Max Malloy, Head of Employee Engagement & Communications at AMD, shared his thoughts on key topics to be discussed at the upcoming marcus evans 3^rd Annual Internal Communications & Situational Messaging Conference, December 4-5, 2013 in Boston, MA.

What protocols has AMD implemented to establish repeatability in internal situational messaging?

One of our tenets is congruous communications planning. It essentially means reduce, reuse, recycle in development of comms plans across various areas of the business. Developing one-off solutions is wasteful and shortsighted when you have a really smart team who can play off each other’s strengths and build out templates for plans that borrow the best from one another. It also ensures we are communicating the same priorities, channel descriptors, and paths forward across the business, which helps give executives the confidence that we are aligned and speaking with one voice.

What strategies has AMD utilized in order to maintain consistent and compelling messaging during organizational change?

An important aspect of promoting transformational themes throughout our messaging is brand voice. As we’ve activated a refreshed brand and purpose statement within the past few months, we weave the core messaging throughout every bit of engagement communications we contribute to the community. Always working to avoid the buzzword trap, we use great care to thoughtfully integrate certain keywords that reinforce the attitude and voice that represent AMD.

Whether it’s in blog posts, discussion threads, polls, or our own team’s responses to ideation campaigns, we feel it’s incredibly important that community members never move on from reading, participating or contributing without getting a strong sense of the brand-infused vibe of the community.

The other element is daily engagement within the community. Where editorial calendars used to work on weekly or monthly cycles, we now are working inside the community constantly, multiple times throughout the day. Questions, concerns, comments and contributions all flow in real-time, from around the world, so we’ve committed to being a conduit for helping identify connections between people and information in a real and useful way. I’d like to think we also work to set a good example that engagement communications means taking genuine interest in other community members and helping to facilitate awareness, education and connection.

How has AMD integrated solutions to combat the drop-off of Intranet usage common in many industries today?

Our smartest move was bringing in a true social business solution a couple years ago, so that we’d have time to launch and integrate with the existing and established legacy Intranet before it started dropping page views and clicks. We were fortunate to have leadership with the foresight to see that coming (looking at what was happening externally with Facebook and Twitter and saw the handwriting on the wall) and prepare accordingly. With each new wave of social-savvy young engineers joining the ranks and longer-term employees shifting their personal interactions to Facebook, Instagram, etc., the expectation is that there will be similar capabilities at work as they find personally and socially.

Our next big pushes are in gamification and mobile which speak directly to the notion of community recognition and reward, as well as fast, easy access to information. Browsing or engaging within the work community should be as easy as scanning Reddit or Buzzfeed on your mobile device and as rewarding as seeing likes pile up on the newest status update you posted to Facebook or post on Tumblr.

As a specialist in employee engagement & communications with AMD, how do you measure the effectiveness of internal communications initiatives?

We reinvented the way we measure to focus on three levels. Awareness, Education and Engagement. I suppose I could break into my Glengarry Glen Ross Alec Baldwin impersonation (“A.I.D.A – Attention, Interest, Decision, Action”) here, but I’ll resist the urge. It really is very similar though. Awareness is the broadest goal…it’s the measure of knowing that employees at least have a basic understanding of the goings on through the business. This is reflected in page views online and open rates in emails. Now, until AMD can track eyeball irises via webcam or smartphone, it is never easy to tell exactly *what* they’re looking at, but the general assumption is that if the community is giving content a cursory scan enough to not be caught off-guard if asked about it, that’s a win. Next is education.

If after giving content that initial scan, they choose to click-in…make an investment of time and energy to pursue a deeper understanding of the information, or provide the most basic feedback to the author or broader community, that’s even better. Education is reflected in email/online click rates and basic social functions (‘Liking’, ‘Following’, ‘Sharing’, etc). The biggest, toughest goal is engagement. Engagement is getting a member of the community to not just give time towards reading, but to give of their opinion and reputation. That’s scary and not something many people are comfortable with…especially at work…and within a very broad public venue like a social business community. Engagement for us is commenting on a blog, offering up an answer on a discussion thread, or best of all…writing and posting a blog or discussion.

Measurement of these can be relatively straightforward if it’s just a numbers game you’re chasing. But that’s missing a lot of nuance. It’s also about seeing how many new names are entering each phase on a regular basis. Where are those new names from? Are you impacting certain cultures or demographics with different types of engagement communications? And what is the reputational impact within the company for those who choose to get increasingly involved? Are employees who engage the community rewarded and recognized, or are they ignored. Those indicators need to work alongside more traditional analytics-based measurements.

About Max Malloy

With almost 20 years in digital/online community management and direction, Max’s passion lies around the promotion of organizational vision and cultivation of transformative engagement through both traditional communications efforts and social technology channels. Having provided both tactical, hands-on activation of multiple offline and online communications initiatives and strategic planning for industry leaders like AMD, Cox Communications and TXU, as well as government entities like Texas A&M AgriLife, Max brings a thoughtful perspective around authentic community messaging and connection. Originally from Pittsburgh, PA, Max now happily resides in Austin, Texas with his wife, two kids and myriad assortment of beagles, cats and other sundry creatures.

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1. Flexibility

The flexibility of contract help means you can enlist this employee for any length of time, from a two-week research project to a six-month website development and launch. You can contract help on a temporary or ongoing basis. This is ideal for short-term projects, particularly when they are inconsistent and sporadic. This means you don’t have to bring on an FTE when you don’t have long-term work for them to do, which also eliminates the need to reduce that staff when the work dries up.

2. Cost Savings

Temporary workers save your company money in many ways—from reducing waste to minimizing expenses. Consider the following:

• No vacation pay, sick time, or overtime
• No insurance costs or worker’s comp costs
• Reduced overhead, such as the cost of hardware and software
• Tax benefits, as contractors pay their own

3. Motivation

A contractor has built-in incentives to deliver quality work and quick turnarounds—because every self-employed individual knows that no work means no pay. With contractors, you’re less likely to deal with employee burnout or laziness. What’s more, referrals are the bread and butter of a contractor’s business.  The worker is self-motivated to meet or exceed expectations, if only because that’s how he or she keeps getting work.

4. Specialization

Contractors are constantly improving their skills as they take on new projects and gain new experiences. This works as another benefit for you—when you hire a temporary worker to do accounting, design, copywriting, labor or other help, you gain the expertise of someone who focuses on that particular skill set.

5. Fresh Perspectives

Contractors offer an invaluable benefit to companies that hire them—fresh perspectives. Think of all the methods companies use to drum up new ideas. With freelancers, you easily gain new ideas and perspectives simply by adding new voices to your team.

Your Thoughts

Based on the benefits outlined in this post, could hiring freelancers, contract or contingent labor be a good choice for your organization? Share your thoughts and experiences?

Shanna Mallon is a writer for Straight North, a Chicago Web design firm providing specialized SEO, Web development, and other online marketing services. Follow Straight North on Twitter and Facebook.

It’s wonderful when your career development manages to stay on the straight and narrow – with positive role models and good experiences – but all too often we learn our most valuable lessons from failures, from tactics or decisions that didn’t work.  Or from failed managers for whom we’ve worked, and those who apparently made error repetition a personal career choice.

With that practical experience in hand you’ll find yourself saying either, “yes, I should do that, when the decision is mine” or conversely, “no, I’ll never do that.”  Both experiences can offer valuable lessons and help shape your career.

One manager’s gems . . . .

Putting together an all-inclusive list can be an endless affair, given the myriad scenarios, personalities and business circumstances that could be involved.  Instead we’ll try to highlight the big mistakes.

These are provided in no particular order of relative importance, and only reflect my own experiences.  No doubt I’ve missed a few, so feel free to add your own experiences.

• General Adjustment vs. Merit:  Granting all employees the same pay raise, instead of varying increases on the basis of performance delivered.  It’s easy to administer, but rarely an effective strategy.
• Performance vs. Entitlement:  Rewarding management with a more generous hand vs. other employee segments – simply because they’re management.  Leadership is no more entitled to fair and equitable rewards than any other employee group.
• Overuse of Discretion vs. Objectivity:  Reliance on subjective measures in lieu of quantifiable results.  When assessing employees on a subjective vs. quantifiable basis management discretion can sometimes lead to abuses (favored sons, “halo” effect, or even discrimination).
• Abuse of FLSA Exemptions:  Avoiding overtime by treating non-exempt employees as if they were exempt.  Managers try this tactic all the time, for numerous reasons.  This is when you need to put on your policeman’s hat.
• Surveys says:  Using a title and a generic write-up for matching jobs against “the market.”  It’s the easy way; anyone can do it.  There’s nothing to interpret, is there?  And then there’s the matter of quality surveys vs. . . . the others.
• The Performance Distribution Curve:  Assigning employee performance assessments in a manner set to follow a bell-shaped graph.  The operative dirty word here is “assign.”  Nobody likes this tactic, except perhaps employment lawyers.
• Ignoring Internal Equity: Hiring candidates without consideration of how other like-qualified employees are paid.  There are no secrets, so pleasing the new one while angering two veterans is a dubious strategy.
• Title Inflation:  That meaningless “bone” you toss employees you can’t otherwise reward.  This tactic will raise fixed compensation costs without providing a corresponding benefit to the company.  You’ll eventually regret the decision.
• Absent Safety Valve:  It’s often said that a good compensation program should cover 85% to 90% of contingencies; for the remainder a degree of flexibility and common sense should guide the decision-maker.  For those more rigid in their thinking, for whom the policy manual is gospel, or those who avoid stick-out-your-neck decision-making, authorizing of exceptions can be a struggle.

Can you see possible rationalizations for each side of the above?  Of course, depending on a litany of possible mitigating circumstances, individuals and . . . whatever.  Just have a care that your rationalizations don’t become a pattern of excuses, and that you document.

. . . are another manager’s errors

Then there are those decisions that over the course of one’s career you continue to regret – wishing you had the time to reboot your thought processes.

• Hiring a friend / relative: If you would hesitate to sell them a used car, why would you ever think that hiring them would be an idyllic experience?  Correcting this mistake can be painful.
• Ignoring Office Politics:  “I’m not very good at politics” is a poor response to an important reality that all managers must deal with.  It’s all around us, so to pretend you’re above it all, or otherwise ignore it, is likely counter-productive.
• Performance will take care of everything:  No, it won’t.  Not anymore.  In today’s work environment image and exposure have grown in importance, to the extent that just doing a good job is no longer enough to ensure career progression, or even longevity.
• “I was too busy for networking“:  I usually hear this from people in transition, from those who failed to connect with colleagues, peers and industry insiders while they were employed.  You build a network when you don’t need it, so it’s there for you when you do.

Have I missed anything?  Are there other ill-considered practices or policies that you’ve experienced during your own career?

Of course there are.

Make sure that you learn from them.

Chuck Csizmar is the Founder & Principal of CMC Compensation Group,an independent global compensation consulting firm whose expertise lies in helping companies manage the effective and efficient utilization of financial rewards for their employees. He also maintains a popular blog on compensation at his website www.cmccompensationgroup.com.

One result of that education was a favored response when faced with a challenge at work; she would fall back on her class work experience by saying, “the greatest minds in Compensation say that . . . .“  It took a great deal of patience on my part to educate this part-time practitioner / part-time student in the difference between the classroom / textbook answer and the reality of the workplace.

A short while ago I came across an HR blog where the author was instructing readers in how to create a merit performance matrix.  Very good stuff, I thought, admiring the technical step-by-step instructions – except I knew from long experience that the procedure being described would never work in the real world.  Didn’t the author realize that?

While it’s very important to understand the technical foundations of compensation methodology and practice, first and foremost you need to anchor yourself in the real world, to know what will work and not work in your own organization – no matter what the finest minds in Compensation think.

Why doesn’t compensation theory match compensation reality in the workplace?

• Business realities:  Management will typically know more about a particular business situation than you do.  What you’re able to provide to the decision-making process as a compensation professional is limited to your particular subject area, while management usually has the bigger picture – the perspective of multiple viewpoints. Your compensation advice may not fit their business reality, no matter how logical an argument you make.

• Bias of decision-makers: Decision-makers may feel that they intuitively know the right approach to take (they’ve done it before, if-it’s-not-broke- don’t-fit-it mentality, a friend / relation / old college chum suggested an approach, etc.).  Perhaps they read an article and are now insisting on following the advice of an author who doesn’t have a clue about their organization’s business.  Years ago I worked for a company whose CEO forced HR to implement a particular benefit plan because he had read a magazine article.  It does happen.

• Problem avoidance: Short of killing the messenger, one solution for management is to do nothing about a problem – you’ve exaggerated it, the solution costs too much, let’s wait and see, etc.  Senior managers can be like politicians when it comes to avoiding a big decision – until it bites them in the leg.  Good or bad, remember that it can be dangerous to your career if you try to force a decision.

• Business culture or model: Some initiatives just don’t “fit” in your organization.  Managers with a relaxed organization style will not be interested in demands to document everything, standardized policies and procedures, or having approved forms for every possible use.  Implementing against the culture can be an exercise in frustration and futility.

Subject matter experts who instruct in compensation techniques should always remember to ground their instructions with a caution to students: remember to account for the reality of the workplace before taking a textbook technique to management.

Two examples:

1) Merit matrix:  When designing a pay-for-performance merit increase matrix the standard rule is to place the average increase percentage in the block populated by most employees (average performance and average position-in-range).   The reasoning for this technique is to better manage the costs associated with that year’s annual increase process.

Many years ago I followed that approach in my first compensation leadership role, and still have a little bump where my head hit the wall.

Here’s the rub: such a technique requires that the matrix change every year, as the analysis demands you annually consider where the population averages are.  But management will likely have none of that. They’ll want the same matrix every year, for ease of administration and communication.

2) Cost of living as a basis for pay increases: I once watched over a fascinating exchange on a compensation blog where the debate raged on for days over the appropriate formulae to use for calculating the cost of living vs. cost or labor as it affected the average pay increase that management would approve.  Each side provided formulae, charts, graphs and quotes from notable experts to press home their opinion.

The reality for this exchange is that management does not use the cost of living as a prime determinant in their decision-making.  They are more likely to roll their eyes at the technical debate and ask only about competitiveness and bottom line cost – and “why can’t we do the same as we did last year“?  If their decision relates to the cost of living in some way, that’s a convenient coincidence that they can use in their communications.

The contribution you can make to your organization is blending the technical knowledge (the how-to) with seasoning and experience to understand what will work for your organization, considering culture and management bias.  Technical knowledge will give you the same answer every time, but knowing how to use that knowledge like a craftsman’s tool to aid in achieving business objectives – that’s the key to success as a Compensation professional.

Chuck Csizmar is the Founder & Principal of CMC Compensation Group,an independent global compensation consulting firm whose expertise lies in helping companies manage the effective and efficient utilization of financial rewards for their employees. He also maintains a popular blog on compensation at his website www.cmccompensationgroup.com.

Envision this: The lead singer stretches over the edge of the stage towards an adoring crowd. He’s perfectly in-focus, the words almost visible in his mouth, and his outstretched hand thrusting the microphone into the frenzied space is … completely cut out of the frame.

I’ll spare you the technical details of photography, but in shooting music I try to focus on three important elements—composition, angle and camera settings. My picture with the missing hand was fine in terms of camera settings and angle, but because the composition was off, the whole image was a bust.

So how does this apply to benefits communication?

Just like that nearly perfect shot ruined by the rock star’s missing hand, I’ve learned that a single element of an otherwise perfectly crafted benefits communication campaign can cause a company’s message to completely miss its mark.

You might not realize it at first, but rock concert photography and benefits communication have a lot in common. It’s true! Of course, benefits communication is far more glamorous, but the two disciplines work best when the elements of composition, angle and settings come together to form a cohesive and engaging result.

Composition

Pictures are all about what you capture in the frame. In certain situations you want a tight shot of someone’s face, while other times a wide-angle that pulls all the action in from the stage is the only way to go.

In benefits communication, composition amounts to how much information an employer is putting out there at a given time. Too much information can induce a chart-and-graph coma, but too little can send employees on wild goose chases as they frantically try to track down the information they feel they need.

Knowing how to deliver content in a manner that is digestible yet useful is vital.

Composition—Is the front man and lead singer framed nicely—without important parts cut out?  

Angle

There’s more than one way to capture an epic guitar solo. Different angles speak differently to people, and not everyone will feel the same emotion when looking at an image.

The one-size-fits-all approach is bad for both photography and benefits communication. The angle of your benefits communication should hit an employee right in the gut, just like a breath-taking photograph that gets a viewer right where it counts.

If you want to ensure your benefits communication will truly have an impact, craft your content to appeal to what matters to employees as individuals.

Angle—Does the direction of the shot tell a good story, or does the viewer just see the back of the lead guitarist’s head?

Camera settings

No element is more important in taking a photo than the camera’s settings. Shutter speed, ISO and aperture dictate what information is recorded by the camera’s sensor.

This is the language of the camera, and without this information a photograph is simply not possible. The language used in benefits communication is no different.

A camera that’s not properly set will still record an image just like benefits communication that uses the same old boring, jargon-filled language will still present benefits information. You can do better.

 Settings—Has the camera been set to let in just the right amount of light to appropriately freeze the action, or is the drummer a blur behind his kit?

Get ready to rock

The goal of concert photography is to capture the energy and emotion of a live performance. In benefits communication, the goal is to deliver the information that helps employees understand and appreciate their benefits options.

By carefully considering the elements of your benefits communication, you can deliver the kind of content that portrays your company’s benefits as the genuine rock stars they are.

Mike Sosin is an employee benefits and HR technologist who helps organizations empower employees through the use of innovative tools and techniques. He currently works in business development for ALEX, a virtual benefits counselor that provides online benefits education for more than 1 million people across 90-plus organizations. Mike is also a frequently published music writer, blogger and photographer.

1.      Make Your System Transparent

One of the easiest ways to prevent accidental time theft, mis-classification of employees, underpaid taxes, and other common payroll issues is to produce a pay policy and put it in writing. Post it prominently and provide a copy to every employee.

The policy should lay out:

• How employees are classified. Wrongly classifying employees as exempt, nonexempt, or contract can put you in violation of the Fair Labor Standards Act and place you at risk of a lawsuit or audit.
• How wages, salaries, promotions, and raises are calculated; how the pay process works; when changes to payroll go into effect; and how the company deals with payroll mistakes.

2.      Avoid Manual Processes

Are you still calculating payroll by hand or in an Excel spreadsheet? The American Payroll Association estimates that error rates from manual payroll processes can cost you 1% – 8% of your total payroll. The more you automate your payroll system with a payroll services provider or payroll software program, the fewer errors you will have to pay for out of pocket.

• Simple ledger mistakes are frequent in manual systems due to its reliance on humans to transcribe hours and calculate wages. These systems are also easy for employees to manipulate.

3.      Regularly Audit Your Processes

Whether you utilize a manual timecard system or one that is computerized, you should audit your processes at least once a year. Even automated systems can produce errors. If these are not caught in time, they can wind up costing you. You may overpay an employee due to a math error, incorrectly classify a new employee’s tax status, or fail to increase the pay rate of an employee who was promised a raise.

• Double-check all of your paperwork and processes to ensure everything is functioning properly.
• If you are using add-ons or plugins to integrate your payroll software with your time and attendance system or accounting program, make sure that all of the connections are transferring data correctly.

4.      Prevent Time Theft

Time theft occurs when employees intentionally mis-record their hours, take overly long breaks, spend work hours on non-work-related activities, or use “buddy punching” to check in when they aren’t present.

• Implement a check-in system that automatically records an employee’s hours when they sign in or swipe their card. You can further decrease fraud by utilizing biometric sign-in hardware such as a fingerprint scanner.

5.      Stay Up-to-Date

IRS tax tables and Federal and state labor regulations change from year to year. It is important that your knowledge of these regulations is current. You can download the latest tax tables from the IRS website. If you use payroll software, make sure that it automatically updates each year so as to keep you in compliance.

• Pay particular attention to changes in regulations governing: income tax withholding, state unemployment taxes, child support withholding, and fringe benefit calculation and taxation.

The best practices for business payroll center around preventing errors and fraud that are commonly found in manual payroll processes. Transferring your payroll to a specialized software system or third-party administrator can keep your payroll in better shape. Whether or not you choose to go this route with your payroll, make sure that your process is transparent, that you audit it regularly, and that you keep it current with state and federal labor laws.

Bio: An avid business blogger, Megan Webb-Morgan writes for online lead generation provider Resource Nation. You can follow Resource Nation on Facebook and Twitter to get the latest business news and expert advice. 

As a result, employee morale has plunged off a cliff.

However there is one reward strategy you can employ that doesn’t involve following the popular drumbeat of negative messages and takeaways.   Other functional departments (i.e., Marketing, Engineering, Advertising) have already taken a different tract to deal with the new realities.   Creative minds set themselves apart, pushing brand identification to carve out market niches away from the beaten path.  Perhaps Human Resources could take a page from that playbook and view employee rewards in a more creative fashion.

HR can stand out from the crowd.

A changed philosophy

Companies fear wasting money on employees who don’t perform, so they often limit the administrative increases so often granted by their reward programs.  They feel they can’t afford a strategy that increases payroll without a corresponding increase in ROI.  However, they could increase the amounts paid to key employees while restricting the level of those who perform . . . less well.  That would place the high achievers at a fair or even generous pay level, but these winners would be only those who deliver an ROI back to the company.  You can afford to reward high performers, can’t you?

Employees who produce results are worth the money.  If you’re fearful of overpaying those who aren’t performing, you hold the solution in your hands / policy manual.  All it takes is the discipline to hold employees accountable and to take action against those who aren’t performing, who aren’t worth the money you’re paying them.

But that’s easier said than done, isn’t it?

Do you know what percentage of your workforce is rated at an average or lower level of performance?  50%? 60%?   If you still grant every employee an annual increase, you won’t be able to differentiate and properly recognize your key performers.  You won’t have enough money.  In that case the reward bar is inevitably lowered to cover the most common performance level.   Instead, why not raise the performance bar and get rid of those who can’t keep up?

If a manager has $10,000 for annual increases and tries to balance rewarding both high and average performers, the increases won’t be enough to recognize key players.   While the merit spend is calculated on average performance high performers need larger increases to feel recognized and appreciated.  A request to grant more than $10,000 will be denied, so what do most managers do?  They trim the increases of their best performers, in an effort to spread rewards as broadly as possible and keep everyone happy.

Does that work?

No, it doesn’t.   High performers will be discouraged and may rethink their future efforts as well as their commitment to your company, but your “Joe Average” will be pleased.  As behavior rewarded is behavior repeated, by using this make-everyone-happy tactic you’ll have encouraged more average performance and less high performance.  Does that sound like your reward strategy?

Okay you say, but if this concept is such common sense, why is the practice of holding employees accountable so seldom used?

The Management Fear Factor

Some managers fear what would happen if they took a tough line on performance = reward.

• They fear that employees are somehow “owed” annual salary increases.  “We have to give them something.”
• They fear their ignorance over how to conduct effective performance appraisals.  “Do these forms really measure performance?”
• They fear alienating  the majority of  average employees (see bullet #1)
• They fear what would happen if they exercised  the discipline necessary  to manage employees – because they want to be liked.

With a process designed to monitor and weed out the lower performers, and at the same time pay the higher performers well,  over time your new practice would retain more of those you want and rid yourself of those you don’t.  The employee performance bar would rise, fostering a more dynamic work environment that will in turn feed business performance.

You can afford to do this.  Consider the impact of increased performance levels on your bottom line.  Isn’t it worth the initial outlay of money to make that happen?

Caution:  The bean counters (Finance) are perennially afraid of spending a dollar to save two — or in this case, spending a dollar to earn three.  They believe that, while the dollar cost is real the suggested gains are “soft”; promises that can’t be guaranteed.

There’s no easy way around this phobia short of direct intervention from the top.  Lacking senior management support compensation practitioners will face a wave of passive resistance, if not outright defiance by managers tying to “help” the average employee.

Providing high performing employees with greater rewards can create a win-win scenario, a greater attraction for talented outsiders, an improved  team atmosphere focused on pushing the company forward — and less inequities to drag and drain the goodwill you’ve established.

Try it.  Spend a dollar and earn three.  It’ll be worth the effort.

Chuck Csizmar is the Founder & Principal of CMC Compensation Group,an independent global compensation consulting firm whose expertise lies in helping companies manage the effective and efficient utilization of financial rewards for their employees. He also maintains a popular blog on compensation at his website www.cmccompensationgroup.com.

Something has to be done to better utilize your payroll dollars.  Too much money is dripping out of your company like a leaking faucet – and not giving you much bang for the buck.

The challenge, then?  You have to change your world.

How do you do that?  Of course, there are program design considerations, costing models, impact studies, external and internal analyses, even focus groups perhaps, but at the end of the day you can’t simply snap your fingers.  Your ideas, your recommendations each need to be approved by the higher ups.  How do you make that sale?

Let’s start with the easy part; what not to do

When facing senior leadership with business-impact proposals, the quickest way to be shown the door is to tell them what they don’t want to hear.  That seems obvious, but basic judgment errors are commonplace when you’re so caught up in knowing the answers that you forget to focus on asking the right questions.

A few examples of how not to sell your ideas:

Leading with “it’s the right thing to do” is rarely a good idea.  Using an emotional, feel-good rationale is seldom a strong argument and is easily sidelined by the bean counters or anyone else playing the “this is a business” card.

“Surveys tell us . . . “ can be another weak point, because the argument that everyone else is doing something hasn’t worked in a debate since you were a kid.

Over analysis:  The more extraneous numbers you throw at senior management (numerical charts, graphs and regressed formula trend lines) to make your point, the more vulnerable your proposal becomes.  Over reliance on data risks having the numbers become the story, which can pull attention from your message.

I’ve worked with senior executives who felt compelled to ask multiple and often tangential questions about the support calculations they were shown, just to show that they’re engaged and shouldn’t be taken for granted.   So don’t let your proposal  rise or fall on the comfort level of decision-makers who are struggling through the details vs. the concept.

Principles of the sell-job

What follows is a series of suggestions worth considering before you walk into that critical proposal review meeting.

> First, make a business case:  Specifically,  seek to illustrate that the result of implementing your proposal(s) is that the company will win.   Once you have them nodding their heads at their own good sense, they’ll be more easily moved to support your recommendations.

> Tell a story.  Start with a statement of the problem, then augment with a back story that explains how the situation became so precarious.  Show the impact of inaction, then close out with your recommendations – highlighting impact, savings, reduced turnover, whatever your goal  is – that solve the problem.

> Do you know the ROI for your proposal?  You had better have one, as that could be your strongest argument.  Pros and cons?  Are there potential glitches?  Rarely will you have simple, uncomplicated solutions that can’t fail.  It would be better for you to address any troublesome possibilities early on, to soften the potential “gotcha’s” that could trip you at the worst possible time.

> Always have a backup plan.  As all-or-nothing strategies don’t work well outside of the movies you’ll need a plan “B” in your back pocket, just in case.  Better to get half a loaf today and be able to hope for more later, than crash and burn today because of pride and lack of foresight.

> You shouldn’t fall on your sword over your own ideas.  But be prepared to compromise.  Proprietary ownership of thought (I want it my way) should be secondary to achieving the business goal.  Often times pride does get in the way though, derailing sound concepts for the wrong reasons.  Remember that it’s not about you.

> The numbers rarely speak for themselves.  In fact, you’re at risk if you rely too much on statistics as your main argument.  Instead, paint a picture with text and a few graphics.  Use your figures and reams of data only to support the points you’ve already made.  Strategic thinkers balance technical skills with the art of persuasion, influencing others to undertake the desired action.  They don’t throw out a bunch of numbers and say, “see?”

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Even when the task ahead is daunting, go ahead and take that first step; it’s usually the hardest.  But if you’re prepared to achieve incremental gains vs. sweeping changes, if you keep your eye on the ultimate goal, you’ll find that the second step is easier, and then the third and so forth.

I’m reminded that “Rome wasn’t built in a day” is a classic and over-used phrase, but for good reason.  Because it makes sense.  Because it rings true.  So think of building blocks when you try to change your world.  Just don’t act like Don Quixote and run off chasing the windmills of illusion and distraction.

Chuck Csizmar is the Founder & Principal of CMC Compensation Group,an independent global compensation consulting firm whose expertise lies in helping companies manage the effective and efficient utilization of financial rewards for their employees. He also maintains a popular blog on compensation at his website www.cmccompensationgroup.com.

Typically we think of babysitting when there’s actually a dependent child involved, but it’s not uncommon for ineffective managers in the workplace to use the same concept when dealing with their employees. These managers seek to use the pay that their employees receive as a surrogate for leadership – for keeping those workers complacent, retained and generally “in line.”

The practice of manipulating rewards presumes that the employee will chase the money and will be happy with their lot, while at the same time not requiring much in the way of supervision, periodic direction or even meaningful conversation. The thinking here is that, if provided with enough rewards, an employee will act as desired in order to not jeopardize those rewards. The goal is to place the employee’s attitude and performance on automatic pilot while the manager is engaged elsewhere.

So far, so good. Not necessarily a problem, right? The red flag goes up when you ask whether these monies are warranted by either performance or business need, or are they simply bribes?

What are we talking about?

Scenarios where pay is used in lieu of actual management are easy to spot.

• The Grand Giveaway: Where managers try to give away as much money as they can to as many employees as possible, not worrying overmuch with distinctions between individual performances.  The goal here is to build an employee’s appreciation of their manager’s largesse.
• Title inflation: The promise of bloated and meaningless titles that distort organizational structures, for the prime purpose of rewarding employees in lieu of cash.
• Over-rated performance: Play the good guy by over-rating performance during salary reviews. Culprits are often seen rewarding activity over results. So look busy!
• Assured compensation: Take the risk out of rewards. Everybody receives an annual merit raise, everyone earns a bonus. This fosters an attitude of entitlement.
• Counter-offers: “Let’s make a deal” attitude to keep resigning employees from actually leaving; a dangerous practice that increases costs and lowers morale.

What’s the cause of this behavior?  Managers typically receive inadequate training (if any) on how to use their company’s pay programs, so many use pay as a crutch instead. Spending the company’s money effectively and efficiently isn’t on the radar screen. They use employee pay like a club to get an employee’s attention. And once they have that attention, the manager is off doing something else – with the presumption that pay will substitute as supervision and motivation while the manager is absent – kind of like a babysitter.

Weak and ineffectual managers don’t actually manage their employees when it comes to things like performance direction, leadership, setting good examples and decision-making. Instead, they want to be liked. They want to avoid conflict and they don’t want anyone to quit. They want employees to get along, and to help foster a friendly team atmosphere they try to manipulate pay in support of their efforts.

It’s really kind of a bribe.

So what is “managing” to these people? It’s not about making hard decisions. Too often it’s trying to get the most for their employees, deserved or otherwise, whether the organization gains in the process or not. The manager is focused on their own interests, and is using someone else’s money in the doing.

Why it doesn’t work

Relying on pay as a replacement for management has a short term effective life cycle, at best.

• Employees see arbitrary equal pay treatment as de-motivating to high performers. Why bother extending yourself if you’re going to receive the same reward as the guy doing crossword puzzles?
• Employees resent favored-son treatment; the names of those who benefit for non-performance reasons will always become known. There goes your morale.
• No amount of money replaces the value of honest performance direction and feedback. Those with an interest in learning and growing appreciate the help.
• Absentee managers lose the respect of their employees, who know what’s going on. Remember that employees leave managers, not companies.
• While employees will take any money carelessly handed out, the organization will not gain because of it. So these “rewards” are ultimately wasted.

For managers who need a crutch to help motivate and retain their employees, to help them do their jobs, the above cautions likely won’t make a difference. Their goal is not to manage, but to get-by, to be liked by their employees and to avoid disruptions to their routine. This is not leadership.

But for those managers who wish to make a difference, who understand that managing employees is a challenging and rewarding role, abrogating responsibility through babysitting is not an option.  They recognize it as the opposite of management, a damaging practice that will not enhance anyone’s long-term career prospects.

Chuck Csizmar is the Founder & Principal of CMC Compensation Group,an independent global compensation consulting firm whose expertise lies in helping companies manage the effective and efficient utilization of financial rewards for their employees. He also maintains a popular blog on compensation at his website www.cmccompensationgroup.com.

Voluntary employee benefits are an easy, affordable way for employers to enhance core benefits at no direct cost to the organization. They are also cost-effective for employees who can access the services at a lower rate than if they were to purchase them on their own.  However, voluntary benefits that appeal to Baby Boomers may not hold the same value for younger generations, so it is important to choose benefits that resonate with all age groups. One such benefit is a group legal plan, which allows organizations to offer employees affordable access to the legal services they need.

In any given year, seven in 10 U.S. households (71%) experienced an event in which they could have used legal assistance[1]. These events include traffic tickets, home purchases, will creation, estate planning documents and powers of attorney. MetLife’s Unlocking Voluntary Value study[2] found that Generation Y, Generation X and Baby Boomers all require some level of legal assistance, although specific needs vary:

• Generation Y (ages 18 – 31):  Common legal issues among this generation include credit card debt and debt collection defense, traffic tickets, landlord negotiations and DUI’s.
• Generation X (ages 32 – 47):  This generation’s legal needs migrate toward real estate transactions, foreclosure, estate planning, adoption, school hearings and will creation.
• Baby Boomers (ages 48 – 66):  Typical events that lead this group to seek legal assistance include tax audits, property sale, identity theft, powers of attorney, living wills and Medicare questions.

Group legal plans reduce mental and physical stress. 

An American Bar Association study revealed that more than half of Americans with legal issues attempt to resolve matters on their own1.  Most individuals outside of the legal profession are unfamiliar with the law and legal procedures; therefore, attempts to go it alone often result in a disproportionate amount of time spent and increased stress (mental and physical, which are intertwined). A Harris Interactive study, sponsored by Hyatt Legal Plans, found that the majority of employees (61%) who hired a group legal plan attorney spent less time at work worrying about, and dealing with, their legal situation[3].

Legal services provided through employee benefits provide convenient access to experienced attorneys. This reduces time away from work, on-the-job presenteeism and overall stress.  Through a simple implementation process, a group legal plan can help a multigenerational workforce address all these issues quickly, affordably and conveniently.

Three audiences are interested and watching; the management above you, peers and colleagues and those below you in the organization’s hierarchy―whether subordinates or rank and file employees. Picture each group pondering your actions and developing an opinion about you.

• Management: This group is comprised of bosses and senior leaders who can have a direct impact on your career. You want these folks to nod their head and smile when they think of you. You would like to be known by name and face.
• Peers: These are the coworkers you interface with on a daily basis, and you need to display the interpersonal skills to keep these relationships robust enough to get things done. The goal is to assist work processes and people, and run as smooth an operation as possible. You want their professional respect.
• Rank and file: These people are either your subordinates or those affected by your decisions/recommendations. They may be dependent on you, but may also whisper about you or spread nasty rumors―or they can rally to your cause. You ignore or mistreat these people at your peril.

Each group has a separate agenda, and over time you as a professional practitioner or manager will develop a reputation based on your actions, decisions (or lack thereof) and through word of mouth coming from those who interact with you. The net result is a label, a persona that surrounds you, describes you and marks you as a “type.”

We all get reduced to a “type.” Ask yourself, would the people you work with, or work for, want to spend time with someone like you? In other words, are you someone admired, someone viewed as a valuable source of experience, someone to learn from? Are you someone worth knowing?

Or would these same folks cross the street to avoid you?

And this is important because … ?

Would you want to have a drink with someone like yourself? If you would, what is it that would make sharing social time a worthwhile effort? If you’d rather not waste your time, what is it that would make interacting with yourself such a turnoff?

A number of years ago I cut back on my attendance at compensation conferences. It wasn’t the subject matter, or the cost, or even the locations that were the problem. It was that the growth and maturation of my career as a compensation professional had moved in a different direction from many of my colleagues. I preferred to have that drink with other “types.”

Most in the profession are very intelligent―many are even brilliant technical practitioners―but the evolving focus for me was the ability to convert technical savvy or textbook learning into effective applications of that knowledge and skill within the work environment. The “type” I was now interested in interacting with more had shifted from those focused on the theoretical to those focused on how specific applications impact and interact with others.

Too many managers and practitioners don’t get it when it comes to dealing with employees―and as compensation has a direct and constant impact on those employees, this ability to deal with the human element becomes of necessity―a critical component of success (or failure).

Do you see yourself as others see you?

• Do you have a reputation as a numbers person, or a people person–or perhaps you’re viewed as presenting a balance between the company and the employees?
• Is your interpersonal style one of engagement, or do you prefer to be left alone, to operate as an individual contributor best left to their own devices?
• Are you more comfortable dealing with theories and concepts, facts and figures, or the hands-on political and emotional realities of the workplace?
• Are you sensitive to the question being asked?  Do those around you sense empathy or arrogance – or simply aloofness?

Recently I refereed an argument about whether the cost of living or the cost of labor was more important in setting annual merit spend budgets. The debaters battled with charts and graphs, regressed formulae and reams of statistics–when a bit of common sense and practical experience would have shown how senior management would react.

Both practitioners missed the point, lost within the argument over technical accuracy and blind to the dynamics of human nature; both ignored common sense and the reality of employee perceptions. Both turned off their audience by their high-toned professorial statements.

Not the sort of reputation you’d like have at work, is it? Not with an audience watching, keeping score.

A well-rounded compensation pro not only understands the technical side, the analytical side to providing competitive rewards in an effective and efficient manner, but is equally comfortable dealing with the softer side, the people side of the profession.

An understanding that real people are affected by recommendations, that morale, productivity and engagement have a price tag as real as payroll dollars flowing out of the company, is a critical awareness that every manager should have.

Once you have that combination in place, adding a bit of persuasiveness and knowing how to modify behaviors will be like having the mortar that holds all the bricks together.

Then you’ll have a (mostly) complete compensation pro.

That’s someone I’d like to have a drink with.

Chuck Csizmar is the Founder & Principal of CMC Compensation Group,an independent global compensation consulting firm whose expertise lies in helping companies manage the effective and efficient utilization of financial rewards for their employees. He also maintains a popular blog on compensation at his website www.cmccompensationgroup.com.

From the opening keynote delivered by conference chairman Jeff Carlsen, SVP and Chief Human Capital Officer for Reyes Holdings LLC, it was clear that a foundation for HRIT starts with a strong global data warehousing process that acts as a reliable hub for other HRIT efforts. Without a data warehouse stocked with validated and secure human capital intelligence, the ability to coordinate and integrate other HRIT strategies and platforms is stunted, requiring multiple data entry points that make integration and alignment of HRIT applications clumsy at best and futile at worst.

Several delegates attending the conference had either just completed a data warehousing project or were in various stages of implementation. Others had their plates full managing global HRIT system rollouts, with efforts focused on unifying platforms to ensure company-wide standardization in human capital reporting. Another resounding message of the conference was that global consistency is no mean feat when considering the plethora of regulations governing employee data security—let alone languages—with EU countries (looking at you, Germany) singled out as requiring the flexibility of a Cirque du Soleil performer to navigate. Several organizations had dealt with (or were still dealing with) issues that arose through years of acquisitions, requiring the aggregation of employee data from dozens of disconnected systems that ranged from the robust-but-not-compatible to simple Excel spreadsheets.

Other messages worthy of highlight, spanning both strategic and tactical levels of HRIT system decisions and implementation, were discussed in-depth over the two very full days of presentations. While specific vendors were bantered around, with pros and cons for each, those comparisons were a bit too granular and company-specific for inclusion here. Overriding themes for sessions, however, included the following:

• Michael Canter, HR Director, Compensation, Benefits and HRIS for Easton-Bell Sports proffered several valuable messages in his presentation focused on change management. First was the seminal rule that technology alone can’t solve HR problems; a message that i4cp research has consistently reinforced. Second were some valuable insights into the mindset of employees when it comes to rolling out new technology and the importance of moving people from resisters to adopters by clearly articulating the value of the new technology to their work processes.
• Vana Matte, VP, IT Portfolio and Delivery for Dollar & Thrifty Automotive Group went back to a main theme with her presentation on building alignment between HRIT and business goals. This presentation was strong on building the proper perspective, affirming that successful HRIT is not about technology; it’s about business relevance and achieving organizational goals. One good take away from this presentation was that having business leaders take ownership and having them make the case to the CEO for an HRIT initiative helps to not only build buy-in, but  also grounds the efforts in what business leaders themselves indentify as their top needs and priorities.
• Randy Goldberg, VP Recruiting for Hyatt Hotels Corporation, switched things up a bit in his presentation, which focused on getting the most out of social media when it comes to talent acquisition. Aside from some great insights on the importance of mobile applications and accessibility, this presentation drove home the imperative of messaging that supports the culture and brand when looking for good employee fit. Conveyed also was that, good or bad, organizations need to embrace social media and have policies to manage those interactions. Oh, and there was a cool Gangnam Style video spoof (Jinan style) done completely by Hyatt employees. Priceless PR.
• Anna Langford, SPHR, GPHR, GPR, CCP, PMP, Director, Total Rewards for AAF International followed with another presentation on the value of alignment with business goals. Top take away: don’t identify yourself as an HR person with HR goals, identify as having your businesses goals first, with your route to achieving them coming through human capital management or HRIT implementation. It’s an important perspective shift if you want to keep your thinking relevant to the business.
• Sean Newcomb, SVP of Global HR Management Information Systems for Bank of America came next with a discussion of mitigating legal risk in HRIT management. On top of being rich in information supporting the need for a strong foundation (with plenty of detail on the importance of employee data privacy), this presentation was designed to take HR from being risk averse to positioning as effective risk managers.
• Erin Govednik, SVP of Global HR Management, HR Technology for Cox Communications shared her company’s journey in HR analytics, predominately discussing the lengthy processes of establishing data management to feed robust analytics. Erin echoed something seen frequently in i4cp research: the need for greater analytics skills in HR to fully realize the business critical nature of the information collected.
• Leigh Dunn, Director, ITS Business Partner, HR and Legal for the Kimberly-Clark Corporation led a lively discussion on moving from an on-premise to a SaaS HCM system. This was mostly a Q&A session, with lots of details being shared on implementation timeframes, hurdles, keeping up with new functionality, managing rollouts and some of the more important aspects of vendor management. In general there was no lack of participation throughout the conference, so the roundtable was a good format for interactive learning.
• Michelle Smith, CPIM, CRP, VP of Business Development for O.C. Tanner came next with a slightly different focus: employee enrichment. This was more of a general leadership presentation, focused on enriching the lives and working experiences of employees as opposed to simply engaging or aligning them―a next step in the process of developing well-rounded employees that went beyond the work environment.
• Karen Sansone, Global HR Process and Technology Leader for Becton, Dickinson & Company was up next with her presentation on globalizing HR shared services with enabling technology. Besides reasserting the main themes of foundation and alignment, Karen talked us through the establishment of a global service center model with tiered levels of complexity, all beginning with a web portal that looks the same for BD employees around the world.
• Jason Grover, HR Director, Global Technology for General Mills kept with the themes of aligning to business strategy and having a strong foundation in data. His hierarchy for HRIS is to start with the business strategy, build the data to inform decisions, use the information to feed analysis, use the analysis to gain insights and to use insights to improve decision making. The basic take away here was to not be distracted by the shiny objects when deciding on HRIT systems. You may want a Ferrari but what you really need is a truck, so focus on what gets the job done for the business.
• Tiffanie Lewis, HR International Business Technology Manager for General Motors followed with a presentation on managing a global HCM system rollout. In conveying how completely complex this process can be, Tiffanie provided us with a plan that involved: finishing what was ongoing, developing a plan (business needs, language needs, etc.), developing a team, collaborating with IT and then tweaking based on feedback from each deployment. This last step is important for making each rollout smoother than the last. Again, knowledge of global data privacy regulations was emphasized as critical.
• Craig Hurty, VP Human Resources for Aetna, rounded out the presentations with a practical discussion on the impact of technology in driving the future of HR. So far, most HRIT has been about reducing headcounts and costs associated with HR, but the future will need to see HR focusing on identifying and exploiting opportunities to drive strategy through human capital. A good take away was that best practices are not strategy; best practices are implementing someone else’s strategy. Also, HRIT should be accessible and useful to everyone, not just HR.

As a final note, this was my first marcus evans event and―though i4cp does not vet or endorse vendors―I have to say that it delivered what was promised. It was an intimate event for high-level HRIT professionals in a top-class venue (although the casino ended up with way too much of my money!). The presentations were excellent and well-focused, and the solution providers (vendors) that were invited had valuable services that meshed well with the needs of attendees. Many fellow attendees commented to me on the great networking opportunities, and while there was a lot of valuable information sharing in the open forums I could tell that a lot of great connections were made to keep that sharing going in the future.

Kudos and thanks to the marcus evans staff for an all-around worthwhile event!

Using those guidelines as a framework to craft your company’s safety standards is a great place to start.

However, if you completely base your approach to workplace safety on government mandates, you’re not doing your employees any favors. Instead of viewing safety solely as a matter of compliance, and in order to fully protect employees from potential occupational hazards, companies should consider the unique conditions of their working environment and customize their safety practices, policies and training accordingly.

While customizing workplace training for a small office environment may come easily, the challenge is more pronounced for large organizations. Companies employing hundreds or even thousands of individuals must address different departments, different job responsibilities and different working conditions. The following five tips will help as you focus your efforts to create a safe and healthy workplace for your employees:

1. Identify objectively positive safety goals

Within a large group, trying to generate a consensus on any matter can pose a challenge. Therefore, when dealing with a large organization, it’s wise to start broadly and develop  basic goals related to safety that are difficult to object to. For example, in an industrial workplace, everyone would agree that proper use of dangerous machinery is prudent. Therefore, begin with that concept as a strategic goal and customize a route for achieving that goal that accounts for the specific challenges posed by your working environment.

2. Deliver safety-related information in a clear, organized manner

Information related to workplace safety often seems dry and boring, and the way many companies disseminate that information to employees is ineffective. For example, giving a lengthy safety manual to an employee on his first day of work and expecting him to immediately absorb its contents is unrealistic and ill-advised. Similarly, conducting marathon, day-long safety training sessions that cover a multitude of different topics will leave employees feeling overwhelmed. As a result, important information is often lost.

A better approach is to carefully craft employee safety training in an organized, easy to comprehend manner. For instance, take a specific piece of the training manual and conduct a hands-on training event (not a lecture), complete with demonstrations and interactive discussions. Covering a single topic during a shorter training session is much easier for employees to absorb. To be truly effective, these sessions should clearly demonstrate the context of how the safety issues fit into the larger workplace framework.

3. Consider employee morale

Employees who suspect that their supervisors are not focused on their safety and wellbeing will be less likely to take pride in their jobs, and productivity will decline. Unchecked rebellious rumblings in any workplace can be catastrophic for production, efficiency and worker safety.

In contrast, employees who feel respected and protected are more likely to work efficiently and to abide by employer-enforced safety procedures. Companies should take great care to convey their interest in employee safety and satisfaction when designing a comprehensive safety plan. One way to do that is by turning what’s often a boring, mundane lectures about safety issues into thoughtful, engaging discussions. Infusing humor, encouraging employee participation and generally adopting a more hands-on approach will help enliven safety training.

4. Make safety a normal part of the conversation

Providing an annual review of safety information for employees, while well intended, won’t create results. If management discusses workplace safety infrequently, employees who are consumed with their day-to-day responsibilities will likely forget important information and revert to bad habits. Therefore, employers should routinely emphasize workplace safety. Requiring attendance at frequent official training sessions is a good start. An even better strategy is to regularly observe employee performance and to provide detailed, constructive feedback. Focusing on mistakes and areas that need improvement is imperative, but it’s also a good idea to recognize and reinforce good performance.

5. Encourage employee participation

Some large companies may have the luxury of employing individuals whose sole responsibility is workplace safety. However, those individuals can’t be everywhere at once. As a result, supervisors should encourage employees to voice concerns about unsafe conditions. Fostering the sense that “we’re all in this together” will undoubtedly lead to a safer, more secure working environment.

Making employee safety a priority will have many positive effects. First, it cultivates an atmosphere in which employees feel respected and valued, thus creating motivation for the staff to succeed. That alone has huge potential business benefits. In addition, studies suggest that a proactive (rather than mere reactive) approach to workplace safety dramatically reduces accidents. On-the-job injuries impact affected employees and their families, but they also are detrimental to employers in many ways. This makes a customized, organized safety plan a sound strategy.

At www.safetyservicescompany.com, Jay Acker’s editorial group makes materials for conducting weekly safety meetings, safety training programs, posters and other items.

We were the herd, the squiggle of arms, legs and heads all pressed together into a single unit. We weren’t considered individuals, and  weren’t treated as such. But this groupthink unit of ours built camaraderie, a comfort zone for each person as a part of that unit. All for one and one for all.

Chances are that you’ve had similar experiences, whether you shouted “Moo!” or not.

This was a time and place when conformity paid dividends, taught us the value of the group, as well as the safety of having numbers behind you. Individual thinking wasn’t a prized commodity back then. I realize now that such experiences don’t help you to become, well, you. The group focus suppresses the individual personality.

And here we are today. As a manager within your organization, as someone responsible for employees who report to you, as someone expected and required to make decisions that impact others, your world has indeed changed. Your previous comfort source of the groupthink, that safety blanket for your personal needs, should by now have been relegated – like old photos and distant memories – to a time and person that you no longer resemble.

Or I should say, that you shouldn’t resemble.

Follow the leader

Another game from my childhood was “follow the leader,” where in essence, each of us did whatever the leader said or did. The first one to miss a step was “out.” Now, look around you.  Look at the personalities of your leadership. Look at yourself in the mirror. Is that game still being played?

At any age, playing “follow the leader” is considered an easy and safe practice, even for today’s managers. Because we still like to stay in a crowd for safety.  Because nobody seems to admire the Lone Ranger these days.  Instead of being viewed as a visionary or a fellow with core beliefs and a stand-your-ground-type, this renegade is more likely tagged as an eccentric who is out-of-touch with common business operating practices.  Marching to the beat of a different drummer makes for a great comic poster, but all too often isn’t considered a career-enhancing move.

So what does this tell us about a related and all too prevalent management style?   Conformity is in, and while singularity isn’t exactly out, that outlier mindset certainly faces a series of obstacles.  Because let’s face it, it’s hard to criticize someone for repeating what everyone else is saying.  But it’s a lot easier to look sideways at an opinion that differs from the common thread.

While the “yes man” mentality is often the butt of office jokes, the sarcastic humor is that it’s all too real – too commonplace in a consensus style management structure. We’ve all seen plenty of examples of supposed leaders tripping over themselves to agree with the big boss.

Managers who have been around the block a few times will tell you that he who sticks their head up above the rest gets it chopped off.  Instead of risk-taking, we often hear numerous explanations (excuses?) for sticking to the middle road:

• “Everyone else is doing it“
• “The survey says . . . .”
• “It’s common practice,” or its new age version, “it’s best practice“

Managers may be reluctant to blaze a new trail unless and until they’re comfortable that everyone else is already on that trail as well.  They’ll tell you in a bit of free advice, that going it alone is risky business.

So there seems to be less interest, less focus on identifying and following solutions, strategies or just simple programs that relate directly to this particular company, with this particular set of challenges, and with this particular employee culture. Instead, we follow the “path often traveled.”

Breaking the mold

So how do you step out from the crowd? What must you do to stand apart as a principled manager, as one who declines to follow the “yes” mentality of peers and colleagues?

• Challenge the status quo: Ask questions, especially those that start with the word, “why”? Don’t accept the excuse, “we’ve always done it that way.” That attitude enables the slow downward spiral into irrelevance of programs that have been ignored for too long. So kick the tires and check the gauges – because repetition without analysis is the worst form of administration.
• Justify your actions: On the other hand, change for the sake of change is equally inappropriate. Build support and leadership buy-in by developing recommendations and program initiatives that advance the interests of the organization. Always have a “why” answer in your pocket.
• Use reason over emotion: Strive to become the manager who makes balanced business instead of emotional decisions when it comes to providing rewards for employee efforts.  There will always be a certain type of individual who will have personal wants and needs for more compensation, but that alone is not cause for action.  Provide rewards for performance delivered.

Perhaps the most difficult challenge that faces you is  standing by your convictions – to become more of a leader and less of  a follower.

This is not the time or place to pass the buck with a muttered, “Moo.”

Chuck Csizmar is the Founder & Principal of CMC Compensation Group,an independent global compensation consulting firm whose expertise lies in helping companies manage the effective and efficient utilization of financial rewards for their employees. He also maintains a popular blog on compensation at his website www.cmccompensationgroup.com.

Interview with: Sean Newcomb, Global Head of HR MIS, Bank of America

Las Vegas, NV, September 28, 2012 – FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

Too often Human Resource (HR) technology executives fail because they do not invest the time needed to understand the business, instead just focusing on the technology components, Sean Newcomb, Global Head of HR Management Information Systems at Bank of America, highlighted. “They need to understand the business processes and policies the technology enables,” he elaborated.

A speaker at the upcoming marcus evans HR Technology Summit, in Las Vegas, Nevada, November 12-13, Newcomb shares his thoughts on mitigating technology related risk in the organization and driving the organization forward.

What should HR technology executives pay more attention to today?

They need to spend more time to understand the business of HR In today’s dynamic regulatory environment, where HR priorities and policies can shift quickly, they must be able to support that shift by aligning their resources to HR’s highest priority work.

What legal risks should HR Information Technology (IT) executives be aware of and pass on to the rest of the organization?

First and foremost is the safeguarding of employee data and ensuring compliance with privacy laws. There are also additional laws in the US, such as the Americans with Disabilities Act, so they have to consider the accessibility and usability of their online tools.

I would also highlight HR’s role in implementing the organization’s social media policy, which needs to be thoughtfully designed to address personnel risks. There must also be appropriate monitoring in place so that employees can be held accountable for what they say and do.

Social media is a reality of our everyday life. Some HR organizations are reluctant to embrace new technologies, probably because of the fear of the unknown rather than actual risks. Social media can enable dynamic employee interaction and be used as a learning tool for new employees. It can also be a real time feedback mechanism for the organization to see how employees feel about the company.

As more companies embrace mobile technologies, what advice would you have for HRIT executives?

Companies are very eager to embrace mobile technologies, as they really do help employees be more efficient and productive. However, they do raise new questions and risks. For example, what are the FLSA impacts related to employees leveraging a mobile device to respond to work emails after hours? How do you address end user authentication and ensure proper data protection protocols are in place?

Nevertheless, mobile technology is the world we live in today and if organizations do not enable that, it will hinder their ability to have a productive and ultimately happy workforce.

Any final thoughts?

HRIT should not operate in a vacuum where it deploys technology for the sake of technology. It must try to solve business problems with the appropriate application of technology.

Interview Conducted By: Sarin Kouyoumdjian-Gurunlian, Press Manager, marcus evans, Summits Division

Contact: Jenny Keane

Tel: 312-540-3000 x6515

Email: Jennyk@marcusevansch.com

About the HR Technology Summit 2012

This unique forum will take place at the Red Rock Casino, Resort & Spa, Las Vegas, Nevada, November 12-13, 2012. Offering much more than any conference, exhibition or trade show, this exclusive meeting will bring together esteemed industry thought leaders and solution providers to a highly focused and interactive networking event. The Summit will include presentations on talent acquisition and development, innovations in HRIT, social media in the enterprise and connecting corporate initiatives through HRIT.

For more information please send an email to Jennyk@marcusevansch.com or visit the event website 

The HR Network – marcus evans Summits group delivers peer-to-peer information on strategic matters, professional trends and breakthrough innovations.

Please note that the Summit is a closed business event and the number of participants strictly limited.

About marcus evans Summits

HR Technology Summit 2012

Red Rock Casino, Resort & Spa, Las Vegas, Nevada, November 12-13, 2012

http://www.hrtechnology-summit.com/HRTechnology_SN_Interview

marcus evans Summits are high level business forums for the world’s leading decision-makers to meet, learn and discuss strategies and solutions. Held at exclusive locations around the world, these events provide attendees with a unique opportunity to individually tailor their schedules of keynote presentations, think tanks, seminars and one-on-one business meetings.

Business leaders and human resource managers cannot afford to be so cavalier in their commitment to consensus. Sticking to the concept of proper consensus management can lead to happier employees and more robust bottom lines.

What is consensus?

Consensus is a method for group decision-making in which the goal is to arrive at a final decision that is acceptable to all members of the group because each  had a say in its formation. Effective consensus decision-making leaves every team member feeling that they have been heard and that their ideas have been considered.

Consensus can be a very powerful tool for human resources because with it you can unite employees around a common goal and generate greater productivity. Consensus also fosters a climate of cooperation with employees collaborating to solve problems.

Because it involves the participation of everyone within a group, fostering consensus builds more buy-in from individual employees who feel they have more say, and therefore more of a stake in business processes and outcomes.

Five Ways to Implement Consensus for Group Decisions

As a human resources manager, it’s important to know some of the considerations that should be weighed before implementing a consensus-building model.

Important ideas to consider:

1. Lose the attitudes that undermine consensus. A team that operates in a “win-lose” environment – one employee’s idea must prevail over another’s – is not going to do well with consensus. Consensus building can also falter on a team with members who routinely avoid conflict. For effective dialogs to take place, employees should be encouraged to speak their minds, but also to understand that everyone has an equal say. Bear in mind that reaching consensus does not necessarily mean a unanimous decision.

2. Have regularly scheduled meetings. A team using consensus management must meet frequently to allow every team member the opportunity to have a voice in decisions. There also should be a consistent process at these meetings for employees to voice their opinions.

3. Foster an atmosphere of open communication. Employees will not speak freely in an atmosphere where new ideas are not welcome. Managers must make it clear to employees that all opinions are welcome. This will lead to employees trusting the process, which is a critical component of consensus building success.

4. Set clearly defined goals. No decision-making process, whether by group or individual, is going to be successful if the goals are not clearly defined. Clichés abound on this subject, but the simplest is still the best:  You can’t get anywhere if you don’t know where you are going. Communication is vital in this area. Managers should make the ultimate group objective clear to employees before engaging in consensus building.

5. Support the decision. After encouraging employees to work together to forge consensus, it’s important to support the ultimate decision. There are rewards that come naturally from this exercise. Proper support reinforces the consensus building process to increase engagement among all stakeholders and decrease negative attitudes that can undermine productivity.

As difficult as it may be to implement, consensus building can offer tremendous rewards for the manager who uses it wisely in the right circumstances.

This guest post was provided by Jessica Edmondson who contributes on online leadership courses and executive decision making for the University Alliance, a division of Bisk Education, Inc. 

Sometimes walking the talk can be a challenge.

When 90% or more of an employee population receives an annual salary review and corresponding increase, one has to question whether it’s job performance or tenure (“it’s been twelve months, where’s my pay raise?”) that’s the catalyst for the increases.

If you are one who advocates a pay-for-performance culture, how does your organization deal with a pay delivery system that in application may have conflicting practices?

• Narrowing the focus of reward efforts by recognizing your better performers with markedly larger increases than their lower performing colleagues, or
• Broadening reward efforts by granting increases for everyone who “did a good job” for the past 12 months.

But can you do both? I don’t think so. You won’t have enough money. The “feel good, pay everyone” approach is self-limiting, because you won’t be allowed to spend more than the budget you’ve been given. Discretionary funds are limited, so you can’t simply shrug your shoulders and complain that you need more money. You’ll have to work with what you have. To do that you’ll have to take a stand – by deciding the who, why and how much.   Because money-laden reinforcements will not be coming to save your promises.

The Decision

Most managers want to be liked by their staff, so they want to be able to dole out rewards as broadly as possible – but perhaps for reasons that upper management wouldn’t agree with.  Some examples: to foster the team environment, to keep employees from quitting, to stifle promotional transfers, to avoid looking bad (why are employees leaving a particular manager?) and to avoid adding to their own workload (recruiting, training, time lost, picking up the slack) when someone is being replaced.

At the end of the day, the manager’s agenda might really be about themselves.

Think about it; when there’s precious little money available to reward employees, does your organization still believe that it’s important to pay more for higher levels of performance? That better performers deserve more? To accomplish such a feat would require taking money from one employee and giving it to another. There’s no other way.

While managers would agree with the principle that better performing employees should be paid more, when reward monies are fixed (and you can’t simply blow the budget) how do they balance their conflicting pressures?

Do they:

• Accurately and objectively assess performance?
• Recognize higher levels of performance by paying extra?
• Penalize those who haven’t performed by granting lower increases, or by passing them over?
• Give average increases for average performance?
•  Take monies saved from lower performers and give it to those who perform at higher levels
•  Blame management that there isn’t enough money for everyone?
• Take from Peter to pay Paul?

Taking from Peter

As managers are pressured to make pay increase decisions, they should focus on their higher-performing employees. Those are the ones who are the most marketable, who will always have the option of leaving and are the most vulnerable to competitor poaching. And as to the rest?  Average performers are much easier to replace, and their departure would be much less disruptive to business operations.

Sound harsh? Does it seem as though this tactic isn’t fair to everyone?  It does appear that way, but an effective manager has to discriminate rewards in favor of those who contribute the most. With only a set amount of monies available, it’s their responsibility to spend the resources they have as effectively and efficiently as possible in order to generate the greatest return for the organization. Because if the better employees do start to leave, the organization will be in a world of hurt much more painful, more financially disruptive than if it had been the lesser lower performers who had left.

Besides, whoever said that doing it the right way was the easy way?  Managers like the money, the title, and the status that they receive for being called a Manager, but from time to time they’re called upon to earn their position.  Sometimes they have to make decisions that aren’t easy, that won’t please everyone, but are still the right decisions for the organization.

However, managers are often reluctant to actually manage performance assessment and rewards delivery for their staff, even though that responsibility is a critical element of managing employees. They’d rather pass the buck, blame HR or do whatever they can to avoid making hard decisions that directly impact their employees.

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The next move is yours. Are you going to manage, or will you simply play it safe and go through the motions? Will you make a stand or pass the buck? Will you make the decisions that a manager needs to make, or throw out some lame excuse like “I’d like to give you more money, but HR won’t let me.”

It’s time for you to manage.  Perhaps it’s time for you to take from Peter to pay Paul.

Chuck Csizmar is the Founder & Principal of CMC Compensation Group,an independent global compensation consulting firm whose expertise lies in helping companies manage the effective and efficient utilization of financial rewards for their employees. He also maintains a popular blog on compensation at his website www.cmccompensationgroup.com.

I still have my doubts about how potent this approach is, especially for positions that job hunters actively apply for. I suspect that when agents and recruiting managers have a CV to consume they lack the time or inclination to do much research on their interviewees via social media.

New research from North Carolina State University reveals that social networking is incredibly valuable at finding new jobs for people who aren’t necessarily looking for one, which is referred to in the study as ‘informal recruitment’.

This study found that over 1 in 4 of all jobs filled in the US were done so via this form of informal recruitment. Perhaps the most interesting finding is that this ratio increases significantly as the salary of the position rises. In other words, the higher the salary is at stake, the more likely the position is to be filled informally.

The researchers have broken this down into a ratio. They found that the odds of a job being filled by social networks increased by 2% for every dollar paid per hour for the position being filled.

To put that into perspective, a job paying $100,000 a year is 86% more likely to be filled informally than a minimum wage job paying $14,500 a year.

Of course you will be rightly saying that personal networks have always been valuable. After all, the saying “it’s not what you know, but who you know” wasn’t coined at the dawn of the social media age.

It does serve to reinforce the importance of making sure that plenty of people are well aware of your skills and experience, and networking online is a fantastic way of doing that. So if you’re not currently building up your personal brand, be it offline or online, there’s never been a better time to start than now.

Adi Gaskell is a social media professional and management blogger for Professional Manager.

While traditional performance reviews may focus on traditional metrics such as whether your sales targets were met, in the burgeoning social age, a new metric is likely to muscle in on your performance review – that of your influence within your organisation.

Measuring influence has been incredibly popular on the web over the last few years, with sites like Klout and Kred allowing people to measure how influential they are in the social media world.

Now, with social media tools increasingly being used within organisations, it seems inevitable that the issue of influence will come along with it.

Chatter, by Salesforce.com, comes with a feature called Influencer, which can measure how influential you within your company. It uses metrics similar to those used on Facebook or Twitter – meaning that if colleagues react well to things you share on Chatter, you score highly for influence.

Though people may sneer at such faddish intrusions, an increasing number of managers are using tools such as this. Imagine, for instance, that you have a project that you need to roll out across your company. By using influence ratings, you can locate employees throughout the company that have the clout to evangelize your project to their peers.

Influence ratings also provide a truer reflection of where the power lies in your company, because people will vote for those whose expertise is most valuable rather than those who have the most powerful title.

Chatter, which was launched two years ago, is not the only company working on a metric for influence within organizations. Other top enterprise social networking tools, such as Yammer and National Field, are also taking a stab at the problem.

With Salesforce recently buying feedback application Rypple, it’s clear that they’re investing heavily into a revamp of how appraisals are managed, with a much more frequent and democratic approach to metric generation.

How would you measure influence in your own company?

Adi Gaskell is Head of Online at the Process Excellence Network