Melina Murray

I loved this and had to re-post.

From Frank Roche at KnowHR, 65 Things I Believe About HR.

• I believe employees want to do a good job.
• I believe they were great when you hired them.
• I believe people do what they get rewarded to do.
• I believe in pay for performance.
• I believe a good manager can make up for a lot of crappy policies.
• I believe a great manager comes along only once in a while.
• I believe great managers should be paid at the 99th percentile.
• I believe crappy policies and crappy managers should be scrapped.
• I believe employees are productive at different times of the day.
• I believe there’s nothing wrong with overpaying people.
• I believe you can’t ask for commitment unless you give it first.
• I believe it’s important to have friends at work.
• I believe you should say hello to everyone every morning.
• I believe you should say goodnight when they leave.
• I believe people want to work with superstars.
• I believe there are more hidden superstars out there than we think there are.
• I believe in honest communications.
• I believe everyone has a hidden talent.
• I believe you should know the birthday of everyone who works with you.
• I believe you should celebrate your employees’ birthdays when they happen.
• I believe executives get isolated and lose track of what’s going on.
• I believe HR has a role in keeping executives grounded.
• I believe HR does its best when it has guts.
• I believe in the power of diversity of thought.
• I believe that none of us is as stupid as all of us when it comes to editing.
• I believe the way we do performance management is awful.
• I believe real performance management is about management, not about annual ratings.
• I believe in management by walking around.
• I believe HR shouldn’t make up silly names for managers, like “career coach.”
• I believe calling employees human capital is about to jump the shark.
• I believe HR shouldn’t practice psychology without a license.
• I believe behavioral-based interviewing is for the birds.
• I believe in asking candidates if they can do the job.
• I believe in asking employees to prove it.
• I believe forced rankings are…forced.
• I believe merit increases can never be performance differentiators the way we do it now.
• I believe people work for more than money.
• I believe managers are naive if they think people don’t work for money.
• I believe layoffs as an annual business strategy is doomed.
• I believe HR was asleep at the switch at some doomed financial services companies.
• I believe people will do a lot more when rules are eliminated.
• I believe we need more lawyers in HR and fewer lawyers telling HR what to do.
• I believe cynical HR people should get out of HR.
• I believe anyone who subscribes to Theory X should never be in HR.
• I believe HR attracts an inordinate number of people who used to be hall monitors.
• I believe HR would do well to work its way out of a job.
• I believe systems work in HR.
• I believe we have too many processes and not enough systems.
• I believe HR and managers need to listen more.
• I believe handwritten notes go farther than all the recognition programs combined.
• I believe travel incentive awards are really motivating.
• I believe teambuilding should be an everyday thing, not done at retreats.
• I believe HR forgot that being fair and treating everyone the same aren’t the same things.
• I believe HR should help managers manage.
• I believe managers can be trained.
• I believe not all managers should be managers.
• I believe in great benefits.
• I believe onsite dog walking and massage therapists are overrated.
• I believe in the company making money.
• I believe in HR helping employees understand how.
• I believe HR should stop buying HR software that never works right.
• I believe in great leaders.
• I believe in small gestures.
• I believe we work 11,250 days out of our 25,000 we get in a lifetime.
• I believe it’s HR’s job to make every one of those days the best they can.

That’s all. The more people who see this (and agree, of course) the better chance we have of workplaces that are worth 1/2 our lives.  It’s awesome and true and I love it.  Thanks Frank!

I am in the midst of recruiting multiple positions.  Yes, I know, an anomaly these days.  I sift through emails and resumes every day looking for key words, things that stand out, something that makes the person a potential fit for the job, then calling those potentials to discuss the position.

What I am finding is a great lack of preparation and attention to detail.  I KNOW there are thousands of people out there who really, really need a job.

But.

These are the things that drive me crazy. (any applicants reading, please take notes!)

Initial Email/Resume:

• Addressing the cover letter or email to a competitor.
• Sending me a Word doc with track changes still on and lots of edits.
• writing sentences in lower case without any punctuation making the entire document a run on sentence
• Forgetting to use spell check. (I make typos all the time, but keep my eye out for that little red line before hitting “send”)
• Using IM speak “can u call me”.

First Contact: Let me preface this by saying I almost always set up a call ahead of time. At least 24 hours.

• Not knowing what the company does.
• Not knowing the job description.
• Telling me you just want a job.
• Being unable to map your work history/experience to the position for which you are applying.  (I called you because I saw a potential correlation.  I certainly hope you thought about it before applying.)

I know it is hard for many people right now. I do.  But because there are so many people out there, those who put in the effort to understand the position/company, communicate effectively/professionally and are able to explain why they are a fit will stand out dramatically from the rest.

And, last, but not least…  Please spell my name right when you reply.  It is right there- in my signature and in my email address.

For those of you who don’t know Zappos, they are an online shoe/accessories store.  The beauty of Zappos is their open communication- public and private. The company is incredibly present on twitter, with the CEO frequently posting about the daily happenings at the company.

Today was a very sad day at Zappos…they had to lay off 8% of the company.  What makes Zappos stand out, though, is the degree of compassion, openness and communication they showed. Tony Hsieh (CEO) made public the email sent out to all employees regarding the lay off- why, how, what.

I don’t need to describe it.  You just need to read it.  Zappos Update

Oh- and just another note.  When you visit the main Zappos website, notice that the company notes one of its core values at the bottom, along with videos with employees.  A rare site indeed.

Thanks to HR Wench for posting this info!

http://www.votehour.org

“CEOs around the country have come together to encourage their employees to take an hour on November 4 and go vote.”

Are you encouraging your employees to take time off to vote tomorrow?

“In the last election, the #1 reason eligible voters didn’t vote was because they were “too busy.” – U.S. Census Bureau”

How is this for a layoff story?

The company is small and the layoff was minimal, so there was no official notice.  The week before the actual layoff, the employee, “Sam”, was talking with co-workers.  One co-worker mentioned they were surprised to be working on a new project with “XYZ Company”.  This was Sam’s client and through the conversation, Sam realized the project discussed was her project.  In asking questions, Sam discovered that not only had her manager told the co-worker they would be on the new project, the project database, accessible to all employees, had been updated with the same information.

After the meeting, Sam reviewed the database, concerned and confused.  All of Sam’s projects were highlighted and reassigned. Again, this information was available at any time to anyone in the company.

The next morning, Sam looked again, and the changes were gone. Her projects were back as her own.  In addition, her manager canceled their weekly meeting and refused to reschedule, staying out of the office for most of the week.

The day of the termination, Sam’s manager presented her with a Recognition Award for her work.  That afternoon, she was laid off. There was no severance agreement, no severance pay. Needless to say Sam left with a very negative feeling towards the company.

Combine that bad feeling with the fact her company, a services company, has no protection against employees taking clients.   They have nothing in writing that prohibits employees from retaining/using intellectual property (including client lists).

See a potential problem?

(note: Names were changed to protect confidentiality)