August 25 – 27th will be the 2008 Indiana State Human Resources Conference.  This year’s conference is being held at the Westin Hotel in Indianapolis.  Achievant is excited to be an exhibitor at the event as well as partnering with HR Dimensions to provide the prize for the Grand Prize Drawing.

I can’t wait to meet and mingle with over 1,000 HR professionals from all over the state as well as visit the booths of the other hundred exhibitors.  If you are attending I hope you will stop by our tradeshow booth in order to see a demo of our products for the first time, meet with a sales rep, ask questions, or just to say hello to me in one of the sessions.

If you’d like to attend the conference but haven’t registered yet or you’d like to learn more about the conference, here is a link - http://www.indianashrm.org/INSHRMconferencegrid.htm.  Personally I am looking forward to hearing several of the speakers including the session on Updating Your Compensation Programs by Debi Mueller, Vice President-Consulting at HR Dimensions. This session addresses best practices in compensation and explores the links to business strategies that will be needed to ensure alignment to productivity and pay for performance. I plan to pick up a couple more recertification credits to complete my SPHR renewal.

Simon Bailey will be the keynote speaker on Tuesday.  His topic will be Releasing Brilliance and will inspire us to take charge of and transform our lives from the inside out.  Clint Swindall will be doing the closing keynote on Engaged Leadership and will focus on leadership enhancement.

It should be a great conference with rich content and ample time to visit the trade show floor.

See you there!

As the use of web based programs grows, becomes more common and is more widely accepted we've begun to have clients ask to add 3rd aprty widgets (like their own stock ticker) to our online human resource software.

I get why clients want this... it's a perk for their users and can enhance employee self-service.  Widgets, when embedded together in a single page, can offer a kind of one stop shop for employee self-service.  if your learning management softwware offers this widget and your performance management solution overs that widget and you embed them all in your core HRIS software then everything has coalesced into one easy to use piece of software.

As a general web surfer I think widgets are great.  I use several of them and like to look at sites like google to see what new gadgets are available.  Almost all of my favorite sites offer some sort of plugin or another.

As the head of IT for a company I hate widgets.  Everyone wants to install them on their desktop, include them in their home page so they're there every time they open their borwser.  My problem with them is that they are frequently authored by random people and aren't subject to oversite so they are potneitally riddled with spyware, malware, virus and whatever other icky stuff someone can dream up.

Two news articles this week point this out.  One, a blog post from TechCrunch, talks about a worm spreadhing on Facebook.  Another points out theat google gadgets are now the focus of hackers.

Employee training and development is the number one way to prevent these kinds of tools from becoming a danger to your information security.  You can't alway control where people go, or even sometimes, what they install while at work.

So, it is clearly obvious that we have all been yelled at here at Achievant for not blogging enough if at all.  Like so many times in life we are being punished for the actions of a few.  Well!  I am that few, or at least a member of a very small group (like no more than 2).  Big picture, I sort of get the blog idea but I am one of those individuals that if I can't see some pretty immediate and measurable gain I am less likely to move it up on my priority list.  Being brutally honest, everythng seems to be a priority!  This is not a new phenomena but one that always intrigues me. I think we would all agree that not everything is a priority and if it is then we better settle for a heavy dose of status quo and mediocre results.

Same holds true for the many organizations we talk to on a daily basis.  We/They get so stuck in the tactical day to day that you can never get out in front of things that are the "supposed" priorities.  Examples would include but not be limited to conversations that should sound very familiar and and usually start out something like; "My top priority is...", "The top project we need to deliver on is...", "The results of our 4 column process (strategy session) reveals we need...",  now insert the priority:

....to improve and automate Applicant Tracking
....to streamline our HRIS System
....to create a consistent Learning Management approach
....to train leadership on the essence of Performance Management
....to automate Time and Attendance 
 

I think you get the picture!  If we continue through the conversation and go out several weeks if not months I would submit that very few of these priorities would actually still qualify or would not be that much farther down the path of completion.  The biggest obstacle is nothing went on the back burner or yielded to the priority.  Sound familiar?  

Speaking of looking out several weeks or months, I am expected (priority) to deliver several more blogs, as in one a week.  Let's see if I can break the cycle.  Wish me luck! 
  

Learning management software is a beast unto itself.  It can be a very simple piece of human resource software or it can be a giant, full-blown module.

In my career I have worked on Online Employee Training software that has covered the entirety of the possible range of robustness and complexity.

Because learning management modules can spider their way into so many other aspects of HRIS they can be an integral and important part of any talent management system. Learning management naturally flows into performance management, succession management and even applicant tracking depending on what your on-boarding process is like.


This week Achievant rolled out some new enhancements to its LMS.  Our module for learning management started off life as a lightweight module that though flexible and fairly robust had room for growth.

We've added over 17 new features some of which included:

·         proctoring features for trainers who need more detailed class planning and tracking

·         more robust class rosters and session results

·         the ability to track education credits for both internal and external classes

·         automated notifications for minimum class size not being met

Our goal, as is almost always our goal (and philosophy), as we build out our web HRIS software is to grow it incrementally.  Each time we work within the app we look for areas where we can add new features.  We listen to our current clients, our future clients and our industry to see what needs and wants are out there and we take the opportunity to add them whenever we can.

For us, such a successive refinement approach to all of our modules is not unlike learning management itself: with continuous work and grooming people (or applications) can get better at their jobs.

I just got back from my first prospective college visit to Florida with my oldest son, Michael (because of course why would he want to attend a college with in-state tuition!).  I’ve also been traveling a lot lately for new and perspective clients so I’m becoming quite the airline connoisseur.  Frankly as airfare has sky-rocketed I tend to book whoever is cheapest or works with my schedule, but I do have my favorites.

This most recent trip had me on Southwest Airlines.  Now I’ll admit that as an HR leader I have followed this company for several years.  Southwest is one of the few profitable airlines and has been in the black for 33 consecutive years and has paid a small dividend for 127 consecutive quarters. While its competitors are reducing the number of flights offered and grounding hundreds of aircraft, Southwest will add a few flights daily, will take delivery of another dozen aircraft next year and still plans to grow by 2 percent to 3 percent.  Southwest now carries more passengers annually than any other U.S. carrier.

So, my down time in the airport yesterday had me pondering...how has Southwest been successful?  I think it is based on a few guiding principles –

    * Keep things simple
    * Keep it consistent
    * Manage costs and maximize productive assets, and
    * Manage customer expectations.

These are business strategies that can be applied to most businesses.

Keep It Simple

While Southwest’s competition operates numerous types of planes, Southwest flies just one plane type.  This saves millions in maintenance costs, employee training, parts, etc.

Business Application – Do one thing and do it well

In the technology world, Human Resources software providers are trying to be all things to all people.  At Achievant, we have determined what we do is provide HRIS software solutions to small and mid-sized companies.  Achievant is not a payroll company, but we work with your payroll company to manage your employe data.  We have seen numerous companies try to meet all needs by bolting together the components of a human capital management system (i.e., HRIS system, time and attendance tracking, learning management, performance management, applicant tracking, and succession management) together with a payroll system and try to pass it off as integrated.  As a result these providers are adequate at many things, but not really good at anything.  Don’t get caught up in a feature/function comparison….who has the prettiest screen, bell, or whistle.  You should evaluate the entire package.

Keep It Consistent

I have to admit that I have not always been a fan of Southwest's approach to assigning seats.  Which is…..there are no assigned seats. You just line up according to an assigned number and you choose an open seat as you board the plane.  As someone who is slightly a control-freak (ok, maybe a little more than slightly), this was initially unsettling to not have a seat assigned specifically to me.  But, as I have flown with them more I have come to appreciate the control of choosing my seat...the one that is not next to the crying child or the chatty person, and have relished the opportunity to get a seat with extra leg room or no one sitting next to me.  Best of all, they still provide beverages and snacks for free!

Business Application – Manage the brand experience

At Achievant we work very hard to manage the experience our clients have with us and our Human Resources software solution.  Every time they contact us we want to respond to them in a friendly way, on a timely basis, and in a way that is relevant to them.  

No fees, no frills

As other carriers have removed perks and added fees, Southwest has kept its customer proposition streamlined and unchanged. The airline only sells in a few price "buckets" which allows it customers to understand the fare structure and believe they are getting value for their money. Prices are all-inclusive too, no fees for fuel surcharges, ticket changes, or luggage.  They have looked for out-of-the-box solutions to things like the clunky beverage cart.

Business Application – If customers can’t understand the pricing structure, they can’t understand the value you offer

Most HRIS systems, learning management systems, time and attendance solutions, and payroll providers utilize an ala carte menu for the services they provide.  In addition to the monthly or annual subscription, anything additional you’d like (e.g., a system change, new report) is charged by the hour or project.  This can make it very difficult to manage your costs.  I have spoken with numerous potential clients who when questioned how much they pay their current system provider, respond that they won’t know until the end of the year.

At Achievant, we have adopted a modular pricing model that is very simple to understand and is inclusive.  You are not charged for new version releases, minor system changes, client support, etc.

Management, Happy Workforce

Herb Kelleher finally stepped away from Southest earlier this year after leading it for more than a generation.  Although he was a very colorful leader, the airline avoided fads, shied away from anything that increased costs or complicated the basic travel proposition. Management ranks are lean, but most importantly, productive.

Southwest has embraced a culture of making their work (and consequently our travel) more fun.  They sing, dress in casual uniforms, and allow employees to go “off-script”.  In return, they have employees who are friendlier, seem to enjoy their jobs, and don't strike.

Business Application – If your workers aren’t happy, your customers aren’t happy

It is important to note that there are many intangibles that contribute to how much employees enjoy their job.  Take time to focus on these and you will be repaid for your efforts in higher levels of customer satisfaction.  360 degree feedback can be a great tool for this.

These are important business applications that I think will apply to any industry, not just HRIS software and talent management providers like Achievant.  In the meantime, I will continue to watch the progress of Southwest. 

Ivy Tech Community College has been selected as Indiana’s only college to offer the Society for Human Resource Management (SHRM) Global Professional in Human Resources (GPHR™) certification.  In fact, Ivy Tech is one of only 27 universities and colleges across the country to offer this certification.

What a great honor for Ivy Tech to have been chosen as the school to offer this certification.  Ivy Tech is Indiana’s second largest public post-secondary institution with more than 110,000 students enrolled annually on its 23 campuses.

The Global Professional in Human Resources (GPHR™) certification assesses the mastery of HR knowledge to be successful in companies conducting business worldwide. Globalization is the defining political and economic force in the world today. It requires new ways of thinking and responding. For HR professionals, recognizing and understanding this phenomenon is fast becoming a job requirement.

The GPHR course is delivered in 35 contact hours over 12 weeks of instruction and is scheduled September 2 to November 18, 2008. The course fee is $995 and includes the GPHR Learning System manuals, software, access to the Resource Center and instructor handouts.

Say what you mean and do what you say. 

Failure to uphold this customer service tenet is often the crux of miscommunication.  We tend to think that whatever we say is always clear, obvious and should be easily understood. But the fact is, others don't always see things as we do, and therefore we need to make allowances for this. We each tend to have our own view of the world which acts as a filter through which we perceive everything that happens in our lives.  

When looking to improve our communication skills two thing you can do to avoid miscommunication, is:   

Learn to Listen

We know that communication is plagued by difficulties in the way we express ourselves and how we perceive others.  It is also easy to see how important it is to learn to listen properly. This is different to the type of listening we are probably used to.

I know that there are all sorts of things going on in my mind when others speak to us. Real listening (and I mean totally paying attention, not just periodically listening and occasionally nodding our head) means that we become open to what others are saying, without interrupting them, without justifying our own position in our minds, and without mentally formulating a response while the other person is talking.

Either the vendor or client believes they communicated something that the other party did not hear or understand.  It is important to take time to ensure that you have communicated the message you intended to.  This can be especially difficult when using various technology devices.  

Do What You Said You’d Do

In addition if you’ve communicated that you will take some action, be certain that you follow though.  I try to make a point of responding to client’s emails advising them that I am working on their issue so they know their request hasn’t fallen on deaf ears.  I also regularly touch base with them on the progress I’ve made throughout the resolution of the issue.  A common mistake is assuming the other party knows you’re working on the issue.  In reality, I know when I am the customer if I haven’t heard from them; I think I’ve been forgotten. 

These days we have less and less human contact.  We shop at a supermarket with self-checkout lanes, we pay bills on-line, we order food from a drive-thru, and get cash from an ATM.  It’s no wonder that with all of these high-tech options that customers look for high-touch service people. 

When we have a problem we can become frustrated very quickly when we try to find a “real person” to assist us.  We’ve all gotten lost in the maze of an automated attendant answering system with an endless list of “press 1 for ….., but no option that is actually what we’re looking for and certainly no option to speak to an actual person.  Or we’ve initially been pleased when a web-site offers “live chat”, only to learn that no one is available to chat with us for hours.  These are both excellent technologies, but must be used with caution. 

At Achievant, we have real people who answer our telephones.  Clients can always obtain customer service assistance from a live person almost immediately if they need help using our HRIS software.  We recognize that people don’t want to communicate with an “organization” or a “computer”.  They want to talk to a real, live, responsive, responsible person who will assist them and resolve their problem satisfactorily.   

What kind of access and response time have you received from your vendor?

Today I had to contact a vendor over a potentially serious problem we were having with some of their equipment. They have a nice little automated package to which you send an email and from you which a new case is automatically created, support personnel are contacted and an initial response sent.

I marked my issues as needing immediate attention and went about my business waiting for a reply.

Three hours ago a reply would have been timely.  A reply now might save a good part of someone’s derriere.  A reply any later than, say, right now will get me a little wound up.  Like Tasmanian devil wound up.

Anymore, every industry is a service industry.  A three hour response to an issue isn’t even remotely acceptable.  You might not be able to solve my problem as quickly as I might like, but at least let me know you’re working on it.  Via a real person.

With live chat support, 24x7 email and phone support and the long list of other support means now available from virtually any company if your company doesn’t supply top notch customer service you’ll pretty much be immediately behind on the customer service learning curve.  And any company that isn’t supply either great service or who doesn’t have a monopoly just isn’t going to make it.

It may seem obvious, but clients are a company’s number one asset and any company that doesn’t jealously protect and nourish that asset is going to lose it.

Like most retailers the Atlanta based home supplies chain, Home Depot, is facing tremendous pressure to be more efficient, increase sales/revenue….basically do more with less.  To that end, they are reorganizing the human resources function—a move that will result in cutting its 2,200-person HR staff in the field by about 50 percent.

Today there is an HR manager in every store, but in the future, there will be 230 district HR teams that will oversee six to ten stores each.  Each team will consist of an HR district manager and three HR managers who report to that person.  Each store will continue to have an administrative HR employee on site who will oversee schedules of the associates. Home Depot is also creating a 200 person service center to handle HR calls from employees and managers.  The new structure is expected to be in place by May.

Home Depot plans to use the savings resulting from this restructuring to add three sales associates to the floor of each of its stores by year-end.  Analysts are already applauding the move by Home Depot believing that they were overstaffed with the current structure. 

I think that it will take some time before we know if this restructuring really saves them money.  Without the right support and training for the store managers, Home Depot may find itself redirecting its HR workforce “savings” into a litigation fund.  Store managers will need to be willing and prepared to “step up” to activities currently handled by their on-site HR such as employee relations, wage and hour, and harassment issues. 

We’ve seen that other big-box retailers such as Wal-Mart have learned the hard way that it can be very costly to the organization when there aren’t enough HR reps in the field.   So with Home Depot, we will wait and see. 

I always find trends interesting.  TechCrunch has a great blog post today that shows Internet trends (using a Morgan Stanley report).  In a nutshell the report shows that social sites are dominating with respect to user traffic.  Being a business to business kind of site, Achievant doesn’t necessarily fall into the same bucket as such sites, but I think there are lessons to be learned.

We all want traffic to our sites whether our sites are the company intranet dolling out the latest company news, or a marketing site pimping the latest product or a consumer site selling the latest must have widget.  Whatever basic human need is driving people to YouTube or Facebook is the same human need we can tap to bring people to our sites regardless of their function.

If you’re trying to get your employees to read the latest policy on this, that or the other thing and you can’t get them to stop on the intranet’s home page, maybe adding something social (as the trend shows) will bring them in.  If you’re trying to sell widgets it would appear a widget forum where the general masses can leave their two cents worth would bring traffic your way.

As a developer of websites I find the trend pointing toward the next iteration of a user interface.  These social sites that hundreds of millions of users hit each month are being hit by the same people using Achievant’s HCMS.  The user experience on these sites frames the expectation of the user for our site.  We probably won’t ever have video sharing or a friend tracking widget, but we might have forums or a look and feel that is less business and more social.

One of the many benefits of using Achievant’s HRIS system is the on-going system improvements that we provide.  We are continually working on the system, module by module, to make improvements.  Typically the suggestions for potential enhancements come from either our clients or Achievant staff. 

Best of all, we provide these enhancements at no additional cost to our clients.  Very few Human Resources software technology companies offer this.  Usually the new version comes at a significant cost to the client. 

Currently we are working on some Training or Learning Management enhancements.  We anticipate having these enhancements ready to roll out late April/early May. 

We are excited to be rolling out the following features:

• Place to record outside classes – allows for better tracking of conference or workshop attendance
• Ability to add classes not part of curriculum – allows for customized or ad hoc additions of coursework unrelated to an organization’s curriculum map for the position
• Class start and stop times – improvements to the training calendar view
• Track number of training hours – more and more organizations set standards as to the number of hours of training each employee is required to have. 
• Print roster for class sign-up sheet with class proctor capabilities for attendance and scoring
• Course enrollment close date – if desired, decline admittance to a class after a certain date
• Track scores and Pass/Fail on per class basis
• Determine class size by course and close class when seats are filled
• Set a minimum class size and if desired, cancel if the minimum is not met
• Create additional reports

 What has your HRIS software provider done for you lately - for free?

 

 

 

If you read this blog on a regular basis, you probably think that either I never returned from Spring Break (a great idea, although I’d run out of money very quickly) or that I’ve reached the pinnacle of ultimate laziness judging by the number of posts I’ve written lately. 

Rest assured that neither is true.  I did return from Spring Break (and it was great, thanks for asking) but I’ve have been swamped with work, which is always a positive thing in a start up organization.  I have just launched the Project Kickoff for another company using our HRIS system, have another client set to Go Live in a couple of weeks, I’m doing a 360 degree feedback engagement for a small employer and we’re overhauling the Learning Management module for our next big system enhancement launch. 

So, I have not been blogging much, but I have not been sitting idle either.  Tomorrow, I’ll tell you about some of the upcoming enhancements to Learning Management/Employee Training. 

I was intrigued to read a February 2008 white paper by Hudson, a talent management service provider, The Ambition Divide: Differences Define Women’s Career Aspirations.  Both as an HR leader and as a female, I wanted to learn the results.  When asked if they aspire to the executive level or higher, 77 percent of the female respondents said “yes.”

Approximately one in five female mid-level managers are not interested in reaching the executive level according to a recent study by Hudson.  Those who said “no” are referred to as “decliners” in the survey.  Interestingly the study found no correlation between respondents’ aspirations and their family commitments. The report indicates that 69 percent of “aspirers” are married, compared with 61 percent of “decliners”. 63 percent of aspirers have children, compared with 59 percent of decliners.

Decliners should not be viewed as unengaged. Rather than advancement, 37 percent of decliners said they seek intellectual stimulation, compared with just 17 percent of aspirers.  The opportunity to do interesting and challenging work is what 39 percent of decliner respondents like most about their job, compared with 22 percent of aspirers.  By contrast, the opportunity for growth and development was the single most important goal for 48 percent of aspirers, compared with just 28 percent of decliners.

The vast majority of aspirers (78 percent) said they want their next career step to be a promotion or lateral move at their current company.  So what is the call to action for the corporate world to keep these women? 

Female respondents said they favor opportunities to work with senior management, access to leadership development, mentoring and training programs, and the chance to work on companywide strategic initiatives.  Respondents reported that they believe their employers are most effective at offering training programs and formal schooling and least effective when it comes to providing mentoring programs, offering flexible hours and instilling an understanding of the business. 

If employers understand the goals and aspirations of female managers, they should be able to develop strategies to retain them.

 

One of the most important components here is training on how to do a performance evaluation.  Tomorrow, I’ll explain what that should look like.

 

There seem to be no end of cautionary tales in the media these days.  Hackers steal over four million credit card numbers,  more hackers steal students’ personal information,  electronics come straight from the factory already infected ,  your swipe card for door access at work and other places can be easily hacked , and even your pacemaker (if you have one) isn’t safe.

It’s like a hail storm of bad technology news.  I might move to a deserted island somewhere and give up all my modern conveniences in order to escape to digital mongrel hordes that are after my data.

So what do you do?  You take all the precautions you can.  You make sure your anti-virus, anti-spyware, anti-malware and anti-spam software are all up-to-date.  You make sure your OS is up-to-date.  You are careful about what links you click, what emails you open, what programs you install.  You make sure your spouse, kids, mom, dad, cousin and aunt are all aware of the same precautions and are taking them.

Sounds tedious.  Sounds time consuming.  Sounds like a pain in the rumpus.  It is. But you’re not done yet.  You need to make sure that all the people who have your data do the same: the grocery store, the bank, your online retailers, your doctor, your accountant, your HRIS vendor and pretty much everyone else you do business with.

If you outsource an HRIS needs (like time and attendance, learning management, payroll integration, etc) you need to make sure that vendor is doing all they should.  They don’t just have your data… they have the data of every employee in your company and quite possible the data of their dependents, beneficiaries and a whole host of other innocent people.

A company should spend at least 10% of its IT budget on security.  All of the things I suggested you do above are the bare minimum they should be doing.  Ask to see their security policies, their intrusion response documents, their SAS 70.  Ask to see everything.  Then ask them how they know all of these policies are being followed.

For me, I believe actions are better than words.  Any good company has their employees sign acceptable use policies, claim they use “best practices” around digital security.  I like to prove that.  How?  You can:

1.       Hire someone to perform a physical penetration.  In the past I have (about every six months) had someone walk into the office, pretend to be a computer technician, a new IT employee, whatever and then work to gain access to computers, networks and other data stores.  It’s a great way to keep people on the alert.

2.       Pay a company to perform a penetration test against your network (or, if you have staff with the right skills perform it yourself).  Do it once a quarter.  Things change and you need to make sure you haven’t accidently opened a whole in your digital fortress.

3.       Send out monthly security newsletters… it helps keep security on everyone’s mind.

4.       Subscribe to security alerts from your anti-virus, anti-spyware and other security software vendors.  They generally do a great job of getting in front of new attacks and keeping you aware of the latest schemes.

 

There will always be new and improved security threats.  There’s not much you can do about that.  What you can do is be aware, be ready and be on guard for what may be coming your way.

Veritude, a Boston-based talent acquisition, consulting and management services provider, recently published a research report titled, Working Together, Working Apart.  The report, confirms what most HR people has known all along - significant gaps exist in the working relationship between HR and business line leaders,

In the report, respondents said HR must improve business leaders' perceptions of their skills and abilities, while business managers must learn to turn to the "people experts" for support in addressing significant workforce issues.

The online survey gathered feedback from 101 business leaders with responsibility for at least 500 employees and 99 HR leaders in director-level or higher positions in three areas:

• The top strategic challenges that face business and HR leaders.

• The working relationship between business leaders and HR.

• How HR's relationship with business leaders affects the implementation of workforce plans.

I found the most surprising finding to be that 57% percent of business leaders said they have no established relationship with HR or that it would not occur to them to include HR in implementing workforce plans.  Imagine what it must be like to be the HR leader in that organization!

Business and HR leaders report frustration with one another.  21% of business leaders perceive HR as not being able to find the right people for the job or as lacking responsiveness to business leaders’ needs. On the other hand, HR leaders believe business leaders set unrealistic time frames, lack an understanding of workforce issues and are inconsistent in implementing initiatives.

The report also identifies a glaring inability, from the perspective of business leaders, of HR leaders to speak the language of business.  Only 55 percent of business leaders rate HR as "well versed" in financial acumen, but 80 percent of HR leaders give themselves that assessment.   What can you do to increase your ability to speak the language of your business?  When I first moved into banking, I was fortunate enough to report to a bank president who was supportive of me learning about the business.  I attended the Stonier Graduate School of Banking and stepped out of my comfort zone to write a Capstone project on something I knew nothing about, trust services. 

Both groups want to see HR more fully involved in workforce strategy and implementation. According to the report, HR should take the lead in driving human capital management strategy and get involved in the strategic planning process. Business leaders, meanwhile, need to recognize the importance of HR strategy in achieving business results while working to develop a deeper understanding, acknowledgment and respect for the function.

HR leaders are encouraged to schedule time with key leaders on a regular basis to build relationships.

The report contains key questions HR leaders should ask themselves:

• Is my HR team driving the workforce strategy with the sophistication, data analysis and planning savvy required by your business?

• What is the strategic alignment between my HR team and the business, especially in terms of the grasp of the culture and key drivers of success in support of the core business areas?

• At what level is my HR team exhibiting sophistication, business acumen, analytic contributions and leadership skills?

• What is the quality of my HR team’s relationships with business line leaders?

The bottom line - HR leaders who truly speak the language of business are in a position of great power and can offer tremendous value to their companies.

 

This morning one of my coworkers asked if I’d take a look at his computer.  When I asked what was wrong he mentioned it might have gotten wet.  Really?  How did that happen?  Apparently the 2^nd best place behind the fridge to keep a bottle of water is your laptop case (in the same compartment as your laptop itself).  Who knew?  If you don’t tighten the cap to the water bottle bad things can happen.  Like your laptop can get flooded with 16 oz of water and stop working.

Fortunately for my associate most of the water just puddled in the bottom of the bag and his laptop is fine.

Giving your laptop a sip of water when it’s thirsty isn’t covered in our Acceptable Use Policy or our Incident Response Policy or any of the other myriad of forms one has to govern the use of company technology resources.

One of the problems I have faced in the past (aside from sometimes novel uses of one’s computer) is keeping employees aware of those policies.  Generally the read and sign them on their first day and never see them again.

At Achievant we have a feature in our application (which we use internally) that posts news and documents on our HRIS’ home page so that a user logging in gets a brief news update.  Using these creatively we can remind folks of the content of our policies and keep some of the more important ones (like security awareness) forefront in the minds.  It’s a feature that has less star power than time and attendance or learning management, but is one that adds considerable benefit when used effectively.

 

In my HR career I have seen numerous candidates (and discovered a few who made it to be employees before being discovered), who “stretched” the education, skills or experience detailed on their resume. 

Some were easy to spy, like the person who said they graduated from the University of Indiana instead of Indiana University, but others weren’t uncovered until the reference and background checking stage.  I am surprised at how many companies don’t take this exercise seriously.  A great deal of information and red flags on the candidate can be learned through this process. 

But as recently disclosed in the news, it’s not just companies like ours that must ferret out these imposters, so too must television networks.  After rising to culinary stardom with his own Food Network series, Robert Irvine, the star of "Dinner: Impossible", has acknowledged fabricating some of the more fantastic parts of his resume.  His fabrications included having cooked for Britain's Royal Family and various U.S. presidents!  Now in my mind, I can’t imagine how he thought wasn’t going to get caught in that lie, but apparently no one checked his references. 

Following these revelations, the network announced it would not renew Irvine's contract, though it would air the remaining episodes of the current season.

Irvine issued a written statement saying, "I was wrong to exaggerate in statements related to my experiences in the White House and the Royal Family.  I am truly sorry for misleading people and misstating the facts."  The Food Network said it might revisit its decision at the end of this season, but for now would begin searching for a new host for the series, which challenged Irvine to cook under arduous conditions. 

For the rest of us it is a reminder just how important those reference and background checks are! 

I hate inaccuracies.  I don’t mean your run of the mill, oops I made a factual error inaccuracies.  I mean the silly, any thinking person should know better inaccuracies.  To protect the (mostly) innocent I won’t mention the name or relationship of this person, but in my digital life I have an individual (and I know we all have one) who endlessly forwards me every email warning ever.  All of them are untrue.  In the last month I have received ridiculous emails about every Presidential Candidate, computer viruses, the latest gang initiation death threat and everything else you can imagine.

Oddly, I find some of these same messages plaguing my inbox at work.  Good meaning, but perhaps ill-informed coworkers, colleagues or professional acquaintances forward on a variety of spam that should never make it anywhere except someone’s Deleted folder.

As the head of IT I face a bit of a challenge with these emails: I don’t want anyone to think that I do not appreciate their attempts at security and I don’t want a well intentioned person to raise a false alarm that creates even more work for me (or a political headache).

Let me give you some examples:

1.       A colleague once forwarded me an email that said “Ed, this looks like a virus.  What should I do?”  He CCed his boss and the technical support distribution list.  Well, for starters, don’t email it to me.  If you think an email has a dangerous attachment or link in it, don’t send it to someone.  Call and ask. The email was actually a notification from the email server that the original email attachment had been deleted because it contained a virus.  Had this person simply read the first sentence in the email there would have been no cause for concern.  Of course he told a few people that he had a virus, who told a few more people and pretty soon the entire company was fraught with worry.

2.       A colleague once convinced the CEO of the company for which I worked that we would lose some of our contracts should the client ever learn that we received so much spam.   The account on which she was getting spam was our marketing account which was on about a billion websites and had its spam filter settings set very loosely so that we did not miss a viable opportunity due to it ending up caught in the spam filter.  I ended up coming in from my vacation to deal with the fallout from this one person urban legend.

3.       A colleague once sent the entire company an email (which was actually a hoax circulating on the Internet) warning them that they needed to shut their computers off on a specific day because a massive virus was supposed to hit.  Before I could control the tsunami of proactiveness that followed action plans had been formed, productive work had stopped.

So, how do I control the flow of information to make sure it is valid and accurate?  First of all I make sure we have spam, spyware, malware and anti-virus software installed everywhere.  Then I make sure the policies for these tools are well defined, well communicated and that people know what to expect from these types of software.

Next, I make sure that there is one definitive source for communication of all cyber related threats.  This way people will know not to respond to the occasional false alarm from the general population.  I also make sure the inverse is true and that there is a definitive contact for any cyber related concerns.  If someone knows who to contact it helps control the flow of information.

How can an HRIS system help?  The Achievant platform allows for two forms of companywide communication: there is a home page that acts much like an intranet and there is a messaging component.  Use of either of these can alert staff to virus outbreaks, security updates, etc.  At Achievant we use this messaging to great effect, keeping the staff aware of any news alerts that are important enough to warrant immediate distribution to either the whole company or a select group.