First Marijuana Job Fair. No Drug Testing Required.

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Want a job?  Like smoking pot?  This is your day!

Doesn’t that sound like a bad Hollywood movie script!?  Unfortunately, it’s real world, as Colorado is in the middle of a talent bubble after legalizing marijuana.  From Time:

This Thursday, March 13, a very special, first-of-its-kind job fair is being held in Denver. It has been dubbed “CannaSearch,” and as the name indicates, it’s a marijuana-themed gathering intended to match job seekers with Colorado employers in the cannabis industry—a field that one is now all but required to cutely describe as “fast-growing” and/or “budding.”

At last check, 15 employers were scheduled to participate in the event, being held from 11 a.m. to 7 p.m. at the Denver headquarters of the job fair’s sponsor and host, O.PenVAPE, a company that specializes in vaporizer pens that get filled with cannabis oil—and that also bills itself as the “the largest national brand in cannabis.”

No advanced registration is necessary for job seekers. Everyone in attendance must, however, be 21 or older. And to answer the question on everyone’s minds: The event is strictly smoke-free.

So, what does it take to get a job in the Pot Industry?  I’m guessing some of the skill sets would be the following:

1. Like weed.

2. Knows stuff about weed.

3. Likes to talk about weed.

4. Willing to bring your own Doritos to work.

5. Don’t steal the weed.

Doesn’t that sound like every stoner you’ve ever known!?  You know they are all going back to those high school guidance counselors who told them they’d never amount to anything if they kept smoking pot and say “See, smoking pot got me somewhere!  I’m now head manager at Smokes-A-lot!”

It’s all fun and exciting now, wait until these companies really start to ‘grow’ and they need to hire an HR lady to come in and start setting up policies. That will be a ‘drag’.   Can you imagine!?  Margo comes in from her dental office HR manager gig in Pueblo and now is trying to build process and practices for Smokes-A-Lot world headquarters.  First, a few ground rules from the burned out CEO Steve.  No drug testing.  Unlimited smoke breaks.  50% employee discounts.  Go Margo!  Can’t wait to see those insurance premiums come in!

I would actually pay money for the ability to show up at the Marijuana Job Fair and interview potential hires!  They don’t even have to pay me, I’d have blog fodder for the rest of history!

How to tell your Work Critics to “Suck It”!

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In the corporate world everyone is a critic!  Everyone!  We’ve gotten really good at a learned behavior.  No longer can we just send out a final product the first time. Why?  Because everyone wants to trash it and change it, so it can be this really nice piece of plain old vanilla cake!  Welcome to Corporate America. But you know what? This isn’t new. Critics have been around since Jesus, and critics have been wrong since before Jesus!   I wanted to share with you some famous things that critics got wrong:

Symphony No. 9 in D minor, Op. 125, by Ludwig van Beethoven (1824)

What the critics said in 1825: “We find Beethoven’s Ninth Symphony to be precisely one hour and five minutes long; a frightful period indeed, which puts the muscles and lungs of the band, and the patience of the audience to a severe trial…” –The Harmonicon, London, April 1825

Moby-Dick, by Herman Melville (1851)

And the critics response: When Melville died in 1891, Moby-Dickhad moved a grand total of 3,715 copies…in 40 years! The below was typical at the time of the book’s release:

“…an ill-compounded mixture of romance and matter-of-fact. The idea of a connected and collected story has obviously visited and abandoned its writer again and again in the course of composition…Our author must be henceforth numbered in the company of the incorrigibles who occasionally tantalize us with indications of genius, while they constantly summon us to endure monstrosities, carelessnesses, and other such harassing manifestations of bad taste as daring or disordered ingenuity can devise…” -Henry F. Chorley, London Athenaeum, October 25, 1851

Animal Farm, by George Orwell (1945)

What the critics said about the book we all had to read in high school: “It is impossible to sell animal stories in the USA.” –Publisher’s rejection

 

Here’s what I know, true creativity in what we do, does not come from running our ideas through everyone and their brother for approval.  If your organization wants your employees to be truly creative and innovative, stop pushing teams.  Teams don’t make masterpieces. They can do some pretty cool stuff, but pure creativity isn’t one of them.  We push “Team” so hard in HR and in most organizations it sometimes makes you think like this the only way everyone in the world must work, but it’s not.  An HR Pro that can determine the proper work structure throughout their organization is truly valuable.  “Team” isn’t always the answer, and you should have other tools in your toolbox.

 

You hear artist all the time say, “I don’t listen to my critics”. This is valuable in that they know listening to a critic will hurt their art.  Unfortunately, in business, we don’t always have the ability/decision to not listen to our critics (who could be bosses, peers, friends, etc.).  In business telling your critics to “Suck It”, could be a big career derailer!  So, when do we go all “Suck It – It’s my project” in the workplace?

 

First, I would never suggest you approach it beginning with “Suck It”!  While it will get their attention, it will also shut off communication.  I think we all need the ability in our work environment to push back appropriately when you truly know you have something that will make a difference.  But, it’s really about having the conviction to stand behind it and not let it get changed.  That’s your indicator,  “am I willing to put my career/credibility/bank of influence on the line for this idea/project/etc.?” If you are, it’s time to pull out the “Suck It” card and push forward.  For most of us, this might never happen in our work lives.  It’s rare to have to do this, if you find yourself doing it often, you’ve got an interpersonal issue to deal with!

 

I think what we learn over time is that not all of our critics are bad, and some actually might help truly make us better.  The key is to continue to have confidence in what you do, without it, your work critics will make your work life less than artistic.

It’s not a Bromance, It’s a Promance!

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Bromance –

“A bromance is a close non-sexual relationship between two (or more) men, a form of affectional or homosocial intimacy. “

Basically a Bromance is two dudes who really, really like each other, but not in a romantic type of way.   It’s like girls can be ‘besties’ but guys can’t.  So, if guys are ‘besties’ and acting a little to close, they’ll be told they’re having a ‘Bromance’.

Professionally this is called a ‘Promance’.

Promance –

“A promance is close non-sexual relationship between two (or more) coworkers, a form of affectional or homosocial intimacy.”

Basically a Promance is coworkers who are best friends at work, but might not actually be that close outside the work place.  This sometimes has been called ‘Work Wife’ and/or ‘Work Husband’, but it can also between coworkers of the same sex.   The fact is we spend a great deal of time with our coworkers and become very close to many of them.  But we also have life outside of work, sometimes that includes coworkers, sometimes it does not.

Promances allow us to have close relationships with coworkers we actually like.  Promances are what keep coworkers staying at companies, sometimes, far longer than they would have if no promance was in place.  It also causes multiple coworkers to leave, or follow, each other to other companies.  “My promance just got a job at Ford, I’m going to follow her over there, we work great with each other!”

The cool thing about Promances is that they’re really only defined by work hours.  There is no expectation from a promance that you’ll actually communicate outside of work hours, and no one feels slighted by this!  It’s like the relationship you always wished you could have with everyone! “So, you mean like when we’re together we can be totally cool and hangout and just be great, but when we aren’t together neither one of us is going to feel an obligation towards communicating with the other!? Okay, I’m in!”

There is a fine line that you have to be careful with, as Promance can turn into a Bromance if you’re not careful.  It usually starts with happy hour or the company softball team, and quickly begins to spiral out of control.  It’s when boundaries of work hours no longer matter, and you begin to spend non-work hours with your Promance.  Many times this becomes too much.  All of sudden you’ll find yourself sitting on your coach on a Sunday night watching a game and saying things like “okay, I’ll see you in the morning at work” and realizing you’ve never stopped seeing that person, ever!

I love Promances.  I’ve got a wife and three sons, very full out of work life.  Promances are perfect for me.  I can have all of these relationships at work, and go home and not have those relationships interfere with my home relationships.  It’s truly the best of both worlds!

More Resumes vs. Enough Resumes

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I work in a world of resumes, where resumes equal solid quality candidates.  I recently met with a client who needed ‘more resumes’, they didn’t have enough quality candidates.  Seems like a simple equation, I just go back to the office and crank up the Resumatic 2000 and BAM, you’ve got ‘more’ resumes.  But those in recruiting know, it’s never that simple.

I started digging into what was really going on, because the fact is, you only need 1 resume to fill a position.

My line of questions in order:

Are you not getting any resumes? Well, you see we have a very involved process.  It’s hard for resumes to get through this process.

Oh, so you have a ‘too many’ resume problem, so you set up many filters to get just those that fit your need best?  Not exactly.  We have one process for all positions. Some positions we have too many resumes, some positions we don’t have any resumes coming through.

Why don’t you change your process for those positions you’re not getting resumes?  We can’t. It’s illegal. EEOC.

It’s not illegal to change your process based on need and position.  It’s illegal to discriminate against candidates. (that wasn’t really a question, but I couldn’t help myself from saying it!)  Well, our “EEOC Lady” (exact quote) won’t allow us to change the process.

What does the hiring manager think?  He loves the process!  He created it.

How many positions do you have open? 70.

He likes having 70 positions open? Doesn’t that cause a business issue?  He just wants us to get more resumes, but keep the process the same.

You see there really isn’t an issue with getting more resumes.  The problem is, is when you already have enough resumes but you put barriers in place that cause those resumes not to be enough.  You have enough resumes, more resumes isn’t going to solve your problem.  Your process is the problem.  Your filters are the problem.  Me giving you more resumes isn’t going to help you, it’s just going to cause a bigger problem.

But that’s what they did.  Just go get more staffing vendors to work with.  If ten can’t get us ‘enough’ resumes, get twenty.  Twenty isn’t working, let’s try 75.  Still not good?  Why not one thousand!?  It won’t matter, you still have a you problem.  You are unwilling to change.  More isn’t going to help.  You have enough.  You need to fix you.  You don’t have a resume problem, you have a ‘You Problem’.  That is actually harder to fix!

 

Putting On the ‘You Show’

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That’s what an interview is, right?  It’s a complete 60 minute show about you.  The entire thing rotates around your storyline.  Will you fit with this position? Will you fit with our culture? Are you the skilled enough?  Are you the ‘right’ personality for the hiring manager.

It’s a complete 60 minute tell all that you really control.  You can make it a sitcom, a drama, a horror show, crime show or a boring biography.  It’s really your choice!

But in the one time any of truly has for a ‘You Show’ we allow employers to make it a ‘Them Show’.  We allow them to run the show.  Can you imagine going to a Broadway musical and you tell them what songs you want to hear!  It doesn’t work that way.

“But you have to follow the employers interview structure!”

To a point.  If you’re asked a question, you have answer it.  Wait a minute. No you don’t!  Do you know how many hundreds of thousands of questions I’ve asked in interviews over my career, where the candidate didn’t even come close to answering what I had asked!

Here the secret to getting and not getting a job all at the same time.  Be the director of your You Show.  Some employers will not like your show and will not make you a offer.  That is okay, that is not an offer you would want anyway.  In the long run you wouldn’t be happy.  Some employers will love your You Show and want to extend your You Show to many more seasons.  That’s the job you want.

That doesn’t mean you go into an interview with sweatpants and your “Just Legalize It!” t-shirt, because that is who you ‘truly’ are.  You go into the interview the best version of yourself, not the worse version of yourself.  Think date night, I really love this girl you.  Trying to impress, but also not trying to be someone you are not.

The You Show, now playing at an interview near you.

The Ghost of Athlete Past

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I have three sons.  Two of whom are current high school athletes having successful high school careers.  Both have potential to move onto college and play the sport they want, if they choose that is the path they want to take.  Both are considered very hard working kids in their sports by their coaches and teammates.  They get that from their Mom, I was more of a gamer type.  Their Mom was the type of player other teammates hated playing against in practice because she never took a play off.  It made her very successful as a college athlete.  She has passed this down to our sons.  I’m grateful.

You see, anyone who has been around high school athletics will recognize this, not all kids give their all.  Many times you have kids on these teams with super high potential and athletic ability who seem to just piss it away for no real reason.  They don’t work hard.  Coaches play them anyway.  They screw around in school because they think their future is playing professional sports, or that colleges won’t care they’re a crappy student.  People treat them differently because their the local star of the moment.  They float through life believing this will never end.

Flash-forward 10 years and they are usually sitting in the stands of the same local school’s games carrying around their regret like a backpack.  Working at the local factory or some crappy sales job, talking about how they were so close to ‘making it’.  But they didn’t.

I wish I could send these kids a Ghost like in the movie The Christmas Carol.  A Ghost of Athlete Past to show them where they are and where they are going.  Where they are truly going is not where they think.  It’s not dropping out of college because they didn’t prepare themselves. It’s not sleeping in their parents basement at 28 because they can’t find a job to pay them enough money to have their own place.  It’s certainly not sitting a some random game at their local high school talking to anyone who will listen how they were better than the current version of themselves on the field right now.

I know people like to blame coaches.  The coach should have been able to get ‘that’ kid to see how they were throwing it all away.  Some blame the parents for not disciplining them enough and showing them how their path was broken.  I tend to blame the collective.  All of us who each, at one time or another, gave the kid a pass.  Well, he’s the best player, you need to put up with his attitude.  We won’t win with out him so, you’ve got to put up with him not practicing hard.  Well, we need him for this Friday’s game, so let’s just give him a passing grade ‘this’ time.  We’ve all failed him.

We all had the chance to make this kid a great kid.  Great athlete, great student, great person.  Instead we filled him with regret that he’ll have to carry around for a lifetime.  I lifetime of regret at 18.  It’s heavy at 18, and it only gets heavier each year after.  I love athletics.  Athletics have given me a ton in my life, as they have for so many people in our society.  It breaks my heart to see a young kid getting ready to sling that backpack on, though. To know you’re looking at someone who has already seen their best days at such a young age.

Just a reminder to give it your all today.  Some will only have one shot. Did you do everything you could have done to be ready?

 

Performance Doesn’t Matter: Women must still sell attractiveness

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True.

Right?  The title of this post is a true statement.  A woman can be a great performer, but she still needs to be attractive to find high success.  This is a parameter for her male peers.  Her male peer can come in with a beer belly and stain on his tie and no one cares. No one!  That same performing lady comes in with a beer belly and stain on her tie, and well, that’s might be a little weird, but you get my point.  She has to sell not only is she great performer, but she looks good doing it!

I grew up with an attractive mother.  Don’t get creepy.  I didn’t think she was attractive, she was my Mom, but I constantly had people tell me, “you’re Mom is attractive”.  Which to this day I’m not really sure on how to respond, but with “thanks, she owes it all to the easy childbirth I put her through”.  She was also a very successful business woman.  But she would be the first to tell you, these things weren’t mutually exclusive.  She always had to have her ‘A’ game on both in business and with her looks.

Oh, but Tim that was the 1970’s and 80’s, today that isn’t the case.

Is it ladies? Do you feel like your attractiveness plays no role in your perceived performance?

I can take a look at my own workforce.  Some of the guys role in here looking like they took all of 10 minutes to get ready and find the cleanest smelling shirt.  The females who work for me carry around ‘toolboxes’ of beauty products and always, I mean always, are put together.  I don’t ask or demand this, but some how there is a perceived culture which makes this seem appropriate.

I’m sure there is a bit of competition going on.  The ladies like to look good, especially when the other ladies in the office look good, and it starts a vicious little game to who’s more beautiful.   Doesn’t matter if you’re married or single, young or old, almost all play the game.  Guys don’t play this game.  Guys play other games, just not the ‘I’m prettier than you’ game.   This still doesn’t speak to why in our culture we expect both great performance and good looking when it comes to female performance.

You then have that big stereotype of the pretty woman who doesn’t perform, but still keeps her job.  This is the traditional stereotype of women and performance.  Oh, Mary is an idiot, but she’s beautiful so they’ll never let her go.  I don’t think this happens as much, but I’m also not naive enough to not think it still has some impact.  Pretty women will always get more chances to screw up, than a less attractive woman.  Always.  Not fair, but true.

Guys, especially those in leadership, will never bring this up.  It’s a taboo subject. Being in HR I’m always amazed that the ones who will bring up this subject more than anyone are other female leaders.  Guys won’t touch performance and attractiveness with 10 foot pool, but the ladies will!  Female executives are some of the first ones who will speak about another female employee in the context of ‘she’s a good performer, but she holy smokes she’s a troll’ and then walk away like it’s completely normal!

So, I ask you female readers, do you feel your looks play a role in your perceived performance at work?

 

 

 

The #1 way to tell someone they Suck!

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Every Monday morning we have a recruiter meeting at HRU.  The purpose of the meeting is for our recruiting department to share with each other what they are working on, what they’ve accomplished the prior week, and give in updates that the full group might need to know.  Something came up this morning that I wanted to share.  Like most recruiting departments/companies/etc. we have our “Repeat Offenders”  – these are the people who just won’t give up.  At one point, a recruiter probably called them, and maybe even interviewed them, possibly even hired them – but now, they won’t leave you alone – they call, they email, they LinkedIn, send Facebook Friend requests, etc. Basically, they become a stalker!

This morning, one of the recruiters says “Mr. Jones (I’ve changed the name to protect the guilty) won’t stop bugging me, he emails his resume to me ‘every’ day!”  We all know Mr. Jones, because Mr. Jones use to work for us at a client, and it didn’t turn out so well.  Now, Mr. Jones wants us to find him his next assignment.  The problem with Mr. Jones isn’t skill related, it’s personality related – he’s annoying.  He was annoying to the client and to his work group peers, he is annoying to us, and I’m pretty sure he was annoying to his ex-wife – thus the “ex”!

So, the BIG question. How do you get Mr. Jones to stop bugging you?  This happens to every single recruiter I know eventually.

Here are the steps I use:

1. Tell Them!

That’s it – no more steps.  Here’s our problem as recruiters – we never want to burn a bridge.  “Well, Tim, you don’t know where he might go, who might hire him, I don’t want to ruin my reputation”  We have to think about our “Candidate Experience”! Bullshit.  You’re being conflict avoidant, and if you look at your last performance review, I bet under “opportunities” is probably says something about avoiding conflict or not confronting issues head on.  I had a very good HR mentor once tell me – “it’s best to deliver them that gift, then to allow them to walk around not knowing”.  Once you start being straightforward you’ll be amazed at how many people will say, “No one has ever told me that!”  That’s the problem – no one ever tells them the truth, thus they keep doing the wrong thing, instead of trying to fix what is wrong.

How do you get an annoying candidate to stop bugging you?  You tell them exactly, very specifically, very calmly, with no ill intent – “I want to give you a gift.  You might not see it as a gift right now, but I hope in time you’ll understand it to be a very valuable gift.  I (don’t use “we” or “us” or “the company – you’re avoiding again by using those) – I think you have a very bad personality flaw that comes across annoying to me, and from the feedback I have received, to those you work with.  If this does not change, I won’t be finding you any job in the future, and you’ll probably struggle to find one on your own as well.”  OUCH! That hurt right?  But, read it again, was there anything mean or untrue in the statement? If this person actually listens to the statement and acts on it, will they be better for it?  You can change the reason for whatever issue the person might have – maybe it’s hygiene, maybe it’s a crazy laugh, who knows – but the basic message stays the same.  You need to change, or I never want to speak to you again.

It’s hard for recruiters to understand this, because 99% have been taught to be nice, thoughtful people – not to be rude.  This sounds a bit rude.  In reality, I think it’s rude to string a person along and not care enough about them to actually tell them what is wrong and to help them.  Stop telling candidates your blow off lines and start telling candidates the truth.  At the very least, you’ll have more time on your hands to talk to the candidates you really want to speak to!

HR’s Biggest Irony: We think we’re Contrarian

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When you get a group of HR Pros together there is one thing I can count on – the majority believe they somehow think differently than everyone else.  Then you look at their words and actions, and you discover they’re just like everyone else.  HR isn’t the only ones who believe this, in fact it’s rampant throughout our organizations.  The reality is, when we get around others, it’s really difficult for us to act and think differently. Hello ‘Group-think’!   The Motely Fool had a great piece on this in regards to investing, but it works for organizations as well:

“In the 1950s, Solomon Asch brought a group of students together and asked them to solve a set of problems, such as whether two lines were the same length. These were simple problems with obvious answers. But several of the students weren’t trying to pick the right answers. They were actors working for Asch, purposely giving the wrong answers in front of their peers. 

Asch repeated the study with varying numbers of actor-students blurting out the wrong answers. His conclusion: Three-quarters of the test subjects went along with the actors’ wrong answers at least once. In any given experiment, at least one-third of test subjects ignored the obvious answer and followed the actors. Just one in four consistently gave the right answer even when their acting peers disagreed with them.

Even when everyone around you is giving an obviously wrong answer, your tendency to second-guess yourself, not want to embarrass yourself, and your natural desire to fit in can trump every bit of rationality you think you have.”

Sound familiar?

The contrarian in most organizations is either the CEO, or the first one fired!  Contrarianism is not valued in the majority of our organizations.  CEO, and many senior executives, will tell you it is, and it’s what they want, but the facts don’t lie.  Most people who go against the grain don’t fit in well in corporate structures.  Which makes it even more funny when I hear HR Pros tell how they are the contrarian voice in their organizations.  No you’re not.  Plus, I would question is that what you really want to be?

I believe HR doesn’t need to be contrarian, HR needs to be conformist.  HR needs someone who is going to take that executive vision and completely conform to it.  Full buy-in, drink the kool-aid, get the tattoo on your ass, conformity.   In away that is contrarian, if you are lead by a visionary leader, either way it’s what our organizations need out of HR.  HR thinks the opposite.  They think our leaders need someone to tell them their full of it.  They don’t. Your leaders don’t want to hear they’re full of it. In fact most, really, just want to hear you think they’re right.  Those who are very self aware still only want to hear how you can help them make their ideas reality, not that their ideas are crap.

That isn’t what you expected was it? HR needs to conform, there, I said it.  Conform to the vision. Conform to the mission. Leading through conformity.

 

It’s Criminal Not To Recruit Your Competition’s Talent!

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If I get 100 Talent Acquisition Pros in a room (no this isn’t going to be a dead lawyer joke) and ask them if it is ‘ethical’ to recruit each others employees, about half will say ‘No’. In fact, there are even a number who will say, “we have an agreement to not recruit from each other”! I’ve heard this, out in the open, with no restraint. It’s normal practice in the corporate world. It’s very common to hear inside Talent Acquisition departments say they don’t ‘actively’ recruit from each other because they’ve been told not to by their executives. That type of conversation will soon be a thing of the past, although, I doubt highly the activity will be!

From SHRM on the highly publicized lawsuit of many of Silicon Valley’s largest tech companies who ‘conspired’ to not recruit employees from each other:

“From 2005 to 2009, the leaders of Northern California’s largest and most powerful companies agreed to reduce competition for workers by entering into an interconnected web of secret, bilateral agreements not to solicit—‘cold call’—each other’s workforces,” the plaintiffs allege.

“By shielding their employees from waves of recruiting, defendants not only avoided individual raises, they also avoided having to make across-the-board pre-emptive increases to compensation,” the plaintiffs claim.

Agreements among the companies to refrain from the common recruiting practice of cold-calling each other’s employees deprived workers of information regarding pay packages that they could have used to find higher-paying work or to negotiate for higher salaries with their existing employers, according to the lawsuit.”

That’s right Talent Acquisition Pros it’s actually illegal to say you won’t actively recruit from your competition because you’ve agreed between each other not do it.   I get it, I get why you do this.  Having a hot job market and constantly taking talent and losing to each other seems like a never ending treadmill of work, but that’s the life of a Recruiter.  You know there are ways to stop this from happening.  Pay better.  Engage better.  Develop talent better. Have a vision that is real and share it.  It’s the age old business conundrum, do you want to pay on the front side or the back side.  Reactionary companies end up paying on the back side – more money in wages to attract talent because they turnover people who leave for better companies, more wages, etc.  It eventually catches up.

Other companies pay up front and keep their talent by paying at market or above, then constantly evaluating the market and changing pay whenever it’s needed without having employees ask, or have to leave to get paid fairly.  They develop talent from within and spend the money to do it right, giving themselves an internal pipeline.  They make sure to only allow people into leadership positions who are engaging and visionary.  It’s a lot of work, and costs money, but in the end it’s still cheaper and you have a better company.

I would actually love to see legislation that makes it illegal if you’re a corporate recruiter and you don’t make cold calls to recruit!  You saying you’re a ‘Recruiter’ but you don’t actually recruit!   That’s the real criminal activity going on!