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Psychological safety is being significantly misunderstood, according to the May-June, 2025 edition of the Harvard Business Review. Academics Amy C. Edmondson and Michaela J Kerrissey, have identified six misconceptions about psychological safety that that they say are leading organizations astray.…
Read More Is psychological safety in trouble at your organization?
If you are feeling stressed at work, you are not alone. According to Headspace’ sixth annual Workforce State of Mind report (published in 2024), 86 percent of workers have experienced moderate, high, or extreme stress in the past year. For…
Read More The biggest cause of employee stress? A toxic workplace
Gallup reports that its global employee engagement measures have fallen during the last two years, after rising for all of the previous 12 years, except in 2020, during COVID-19. In 2024, it fell by two percentage points. Gallup estimates that…
Read More For greater success, pay attention to your culture scores
Our emotions are being significantly affected by the economy. It is currently facing significant challenges, including instability in international trade and market and manufacturing disruptions. As well, the confidence of Americans is declining. These macro disruptions affect all of us,…
Read More Unbreakable: Lifting resiliency in uncertain times
Employees who switched companies used to earn roughly 10 to 20 percent more than those who stayed with one company. Not anymore. The median pay increase for workers switching jobs sank substantially to 4.8 percent last month from a high…
Executives would sleep better if they knew their employees had their back and would raise significant issues and opportunities, not just brush major issues under the rug. As a C-suite executive, wouldn’t you want an organization like this? Today, I…
Read More Would you have the nerve to shut down a multi-million-dollar robot?
The trend in government and business these days is to cut workers across the board with little notice and shared strategy. It’s done in the name of improving efficiency. But mindlessly cutting workers doesn’t achieve this goal. Instead, it leaves…
Read More Mindless workforce cost-cutting could cut down your business
When I took over Human Resources for a division of the global medical technology company Medtronic in the 2000s, I discovered they were spending a paltry sum on employee learning. I asked them to engage with me in developing a…
Read More Improve your profitability with a better learning plan
Executive strategy sessions don't have to be futile or unproductive. Yet, according to some sources, a significant portion of executives, potentially as high as 97 percent, believe that traditional strategy sessions are a waste of time. But because of a whole…
Read More Seven tips for effective executive strategy sessions
The business environment and workforce are undergoing significant transformation as organizations brace for change and the integration of artificial intelligence (AI), which is often the automation of repetitive tasks, and generative artificial intelligence (gen AI), which creates new content like…
Read More AI transformation is most successful with a human-centric approach
Many employers in 2025 are still waking up to a vexing pay issue: pay compression, made more troublesome by pay transparency laws. Pay compression occurs when companies give higher-than-normal wages and salaries to new hires, often during times of labor…
Read More Pay transparency is exposing your pay compression problem
Organizations that use performance management systems that set goals, continually clarify priorities, help employees develop, and reward performance outperform those that do not. In volatile times organizations are pressured to digitize, continually improve, innovate, and respond to dramatic political and…
Read More Use performance management to increase growth and improve employee morale
The pace of new tools for innovators, such as OpenAI, is exciting. However, research shows that without the right culture, digital transformation in organizations fails. Organizational Culture is key for executives to lead continual change, technology implementation, and to have…
Read More Culture remains critical for today’s innovative organizations
On Martin Luther King Day this week, Donald J. Trump was sworn in as the nation’s 47th President. He vowed to curtail Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion (DE&I) programs in government, have government policy recognize only two genders, male and female,…
As many as 40 percent of companies admit to posting fake jobs, according to a May survey of 649 hiring managers by Resume Builder, a career site. Another organization, Greenhouse, a hiring platform, collects data from its clients who hire…
Read More Fake job postings are ruining corporate credibility
Great leadership is critical for the success of every organization, every year. Leadership is dynamic and requires continual feedback, growth, and change. The beginning of the New Year offers a great opportunity to start your growth as a leader. I…
The year 2025 promises to be turbulent due to planned business tax cuts by the new Presidential Administration that will stimulate investment and growth. The round up and deportation of illegal immigrants will cause further labor shortages in certain industries,…
I was stunned, as you probably were, too, over the cold-blooded murder of United Health Care Insurance (UHC) CEO Brian Thompson in New York City last week. The social media backlash was equally appalling to me. Most of the social…
Read More Does it take a CEO murder to wake up leaders over the anger with US healthcare?
For decades, employees have preferred to have men as bosses, but new research shows that as many as two-thirds of workers now have no preference for the gender of their bosses. This is a significant gain for women, going from…
Read More Most workers have no preference for the gender of their bosses, which is news.
We celebrate Thanksgiving in the US this week. It’s my favorite holiday of the year because of the family-and-friends gatherings, my favorite meal of the year, and the spirit of gratitude and giving without the hustle and bustle of the…
Read More Workers need gratitude year-round — not just at Thanksgiving
Today is election day in the United States. Americans regret incivility in our politics and believe that politics is a top driver of incivility at work. More than half (58 percent) of US workers believe our society is uncivil. It…
Read More Whether you support Harris or Trump, be civil at work
New research based on 15 years of studying the behavior patterns of more than a thousand job switchers at varying job levels and career stages has identified the dominant reasons why employees quit their jobs. The answer isn’t compensation and…
Perhaps you missed it, as I almost did, but it was bosses’ day last week. There were plenty of articles on what gift to give your boss, and some of my clients asked me the same question. I found this…
Large-scale layoffs have been the norm for the past three years. According to layoffs.fyi, over 141,000 employees have been laid off from 468 companies in 2024 so far, many of which are in high-tech. While layoffs sometimes provide short-term financial…
The experience job candidates have with your organization’s recruiting process can affect your employer brand, costs and even your revenue. In my book, Hack Recruiting, I disclosed that Virgin Media first learned of the revenue-damaging impact of rejected candidates when…
Read More If job applicants become pissed off, it hurts your bottom line
Company culture and workplace etiquette are evolving, according to new studies this year. But how it is evolving, and how your management team responds to these changes can affect your company culture and improve productivity and employee retention. A Harris…
Read More How a thriving workplace culture fuels productivity
If I proposed a way to raise worker productivity by 20 percent, improve worker collaboration and innovation and significantly reduce employee turnover and real estate costs (for some organizations by millions per year), would you refuse my suggestion? Apparently, Andy…
Read More Working fulltime in the office should not be the new normal
Unfortunately, many employees do not feel valued at work. As reported by Forbes, a survey of more than 1,000 full-time employees in the US found that more than half of respondents felt only somewhat valued (46.6 percent) or not valued…
Read More Recognition is the remedy for undervalued employees
The cost of US health care benefits provided by employers are predicted to increase in 2025 by about five percent, after a decade of averaging three percent annually, according to the Survey on Health and Benefit Strategies for 2025 by…
Read More Increasing health care costs lead employers to seek new options
According to three compensation surveys, US employers are planning slightly smaller pay raises in 2025, between 3.5 percent to 4.1 percent, which is below the average 4.1 percent salary increase given in 2024, and the 4.5 percent increase in 2023…
As reported in HR Executive, a January 2023 Resume Builder survey of 1,250 Americans found that 35 percent have lied in the hiring process, and 75 percent said they had secured a job using an application that misrepresented their education, years of…
Read More HR tech is getting played. Learn how to prevent it.
Tech sector leaders last month advocated the use of merit, excellence, and intelligence (MEI) as their recruiting strategy to hire the best and smartest talent. At the same time, some decried diversity, equity, and inclusion strategies as somehow requiring suboptimum…
Read More Intelligent recruiting doesn’t depend on an MEI system
Johnny Taylor, President and CEO of the Society of Human Resource Management, shocked and upset much of the human resources world last week by dropping the equity in Diversity, Equity, & Inclusion. Taylor wrote, “We're going to lead with inclusion,…
Read More SHRM Drops the “E” in Diversity, Equity and Inclusion, Causing Uproar
Readers of this column know I frequently encourage managers, above all else, to build trust among their teams and with their performance management systems in order to achieve high performance and innovation. (As one of my readers told me, “You…
The July 4th holiday traditionally marks the halfway point of summer (summer break from school for the kids) and is a time of family picnics, BBQs, and fireworks celebrating our Independence as a nation. Sadly, The new research from growth…
Read More Easy solution for allowing employees to unplug while on vacation
Gallup released its State of the Global Workforce 2024 report last week and found that employees are at their highest level of engagement, at 23 percent. Unfortunately, 62 percent of the workforce is unengaged, just doing what they need to…
Read More Gallup discovered that managers who inspire their workers are increasingly urgent.
Warning to recruiters: Your world is becoming a mess. First, some AI-digital screening software are being accused of discriminating against candidates based on their race, disability, and other factors. Second, job applicants are using ChatGPT and other software to re-write…
Read More The mess in recruiting: bias, robo-bots, bot booby traps, and how to fix it
We live in an era of long-term labor shortages. The much-ballyhooed AI will not alleviate these shortages quickly, even for highly repetitive work. While I’m enthusiastic about digitization, I also know is is often expensive, usually overrated, and has long…
Gallup reported this month that only 20 percent of Chief Human Resources Officers (CHROs) from Fortune 500 companies believe that their performance management systems inspire employees to improve performance. But there’s worse news yet. Only two percent of CHROs believe…
Read More Performance management remains in the doldrums. Seven steps to improve it
Research shows that innovation and culture can be measured. And, just as importantly, strong cultures of innovation lead to the creation of sustainable competitive advantage and higher financial performance. The key to innovation in organizations, according to InnovationOne LLC’s research,…
Read More Seven traits of highly innovative organizations that drive improved financial performance
Today’s leaders face many challenges requiring an effective talent strategy. These include: a prolonged labor shortage in the US, competitive pay issues, big reskilling gaps for AI and digital technology transition, stressed-out workers, finding the balance between hybrid and in…
Read More America’s got talent — with help from an employer brand
New research from McKinsey and Company suggests that the secret to developing effective leaders is to encourage four types of behaviors. Earlier research by McKinsey and other organizations has consistently shown that good leadership is a critical part of organizational…
Read More Drive shareholder returns by developing the right behaviors among leaders
In a recent landmark Harvard Business Review article, Peter Cappelli and Ranya Nehmeh advocate for HR returning to its roots as the advocates for employees and their career development. The current business focus on relentless cost-cutting and restructuring during a…
The hottest issue in HR is overcoming the current labor shortage, which exists despite the last month’s hiring boom, and presents troublesome issues for CEOs and CHRO leaders. Last week’s US Department of Labor (DOL) job report showed a shocking…
Read More Hot hiring numbers belie the need for strong HR practices
There is an irrefutable link between organizational culture and profitability. Organizations with more collaborative, learning, and agile cultures have 22 percent higher profitability than those with static cultures, according to InnovationOne, LLC. Gallup shows even bigger numbers. Although Gallup's’ expertise…
In today’s tight labor market and with digital technologies changing the skill sets needed by employees, every organization needs a talent strategy for its workforce to ensure profitable growth. Organizations with a good talent management strategy can attract, align, motivate,…
Read More Talent strategy is a must for today’s labor shortage
Artificial Intelligence is taking the world by storm, as the old saying goes, not just automating redundant tasks, but reshaping business, society, and science. However, many large AI projects fail to deliver on their goals. AI algorithms have proven to…
Organizations are resorting to relentless cost-cutting and lean sigma during these volatile times. Their goal is to improve their operations, but they’re doing it in a way that alienates employees. Instead, organizations can achieve breakthrough productivity, innovation, and profits by…
In an age of analytical decision-making, many CEOS have spoken publicly about their intuitive belief that office-based workers are more passionate, creative, and productive than remote workers. And that serendipity in the office is critical. Why do they persist with…
Read More Many CEOs have it wrong. Remote workers have more passion, creativity and productivity
This was an extraordinary, insightful discussion on the issues facing executives and managers today in our rapidly disrupted and changing world. It was a delight to participate in this conversation with Arthur Taylor, Victor Assad, Carol Stewart, Steven Zylstra and Karen Nowicki. Whether you’re new…
Read More Navigating Leadership: Insights from Industry Pros. AZ TechCast
I am delighted to be co-leading an insightful workshop on “Boosting Innovation by 3X-The Power of Culture Management” with Jason Stolworthy and Jim Keating of Idaho National Labs and my InnovationOne, LLC colleague, Brooke Dobni, PhD., at the LESI 2024…
Read More Workshop on innovation cultures at LESI2024 in Madrid!
New research published in the Harvard Business Review shows that employees who trust their organizations are more productive, more creative, and have higher engagement. Those who don’t trust their organizations experience more stress, have higher rates of burnout, and are…
Read More Workers who trust each other are more productive and innovative
Even though remote workers are more productive and engaged than in-the-office workers, new research shows that they are promoted 31 percent less frequently than their counterparts working in the office full-time or as hybrid workers. My question: Why pass over…
Many interviewers need to use two of the best candidate selection techniques when hiring: validated assessments and structured interviews. Unfortunately, unstructured interviews are not much better than a coin toss when deciding who to hire. Companies hiring new talent would significantly…
Read More Improve your hiring success with aptitude tests and structured interviews
Employees who work in organizations with a positive culture are overwhelmingly more satisfied at work and are consistently more committed to their organizations. That was the conclusion of a recent workplace culture study by the Society of Human Resources (SHRM)…
Read More Positive organization cultures lead to more satisfied employees—and more
Job satisfaction scores have fallen to their lowest point since early 2020, at the beginning of the pandemic. To my mind, employees are stressed-out and frightened about being replaced by OpenAI or a robot. Employees are unhappy due to a…
I was working with a program development team leader heading up a significant upgrade to one of the company’s most popular and profitable products. And he was failing. The leader was intelligent, hardworking, very clear with setting goals and direction,…
Read More Employee recognition leads to exceptional performance
Organizations that want to improve their productivity, innovation, and financial performance won't address all the issues by focusing on employee engagement. Instead, they’ll get much better results if they focus on culture. Even Gallup, which has been tracking employee engagement…
Read More Culture drives higher performance than employee engagement
Data released last week by the U.S Department of Labor shows there’s a stable, growing workforce with continued strong hiring (216,000 in December) and that salary costs remain rising at a 4.1 percent annualized rate, slightly higher than inflation. These…
Three years after the start of the pandemic, the call by CEOs to return to the office is faltering for several reasons. There is no grand “fix” for hybrid working. The ideal solution for each organization will depend on the…
Read More Returning to work is faltering: Seven steps for productive hybrid working
Many managers complain about providing performance management feedback. They find it unpleasant, say it leads to more trouble than it is worth, and complain that employees don’t always make the changes needed to improve performance. An IT manager once told…
Read More Improve employee performance by focusing on the positive
According to news reports over the last decade or so, performance management is on the way out. It has survived after many changes, like dropping forced rankings. Today, some believe it is too anxiety-inducing and the terms “feedback” and “performance…
Read More Trust is essential for performance management feedback
We have long advocated the importance of cognitive diversity for successful innovation. Successful innovation teams have much higher cognitive diversity. The trick is identifying cognitive diversity among people for more successful teams. We have long advocated the importance of cognitive…
The Labor Day holiday had me reflecting on the future of work. Dramatic changes are forecasted by McKinsey, Korn Ferry and other prognosticators. As is often the case, futurists make predictions of trends that have already begun. In many ways…
Read More Most companies are stumbling with the future of work
Before the pandemic, I was giving a seminar on implementing hybrid work to drive up productivity, better attract and retain employees, and cut costs. Part of the training included recommendations on the technology to enable hybrid work, such as video…
Consulting companies with expertise in benefits are projecting that employers should expect higher benefits increases in 2024 — in the range of 5.4 percent to 7 percent. The days of three percent benefit increases and shifting costs to employees are…
Read More Employers should expect higher health care costs in 2024
Companies need to continue focusing on hiring and retaining their most talented workers, regardless of race or gender. That’s why you shouldn’t worry about lawsuits over Title VII affirmative action practices. And this is despite the US Supreme Court ruling…
Several surveys show that employers are planning on a 4 percent pay increase in 2024, down from the 4.4 percent delivered in 2023 and up from 3.1 percent in 2021, which was the approximate pay increase percentage for several years…
Read More Employers are planning on a 4 percent pay increase in 2024
Last week, there was an explosion of news about the labor force that rocked the stock market. The big surprise was that hiring was significantly higher than expected. There was some good news: hiring was lower than in April by…
Read More Stay ahead of labor force trends by improving your organizational culture
Recruiters and human resources leaders have had access to chatbots, machine learning, and artificial intelligence for years. But HR has been slow to put these digital tools to use with recruiting. The business cost of losing the talent war is…
Read More Use digital technologies to transform recruitment and hiring
Gallup’s 2023 State of the Global Workforce reveals a wealth of information about the workplace and the workforce. For example, did you know that: Employee engagement and job opportunities in the US and Canada stand at 31 percent, down from…
Read More Gallup: The office alone has no magic to create a great organizational culture
Many companies, including high-tech ones, that once told their workers they could work from home forever, are once again trying to recall remote workers to the office. And many of them are making arbitrary rules and showing little success. Here…
How can we resolve the US’s 3-million-person labor shortage that may last the decade without raising unemployment? Simple. We can do it by making smart changes to immigration policy. Employers, by large majorities, believe the US immigration system should be…
Read More Spark economic growth by modernizing the US workplace immigration system
According to The Conference Board, US workers have never been more content, despite the pandemic, quiet quitting, quiet firing, and the forwards and backwards over hybrid working. Overall job satisfaction among US workers increased in 2022 to its highest point…
Read More Job satisfaction at all-time high thanks to hybrid working and job switching.
Google researchers launched Project Oxygen 15 years ago to understand what makes people great managers. In 2018, some 10 years after Google’s original report, its researchers looked again at their results to understand if the initial findings had held true…
Read More Google’s 10 Behaviors of Great Managers continue to succeed!
Innovation cultures at six US Department of Energy (DOE) Labs surveyed differ significantly according to a study conducted by InnovationOne, LLC, in concert with the Idaho National Laboratory (INL). The Department of Energy put a bullseye on innovation. The results…
Read More Department of Energy puts a bullseye on innovation!
Welcome to the Pivot2First Podcast, your go-to source for all the latest trends, tips, and strategies in the world of recruitment. Join us as we chat with the leading experts in the industry about the latest recruitment tools, best practices,…
There is hot global debate —maybe even an arms race — about Open AI and the blockbuster San Francisco-based start-up app ChatGPT. Is it the harbinger of humanity’s doom as predicted by Elon Musk and Stephen Hawking in 2017 or…
Read More Open AI Arms Race: Doomsday or Productivity Godsend
More and more companies require remote and hybrid workers to spend more time in the office, despite knowing that US workers prefer hybrid work, are more productive, and the US is in a decades-long labor shortage. You can join the…
Read More Avoid the return-to-office stampede and hire and retain great employees
Our research with the DOE Ethos Project shows that a culture of innovation is the path to a three-fold increase in core technology transfer metrics. We are honored to present our research results twice at the 2023 Federal Laboratory Consortium…
Read More Culture of Innovation: Path to a three-fold increase in core technology transfer metrics.
Earlier this month, a Delaware court found that McDonald’s Corp. board members and the company’s chief human resources officer did not violate their duty to shareholders in handling sexual harassment and misconduct allegations, ruling that the directors’ response was legally…
Read More CHRO’s can be held liable for not stopping rampant sexual misconduct.
Many organizations are implementing cost-cutting measures. I have been stunned to learn that some companies are trying to cut costs by recalling hybrid and remote employees to the office and are thinking about implementing forced ranking with the intention of…
Read More Don’t allow these two strategies to be part of your cost-cutting plans.
During the current recruiting slowdown, smart organizations are using their talent acquisition teams to source new talent in preparation for the economic recovery in the second half of 2023. Are you building your talent pipeline during the downturn? This is…
Read More Are you building your talent pipeline during the downturn?
The following ten years will be what we at InnovationOne (Dobni and Klassen (2020)) describe as the decade of innovation execution, which is now the central challenge organizations face. Executing innovation agendas is not easy. McKinsey (2022) reported that 84 percent of executives…
Read More Six Questions to Measure and Drive Employee Behaviors and Actions for Innovation
The 2022 North American Candidate Experience Benchmark Research Report by Talent Board comes at a time of continued business anxiety. It also comes at a time when we need improved recruiting practices to improve recruiting success and company revenues. While…
Read More Ten takeaways to improve recruiting and company revenue.
Last week, I was fired up by an article in the New York Times, “Laid Off in Your Living Room: The Chaos of Remote Job Cuts.” I posted the article and my comment on LinkedIn. From my profile page and…
It is time to forget about Quiet Quitting and Quiet Firing. Instead, think about the Pareto Principle from physics and microeconomics, commonly known as the 80/20 rule. Your goal should be to figure out how to expand the 20 percentage…
Executives are in a quandary. The economy is growing but the Federal Reserve is determined to reduce inflation to two percent. With US workers in short supply, it is not wise to lay off this precious resource unless your business…
Many leaders believe that “culture” is soft and difficult to measure. It isn’t. In fact, it’s the ultimate performance driver. And you can manage what you measure. InnovationOne’s research shows that companies ranking in the top quartile as scored by…
Read More Improve your financial performance by improving your culture
Organizations typically conduct their annual performance reviews and make decisions on merit pay increases and pay adjustments at the end of the year. Employers need to remember that the most effective and innovative teams are built on trust. Executives need…
Read More How to ensure your performance management engenders trust
Surveys show that the war over hybrid, remote, and office-based work continues. It is a conflict that about two-thirds of current remote and hybrid workers are willing to quit over. And the number of employees working remotely or in hybrid…
Last week’s announcements by Meta (11,000 employees let go), Twitter (3,700), Stripe (1,100), and Lyft (700) turned heads as the high-tech stalwarts of the US economy stumbled. Previously, Coinbase, Shopify, Netflix, Microsoft, Snap, Robinhood, and Tesla had cut employees. When companies…
Read More Don’t be stupid with layoffs. Follow these 7 best practices.
On Monday, November 11, we celebrated Veteran's Day. So let's remember our vets, especially when hiring. According to the US General Accountability Office, roughly 200,000 US veterans leave the military and enter the civilian workforce each year, and they have…
Read More Six strategies to improve your ability to hire veterans
As HR Departments finalize their strategies and budgets for 2023, their workforces face daunting challenges. According to The Conference Board, the US economy will continue to restrict and achieve only 1.5 percent GDP growth by the end of 2022 and…
Read More Seven HR Strategies in the War Between Executives and Employees, 2023
The labor shortage has pushed more companies to recruit employees who have served time in prison, according to NPR and The Wall Street Journal,. There are more than 70 million formerly incarcerated people in the US. But, for employers, their…
Read More More companies are hiring the formerly incarcerated with success
Last week’s The Wall Street Journal article on Quiet Quitting and Quiet Firing includes observations from me on this popular topic. The very next day, Friday, I was interviewed by Fox26 Houston to provide advice to employees who find themselves being a…
Read More It’s foolish to punish quiet quitters in this small-growth economy.
Updated on September 27, 2022 Three national human resources professional organizations have released their predictions of salary increases for 2023. Their results show that while recruiting and turnover are expected to ease slightly, high salary increases will continue into 2023.…
California may join Colorado in requiring companies that post jobs to disclose hourly pay rates and salary ranges. Washington and New York states may soon follow. Fortune 1000 companies frequently follow the trends of large states like California and New…
At least half of the workforce is quiet quitting, according to a report published last week by Gallup. Weeks before, The Wall Street Journal reported on the viral spread of the topic on social media, especially TikTok, by Gen Z…
Since the 2008 recession, corporations have tried to reduce costs and offer headline-grabbing perks with respect to benefits strategies. Not anymore. Companies are switching their benefits strategies for 2023 to attracting and retaining employees and helping them deal with costs…
Read More Companies are shifting their benefits strategies for 2023
After two years of burnout from Covid-19, Gen Z employees have begun to set boundaries, focus on a life outside of work, and have a better work-life balance. They call it “quiet quitting.” Their viewpoint also comes with less enthusiasm…
Companies have been using a variety of innovation methodologies and technologies to improve their innovation capabilities for more than a decade. Now, empirical research is identifying the ways that are the most effective. Is design thinking universally helpful to organizations…
Read More Which method or technology will help improve innovation in YOUR industry?
Criteria, a research and talent success company, has published its 2022 Candidate Experience Report. It shows the top job candidate priorities for 2022, a year of the great resignation, the US’s lowest unemployment rate since 2019 of 3.5 percent (tying a…
Read More Better work-life balance tops list of seven job candidate preferences
US inflation is at 9.1 percent, the highest level in over 40 years. While wage increases are also at their highest level in four decades — 4.8 percent according to a new Pearl Meyers survey — they are not high enough…
Read More Three Strategies to Help Employees Fight Inflation
US companies have doubled the number of interviews they conduct — despite inflation and worries about recession, as indicated by June 2022’s hiring numbers. The US Department of Labor recently reported that employers added 74,000 white-collar jobs in June 2022.…
Read More How you can do better, more successful job interviews
It is essential to use a people-oriented approach to implementing AI to keep the human emotions and work front and center in the change. A people-centric approach involves the impacted employees and clients in the design of digitizing workflows and…
Read More Use a people-orientated approach to implementing AI
When I worked for Medtronic businesses in Santa Rosa, CA, in 2012, implementing a remote work environment, we learned that requiring innovation workers to come into the office every day was unnecessary. In fact, we discovered that virtual teams and…
People started questioning whether email was dying in the mid-2010s with the rise of channel discussions such as Yammer. In 2018, Inc. Magazine declared that “Email is already dead” because Gen-Z won’t bother with email and the rest of us…
As the great resignation rages on, employees have made it clear they want to work for organizations that provide great pay and benefits, flexible work option -- and career paths. Career pathing doesn't provide the organization with excellent leaders without…
Today on #MemorialDay, we honor all the men and women who sacrificed life and limb for our nation. Please remember to recruit veterans. Have a safe and enjoyable day.
Change is imperative for organizational success. The bedrock of organizations that achieve success is a culture of innovation. Yet many leaders resist these cultures of innovation. They may believe culture is too mushy to measure and manage or takes too…
Read More Cultures of innovation improve company performance
A higher innovation culture score at R&D Labs leads to dramatically higher organization performance. That is the conclusion of a joint study by InnovationOne® and the US Department of Energy (DOE). The study hypothesized that the higher the innovation culture scores…
Read More Higher innovation culture scores dramatically improve performance
College recruiting is back after two years of the pandemic. According to new research, 65 percent of companies are increasing their investments in technology related to college recruiting, 57 percent are increasing the number of events, and 55 percent are…
Read More Here’s how to improve your return to college recruiting
Gallup reported this month that US employee engagement has dropped in each of the last two years, from 36 percent in 2020 to 32 percent in 2022. However, employee engagement is higher for organizations that focus on culture. Gallup’s reporting…
Read More Engagement is higher for organizations that focus on culture
Finding candidates is difficult now. Once you’ve scheduled an interview, don’t weaken the chances of hiring the ideal candidate by making these four classic interview mistakes. Job candidates now have choices, and you want to be No. 1 on their…
Read More Are you making these four classic interview mistakes?
Are you the type of leader that loves to provide positive feedback? Or, are you the type who prefers to tell people what they did wrong? Long-standing research shows that the leaders who provide positive feedback more often than negative,…
Read More How better feedback will help employees — and CEOs
A global client confided in us that they suspended their annual employee engagement surveys for three years to save costs due to an economic downturn. Now their business is growing again, and they plan to restart their surveys. Instead, we…
Read More Organizations can do better than employee engagement
In past columns, I have advised business leaders to take precautions against the next wave of Covid-19. It keeps mutating. Although it appears to be transitioning from a pandemic to an endemic, it can still be epidemic and very dangerous.…
Read More Covid-19 endemic or epidemic? Smart firms need to be agile.
CEOs are asking their human resources leaders to implement talent management strategies to beat the Great Resignation and attract new employees to their brands. This request is not a nice to have. It is essential for business growth. Talent management…
Read More How the War for Talent looks different in the 2020s
Andrew Burak, the CEO of Relevant, shared his belief that without an active innovation culture, organizations fall into stagnation and lose to more innovative competitors. Today’s supply chain crises from Covid-19 and the Ukrainian – Russian war require ongoing organizational…
Read More Creating a culture of innovation is essential today
In a 2022 report on HR Trends, Trust Radius has concluded that most HR professionals are pleased with the success of remote work implementation and employee wellbeing. But, at the same time, HR professionals have been challenged and exhausted by…
Studies by Pew Research and the Labor Department show that as work reopens, most employees prefer working from home, especially women. After the pandemic, women lag men in rejoining the labor force, exacerbating our labor shortage. Preference has replaced fear…
Read More As work reopens, studies show workers prefer remote work, especially women
Many executives we speak with about improving the innovation of their companies ask us how to open the minds of their CEOs to transform their organizational cultures. Many CEOs fear that culture is too soft to manage. Innovation feels like…
Read More Managing culture and innovation improves real numbers: your bottom line.
At the end of last year, I identified top strategies for HR in 2022. In the 2020s, HR strategies are shifting to reinstating powerful, comprehensive talent management strategies to offer employees careers with purpose, excellent pay and benefits, and equity…
I don’t need to tell you that recruiting is tough. Wages are soaring, and job opportunities are abundant. New research identifies how to change your recruiting tactics to compete. For example, if your job application process takes more than five…
Read More Recruiters: Speed up your job application process or loose 92% of job applicants
Many organizations trying to fight falling employee engagement numbers are making a mistake. Frankly, now is not the time to deal with such matters. Instead of launching another employee engagement survey, listen to your employees’ frustrations and begin to work…
Read More Stop fretting over falling employee engagement. Go to the source.
There is long-standing empirical research demonstrating how corporate culture improves organizational innovation, productivity, and profit. Now, evidence is emerging that healthy organizational cultures are also the best way to beat the Great Resignation. Two weeks ago, MIT researchers uncovered that…
Read More Corporate culture drives business performance — and employee retention
The Supreme Court last week blocked Biden’s Vaccination Mandate for private employers with 100 or more employees, by a 6-3 vote. Companies will no longer have a federal mandate as a cover for requiring vaccinations. With Covid-19’s Omicron variant surging…
Read More Stop the Omicron surge from siphoning your bottom line.
Many recruiting colleagues have told me their organizations do not know how to source passive job candidates -- that is, someone who is not actively looking for work. They depend on posting jobs on LinkedIn or Indeed, hoping active candidates…
Read More Seven tips to improve sourcing passive job candidates
Over the holidays, I experienced how Omicron has significantly changed the rules for Covid-19 for my family and businesses. Two members of my family -- both fully vaccinated, and one even boosted -- caught Omicron. The former had four days…
Read More My family learned that Omicron changed the rules. Three tips for businesses.
Several research organizations have published their HR Priorities for 2022. I was particularly impressed with the findings of Fuel50 because it looked at an issue the “Best-in-Class” HR organizations are prioritizing: The Future of Work. This priority did not make…
Read More The Future of Work Tops the 2022 Priorities List for Leading HR Organizations.
Innovation remains a priority for CEOs because innovation improves business and financial outcomes. We learned from our extensive research over 20 years and the publishing of over 25 academic, peer-reviewed articles, and our consulting practice that highly innovative companies have…
Read More Seven traits of highly innovative organizations that drive improved financial performance
Organizations have been talking about changing performance management for years. Many in the past ten years abandoned forced performance rankings or have eliminated performance reviews all together. Others like Facebook have reinstated performance ranking. Compelling business challenges -- more than…
Read More Why and How Performance Management Will Change in the 2020s
After nearly two years of the Covid-19 pandemic, employee expectations and company strategies have permanently shifted. The surge of Omicron in December 2021 and January 2022 has once again delayed office reopening plans, according to The Wall Street Journal. Many…
Read More Survey shows hybrid work is here to stay — here’s how to get started.
As many organizations implement new hybrid work models, improve their sustainability, try to enter new markets or work to realign their cost structures, executives wrestle with implementing change successfully. It is important for them to understand that more than 70…
Many employers will have to ensure by early 2022 that their workers are vaccinated or tested weekly for Covid-19 under a set of new vaccine requirements by the Biden administration that will cover more than 80 million employees. As reported by The…
America’s supply chain is being reordered, and with-it American firms are rethinking their relationship with employees. For more than a generation, the CEO playbook was to believe employees were expendable and to move manufacturing to low-cost or low tax regions…
Read More The Compelling Argument for Upskilling and Reskilling Your Workforce.
We now live in a data-driven world. Data generated by the people and performance systems within your organization needs to be the foundation for getting your employee experience strategy right. Organizations that have managed to leverage data to extract information…
Read More The fastest growing department in HR is driving organizational performance: People Ops!
The US economy is in an unusual position, and so are employers. Demand is strong. Consumers are flush with cash and spending more. Vaccinations rates are rising, and Covid19 cases have fallen by a third across the country. Normally, we…
Read More Five strategies to overcome the US’s labor shortage of the 2020s
Clients and HR leaders frequently ask me how to calculate the cost of employee turnover. The cost of turnover is a critical measure to determine how effectively the workforce is aligned to the organization’s mission, values, and culture and the…
Read More How to calculate and strategically use the cost of employee turnover.
Innovation has long been a priority for many CEOs. Now, the pandemic has added new urgency to the quest: COVID-19 has driven a jump of 10 percentage points (to 75 percent) in the share of companies reporting innovation as a…
President Biden’s sweeping Covid-19 mandate requirement for companies of 100 or more employees, announced last Thursday, brings managing the mandate and the reasonable accommodations requests from employees to the top of HR’s to-do list. The mandate requires workers either to…
Read More Managing religious and medical exception requests for Biden’s Covid-19 vaccine mandate
For the second year in a row, the US celebrates Labor Day during a dramatic transformation of work and high anxiety for CEOs and workers. The difficulties presented by a chronic labor shortage of skilled and unskilled jobs are complicated…
Read More Four disruptive steps to transform the work environment and finally beat Covid-19
This year’s open enrollment will be like no other. Continuing COVID19 concerns, technology-empowered health care services alternatives, and new legislation will drive novel considerations for 2022. In addition, there are always the standard open enrolment issues of new health care…
Read More Nine commanding health care benefit issues for 2022 that will drive your employer brand.
Leaders often speak with me about the repeated delays in calling back to the office their remote employees and alternative optimum dates for their return. In fact, some organizations have rescheduled the return-to-the-office date four times. Others have recalled managers…
Read More Are you on the right — or wrong — side of history with your return-to-the-office plan?
Google has changed its Jobs Search function in ways that have either already gone into effect or will take place on October 1. The new system should improve the experience of job searching. However, these changes will require recruiters to…
Read More Google’s Job Search changes requires action and will improve applicant experiences
Economists from the University of California, Berkeley, and the University of Chicago last week released the results of a discrimination audit of 108 companies. The audit revealed that entry-level applications from candidates with a “Black name” get fewer callbacks than…
Read More Economists find discrimination in recruiting by race and gender. We can change it.
This week’s headlines highlight how the fourth COVID19 surge among the unvaccinated in the US is shifting plans by employers to recall workers to the office after Labor Day and explore whether employers should require workers to vaccinated. Companies need…
Read More NOW is the time for employers to require COVID19 vaccines.
The labor shortage in the US will be long-lasting because of low birth rates, retiring baby boomers, immigration that is not up to the demand for skilled and unskilled labor, and the difficulties of automating professional services. To overcome these…
Gallup released its venerable State of the Global Workplace Report for 2021 this month. Surprisingly, workplace engagement rose to 36 percent in 2020, the year of the pandemic, a one percent increase for both the US and Canada. But, stress…
The turnover tsunami of 9.3 million US open jobs is now being joined by a new storm: labor wage increases. Total private sector US wages are now up 7.9 percent from February 2020, and the wages for low-wage earners in…
Read More Seven solutions to overcome the double tsunami of labor shortages and rocking wages.
The turnover tsunami is here. There are 9.3 million US open jobs, which is the highest number since 2020 and almost twice the number of a year ago, and it nearly matches the 9.8 million unemployed. In normal times, a…
A client called asking for a referral for a behavioral interviewing vendor. While I applauded her initiative to improve the interview skills of her hiring managers, I had to ask, "Why behavioral interviewing?" It ran its course ten years ago,…
The secret of successful innovation is not simply innovating, it’s embracing innovation. In today’s era, innovation should be shared and promoted internally just like your brand is across the globe. In this Master Class, Victor Assad of Innovation One and…
Read More Eight Practices to Fire Up Your Innovation Culture
Four CEO’s blasted remote workers last week, saying that employees who want to continue working remotely aren’t engaged with their companies. Perhaps the most egregious and self-serving comment came from WeWork CEO, Sandeep Mathrani, who said at The Wall Street…
Read More CEOs choose well. There is a great tsunami coming of employee turnover.
Updated guidance from The Center for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) saying that vaccinated people do not have to wear masks either inside or outside or follow social distancing guidelines (in most circumstances) has complicated the decisions companies are considering…
Read More CDC’s new pandemic guidance is a game-changer. Are you ready?
InnovationOne will be joining IdeaScale to present the six traits of highly innovative organizations and to show the responses of IdeaScale followers for each of the six traits of highly innovative companies. Based on our research at InnovationOne, they have…
As companies announce plans for remote workers to return to the office, a new study finds that employee anxiety is surging. Companies call me concerned that many of their employees, including key technical and leadership staff, are resigning rather than…
Read More Employee stress skyrockets due to return-to-the-office plans. Time for a reliable playbook
The year of the pandemic is just about over. An HR digital transformation is at hand. The coronavirus pandemic, the switch to digital business models, and the hybrid work environment -- triggered by working from home -- have accelerated HR’s…
Read More Ready, Set, GO: Get ready to win the race for HR digital transformation!
Jobvite’s latest annual survey of hundreds of recruiters and HR professionals shows many critical differences one year after the coronavirus pandemic. Recruiting priorities have changed. Due to the lack of skilled candidates and competition from other employers, the quality of…
The pandemic had us all rushing to implement digital technology for the survival of our businesses. We made these investments in order to keep employees aligned to the organization’s mission, changes, and goals. Take a bow, everyone, as your success…
Read More Improve employee productivity and retention with in-person onboarding in 2021
A recruiter told me last week that job ghosting has started up again, even after her company moved its pay levels to market competitive levels. The prediction I made to her is that by August, the US will have more…
Read More Is your employer brand ready for a labor shortage in 2021?
The pandemic, remote work, and digital technology have changed the paradigm of how to think about work, where we work, and the employee experience. Accelerated vaccination rates have employers making plans to reopen their offices, but the role of the…
Read More The new paradigm of hybrid work and improved employee experiences
Fast Company announced its 2021 list of the Most Innovative Companies. Amazingly only three companies from the 2020 list of the World’s 50 Most Innovative Companies made the 2021 list, reflecting the disruption rollicking the business world. They are Shopify,…
Read More The World’s Most Innovative Companies, Reshaped by COVID19
What an irony. International Women’s Day, yesterday (March 8th), coincided with the anniversary of the onset of COVID19, a health disaster that brought the international economy to its knees and resulted in a tempestuous year for women in the workforce.…
Read More COVID-19 crushed women’s progress in the workforce. Five steps to turn it around.
When one of your children grows up to be a Hollywood comic, you get used to your parenting style and idiosyncrasies being the fodder of jokes in comedy clubs across the country and post-pandemic online. My daughter is a Millennial…
Read More Tips from a Hollywood comic: Address stress in the workforce
Even in the normal times of the 2010s, before the pandemic, the business world was disruptive and innovation was difficult. We had many vice presidents of research and development, digital transformation, innovation, and marketing come to us asking, "Can you get our…
Behaviorism has long taught us that immediate and direct feedback is critical to reinforce the behaviors and outcomes we want. It has been the source of breakthrough books on leadership, such as the One-Minute Manager. But too much of a…
Read More How to find the sweet spot between micromanaging and too hands-off?
Executive teams deserve high praise for their excellent leadership implementing safe COVID-19 policies, complying with new laws, and the quick pivot to remote work in mid-March 2020. As one said to me, “It all went smoother than we thought. Now,…
Read More Seven practical lessons to make a hybrid workforce engaged, productive, and innovative!
I have been involved with recruiting for more than 30 years and have never before seen a disruption in recruiting (and HR and leadership practices) as serious as the one in the past tumultuous year. I led recruiting and human…
Read More The good, the bad, and the ugly of recruiting — and five components of success.
The virus COVID-19 proved Plato was right: crisis is the mother of invention. McKinsey's new report on the Trends that Will Drive 2021 and Beyond identifies a wave of innovation and a new generation of entrepreneurs sparked by the pandemic as one…
Read More Innovation in 2021 requires three talent strategies
Last year ended with the FDA approval of Pfizer’s COVID19 vaccine and the vaccination of the first US health care workers on Monday, Dec. 14. The US still has several months of rising COVID19 infections and deaths before 60 percent…
First ISO, then the SEC, and now Nasdaq. All these agencies are requiring the disclosure of human capital measures. Human capital often drives a majority of the costs for businesses. Its role in driving business success, when smartly managed, is…
Read More Better talent management will help improve your bottom line
Many executives cling to the hope that COVID-19 vaccines will abate the pandemic and allow a return to normal, with remote workers back in the office. They remind me of a VP of Clinical Research who initially resisted our remote…
Read More Optimize remote work and redesign your office now, before you’re left behind
This is a year to forget. In 2020, we have witnessed more Americans die from the pandemic than many of our wars combined, more unemployment than the Great Depression, social and racial unrest with severely divided politics that we have…
The pandemic has changed investment priorities for recruiting organizations in 2020. Last year was all about improving the candidate experience. Today, the emphasis is on finding skilled and qualified job candidates. But without a focus on candidate experience and employer…
Read More COVID19 has changed recruiting strategies. Don’t be short sighted
The pandemic has proven that remote work can increase office employee productivity, morale, and employee-work life integration while reducing carbon emissions. But what about innovation workers? Do they have to be face-to-face every day to innovate? The answer from my…
Read More Six tips for accelerating innovation in a hybrid workforce.
This week we celebrate Veteran's Day so let's remember our Vets. About 200,000 US veterans leave the military and enter the civilian workforce each year, and they have excellent skills. Hiring veterans is a smart recruiting strategy. In addition, companies…
Read More Six strategies to improve your ability to attract and hire veterans
Pfizer and BioNTech’s Nov. 9, 2020 announcement that their vaccine is successful in preventing more than 90% of infections, is welcome news. However, it’s also important to stress that the better-than-expected results are preliminary and a successful vaccine by the…
Read More Five steps to take to lead in 2021 with the hybrid workforce of today
COVID19 has accelerated companies’ digital communications strategies by an average of six years, said Jason Averbook when he spoke at the HR Technology Conference. Unfortunately, research on spending for HR Tech is predicted to be anemic in 2021, meaning organizations…
Read More The pandemic accelerated the need for HR digital technologies. Do you have a strategy?
The biggest news from last week’s virtual HR Tech Conference was not about tech. It was about research from Marcus Buckingham on how companies can boost the resiliency of their workforces. Resilience is independent of employee engagement, according to Buckingham,…
Read More Three steps to improve employee resiliency during COVID19 based on new science
While championing diversity initiatives over the past 20 years, I have always emphasized how these actions will improve financial outcomes for companies. Now there is mounting evidence that by overcoming the racial wealth gap, which includes hiring biases, the U.S.…
Your job postings may be your worst nightmare, scaring off job applicants with jargon and needless clutter and driving away female applicants. If your job posting is more than 250 words and uses gender bias tones, it is time for…
Read More Over 50 percent of job postings drive away applicants, especially women
Most U.S. companies are planning to give employees pay raises and annual bonuses next year despite the economic fallout from the pandemic. However, the pandemic and the growing demand for pay equity and transparency and remote work are all changing…
Online recruiting is still under attack since I wrote this article a year ago. The system is breaking down and becoming rife with tech-savvy scammers. Job aggregators are ruining the job candidate experience and in many cases preventing job applications…
Read More Job aggregators are sabotaging online recruiting. Tips on how to stop them.
To alleviate stress for new remote workers, many companies stopped their performance management systems during the pandemic’s peak. But rather than stopping performance management, they should have focused on accelerating their organization’s ability to be agile. The best performance management…
Has your employer brand held up during the pandemic? Even companies with stand-up employer brands in February need to retool them in the pandemic age. For example, how has your brand changed regarding remote work, innovation, and your new role…
Many companies are ramping up their recruiting efforts as the pandemic abates in many areas of the country. At a time when face-to-face meetings in an office are still considered risky, virtual recruiting and interviewing techniques such as the pre-recorded…
Read More Structured interviews significantly improve your hiring success
I am always struck by how many companies fail to track their readily available data. This data offers cost-saving, productivity-enhancing, and revenue-generating information for the picking. If only someone would look. While today’s applicant tracking systems and AI powered chatbots…
Read More Increase your business revenue with better recruiting data literacy
Join me on August 27th for a recruiting roundtable discussion on data literacy for HR professionals. Piyanka Jain ⭐️and I will discuss how with excel and some simple data sets, along the candidate funnel, HR practitioners can gain valuable insight into…
Read More Aug. 27 Recruiting Roundtable on data literacy for HR professionals
With the pandemic and significant decline in revenues, executives know that they must innovate to survive these unprecedented times. But how? Many executives, however, have chosen to play it safe and secure, hunker down, and hoard cash. The problem with…
Our most recent research with The Conference Board reveals the importance of managers in encouraging innovation. In our infographic below, the "Innovation Priorities" chart on the right shows that highly innovative companies have managers who score higher in encouraging innovation…
While the Pandemic has cooled recruiting in most industries, many HR organizations have upgraded their technologies to conduct online interviews and onboarding. But there is much more to do. Now is the time to hack recruiting processes before the hot…
Read More Join my August 27 virtual session to learn how to hack your recruiting.
In this Orange County ReINVENTHR webcast, I present 3 robust strategies to crush today's crises. I remind HR leaders that HR has the empirical research, predictive models, and digital technology to crush it! The full REINVENT HR webinar, "HR…
Read More ReINVENTHR webcast: 3 robust strategies to crush today’s crises
In the wild pandemic world of constant fear and change, management needs feedback from employees to keep them aligned, motivated, safe, and innovative. Are employee surveys still useful — given how they have been carelessly overused and in the face…
Read More Bad management practices killed employee surveys. 7 ways to get reliable employee feedback
I am delighted to announce that my company InnovationOne, LLC, has joined forces with Innovation Minds. Together, we provide our clients the best researched-based cultural assessment for measuring, benchmarking, and improving your culture and capability to innovate with the best…
Companies that enjoyed progress with their remote work strategies in March, are now stalling in the dog days of mid-summer — and in the face of a pandemic that just won’t quit. After the resurgence of COVID-19 across most of…
Read More Six tips for rekindling remote work success and creating the now office
When the pandemic started, employers reacted to the first surge and warning by health officials. They sent employees home to work remotely and to be safe. But as the stay at home orders were canceled, and the public ventured out.…
Read More COVID19 surges, confusing leaders, and stalling remote work progress
Highly innovative companies treat innovation as a strategic imperative. These companies involve their external partners, nurture transparent, inclusive, and collaborative cultures, and align their operations to quickly adjust and commercialize innovation. These findings are based on InnovationOne's research of over…
Read More Top six factors of highly innovative companies in the digital era!
While the rush to remote work provided a welcome relief from daily commutes and the fear of catching COVID19, many employees struggled with being on-the-job 24/7 now that the commute does not define the workday. Besides, when school resumes, the…
Read More 9-to-5 is on a COVID19 ventilator. Rethink your work schedule!
Today's hottest conversation among many executives is on the best strategies to nimbly pivot among our multiple crises. When they decide upon winning strategies, the question then becomes how do we implement strategies successfully. Our research at InnovationOne has found…
Read More Why some companies innovate during crises and others don’t
Video evidence of police brutality, the Black Lives Matter protests, and recent discussions on social media have raised the nation’s consciousness. These events have also challenged recruiters and hiring managers to rethink their hiring practices. The bad news is that…
Long before the world knew there was a coronavirus, I, and a team of executives, implemented a flexible work environment enabling 45% of a medical device company workforce to work from home three to four days a week. The result…
Over five years of writing blogs, I have noticed that posts on diversity and inclusion are often the least read. Today, are you ready to reflect on the nation’s crisis with civil rights and social unrest and the failure of…
Executives have often confided to me that employees’ jobs are difficult enough without having to think of new products and services or better ways of doing their jobs. Besides, they cannot afford to have people lose their focus on this…
Read More 7 Steps to Seize Upon a Crisis and Innovative Successfully
Many business leaders told me they planned to reopen their offices in May. Then in mid-May, after their state’s restrictions were lifted, they told me that they had delayed until June. Now, the date they have in mind is July.…
Read More 4 strategies that will transform your office into an industry leader—post-COVID19
Eighty-one percent of US office workers have been working at home four or five days a week since COVID-19, and 71 percent would like to continue working from home. Further, some 70 percent of managers report that their workers’ performance…
Read More Work from home has become the new normal. Boldly adapt now!
More than 50 percent of small US businesses and 90 percent of high tech start ups fail. But not all failures are equal. Some are catastrophic, while others smaller. More vitally, the catastrophic failures are often proceeded by smaller ones.…
Read More 6 Steps to instill a discovery culture and thrive through adversity.
Your guidebook to restart your business with the new normal, safely, productively, with high morale for employees, and reduced costs. Your company sent office workers home in March in a mad scramble to protect them from COVID19 and to…
Read More 9 Steps to Implement a New Post-COVID19 Office Environment
Our new research shows that highly innovative companies can pivot quickly in a crisis because of their collaborative cultures, agile organizations, and the well understood processes they have to suggest, build upon, and prototype new ideas. Download our free report…
Read More Highly innovative companies are designed to pivot quickly
Watch the rebroadcast of our highly attended and successful webcast, "Reinventing Innovation During Times of Crisis: Lessons from Leading Companies." From this post, you can also download our valuable report and PowerPoint slides. John Metselaar of The Conference Board, Peter…
Read More Watch the Rebroadcast of Reinventing Innovation During Crisis Webcast.
Companies have been switching to video interviewing over the last decade because they could screen job candidates faster and save costs. Today, with COVID19, it is a no brainer. Video interviewing technology allows recruiters to conduct pre-recorded interviews quickly with…
Read More Learn the key features and how to pick video-interviewing software
How a company pivots during a crisis significantly impacts its customer engagement, employer brand, and long-term profitability. In the latest podcast in my series, "Leadership During the Coronavirus Crisis, I cover alternatives to RIFs and the legal issues. I review…
Read More Leadership During the Coronavirus Crisis Podcast: Alternatives to RIFs
US companies with fewer than 500 employees will be covered by the Families First Coronavirus Response Act beginning April 1. The Act requires employers to pay for 80 hours of sick leave and extended family and medical leave for up…
Read More Must Know Overview for The Family First Coronavirus Employer Paid Leave Requirements
Many businesses are now scrambling to implement working-from-home procedures, cutting worker hours, and reducing their workforces, whether temporarily or permanently. Economists are now predicting a short but deep recession, with a drop in US economic output of $1.5 trillion, 7%…
Read More Brand building strategies for handling the coronavirus recession
After the decade of innovation, the pursuit of successful innovation execution is still not easy. As reported by McKinsey (2018), 84 percent of executives feel innovation is critical for growth, yet only six percent are satisfied with their innovation efforts.…
Read More Ten insights on improving innovation from the decade of innovation
Join me for an informative webinar today on how to continually win with innovation in today's competitive and fast changing business environment. Arthur Liberian, Senior Innovation Advisor at Planbox and I will uncover how highly innovative organizations disrupt the market…
Read More Webinar TODAY: Eight Practices to Fire Up Your Innovation Culture!
Today's applicant-tracking systems (ATS) not only help you lure and build relationships with job candidates and hire high performers — they can also help you build employer brand. Applicant tracking systems have become job candidate management systems. Wouldn't it be…
Read More 9 tips for buying game-changing applicant tracking systems
The Coronavirus is now growing faster outside of China than in China — including in the US. More than 90 Americans have the virus from coast-to-coast, and six have died. Health officials expect the virus to infect hundreds if not…
Over 4.7 million people now work remotely. Employers reap the rewards of a cost savings of $11k/person. Learn up to date best practices for managing a remote workforce to ramp up productivity, save costs, recruit top talent & maintain accountability.…
Read More Back by Popular Demand! Managing a Flexible and Remote Workforce.
Since Gallup began measuring employee engagement at the turn of the century, it hasn’t improved employee engagement much. It has helped companies realize the importance of empathetic and empowering leaders and collaborative team environments. But Gallup this month published a…
Read More Successful companies focus on building a better culture
The secret of successful innovation is not simply innovating, it’s embracing innovation. In today’s era, innovation should be shared and promoted internally, just like your brand is across the globe. Victor Assad and Arthur Liberian will uncover how highly innovative…
Read More Webinar: Eight Practices to Fire Up Your Innovation Culture
The US now has had 22 months where there are more job openings than unemployed people. According to Manpower’s last study, 69% of US companies struggle to find workers. This trend will continue in the US for a long time due…
Read More Today’ Talent Shortage Is Long Term. Are You Prepared?
Executives who want to dramatically increase their success should implement Objectives with Key Results (OKRs). Research shows that executives who set such goals can significantly improve the performance of their organizations over telling employees to “just do their best.”[i] Moreover,…
The issues of automation and digital transformation and how to create inclusive, transparent, and innovative cultures were some of the many topics discussed by CEOs, technologists, and human resources leaders last week in San Francisco at the Work Rebooted conference. Julie Douthart, biochemist…
Read More Work Rebooted conference examines everything from AI to cultures and the gig economy!
CEOs and other executives are finalizing their business strategies and financial plans at this time of year. With great enthusiasm, their thoughts turn from strategy to implementation. My frequent advice to CEOs is to have no more than seven top…
Read More How to champion your organization’s top 7 priorities
On Martin Luther King Day 2020, almost 52 years after his assassination, the issues of equal treatment and diversity and inclusion for all still trouble many companies. But here’s another way to look at the issue: The cultures that empower…
Read More Drive innovation and diversity— at the same time. Learn how!
Join me and SHRM of Greater Phoenix on Feb 19th for my informative Lunch & Learn on recruiting hacks that will enable you to hire high performing employees faster, build your employer brand, save time, and cut costs. Register today!
During annual workforce planning, Scott Ward, the President of Medtronic Vascular, used to say, “Hire some more mavericks. They don’t always fit in, but we need them for innovation.” He defined mavericks as the technical people who were dedicated to…
An executive team asked me about the company’s need to cut overhead costs and invest more money in R&D. “Why not switch to a flexible work environment?” I suggested. Many companies find that 25 percent to 45 percent of the…
The Glassdoor Best-Place-to-Work list saw a fall of High-Tech companies, such as Facebook, Google, and Apple, while Amazon didn’t even make the list! The ranking of these High-Tech firms fell for different reasons but data privacy scandals and and falling…
Read More How Companies Become a ‘Best Place to Work’ is Changing…
I remember being promoted to my first leadership position early in my career and thinking about how I was going to set the world on fire. Slowly, I began to realize that the role of the manager, being the leader…
Read More Newly promoted to manager? Your learning has just begun…
Check out my podcast episode with @workology discussing How to Create a Strategic Recruiting Process and Plan. Listen now. Podcast Description by Jessica Miller-Merrell of Workology Victor shares why it’s a critical point for HR and recruitment. He says that…
Background checks are essential for employers to uncover resume lies or misrepresentations and to avoid the cost of a bad hire. Companies have other dependable options to ensure they are hiring qualified, high performing job candidates. Over the next five…
Read More Lies on resumes are at an all-time high. Learn how to get to the truth.
“Hack Recruiting” makes a perfect gift for recruiters and hiring managers. It has received outstanding reviews and 5-star ratings on Amazon. Order it online on Cyber Monday from Amazon, Archway Publishing, or Barnes and Noble. and now The SHRMStore. Email me for discounts…
Read More “Hack Recruiting” makes a perfect gift for recruiters and hiring managers!
Charles Schwab said, "The way to develop the best that is in a person is by appreciation and encouragement." Oprah Winfrey said, "Be thankful for what you have; you'll end up having more. If you concentrate on what you don't…
Read More Gratitude will do yourself, workforce and productivity a lot of good.
Luck is never enough. Instead, double your hiring success by using effective interviewing techniques, validated assessments, and reference and background checks. If you believe that it sounds like a lot of work and money, it is cheaper than the cost…
Read More If you depend on gut feel while interviewing, you are relying on dumb luck.
When buying HR technology, know what you want, have great questions, and follow the 80/20 rule. Learn more and the future of HR technology by watching my "Hack Recruiting and HR" podcast with serial entrepreneur and CEO of Place Technology,…
With 200,000 US veterans leaving the military and entering the civilian job market every year, a smart recruiting strategy includes finding and attracting veterans for your roles. In addition, companies can earn a tax credit of $5,600 for hiring veterans…
You will find valuable insights from my new video podcast series, "Hack Recruiting and HR." My video podcast series picks up where my book Hack Recruiting left off, keeping you up-to-date with today's ongoing HR technology innovations. It provides insightful…
Many business leaders want more collaboration and innovation from their workers, but they often struggle with how to get it. Too often, they believe that a crisis, an open office environment, or a set of values will spur collaboration. They…
Another 5-star review on Amazon: "One of the most comprehensive views into full cycle recruiting, especially around the macroforces and innovations impacting how organizations attract, hire and retain talent. Plus advising the profession of what one needs to stay competitive."…
Read More Another 5-star review of “Hack Recruiting” on Amazon
I was speaking recently with a recruiting executive for a Fortune 200 company. She was struggling with the costs of domestic recruiting, poor results, and managers who didn’t interview well. The head of HR, her boss, wanted to cut hiring…
Read More Are your recruiting costs too high? Insource it and save. Here’s how…
AI won't replace recruiters. We need to embrace AI to find job candidates faster, for unbiased job matching, instantaneous communications and analytics, and to automate processes. We will always need the human interface. Step into the sunshine with Hack Recruiting:…
People often ask me the best way to lead a multigenerational workforce. The question frequently comes from frustrated Gen X or baby boomer leaders who enthusiastically tell me stories about millennials who always want fast promotions, who spend too much…
Read More Leading multigenerational workforces with success.
The inspiration for TerrainHopper’s off-road mobility vehicles was founder Todd Lemay’s desire to stroll on the beach with his girlfriend. “I remember 20 years ago being so excited that I just bought a van enabling me to drive, and now…
Read More Girlfriend’s desire to stroll on the beach led to the creation of TerrainHopper
Burnout is becoming pervasive across the US workforce, costing employers productivity and innovation, and leading to employee turnover. It disproportionately impacts our younger workers and women. However, companies can reverse this trend. A recent Gallup study of nearly 7,500 full-time employees found…
My most significant learning from last week’s HR Tech Conference in Las Vegas relates to how chatbots and online discussions are being used to improve the employee experience. Not only are there chatbots that can automate and provide instantaneous communications…
Read More HR Tech: the year of chatbots and improved employee experiences.
My book Hack Recruiting has received excellent reviews, such as this one: “Hack Recruiting is an essential read for anyone hiring employees or gig workers today—from employer branding to technology to recruiting processes, it offers fresh thinking based on research and years…
Read More LAST DAY to purchase “Hack Recruiting” and have access to my new video podcast series!
Today, I am at HR Tech in Las Vegas, the largest HR technology conference in the US with over 10,000 attendees. The place is abuzz with the latest extraordinary technology platforms for human resources: chatbots, blockchain, on-demand video interviewing, artificial…
Read More Digital technology is a candy store, but most implementation fails. Turn the odds.
During a time of full employment, Universities offer a valued and increasingly rare asset: new entrants to the labor market who are trained in their disciplines and the latest technologies. The long-standing advice for University recruiting today is similar to…
Read More University recruiting: 8 tips for success and how to recruit Gen Z
Please look for me at HR Tech in Las Vegas Oct. 1-4, with the ThisWay Global team at Booth 1953. At 2:00 PM on Wednesday, Oct. 2, ThisWay Global Founder and CEO Angela Hood will sponsor an excellent panel discussion…
Read More Join Me and ThisWay Global at HR Tech in Las Vegas, Oct 1-4.
Before launching recruiting chatbot AllyO, co-founder Sahil Sahni walked around shopping malls in Silicon Valley recruiting workers for the mall’s stores. The manual processes he and co-founder Ankit Somani put in place became the blueprint for AllyO’s award winning algorithms…
Read More Meet Sahil Sahni, Co-founder of AllyO, in My New Video Podcast Series
When the California legislature passed its bill last week that most likely will require Uber, Lyft, and DoorDash to convert contract workers to employees, the legislation upended the business models of these companies and the gig economy itself. The upending,…
Read More Gig economy disrupted. How to keep your company out of legal pitfalls.
Beth White is the Founder and CEO of MeBeBot, and you can meet Beth in my upcoming video podcast series, Hack Recruiting and HR. After working in HR for 20 years, Beth founded MeBeBot, a 24/7 virtual HR assistant leveraging…
In today’s fierce recruiting environment, expect to be asked penetrating questions about your company, its culture, and the career development employees may expect. If you are not asked questions by a candidate, it’s a red flag as to their interest…
I was delighted to interview Sandeep Purwar, Founder and CEO of Bevov in Sausalito, CA, for my upcoming video podcast series. After consulting and recruiting for pharmaceutical companies, Sandeep founded Bevov to help companies overhaul their manual and fragmented recruiting methods that…
Last week Google surprised the small to mid-company landscape by announcing that Google Hire will shutter in September 2020. Google Hire was launched with great fanfare a little over two years ago as a top job candidate search, posting, and…
Empirical researchers have long pointed out that more than five years of previous experience did not predict great job performance for new hires.[i] A new review of 81 studies looking at the correlation between prior job experience and performance in…
Read More Experience does not predict the success of new hires. Here are better methods…
I know several CEOs who want to always hire the smartest person they could find for leadership roles. Unfortunately, they are making costly mistakes. Intellectual intelligence is only one of several factors for recruiters and hiring managers to consider when…
Read More What is better than intelligence for job performance?
