Twenty-seven Things You Can Do Right Now to Win the War for Talent – Part One
How about if I don’t start this out by recounting how hard it is to find and keep workers right now? That would be only slightly less useful than an OB/GYN standing over the bed of a woman in the travails of labor, saying, “Let me tell you how bad you hurt.” I’ll also save […]
Time for Some Straight Talk About Returning to Onsite Work
As employers move people back to onsite work, it’s important to consider that this is an employEE’s market, not an employER’s. Swimming against the tide of the asserted will of the labor force will hurt recruiting, retention, and Employee Engagement.
Childcare = Infrastructure
As much as businesses depend upon electricity, reliable digital signal, mail, roads, bridges, and airports to do our thing, we also rely on the availability of talented labor in sufficient quantity to do whatever it is we do. For too long, much of our workforce has seen its availability tightly constrained by reliance on a […]
5 Ways Leaders Can Catch Lightning In a Bottle Via the Power of Positive Surprise
What workers commonly expect to happen in a job/from their boss: There will always be a few stars, a bunch of mediocrity, a few slugs, and at least one a-hole. I’ll be working for somebody who is more concerned about their agenda than my interests. Chances are, no one will be willing to listen to […]
Getting Serious About Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion
In the aftermath of George Floyd’s death, corporate America has professed fresh interest in the subject of Diversity, Equity and Inclusion (DEI). I’m heartened by that, and especially so to see former Xerox CEO Ursula Burns lending her considerable voice in this regard https://fortune.com/2020/09/29/ursula-burns-black-women-corporate-boards-bdaa-diversity-inclusion-xerox-ceo/ . Among other things, DEI emphasis has driven renewed calls by […]
Coaching From a Distance
With the sudden, COVID-inspired shift to WFH, one topic that has come to the fore is productivity. How do we get it? How can we possibly verify and measure it in light of physical separation? How can we coach people to better outcomes? Fair questions. One emergent point of view is that the manager/leader should […]
Employee Engagement: Two Reasons Why ‘Getting Sticky’ Matters
(This piece generally represents the text of a letter sent to some of our firm’s leadership coaching clients this week.) Too often I see HR professionals and the organizations they are apart of throwing around the expression, “employee engagement” like medical terms used by healthcare professionals, without first clarifying what the term means, and why […]
Yes, Organizational Fit Still Matters
In the work world, “Culture” represents the values, norms, aims, customs, rules, the way of life if you will of an organization. It is an amalgam of the non-talent ingredients required to be happy, productive, and successful in that organization at a particular time. For nearly 30 years, I have been one of the louder […]
Improve Your Talent Hunts… Get Good With Crayons
Much has been written and said recently about the incidence rate of job candidates’ outright refusal of job offers, and the unprecedented ghosting of interviews and start dates. Anecdotal evidence suggests that one central cause of this behavior rests outside the terms of the deal. Rather, many candidates are balking because they’re not particularly wowed […]
You Might be Struggling to Find and Keep Good Talent If…
Convention season is in full swing, and if the groups I’ve been invited to speak for are any indication, one of THE heaviest concerns weighing on the minds of employers almost everywhere is this: Where, and how, am I going to find enough qualified people to grow our business? (Or in some cases, just to […]
