organisation | change-effect

We like it nice and hard

Posted on July 7, 2014 by Blog

The hard appeals to us, the hard is commercial. The hard is sure and certain. The hard is the thing that we yearn for. As humans we long to be hard, to be formed, to be clear, to be resolute in our existence. The hard makes sense, it makes it easy, it makes us believe and belong.

And anything that stands in the way of this is unhelpful, it is counter productive, subversive nonsense. That needs to be put in its rightful place.

The soft is for the uncommitted, the inconclusive and the indecisive, the soft is for the softies, the losers and the weaklings, the almost rans and the wannabes. The soft is what makes us vulnerable.

Giving people choice is soft.
Telling them what to do is hard.

Giving people responsibility is soft.
Taking control is hard.

Considering the views of others is soft.
Being decisive is hard.

Looking after the wellbeing is soft.
Measurement of output is hard.

We know what we need and what we want, we know what we value and where we excel. We understand what makes us tick. What’s soft is hard, what is hard is soft.

The rest is just a choice.

Refocussing HR…..on employees

Posted on June 23, 2014 by Blog

I’m constantly reminded about the need for HR to “refocus”. I get it. I hear it at conferences, in journals, on social media. We need to refocus. That’s great. Normally the schtick is based one of two things,

We need to be externally focussed.

We need to be commercially focussed.

Both are true and yet both are incomplete assessments of the state of HR. The missing piece for me, the area that we should not speak, the real truth is,

We need to be more employee focussed.

If you speak to anyone in a consumer facing marketing function, they will wax lyrical about the need to focus on that consumer, to understand their behaviour, to open the channels of communication with them, to have a dialogue and to serve (yes, I said serve) them better.

But when we come to the world of people management, it appears we feel that employees are somewhat of an inconvenience that get in the way of good HR practice. If only it wasn’t for these pesky folk, we’d be doing great things.

Yes we need to be commercially minded and we need to understand the context in which our organisations operate. Yes we need to be confident with the financial aspects of our business and the economic conditions. But we also need to remember that our primary purpose as a function is to understand our employees’ needs better than anyone else. And to serve those needs.

I have a simple test, a simple analytic that I’ve built up over a few years when assessing what we’re doing and whether it is worthwhile. Ask yourself three questions,

Does it make life better for employees?

Does it make things simpler for managers?

Does it add tangible value to the business?

And if you can’t say yes to one of these three questions, then you should simply stop doing it.

Here is my challenge to you, give it a go, ask yourself those questions. You’ll be surprised what you find.

You’re so fit

Posted on June 9, 2014 by Blog

“I just didn’t feel they were a right fit”.

That’s the feedback heard time and time again in recruitment. But is it fair? Is “fit” something that you can reasonably justify and does it really matter?

As much as we would like to pretend recruitment is a science, so much of it still resides firmly in art. We make decisions not just based on technical skills and abilities, but on how we feel about the person. And the irony is that we both accept and reject this concept in modern HR practice.

On one hand we applaud the Google approach to assessment and selection being analytic and impartial. At the same time we congratulate Netflix for their intolerance towards mavericks and disruptive individuals. We want you to have the skills, but we want you to fit in.

Of course fit has a whole host of discriminatory overtones to it too. I’m not entirely sure I’d be judged as a good fit in a conservative, Catholic institution. But that is perhaps a too trivial way of looking at things. What about a woman applying to an all male environment, or a muslim to a secular workplace?

Yet at the same time, I understand the importance of “fit”, the need for someone coming in to the workplace to embed within the team and to gel with the organisational ethos. In many ways I think the organisational fit will be more important than technical skills in the future of our corporate lives.

But is “fit” ever justified? I think it is. As a candidate, I assess an organisation on whether I think I’ll be happy there, whether it matches with my ethics and opinions. So why shouldn’t organisations do just the same thing, providing it isn’t discriminatory?

I think that’s ok. Don’t you?

All animals are equal….

Posted on May 12, 2014 by Blog

There’s an assumption that often runs through recruitment, that industry experience is necessary. That somehow the experience of a particular environment is more important than the skills and knowledge that may have been developed. It has happened to me in my career that I’ve not been considered for a job because, “they’re looking for someone with experience in x industry”.

I find this peculiar. In my career I’ve worked in,

the public sector
professional services
retail
media

In my team, we have people from a range of backgrounds, transport,manufacturing, media and financial services. But something I noticed over time was we have a lot of people who’ve worked in retail.

A disproportionate amount.

I tweeted something about this last week

and the response was really interesting. In general, there was a lot of positive reaction. But, of course, some people tried to argue the point. So let me tell you what I think.

No career path is the same and there is no “right” way to develop your career. But certain sectors provide a quicker, more intense training ground and experience than others. And retail is one of those.

Why?

Because it is fast paced, fundamentally aligned to the brand, customer focused, varied and genuinely commercial. Pretty much everyone working for a retailer understands why they are there, what they are there to deliver and their role in making that happen.

Each of the sectors that I’ve worked in have given me something different and something challenging, but as a learning ground, I don’t think anything was as formative as my time in retail. And when I recruit good people, a lot but not all, come from retail backgrounds.

So that doesn’t mean that good people only come from retail, or that retail produces only good people. But there is a higher likelihood that you’ll find a bright, commercially astute, experienced and organisationally focussed individual. They might add something to your organisation, even if they haven’t worked in that sector.

The myth of recruiting within sector is dangerous, arrogant and essentially lazy. Cross pollination is the new black, variety is the spice of life and change is the new normal.

All animals are equal, but some are more equal than others.

It’s just the way it is.