What Messaging Tool Should You Pick To Tell Off Your Boss?

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The messaging technology today is ridiculous!  There are so many ways to communicate it sometimes becomes really difficult to determine which technology to use for which messages. Think about it terms of breaking up.  I remember the first girl I had to break up with in middle school.  I had basically three ways to tell this girl I no longer ‘wanted to go out’, which entailed see each other at school. It wasn’t so much of going out, as it was meeting at school.

I could go right up to her face and tell her like a man.  But I wasn’t a man, I was a boy, and that seemed like a really awkward way to communicate, face to face. I could write her a note, give it to my buddy, who would give to her best friend, who would then give it to her.  This was the popular way but fraught with peril, as the message in these notes seemed to travel faster than the actual note.  I could call her on the home phone. This always seemed best to me, but you still risked her mom or dad picking up, and that was a fate worse than the death!

I was listening to a couple of people talk the other day in a coffee shop, and the one was telling the other, she was finally going to tell off her boss. She had enough! You go girl! But, there was a problem. No way did she want to do this face to face. She had to determine the exact right way to do it, that came across professional, but also got the message across she was serious.  (Yes, I listen to your conversation when I’m at a coffee shop acting like I’m working on my laptop)

I wanted to break in and help this poor girl with this problem, but that’s super creepy, so instead I’ll just fill you in on my take on each method:

1. Email – Seems like the logical communication method, knowing you don’t want to speak face to face. The problem is, it’s also very easy to copy and forward to HR.  From a professional standpoint it’s hard to really give it to your boss on email, because you know it’s will be used against you.  Still, I believe most people would use email.

2. Twitter – Probably the passive aggressive way to tell off your boss that is now in use!  Twitter has become the playground for the disengaged workforce of our generation.  You can tell off your boss and there is a 97% chance they’ll never see it, but many of your coworkers and friends will, and you’ll feel better. Plus, how much trouble can you actually get in with only 140 characters?

3. Facebook – First off, are you really ‘friends’ with your boss on Facebook!?  If so, Facebook messaging could actually work for telling off your boss. Definitely a bit more personal than other methods, and it’s likely your boss would probably take it that way as well.  It’s really more of a scream for help, than a tell off, though.  If you actually post the tell off of your boss publicly on Facebook, well that’s just career suicide.

4. SnapChat – Smart move, because chances are your boss is older than you and will have no idea what’s going on until it’s too late to really do anything to copy it. But it’s logistically a nightmare, because you first have to get your boss to sign up with a snapchat account, which seems like a lot of work and hand holding to eventually just tell them off! But, I can still see this being better than doing it face to face for many people!

5. Skype with video – Better than just a telephone call, this one they can at least see you, and you them but you can always click off quickly and claim technology problems.  This way you get all the benefit of telling them off to their face, but don’t have to wait around for their awkward measured responses.

6. Yammer – Okay, I’ll wait, go look it up.  It’s like your own personal social network for your organization.  Kind of like Twitter, but only for your own employees.  This would be an epic way to get yourself fired, but probably not a great tool to tell off your boss!

I still like my 13 year old boy way the best.  Tell one of your coworkers, who you know can’t keep a secret (you know the ones), all the issues you have with your boss.  Wait about 3-4 hours and go in casually to ask your boss about a project.  Your boss will ask you to come in and be super, super nice for some odd reason, almost like someone went and told him or her that you had a problem with them…

I’m Hiring! Are you sure you want to work for me?

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Okay, I’m adding a Recruiter to my team.  At hru-tech.com, we do mostly engineering and IT contract recruiting, some direct placement recruiting and some project RPO work for clients around the country.

I would put my team up against anyone.  They’re that good, and most are homegrown!  That’s right, the majority of our staff came in entry level and we smacked off that new car smell like an old bag of Taco Bell that’s been sitting in your back seat for three weeks in the summer.

I started looking around and getting the word out a couple days ago.  You would think it would be easy.  I don’t really ask for a lot, but I sure know it when I ‘hear’ it!   Recruiting is a pretty good gig.  It’s transferable. I’ve worked in 5 different states, 4 different industries and my recruiting skills I can take with me anywhere.  It’s the one thing I can guarantee you if you come work for me. You’ll always be able to find a job and make money.  Every economy needs good recruiters.

The pay is way better than your normal crappy sales jobs selling cell phones or renting cars to people that bring in their phone bill and a report card. The hours are pretty good. No weekends. A few nights here and there.  You get to interact with a great group of people. The latest and greatest recruiting tools.

What’s crazy to me is how hard it is to find people who want to do this job, and that can be good at it!  I like for people to have a four-year degree.  The actual degree isn’t as important, as the process of gaining that degree.  I find those who worked their way through college, tend to be better recruiters.  Bartenders might be the best previous job if I was forced to pick one. Any kind of job that had you on the phone talking to people would be second.

There’s also a need for people who don’t freak out when they are held accountable for results.  That eliminates most people who want to work in government or big companies.  My recruiters don’t sit around and wait to get paid.  So, self-motivation is important, as long as it’s targeted in the right direction.

Work-life balance is really important to me.  Hold on, let me define work-life balance.  Work-life balance is when you do enough work that I pay you so you can have things and do things you want to do.  It’s not you doing whatever you want at any time you feel.  That’s not balance.  Balance means equal both ways, work and life.

We aren’t saving the world.  For some people that’s really important.  We do find people some really, really good jobs.  Some people find that cool and rewarding.

I care about you as a person, and I want to see you be wildly successful.  I’ll treat you like family. The family that you actually like, not the ones you try to forget about.

The position is in Lansing, MI. No, you can’t work remote or virtual or on a boat, unless the boat is in the parking lot of our building, then you can work on a boat.

So, if you’re interested send me a note – sackett.tim@hru-tech.com.  

If you are interested, and I don’t think you’re a fit, I will actually tell you why I don’t think you’re fit.  Some people like that. Some people think they’ll like that.  Some people don’t like that at all!

Are You Tired of Your Employment Brand?

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You might be tired of your employment brand…but your candidates aren’t!

That’s real.

This happens all the time in organizations.  Talent acquisition isn’t feeling successful, or they’re getting pressure to do more/better/faster, and they start looking for excuses.  The one excuse that always comes up is ‘our employment brand is old/tired/sucks, etc.’   It might be that it is old/tired/sucks, but it’s usually just an excuse.

Here’s what happens internally at your organization.

1. You have an employment brand. If you say you don’t, you’re lying to yourself! You do, you just didn’t have a part in making it!

2. You’re having trouble attracting the talent you want.

3. You believe having a really cool new employment brand will help attract the talent you can’t attract.  Which it might, but most likely not.

4. You use your old employment brand as a crutch to why you can’t be successful in talent acquisition.

The real problem has nothing to do with your employment brand.  For most companies, your candidates have little knowledge of what your actual employment brand really is.  Most candidates equate your employment brand to your consumer brand.

So, externally your employment brand is what it has always been.  The real problem is we get tired of our employment brand really fast because we are dealing with every single day.  We forget that most candidates only will engage our employment brand usually once in a lifetime.  So, they aren’t tired of it at all!

Any time I hear a talent acquisition pro tell me they can’t attract talent, and blame their employment brand, I question their ability to actually recruit.  Being able to attract talent has very little to do with your employment brand, and more to do with your own perception of your employment brand.  Our reality is most candidates have hardly any idea of our employment brands, until we engage them with it.  If you are great at selling your brand, the candidates are more than likely going to have a positive perception of your employment brand.

If you believe your employment brand sucks.  More than likely so will the candidates you’re contacting.  It comes back to your attitude about your company.  I’ve never seen or heard from a recruiter who desperately loved their organization who said they couldn’t find talent!   Coincidence?  I think not.  If you love your organization, and you recruit, you usually are pretty successful.  If you don’t like your organization, and you recruit, you usually are pretty crappy at it.

Just because you’re tired of your employment brand, doesn’t mean everyone else is.

 

The Crappy Job Badge of Honor

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As some of you may have realized from recent posts (Wanted: People Who Aren’t Stupid), I’ve been interviewing candidates recently for the position of Technical Recruiter working for my company HRU. I love interviewing because each time I interview I think I’ve discovered a better way to do it, or something new I should be looking for, and this most recent round of interviews is no different.  Like most HR/Talent Pros I’m always interested in quality work/co-op/internship experience – let’s face it, it’s been drilled into us – past performance/actions will predict future performance/actions.  So, we tend to get excited over seeing a candidate that has experience from a great company or competitor – we’re intrigued to know how the other side lives and our inquisitive nature begs us to dig in.

What I’ve found over the past 20 years of interviewing is that while I love talking to people that worked at really great companies – I hire more people that have worked at really bad companies.  You see, while you learn some really good stuff working for great companies – I think people actually learn more working for really crappy companies!  Working at a really great companies gives you an opportunity to work in “Utopia” – you get to see how things are suppose to work, how people are suppose to work together, how it a perfect world it all fits together.  The reality is – we don’t work Utopia (at least the majority of us) we work in organizations that are less than perfect, and some of us actually work in down right horrible companies. Those who work in horrible companies and survive – tend to better hires – they have battle scars and street smarts.

So, why everyone wants to get out of really bad companies (and I don’t blame them) there is actually a few things you learn from those experiences:

1. Leadership isn’t a necessity to run a profitable company. I’ve seen some very profitable companies that had really bad leadership – people always think they’ll leave those companies and they’ll fail – they don’t.  Conversely, I’ve worked for some companies that had great people leaders and failed.

2. Great people sometimes work a really crappy companies.  Don’t equate crappy company with crappy talent.  Sometimes you can find some real gems in the dump.

3. Hard work is relative.  I find people who work at really bad companies, tend to appreciate hard work better than those who work a really great companies with great balance.  If all you’ve every known is long hours and management that doesn’t care you have a family – seeing the other side gives you an appreciation that is immeasurable.

4. Not having the resources to do the job, doesn’t mean you can’t do the job. Working for a crappy company in a crappy job tends to make you more creative – because you probably won’t have what you need to do the job properly, so you find ways.

5. Long lasting peer relationships come through adversity.  You can make life-long work friends at a crappy job – who you’ll keep in contact and be able to leverage as you move on in your careers.  And here’s what each of you will think about the other: “That person can work in the shit!”  “That person is tough and get’s things done” “That person is someone I want on my team, when I get to build a team”

We all know the bad companies in our industries and markets.  Don’t discount candidates who have spent time with those companies – we were all at some point needing a job – a first experience, a shot at a promotion or more money, etc. and took a shot at a company we thought we could change or make a difference.  I love people who worked for bad companies, in bad jobs with bad management – because they wear it like a badge of honor!

Make HR Suck Less

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Are you working in a HR department that sucks?  You know if you are, it’s alright, you can admit it – it’s the first step of changing it.

I bet I talk to over a hundred HR Pros a year that begin the conversation with – “our HR department sucks!” or “my company doesn’t get it when it comes to HR” or “Our HR department is terrible”.   It’s not the outlier, it’s the norm.  So, many HR Pros working in HR functions where the organization has the feeling that “HR” sucks in our company.  If you’re not in one now – great – but chances are you have either been in one before, or eventually you’ll make a “grass is greener” decision and put yourself into this situation.

You know what?  We have the power to make HR Suck Less.  Yes, you do.  Stop it, you do.  No really, you do. Alright that’s enough, just play along with me at least!

Here are the 3 steps to making HR Suck Less:

1.  Stop doing stuff that Sucks.  But Tim! We have to do this stuff.  No you don’t – if your HR shop blew up tomorrow – your organization would still go on.  Over time you’ve “negotiated” to do all this sucky stuff – thinking it would “help” the organization, or give you “influence”, etc.  Stop that.  Give it away, push it out to other departments – start doing stuff that doesn’t suck, more than doing stuff that does suck.  It’s not easy, but it can be done, little by little.

2.  Get rid of people in HR who Suck.  Some people get real comfortable with sucking.  They wear their suckiness around like a badge of honor.  You need to cut the suck out of your department – like cancer!

3. Stop saying that you Suck.  We brand ourselves internally with everything we do – and if you say that you suck at something – the organizational will believe you suck at something.  If you say we are the best in the industry at recruiting our competitions talent away from them – you’ll be forced to live up to that – and little by little you will live up to that and the organization will begin to believe it as well.  Signs and Symbols!

Every single HR Shop who feels they suck – doesn’t have to suck.  If you feel you don’t suck, but everyone else tells you that you suck – you suck.  You’re just delusional and you keep telling yourself things like “we have to do this stuff”, “it’s the law”, “we don’t have a choice”, etc.   This is the first sign you’re comfortable with sucking – you aren’t listening to your organization.

No one has to suck – you can decide to do things in a complete different way. Perception is reality in terms of sucking.  You need to change perceptions, not reality.  You can still accomplish the exact same things, just do it in a way that people think you rock.  Start saying “Yes” to everything – not “No”.  “No” sucks.

Sucking less is a decision – not a skill.  You all have the skills – you just need to make the decision – to stand up and believe – Today we will no longer Suck!

What Do You See When You Look In The Mirror

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Was at ERE last week and got the chance to see John Robinson speak.  Here’s his story:

Very cool story and great example of a person who rises up over all that life can throw at you.  We all need these reminders, more than we usually get them.  Think your life is hard?  How about needing 30 minutes each morning to just be able to put on your clothes. Every. Day.

John said one thing that stuck with me.  After getting dressed in the morning and brushing your teeth, etc. We all at some point take a look in the mirror.  John asked, “What are you looking for when looking in the mirror?”  Do you know?  Ask yourself that same question. What are you looking at?

We are all looking for something wrong that is wrong with us!  That is a conscious decision we make, each and every day, before beginning our day.  We are looking for something wrong with us!  It’s so true, and so crazy!

We get ourselves looking good, ready for our day, all positive stuff, but we take one last look.  Before I leave is there anything wrong with me?  Did I miss something with my hair?  Leave some toothpaste in the corner of my mouth?  Does this shirt look right with these pants?

John’s point is that there’s nothing wrong with any of us.  We are who we are.  Some of us are tall, some are fat, some are black, some have no arms, some have scars.  This makes us different from each other, but not better or worse or ‘wrong’.

So, when you look in the mirror today, do me one favor.  Find something that is right with you, not wrong with you.

Making Your Jobs iPhone 6 Plus

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I think there is an epidemic in our society, and I’m going to blame Apple.  Sure other cell phone companies do the same thing, but Apple was the one who really made this such an issue.  Last week Apple released the latest version of the iPhone and the entire world stood in line to get the latest phone.

I have a iPhone 5s, the new version is iPhone 6 or 6 Plus.  Apparently, my iPhone 5s is now garbage.  But it’s not.  But Apple wants me to think it is, so I get the new version.

The HR Problem in all of this is our employees and managers are doing the same thing with our jobs.  Let me give you an example.  You hire a great candidate last year for an opening you had on your Finance team.  A year later this great hire is doing really good, in your view it was a successful hire.  But there’s a problem.

This great hire wants ‘more’, wants ‘different’, wants a new version of their job, the iPhone 6 plus version!

It’s only been a year an already the employee believes they deserve an upgrade.  Their manager isn’t ‘controlling’ the situation, which is probably the major underlying problem.  The manager is actually feeding the problem by believing it’s also something they need as well.  Let’s face it, the manager hasn’t had an upgrade since you guys were handing out Blackberrys, she is pissed! Where is her iPhone 6 plus level position?!

In terms of HR, this is a major problem across all industries.  No one wants to have your iPhone 4 jobs. People are mocking your iPhone 4 jobs.  They might accept your iPhone 5 jobs, but only because they have no iPhone offers.

What should you do?

Ultimately, this is an expectation level setting leadership discussion.  It starts before the offer is made, before you ‘allow’ someone to accept your offer.  Too often we allow new hires to believe, don’t worry you will always have the latest and greatest version of this job.  When our reality is, we try to upgrade as often as possible, but you shouldn’t expect to always have the latest and greatest.

If you feel that having the latest and greatest is really important for a potential hire, it might not be the right hire for you and your organization. That’s okay.  We get caught up in this belief that we have to hire the most talented candidate, not the candidate who is the most talented for us. Only a few of us can offer the latest versions of jobs, most of us can’t.  The world needs ditch diggers.

The 6 Things You Need To Know To Be Great At HR

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The one great thing I love about going to HR and Talent conferences is that you always get reminded about what really good HR should look like.  It doesn’t mean that your shop will be there, but it gives you something to shoot for.  I’ll admit, sometimes it can be frustrating listening to some HR Pro from a great brand tell you how they ‘built’ their great employment brand through all their hard work and brilliant ideas.  All the while, not mentioning anything about “oh, yeah, and we already had this great brand that marketing spends $100 million a year to keep great!”

Regardless, seeing great HR always reminds me that great HR is obtainable for everyone.  Great HR has nothing to do with size or resources.  It has a lot of do with an HR team, even a team of one, deciding little by little we’re going to make this great!

I think there are six things you need to know to make your HR department great:

1. Know how to ‘sell’ your HR vision to the organization and your executives.  The best HR Pros I know are great storytellers, and in turn great at selling their visions.  If you don’t have a clear vision of what you want your HR shop to look like, how do you expect others to get on board and help you get there.  Sit down, away from work, and write out exactly what you want your HR shop to look like.  Write it long-hand. Write in bullet points. Just start.  It will come.

2. Buy two pairs of shoes: one of your employees and one of your hiring managers. Try them on constantly.  These are your customers, your clients.  You need to feel their joys and pains, and truly live them.  Knowing their struggles will make you design better HR programs to support them.  Support them, not you.

3. Working hard is number 1.  Working smart is number 1A.  Technology can do every single transaction in HR.  Don’t allow tasks and administrative things be why you can’t do great HR.  Get technology to do all of this busy work so you can focus on real HR deliverables.

4. Break something in your organization that everyone hates and replace it with something everyone loves.  This is usually a process of something you’ve always done, and people are telling you it still has to be done that way. Until it doesn’t, and you break it.  By the way, this doesn’t have to be something in HR.  Our leaders and our employees have so many things that frustrate them in our environments.  Just find one and get rid of it.

5. Sometimes the path of least resistance is the best solution. HR people love to fight battles for the simple act of fighting the battle. “NO! It has to be done this way!” “We will NOT allow any workarounds!”   Great HR finds the path of least resistance.  The path of greatest adoption.  The path which makes our people feel the most comfortable, even if it isn’t the path we really, really want to take.

6. Stop being an asshole. You’re in HR, you’re not a Nazi.  Just be nice.  We’re supposed to be the one group in our organization that understands.  Understands people are going to have bad days and probably say things they don’t mean.  Understands that we all will have pressures, some greater than others, but all pressure nonetheless. Understands that work is about 25% of our life, and many times that other 75% creates complete havoc in our world!

Great HR has nothing to do with HR.  Great HR has a lot to do with being a great leader, even when that might not be your position in the organization.

Expecting Expectations

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Down at ERE’s Fall conference this week and was a little surprised at how many session speakers talked about ‘expectations’ in talent acquisitions.  It seems like talent acquisition 101, but by the amount of conversations being had on this one topic it was pretty clear that as a function talent acquisition is still doing a pretty crappy job with expectations.

What do I mean by ‘expectations’?  Here are a few ways we fail to deliver on expectations in talent acquisition:

Not setting expectations with a candidate. We constantly fail as recruiters to set proper expectations with our candidates.  When they will be communicated to and how.  What they should expect from the process.  What they should expect from an offer.  What the job will truly be once they start. What the real culture is, not the culture we wished it was.

Not setting expectations with our hiring managers. Mrs. hiring manager I’m going to work my butt off for you in getting the talent you need but I need… I might need you to respond back to each resume within 24 hours so we ensure we most fast enough to capture great talent.  I might need you to provide feedback on the quality of the talent your seeing. How the process is working or not working for you.  To let me know if something changes with the position I’m working on for you.

Not setting expectations with our peers. I expect as peers, as an internal team, as a department, that we’ll support each other and our function above all.  That means if one of us is failing, we are all failing.  We use positive words when describing our peers and our function.  That I will always make decisions based on making each of us successful in our professional positions.

It seems really, really simple.  But it’s something we fail at so much.

Why?

We fail at setting expectations because establishing expectations isn’t a one way street.  If you are going to set expectations on someone else, you have to be prepared for having expectations set on you.  This becomes a big roadblock.  We love putting accountability on others, but we hate it when accountability is put on us!

So, instead of doing a very simple thing like ensuring we are both on the same page with clear expectations, we do a lot of assuming and just plain poor communicating.

It really might be the one thing you could start doing tomorrow that would have the biggest impact to your functions performance.  We are going to certain expectations for candidates, for hiring managers and for peers, and I’m going to work on what they can expect from me.  We are going to live by these, and we’re going to move the needle in a positive direction on our functions performance.

We waste so much time and resources because we just aren’t being clear on what is expected.