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Think Your Meetings Stink?

March 9, 2012 by charlie

It is possible that no other topic gets more air time in management journals, newspapers, and business school classrooms than “effective meeting management”, and here’s another example from The Wall Street Journal reporting on “stand-up meetings”.  There’s a tsunami of theory, conjecture, assumptions, and assertions on how to conduct better meetings!  Is it possible that poor meetings are simply the reflection of the irrelevance, the lack of maturity and/or the willingness to waste time of the meeting participants?  If you are asked to attend or are attending a bad meeting, well, then, change its course or leave!

Do not even attend a meeting when:

  1. You have not received an agenda beforehand.  Do not hesitate to ask for one!
  2. There are more than 10 invitees (with exception).  Rarely, should there be more than 1 person representing a function, and I am having a hard time thinking of 10 functions in any one organization.  If there is more than one representative invited from a specific function, then the reason should be readily apparent otherwise somebody’s time is being wasted.

Leave a meeting when:

  1. It has not started after 10 minutes.
  2. You find that you have nothing to contribute.  Warning signs may include: 1) blank note paper except doodles and unrelated rants, 2) a strong desire to fall asleep, 3) a desire to check and respond to text messages, and 4) words are not coming out of your mouth.
  3. The agenda is not followed, and there are no decisions or action steps to be taken.
  4.  Attendees have their laptops open.  This means that the meeting is really not that important enough to pay full attention.

Before leaving a meeting, though, HRInsights recommends that you excuse yourself, and indicate in polite terms why you are leaving.  It is possible that there has been a miscommunication or a disconnection that the meeting leader should have the chance to address and correct.  If there is no “push-back”, that’s your license to head off to something more productive.

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HRInsights Weekly Lightbulb 03-08

March 8, 2012 by charlie

This Week’s HRI “Lightbulb”  – Slow Your Roll

Wouldn’t you have guessed it!?  A new study published in the current edition of the Academy of Management Journal finds that when workers face a choice between right and wrong, they are five (5) times more likely to make the unethical choice when the decision is rushed.  One test put 146 undergraduates in a fictitious situation in which they received more money for lying and less for being truthful.  Some were given 30 seconds to make a decision; others, 3 minutes.  Those who had the longer to think were more likely to make the moral choice, and be truthful.  So, when in doubt? HRInsights says “take a deep breath, have a cup of de-caffeinated coffee, and consult an ethical colleague.”  You may prevent a corporate scandal!  (On a personal note, this technique also helps you respond more effectively to e-mails that “test your patience”).

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FMLA Advisor

March 8, 2012 by charlie

The Department of Labor has recently released the FMLA Advisor to help businesses determine if they are covered by the FMLA and if employees are eligible for coverage.  At HRInsights, we realize that you may not have the time to go through the entire advisor, but it is important to know if you are covered and if your employees are eligible.  So here’s a quick review of the FMLA:

The Family & Medical Leave Act:

  • Covers only certain employers;
  • Affects only those employees eligible for the protections of the law;
  • Involves entitlement to leave;
  • Maintains health benefits during leave;
  • Restores an employee’s job after leave;
  • Sets requirements for notice and certification of the need for leave;
  • Protects employees who request or take leave; and
  • Includes certain employer record keeping requirements

Eligible employees of covered employers are entitled to FMLA leave for:

  • The birth of a child and to care for the newborn child;
  • The placement of a child for adoption or foster care and to care for the newly placed child within one year of placement;
  • Care for a family member with a serious health condition;
  • The employee’s own serious health condition that makes the employee unable to perform the functions of his or her job; or
  • Certain military-related reasons.

So if you’d like to take a quick look at coverages and eligibility, here’s a simple way to do it:

Employers click here. Employees click here.  Go through the questions to find out.  If you’re unsure contact HRInsights’ HR Advisors to get further advice (go to www.hrinsights.com and click ‘I Need HR Advice’).

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HRInsights Weekly Lightbulb 02-28

February 28, 2012 by jim

This Week’s HRI “Lightbulb”  – Sleeping on the Job

Maybe it only happens to a few of us at work; the 15 minute “beauty sleep” after lunch.  I suspect it happens to many more.  And, quite possibly even a longer nap may be even better.  Recent studies have found that a simple 26-minute nap can boost employee performance by as much as 34% and alertness by 54%.  See this list of well-known companies which have recognized the importance of a well-rested workforce.  We at HRInsights say, “Sleep Hard!  Work Hard!

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HRInsights Weekly Lightbulb 02-23

February 23, 2012 by charlie

This Week’s HRI “Lightbulb”  – Hiring Veterans

This sentence in the WSJ from February 21, 2012 (p.B9), stopped me as I looked at it, “Hiring veterans isn’t something we should do to make ourselves feel better; it’s something we should do to make our companies better…”.  While translating military skills to civilian job needs is a hurdle, there are proven benefits of hiring employees with military experience.  The SHRM Poll, Military Employment 2012 surveyed organizations that have hired a veteran within the last 36 months.  Its key findings are noted in the graph below.

Benefits of Hiring Employees with Military Experience1

1 Source: SHRM Poll, Military Employment, 2012.

So, do something advantageous for your business while at the same time giving back to those who have given us so much.

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HRInsights Weekly Lightbulb 02-15

February 15, 2012 by charlie

This Week’s HRI “Lightbulb”  – Unemployment Levels

A robust unemployment level does not necessarily mean that finding good people will be easy when small businesses need to increase staff.  In fact, finding the right employee may actually be getting harder!  The Wall Street Journal headlines in its 2/14/12 edition, p. B9 that “Applicants Are Fewer, And Many Are Lacking”.  There are now less applications per job posting, and, of those who do apply, more and more are not qualified (65%!, from a survey of 215 recruiters nationwide).  What does this mean for small business?  Plan early, and plan carefully.  HRInsights recommends that small businesses structure a hiring process that reaches the potential applicant pool efficiently and that helps screen out unqualified candidates early.  As the economy continues to pick up, make sure you have the best organization ready and in place to bank your share of business.

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Why Small Businesses Fail

February 13, 2012 by Jack

They don’t really care about their Employees

Let’s be honest, small business owners and entrepreneurs, most of them, have little experience managing and leading.  They have ideas, they have a passion, they have conviction.  Small businesses don’t grow and don’t succeed because they don’t inspire and manage employees to share the passion of building something.  There is little to no time spent on the basics of management such as organizing files on employees, setting up objectives, showing how these relate to strategy, compensating on results and vision, hiring properly, legal compliance … and providing the direction that comes with the guidance of experienced HR management.

It’s all lip service.  It may be more fun to work at a small company where responsibilities can be more and the pains of bureaucracy less.  But, large businesses do invest in their employees – training, development, benefits, proper legal management, creating an environment free of sexual harassment and other discrimination.  Big businesses think about having some fun and including employees in idea creation and developing better ways to deliver in their markets.

Small businesses are always running, to the next crisis or the next opportunity … why? Because we think that’s what it takes to succeed.  And we are wrong!  Dead wrong!!  Companies grow because they have employees that care about the success, get guidance and accountability … and they create success by resolving problems on their own, delivering great customer service on their own, implementing a way for the company to save money on their  own.  But, that can’t be assumed, it must be nurtured and MANAGED.

I’ve worked at big businesses that really cared about development of employees and we’ve flourished.  I’ve worked at small companies and we don’t have the time.  That’s nonsense and short-sighted.  Financial ownership rarely understands the importance of this too and can become conflicted with these priorities that don’t appear to impact this quarter’s bottom line.  My advice, get some help, it’s not your expertise and you won’t ever make it a priority on your own time.

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Employees Love to be Loved

February 10, 2012 by jim

We all know that a big red heart is the symbol of Valentine’s Day, and for this reason February is also American Heart Month.  Heart disease is the leading cause of death among men AND women, and ultimately, your employees.  Do you care about your employees? Yes, you do.  That’s why February is a great time to show your concern for your employees’ health by generating awareness about the risk of heart disease and also by helping your staff do a “little something about it.” But, why make the effort?

Numerous studies conclude that there is a significant relationship between Organizational Commitment to Employees (OCE) and company performance (eg. Muse, Rutherford, Oswald, and Raymond; Small Business Economics, Vol. 24, No. 2, Mar. 2005).  OCE is defined by an organization’s actions toward and treatment of its employees including caring for their well-being.  Not to get too technical, but briefly there is a positive correlation between return on assets, return on sales, and return on cashflow and OCE.

I recently had the opportunity to listen to a presentation by Dr. Martha Grogan of the Mayo Clinic which recently published Mayo Clinic Healthy Heart for Life!.  This book promotes an innovative yet very simple plan that could help your employees understand where to focus and how to make it easy for them to succeed in reducing their risk of heart disease by well over 50%.

First a couple of questions (answers below):

  1. Which increases a person’s risk of heart disease more?

a) smoking a pack of cigarettes a day          b) sitting around all day, every day

2. How many hours per week does one need to walk briskly to reduce the risk of heart disease by at least 50%?

a) 1 hour/week          b) 3 hours/week          c) 5 hours/week

Here’s the “little something about it” part.  The Mayo Clinic proposes this simple regimen: “Eat 5, Move 10, Sleep 8″.  Per day, that’s: eat 5 fruits/vegetables, move for 10 minutes, and sleep 8 hours.  Pretty easy, right.  How can employers reinforce this program?

  1. Keep a bowl of fresh fruit and vegetables near the coffee or common area.
  2. Allow employees an extra 10-minute “walking” break.
  3. Schedule “walk-and-talk” meetings.
  4. Limit in-office e-mail; promote face-to-face discussions.
  5. Obtain a company discount at a local fitness center and/or provide partial membership reimbursement for club fees based on real-time usage.

What makes Mayo Clinic’s program more acceptable is that it doesn’t tell people what NOT to do such as the obvious (no smoking, maintain a healthy weight).  Rather, this program highlights easy steps to better health that even the most sedentary of us can manage.

We at HRInsights strongly believe that employers have a wonderful opportunity to better motivate productivity and loyalty of workers by providing assistance and support for their PHYSICAL as well as FINANCIAL well-being.

Answers:

1. a & b equally increase the risk of heart disease. 2. a, only 1 hour/week!

Note: 2 hours of active movement per week can reduce the risk by over 75%!

 

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Performance Review Systems

February 6, 2012 by jim

Remember the “rank and yank” employee performance review system?  “Rank and yank” is the slang term for the forced ranking system which Mr. Jack Welch pioneered at General Electric starting in 1981 and which was used to gut the “bottom 10%” performers of the workforce every year.  Mr. Welch is the almost mythic GE leader who garnered the nickname “Neutron Jack” for eliminating 100,000 company jobs soon after becoming the CEO.  I do not dispute that Mr. Welch was a brilliant business person who (one way or another) consistently delivered results.  I would just never classify him as the selfless, humble person categorized as the highest level leader in Collins’ book From Good to Great.  Is the “rank and yank” system consistent with your values as a small business leader?  Shouldn’t organizations be similar to families with shared values, shared ethics and common approaches?  If you agree, then perhaps the “bottom 10%” rule is a bit of an easy out; it may let management off the hook from giving employees the tough love that they may really need.

In the family model, divorce is a normally occurring reality, and divorcing from employees for misbehavior or for not sharing the company’s values, ethics and approaches is acceptable; not controversial.  But what about the brother/sister /employee who maintains commitment, tries hard but just cannot deliver a similar degree of defined results?  Uh, just cut them off from the family?  Hardly.

In many organizations, underperforming employees who maintain commitment to the company values may very well be mis-allocated human resources; maybe their capabilities better serve the company in another capacity.  I can count on more than two hands examples of hard-working, smart employees who under-performed in one position, but then went on to a very successful career at the same company in another.  Given the investment of time and money already in some of these employees, HRInsights recommends that you, as a manager, should consider the following before choosing a point of no return for both the company and the employee.

Step 1:  Revisit the performance criteria defining the success of the position.

  • Are the criteria relevant to the employee’s function?
  • Is the employee able to influence the outcome?

Step 2:  Evaluate why the employee has under-delivered on the performance criteria?

  • Does he/she understand what is required to be successful in the position?
  • Does he/she lack a key characteristic that is critical to success in the position, eg. communication skills, leadership, ability to work independently?

Step 3:  Evaluate if there is another function in the organization which would be better suited to his/her capability set and past experience.

Step 4:  Consider transition to another position or begin termination process.

Good people who share your company’s value and ethics alone are hard to find.  Once you have identified these people, do everything you can to insert them into the right place within the organization.  And, forget about being the next Jack Welch.  Mr. Welch was a good businessman, but he is old and he was wrong.  GE has since dropped Mr. Welch’s forced ranking system, because it was just insane to force people into categories where they did not belong.  Coincidentally, there is a relatively new corporate video titled, The GE Family.  In it, one employee’s comment summarizes the point well, “Once you become part of a family, why leave?”

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HRInsights Weekly Lightbulb 02-02

February 2, 2012 by charlie

This Week’s HRI “Lightbulb”  – Valentine’s Day

Valentine’s Day is a time for amour and passion with your love dove, AND it is also a great time for small business owners and managers to remember to reiterate the company’s policy on sexual harassment.  It is good HR practice to remind employees about this important issue once a year.  Don’t forget to have them sign acknowledgement forms.  And, HRInsights says if you have the meeting on this “love”ly day, you may want to skip the wine, but chocolates would be nice!


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