Does Your Recruitment Process Suck?

It's nice to see the UK job market improving - many of my friends who have been 'on sabbatical' for a year or so are now finding their way back into permanent employment, but some of the stories they tell about recruitment processes make me want to cry.

Most popular experience - submitting an application, following up and then hearing nothing back. Nada. Not so much as a short 'You're rubbish and we don't like the font you used' email.

In second place - having a face to face interview (in person or on Skype) and hearing nothing back. Given that at this point they have typically met some of the people from the company too - the offence and level of rudeness is even more exaggerated.

Third on the list - repeated contact telling people to 'just wait' while decisions are made, other candidates are interviewed or organisation changes are taking place. In other words, "Our time is valuable, yours isn't, we're trying to find someone better, but if we don't we might just hire you."

I could carry on with these - from systems that eliminate candidates who don't enter their expected salary in the right ballpark, to skills not counting if they have been learned in other industries (I especially enjoyed the tale of a large financial institution looking for a full time employee engagement and culture specialist insisting that they would only interview candidates from other banks......)

Ask yourself one question. What impression of these companies are people left with? What do you think they tell their friends? How likely is it that their brand will be improved from these interactions? 

Then there's the personal level. In several of the cases above, job offers were eventually extended. How valued would you feel as an employee walking through the door on day one after having been treated this way (if indeed the offer was accepted)?

Contrast this to a conversation I had a few weeks ago on a flight back from Barcelona. 

Several members of the executive team of a very well known global sportswear company were sat around me, and I got talking to their new head of UK Sales & Marketing. He was four weeks into the role - and still in 'training'.

During the recruitment process he had interviewed with a number of people from the company. Finally he sat down with the Managing Director for a discussion. 

Within 24 hours he was offered the job.

Despite all the efforts of his previous employer to retain him, he chose to move on. And why wouldn't he? They wanted him NOW. Here was a company that felt confident enough in his abilities to extend an immediate offer. 

A company that made fast decisions, that was passionate about their products, and finding the right people. Above all else, one where taking this 'risk' was acceptable, and where it was part of the company culture to be enthusiastic and passionate about everything - including recruitment.

The passion for his new employer, their product and ethos was palpable. It rubbed off on me, and although my family have all been big fans for years, we've spent some money since on refreshing our supply......

I spent some time with Zappos a few years ago. Early on, the HR team realised that recruitment was not all about finding the right people for the company - it was also about leaving those 'rejected' from the process with a good feeling about Zappos. So they started to recommend other companies that may be a better  'fit' to candidates that didn't quite make it - using experience and a library of culture data.

The company 'powered by service' extends that to everyone that touches them. Because it's good for business, and it's a nice thing to do. 

So why not take some time today to review how well you do with the 'recruitment experience' in your company? You may not feel it's worth the effort to treat people well - but can you really afford not to in this age of social media and brand awareness?

What does your recruitment process say about you as a company?

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Nanny State Culture and Halal Meat

Culture is my thing, I love working with people on their engagement strategies, I love making companies better places to be. I try and avoid strong opinion and controversy, but embrace crucial conversations - which is why I'm a little worried about publishing this blog.

Last week I was talking with David D'Souza about his blog "The Sexy Women of HR" and some of the trouble it caused. I enjoyed it, it made me laugh - and I didn't take it too seriously - ultimately it started a great debate which is always healthy.

But I wouldn't be brave enough to have written it.

However, two things just pushed me over the edge. Firstly, I was astonished to hear the leader of our political opposition talking about banning the displays of sweets at supermarket checkouts, and making that a major policy should they reach government after the next election.

Really? Is there nothing better the government of the sixth largest economy of the world could be doing?

He claims it's to help obesity rates decline, especially with regards to children. But I have an alternative policy - trust people to say 'no' to their children and make up their own minds.

I have a fundamental belief that it's my choice to resist (or give into) temptation, and it's certainly not the place of the government to dictate the positioning of goods in a supermarket. Weird I know, freedom of choice......it will never catch on.

If the opposition wants a controversial policy about obesity, how about giving the UK population five years to change before introducing a 'no free healthcare' policy for the clinically obese. 

That should make people a lot healthier, reduce food consumption and reduce health expenditure - and it's easy to measure (may improve our chances in the Olympics too). That beats moving the chocolate a few feet away from the checkout.....

Then today I find that much of the supermarket meat sold in the UK is Halal, and the companies involved haven't thought to mention it. Stunning.

Cards on the table here - as a family we buy most of our meat from the butcher, we keep chickens that I kill and eat on occasion, and I'm a very imperfect Christian (aren't we all).

But this Halal debate makes me angry. 

Do I object to an Islamic blessing being said over an animal as it dies ("In the name of Allah, who is the greatest")? A little bit, but maybe I should take more offence -  there are plenty of scripture interpretations out on the web that say I should.

But personally I take this verse from the Bible as the final word... 

"It's not what goes into your mouth that defiles you; you are defiled by the words that come out of your mouth...........Anything you eat passes through the stomach and then goes into the sewer. But the words you speak come from the heart - that's what defiles you" Matthew 15:10 & 15:17

Do I object to an animal having it's throat cut after being stunned unconscious? No - but that cannot happen with cattle, electro-stunning won't work and I do certainly object to a live, conscious animal having it's throat cut and dying slowly.

But what really makes me upset is that this activity has been kept from the consumer. You would imagine after the horse meat scandal last year, somebody might have thought honesty would be a good option.

Because it IS dishonest - everyone working in the food industry (at least those with any common sense) know that labelling meat Halal will affect sales - so it was deliberately left off the packaging. That's lying by omission, even if many don't care (or prefer not to know) about how their meat gets to the table.

It must increase the cost of our meat, it's certainly not the most efficient or fastest way to kill on the scale needed for modern appetites, and that means everyone is bearing a shared extra cost for the activity.

4.8% of the UK population is Muslim - and regardless of the 'secular' make up of our society, it  is wrong to make universal decisions based on a small minority. If 5% of your company wanted to start and finish work an hour early, I don't think that would change corporate policy.

But most of all I object to seeing any objection or debate about this practice being labelled as racist. Grammatically it is incorrect - Islam is a religion not a race, and ethically it is wrong.

Objecting to the way animals are slaughtered is not racist, or even Islamophobic - it's a matter of personal opinion.  

And the executives of the supermarket chains should hang their heads in shame for intentionally supporting the practice of concealment.  

So I leave you with this thought - what kind of culture are you condoning within your own organisation?

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Lego Movie Culture Lessons

I love Lego, so the fact that we enjoyed the movie so much was hardly a shock. Although one of the occupational hazards of working with organisational culture is looking at how things could be improved or replicated (even in fictional worlds)......

In the opening scene of the film we are introduced to the bad guy, Lord Business, who divides the all the Lego worlds and locks them away for eight and a half years.

President (Lord) Business wants to glue everything down, stop it moving, make it perfect and prevent changes and chaos. He even creates micro-managers and robots to help him restore order and process. 

He makes himself bigger before meetings, shouts a lot, doesn't listen, sends his chair kicking minion to terrorise the protagonists, and misunderstands things (especially new stuff he hasn't encountered before).

Then near the end of the movie, we see the the 'real world view' as Dad marches down into the basement to prevent his son playing with the perfect Lego models. He stops him creating new models, acting out new stories and building more fun. He wants his perfect models in their perfect dioramas to remain untouched and unchanged forever.

(I would add that I've come close to gluing some models together in the past, just to stop the kids breaking them. I received several jabs in the ribs from my Wife during the film).

What happens when Dad finally looks at the work he hasn't micromanaged? He sees some pretty impressive stuff - much more exciting than the original designs. 

____________________________

Hmmmmm

I've seen managers (and entire companies) with the same problems.

The bad guy eventually fails because of the overwhelming passion of the heroes to make things different. No amount of chair kicking, glue spraying, control freak megalomania stops the inevitable march of progress.

Sometimes we all need to face up to the fact that the people you manage (or parent in this case) know more than you do, and getting them engaged will create the innovation you need to succeed and grow.

In the real world Lego already know this - they set the gold standard for engagement with their Japanese partner CUUSOO (which charmingly translates to 'wish something into existence'). 

When enough people vote for a community model, then Lego make it. Add this to their incredible design and marketing team and you find huge levels of constructive competition keeping a largely unchanged concept from 1958 at the leading edge of the toy market.

So please, take some advice.

If you only do one thing today, then listen to someones idea. Listen properly. Don't interrupt, thank them when they're done, then engage in some dialogue with them about it.

Everyone at your company has good ideas. Some of them may improve process, some may lead to new products. One of them is likely to be the thing that sets you apart from your competition and lets you retire early.

It's a good idea to build an engaged, healthy culture in your company if you want to survive. Doing that starts with you, and it starts today.

PS Don't kick chairs around. This happens a lot in the movie, and a lot in real life too (trust me on this, I've seen it happen, and I've seen it many, many times in employee surveys). It makes you look like an ass and undermines your authority. If you have to throw your toys out of the pram to get your message across you need to work on your dialogue skills.

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Five Reasons Performance Management Processes Suck

OK - let me tone down that title a little. All performance management processes don't suck, but most do - if you don't believe me, just ask some of your employees.

Managing and improving performance is essentially about developing people - these are management and leadership skills that require continuous communication, coaching and feedback.

1

By creating a 'performance management' process (or worse an 'annual appraisal process') you are absolving management from a key part of their role. Essentially you are saying "Don't think too hard, we'll create a process that you can follow, and magical things will happen to performance when you're done"

2

No good ever came out of a performance management system. What did you personally get out of your last performance review? Do you think HR rigorously go through each one and develop organisational development plans? Was your last promotion based on your review? Do you believe that organisational decisions are made based on your review? How much time was spent on the process?  Did it help YOU at all?

3

The process actively discourages tough conversations. Many new managers learn to rely on reviews as a 'formal' methods of giving feedback - instead of learning to deal with issues head on as they happen, respectfully and constructively. It becomes easier to make a note and bring it up during the next review cycle. This helps nobody, and eventually leads to a form of 'incompetence paralysis' in any company.

Eventually this builds a culture where managers only share the review with the employee during the meeting, an evil bullying trick designed to put the recipient on the defensive.

4

Invariably, the more process that get's placed around performance, the closer you get to  the 'happy hippy' system - where everyone is doing just GREAT. I've worked with several companies recently who have less than 1% of their staff in the lowest bracket for overall performance.

Two points on solving this one - firstly don't put a forced ranking in place, that will cause more problems than it solves. You might as well just start beating your employees with sticks - it's kinder, and at least illustrates your intent in a more obvious way.

Secondly don't under any circumstances add a 'super duper brilliant' achievement level above your top ranking because too many people are getting 'excellent' in their reviews. 

(You may be laughing at that idea, but I've seen it done many times)

5

Reviews are individually subjective. If you have a personality clash with your manager, that is going to reflect in your review - in most cases, because nobody takes any notice of the results anyway, it won't matter. But it will make you feel unhappy, and if you decide to 'appeal', it will draw HR attention to the matter and use lots of time that could otherwise be constructively spent.  This works equally with the managers 'favourites' and is even more damaging. 

__________________

Want to measure how badly your systems suck? Try these three simple tests:

1

Check out the percentage of your managers who complete their reviews in the last 48 hours of the process window. Plot the number of completions per day on a chart and you'll see a pretty curve. The steeper the curve, the more the system sucks.

(If you're feeling a little more bold, you can also look at how many managers started their reviews AFTER getting the employees self appraisal........there is nothing wrong with making edits based on submissions, but waiting for it before you start is a bad sign.....)

2

Look at how the overall performance rankings spread out (across the whole company) - you should see a normal distribution curve, low at the bottom, low at the top, and high in the middle brackets. It's OK to see some positive leanings here - but you know you're in trouble if you see this:

3

Check out how closely aligned your rankings lie with other factors - such as quota achievement, employee attrition, high potential leadership programs, training completion and so on. You should see a close match, if not, then consider that an alarm bell.

__________________

If you've made it this far, then let me offer some advice on some stretch goals for handling this problem (I'll check back on progress in a year and hope you've done something about it - that's our next scheduled review)......

Get rid of the whole thing. Teach your managers to continuously communicate, educate them on how to have uncomfortable conversations (try "Crucial Conversations" - Patterson et al), promote a more open and constructive culture within your organisation. 

Lose the idea of annual merit increases. This is where the whole mess began - higher performance should absolutely be rewarded, but lumping everyone together in a monolithic process and adding 'other stuff' just screwed it up. Either determine increases on career service anniversaries, or deliver them every quarter to 25% of your employees. 

You may not think this will work, your sales may 'hockey stick' at the end of the year and provide funding, your budget process is annual, it's never been done that way etc. etc. But your employees will understand it, you'll find it easier to plan for, and your shareholders will respect the predictability of the expense.

Finally have employees rate their managers performance. 

Yes, you read that correctly - reverse the process. The best feedback a manager can get is from those who work for them - you may have to make the process anonymous at first, but it will develop and grow your leaders like nothing else. 

I am not advocating universal 360 degree assessments (they don't work organisation wide, though I'll bet you use them occasionally for with your high potential leaders). Try something like this instead.

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HR Hunger Games

I was lucky enough to participate in the HR Directors Business Summit in Birmingham earlier this week, and I had a great time learning from the many speakers and interacting with the delegates - if you didn't make it this year, here are a few of my takeaways from the event.....

Generalisations and prejudice are close cousins and should be avoided

It set my teeth on edge every time somebody introduced the idea of 'Millennial' behaviour, as +Mervyn Dinnen remarked during our HRD spotlight with +Perry Timms and Peter Reilly - if we all started making generalisations about women, black people, old people, gay people, muslims or disabled people we'd quite rightly be shouted off the stage - so why is it appropriate to group people into convenient age brackets for HR purposes?

This study is no doubt valid - but trying to fit my family into it would be impossible. My 'maturist' father couldn't care less about his car, sends emails and uses an iPad every day. I'm dead centre of 'Gen X'  and loathe online meetings, use my smartphone as much as my macbook and certainly don't demonstrate disloyalty to my employers. My eldest son 'Gen Z' prefers to use Minecraft and a desktop Mac to communicate with his friends and considers Facebook something 'old' people do. 

People are people. Trying to organise them into convenient groups is the equivalent of herding cats..........

Trust the professionals to do their job

I spent much of my career in the IT and data management world, and it never ceased to amaze me how often people would come and pass judgement on huge IT projects after completing their own home network installation, or first excel data macro.

The HR world is starting to see the same kind of influence occurring, and whilst external perspective is wonderful, and adding those external to HR can strengthen perspective - make sure you walk a mile in those shoes before passing judgement.

This was illustrated to me as my taxi driver took me to the station after the event - "Do you mind if I take a different route, it will save you time, but it will take us down the side streets" - I asked him if people ever refuse his advice...."more often than you think" was the answer.

There were the two hosts for our event. Juan Señor, the Emmy nominated journalist and TV presenter acted as master of ceremonies for the daytime events - and was completely captivating with both his stage presence and ability to summarise and question the keynote speakers. 

I was left however, with the unshakable conviction that the Hunger Games host Caesar Flickerman (played by Stanley Tucci in the movie) was wholly inspired by him. A fact pointed out to me during the second day by a friend who shall remain nameless.....(you know who you are)

During the awards ceremony in the evening, Jon Culshaw was not only master of ceremonies, but kept everyone engaged (and crying with laughter) as he impersonated everyone from Tony Blair to Les Dawson. Having Barak Obama read out the description of one of the HR awards will live with me for ever.

The fact is, if you want the best job done, hire a professional. You'll get better results, gain credibility and learn a great deal. 

Stop using dumb statements to describe people

Undoubtedly the worst phrase I heard during the event was "Human Resource Asset Philosophy" - I literally had to bite my hand to stop myself interrupting the speaker. Nobody likes being described as resource or an asset.

I'm not advocating a global shift towards "Chief People Officer" or "Personnel Director" - but talk about people as people. Never resources, assets, expenses or any other phrase which brings to mind a dehumanised automaton or a machine.

As Pierre Mille of Carlsberg remarked during his presentation "Last time I checked, people were not assets - they need love. Machines just need occasional maintenance"

If you don't have an engagement program in place you are being left behind

Employment engagement, retention and rewards had it's own track this year - but I heard about it in every session and within every keynote. Some selected quotes below:

"Leaders can be the biggest barriers to engagement and bringing yourself to work" Stephen Lehane, HR Director at Alliance Boots

"Engagement and simplicity are the two big issues"

Dr. Graeme Codrington, Futurist

"We have changed to a world of employee engagement" 

David Arkless, former President of Manpower Group

"Engagement success is directly responsible for higher sales, lower absences and greater mystery shopper scores"

Tanith Dodge, Director of HR at Marks & Spencer

"Engaged, enabled or energized - what level of engagement are your employees feeling?" Isabel Collins, Director of Culture & Engagement at Astellas

If you're not taking a long hard look at your own company through the lens of culture and employee engagement, you are ignoring a movement as significant as the introduction of the motor car and the retirement of the horse and cart. Take a look at the government backed Engage For Success movement website if you're looking for inspiration.

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It's Friday as I write this blog, so in honour of what I'm sure MUST be a Gen Y behaviour started by Micah Baldwin (oops, my bad - he was born in 1971) I would recommend you 'follow friday' #FF this group of experts and further your HR knowledge.....

@Fuchsia_Blue, @MervynDinnen, @PerryTimms, @OD_Optimist, @KingfisherCoach, @HR_Gem, @Katie_Jacobs, @HRZone, @cathyab, @jododds

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Bring Your Jelly Babies To Work

I'm a big fan of 'bringing yourself to work', and I always have been. I suspect it's because I'm too simple minded to try and have multiple personalities - but I've always figured that if people don't like or respect me for who I am then that's OK. No big deal. Better that than I become a pretend person for others.

As I collected my morning coffee from James this morning (7th customer of the day apparently) - he mentioned that I was the first person to say say 'good morning' to him. He must have seen me looking confused, because he went on to explain that those before me had replied "Toffee Nut Latte" or similar when he greeted them. Rude.

Then I got to thinking about the lady in Sainsbury's who waited until a customer had stopped talking on their phone before putting their shopping through, and how I felt the companies response (an apology) was wrong. Talking on the phone when someone else is talking to you? Rude.

And the poll from the Telegraph would indicate that 89% agree with me (unsurprisingly). I asked a few people in my local Sainsbury's about it - they were disgusted with their own executives that day.

Then there are the countless people I see on aircraft refusing to take their headphones off or make eye contact with the air crew serving them drinks and food, checking if they are OK, and generally caring for their passengers. How would you feel if you were talking to someone and they didn't make eye contact? No excuses. Rude.

I was brought up to treat others the way I want to be treated. It's not hard - and it makes sense. Sometimes I can take it to far I'll admit; last week on the train I had a bag of jelly babies and offered them around the carriage - either listening to the voice of my mum telling me to share or embracing my inner Doctor Who. You decide.

So when I start working with companies on their leadership, their company culture or their level of employee engagement I'm ever watchful for those that conceal themselves from their colleagues, manage their image upwards (and downwards) - and generally seem to focus too much of their time on trying to be someone else.

I've found that the people who do not fit their corporate cultures are often in this mould, and I've come to believe that it's a side effect of trying to be different people all the time. 

If you do that, then you are setting yourself up with different internal beliefs, and in turn that effects your behaviour. You'll never be truly comfortable, or fit in with the tribe at any company you work for because there's an internal level of indecision and discomfort that is holding you back - and others can sense it.

So bring your authentic self to work. It will make a difference.

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Everything I Do - I Do It For You......

Bryan Adams' "Everything I Do" was the first dance for my Wife and I as a married couple - and we still love it. It was nice to see it featured as the '#1 Power Ballad' on the TV at the weekend, and with 85 million views on YouTube it's clearly still popular.

Do you know the story of the song? I'll bet you don't. For those old enough to remember, it was the theme song to the 1991 movie "Robin Hood - Prince Of Thieves". 

Mr Adams was asked to write and perform the theme song, which he did - but when he presented it back to the film makers it was rejected. They wanted something full of harps and flutes - and didn't take kindly to his interpretation. But in true rockstar fashion he told them to stick with making films and leave him to the music - then refused to rewrite it.

That's why it doesn't feature in the film until half way through the end credits. 

It went on to spend 16 weeks at number 1 in the UK and sell over 1.5m copies, and became the biggest advertisement any movie had ever seen. Doh. 

But there's more.....when asked in 2002 by the singularly annoying Brian Conley if he now hated the song after all the popularity (and the ensuing negativity that seems to accompany all such success) he defended it passionately as being loved by the fans & loved by him.

So what's that got to do with culture? Many, many things.

1. Love what you do. It's important to be passionate about all things in life - including your professional life.

2. Listen to the experts. By all means have an opinion, but keep your ears open and hear what's being said.

3. Don't be negative about others and their achievements, it only makes you look stupid.

4. Don't ask people to do things that clearly don't fit their world view. Asking Bryan Adams to write a song with harps and flutes is like asking One Direction to cover Highway To Hell.

5. Embrace your inner rock star.

OK - kidding about the last one, but the rest are valid lessons.........now I'm off back to my vinyl collection and the wedding video.

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Five Easy Ways To Measure Employee Engagement - Right Now

I confess to being a data geek. Those who know me well often use more unkind words to describe that trait (you know who you are) - and I'm often surprised when people talk to me about measurement challenges and the astronomical amount money they are prepared to spend to solve the issue.

Fundamentally this challenge is about recognising the assets you already own - and too often the communications and HR groups I work with struggle with taking those assets and turning them into action.

So here's a quick guide for quick wins on data.

First - the ones everybody thinks of first, the active measurement techniques for engagement. Bluntly speaking this typically revolves around an employee survey being sent around the organisation - then presenting the results from the survey tool.

You know the ones I mean - if it's not four questions buried in the dreaded "98 Question Employee Opinion Survey" - it's a generic one asking such questions as "How would you best describe your level of interaction with your immediate manager/leader/annoying boss". 

Then the team responsible starts looking for ways to spin the data.

If you have 33 people that love their job, 33 that think it's OK, and 33 that hate it. You could say that two thirds of employees are happy in their job. Then you go on to group all the 'strongly agree' and 'agree' together for the next one to make things look better. ARGH!

If you're going to measure engagement with a questionnaire, then make sure you tailor it to your company, and focus on capturing the emotion of the participants. Set a target for participation and consider that to be your best measure of success - lack of response is an indicator that those being surveyed don't expect any action to be taken, and don't see the value in giving you their opinion.

But wait - that brings us to passive measurement - and that's a much more powerful tool, especially in the early stages of determining levels of engagement. You already know your participation statistics for other surveys you've completed over the years - so plot that on a chart and you'll get a rough engagement measure to start with, and it will even show you changes over time.

Read on, but beware, because we may get a little more geeky....here are just five (of many) common nuggets of engagement gold you already have in your systems....

1

Do you have performance management tools? Do you have an annual window of participation when managers have to complete them? Is there a 'free text' field along with the review. Great! You have a very powerful engagement statistic just waiting to be measured.

Who is more engaged? The manager who completes the review process in the first week of the window, or the one who completes on the last day. The manager who writes 500 words on the employee, or the one that writes 20? So get a report from whoever the administrator of the system is on manager, completion date and length of the text field. Then play about with both measures in excel and rank them. It's honestly not that hard.

2

Do you have an intranet? Does it have company information on there? Information about your board of directors? Products? Good news, that's another statistic for engagement just waiting to be tapped. Your IT folks can send you a report that shows you the number of hits on any specific pages that everyone in the org has recorded. If Mabel has 300 hits on the intranet a month, Geoffrey has 5 - who's more invested in learning about the company? 

Way to go Mabel - step up, you're taking the time to use the resources available. I know who I'd ask about what info employees need. Oh, and guess what - you know have another ranked list of engaged employees.

3

Compliance training system? Online education? Opt-in leadership development program? Who completes the required training after the first email? Who leaves it to the last minute? As long as you know when each email is sent you can see who responds - that helps with both communication strategy and determining engagement levels. 

Optional training is an even better measure. Take those that complete the training that you don't send reminders for and you can bet they are a darn sight more interested in the wellbeing of the company (and their own career) than those that don't. Another one to add to the  list.

4

How about a recognition system? Many companies have mechanisms where employees and managers can give a shout out for good work done by others in the organisation. Recording the recipients will show you who shines at making extra effort - but recording those that give rewards will show you who's spending their cycles being more engaged. Add them to your list.

5

And finally - if you're progressive enough to have some form of internal social media tool - maybe Chatter or Yammer - then you have a gold mine of information about activity and participation. Those that spend time sharing information, setting up groups and responding will add even further value to that list we've been creating - and the best news is that the system administrator can just push a button and send all the info you need straight to you.

WARNING

Trying to work out who is the most engaged person in your company is not a good idea. It won't be of ANY value and it's just creepy.

But looking at who scores highly in each of those categories will give you an idea of whether you're on the right track. I'd bet good money that if you have someone with high scores in each of those, you already know they're a good 'go to' person.

So what do you do with that list? Back to excel - and plug in your organisation report. The one you have with 'who manages who' and 'which division' and 'which country'.

Put a score next to each name from your list.

Now group up by country, division, or senior manager and take an average. You'll find you can find those hotbeds of engagement very easily - and once you really know where these groups are you can start work on finding out WHY they do so well.

But that's a subject for another blog.

Feel free to check out some of my reporting examples - for the most part drawn from already existing data and built for senior execs here. 

If you want some help dragging information from systems and making sense of it, just let me know - drop an email to mark.ellis@culturetransform.com and I'll respond. 

You CAN start to measure engagement already, without spending anything. Be brave!

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It's Time For HR To Bare It's Teeth

I've spent most of this week at the 2013 CIPD annual conference - and it's been a great experience, hearing and talking with those leading the HR field - both up on stage and in the world of Twitter and Blogs. 

How would I measure the success of such an event? No surprises, of course I focus on culture and engagement.....so how did it measure up?

Well the culture was fantastic, and just what you'd expect from a group of people committed to a career of making the lives of those in companies better (don't laugh, it's absolutely true - bad reputations often come from misunderstanding). I found everyone was open to new ideas and seeking new ways to improve the bottom lines at their companies. There was an open collaborative culture everywhere you looked.

Engagement - well, the halls were full, the stands were packed and the speakers got feedback (mostly positive, but no one was shy about disagreement) from those in the sessions and out in the twittersphere. Note to presenters - don't use "Gen Y" anymore - tech is changing too fast, and it's not applicable.

Better than that though, was the overwhelming momentum that was generated AFTER the event had finished for the day - heated conversations at dinner tables (and occasionally in bars) were joined by all as the topics of the day were bounced around. 

My favourite after conference debate concluded thus:

Stop asking to be at the executive table, and take the seat. Too many times (as Peter Cheese pointed out) HR talk about this and don't take action. If you're not already at the CEO meetings, here are some pointers:

1. Everybody listens to the head of sales, she brings a forecast of upcoming revenue, facts to back it up and everyone in the room relies on that income for their wages.

2. Everybody listens to the development head, he brings an update of how the products are performing, when the new ones are out, and how that's going to impact sales.

3. Everybody listens to the head of communications, she brings a communication plan that supports the sales of the current products, and the new ones about to release - and how that's going to impact sales.

4. Everybody listens to the legal head - he brings a report of the threats and opportunities to the safe running of the company, and how that's going to impact sales.

See the pattern? How do you impact sales?

If, and I mean if, your HR head is not a direct report to the CEO - then you have a problem. 

HR is not an overhead. I hear this too many times from the IT folks as well. HR is the custodian of the most valuable data about the most valuable (and typically most expensive) asset any company has.

HR owns the success and failure of all of the other departments, and should be measuring that. Companies live and die by the people who work there, not the product, or the service, or the sale. 

What does HR bring to the table? The most engaged people are those who bring the greatest sales, who develop the best products, who deliver the best soundbites to the press. 

They also provide the innovation and intrapreneurship for the company - every other head in the room is looking for that (they may think they know, but in my experience, the reality and the 'managed up' perception is rarely the same).

Sales teams with good culture fit make more money than those that don't. HR govern the interview process, and own that data. Compare your culture profiles to that of the highest achieving sales people and demonstrate the value (in the example below ALL the quota exceeders are solid culture fits).

High attrition is possibly the greatest cost to any company. HR knows where that voluntary attrition is happening across the whole company - the other heads only see their own issues - mitigating that risk is something that HR are not only the best qualified to do, they are the ONLY function with the appropriate skills.

I recently had a conversation with a friend at LinkedIn. "Who do you think knows more about what's happening in your company - HR or us?" they said. 

LinkedIn know who in your company are looking for jobs, who's engaged, who's leaving, where they are going, what they are posting, which groups they are in, who they are connected with - HR often don't take the time to even look at these facets. A good company with proper career management, high percentage of culture fit and great collaboration should know ALL of this.

The elephant in the room is that the HR team gets blamed for all the evils within a company, and rarely does anything to correct the perception. 200 people being laid off - instinctively the population believes that the names on the list were put there by HR. Often it's HR managing the process, delivering the news and dealing with the fallout - sadly, they can also take the blame.

No pay rise? It's HR again. Lack of development opportunity? Lack of promotion? Benefit cut? All HR. 

And yet it isn't - that the decision of the CEO and his team to build a better and stronger business, HR advises and implements. 

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So here's the thing. 

It's time for HR to bare it's teeth. You are the best qualified, most connected, most influential part of any business. You have the skills, the talent and the AUTHORITY to help deliver better business results throughout all functions

PROVE that you act on behalf of the business, whilst representing the voice of the employee. 

You KNOW how to strengthen and build a better culture, improve engagement, create better leaders and management, recruit and look after the wellbeing of the employee. You have the data to prove it and the motivation to do so.

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