One Minute HR Consultant

One would be hard pressed to find an organization not impacted by the current state of affairs, which include calls for or against financial regulatory reform, restricted access to capital for SMB(s), and a flurry of legislation and executive orders impacting how we  conduct operations and relate to  our employees. 

Perhaps your organization is being impacted by one of these factors, but an assumption is that a combination of these factors is having an impact on  your company.  It is during these times that ambiguity increases despite well-intentioned efforts to prevent otherwise.  One of the things that we as leaders need to focus our efforts (both individually and collectively) is on continuous communication and feedback. 

The danger of organizational ambiguity can have profound impacts, which  contribute to the factors mentioned earlier and taken together result in organizational politics.  Organizational politics itself manifests within our employees in the form of  stress, intentional and unintentional discrimination, and at the extreme, turnover. 

Thus feedback should consider multiple formats addressing areas to include employee performance, organizational direction-visioning, and business goals.  Your key objective as a leader is to maintain or improve performance so that your organization maintains or ideally improves effectiveness and its ability to  accomplish its organizational objectives.  Presented below are three ways to enhance feedback and create an open-feedback culture that ideally will increase morale, diminish the impact of organizational politics, and contribute to increased profitability, readiness, and affiliation with organizational citizenship behaviors (OCBs):

1.  Ensure employees have access to relevant information regarding their performance.  This includes, but certainly not limited to individual efforts within the context of accomplishing organization, unit, division and department objectives.  With this access, senor leaders, managers, and supervisors should encourage open dialogue on not only the importance of the job, but how an employee’s job performance can improve at the individual level and mapping the linkage to organizational performance. 

2.  Provide informal and formal feedback outside of performance appraisal interviews.  As I persistently state within blogs, lectures, round tables, etc. is that performance discussions should not be limited to appraisal feedback sessions.  When you, as a leader, take the time to discuss employees’ performance in settings outside of performance appraisal review sessions and interviews, you are increasing trust-building and decreasing the impact of perceived organizational politics.  

3.  Discuss importance of job performance, teamwork, and feedback as it relates to desired OCB.  Integrate what your organization stands for as often as possible.  Your goal is to impact the subconscious work efforts of employees to align their behavior with organizational goals – that is always the number one objective.  Once your employees understand how their work behavior/performance outcome contributes to the organization’s ability to accomplish its objective, you have again decreased ambiguity and set a clear standard of performance. 

In the end, you, as a leader, must exercise the behavior and activities associated with transformational leadership during difficult times.  These are difficult times at some level and through your consideration of employees’ perceptions, beliefs, and attitudes as it relates to their job, job performance, job accomplishment, and job security, you will go a long way in enhancing organizational performance through increased productivity  and morale while at the same time create an atmosphere conducive to feedback, information sharing, and building trust.

If one thing that both our current events and socioconomic conditions has taught us is that for all our contingency planning, we are normally only prepared for high probability, high impact scenarios.  Who could have predicted the economic downturn and the severe loss of jobs that we began to experience as early as 2007? 

But the bigger question is how prepared were you and your organization for the conditions we now find ourselves faced?  Many reacted fairly quickly through various tactics that included hiring “freezes”, carefully orchestrated down-sizing, furloughs, etc.   Perhaps the biggest lesson we learned as HR business professionals is that we are not immune to ensuring we have an effective, proactive risk management plan in place to decrease the impact of the unknown, while also ensuring we are prepared for events that have a high probability of occurring.  I am not going to get into probability or statistics, but the point is this: We must ensure that our HR risk management planning and implementation processes are vibrant and continuously adjusted minimizing the impact of unforeseen, high-risk, high-impact events.  Furthermore our HR risk management planning must effectively integrate with the overarching organizational risk management plan – a key component therein.

Yet risk management is not just for unforeseen ”disasters”, your risk management plan should also incorporate the optimistic – it is often the optimistic, macro events that leave your organization exposed – causing lost opportunities, decreased market share, or customer turnover.  Furthermore, we as HR business professionals must ensure that our risk management plan compliments our organizational threats and opportunities and not the reverse.  Here are some examples for you to consider – remember our task is to think (and act on) of the human capital-human resource impact from an organizational strategic perspective. 

1.  Impact of increased demand: Is your organization poised for an increase in demand or are all your plans considering a flat-line/zero-growth scenario forecast for the next few years?  How will your organization respond to additional manpower required to respond to increased demand?  Is the workforce trained and equipped to handle additional demand?   

2.  Impact of emergent competitor cutting into market share:  A hidden competitor emerges quickly with a product that has increased functionality or a well-rounded, responsive service offering.  You and your organization must respond.  From a human capital-workforce planning perspective what plan do you have in place?

3.  Business organization decides to divest or invest business unit/line of business:  Senior leadership is continuously asking (whether you are in the room or not): “Is this the business we should be in?” Or, “Is this a business we should consider?”  What is your plan for both scenarios?  What are the costs, change management, risk of failure for a proposed merger?  What is the downside and upside of executing a divestment/exit plan?   

4.  Brand Introduction/New Product Development (Early Green light):  There are times when acceleration of a product or a service offering/introduction may be required (See Point #2).   What contingencies does your strategic human capital-human resource risk management plan have in place for such a scenario?  We all know the reasons for accelerated introduction, but how many of us are really prepared?  Some questions to ask in formulating your HR risk management plan: Do we have the required skills on-hand (skill-set inventory)?  What changes/updates must be made within our recruiting efforts?  Is the workforce training and development plans sufficiently developed to ensure that the workforce within the line functions can support early introduction of the product/service offering?

5.  Increased/Decreased footprint in overseas/global market.  The joint venture migration is ahead of schedule, or on a not so optimistic note, there is a need to exit a market sooner than expected.  Have you engaged and developed an exit strategy that meets the organization’s accelerated growth plan or exit strategy?  Every time I think of this detail, I think back to Mr. T in Rocky 3 when he was asked what his back-up plan for beating Rocky was.  Mr. T famously replied, “Don’t need one.”  However, you do.  Ensure that you have considered and developed a plan for an increased or decreased presence in overseas/global markets.

These are just some of the business scenarios you should be thinking about when developing your HR risk management plan.  See, it’s easy to develop for contingencies when your contingencies fit in a neat box during a planned meeting that looks for highly probable-high impact scenarios.  But one thing our current business environment has taught us is that the only predictable event is the one for which we did not plan. 

Finally be strategic about your risk planning.  Ensure that your risk management plan has a top-down perspective and is not developed with what you hope happens or can best plan for from a functional perspective.  In other words, ensure that it aligns, but takes into consideration, that which is unseen/not forecast, or detours your organization for better or worse.  Your risk management plan should be proactive, supplement the organization’s risk management plan (supplementing line risk management planning where appropriate), and rigorously consider impact (both positive and negative).

When respected and known HR consultant/blogger/speaker, Jon Ingham recently wrote about the “Future of HR (more proactive support function or real driver of competitive advantage)” in his HCM blog, I immediately thought to myself – Jon makes some good points – very good points.  However (not but) there are some things that HR is doing right (Note: Jon’s argument is not about what we are doing “wrong” or “right” as you will see, but instead formulates an argument of the (or what) role HR must play and how it must contribute to competitive advantage to be viewed as a key business “player” within organizations – thus my post is more of an inspiration vice a rebuttal).

In addition to what we are getting right, there are businesses that KNOW that a key differentiator from a good business (or a business at all) to a great business is to recognize, embrace, and implement key effective HR practices – that directly contribute to the bottom line.

Furthermore, businesses both large and small, make it point to focus on the bottom-line contributions that HR brings.  HR Magazine (September 2006) states that “Small businesses that invest in formal employee selection, management and retention strategies see direct, quantifiable results on the bottom line.” This insightful article concludes with a powerful quote by Christopher Collins, associate professor at Cornell University and conductor of the study: “. . . we’ve proven that specific human resources strategies have a meaningful, and statistically significant impact on small business financial performance.”

One of my favorite works, “The HR Scorecard” (Becker, Huselid, Ulrich) – the almost timeless classic – unearth findings still relevant today, seven years after its publication.  This formal study provided a framework for companies to implement bottom line HR strategies by highlighting the studied companies financial performance (those that got it right and those that didn’t), making the case for implementing the right mix and relevant HR strategies, which have proven to play an invaluable role in their financial success. Continue reading »

This is a post that I struggled to write because it brings to task, so to speak, us as HR professionals.  However, at the same time, I feel a great need to share with you my thoughts on how we can actually seize and demonstrate value during this challenging economic cycle. Let me put it simple: This is a rare opportunity for HR, across the board, to add significant value and change the perception of our profession as a CRITICAL value-added function in the organization. In writing this, I thought about the ground-breaking work conducted by Brian Becker, Mark Huselid, and Dave Ulrich in their landmark work ‘The HR Scorecard”.  One of their observations is that HRM either adds value or does not (reference pg. 38, HR Scorecard). 

Any middle-ground has no significant impact.  Many of us can personally attest to this research in the real world as  organizations either put the thumb on us as merely daily tacticians or those that let us flourish.  Here is a time for us to flourish. Before revealing the Five Activities that we, as HR professionals, should be considering-undertaking, I want to share this observation:  A serious lack of judgment, conscious or not, is occurring each and every day amongst us as HR professionals that has potential dire consequences (or at least significant) to our organizations, which can set-up our organizations (and ourselves) up for failure – in some areas. As reported in the January issues of HRMag, EEOC complaints are up, training budgets are down, and complaints will be thrown our way from every angle from recruiting to talent management to outplacement and employee assistance.  Continue reading »

In the midst of a crazy and eventful day, I reflected on my Grandmother and her lessons of life.  My reflection was brought upon by the fact that she is coming toward the end of a long and eventful existence on this earth, and assuming I out live her (she is a fighter and very strong), I am gong to miss her.  But my feelings are not of sadness, but more of gratitude and thanks for I am fortunate to have had such a wonderful lady in my life.

In reflecting, I thought about some of her advice to me while growing up and it’s applicable to all HR professionals (my opinion).  Here it goes (Note: My Grandmother grew up in the country.  Her advice is based on lessons handed down.  Her quotes below are not edited for grammar – but presented as exactly as she said them to me – ain’t that nice):

*”Whenever you deal with a person, let them know what you are thinking!”: How many times are we reminded that feedback is important throughout an organization as well as on a professional-personal level.  Rather undertaken a change management initiative, or communicating to one of our employees – don’t leave people guessing about where they stand.  Be honest, truthful, and professional when providing feedback during a performance appraisal review.  Ensure that the organization knows how HR measures up against strategic goals and your developed metrics-measures; communicate the reasons why the organization is undertaking the IT/HCM initiative, and relay the actions being taken to help reduce workplace mishaps.

*If you have an obligation – meet your obligation.  If you can’t, tell em’ why, and say when you can!”  As HR/business professionals, no one is immune from having competing tasks.  But there is a problem among some HR/business professionals that management will somehow figure it out.  Or there is that person waiting to find out the details of a benefit waiting on your advice and expertise, so they can make an important decision.  If you’re lucky, you can get buy with an explanation.  That’s if you’re lucky.  The bottom-line: If you have competing priorities that will force you to delay a prior commitment/obligation, don’t assume that someone can read your mind.

*”Sometimes you get what you pay for.  Sometimes you get more and there will be times you get less!“  This is one of her axioms that I think about often.  How many occasions have we selected or recommended a vendor with the utmost confidence that they will deliver only to fall short of project-program requirements – one instance happened just recently in an organization that I am very familiar with.  This particular vendor promised the world, drew up a compelling RFP, was awarded the bid – just to fall short.  The result: The approval for the replacement vendor moved up to the next level in this organization.  Losing the confidence of senior leadership doesn’t have to happen, if you ethically and accurately communicate on what you can deliver and meet the specifications (exceed if possible) of your client.

*You can’t force the fit -umph, don’t even try!“  Undoubtedly true and one of my favorites.  This applies to so many areas, but one area that stands out is in our recruiting/job analysis-staffing roles.  Rather you are using a competency based or traditional job analysis – another post on that all together – we lead our organizations in this process because we are there to ensure that when it comes to staff-placing a person to the requirement that the “right fit” at the “right price” at the “right time” applies in practice.  This mindset in which we enter this important function is known by most HR professionals that have been around a while; however, in execution, we are often spend too much time thinking trying to fit a “square peg into a round hole.”  Then there are the department/organizational transfers that we try to force, only to set-up the prospective incumbent in our organizations up for failure (or at a minimum disappointment).  Having conducted many job-analysis in my professional career, we undertake this arduous and sometimes complicated process, as an example, to increases our chances of ensuring the right fit.  In essence, we are tasked to ensure HR processes fit the strategic organizational goals and objectives.

*”The truth is always the best way to go!“  My grandmother drilled this into my head on a persistent basis.  However, many get into the habit of stretching the truth.  “Yes, we can meet the deadline;” or “Yes, we did a thorough investigation and the report will show that.”  Only for our fellow professionals to experience a missed deadline has past, or for the safety committee to review a report that was not well thought out or thorough as stated.  It happens at the senior levels of the organization and it has happened recently (there is no need to revisit Enron, we can observe companies/individuals today misstating income, or committing painstaking fraud on behalf of other individuals, such as the case with Bernard Madoff.)  Many view untruths by walking the thin line that often occurs between what is legal and what is ethical.  Only to present a less than truthful opinion or less than accurate account – wrong road to follow.

In the end, “real world” suggests that not all of my Grandmother’s advice is applicable. But her advice is at the least concrete.  It’s not “pie in the sky” talk nor is it theoretically based on research without implementation.  At a minimum, it is practical and sound – and can be applied today – right now from where you sit.

I love you Grandmother – thanks for giving me advice I can use!

It’s raining outside and you walk into the main entrance of your office and the demands start:

“Phyllis, I need an updated candidate profile for Operations Manager, like yesterday!”

“I need you to explain to me why you need $80K more this year than you needed last year.”

“The consulting company called, they need to know the status of the RFP they submitted!”

You settle into your office, grab the first cup of coffee and here it comes:
“Staff meeting.  I know it’s not scheduled, but see you in five!”

That the life of a busy professional and a high-speed-low drag world of HR.  Senior leaders often want us to pull back only to put us right back into the tactical world of unscheduled activities and unplanned events.  What do you do?!

There is always simplicity in a world of confusion.

When you have a moment, go back and review the business and project plans (assuming they apply to you) to find out just what is your role in accomplishing those “strategic objectives.”  Ask yourself the question, “What is the best use of my time?”  Afterwords, update your schedule and events to ensure that the high priority objectives don’t get lost in a world of confusion (or tactics).

Next, think about this (and we don’t do this often enough): What can be done without me or who can do as good as a job (if not better) for tactical tasks that pull me away from strategic planning – yes, I am suggesting team play.  Is there a HighPos in your department?  Is there an Intern available?  Is there someone who has that “fire in their belly” and is just longing for a chance to be called?”  There is.  Find that person and put him/her front and center.

Here is where it gets really good (and fun) if you just try it:  Remember the phrase you learned in college or grad school, “Management by Walking Around.”  That’s right!  Walk around and get the vibe of the workforce.  Find out what’s on employees’ mind.  Don’t be shocked if you have to pick some people off the floor if your department is known for, “When something bad happens, there is HR.”  Have fun.  But here is the assignment: Talk about the goals of the organization.  Get a gut feel.  Draw into a conversation.  Find out how they feel about the current macro and micro economic environments and how it is impacting their work.  Are they optimistic?  Are they fearful?  How does it impact what you do?  Seek out your peers as well.  Talk to a line manager and get a feel of what’s going on in their department.  You are HR and you provide a valuable role.  Go over a piece of equipment and how it works.  Observe risks in the manager’s world that you can talk about.  Discuss high performers and problem employees – in a generic sense.  Now after you pick that person off the floor, go back to your office, reflect, and write down some observations.

You will probably note that some things need to be readjusted, but most importantly, you will be refreshed on why you are where you are – the prized and important HR professional.  If all goes well, you have accomplished the following:

a.  Taken a step back to see how your role fits into the organization;

b.  Shown a commitment to learn more about what’s on the mind of employees and your professional peers;

c.  Talked about where the organization is going and observe how your “change agent” role can benefit the organization;

d.  Become flooded with a host of ideas and thoughts that tie into every major component of your job (yes, even if you are a specialized professional) that will help you refine your work activities – not put more on your plate.

Whenever I have the pleasure of working at the senior or mid level at an organization, I am always pleased by how refreshed and rejunivated about what my role and goals for the organization are.  Every single person in the organization is important (or should be).  Their jobs/careers play a role in what the organization accomplishes and how it is accomplished.  Your role is to facilitate the “people” side of the equation to help your organization and its employees meet their goals and objectives.  But just as important, get something done.  Don’t leave a bunch of untidy projects and tasks and go to the quarterly meeting with nothing done.  Get er’ done and make it happen.  Now doesn’t it feel great!