to move this person into a role they were better suited for? No. It’s just easier to cut bait and move on to another hiring mistake.

The problem most employers are facing right now is at 4.1% national unemployment, almost any candidate that you find out of work is going to have a ‘hickey’. Maybe they require too much money, maybe they don’t have the education you require, maybe they won’t move, etc., etc., etc. We all know the deal. It’s tough sledding finding talent right now, it’s even tougher if you’re looking for someone out of work to fill your job!

That’s why 2nd Chance Candidates can be some of the best hires you’ll ever make, but you need to pick the right ones. Here’s what I look for in 2nd Chance Candidates:

1. A chip on their shoulder. I don’t want them to talk bad about their last employer, but I want to know they feel like they were unfairly evaluated and have something to prove!

2. Job history before the last job. Say what you want, but when taking a flyer on a 2nd chance candidate I find those will more solid work history tend to be the right ones to pick.

3. Willingness to do anything. When you get fired some weird shit happens to you. You get angry. You get sad. You get frustrated. Eventually, you get to a point where you go “I don’t care what it takes, I’m getting back into the game!” Those are my 2nd chancers.

4. The story seems to make sense. I don’t hire a 2nd chancer where the story doesn’t add up. So, you were the employee of the year, last year, then out of nowhere, with no reason, you got fired? Yeah, no thanks.

5. They want to work. You’ve been out of a job for 7 months, and I offer you a job, I only want to hear one thing. “I can start tomorrow!” If you tell me I can start in two weeks, or next Friday, or anything besides “I’ll start working right now if you let me” I’ve got a concern!

People get fired for awful things, but they also get fired over petty things. Being in HR, I’ve been apart of both kinds of firing, and I’m not proud of that fact. It’s super hard to support a hiring manager who wants to fire an employee because basically, the employee cares more than the hiring manager about the work, but I’ve seen it happen!

It’s our job in TA and HR to find out if we’re going to give someone a second chance. It’s not an easy decision. It seems like there’s always a red flag, and it seems that way because there is! The person was let go! It’s now our job to determine was that person being let go going to be a positive for our company, or a negative. I like to think, many of second chancers can be a positive!

But, don’t get me started on 3rd and 4th chancers!

T3 – Do you speak A.I.? If you’re in TA or HR you better learn!

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I’ve said this publicly before but John Sumser is one of the smartest people in our space when it comes to understanding HR and TA technology, or really any part of HR and TA that starts to get beyond the normal reach of HR and TA leaders. Pick a topic that is difficult to comprehend or understand, and Sumser is usually the first one breaking it down for the rest of us!

John recently sent me his latest research on A.I., or what he thought would be his latest report on Artificial Intelligence when he started doing the research. John goes deep in this report, over 90 pages filled with information on the latest and greatest A.I. related technology in HR and TA. I say related because what John found was that ‘true’ A.I. isn’t really present yet in the HR and TA tech stack.

We have a ton of companies telling us they have A.I. to sell us, but what they are really selling us is a form of ‘Intelligent Software’, advanced intelligent automation, and a whole lot of machine learning. Don’t understand any of that? Most of don’t. John breaks it down in detail and tells you the difference in all of it.

There’s no doubt that intelligent software has made its way into every segment of the tech stack in HR and TA. It’s important that as HR and TA leaders we actually understand what that means, where it’s all going, and how you will position your organization to take advantage.

One of the piece’s I loved from the report were questions John gives for HR and TA leaders to ask “A.I.” vendors they’re considering:

1. How long does it take the machine to learn something new? Can you define that both in calendar time and the number of transactions?

2. What are the feedback loops we should use to monitor the tool’s alignment with our culture, processes, and procedures?

3. What is the process by which we inform the device that it is missing something or needs to learn something new?

4. If the machine makes a recommendation and we think it is out of date, what do we do?

5. What sort of staff do we need to ensure the performance of our intelligent software?

Those questions are brilliant! All of us fail in asking potential vendors enough of the right questions, and John truly nails this.

If you want the full report you can download it at HRExaminer – The Emergence of Intelligent Software. The full report costs $249, but if you tell John that “Tim sent me!” he’ll give it to you for $249! It’s a cheap education of a really complex issue that we are all facing right now in HR and Talent Acquisition.

T3 – Talent Tech Tuesday – is a weekly series here at The Project to educate and inform everyone who stops by on a daily/weekly basis on some great recruiting and sourcing technologies that are on the market.  None of the companies who I highlight are paying me for this promotion.  There are so many really cool things going on in the tech space and I wanted to educate myself and share what I find.  If you want to be on T3 – just send me a note – timsackett@comcast.net Also, I advise HR and TA tech companies. Interested? Let’s talk. 

Just a bit of break from the norm…Raising a special kid

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George Springer, the World Series MVP that plays for Houston, has a pretty cool Dad! I tend to like Dad stories. I have a pretty great Dad, and I like to think I’m a half-way decent Dad, but it’s a constant struggle! I think in society we don’t get enough Dad stories, so when this one came up right after the World Series, I wanted to share (the video is 3 minutes):

George Springer, Jr., the baseball players Dad in the video is a pretty great Dad, you can tell! Dad is proud of his son and not because he’s a great baseball player, but because his son is really a whole person.

George Springer, the baseball player, grew up with a stutter and had to overcome that and learn how to turn that ‘disability’ into a uniqueness. As his Dad says in the video “understand this is who you are, this is what makes you special”.

George Springer, the Dad, is an accomplished lawyer in Connecticut, and just a special person as a Dad. I think we all hope, at the end of the day, that we raise our own children like the Springer’s have raised theirs. To be team players. To help others be the best version of themselves. And to accept themselves and their uniqueness for what it truly is, something that makes them special.

Congratulations to George Springer on his accomplishments, and congratulations to his parents for raising a remarkable young man.

 

What Does Talent Taste Like? When Recruitment Marketing Keeps it Real…

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So, have a Coke and a Smile wasn’t good enough, the college recruiting folks in Coca-Cola’s Italian team had to get ‘creative’ and go off script. Here’s how that ended up (hat tip to Jim D’Amico for finding this pic!):

So, I’m not exactly sure from this ad who is tasting the talent. Maybe this is meant to get creepy hiring managers to the university, or maybe it just doesn’t translate to English. But whatever it means the Italian Coca-Cola team doubled down and also dropped in a landing page and hashtag for the event #TasteYourTalent or visit – www.tasteyourtalent.it.   

The site opens up with:

“Allenati per diventare un Champion di Coca-Cola HBC Italia”

Which, when translated means:

“Train to become a Champion of Coca-Cola HBC Italia”

I’m not sure if that is training to be a champion of sexual harassment, but whatever it is I’m interested in seeing how it all turns out!

I can picture this entire creative process playing out in the TA department at Coke Italy. “Hey, we need a great theme for our next university recruitment event! What do you guys have?”

“The Real Thing!” – did it. 

“Coke is it!” – did it.

“The Coke Side of Life!” – did it. 

“Taste the Feeling!” – did it. 

“Taste the Talent!” – Wait! What!? What did you just say!? That is f’ing brilliant. We’re recruiting talent. Coke tastes great! Taste the Talent! Go spend $3 million Euros and make that happen!  

Do you want to know what’s great about blogging? You just can’t make this stuff up! The bar for entry into Recruitment Marketing is apparently very low. Stay thirsty my friends.

Recruiters! Do you know what candidates really want in their next job? @ATAPGlobal

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One of the reasons ATAP (Association for Talent Acquisition Professionals) was founded is that we need a better way to accumulate and share data in the talent acquisition space. Right now we have all this disparate data all over the place and if you were to ask one TA pro this question they might send you to one place and one answer, and another would send you to a completely different direction for a different answer, etc. That’s if you can even find someone in your network with an answer!

One thing we want to be at ATAP is a destination for TA pros and leaders for answers to your questions. To be a place where the talent acquisition industry can come to share the latest and greatest data around the globe! We aren’t quite there, yet, but we are working in that direction and future is bright at ATAP!

One piece of data came across my desk recently that I wanted to share. Hacker News recently did a reader study of their audience to select 8 traits of their ideal engineering work environment and here’s how they ranked:

1- Work/Life Balance

2- High-Quality Code Base

1 & 2 were one and two by a ton! After work/life and code base the rest were all virtually the same.

It is amazing that three out of the top 4 all speak to the work arrangement. Balance, flexibility, remote. Basically, what IT pros are telling you they want is to be able to work on high-quality stuff, when and where they want. Just give me good work and get the hell out of my way!

Is this similar to your EVP?!

One thing that is far down the list, that almost every corporate TA leader I know will want to argue is “Personal Growth” and development. It doesn’t really matter as compared to a lot of stuff, but we continue to shove this down the throats of our employees because we believe that personal growth and development are super important!

The big question is, why? Why do we believe our employees care so much about personal growth and development when it’s really a minor issue in the overall scheme of things?

You know what happens when you get your hands tied on things like work/life balance, flexible work, remote work, etc.? You focus on things you can control, like personal growth and development…The ‘you’ in this example is ‘us’ – TA. Our reality is we haven’t been able to get our executives to see this is what IT talent really wants, and because we can’t move the needle on work arrangements, we act like personal growth is super important.

It might be for some, but it’s only important to all after the higher level needs and wants are met. Want to attract great IT talent? Offer work arrangements that attract them and you will be shocked at how great talent will find you!

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What the heck is ATAP?!? I get asked this question almost daily. ATAP stands for the Association of Talent Acquisition Professionals. Founded in 2016, ATAP’s mission is to develop a body of unified educational, ethical and measurement standards, advocate on issues that impact those in our profession, and build a global community of inspired and informed professionals. I’m a member! You should be one too – Join Here – use my code to get $5 off your first-year “ATAPDISCTS”!