Category: Human Resources

How concerned are you about employee retention? If you are a HR pro, you should always be concerned about the retention of your high performing employees. And if you have allowed the job market of the past two years to sway your focus on this, then you might expect some trouble ahead. According to a recent survey conducted by Kelton Research, The Cornerstone OnDemand “Employee Attitude Survey”, you may not be alone. The survey reveals a look at the perceptions employees currently have about their workplace. If we were to use the survey as a scorecard, then we would see that many organizations are failing in some very critical retention areas. Using the familiar grading scale of where a 70% get you a C, let’s take a look at the areas with a failing grade.

			GRADE
Showing appreciation	54% say their colleagues show them appreciation	Only 30% say their managers; 16% say executives	F
Receiving Feedback on Performance	58% say NO	71% say “they haven’t gotten any reaction from their supervisors in the last six months.”	F
Establish Career Goals with Employees	82% say during the past six months that they haven’t		F
Show alignment with company goals and objectives	53% say they don’t have a clear understanding of how their role fits within the organization		F

Study after study continues to a direct link to these behaviors and the retention of talented employees. Despite the research, many company leaders seem baffled by the retention dilemma that is projected to get tougher on companies as the job market shifts and opportunities for top talent increase.

How would you rate your company and yourself on these critical retention driver? By the way, many of them are a lot more cost effective than expensive reward and incentive programs.

Your comments are always welcomed and encouraged!

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For more resources, See the Human Resources library.

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Sheri Mazurek is a training and human resource professional with over 16 years of management experience, and is skilled in all areas of employee management and human resource functions, with a specialty in learning and development. She is currently employed as the Human Resource Manager at EmployeeScreenIQ, a global leader in pre-employment background screening. Follow her on twitter @sherimaz!

An article in The Wall Street Journal* suggested that while team building exercises may be fun (for some people), they really don’t do much to solve workplace issues.

For example, sales executive Paul Garvey claimed that the most insightful team-building exercise he ever participated in involved paintball, which in no way helped to resolve the relationship issues back at the office. Speaking of his former company, he said that colleagues would poach each other’s deals while their manager played favourites. Someone decided a paintball exercise would help. It didn’t, and merely reinforced the divisions and favouritism already present.

Another instance of completely inappropriate team building involved the team from a contractor on an Apollo space project. They were asked by their HR department to participate in a role-playing exercise where they had to return safely from the North Pole. Their day-to-day job involved helping astronauts return safely from space. What additional insights into teamwork did HR think this role play could teach them? Continue reading “Does “team building” actually work?”

Most employees in companies today are all too familiar with the concept of the performance review. Just the mention of this often dreaded occurrence of discussion with one’s supervisor where they get to critique every move you’ve made during the year while you sit ideally by is sure to send negative feelings throughout the mind’s of employees everywhere. The performance review generally has a similar effect on managers and supervisors as well. So why is this performance review so dreaded and loathed by many?

A few of the reasons are listed below.

Employees:	Managers:
They have no control in the situation. Managers get to provide ratings and comments on multiple areas of performance that are most often subjective in nature. If an employee disagrees, they might get a small “employee comments” area to provide their rebuttal all the while knowing that if they push too much the person controlling their future still has control.	Managers often dread the discussion of the employee performance review assuming the discussion will turn into a battle with the manager left to convince the employee that their ratings are accurate. Managers usually assume employees think they perform better than they actually do.
Reviews sheets are completed before the actual discussion occurs. Therefore bringing up comments has little effect on the actual rating which is most often tied to their annual increase which is usually only a few cents different from the person with the next highest or lowest rating.	Managers are busy with tasks and goals of their own . Taking the time to thoroughly review a whole year’s worth of performance is time consuming. They often rush through the forms because the HR department has a deadline they are struggling to meet?
Employees are often forced to write a self evaluation prior to the meeting as well. Unfortunately, these usually only serve as annoyance to employees because the majority of the time it is ignored by the supervisor any way.	The forms are too complicated, long, short or don’t cover what is really important to success in this department.

So, what’s the answer to overcoming the negativity around the performance appraisal? Here’s a few tips to get you started:

1. Set clear expectations. Provide them on the first day of employment.
2. Provide feedback all year. Create a culture where performance discussions are a regular part of the work day and review meetings are held at frequent intervals such as montly.
3. Ask first, tell later. Begin a performance discussion by asking the employee to rate their performance. Have them provide examples of where they have met and exceeded the expectations.
4. Do not complete the form until you have the discussions. Do monitor performance all year and have examples ready to discuss.
5. Guarantee no surprises at the annual meeting. If you are waiting for annual meeting to discuss performance, you lost your chance to be effective.

How does your company handle the performance review? Why do you hate it?

Your thoughts and questions are always welcomed and encouraged!

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For more resources, See the Human Resources library.

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Sheri Mazurek is a training and human resource professional with over 16 years of management experience, and is skilled in all areas of employee management and human resource functions, with a specialty in learning and development. She is currently employed as the Human Resource Manager at EmployeeScreenIQ, a global leader in pre-employment background screening. Follow her on twitter @sherimaz!

When I went back to college to get my BS and MS degrees, I was looking for something I would fit into. I choose psychology with a concentration on behavioral analysis. Then I was looking into MS programs, and social work seemed to be calling my name then I remembered a course in I/O Psych that I loved, so I talked to the professor of that class and fate fell into my lap, I was hooked on Training and Development and Performance Improvement.

The reason I love T/D and HPT are that we as professionals are helping improve performance, business prospects, the bottom line and most importantly and the marriage between behavioral psychology and HPT / T/D because when it comes right down to it, the changes and trainings we develop and deliver are basically behavioral changes. Even when there are environmental changes being made or the plant is being more ergonomically feasible and effective, there are behavioral changes taking place such as a behavior to do things differently and adjusting ones thought processes or even priorities are behavioral in nature.

I strongly urge people in the HPT and TD profession to examine behavioral psychology theories to help develop programs that are more effective and address the problems with personnel behaviors. I think that putting some behavioral psych techniques into our classroom trainings and change management programs will in the short and long terms improve performance and make the ROI of our programs improve.

This is just food for thought let me know what your thoughts and anything topics you’d like to have covered here.

Happy training and enjoy your summer…

Leigh

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For more resources about training, see the Training library.

– Looking for an expert in training and development or human performance technology?
– Contact me: Leigh Dudley (Sassenach Training Services)  – Linkedin – 248-349-2881 or 248-277-2966
– Read my blog: Training and Development

One of my favorite reads is the Fistful of Talent blog. The blog hosts a number of talented HR folks who focus on moving the profession forward. The perspective of this group is fresh and I highly recommend adding this to your reader.

In a recent article posted on the blog, author Tim Sackett discusses the workforce readiness of college grads (or should I say the lack of). He further provides insight on how the parenting of these graduates fails to prepare them for the skills needed to be successful in the workplace. His list is right on the mark and I encourage you to review it here

So, what do we do if we find one these ill prepared college grads on our work team? For many of us, we continue the training of the workforce just like the well-meaning parents did before us.

1. Problem solving: “I don’t know what to do, I am going to have my manager handle this.” Managers if you are always solving the problems, you are doing nothing for the development of your team or for yourself. If you have time to solve all the problems, them keep solving them!
2. Collaboration: Do any of you have “chain of command” rules in your organization? Or do you find yourself saying, “Next time, you need to ask me.”
3. Agility/Adaptability: Anyone use those checklists with time frames for each and every task that is completed during the day?
4. Entrepreneurialism: Do you employees know how their work contributes to the bottom line? Do they know what factors control the department budget? Do they know you have a department budget? Have you ever asked for input in the budget?
5. Oral and Written Communication: What are your doing with your poor communicators. Do you just keep them away from clients/customers and find them a job that doesn’t require much. Are you modeling solid communication skills?
6. Accessing and Analyzing information: If you are always solving their problems and giving them the answers, how will they develop these skills?
7. Curiosity and Imagination: This is probably the most stifled skill of all. Our employees can’t think on their own. “We do things this way because it works or because that is how we have always done it this way.” Have you ever heard the saying, “keep doing what you’ve always done and you’ll get what you always get?”

If you want to succeed in business, your people have to succeed. Develop their skills and keep them engaged. That just makes good business sense. And remember, like parenting, management isn’t for cowards!

As always, your comments are encouraged.

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For more resources, See the Human Resources library.

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You can also follow me on twitter @Sherimaz

Take a peek around your office, who’s got bags under their eyes? A recent poll revealed that lack of sleep is the biggest health concern for 42% of the population, with another 34% experiencing low-level general fatigue.

Our relationship to tiredness is paradoxical, a source of shame, indicating our inability to cope; but also a badge of honour, signifying the importance of our work, for some its become an ‘affordable’ status symbol.

In reality tiredness leads to irritability, either bad decision making or worse, procrastination, poor concentration and reduced creativity. Fatigue also reduces our immunity leading very quickly to ill health. Continue reading “Sick and tired – two ways to reduce short-term sickness”

A recent survey, Mercer’s 2010 Attraction and Retention Survey (as cited on clomedia.com) indicates that 27% of companies are planning to expand their workforce, which is up from 12% in 2009. As more and more companies begin hiring in higher numbers, the fear of losing high performing talent increases for many. If you have that fear, please see the below list of things that will drive your high performing employees to seek other opportunities.

1. Fail to provide them with development opportunities
2. Question everything they do
3. Micro manage their work
4. Fail to let them take ownership of their work
5. Fail to provide challenging work
6. Fail to address performance issues of others
7. Fail to provide them with performance feedback
8. Fail to consider their insight or fail to even ask
9. Ignore their suggestions
10. Fail to discuss their goals

What else can you add to the list? Your comments and questions are always encouraged!

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For more resources, See the Human Resources library.

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So far this year I’ve spent more hours than I care to remember trying to calm the nerves of fraught conference organisers. Often days before the event has even started.

The other day I spent the afternoon on the set of a live TV show. With just two hours to air the production team managed to deal with numerous unforeseen crises calmly and confidently.

Much has been written about stress and its impact on individuals but this afternoon’s experience got me thinking about team stress.

It’s surprising how often we allow anxiety to build from within our teams, limiting productivity, stifling creativity and eradicating the fun from work.

The TV production team demonstrated excellent performance under pressure by following these 5 simple rules: Continue reading “5 Tips to help teams perform under pressure”