5 Reasons Facebook is the Future of Recruiting

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On February 2nd, at 1pm EST, Kris Dunn, The HR Capitalist and FOT01, and I will be putting on a 1 hour webinar called: Social Recruiting MacGyver Style!   Our goal is to give the HR/Talent/Recruiting Pro who are busting there butts each day to bring better talent into their companies – so quick and easy tips on how to recruit and source talent on Facebook for little or no money.

So, what will it be all about – basically why and how we think Facebook will dominate the future of recruiting!

Why?

Here’s a few reasons:

1. 1 Billion Facebook members (they’ll hit that number soon) who are more active than LinkedIn’s core member. (Think about it – how many times per day do you check FB vs. LinkedIn?)

2. Facebook has everyone – I need to recruit many different functions  – not just professional or technical. I need clerks, line workers, customer service reps, skilled trades, Nurses, lab techs…see where I’m going with this!  Staffing and Recruiting departments just don’t recruit professionals – we need all levels of talent in our organizations.

3. I want to fish in a pond where there a few fishermen/women – not one where there is one fisherman for every fish.  Recruiters are the most prevalent single profession on LinkedIn – or so it seems!

4. Referrals are my best hires and all of my employees (at every level) are on Facebook – I need to tap their networks.

5. Facebook and some of its App Developer partners, like BranchOut, have figured out some great ways for you to tap into their membership – to see who might have interest in your company or be willing to refer your company to their friends and family.  We HR Pros love Easy Buttons!

Come check it out – if you know Kris and I we will guarantee 2 things:1. There is a good chance you will be entertained for an hour; 2. We love to share things that make HR and Talent Pros lives easier!

Register Today!

 

 

 

Burning Down Your HR Department

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A couple of years ago my parents house burned down.  They were away on vacation and lighting struck the roof. Before the fire department could get there and put it out, most of the house was destroyed.  60+ years of memories and possessions, gone.   In hindsight, it was a bit of a blessing,  there house was at the age where everything was starting to need replacing, and my father was at the age, where he wanted to retire.  Those two things don’t go well together!  Major home improvements equals major expense, and a fixed income.  So, long-story-short, mother nature, and the insurance company, gave my folks a new house for a retirement gift!  All is well that ends well, I guess.

This situation, though, led to some deep emotional conversations about what the wish they could have pulled out, if they new this was going to happen.  As you can imagine it was all the stuff you and I would want – our photos, our mementos, some favorite things that remind us of loved ones, or things that we were proud of.  I thought about his recently when having a conversation with a friend who just started a new position as the head of a large HR shop.  His comment to me was:

“What I really need to do is burn this place down and start over!”

To which I replied, “well, isn’t there anything you would keep?”  Bam!  That is what he needed – he did need to burn it down, but there were definitely some things he needed to take out before lighting the match.

It’s a common practice that Leaders tend to do when taking on a new position – we tend to burn down our departments.  Oh, we say we won’t, as we go around throwing gasoline on everything, and we say we aren’t rebuilding as strap our tool belt on and start hammering away, but the truth is, most leaders want to remake their new departments into what they want, not what it was.

So, I’ll ask you to take a few moments today and think about the concept of burning down your HR department.  What would you pull out and save?  What would you happily allow to burn up?  What would you miss?

Everyday we owe it to our organizations to get better.  You don’t have to burn down the department to get better – but you do need to get rid of those things you know you would easily allow to burn up!

Hire More Beautiful People!

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What do you think of, in regards to smarts, when I say: “Sexy Blond model type”?

What about: “Strong Athletic Jock?”

What about: “Scrawny nerdy band geek?”

My guess is most people would answer: Dumb, Dumb, Smart – or something to that context.

In HR we call this profiling – and make no mistake – profiling – is done by almost all of our hiring managers.  The problem is everything we might have thought is probably wrong in regards to our expectations of looks and brains.  So, why are ugly people more smart?

They’re Not!

Slate recently published an article that contradicts all of our ugly people are more smart myths and actually shows evidence to the contrary. From the article:

 Now there were two findings: First, scientists knew that it was possible to gauge someone’s intelligence just by sizing him up; second, they knew that people tend to assume that beauty and brains go together. So they asked the next question: Could it be that good-looking people really are more intelligent?

Here the data were less clear, but several reviews of the literature have concluded that there is indeed a small, positive relationship between beauty and brains. Most recently, the evolutionary psychologist Satoshi Kanazawa pulled huge datasets from two sources—the National Child Development Study in the United Kingdom (including 17,000 people born in 1958), and the National Longitudinal Study of Adolescent Health in the United States (including 21,000 people born around 1980)—both of which included ratings of physical attractiveness and scores on standard intelligence tests. When Kanazawa analyzed the numbers, he found the two were related: In the U.K., for example, attractive children have an additional 12.4 points of IQ, on average. The relationship held even when he controlled for family background, race, and body size.

 

That’s right HR Pros – Pretty people are smarter.  I can hear hiring managers and creepy executives that only want “cute” secretaries laughing all over the world!

 

The premise is solid though!  If you go back in our history and culture you see how this type of things evolves:

1. Very smart guy – gets great job or starts great company – makes a ton of money

2. Because of success, Smart guy now has many choices of very pretty females to pursue as a bride.

3. Smart guy and Pretty bride start a family – which results in “Pretty” Smart Children

4. Pretty Smart Children grow up with all the opportunities that come to smart beautiful families.

5. The cycle repeats.

 

Now – first – this is a historical thing – thus my example of using a male as our “Smart guy” and not “Smart girl” – I’m sure in today’s world this premise has evolved yet again. But we are talking about how we got to this point, not where are we now.  Additionally, we are looking at how your organization can hire better.  So, how do you hire better?  Hire more pretty people.

 

Seems simple enough. Heck, that is even a hiring process that your hiring managers would support!

21 Hour Work Week?

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Fast Company had an article last week “The Case for the 21 Hour Work Week” which at my first glance I thought “oh, here we go again – more work life balance crap!”  Then I read it.

The article is more about sustainability than balance – meaning – how do we (members of the world) expect to continue at our productivity pace and survive as a human race long term? Fascinating stuff, from the article:

The New Economics Foundation (NEF) says there is nothing natural or inevitable about what’s considered a “normal” 40-hour work week today. In it’s wake, many people are caught in a vicious cycle of work and consumption. They live to work, work to earn, and earn to consume things. Missing from that equation is an important fact that researchers have discovered about most material consumption in wealthy societies: so much of the pleasure and satisfaction we gain from buying is temporary, ephemeral, and mostly just relative to those around us (who strive to consume still more, in a self perpetuating spiral).

The NEF argues we need to achieve truly happy lives, we need to challenge social norms and reset the industrial clock ticking in our heads. It sees the 21-hour work as integral to this for two reasons: it will redistribute paid work, offering the hope of a more equal society (right now too many are overworked, or underemployed). At the same time, it would give us all time for the things we value but rarely have time to do well such as care for our family, travel, read or continue learning (as opposed to feeding consumerism)…

Creating EU-level living standards for the entire world by 2050 would require a six-fold increase in the size of the global economy, with potentially devastating consequences. Instead of growing the economy, maybe we need to recalibrate society to make everyone happier and successful with less. “The proposed shift towards 21 hours must be seen in terms of a broad, incremental transition to social, economic and environmental sustainability”…

The shift won’t happen overnight.  Can you imagine going from the 40, 50, 60+ hours per week now to 21!?  First, most wouldn’t be able to sustain their quality of life, and most aren’t willing to do with less, if given the choice.  But the logical nature of the idea has merit.  Theoretically, we can’t continue on our current pace forever.  Major shifts in how we work and the choices we make will begin to change over time – globally – they just have to.  I see HR being on the forefront of much of this change.  I don’t consider this having anything to do with work-life balance, sure that will be an outcome of these cultural shifts, but work-life balance won’t cause this shift.  Our lack of ability to sustain mankind globally will cause this shift.

I Hate Sumser’s Top 25 Lists

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Let me get something very clear – I really do hate the Top 25 Lists on HR Examiner.  I hate them because I’m not #1 on any of the lists  – ok, let’s be honest – I’m actually not even #25 on any of the lists.  Let’s be more honest, I don’t think I’m in the top 100 – I scored 2!  The top person Dean DaCosta scored 153!  In HR Performance Management speak that is like saying Dean is your “A” player and Tim is the owner’s crackhead son you are force to keep on payroll.   Don’t get me wrong – I don’t know Dean – I’m sure he’s wonderful and knows a ton about recruiting and talent.   Number 2 on the list is Matt Charney – someone I do know and respect.  Matt knows a ton about our industry – he scored 24 out of 25 on recruiting (for the record I scored “0” – as in zero and as in everybody knows more about recruiting than I – even those on the list who actually have never recruited and aren’t in the recruiting industry) – I think even Matt would admit based on his 24 – I should at least have gotten a point or two…or 25.  Matt works for Monster.com, one of the major advertisers on HR Examiner’s website – having him #1 would have sent up red flags – having him #2 makes it totally legitimate.

I consider myself a confident person – especially when it comes to most things HR and Recruiting.  Do I think I’m the best and should be #1?  Well, yes, I do – but for arguments sake, do I know there are better HR and Talent Pros out there than me? – well, yes – I guess, that’s hard to admit, but logically I know it’s true.

It’s true because there are fantastic people around the country that I reach out to on a daily, weekly and monthly basis – and sometimes a few of these people actually show up on one of Sumser’s lists.  Being in the social media/HR/Talent deal for the past 3 years you run into a lot of people.  There are a number of frauds that lurk around this playground.  There are number of frauds who show up on these lists – which is one more reason I hate these lists.  (so now for the record – I hate the lists now because I’m not on them and the frauds)

I hate the lists because so many people read them and comment on them and send out congratulations about them – like it’s a big deal – which it would be if I was #1, but I’m not, so stop trying to make these a big deal!   I hate these lists because people use them to promote themselves for branding purposes on their resumes – “I was voted the #7 most influential Recruiting professional by such and such” – and to many folks are too stupid or lazy to do some real background checking to see how substantial that claim really is.  (So, now for the record I hate the lists because I’m not on them, frauds, too many people pay attention to them, congratulations messages on my social stream and branding)

I hate these lists because there just doesn’t seem to be enough correlation between what they say they are measuring (i.e., Influence in Recruiting) and then a list of actual people who influence recruiting.  Some great pros – no doubt on the list – but for recruiting?  Steve Boese – a friend of mind and fellow FOTer – probably the single best source of HR Technology knowledge in the world – not the US – the world.  Recruiting/Talent/Sourcing/Staffing/Talent Acquisition?  Not the first person I think of in those respects.  I reach out to Steve frequently for stuff – but not usually stuff on recruiting – he’s a genius – should be on a number of lists – but this wouldn’t be the first list I would choose for him.   What about the true recruiting genius’s in our industry: Glenn Cathey, Chris Hoyt, Jim Stroud – how can they not be on this lists? In fact how can they not be in the Top 5 of this list?!  Arguably, these 3 guys know and influence more in recruiting than the Top 25 listed combined.

So, for the record I hate Sumser’s lists because: I’m not one them, frauds, too many people pay attention to them, congratulations, using it to brand yourself, notable missing industry leaders – but mainly because I’m not #1.

 

89 year old Nurse for Hire

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I read a wonderful story last week about the longest serving Nurse in Michigan, Dorthe Canty, who is retiring at the ripe old age of 89!  Having worked in a Health System I can tell you this is no small feat, for one simple reason it’s tough being on your feet for 50+ years taking care of patients.  Can you imagine what pushes someone to work in such a demanding field until the age of 89?  Here’s what Dorthe had to say:

“What am I going to do instead – sit at home?”

I love that!

Why is it we push so hard for everyone to retire at 65?  That’s what we do as HR Pros.  As soon as someone starts having those birthdays pop up around 62, 63, 64 we start hinting around those questions – “So, Charlie when are you going to retire?” , “What’s your plan for retirement Sue?”, etc.   It’s really one of those American cultural norms that our government started when they decided Social Security should start at 65 – that was our little reminder that at age 65 you become to broken down to work any longer!  Thank you – but like so much of what our government set up in 1930’s and 1940’s in really no longer relevant.

We now raise our kids to believe that retirement, basically to stop working and start having fun, should be there goal.  I think we should change it.  I don’t think I’ll ever stop working. I have 3 boys to put through college, then I have weddings,  then I hope to have untold numbers of grandchildren that need to learn how to hit a curve ball and master the crossover dribble, then I have another round of college, and, well you know life just keeps coming at you.  The goal shouldn’t be to stop working, the goal, the expectation should be to enjoy your life while you are living it.

I don’t need retirement at 65 for one simple reason – I enjoy what I’m doing – and oh by the way – I get paid to do it!  If or when that stops, I’ll find something else I enjoy and usually if I enjoy something I find a way to make money at it, because I like money – it allows me to give things to my family, which I enjoy most of all.  You see work doesn’t define me at 41ish – the combination of my family, my friends, my work, my life defines me – so retirement doesn’t sound like a goal I want, it sounds quite frankly like an end. I think it was that way for Dorthe as well. She didn’t want to just sit home on the sidelines, she wanted to be in the game, she wanted to participate in life. So do I.

7 Sure Fire Ways to Fail as an HR Leader

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It’s tough being an HR Leader these days!  You have all these boomers retiring and taking their typewriters and knowledge with them, you have all theses X’ers who think they are now the second coming, the GenY’s and the Millennial’s who have been told they are the second coming, and now we have these Generation @’s who think they can work from where ever since they grew up with a smartphone and a iPad in their crib.  On top of all this, somehow in the last 10 years executives decided HR is no longer HR, but now we are these business partners, so on top of having to take care of all these people issues, we now have to be concerned with business issues, teach our leaders how to be leaders, continue to train our workforce to stay current, fight off talent sharks from our competition, make sure the corporate picnic still runs smoothly and oh by the way can you put a nice internal blog post together for the CEO and make it real “peopleish”.

I get it – it’s hard being a leader in HR, that’s why I’m going to help you out and give you some tips of things to stay away from:

1. Think of yourself or your company as “the” industry leader. As soon as you do, someone will knock you off.

2. Identify so strongly with the company that you no longer have a clear boundary between your personal interests  and the corporation’s interests. Yes you should be committed, but don’t be “committed” – to often leaders doing this fail to differentiate their personal agenda and the corporate agenda and start empire building.

3. Have all the answers.  This is tough because it’s common leadership training that we all know – use your people, surround yourself with people better than you, make group decisions, etc.  But until you put your butt in that seat you never realize how many things will come your way, where people want a decision and they are unwilling to make it – so they look to you for the answer. Don’t get sucked into this trap – push back – make them bring you solutions.

4. Hunt down and Kill those who don’t support you. Don’t think this happens! Look at turnover numbers of  departments when a new leader takes over – they are almost always higher than those of the organization as a whole.

5. Become obsessed with the company image.  Your company image is hugely important, but it is not the most important thing you have going on. Make sure your operations match the image you want to create, not the either way around.

6. Underestimate or take obstacles for granted.  As a leader you want to be confident during hard and challenging times, but don’t let yourself get fooled into believing your own confidence will get you through.  Having a clear understanding of the reality you are facing, and being able to communicate that without fear to your team, with a plan of action, is key.

7. Stubbornly rely on what you’ve always done.  “Well, when I was the leader at GE we did it this way…” Look, this isn’t the 80’s and this isn’t GE. Might it work? Sure. But be open to new ways of doing things, while being confident of what you know will work. Don’t put yourself or your organization in jeopardy, but be willing to try new things when time and circumstance allow.

Adapted from The Seven Habits of Spectacularly Unsuccessful Executives in Forbes by Mike Myatt

Why Succession can be Sticky Business

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Did anyone see the announcement by Warren Buffett before the holidays where he named his son, Howie, as his successor to run Birkshire Hathaway when he dies?

I didn’t think so.  It was low key as is much of of what Warren does.  Somehow the richest man in America tells us who will be running his company and no one really seems to care that it was his son.  Tough choice, though, picking from anyone in the world, the greatest business minds of our generation where lining up for a chance to run one of America’s greatest companies or his son, the soybean farmer from Nebraska.  You see, Succession isn’t as much a science as it’s an art.

Whatever – he choose his son because, as Warren puts it:

Howard, or “Howie,” as he is known in the family, will serve as a “guardian” of the company’s “values”…Buffett said he worried that “somebody will be in charge of Berkshire that uses it as their own sandbox in some way,” and “having Howie there serves as an extra layer of protection.”

Trust.  In the end, the greatest business mind of our generation, and possibly any generation, didn’t make an analytical decision, he made a decision with his heart.  He choose someone he trusted would carry on his vision – not someone who would be out to turn Birkshire into something he or she would want to make it.  Succession is a funny thing that way, when you leave it up to the current person in charge to decide.

This is truly why most HR based succession plans fail to hit the mark.  CEO/Presidents/Owners don’t want competency models and scorecards to determine who will be next in line – they want to use subjective data that we all steer them away from – “who do I trust?”, “who do I feel will carry on my vision?”, “who do I feel will do most like me?”  Your leaders want to ensure that your organization has a great pipeline of talent, some of which is capable of moving up a level or two – but they also want and need to know those individuals on a very personal level.  A level where they have complete confidence in the decision they are making – this usually isn’t a part of our HR succession plans.

Don’t think this is the case as you move down the ladder and you’re just say replacing your next Director of IT – you would be wrong.  It really works at all levels – the next level or two up want to know that when they place someone in a position, they can trust that person won’t make them look like a fool. The only way you make that happen is if the person in the succession plan has a relationship one and two levels up – not a working relationship, but one that is beyond that.

So, go add that to your succession plan and see what happens!  “What? You want me to take Nick our lead developer to dinner, with our spouses!? Are you serious?” Yes, and we’ll even pay for the dinner and drinks.  Then sit back and enjoy.  Is it subjective? Yes.  Does it work? Yes.

3 Leadership Traits to Lead you into 2012

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I’ve been unplugged for about 12 days and it felt wonderful!  Caught up on a bunch of family time, a bunch of sleep, a bunch of eating and basically forgot about email and work – well for the most part.  One thing I was able to do on vacation, that I don’t get to do regularly, is read the paper – not the online version, but a real get-your-hands-a-bit-dirty paper, I love that!  Just sitting in a quiet house, before everyone is up, just catching up on the world.  I start with the sports section, spend probably 50% of my time there, then the business section, then the front page, and finally the personal journal/back page/health wellness/entertainment section – whatever that thing is called in your hometown.

Much to my surprise I actually found an article that I thought was actually worth blogging about – and more to my surprise – I was unable to find the copy anywhere online – even at the local paper I was reading!  Can you imagine – actual content that has never seen the internet – who knew!?!

The article was actually an interview with Scott Durschslag the current CEO at Expedia, he was also the previous CEO at Skype, so I was intrigued to what he had to say. Mostly they were talking about the future of travel, in regards to online booking, etc., but stuck in the middle was an actual question about Leadership and Management, whereas the reporter asked him why Expedia who prevail over other travel sights and he got into his leadership theory.  Durschslag said he has 3 “management” traits that he focuses on, which are:

1. Define a clear vision and strategy. (I think this is probably two traits – vision and strategy aren’t quite the same – but it’s a good start)

2. Get the required investment. (This one is a bit tricky, for most HR folks I think they immediately go to the finance portion of “investment”, but what he was referring to was the investment you need from your workforce to be successful.  Your people need to be invested in the vision and strategy, if they aren’t, you will fail every single time)

3. Put great people in charge and empower them.  (Yep, get yourself out of the way – a great leadership trait to have, but extremely hard to do for most leaders!)

It just sounds so easy!

The fact is, it’s not – defining a clear vision is a skill most people just don’t have, getting your people to buy into your crazy vision is even harder, and then you want me to just watch someone else put it all together!  Yep.  Stay thirsty my friends.

Sackadamus returns – 2012 Predictions

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Back when I first started blogging in 2009 – I wrote my first Sackadamus 2010 Predictions over at FOT (check it out – I was right on!). So, for 2012 I thought it was time to give you some new predictions for the upcoming year.  Don’t be frightened, I’m not sure why I have this gift but I do, I promise to only use it for good and HR!

My Top Predictions for 2012:

1. HR blogging reaches it’s pinnacle as the last HR person finally starts the final HR blog called: TheLastSeatAtTheTable.com.  It will be by a GenXer who will talk to much about their philosophy on performance management, why their GenY co-workers suck and how they no longer want to talk about having a seat at the table (very original like most of the content us HR pros put out…).

(It’s scary right!? You get an uneasy feeling, like you can almost feel these predictions coming true as you read them!)

2. Organizations will discover that all this time and money they’ve been putting into Employee Engagement is getting what they hoped for – better performance and higher results.  With one last ditch unfocused effort they’ll work towards the “new” engagement model of just making people Happy at any cost.  This to will fail, but what the heck – we’ll have a subjective rating scale that will ensure it wasn’t our fault that it failed – the measure said people felt more happy!

3. Work Life Balance will jump the shark.  It’s taken us almost 10 years, but HR will finally discover that Work Life Balance doesn’t mean you can come and go whenever you want and put work as the 4th, 5th or 13th priority in your life.  The next generation of “Work Life Balance” will be “Work To Have A Job” – it will be sweeping the country like a Tsunami of actual productivity.

4. SAP and Oracle will merge to create on giant super Dinosaur of an HRIS system that all HR people will be forced to use worldwide, and this new system will still generate reports that our leadership teams won’t believe.

5. LinkedIn will (has) become the 2010ish version of the 2000ish job boards. (Quick Question off subject – How do the HR Pros who taught their workforces to put up profiles on LinkedIn about 3-5 years ago feel about themselves now?  Thank you, by the way – I love easy ways to recruit your employees!) LinkedIn will now become the worlds largest recruiting site of recruiters – which make up 63% of the actual users of LinkedIn.  Hello – Facebook – whomever figures out how to effectively recruit on Facebook wins – Wins big! – I’m guessing on Branchout as of right now – but Facebook really has an opportunity that no one has figured out – Billion dollar plus opportunity just sitting there…

6. HR/Talent Pros will finally get the power of video.  “But Tim, we can have video resumes, interviews, etc. our hiring managers will discriminate!”  Yes, they will.  Deal with that issue, don’t stop technology and one of the best productivity tools that you’ve been given in years!  The hiring managers who will discriminate using video, are the same ones who are discriminating now – the difference being they just wait for the live interview to do it now.  Measure, determine the issue, take action – it’s not difficult to determine discrimination – but it takes a lot of courage to call someone out on it – don’t blame the tools being used.

Have a great 2012 HR/Talent Pros – and thanks for all the support you’ve given me in 2011!