Archive for October, 2008
« Previous Entries3 Reasons Why We Don’t Pay For Performance
Friday, October 31st, 2008Note: I’m talking about those of us who manage merit pay systems.
Some of us might get close to paying for performance, but no cigar. Why not? A lot of the time it is because of Ron’s 3 Laws of Compensation:
1. Managers are afraid not to give salary increases to those employees who don’t deserve them. [...]
Herzberg Is Turning Over In His Grave
Thursday, October 30th, 2008I just read interesting comments on a blog about the unintended consequences of a certain bonus program. My experience has been that there is always unintended consequences. When people chase the proverbial carrot, the motivation for the real work gets sidelined. The carrot becomes the goal, not the job itself.
I told someone recently that Herzberg, the [...]
Don’t Forget Your Manners
Wednesday, October 29th, 2008
Today, I want to play Miss Manners (in the old days, she was a real person named Emily Post). Anyway… I witnessed a class act yesterday. A Human Resource person called one of his candidates and told him that he wasn’t selected for the final rounds of interviews. “So what,” you say?
Well, I’m saying that we [...]
HR Comes In All Flavors
Tuesday, October 28th, 2008
I heard an audio clip on another blog recently describing four types of HR people. It was satirical, but I do believe that the author was trying to make a valid point. The four types were: Cold and Analytical (Comp and Benefits folks), Amiable (likes people and works on building company culture), Expressive (Drama Queens [...]
Keep The Romance Alive
Monday, October 27th, 2008Hiring someone is a lot like getting married. The recruiting phase is all romance and lust. The recruiter is chasing the new candidate like a smitten teenager. Sometimes, the applicant plays hard to get or sometimes she is calling the recruiter incessantly. As a determined staffing professional, I used a technique that, many times, worked – I [...]
Wonder If We Only Hired Adults?
Saturday, October 25th, 2008Wonder if we hired only adults? I mean people that acted like adults. Just think about it – we could throw away our Employee Handbook, our Policies and our Procedures. Adults don’t need these rule books.
We in Human Resources spend a lot of time focusing on trying to control the “kids” that sometimes slip [...]
RIF’s: The Non-Fun Part of HR
Friday, October 24th, 2008I’ve assisted in laying off 100’s, maybe 1000’s of employees in my past life. I actually shut a plant of 300+ people down. It is definitely not the fun part of HR and it was never easy.
3 Ways to soften the blow for the employees scheduled for a layoff:
1. Keep everything low key. Keep the [...]
You Can’t Buy Passion
Thursday, October 23rd, 2008
Last Saturday night, we went to see a blues singer, Angela Strehli, in a dive located in Marin County, California. To me, Ms. Strehli is a legend – she sang with the late Stevie Ray Vaughn at Carnegie Hall in 1985. Her guitarist on Saturday was Mighty Mike Schermer who also plays in the Elvin Bishop Band. Mike’s [...]
Welcome to “Guyland”
Wednesday, October 22nd, 2008Look out folks, there is a new group out there that has to be dealt with – “thresholders.” In sociologist Michael Kimmel’s new book, “Guyland,” he describes this new group of “kidadults” who drink, chase women and not much else. They are college graduates who take low level jobs and party hearty throughout their 20’s. It [...]
The Disconnection That Makes Our Employees Crazy
Tuesday, October 21st, 2008We have all worked there, right? “People Come First,” “People are our most important assets,” “People Matter,” whatever… As Human Resource professionals, what are we doing to make the reality match our slogans?
I was on a marketing call sometime back and, while waiting in the lobby, I read the Mission Statement of the company. When I [...]