The iPhone Dilemma

By Julie Geurin

I just spent the last 6 months deciding what phone to get. When I realized last summer that a) it was time to combine my work PDA and my personal phone and 2) my Razor wasn’t going to last much longer (yep, a Razor—that old-timey little phone that fit perfectly in my back pocket), I knew I had to make a decision. The answer was very clear—get an iPhone. And my husband did. He downloaded apps, played games, and learned to surf the web on it. He can entertain himself for hours with that thing. And it’s definitely cool. I really like it.

But as time dragged on and I waited for my upgrade, the winds began to change a little bit. I asked friends and strangers. I played with my seatmates’ phones on planes. I read online reviews and articles. I talked to IT folks. I used my husband’s iPhone. And I started to hear people say that if you need it for work, Blackberry is actually better. And the iPhone battery is the pits. And I do love a keyboard. But wait, the Android and Chrome operating systems are coming out on SmartPhones now, and they are the next new thing. Argh! It is all so overwhelming.

But the time has come. I can’t talk on my phone for more than 15 minutes without it being plugged in. People routinely laugh when they see me pull out my ancient Blackberry—the word “brick” is frequently used. I have to decide. And then it hits me…I have spent more time on this decision than any decision I can ever remember making. I didn’t even date my husband this long before marrying him!

That made me wonder…How many decisions do I rush through rather than giving them this kind of thought? And what decisions do I drag out rather than just committing to an answer and living with the consequences? What could I have done with the time I spent agonizing over the right phone?

I can’t be the only one making this mistake. What decisions have you rushed through and later regretted? In what situations do you drag out the decision longer than necessary?

Why you should evaluate talent like spaghetti sauce

By Kevin Impelman

I recently viewed a talk by Malcom Gladwell on TED in which he discussed spaghetti sauce and happiness. He told a story about Howard, a psychophysicist, who consulted with food companies to determine the precise ingredients necessary to appease the critical mass when developing a new product. When Howard was working with Pepsi to determine the precise sweetness for Diet Pepsi the data did not fit a nice bell curve (i.e., one level of sweetness did not stand out). His frustration with this finding led to a ground breaking epiphany - he should have been looking for perfect Pepsis not the perfect Pepsi.

His subsequent work with Prego provided him notoriety for this insight. He took a scientific approach to understanding what types of spaghetti sauce people enjoy. Rather than look for the favorite spaghetti sauce, he administered many different types of sauce, evaluated the data, and found that the American public fell into 3 clusters of sauce styles: they like either plain, spicy, or extra chunky. The food industry up to that point was trying find universals - products that appeal to the greatest majority. Furthermore, most spaghetti sauce up to that point was thin, and chunky did not exist, yet people now buy chunky sauce in droves. Howard's work pointed to the fact that one spaghetti sauce may make the majority of people sort of happy, but 3 kinds of spaghetti sauce make almost everyone deliriously happy. This is why today we now have 36 types of Ragu and 36, 864 different ways to have your Whataburger.

So what does this have to do with evaluating talent? Well, universal solutions do not work very well in matching people to organizations either. Don't get me wrong, there are certain traits and abilities that are important to have regardless of your company or position, but that only makes your customers sort of happy - not deliriously happy. Understanding how your company is different, how positions are different, and how you can select for those specific differences will help you make better matches for your employees. Trying to find your one "ideal employee" using the same method for evaluating candidates across positions doesn't get you there. Trying to find the "right employee" for your culture and for certain positions helps you create a competitive advantage in acquiring talent. Your west coast hourly employees may be of the "garlic parmesan variety" while your east coast hourly employees may be of the "chunky garden variety" - using the same methods to identify and select these employees will inevitably miss those nuances.

So the next time you order your double tall, nonfat, no vanilla syrup, extra foam caramel macchiato that makes you deliriously happy - you may want to think about what type of employee makes your customers happy and if you're evaluating talent as if they are all black coffee.

Hire for what you can live with…

By Julie Geurin

I love my job. I really enjoy offering solutions to help my clients hire the right people and seeing the positive impact that has on their business. But a big part of that is telling them not to hire the wrong people. That part is a little trickier. Have you ever tried to talk your teenager, or a close friend, out of dating someone who is all wrong for them? This is pretty much the same thing. “But, Julie, I really like this candidate. We just clicked. I know they have an issue with (fill in the blank), but I can change that.” And I want to agree with them. I really do. But the reality is that I usually don’t.

You see, as someone with a Master’s in Training and Education, I want to believe that everything is developable. And most things are. One of the first things I learned in all my education classes was this—you can teach almost anyone almost anything given enough time. But there’s the rub…who has that kind of time these days? Managers hire with the best intentions of developing someone, but the needs of the business quickly intrude, and they find to their dismay that the new hire is consistently underperforming, and for all the reasons they should have expected when they hired them.

What a frustrating situation for all involved. Managers don’t want underperforming employees, and employees don’t want to underperform. But if you’re hiring with the expectation of “fixing” them, you will most likely be disappointed. Hire someone you can live with today. If you develop them, you’re already ahead of the curve. And that sure beats trying to manage an underperformer. Even someone you really like!

Organizational Diseases

By Chloe Lemelle

Have you ever had this thought come through your mind…? ‘Bob’s constant negativity is draining and de-motivating to everyone. My company would be a much better place to work if he wasn’t here...’ Or how about this one…? ‘Sue is the only thing about my job that I don’t really like. Her overly critical attitude gets on my last nerve.’ These Bobs and Sues are what I like to call organizational diseases. They are the type of people that basically come into organizations and infect people. No one wants to get caught in their wrath and people are somewhat sickened by their presence. In essence, these organizational diseases can take a person who is otherwise satisfied and what I like to call organizationally healthy and make them unhappy and organizationally fevered. The more influential they are, the worse the disease becomes. In fact, these diseases can be more like a plague or an organizational pandemic that permeates throughout the entire organization and corrupts everything in their path. So, why are so many organizations fraught with these organizational diseases?

Here’s the thing. Oftentimes these organizational diseases gain clearance into the organization, because they are not detected at the outset. They are typically people who are good at what they do and capable of performing the job. That’s why they get hired. Their bearing on other people and subsequent infestation has little to do with whether or not they will get the job. So then, is a person who is really good at their job, yet noxious to those around them truly a good hire? If a person is causing other highly qualified people to feel less satisfied and potentially leave the organization, then aren’t they more detrimental than effective? If only there was a vaccine to screen and prevent these organizational diseases from coming onboard… ah, the beauty of personality assessments.

HR "Fear of the New"

By Kim Hefley

Sometimes HR policy drives me crazy. It’s legalese based on fear rather than providing relevant guidelines. A recent article from SHRM on HR policy on social networking sites fell squarely in the “fear of new” category, and I’m frustrated with the out of touch advice. http://www.shrm.org/LegalIssues/FederalResources/Pages/BlurredLines.aspx

The article warned HR managers on the dangers of Linked In recommendations, and encouraged policies prohibiting managers from posting recommendations on networking sites. Supervisors should not be allowed to provide informal comments on Linked In, because they “may cause a lot of problems.” Supervisors should stick strictly to the company review! And by the way, we should remind supervisors to monitor work friends on Facebook for signs of harassment or discrimination.

Wow. I’m trying to imagine that discussion. I’m also trying to imagine the credibility of HR if we persist in this kind of antiquated outlook.

We want to hire smart and innovative employees. They look for jobs on these sites. They put more stock in what colleagues say about them voluntarily on their profile than the requisite “meets expectations” performance review. Linked In connections are the new version of the rolodex. That is the real world. It’s also one in which HR can take a leadership position. I see our clients using Twitter, Facebook and Linked In for recruitment and marketing. It’s working. Instead of trying to pigeon hole these sites into circa 1970’s HR policy, we can look at the possibilities these forums offer in finding and keeping the right people.

Jane's Epilogue

By Kevin Impelman

The business owner decides to go ahead and hire Jane. She works for 3 months and does a great job. Such a great job, in fact, that she is promoted to a manager position. In the meantime, the business owner has changed their policy on tattoos in the workplace which has significantly increased their recruiting pool. The business owner feels good about their decision.

One day, a customer comes in and complains about the service they received from an hourly employee. The customer asks to speak to the manager, and in walks Jane. When Jane explains she is the manager, the customer is appalled that this “young girl with the tattoo” can in fact be a manager. Upset by the experience, the customer walks out and doesn’t return. The business owner hears about the situation and immediately institutes a policy restricting management staff from having visible tattoos.

Is this a fair policy given the customer’s experience?

How many delighted customers need to outweigh alienated customers?

Do a few star employees compensate for a few upset customers?

If you can’t see your managers or directors with tattoos - why hire them at the hourly level?

Jane's tattoo

By Kevin Impelman

You're a business owner and you come across Jane who is an enthusiastic, hard working, and smart worker who has a lot of experience in your industry. Her application and resume look outstanding and everyone who has interviewed her has great things to say about her. As she stands up and turns around after her interview, you notice a tattoo on the back of her neck. Everything about her felt so right, but you have a strict policy about employees not having visible tattoos. She can't grow her hair out immediately, so what do you do??

I have had several conversations recently with clients who are running into this issue more often than they would like. Currently, 14 percent of people in the United States say they have a tattoo, however one-third (32%) of those ages 25-29 and one-quarter (25%) of those 30-39 have tattoos (Harris Interactive Poll, 2008). So managers and owners are having a much more difficult time staffing their businesses with this growing trend. I completely understand the necessity of promoting a "professional environment" and the dress code that supports that climate should certainly be determined by the business owner as it relates to the strategy. However, I think this all points to a larger issue.

As humans, we like to categorize people and group similar things together (even if they are not so similar). This helps us get through life easier. This helps us not run away from someone with a gun as long as they have a shiny badge and blue uniform. This also is the source of stereotypes and group bias. We make broader inferences and assumptions about someone from one small observation. So what does this have to do about Jane and her tattoo? Many hiring managers make assumptions about a person's work ethic, stability, and character based on their external appearance. When there are clear and reasonable standards about not having certain piercings or tattoos as they impact the customer experience, it makes sense to draw the line on acceptable appearance. However, when a hiring manager is clouded by their personal assumptions and biases when evaluating someone based on their external appearance, we get into problems.

I enjoy helping our clients build selection systems that drive their success and profitability, but I am also proud that we curb biases and assumptions in the hiring process for the candidates' sake. I am happy to see people being evaluated as individuals as it relates to the job as opposed to a just another group member. As a hiring manager, you should be evaluating one person - the candidate - not the candidate who had a similar tattoo as someone who quit, or the candidate who went to the same high school as someone who failed, or the candidate who came from the same company as someone who alienated their co-workers. You are evaluating one person and their fit to the job.

Maybe as we begin to incorporate a fairer, more objective way to evaluate people for their jobs we will eventually live in a nation where candidates will not be judged by the presence of a tattoo but by the content of their character. Maybe it's just a dream....