At about 2 PM Eastern on Tuesday, there was a great disturbance in The Recruiter Universe.
Did you feel it? Did it cause your recruiting efforts to come to a deafening halt? Across Facebook, Twitter, Slack, and Discord, a confirmation came: LinkedIn was down.
Not for a few minutes. No, the champion tool was down. And it wasn’t the first time, LinkedIn last experienced widespread issues in January last year, when users weren’t able to post to the service or make new connections.
Today’s outage affected the entire website, and it wasn’t loading for most users at all.
While the service, the all-powerful, all-knowing tool, did little to remedy the situation and offered a tongue-in-cheek explanation via Twitter.
While I watched those different feeds on Tuesday, I wondered: why do we all care so much about LinkedIn and LinkedIn Recruiter?
I think that for some it’s obviously their number one source of hire. There’s no shame in that. It’s a highly effective tool.
But with LinkedIn’s sinister easy-of-use, is it making us less effective recruiters?
Levy and LinkedIn
I remember a talk I gave back in 2016 shortly after Microsoft acquired LinkedIn. It was at the same conference that I met Matt Charney, Derek Zeller, Pete Radloff, and Steve Levy. These were my sourcing gods, and as I gave the talk, Charney asked if I thought anything would change to LinkedIn.
I was arrogant. I explained that LinkedIn would always be there for us to “freely” extract information because of the SEO and link building that had gone into the site. It was in the middle of the Q&A that Levy challenged the audience to “find one day a week that they sourced from a resource other than LinkedIn.”
Three things happened that day:
Levy subtly told me what I needed to do to be a better recruiter.
Levy subtly told the audience what they needed to do to be better recruiters.
Levy subtly coined the term “inmauling”.
For these and other reasons, I consider Levy a force of good and a hell of a mentor to the greater community. I digress.
Let’s come back to focus on the first two things that happened as they are one and the same and if anyone is following Levy’s advice then they did not freak out on Tuesday. Why didn’t they freak out?
Because they know more than one way to source and they also know that they can still use Google to extract relevant information from a downed LinkedIn.
Simple Boolean Search?
Do we make Boolean search too esoteric? Something like Moses carried down from Mt. Sinai?
Come on, please! But do we use AND, OR, and NOT outside of LinkedIn enough?
Or do we not use so-called advanced operators or Google Dorks to find what we are looking for?
Take for instance the site: operator. When LinkedIn went down this afternoon, I offered my compatriots a simple string to find email addresses on LinkedIn while LinkedIn was down using Google. Call it the power of indexing robots or well-contrived link building, but it works.
Using the site: operator, I was able to look only at results from LinkedIn. As you can see from the results, I was looking for profiles that had email addresses – specifically gmail.com addresses.
Think about how you could make this string find people with yahoo.com email addresses. That’s one part of what Levy was saying that August day.
Maybe we don’t need LinkedIn to find this contact information. Try the site: operator with Meetup.com or WordPress.com.
My Point Remains
There’s something that’s happening – like parts of the body collective of Recruiting is going soft or merely competing for the low-hanging fruit. It’s like we aren’t putting in the effort to really uncover talent because of the effectiveness of LinkedIn.
And that effectiveness is making us less effective.
When LinkedIn goes down, then we look to other networks. Shouldn’t we be looking all along at different networks?
Email marketing is one of the best ways to reach clients, but with so many different platforms available, it can be difficult to find one that meets your needs and budget. For that reason, we’ve compiled the following list.
MailChimp
The MailChimp email marketing platform was first launched in 2001. With the primary goal being to help businesses create email campaigns, build lists, and track data, it continues to be a popular option. Its user-friendly tools allow you to create newsletters and signup forms geared towards your target audience, or simply choose from the 100+ templates provided.
Any e-commerce business recognizes in order to be successful, it’s crucial to have a sales funnel. MailChimp offers both free and paid plans with the free plan allowing you to have up to 2,000 subscribers and send 12,000 emails every month.
Unlike other email services, there is no time limit on MailChimp’s free plan. As long as you don’t exceed 2,000 subscribers, there is no charge. Plus, this plan provides you with auto-responder tools, A/B testing, and analytic reports.
In regards to the paid plans, extra features include custom branding, additional testing options, and reports, unlimited monthly emails, branding, and support.
Gem
Gem is ideal for tracking candidate outreach from beginning to end. It gives you the ability to assess those funnel results at every touchpoint, empowering you to adjust in a way that strengthens your relationship with team members.
Conversely, you can create campaigns that focus on a broader audience base such as demographics, engage individuals based on specific talents, or anything in between. The Gem platform provides a way to centralize all your efforts in one place with its ability to integrate with various email and social media platforms.
Additionally, it offers a space where you can easily collaborate with your team, track their progress, and quickly compile all candidate information in lieu of updating a spreadsheet.
EngageBay
If you’re in search of a turn-key solution that addresses marketing, customer support, sales, and CRM software, check out EngageBay. The free version includes features like email marketing and sequences, landing pages, autoresponders, CRM, and support desk.
Paid versions offer advanced features which include push notifications, goal setting/tracking, phone support and array of testing options.
Overall, EngageBay’s all-in-one approach can help you find new leads, grab their attention, and keep them from finding your competition.
SendPulse
The SendPulse platform offers an easy-to-use drag and drop editor that makes it ideal for anyone, regardless of technical knowledge. In addition to the free plan, which allows unlimited monthly emails and up to 2,500 subscribers, other plan prices are calculated based on additional subscribers.
SendPulse allows you to market to your subscribers via SMS, emails, as well as through chatbots that easily integrate with social media platforms. Additionally, it’s unnecessary to integrate SendPulse with other email services as campaigns can be created directly from the dashboard using one of the multiple templates provided.
Another popular feature of SendPulse is the ease of which it integrates with various third-party platforms including Zapier, WordPress, GoToWebinar, CreateForm, Salesforce, Shopify, and more.
Further, if you want more tracking diversity, SendPulse has the ability to track metrics such as email open rate, click-through rate, device stats, and A/B testing. Also, because it works seamlessly across PCs, tablets, as well as Android and Apple devices, with just a few clicks you can send push notifications, text messages, or emails.
Drift
The Drift marketing platform makes it possible to connect with new leads quickly and coherently via website chat. What better way to engage potential clients than providing quick responses and making it possible for them to book meetings on the spot 24-hours a day.
While Drift is used by many major companies to boost revenue, it’s also beneficial in the recruiting industry. The advanced conversational AI technology is ideal for screening applicants as well as providing valuable information regarding available positions on a career page.
After all, isn’t growing your business all about building customer relationships?
There are 4 different plans available, ranging from a free option that enables you to schedule up to 150 sales touchpoints monthly, to the Enterprise version that includes multi-lingual chatbots and allows you to incorporate multiple brands.
Additionally, the data compiled will give you a better perspective into pertinent details such as website performance, where your most qualified leads come from, and what strategies are the most influential. With the Drift Analytic and Insight reports, you can also test different conversation styles to see what works best for your target audience.
Trinsly
Besides the fact that creating email campaigns can be quite time-consuming, there’s also the issue of switching between two or more platforms when reaching out to contacts. Not only does Trinsly eliminate the need to create your campaigns in your email application, you can communicate directly through the specific social media site in which a candidate’s profile exists.
This includes the major platforms such as Facebook, LinkedIn, and Github. Also, if you need help creating a campaign, simply access the Trinsly website and choose from the many templates available. That’s not all – from there, you can select between 1 and 3 stages of funneling, set up scheduled emails, and track conversion rates.
Trinsly offers a free 10-day trial on all pricing tiers and gives the option of charging monthly or annually.
Interseller.io
Interseller.io enables you to reach out to candidates without jumping through multiple hoops. Once you install their Chrome extension and connect it to your email, Interseller will compile candidate emails and send out your customized email straight to their inbox.
There’s no need to worry about candidates being contacted twice because Interseller tracks all correspondence for you. Also, the email sequences for those contacts ceases, once the message is opened.
The user-friendly interface allows you to easily schedule email sequences and track candidate responses. With the mail merge feature, you can customize emails for each and every contact as well as include titles, branding, and more.
The reports provided will offer helpful information for tweaking your marketing strategies. For example, you’ll have access to the A/B testing feature in conjunction with the Team Reporting aspect, which gives you an overview of the optimum time of day in which messages were read, as well as how many contacts were made.
Diversity, equity, inclusion, and belonging (DEIB) is a hot topic. However, it’s not just a trend or another corporate initiative – it’s a mindset and a business imperative.
In the workplace, DEIB is about everyone coming together from all walks of life and backgrounds to celebrate commonalities and differences.
As business leaders are rightly concerned with building inclusion and belonging into company culture and diversifying their workforces to have contributions from varying perspectives, we (as talent acquisition professionals) also know how important it is to tailor our recruitment process and sourcing strategy accordingly.
Sourcing diverse, qualified talent is a skill that takes practice and time. Building and optimizing a diversity sourcing strategy is a craft.
There is no perfect method or single tool, resource, or technology platform that will give us exactly what we’re looking for right away.
Knowledge is power and the more we understand about diversity targets and can control and master the craft of diversity sourcing, the more effective, efficient, and productive we, as talent professionals, position ourselves.
In this post, I’m going to share several diversity sourcing tips that any talent acquisition professional can use. My aim is to inspire, provoke thought, and encourage everyone to get creative!
Why Boolean?
Boolean search strings, a classic sourcing method, have been around for quite some time and they aren’t going anywhere. They’re only limited by our needs and creative ideas!
Think about your underlying critical thought process and analytical approach that comes with crafting strings.
Whether you decide to automate string creation via tools, such as Recruit’Em, BOOL, or Sourcehub, that add synonyms to your search, or you’re an expert at compiling complex strings yourself, they allow you to tap directly into the deep end of the target candidate pool.
Everyone has a digital footprint that can be found.
What’s your information need?
Before we start, I’d like to note that, ideally, effective Boolean searches start with a creative approach to information retrieval.
Think critically about what terms or phrases might show up in your target candidate profiles (such as associations or group names).
Then, work backward to create highly effective Boolean searches.
Gender Diversity Sourcing | Women
A common approach I see when searching for female profiles is immediately targeting interest groups, sports, or associations. This approach is helpful and great for growing your network and brand.
When it comes to searching using direct terminologies such as “women” OR “women’s” OR “female” or pronouns (“she” OR “her” OR “women” OR “woman” OR “lady” OR “ladies” OR “Miss” OR “Mrs” OR “mother” OR “mothers” OR “sister” OR “sisters”), you need to remember that if your strings are too vague or narrow, this will likely yield less viable results.
Here are some suggestions to take your search outside the box and be more specific.
Searching for women’s profiles with an academic degree, for example, we could target Greek-letter organizations (GLOs) and enter in the names of major sororities. Estimates suggest there are around nine million students and alumni from sororities in the US.
Using the term “sorority” may yield a relatively small number of candidates, therefore, building a comprehensive string that encompasses the names of major Greek sororities may be effective and will almost certainly save time.
You can find a free public list of sororities in the US here.
(“Alpha Delta Pi” OR “Alpha Gamma” OR “Delta Alpha Omicron Pi” OR “Alpha Phi” OR “Chi Omega” OR “Delta Delta Delta” OR “Delta Gamma” OR “Gamma Phi Beta” OR “Kappa Alpha Theta” OR “Kappa Delta Chi” OR “Kappa Kappa Gamma” OR “Pi Beta Phi” OR “Sigma Kappa”)
Searching women’s universities or colleges directly is another great way to find viable female candidates. You can find a free public list of both current and historical women’s universities and colleges in the US here.
Below is an example of a full list of women’s universities and colleges:
(“Agnes Scott College” OR “Alverno College” OR “Barnard College” OR “Bay Path College” OR “Bennett College” OR “Brenau University” OR “Brescia University College” OR “Bryn Mawr College” OR “Carlow College” OR “Cedar Crest College” OR “Chatham University” OR “College of New Rochelle, The” OR “College of Saint Benedict” OR “College of Saint Elizabeth” OR “College of Saint Mary” OR “Columbia College” OR “Converse College” OR “Cottey College” OR “Douglass Residential College of Rutgers University” OR “Hollins University” OR “Judson College” OR “Mary Baldwin College” OR “Meredith College” OR “Midway College” OR “Mills College” OR “Moore College of Art & Design” OR “Mount Holyoke College” OR “Mount Mary College” OR “Mount St. Mary’s College” OR “Notre Dame of Maryland University” OR “Pine Manor College” OR “Russell Sage College” OR “St. Catherine University” OR “Saint Joseph College” OR “Saint Mary-of-the-Woods College” OR “Saint Mary’s College” OR “Salem College” OR “Scripps College” OR “Simmons College” OR “Smith College” OR “Spelman College” OR “Stephens College” OR “Sweet Briar College” OR “Trinity Washington University” OR “Wellesley College” OR “Wesleyan College” OR “Wilson College” OR “Women’s College”)
Racial and Ethnic Diversity Sourcing
If you need to source racially and ethnically diverse candidates, the aforementioned strategies can give a baseline to tailor your searches accordingly. If you would like to take the GLO approach, the below list can be used for targeting Black fraternities and sororities:
Likewise, if your goal is to directly target an academic background and perhaps you are seeking Black candidates, why not use this list of historically Black colleges and universities (HBCUs) in the US. Below is an example string.
Keep in mind to get as creative as possible to tailor your search based on geography, candidate persona viability, and so on.
(“Bowie State University” OR “Clark Atlanta University” OR “Fisk University” OR “Grambling State University” OR “Howard University” OR “Jackson State University” OR “Morehouse College” OR “South Carolina State University” OR “Southern University Baton Rouge” OR “Spelman College” OR “Stillman College” OR “Tuskegee University” OR “Xavier University”)
Expanding on diversity Boolean strategies geared toward racial and ethnic diversity, you could construct a search syntax that targets other cultural interest GLOs.
Bonus Hacks
As an added bonus to this post, here are two other Boolean diversity sourcing hacks:
1. Google’s keyword search limit is 32 words.
This means using strings that extend beyond 32 words, such as the starter brackets provided above, just won’t be effective. Here’s a free back-end solution to get the results you want without word search limitations: Google Custom Search Engines (CSEs).
You can create and program your own search engine. If you’d like an example of a diversity-tailored CSE, I’ve included a personal favorite of mine, this CSE is publicly accessible and can be used by anyone.
2. Use different search engines.
When using Boolean searches, oftentimes we tend to stick with our default web search engine. My recommendation is to plug your string into different web browsers to take advantage of varying algorithms and search results. This site provides a dual-screen comparison between Google and Bing search results.
Ultimately, I wanted to inspire you to think a little bit differently when it comes to Boolean sourcing. Keep in mind that effective sourcing, diversity or otherwise, isn’t just about Boolean.
It’s about critical, analytical thinking and seeking to step outside of the box to find ways to meet your information needs.
EWA is an acronym you’ve probably never seen before, based on a term, Earned Wage Access, you’ve probably never heard before.
Let me explain.
An estimated 78% of the US population currently lives paycheck-to-paycheck. This was a stark number pre-coronavirus, and the global pandemic has only heightened the economic stresses many Americans face.
Today, a contracting economy, coupled with mounting anxieties from COVID-19, mean added financial pressures for today’s workforce.
Let’s revisit the opening to this article and really think about the fact that nearly 80 percent of workers in the United States were living paycheck-to-paycheck before coronavirus hit.
It paints a clear picture of ever-present fiscal stresses and issues with spending and savings. This includes hourly workers and salaried employees, many of whom, on the surface, may appear to earn enough to live comfortably.
Consider these statistics: Just over 28% of employees currently earning $50,000 to $99,999 a year live paycheck-to-paycheck, and 70% of them are in debt. One out of every 10 workers earning $100,000 a year or more lives paycheck-to-paycheck. A quarter of workers cannot set aside any savings. Three-quarters of workers are in some form of debt.
With these situations in mind, fintech companies worldwide have endeavored to alleviate unnecessary financial hardship and promote economic well-being.
And that is why EWA – or Earned Wage Access as our industry commonly refers to it – is considered the way of the future. The way of the modern working world.
What EWA is and What it Isn’t
In short, Earned Wage Access platforms allow employees to access their accrued wages before payday. An employee can access and withdraw already-earned income immediately, allowing them to better manage their finances and use funds for recurring monthly payments.
EWA isn’t a magic solution to an employee’s financial burdens. And it shouldn’t be positioned as a quick fix. But it definitely can go a long way in helping people better manage their day-to-day finances.
As most employees’ main worry is ongoing cycles of debt because of late or missed bill payments, having access to income on-demand each week can offer much-needed help and create a foundation for long-term financial well-being.
Most importantly, it can alleviate the all-too-common practice of predatory lending, perpetuating cycles of debit and fiscal hardship.
The Key to Recruiting Strong Talent
So, as professionals who recruit and source talent, why should you care about EWA?
Because today’s workforce wants it. And in a competitive job market, employer-sponsored financial benefits can be the key to finding the next star employee.
Consider the fact that, according to The Workforce Institute at Kronos Incorporated, three in five employees think they should not have to wait until their scheduled payday to access their earned wages. That’s 61% of employees surveyed.
Regarding recruitment efforts, 74% of employees who participated in the same survey said they would prefer to work for an employer that offers financial planning, budgeting, and savings tools over one that does not.
Ultimately, as companies vie for talent, EWA is an increasingly important part of the recruitment equation. Having this benefit listed on a job description could help you get the person you need in the interview chair or on a Zoom call.
Keeping Talent
Simply put, the top talent in 2021 wants liquidity. They want access to the money they have earned when they need it, and being paid twice a month isn’t cutting it. Today’s world includes unexpected expenses, rising costs of living, and declining benefits. To truly rise above your recruiting and talent management counterparts, innovation must be at the forefront of your efforts, and EWA should be an important tool to help you achieve your goals.
In addition to more frequent access to earned pay, another issue raised by workers across the United States is their lack of budgeting knowledge and access to tools to help with money management. An estimated 32% of employees had a budget in 2019, a staggering figure given the importance of saving for short- and long-term expenses.
With this in mind, a number of EWA platforms have introduced extensive budgeting and savings tools to their platforms. These tools include useful functions such as alerts that warn users when they are spending unusual amounts or flag potentially fraudulent activity when it occurs. And having access to these tools could be the difference between falling into debt or remaining financially sound.
Considering that 48% of US employees say their financial worries are a distraction at work, EWA is clearly an important factor in attracting and retaining an engaged and productive team.
Why Understanding an Earned Wage Access Funding Model is Essential
Thirty-six percent, or more than one-third of employed Americans, rely on their employer for financial assistance programs. This has made earned wage access solutions increasingly popular. From an employer standpoint, how the programs are structured, however, is important to examine.
More recently, the funding model of an earned wage access solution has become increasingly important for employers and employees. Most providers are adapting their models to ensure their on-demand pay platforms are not an extension of credit. This is in direct relation to the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau’s recent advisory opinion.
For instance, the new federal guidance from the CFPB addresses the question of if/when an earned wage access program is covered by the Truth in Lending Act (TILA) and Regulation Z. It concludes that earned wage access programs that meet certain requirements are not an extension of credit and are not subject to TILA or Reg Z.
In the wake of this advisory opinion, many earned wage access solutions are being forced to quickly change their models – particularly those that held employees liable for overspending on their accounts or charged fees to access wages early.
The Takeaway
It’s clear that EWA platforms can be a fantastic tool for recruitment.
Ultimately, this tool may be the difference between employees sinking into debt and building a solid financial future. And the direct benefit for the employer in terms of employee retention and motivation is substantial.
Through the adoption of earned wage access programs, companies and their hard-working employees can benefit from increased financial wellness and eliminate the stresses that keep them from realizing their full potential while on the job.
The pandemic has left an indelible mark on the priorities of many industries. There are always going to be negative consequences to a public health emergency, but it also allows businesses to examine whether their methods of working really are best suited to them, their customers, and the contemporary climate. A popular area for change and discussion at the moment is remote operations.
While working from home has been an immediate solution for some enterprises, for many this has developed into a more permanent part of the business. One recent report found that those businesses surveyed expect their number of permanently remote staff to double in 2021.
Indeed, there will be many staff, customers, and even industry peers that find this is both a more positive and responsible way to operate. Yet this presents a quandary for some enterprises, who are uncertain whether this approach is beneficial for them — particularly those companies who emphasize in-person interactions.
It’s not an easy decision to make, and there are various elements to take into account. Let’s look into some of the aspects that should factor into your evaluation of permanent remote operations.
The Pros
One of the reasons that more businesses are moving to make remote operations permanent is that even those that hadn’t previously considered it an option are finding it beneficial. Some of the key advantages that are worth taking into consideration in your evaluation include:
Improved Diversity
Having a workforce that operates from their own homes is not just convenient, it opens your business up to talent from around the planet. It minimizes location bias, allowing you to benefit from contributors from a variety of socioeconomic backgrounds.
It provides new cultural perspectives that can improve your connections to a wider demographic of customers. Having a more diverse workforce is also known to be a driver of innovation, as you have a team that doesn’t all think or act from a culturally, educationally, or economically homogeneous position.
Lower Overheads
Rent, utilities, insurance, cleaning — it all adds up, and it all eats into profits. You’ll generally find that few if any of these apply to businesses that have a remote workforce. It’s important to note that remote employees have needs, though.
Yes, in-person teams can be good for morale. But so do flexibility, comfortable surroundings, and not having to spend hours each week on that commute into the office. Workers who operate remotely tend to have a higher rate of satisfaction in their jobs, as — when done correctly — can be more conducive to a healthy work-life balance.
In turn, this satisfaction positively impacts productivity and boosts employee retention.
The Cons
While there are benefits to remote operations, that’s not to say that it is entirely without challenges. It is certainly not suitable for every organization.
It’s worth considering the cons in a way that both aids your decision-making and helps you prevent disruption if you decide to adopt remote practices in the future.
Issues can include:
More Complex Administration
Onboarding and payroll for employees in a single location tends to be simpler. Indeed, when setting up payroll for a remote workforce from diverse locations, you also have to take into consideration the legal issues of doing so — there may be taxes that you need to collect based on their state residence or differing social security payments for the country they’re working from.
This is not an insurmountable obstacle; some tools and processes can optimize these elements to suit remote teams. However, it’s an important additional responsibility that you should bear in mind.
Weaker Team Culture
One of the reasons some businesses prefer in-person operations is that they can feel more naturally conducive to a close team culture. All the workers are interacting in the same space, and there are generally more opportunities for them to forge deeper bonds with one another and the company.
Remote operations create more distance between team members and leadership, with a reliance on utilizing technological tools to communicate rather than having easy conversations. That’s not to say that it is not possible to have a strong and compassionate culture in remote teams, it just takes additional effort and planning.
Preparing for the Adjustment
Whether you’ve already decided to go ahead and adopt permanent remote practices, or you’re still uncertain, it’s important to consider how your business can adjust effectively.
There are some preparations that, with some additional investment and attention, can help you and your remote team to succeed.
These include:
Onboarding and Training
The process of guiding new hires through remote practices is not necessarily the same as in person. Alongside sharing the usual handbooks, you also need to prepare documents that help them to understand what your expectations are for their productivity levels and working activities as a remote employee.
You must take time to discuss how they can fit into the overall company culture while not being physically present, too. It can be prudent to set up remote contract sharing and signing platforms.
You may need to establish ahead of time what tools you will use to guide workers through training — will you be screen sharing as you explain processes, or will you create a series of video explainers beforehand?
Communications
This is probably the most important element to prepare for any transition to remote practices. Without reliable, easy-to-use tools that are appropriate for your activities, there is likely to be serious disruption.
Wherever possible, utilize software that encompasses as many of your operating procedures as possible — platforms such as Microsoft Teams and Asana allow video calls, text chat, and project management in the same place.
Don’t just find tools for communications, but formalize protocols to ensure everyone is using them in ways that not only allow them to be productive but also strengthen team bonds.
Conclusion
Remote operations are an increasingly popular part of our business landscape. However, before leaping in, it’s important to consider how the relative pros and cons of these practices can impact your company.
Knowing what aspects of practices can be adapted to meet your needs, and some attention to preparations can set you off on solid footing.
The Evolution Of Business From Brick and Mortar Rigidity to Athletic Agility
Since the beginning of the industrial revolution, companies have defined themselves by their “Brick and Mortar.” Or, their hard assets, in the form of equipment, warehouses, manufacturing facilities and corporate office buildings. Though this remains for many, such as manufacturing-based companies or business models for service companies.
Those with no tangible products have still been defined by what happens within the walls of their offices; the culture, collaboration and energy being the crucial components for the success of the company.
This solid foundation has also caused certain inherent realities such as finite, local talent pools. Pools expandable only by opening more brick and mortar offices everywhere the business wants to function. Thus, costs of living, office space and vendors’ availability and support services often dictated expansion plans and customer satisfaction.
Along comes COVID, and everyone is working at home. Suddenly, the office culture is gone. No more daily lunches, Friday Happy Hours, office parties, birthday parties or in-person collaboration.
Without the office structure – the brick and mortar containing and offering a structure to the organism – companies felt they were on shaky ground and uncharted territory.
How do we preserve our culture? How do we foster Synergy? What about productivity? Can everyone be productive working at home? What are the needs of our employees while working at home? How can we possibly measure this?
Work at Home Skepticism
Traditionally, companies have been very skeptical about allowing team members to work at home. The assumption has always been that productivity would suffer as everyday distractions continuously interrupt the old 9-5 workday.
There was also the unsaid concern that employees that wanted to work virtually had something to hide: a questionable work ethic, poor interpersonal skills, or some kind of social anxiety that made working in an office stressful. The overall assumption was that they were not team players if they need to work at home.
I have worked virtually for over 20 years and personally have encountered these assertions. I have been passed over for roles that were strong fits for my experience and background because of my desire to work at home.
I have been the subject of daily 7:30 AM meetings: to make sure that I was awake, at my desk, and ready to work by 8 am. Or the “random” checkpoint phone call or even being instructed to tape-record my recruiting calls so that I could present at least 8 hours of cold calls per week to prove my activities.
A Forced Evolution
COVID forced the rapid shift of the organization’s dependence on the office to define their culture and assure productivity, toward depending on the employees themselves to ensure personal productivity and be personally accountable for producing quality work on time.
Companies have discovered that they don’t need the brick and mortar of the office building to bind the business – essentially being the company’s cell wall. Instead, they can turn to Technology to be the binding force – the cell membrane – in a much more flexible and agile organism.
Not only did we find that we can use tech for measuring productivity, contribution, build teams, and foster collaboration, but found that the assumption of people being less productive and more distracted working at home was not true.
We also learned that the expectation of family life not interfering or distracting from work has always been a farce. Even when in an office, people would step into the stairwell or go for a walk to handle personal affairs during office time.
Sometimes these distractions could take up hours in the course of a workday. While parents make call after call to take care of urgent family issues that cannot be put off until later, or even to leave the office to take care of the family. Which would often result in the loss of the entire workday or a return to work later with other things on their mind.
Work-life integration while working at home has shown employers that it is better to let people understand that they have obligations for performance, deadlines and making video call appearances as needed to satisfy customer needs.
We have realized that more important than the 9-5 workday is the expectation of performance and completing quality work on time, and always keeping the customer’s need at the center of our activities.
So then does it matter if someone works 8-4? Or 9-5, or 9-9 with a couple of breaks throughout the day to drive the kids to piano lessons or go to appointments?
No. It doesn’t. Shifting to the work-at-home environment has proven what I have always known: Most people are more productive at home.
Though the family might be physically right in front of us – they always have been as the phone calls or text messages blow up the phone – what is missing are the office distractions.
Gossip, water cooler chats, office parties, dress-down days, happy hours, farewell cakes, gift exchanges, Halloween dress-ups, and any number of other little events aimed at building team comradery, all designed to make the office less grueling.
At home, we are less distracted when we can handle life’s little problems as they come up and get back to work. Rather than ignoring problems, allowing them to snowball until we can no longer ignore them, then taking much more time to resolve.
Not Defined by Walls
We have discovered that indeed, we do not need walls of an office to define us. Instead, Technology can now bind us together, allowing us to meet in real-time.
Productivity software tracks project progress, reminds us of upcoming deadlines, shows managers when someone on their team is falling behind or struggling, and shows the capacity of other team members who may be able to step in and help.
Since we are digitizing the employee experience, we can now also qualify skills that are being nurtured and opportunities for improvement. Training can happen one-on-one in real-time when we first identify we need it.
Employees can find opportunities to grow specific skills, and managers can plug those into projects that will nurture their passions into proficiencies. This means companies must immediately reallocate budgets for physical office space toward technologies that now are the organization’s structural cohesion.
This evolution of business from the hard cell body of a tree – brick & mortar – to the more flexible cell membrane of an animal with the agility of a Cheetah.
A company bound by technology and talent will enable companies to grow faster, be more agile to address customer needs, and move in any direction driven by customer demand.
Stagnation should become a thing of the past. The old, stodgy, restrictive, and conformist model of the cubicles in stacks in an office building will be replaced with virtual, diverse, globally inclusive companies that foster creativity, growth and collaboration.
We have partnered with Jim Stroud to bring this article on the dangers of teaching critical race theory to our RecruitingDaily audience. You can find the original article here.
Critical race theory supports the logic that all whites are born racists and oppressors by nature.
They are to be viewed as a collective threat to non-white people and beyond redemption. This sentiment is already infecting the American workplace via racial sensitivity and diversity trainings.
Despite the obvious controversy, such trainings are being accepted as just and fair; and at an alarming pace across Corporate America.
This piece is written with a three-fold purpose.
To explain the basics of Critical Race Theory
To demonstrate how Critical Race Theory is negatively affecting the American workplace
To inspire a resistance to Critical Race Theory being taught in the workplace
In light of the increased sensitivity to recent events like the George Floyd protests, the emergence of cancel culture, and the pressures on corporations to adhere to political correctness, the information herein is a counter-balance that should be carefully considered prior to new investments in diversity trainings.
A Few Points of Consideration First
When discussing matters related to politics and society there is the potential of triggered animosity where ideas are rejected, silenced or canceled out right. This is to be expected with this treatise. I do not expect to persuade every reader to my way of thinking.
It was conducted by several professors of Sociology, Political Science and Statistical Science from Duke University, Princeton University and New York University. The findings were published on March 19, 2018. This is the summary of what they discovered.
There is mounting concern that social media sites contribute to political polarization by creating “echo chambers” that insulate people from opposing views about current events. We surveyed a large sample of Democrats and Republicans who visit Twitter at least three times each week about a range of social policy issues.
One week later, we randomly assigned respondents to a treatment condition in which they were offered financial incentives to follow a Twitter bot for one month that exposed them to messages produced by elected officials, organizations, and other opinion leaders with opposing political ideologies.
Respondents were re-surveyed at the end of the month to measure the effect of this treatment, and at regular intervals throughout the study period to monitor treatment compliance.
We find that Republicans who followed a liberal Twitter bot became substantially more conservative post-treatment, and Democrats who followed a conservative Twitter bot became slightly more liberal post-treatment. These findings have important implications for the interdisciplinary literature on political polarization as well as the emerging field of computational social science.
One aspect that separates Christianity from other religions and belief systems is the evidentiary basis for it. Scripture provides historical and logical evidence to back up its claims that Christ is the son of God and only through his sacrifice can human beings be redeemed.
While secular leftists scoff at the above evidence, they hypocritically make absolutely no effort to provide any to support their new religious orthodoxy of critical theory.
This gives critical theorists the room to make broad, radical statements about society without having to provide one bit of evidence…To put it another way, critical theorists nitpick aspects of society that they deem to be unfair, whether that opinion is based on facts or not.
All that being said, it is important to have a foundational view of what Critical Race Theory is and why, in my view, it is so pernicious. Critical race theory (CRT) uses racism to combat largely imaginary racism. Its doctrine promotes systematic racism, white privilege and white fragility. These Marxist-inspired ideologies are designed to create hate and division. I now quote the Pulpit and Pen article “4 Main Things Christians Need to Know About Critical Race Theory.”
Invented by Derrick Bell and other attorneys as a spin-off of Critical Legal Theory in American law schools in the 1980s, these theorists were disenchanted with the results of the Civil Rights Movement. Bell, Richard Delgado, and other CRT thinkers viewed classical liberal ideas such as meritocracy (people being rewarded based on their individual merits), equal opportunity, and colorblind justice (like that promoted by Dr. King) to all be factors that cause systemic, invisible, intangible racism.
What many people don’t understand is that CRT rejects most of the things that the 1960s Civil Rights Movement fought for, like treating people equally in institutions and under the law. Instead, CRT teaches that if power is to be properly redistributed from the “haves” to “have-nots” (which in their eyes include minority identity groups), the law may actually need to biased in favor of minority identity groups.
It is likely that the 1960s Civil Rights leaders like Dr. King, Bayard Rustin, Hosea Williams, and Gloria Richardson all would have opposed CRT vehemently, as it denies that people should be judged “by the content of their character and not the color of their skin.” CRT, conversely, teaches that skin color (or identity group) is the lens through which all things – especially justice – should be viewed.
…believes racism is present in every aspect of life, every relationship, and every interaction and therefore has its advocates look for it everywhere
…relies upon “interest convergence” (white people only give black people opportunities and freedoms when it is also in their own interests) and therefore doesn’t trust any attempt to make racism better
…is against free societies and wants to dismantle them and replace them with something its advocates control (which is a very Marxist way of thinking)
…only treats race issues as “socially constructed groups,” so there are no individuals in Critical Race Theory (for example, depending on the racial group you’re in, you are oppressed despite how financially successful you may be as an individual).
…believes science, reason, and evidence are a “white” way of knowing and that storytelling and lived experience is a “black” alternative, which hurts everyone, especially black people [My note added here: so, in other words, things like statistics and logic don’t matter. What matters is how you feel.]
…rejects all potential alternatives, like colorblindness, as forms of racism, making itself the only allowable game in town [My note added here: In other words, judging people based on their character and not their color, is racist.]
…acts like anyone who disagrees with it must do so for racist and white supremacist reasons, even if those people are black [My note added here: which is why black conservatives like Candace Owens can be called a white supremacist with a straight face. Anyone who disagrees with CRT is by CRT standards, a racist.]
…cannot be satisfied, so it becomes a kind of activist black hole that threatens to destroy everything it is introduced into.
Now, let’s apply these rules to the workplace and you see the horrific potential.
The white CEO of your company is racist and has proven their bias by their outright denial of their own inherent racism.
The Black CEO or female CEO of your company is racist should they dismiss the “reality” that racism is everywhere and as such, prevalent in the company they lead.
Any diversity and inclusion initiative results from “interest convergence” and done solely to somehow benefit the white people inside the company.
Since the company itself is racist, it’s systems must be dismantled and replaced (in part or in whole), so as to insure fairness for all oppressed people who work there.
Requiring proof of systemic racism within the company is racist as feelings and lived experiences are enough for any accusation to be accepted as fact. This is especially true if oppressed groups are not promoted within the company regardless of their individual merit.
CRT fully realized in your organization leads to an internal activism where demands will be made and trouble threatened if they do not get their way. If you give into them, you will not satisfy them, however, because Critical Race Theory cannot be satisfied.
It is guaranteed, before you do anything at all, that you will do it wrong because of your racism. You did it in a way that just created new problems that amount to racism. You didn’t do it sooner, faster, or better because of your racism. No matter what you do, the resulting situation must contain racism, and the Critical Race Theory activist’s job is to find it and hold you to account.
Case in point, consider the situation of Gary Garrels.
Until last week, Gary Garrels was senior curator of painting and sculpture at the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art (SFMOMA). He resigned his position after museum employees circulated a petition that accused him of racism and demanded his immediate ouster.
“Gary’s removal from SFMOMA is non-negotiable,” read the petition. “Considering his lengthy tenure at this institution, we ask just how long have his toxic white supremacist beliefs regarding race and equity directed his position curating the content of the museum?”
This accusation—that Garrels’ choices as an art curator are guided by white supremacist beliefs—is a very serious one. Unsurprisingly, it does not stand up to even minimal scrutiny.
The petitioners cite few examples of anything even approaching bad behavior from Garrels. Their sole complaint is that he allegedly concluded a presentation on how to diversify the museum’s holdings by saying, “don’t worry, we will definitely still continue to collect white artists.”
Garrels has apparently articulated this sentiment on more than one occasion. According to artnet.com, he said that it would be impossible to completely shun white artists, because this would constitute “reverse discrimination.” That’s the sum total of his alleged crimes. He made a perfectly benign, wholly inoffensive, obviously true statement that at least some of the museum’s featured artists would continue to be white. The petition lists no other specific grievances.
According to Critical Race Theory, Gary Garrel’s implied crimes were:
He did not overly favor the oppressed minority class of artists by not removing the white artists.
He did not recognize the inherent racism of saying that he would still collect art from white artists.
The ignorance of his own white supremacist beliefs was enough to justify his exit.
Can you imagine this type of incident being multiplied across workplaces in America? You don’t have to imagine, it already is.
According to Newsmax, “Nearly every major U.S. company now has a diversity and inclusion department offering lessons in unconscious bias, workshops on “white privilege,” and “struggle sessions” on systemic racism to their employees.
According to McKinsey & Company, they collectively spend $8 billion for these services annually, with consultants raking in a combined $400 million-$600 million in fees.”
Yet, with everything shared so far, what can a company expect when they hire someone to give a workshop that is rooted in CRT? I have two examples to share. The first quote is from Independent Women’s Forum.
As I document in detailed reports for City Journal and the New York Post, critical race theory training sessions in public agencies have pushed a deeply ideological agenda that includes reducing people to a racial essence, segregating them, and judging them by their group identity rather than individual character, behavior and merit.
The examples are instructive. At a series of events at the Treasury Department and federal financial agencies, diversity trainer Howard Ross taught employees that America was “built on the backs of people who were enslaved” and that all white Americans are complicit in a system of white supremacy “by automatic response to the ways we’re taught.”
In accompanying documents, Mr. Ross argues that whites share an inborn oppressive streak. “Whiteness,” employees are told, “includes white privilege and white supremacy.” Consequently, whites “struggle to own their racism.” He instructs managers to conduct “listening sessions” in which black employees can speak about their experience and be “seen in their pain,” while white employees are instructed to “sit in the discomfort” and not “fill the silence with your own thoughts and feelings.” Members of “the group you’re allying with,” Mr. Ross says, are not “obligated to like you, thank you, feel sorry for you, or forgive you.” For training like this, Mr. Ross and his firm have been paid $5 million over 15 years, according to federal disclosures.
Further in the article, there is mention of Sandia National Laboratories.
At the Sandia National Laboratories, which develops technology for America’s nuclear arsenal, executives held a racially segregated training session for white male employees. The three-day event, which was led by a company called White Men as Full Diversity Partners, set the goal of examining “white male culture” and making the employees take responsibility for their “white privilege,” “male privilege” and “heterosexual privilege.”
In one of the opening exercises, the instructors wrote on a whiteboard that “white male culture” can be associated with “white supremacists,” “KKK,” “Aryan Nation,” “MAGA hat” and “mass killings.” On the final day, the trainers asked employees to write letters to women and people of color. One participant apologized for his privilege and another pledged to “be a better ally.”
(A link to the training materials used at the Sandia National Laboratories can be found online here.)
And now this, what follows is an infamous example of a “trainer” giving a presentation called “All White People are Racists” and from what I can discern, much of the tone is mired in critical race theory. I label it “infamous” becauseitwent viralearlierthisyear.
As one might imagine from the above video and the examples cited prior, this type of training can have the opposite effect of what was intended. Ironically, this is not a new revelation. There have been many studies that prove that possibility. Here are some quotes from a 2016 Harvard Business Review article – “Why Diversity Programs Fail.”
Do people who undergo training usually shed their biases? Researchers have been examining that question since before World War II, in nearly a thousand studies. It turns out that while people are easily taught to respond correctly to a questionnaire about bias, they soon forget the right answers. The positive effects of diversity training rarely last beyond a day or two, and a number of studies suggest that it can activate bias or spark a backlash. Nonetheless, nearly half of midsize companies use it, as do nearly all the Fortune 500.
Research from the University of Toronto reinforces our findings: In one study white subjects read a brochure critiquing prejudice toward blacks. When people felt pressure to agree with it, the reading strengthened their bias against blacks. When they felt the choice was theirs, the reading reduced bias.
“…participants were divided into two groups—an autonomy group and a control group—and asked to read a brief anti-prejudice essay. The autonomy group read an essay that emphasized individual choice, explaining why open-mindedness is a more joyful way to live… Before and after reading the essays, participants took a multiple-choice exam designed to test their biases. Participants who read the autonomy essay displayed less prejudice, as expected. But participants who read the control essay tended to test as more prejudiced than they had before. Reading the demands set off what the researchers called a “counter-response to threatened autonomy”: a backlash. In other words, employees need to feel that they’re freely choosing to be nonprejudiced, not that they’re having it forced upon them.”
All this being said, am I implying that all diversity and/or racial sensitivity training does more harm than good?
No, I am not. Neither am I saying that racism does not exist.
Racism exists and will always exist because 1) it is a heart condition that cannot be dismantled by mandate, legislation or triggered responses, and frankly, 2) there is too much money made from its exploitation.
I also want to be clear that there are instances when diversity measures are fair and warranted.
“A firm found it consistently gave African-Americans smaller raises than whites, even when they had identical job titles and performance ratings.
So Castilla suggested transparency to activate social accountability. The firm posted each unit’s average performance rating and pay raise by race and gender. Once managers realized that employees, peers, and superiors would know which parts of the company favored whites, the gap in raises all but disappeared.”
My sincerest hope with all of this is that I spark hesitation when considering diversity-related training that includes critical race theory.
To put it simply…
Critical Race Theory ruins team cohesion across diverse groups.
Critical Race Theory will encourage racism witch hunts inside your company.
Critical Race Theory encourages rewards based on race and not merit.
Critical Race Theory forced upon your employees will likely cause a backlash effect.
For the sake of the company and all those employed within, run (don’t walk) away from critical race theory.
Everyone wants the magic potion for the most efficient and innovative modern talent acquisition teams. In certain industries, the modernization and drive for cutting-edge teams has reached a crisis point.
Not to be dramatic but we are almost at a perish or die moment.
I have had the pleasure to consult with all types of businesses, large and small across the nation in the areas of talent acquisition (TA). All the top box performers share a similar philosophy as to the makings of a great team.
I share the common elements below.
Four Components of a Modern Talent Acquisition Team
1. Traditional Recruiting
Stating the obvious. We still need traditional full-life-cycle recruiters to manage the candidate and hiring manager process, end-to-end.
Recruiting is the giant overseer to which all other components support.
2. Sourcing
The best TA organizations view sourcing as the only way to truly pipeline candidates for the future. Sourcing isn’t a vending machine that spits out candidates or engages in just-in-time staffing.
It is the long-term woo of prospects who for whatever reason, aren’t ready to take a job right now. However, there are Sourcers who function on emergent needs. It’s not the best use of Sourcers, but most successful TA team has at least one Sourcer reserved for difficult and urgent requirements.
Bottom line, if you don’t have Sourcers, you aren’t pipelining. It’s like being the Yankees without a minor league farm team to pull from. There is an investment that is necessary to grow talent until the talent is ready.
And to that end, you can’t grow talent without the brand messaging that comes from the next component of recruitment marketing.
3. Recruitment Marketing
Content, Content, Content. Engage, Engage, Engage. Candidates are consumers. We are selling our positions to them just like Apple markets an iPhone.
The connections should be measurable, planned, constant, and persistent. Sourcers won’t be successful without the knowledge foundational marketing knowledge around timing, content, and engagement.
A candidate relationship database or recruiting platform is required to maintain these budding relationships and connections.
Sourcing and Recruitment Marketing go together. You can’t have one without the other.
4. Competitive Intelligence
Would it be easier to find talent if you were the leader in pay, benefits, and culture? You bet it would.
Knowing a competitor’s weakness is a skill that has been long perfected in the sales industry. Those same tactics of researching a competitors’ product are used today in market analysis.
Engagement campaigns to passive candidates can be tailored to fill a gap in a competitor limitation. As an example, consider a competitor that has shown to have a weakness in the areas of diversity, equity, and inclusion.
A Recruiter or Sourcer would leverage that intel by focusing a recruitment marketing campaign around the diversity programs and underrepresented individuals in leadership. Offering solutions to a candidate’s problem is ultimately what makes a person apply online for a new position.
Can a modern talent acquisition team be successful without these four components? I am going to go out on a limb to say no, it is not possible.
Missing even one component puts an organization at risk for failed performance.
If you don’t have sourcing, you aren’t pipelining. Without recruitment marketing, you are failing to understand the consumer-driven candidate of today. And if you don’t have competitive intelligence, you won’t be able to woo candidates out of their current jobs.
And, without Recruiters pushing the candidates through the process, no one would ever get hired.
Can a leader rearrange duties in a smaller organization so that all four of these components are covered by one person? Yes.
There are varying degrees of need, but a need, nonetheless. Welcome to the 21st century of talent acquisition.
There are a ton of recruiting tech tools and software tech available in the market, but there are specific ones that I’ve been exploring personally this past month. In this post, I wanted to focus on talent sourcing, AI search, automation, and assessment pre-screening tools.
I participated in the 12 Days of Sourcing event and a lot of these topics were asked during the live sessions.
Talent Sourcing
This area is always evolving but I wanted to focus on some new talent sourcing that I’ve recently demoed on WizardSourcer.
Hireflow
Hireflow is a comprehensive tool designed to gather candidate leads based on your criteria input. This AI-based platform, with its innovative search features, CRM tracking, and integrative outreach options provides a seamless way to compile your daily sourcing within a matter of minutes.
While additionally, the data compiled over time allows you and your team to focus on those qualified, perhaps harder to reach contenders through optimized email templates that are easily personalized to specific campaigns.
Chatterworks
Chatterworks is one of the newer players in the realm of recruiting. Designed to gather candidate contact information from an array of resources, Chatterworks offers a budget-friendly solution for recruiters to obtain email addresses, cell phone numbers, and LinkedIn profiles for top talent of various industries.
Native Current
Native Current, an extension tool that works congruently with Boolean, enables recruiters to uncover new talent and find a variety of unique niche groups. With new business models being formed all the time, Native Current gives you and your team the upper hand by compiling data results of qualified candidates found across the major social media platforms.
The tool helps you choose a niche (BLNA) area to focus on and gives you a variety of Boolean string examples. I presented this tool during 12 Days of Sourcing.
Seamless.ai
Seamless.aiallows you to generate business leads via industry type, professional title, specific businesses, keywords, and so on. This lead generation tool boasts an extensive database comprised of 800+million contacts. The final reports provide details on individuals ranging from career history, contact information, and online presence. Whether you’re in the market for finding new business leads or individual talent, the extensive AI features of Seamless.ai do the searches for you in a fraction of the time.
AI Matching
When it comes to AI matching, these tools will help you find and screen applicants more efficiently. Technology within this space continues to improve and I wanted to highlight these 2 tools that have gotten recent funding.
Text Kernel
Textkernelwas designed primarily with human resources and recruiters in mind. By using the latest artificial intelligence technology in conjunction with the data of thousands of staffing and hiring agencies around the world, you can find the most qualified candidates of practically any industry with just a few clicks.
Daxtra
Daxtra, a recruiting software that helps you search for new hires worldwide. It features multilingual parsing, talent searches, and relevant job history of potential candidates, providing time-saving automation at affordable “cost-per-hire” rates.
Chatbot Tools
These interactive chatbots will help build a better candidate experience at your company. They can help screen potential leads to help answer basic questions that a lead might have. Instead, of having a candidate review and leave a career site you have a tool to convince them to stay.
SmartPal
SmartPal, an interactive chatbot geared towards recruiting. Not only is SmartPal designed to set up interviews, but it is also equipped to customize job searches, answer common questions, and screen potential candidates based on your specific criteria. Additionally, since SmartPal is available 24/7 and able to decipher more than 15 languages, when you incorporate it into your recruiting strategies, you’ll save time, money and build your client base.
Wendy and Wade
Wendy and Wade takes chatbot AI to a whole new level of “human-like” interaction. The software features two separate chatbots, hence the name Wade and Wendy. While Wade is programmed to assist the job seeker, compiling certain data provided by the individual and offering suggestions much like a personal recruiter would do, Wendy’s function is to aid the recruiter in locating qualified people by screening and prioritizing said applicants based on criteria and talent matches. Bottom line, the job of this chatbot tool is intended to replace the need for those mainstream telephone screening calls.
Resume Parsing
When it comes to resume parsing, there’s only one tool I consistently recommend which is Sovren. It’s a fairly new tool that has made a lot of improvements.
Sovren
Sovren AI Matching is able to find the best candidates for a position based on their resumes. Unlike many AI tools that merely use keywords, Sovren has the ability to decipher an individual’s job history and qualifications, as well as differentiate between the varying levels that a specific career/title may entail.
High-level candidate matching is possible because the software features thousands of built-in skillsets across multiple industries, compiles data from several platforms, and supports a number of document formats. Imagine being able to customize your searches and receive relevant resumes in a matter of minutes.
Assessment Tools
These assessment tools can help measure strengths and habits while also branching out to help with interview scheduling and improving candidate experience. During 12 Days of Sourcing, Ashley had the viewers rank assessing and pre-screening applicants as a top issue in 2021. There are many personality tools that can help screen applicants more efficiently.
Pymetrics
Pymetrics can be used by recruiters during the application process. This assessment tool features a dozen different games that are used in measuring an applicant’s strengths, habits, and overall approach to problems through the answers provided. Not only does it enable the recruiter to target potential new hires, but the personalized reports can also help applicants recognize their own talents and find a career best suited for him or her.
Arctic Shores
Arctic Shores is described as a neuroscientific assessment tool that is designed to provide recruiters with feedback on behavioral patterns and trustworthiness of candidates. Rather than conducting a traditional interview asking how a candidate responds to various interactions with superiors and co-workers, Artic Shores uses science to assess applicants based on their responses in the assessments. Not only does this eliminate bias, the system is reliable and cost-effective.
Vervoe
Vervoe offers a turn-key solution for recruiters when it comes to advertising positions, recruiting, skills assessments, scheduling interviews, and tracking data. You can also customize questionnaires, schedule emails, and easily collaborate with team members throughout the entire process.
AssessFirst
AssessFirst can help you simplify the process of creating and launching a campaign as well as find the best talent for specific jobs. A subscription to AssessFirst will allow you to create job listings, set up profiles, screen applicants with the assessment tools provided, all while creating a positive candidate experience.
As recruiters, 2020 brought a lot of changes to the way we do things. There has been a lot of focus on the shifts we’ve had to make in general business procedures such as the abrupt transition to working from home, but there are other transitions that have not gotten a lot of attention.
If your postings are anything like mine, you’re seeing a much larger applicant pool for the majority of your positions. These applicants range from those who do not meet the minimum qualifications of the position to executives applying for entry-level positions.
Those of us who have been in recruiting for twelve or more years have seen this before. In late 2007, the job market began to decline, and by the middle of 2008, we had entered a full recession. None of us saw it coming then. Just as no one saw the pandemic coming a year ago.
I’ve been in recruiting for almost fifteen years now, but when the recession began, I was the newest recruiter in my department, which meant that I was the first to be laid off. From December of 2007 to early 2011, I was laid off twice and eventually had to take contract roles to see my way through the recession.
It’s an interesting experience to be a recruiter and see this type of job market from the candidate side, and that experience gives me a different perspective on the job market today.
Candidate Experience
In talent acquisition, we talk a lot about the candidate experience, but as we approach the one-year mark of the pandemic, how has the candidate experience changed?
In the past year, we’ve moved more into phone and video interviews, and far fewer candidates make it to the in-person interview stage.
As recruiters, we need to do more to ensure that candidates still feel engaged in the hiring process rather than feeling like they are just names in the ATS. Each candidate’s needs are different, and each candidate has a different perspective on recruiters and the hiring process.
Some people see recruiters as helpful guides through the hiring process, some see us as a stepping stone to get to hiring managers, and others see us as roadblocks.
Of course, we all want to imagine that we are helpful guides for both the candidate and the hiring manager, so how do we ensure we’re in this group?
Empathy
We need to have empathy for the candidate and what they’re currently experiencing. The majority of the candidates who I’ve spoken to lately have lost their jobs or have been notified that they will soon lose their jobs due to the pandemic.
For those who have been out of work for several months, many times you can hear the anxiety and the desperation in their responses. Candidates might be reaching out for updates more often, asking for more introductions, and checking on their applications more.
Let them. Be responsive with candidates, take a little extra time to talk to them and to hear their stories, and let them vent a little.
They are going through a very difficult time, and many of them feel that they have no one to talk to about it. Don’t assume that because a candidate follows up a lot or they seem a little desperate that they are a bad candidate.
As recruiters, we have a lot more candidates to choose from than we did a year ago, but that’s because the candidates have fewer jobs to choose from now. Instead of assuming that someone is a bad candidate because they have been searching for a job for six months, give them the benefit of the doubt and be patient with them.
What is Overqualified?
Don’t consider any applicant to be overqualified for a position. People have different reasons for taking a step back in their career, and most times you won’t see those reasons in their application, resume, or even cover letter.
If someone with a director title applies for an administrative assistant role, but you still feel that they could do well in the position, give them the courtesy of a response. They may hear the salary or the details of the position and decide that it will not be a good fit, but they may be genuinely interested in taking a lower position than their previous role.
There are many reasons for this type of move – they may need more time to care for a family member, they may have transitioned to homeschooling their children, or they may simply be looking for more work-life balance.
Whatever the case may be, these candidates deserve equal consideration.
Keep an Open Mind
Be open-minded. Consider candidates who have more diverse experience rather than looking for “cookie-cutter” candidates. Many people are taking the changes in the job market as an opportunity to switch directions or focus on the parts of their jobs that they love but may not have gotten to do as much in their current or previous positions.
Often recruiters and hiring managers have such specific ideas of the candidate we’re looking for that we can overlook a great candidate who has a slightly different background. Keep in mind that diversity of experience and diversity of thought can add a lot to a department, project, or workgroup.
If everyone comes from the same industry, has the same work experience, and went to the same schools, then everyone will have the same ideas. Adding diversity of thought and backgrounds can bring positive change to a team.
There are many ways that we can make this job market more tenable to job seekers, but the most basic need most candidates have at the moment is for recruiters to be a resource.
Sourcing Cookbook: A Recipe to Save Time and Increase Conversion Rates
I enjoy automating my sourcing workflow. In this article, I will share my sourcing cookbook recipe which will lead to an increase in conversion rates and reduce the man-hours of manual tasks.
Let’s find some Solution Architects, shall we?
Step 1. LinkedIn
We can use an awesome Boolean builder. In this example, I’m using the one from Mike Cohen.
Once you have your preferred Boolean lined up and combined with the “Concatenate” function, it’s just a matter of copying it in the keyword section in Linkedin.
I’m using my own Boolean string in my keyword section of LinkedIn:
And here’s the result:
Step 2. Scraping and Enriching Data
What’s next? I’m using two different tools, Quickli* and SalesQL. Both scrapes instantly the shortlist from the LinkedIn result above.
Why scraping? Simply to be time-efficient. Additionally, reaching out via an InMail shows less conversion rates (average of 18%) compared to using an email campaign.
I make sure that the data is cleaned up and is copied to values in a neat CSV.
Once I scrape the data, I upload it into my own Google spreadsheet and enrich it as shown below. I use this spreadsheet to keep track of the sourcing funnel and make it visible to the hiring managers.
Then, I use contact finder tools such as Contact-out, Kendo, and Swordfish. You will still need to check the email validity with an email verification tool. Personally, I’m using Clearbit or Bouncer to check a whole list of candidates in one go.
Another option that is more time effective is using SalesQL. In comparison with Quickly, SalesQL automatically populates it with e-mail addresses. To be fair, SalesQL did get me often only 60-70% of the correct e-mail addresses. So, it is important to always check your email deliverability.
For the remaining 30-40% undeliverable emails from SalesQL, I will use Contact-Out since their e-mail deliverability is around 90-95%.
Step 3. Reach-outs
Now, it’s time to drive the e-mail campaign.
I prefer to use Lemlist instead of reaching out to candidates one-by-one. By doing so I save time and I keep track of all my activities in combination with using my own master sheet.
I created aliases for all my hiring managers. I can create this easily at the Email Provider Settings.
Once I imported my shortlisted candidates in Lemlist, I created a “personalized” message in sequences as if I’m the hiring manager. This will increase my chances for a higher conversion rate.
To avoid the email campaign ending up in the SPAM boxes, I ask my ICT support team to give me the Tracking Custom Domain of the company I work for.
As a result, I have gone from 18% conversion rate to 42%. The best part is that I cut out some manual tasks.
Step 4. Site Searches
I’m leaving LinkedIn and I’m searching via Google.
In this example I have built this string:
site:linkedin.com/in -inurl:dir intitle:”architect” (”Microservices” OR ”event driven architecture” OR ”Microservices architecture”) (”springboot” OR ”java 8” OR spring) (”implementation of CI” OR ”implementation of CI” OR ”continuous development” OR ”continuous integration”).
Since the multiple OR statements are sometimes counterproductive, I also try site search:
Once I have the search result, I use Dataminer to scrape everything in one go. I can use one of the recipes in the Dataminer’s Public Library and I can download the results as a .csv file.
I will upload the results into the master sheet I’m using, enrich it, and start e-mail campaign via Lemlist.
Step 5. GitHub Search and Automate Enrichment
In this example I use the following:
site:github.com ”block*report” (”Springboot” AROUND (40) repositories) (”Microservices” AROUND (40) repositories) (”Kubernetes” AROUND (40) Repositories) -inurl:followers -inurl:following
Alternatively, people could use this to get even more diverse results:
This time I only want to scrape all the GitHub user names using Dataminer. Accordingly, I need to tweak the recipe by revising the selector (in the column section) to get the desired results.
I use the following a:first[href*=’’github.com’’]** (Credits to Bret Feig)
After downloading the results, I make sure that the data is cleaned up and copied to values in a neat .csv file. Then I use Amazing Hire to upload my results and to automate my cross-reference and enriching part.
Look! Amazing Hire showed me the candidates I was searching for. I can easily look at their social footprints or enrich my data. I will export the file and upload it again in my master sheet with the enriched data. By using the same steps as before, I have saved a lot of time by cutting out a lot of manual tasks.
Step 6. Remove Duplicate Data
I will make sure I remove duplicate data to avoid sending the same email twice. Since I’m working with Google sheets, I can remove the duplicates under the data tab after selecting the column.
Et voila! Now you can make your own delicious time-saving recipe.
On his first day in office, President Joe Biden signed 17 executive orders aimed at swiftly dismantling a number of Trump administration policies that his aides say caused “the greatest damage” to the nation.
Don’t worry – we’re not going to dive into a lengthy political debate. But it did get us thinking…
What happens when a business leader – who influenced, directed, or dictated the terms of culture at an organization – leaves the building?
How does this impact the direction and momentum of an employer brand – should it flex and adapt to the aspirations of a new CEO?
OK, these are some big questions to take in. Noted.
But they’re certainly warranted, given that, over a 12-month span, nearly 1 in 5 companies can expect their sitting CEO to be fired. With this transfer of power becoming ever more common, we set out to explore the role of employer brand at a time of transformational change.
By taking an honest look at the status quo, organizations can course-correct without changing the wider direction and momentum of their existing employer brand.
The new CEO on the block – what should employer brand professionals do?
Let’s be honest: nobody appoints a new leader to maintain the status quo. By and large, this move indicates change.
However, that doesn’t mean you need to tear up your employer brand and start from scratch.
When a new CEO or senior executive joins a company, employer brand leaders need to find the conviction to interrogate the status quo and ask important questions. What you’re really looking for is the truth.
You want to uncover, warts and all, the accurate realities of today and pair these with the aspirational vision of where the new leader wants to go tomorrow.
This could mean that 90% of your employer brand stays the same and 10% changes. The exact figures are irrelevant – the point is that from an employer brand perspective, you need to capture, characterize and articulate the realities of today and the aspirations of tomorrow.
After all, sometimes the journey yet to be realized is the biggest motivator in encouraging people to work for your organization.
By aligning your existing employer brand with the new leader’s business strategy, you can ensure the two are moving together on the same path. This is the key to building an employer brand that becomes a functional tool for your organization.
The building blocks of an employer brand
To help make sense of the role of employer brand at a time of change, we use an evolving employer brand philosophy that aims to break down and establish how each element should work together.
At the most fundamental level, an employer brand needs to be able to satisfy basic psychological needs. We consider purpose, impact, and belonging as the three foundational ingredients that every successful employer brand should strive for.
Next, we arrive at the specific expectations and behaviors that an organization espouses and believes in. Essentially, these should be a distillation of what matters most to your people. Remember, this will vary depending on the company and the culture.
The key is to find expectations and behaviors that can serve as guiding principles (something everyone will buy into).
As we move up the pyramid, we arrive at perhaps the most interesting, tactical component – the strategy and proposition. Here, an employer brand needs to satisfy the material and conscious needs of employees, which is best delivered via a ‘Give and Get’ employee value proposition (EVP).
This EVP statement should encapsulate what an organization expects of its employees and clearly outline what they stand to receive in return. We can analyze this through the lens of three different ingredients: citizenship, career catalyst, and culture.
Why you should invest in the 3 C’s
The three C’s – citizenship, career catalyst, and culture – play an instrumental role in shaping the material and conscious manifestations of your employer brand, especially at a time of leadership change.
From an employer brand perspective, citizenship encapsulates things like political voice, diversity, the integrity of leadership, environment and social responsibility, supply chain management, and much more.
Each of these issues is now top of mind for candidates and employees alike. As such, they need to be baked into an employer brand so that there are clear rules and expectations across the organization.
This mutual value proposition should define what is expected of employees and what employees can expect from the company in return.
Remember, a real employer brand shouldn’t look like a sunshine version of your company. It needs to address the harsh realities, the obstacles and challenges to be overcome.
By doing this, you can actually better account for the career catalysts that people truly care about. Whether that’s challenging work, proof of career development, or access to learning and development programs, defining these and working to enhance them is key, particularly at a time of wider organizational change.
Last, but certainly not least, we arrive at culture.
By looking objectively at the culture you have, you can identify the gaps and move in an aspirational direction towards the culture you want. At a time of change, this provides organizations with an honest and objective look at the current state of affairs.
When you uncover what people truly care about, then you can start to shape the culture around the issues and values that matter most to your people.
C-suite and executive teams have a vital role to play in demonstrating a commitment to these new principles. When there is a clear synergy between the company vision, business strategy, employer brand, and EVP, it becomes much easier to demonstrate where, how, and why change will be made.
This evolving employer brand philosophy will not only serve you well under new leadership – it will also ensure you build a more meaningful, effective, and impactful employer brand.
This three-part series looks at what’s next for human resources and talent acquisition. Part one makes a case for 2021 as HR’s moment of radical praxis, part two for rebuilding the relationship with TA, and part three for recentering what functions as the heart of organizations.
The Great Reawakening
If we’ve learned anything over the last year, it’s that the “doing things the way we’ve always done them” fixes absolutely nothing. Knowing that the world has experienced a period of collective, sustained trauma, there’s been a lot of talk about building resilience, agility, flexibility, and the like.
But what about grace? For ourselves and those around us? HR has long had its critics, both external and even some on the inside, doing the work. Where are the encouragers? Are you one?
The HR of 2021 is not going to be the same HR of 2020. Nor is it going to be the HR of 2019, 2009, or anything before. The HR of 2021 is part of a great reawakening on the part of organizations and the larger collective consciousness. In part one of this series, we advocated for introspection and a call to action.
In part two, we talked about empathy and repairing the relationship between HR and TA.
Now, it’s time to think about the future.
Lars Schmidt refers to HR’s internal conflict in his book, Redefining HR, reminding us that there is a distinction between the old-school teams and next-generation leaders. More than that, what we need at this exact moment is a way to and solidify HR as a next-generation function.
Finding Center
Given its role at the center of the action, critical to the health of the overall organization and all of its various functions, we would argue for HR as the heart, anatomically and metaphorically. The heart is necessary. You quite literally can’t go on without it, and yet, it’s pretty easy to overlook just how important it is, day-to-day.
You don’t always see your heart. You don’t always know when it’s hurting. And as a result, we sometimes end up more damaged than we realize.
There are a number of ways we could take this metaphor. However, we’re not here to talk about HR in a cutesy, Valentine’s paper heart sort of way. That’s been done before.
There are no two ways about it: HR is a vital organ and, as it stands today, is pretty broken. And once you’ve been heartbroken, you have to pick up the pieces. You have to reconsider patterns and habits. You have to rethink who you were, decide who you want to be, and unlearn what you once believed in order to evolve.
Reflecting on her 2020 HR heartbreak, Kayla Moncayo wrote, “We must stop convincing humanity they have to experience tragedy to earn good things in life.”
Do you hear us, HR?
We want to see HR through a “can’t live without out it” lens. In a “this is the department that keeps your organization happy, healthy, and alive” sort of way. CEOs are always the first to say that their people are their biggest asset. And HR represents the people.
Despite this undeniable connection, the HR muscle has weakened over the years, and its heartbeat has slowed. But HR can’t neglect its own health any longer.
Beyond Purpose
The pre-pandemic narrative focused heavily on reskilling and upskilling in the face of automation. We read scary statistics from McKinsey that estimated “between 400 and 800 million individuals could be displaced” and “75 million to 375 million may need to switch occupational categories and learn new skills.”
We talked about work-life balance or work-life integration and whether remote work was actually productive. We let HR get sick with worry about an unknown future rather than work as an organization’s main artery of support.
You’ve likely heard of purpose-driven organizations. Deloitte explains that purpose “articulates why an organization exists, what problems it is here to solve, and who it wants to be to each human it touches through its work.” Deloitte also shares that these companies witness higher market share gains and grow three times faster on average than their competitors while achieving higher workforce and customer satisfaction.
These are the types of ideas that make the C-Suite care, and let’s be honest, if HR is the heart, the C-Suite is the brain. There’s no denying their role – or say – in the matter.
Getting There
So, with that in mind, we’re not going to say we have the business case for a heart-led approach to HR all figured out. What we do know is that present circumstances aren’t the only reason HR is in this place. Organizations have been neglecting these teams for years. It wasn’t until HR was needed the most that anyone realized how bad things had gotten.
The good news is, we’re waking up.
Still, we can’t move from old-school to next generation if we don’t acknowledge the value in emotional intelligence and the softer side of what HR represents. If we’re to believe that humans are an asset, we must treat them as such, including HR and its varied professionals.
Yes, hearts can harden, and encouraging HR to become heart-led will mean working through the pains brought on by years of derision and disdain. There will be valves to unblock before HR will live at the center of organizations, where it can focus on connecting with others, creating and caring for the community (and itself), and pumping in fresh energy and ideas.
That will take acknowledging lived experiences, shoring up weaknesses, providing help when it’s needed, and demonstrating grace whenever and wherever possible.
And, of course, it will take a whole lot of heart.
This three-part series looks at what’s next for human resources and talent acquisition. Part one makes a case for 2021 as HR’s moment of radical praxis, part two for rebuilding the relationship with TA, and part three for recentering what functions as the heart of organizations.
A New Relationship for HR and Recruiting
The last 12 months have delivered countless clichés. Now more than ever. The new normal. These unprecedented times. We also heard a lot of “We’ll get through this together,” which seems to indicate a level of solidarity that didn’t exist pre-pandemic, so why would it now? The world is full of silos, and HR is no different, often caught in a tug of war with related functions, but mainly TA.
Much like the two-party system, HR and TA’s rift is growing increasingly contentious, despite everyone ultimately wanting what’s best for the organization. HR wants to own TA, likely because it factors into their performance, while TA is on a Rodney Dangerfield-level quest for some respect for their expertise.
The ownership mentality pits one side against the other, allowing the misery and judgment to continue. That said, if 2021 is HR’s moment of radical praxis, it needs to do more than self-reflect.
It needs to assess its collateral damage and find a way to repair relationships. TA first. You need each other more than you realize – or are willing to admit.
Before we hug it out, let’s look at what happened and how we fix it.
The Power Struggle
For today’s purpose, we’re going to talk about radical empathy. The concept, which has a few definitions, encourages people to consider another’s point of view. The key is to consider it even when (maybe especially when) we disagree in order to connect more deeply with the other side. “Side” is an important word here because there are almost always two sides to every story (and relationship).
Some say there are three: yours, mine, and the truth. But what about yours, mine, and ours? Are we on opposing teams – or the same one?
Regardless, the trouble begins when people start to struggle, something the pandemic only exacerbated. When we start to struggle, we tend to see ourselves as alone, without resources, direction – or help. When we feel alone, we get scared and look for a way to control the situation.
Wanting control leads to power … and you probably see where this is going.
Researcher Brené Brown sees power as the real issue, noting that Reverend Martin Luther King, Jr. said power is “the ability to achieve purpose and effect change.” That right there could be the mission statement of both HR and TA professionals the world over.
And even though these functions aren’t known for their power within organizations, Brown goes onto say, “What makes power dangerous is how it’s used. Power over is driven by fear. Daring and transformative leaders share power with, empower people to, and inspire people to develop power within.”
Now, some will take umbrage with her use of the word leadership, and to that, we say, don’t. It doesn’t matter if you are an HR Business Partner or Talent Acquisition Associate. Leadership isn’t what’s wrong here – you are all leaders in your own right. It’s power – and power is in direct conflict with radical empathy.
A New Position
To improve the connection between HR and TA, you need to stop looking for power over the other. That’s not going to improve outcomes. Instead, you need to think about how you’re evaluating your team, as well, a team. How are you working together to engage talent? Who is talking to who?
HR needs to stop looking down on recruiters as less-than, and recruiters need to realize that HR isn’t the enemy. One does not have power over the other.
Having more experience doesn’t make you more empowered. Ageism works both ways (and isn’t helping anyone!). Assuming you need to power over someone more experienced than you because you’re more innovative, or assuming you need to power over someone less experienced because they lack expertise is only making things worse. No respect!
For these barriers to come down, you can’t be too busy (or powerful) to talk to each other. In the world of Zoom, are you making time?
Remember open door policies? Have the doors slammed shut? Think about creating one specifically for HR and TA. Make it an open-heart policy, one that enables you to get back on the same team and become true partners.
That could mean hosting office hours so recruiters can check in with HR and vice versa. Don’t sit – or struggle – in silence. HR and TA are both based on relationships. Yours can be mutually beneficial if you remove fear, power, and shame from the equation. Is it going to take work? Absolutely.
But as Brown says, “Getting it right is more important than being right.”
Likewise, getting to a place of radical empathy will be a build process. There will be growing pains along the way. Building is rarely seamless or easy. Still, someone needs to take the first step. Someone needs to open the door.
We need to put joy back into the work we do. It’s supposed to be fun to hire. It’s supposed to be rewarding to partner with the people around us. If we move away from power and ego and allow trust and collaboration back into the HR-TA relationship, we can center ourselves around connection and humanity, as Brown urges, and use empathy to drive our agendas, cultures, and values.
This three-part series looks at what’s next for human resources and talent acquisition. Part one makes a case for 2021 as HR’s moment of radical praxis, part two for rebuilding the relationship with TA, and part three for recentering what functions as the heart of organizations.
What Happens When HR Gets Rehired?
By now, we all know about 2020 and its impact on HR and TA. For many, it meant turmoil and disruption, subject to job loss and the search for something new. For others, it meant a call to action, to perform without a roadmap or resources in place.
There is burnout on both sides and a lingering sense of uncertainty. A lot has happened in a relatively short period of time, and many of us are still working to reconcile and process. Even so, we know from past crises that things will turn around eventually, and when they do, it pays to be prepared.
But how do you prepare when there’s still so much unknown? You turn inward before looking out. Many things remain outside of your control, especially now, but there’s always more you can do inside.
There are different ways to approach HR’s role within an organization. For years, we’ve heard the call to “secure a seat at the table” and “think more like marketing,” and while this advice is no doubt well-intentioned, it’s also misplaced.
There’s exhaustion to work through, fatigue – and let’s face it, a bit of an image issue to reconcile. 2020 only illuminated that, and without self-reflection, these symptoms will only get worse. It’s time for solutions, for radical praxis.
Here’s why:
Shifting Mindsets
If you work in HR or a related role, take a minute and ask yourself what you’ve learned over the last 12 months. Do you want to keep doing this work? Because if there were ever a moment to get out, it would be now. Are you still in it? OK, keep reading.
If you’re in it and committed to continuing, you need to be in it harder than before. HR is harder than before. Recruiting is harder than before. And things might get worse before they get better. We don’t know. Accepting that we’re dealing in unknowns, we need to start identifying what’s changed.
For one, there’s the continued push towards “strategic” HR, a word we’re all so sick of hearing. Still, to move ahead, we need to understand what this means in today’s context. For years, HR existed as solely transactional. The departments where someone would show up and say, “Can you answer my question about X benefit?” or “I need your help to hire Y.”
That was it, like ringing up an order at the grocery store. Scan the items, hit total, collect the money, and hand over the receipt. Have a nice day – see you maybe never. A lot of old school practices are based on this type of methodology.
Over the last decade, folks have been working to break down this wall and introduce “strategy.” In doing so, we overlooked that HR had been taught to be guarded, to protect their information and knowledge. So much so that HR folks were encouraged not to talk to their peers because why would you share trade secrets?
Not to take a seat at the table or in that meeting, to sit quietly and do the work. Not to ask for what you want and need from leadership. Not to feel worthy of budgets, opinions, or perspectives.
Sure, you could argue it’s because no one encouraged you to speak up, but think about what got internalized along the way. Some unlearning needs to take place. Now, we have this call to be strategic. The call itself isn’t new. It’s just growing louder.
Strategic exists on a continuum: one that favors relationship building, asking for help, learning from one another, and more. The problem is, how to be strategic when you still have the transactional work and less headcount to rely on? HR is being pulled in different directions.
Hence the need for a reckoning.
What’s Next
By definition, praxis refers to the necessary relation between theory and practice – making the implicit explicit. Radical, in most instances, means advocating for complete change or reform. Taken together, the idea of radical praxis is about embracing a new way of thinking and being.
If we’re to make the implicit explicit, HR needs to rethink its role as soon as possible.
HR can continue on this current path, where all of these problems can continue to exist and rehire and pretend none of this ever happened, or it can figure out its problems and pivot in a new direction.
In some organizations, HR might remain strictly transactional if that suits the workforce and culture it supports. In others, it might need to become more strategic to help redefine the employee experience.
HR is full of employees. Employees who need help, coaches, and training. Employees who also face burnout if not considering self-compassion and boundary setting. Coming off the back of 2020, HR probably needs this “now more than ever” to reconcile the “us versus them” mentality that’s led to this point.
It isn’t HR against employees or HR against the organization. HR bridges the gap between employer and employee and needs to demonstrate that it serves both parties (and itself) equally.
That takes emotional intelligence and self-worth, two things that aren’t always easy to quantify or develop.
You don’t have to be kind. You can remove the heart and humanity from the equation. You can choose productivity and efficiency.
HR has done that for years, and ultimately, you have agency over the decision.
It’s the power of choice that makes 2021 your moment to decide.
