by Janine Nicole Dennis | Oct 27, 2015 | Career, Featured, Society and HR, Work/Life
I am coming at you from IBM Insight in Las Vegas. I promise you I will be back to churning out more than just Ask Czarina Live posts soon, but I am on the move a lot this month. Before I proceed, I want to thank everyone who joined me last week. It was great to have you and I am inviting you to join me this week and bring a friend.
Which brings me to our topic for this week’s Ask Czarina Live. This week’s topic is: The State of Working Parenthood.
I won’t spoil what I will share this Thursday, but I had a lot of hustling to do to be able to not only make it to Vegas for IBM Insight, but to be able to go to my speaking gig later in the week.
As a business owner, professional and mom of 3 who also happens to be in the midst of picking up steam as a speaker- my travel is picking up and responsibilities at home remain the same. I know all about the opportunities in front of me and I know what I stand to gain. At the same time, I am forever calculating the risks and cons to what I do. As such, I am calling all working parents and that includes stay-at-home moms and dads. I’ll explore the following:
- Why I stopped making a distinction between these two groups of parents even though society continues to drive a hard line.
- Whether it is easier now or in past generations to be a parent.
- What I do to release present day parenting pressures making life bearable for everyone involved.
- Is work-life balance attainable?
- Is the request for “more flexibility” new or are we in a time and place where it is more accepted?
In addition, I will be exploring a few articles that summarize the state of working parenthood. Here are the links to the articles, should you be interested in checking them out in advance:
Kids of working moms are better off
How working moms define success
What workers around the world want: More flexibility
Stay-at-home moms are on the rise
Join me on Thursday at 11pm EST/10pm CST/8pm PST for my second “Ask Czarina Live”. Last week I promised you that I would be posting the replays of “Ask Czarina Live” to “The Aristocracy of HR” You Tube Channel for those of you not ready to take the Periscope plunge. Unfortunately, Periscope has a bug that is preventing my broadcasts from properly being saved in my gallery, so I am currently unable to share my shows in both places. They are working on it and I will let you know when I am able to do it. For now, you can continue to view replays on Periscope, within the 24-hour window allotted,
As usual it will be fun, fresh, and insightful. I look forward to seeing you there.
Want more? Click here to watch the latest “Ask Czarina” episode. Subscribe to “The Aristocracy of HR” You Tube Channel to be notified when new episodes are published.
by Janine Nicole Dennis | May 6, 2015 | Career, Featured, Recruiting, Recruitment
Image courtesy of Flickr.com
Yesterday, I was on a show called: Drive Thru HR with two of my friends/colleagues (check out the replay here). We had the chance to discuss what we see as necessary qualities for today’s Recruiters and Talent Acquisition professionals. There’s no question that there has been a shift from when I started over 10 years ago. If you speak to the average jobseeker (and this includes candidates internal to your organization) – that shift isn’t exactly a positive one. It appears that as technology improved the quality of Recruitment has decreased. The opposite should be true; but alas it isn’t and people are fed-up.
I have a few friends in the market looking for new work. As such, I have become the go-to gal for all ridiculous Recruiter stories and antics. While I am rarely shocked, I am often disappointed. For this reason, I am listing the essential qualities that I believe make a Recruiter successful.
1) Jobseeker Advocacy- I am always stunned by the Recruiter that doesn’t get that it is their job to advocate for their candidates. It may be a sore spot for me, because I worked in staffing once upon a time- where everything from your paycheck to your performance depended on your ability to find talent and get them working as soon as possible. Hiring managers look to the TA professional or Recruiter for guidance on the candidate landscape and market. As a Recruiter, it is not only your job to snatch up the best candidates; but it is also your job to advocate for the ones that have the potential to be a great hires. You’re probably thinking- well doesn’t everyone have potential? The answer is “it depends”. However, there are times when the hiring manager wants what they want and despite their stubbornness you have to be courageous enough to advocate for your people; so your qualified applicants have a fair chance at being evaluated. I have advocated for candidates that were not necessarily the hiring managers first choice; but they were the best qualified and it turned out beautifully.
2) Understanding the Need– Too often, I hear about Recruiters engaging jobseekers without fully understanding the job they are recruiting for. Not only does it make the recruiter look ridiculous, but it is also a poor reflection on the company. How can you expect the candidate to get excited when you can’t answer basic questions about the position? Last I checked, the first thing a recruiter needs to do is to sit with the hiring manager and understand what they need . The next step is to do your own independent research about the position to add to what you already know. The moral of the story here is: know what you’re recruiting for and stop trying to herd jobseekers like you would cats.
3) Humility– We have all been in a position to look for new employment at one point or another. The Recruitment Process is not the place for a power trip. Often times, people are at their lowest when they are coming in for an interview- especially at the entry-level. Anything you can do to make them feel at ease-so they can put their best foot forward is advisable. Treat candidates as you would want to be treated.
4) Setting Expectations- Recruiters are busy. Nobody gets that more than I do. That being said, help yourself and the candidate by letting them know what to expect in the beginning-so they don’t have to constantly bug you for status updates. If you do this and there are still complaints, you can at least rest easy at night knowing you attempted to provide some guidance to your candidates for what they should expect during the hiring process. If candidates know what to expect they will be less inclined to stalk you for answers.
5) Get Out There- I don’t care how much Social Recruiting you do- it is no substitution for getting out of the office and out to events to meet with potential candidates. In my previous life, I was often the only Recruiter willing to go to events, job fairs and the like. Some of my co-workers were reluctant to do so relying only on internet sourcing to fill positions. To each their own, but it is almost blasphemous to be a Recruiter and not want to be out and about networking. Step away from the screen and get out to an event. It allows people to connect with you in person rather than the normal channel of applying online.
We all get busy or forget to follow-up from time-to-time. However, these should not be the defining a whole industry such as Recruitment. As with any job, the focus for Recruiters should be to deliver a consistent and quality experience. Your reputation and your company’s reputation depends on it.
by Janine Nicole Dennis | Mar 19, 2015 | Advice, Career, Featured, Life
Image courtesy of Flickr.com
Series Introduction
Every year, I like to find a different way of celebrating my favorite day: my birthday. Since I am turning 32 next month (I know…awww…), I’ve decided to share 32 revelations I have had during the course of my life about everything from life in general to business. Think of it as daily inspiration for you and therapy for me. It is a challenge for me, because I don’t think I have ever published a post everyday in the entire existence of The Aristocracy of HR. Plus, I recognize that while I am fairly generous in sharing on social media and here, I have only just scraped the surface on sharing who I am when I’m not pontificating how HR and Business can do better. Let’s use the month of March to get to know one another better. I hope at the end of the month, you walk away with something you can use in your own life or business.
Day 14 of 31- Ask Questions
Questions are more important than we give it credit. In the past I have accepted salary offerings and never once asked if there was room to go higher. My lack of confidence and inability to live with the temporary discomfort that would come as a result of asking for more money cost me thousands of dollars in earnings over the course of my career. A lack of questions is damaging as it leads people to think we are satisfied or even happy with a set of circumstances when we aren’t questioning things. When I didn’t negotiate or ask for raises it gave my superiors a false sense of comfort that I was happy and even satisfied with my work and compensation. By the time, I went to have a serious discussion about my salary they were acted as if I ambushed them with my seemingly out-of-the-blue concerns. I have learned over the years that you get what you ask for. People who negotiate and ask for what they want-usually get it.
The real issue with asking questions isn’t necessarily the question itself, but the answer. There is a fear that the answer may not favor our initial intention of asking the question. No one wants to be seen as a fool or have a request rejected. As such, we sit in silence never knowing what could have been if we only had the courage to simply ask for what we want. When I finally learned the value of a question, things were revealed to me that I wouldn’t have known otherwise . This new knowledge helped me to drive decisions regarding my life and career. When I had enough guts to ask for what I wanted, I was told “no” which pushed me to keep working towards my goals. However, in 50% or more of these instances, I got exactly what I asked for.
That journey to figuring out my purpose that I discussed earlier in the series has only been made possible because I have been asking lots and lots of questions of myself and others the past few years. I see questions as my foundation and the answers as the sails that are steering my ship.
What about you? What sorts of questions are you asking these days to evaluate your life, career, etc?
Czarina’s Lesson: Even if the answer is “no” there is something to be learned and/or gained from asking for what you want.
by Janine Nicole Dennis | Mar 3, 2015 | Career, Featured, Life
Image Courtesy of Pinterest
Series Introduction
Every year, I like to find a different way of celebrating my favorite day: my birthday. Since I am turning 32 next month (I know…awww…), I’ve decided to share 32 revelations I have had during the course of my life about everything from life in general to business. Think of it as daily inspiration for you and therapy for me. It is a challenge for me, because I don’t think I have ever published a post everyday in the entire existence of The Aristocracy of HR. Plus, I recognize that while I am fairly generous in sharing on social media and here, I have only just scraped the surface on sharing who I am when I’m not pontificating how HR and Business can do better. Let’s use the month of March to get to know one another better. I hope at the end of the month, you walk away with something you can use in your own life or business.
Day 2 of 31- Purpose
I spoke yesterday about my mantra of not spending energy or time on people, situations, or prospects that don’t serve my purpose. I find the concept of purpose an interesting and elusive idea. When we are young, people ask us what we want to be when we grow up and we give an answer based on two possible premises: either we answer based on what we see modeled in others in our family or we answer based on the things we like at that point in our lives. As we get older, there is both this familial and societal push for us to settle in on a vocation that allows us to support ourselves financially. This societal push is perplexing because, we are essentially forced to make a decision about the trajectory of our lives at 17 or 18 years of age never being privy to the one thing that makes all the difference in being successful and enjoying your life: purpose.
In my opinion, this lack of emphasis on living with purpose has caused several generations to meander about the workforce from job to job; and in some cases career to career with no guiding principles for how they can cultivate a meaningful contribution to humanity. No wonder there are plentiful stories of unproductive and disengaged workforces. There’s no surprise that people are sailing through life in a stupor. I know people right now who are 50+ years of age -and are finally discovering the ingredients for living a purposeful life. That’s a long time to have lived, worked and expended energy on people, situations, and activities that don’t connect to the essence of who you are. We all need a focus or an objective in life and work.
Have you ever observed a family member or friend who is getting on in age? Among many things that contribute to their occasional bouts of lashing out and irritability is: losing a sense of purpose. The idea that they are no longer viable or able to be of service is often the result of their mental and physical undoing. The same holds true for people in general- we all just want to be a part of something.
I think we should expose children to the concept of having a purpose for their life. The focus doesn’t have to be linear or based on societal pressures, but it should connect to the things that are at the core of who they are. In the least abstract way, I try to explain to my kids that there is great power in doing what you really love. I understand as a parent that “what they love” maybe fleeting at this stage, but at least they are focusing on what they love in whatever moment they are in. I try to model it through my work so they don’t see me as a product of indecision, but someone who is intentional about the work I do and the life I live. My hope is that this focus evolves as they get older and they start to connect-the-dots in doing the things they are good at and have a passion for.
It isn’t enough to make a ton of money. There has to be something uniquely pleasurable and interesting about the work that we do. The intersection of having money and uniquely pleasurable work is bliss. It may sound crazy, but I have recently dedicated myself to seeking out only the initiatives, causes and work that cause my heart to race. It’s just a happier existence for me and it could be for you.
Czarina’s Lesson: Nobody should care more about how your story gets written, but you. Make sure you are in the driver seat of your life.
by Janine Nicole Dennis | Feb 11, 2015 | Career, Featured, Talent Acquisition, Talent Management
As someone who worked in Talent Acquisition for most of her career, I was the person responsible for ensuring the continued progression of thousands of people’s careers. I made offers that meant people could feed their families and others that catapulted people to the executive suite, I negotiated great packages and sometimes had to sell the not-so-attractive offers. I was an agent of opportunity always on the hunt for the best person that met the company’s needs. With all of this workforce good I was doing, it occurred to me that many of my colleagues and I were often closing better career deals for the people we served than for ourselves.
If you have worked in Talent Acquisition you know it is not an easy job. As a function we are responsible for making sure that every department is adequately staffed. From the Janitor to the CFO, we are charged with keeping the halls filled with talent with little to no disruption to the business. In my experience, I have had varying requisition loads. I have handled as little as 6 reqs at anytime and upwards of 175 when I worked for someone who was blatantly trying to drown me- but I digress. My point is this job isn’t for the faint of heart and yet there is often a lack of interest and focus in creating a career path for the very same professionals who dedicate themselves to doing it for others.
If you’re a TA Specialist or Internal Recruiter in a company, where do you go next? The path isn’t always clear or it doesn’t exist. In some organizations, TA Specialists move to TA Leads or Senior TA Specialists and eventually to TA Manager if they shake the right hands- but where else can their skills be utilized? It has been the great paradox of my existence in TA to realize my opportunities were non-existent while remaining excited about the opportunities and salary increases I was able to offer others.
A breakthrough…
Alas, I have met someone who understands the need to develop her Talent Acquisition team. Last week while attending the Take The Interview Talent Acquisition Summit/#truNewYork, I had the pleasure of sitting in on a track led by Ali Wong of NBC Universal. She heads up the Talent Acquisition function there and is changing the game for the Talent Acquisition professionals on her team. During her track, she spoke about how she is helping her team get out of the rut of just filling requisitions and on to thinking about how they personally want to impact the business. She’s not telling her team, “sorry, there is no career path” or “we’d love to see you in leadership, but…”. She is insisting that ever recruiter, sourcer, and coordinator have a clear understanding of how they impact the business; while allowing them to constantly learn, develop and be exposed to the people that can advocate for their career progression.
At NBC Universal, Recruiters are responsible for the mentorship and career progression of the sourcers and coordinators who support them. I have always been perplexed by organizations that went as far to create these talent acquisition teams composed of a recruiter, sourcer and coordinator only to remove the recruiter from having any input into the development and performance management for the roles that support them daily. Frankly, it’s a missed opportunity for the sourcers and coordinators to be mentored by someone in the role they will eventually have and it robs the recruiter of key leadership experience that will be needed as they progress up the ranks.
Back to Ali, she holds her team accountable for results and business impact. None of the ridiculous rumination about time-to-fill and other baseline headaches. She has a clear standard and that is to produce what the internal customers need and she will develop you so you can move on to do the things you want to do in the company, Conversely, if you cannot work up to her standard or find that the job is not what you wanted-she encourages you to move to another area of the company where your talents would be better served.
Changing the game…
If you can’t tell, I am more than impressed with the way she leads her team. Her leadership is not one to admire superficially, but it is backed by results. Her team consistently meets and exceeds their targets. They are “game changers” as she calls them.
Anyone can hire recruiters or a TA team and deploy them to frantically fill all of the positions in a company. However, it takes time, thought and effort to build and deploy a team that love what they do, produce and make an impact. Oh and by the way, she doesn’t care where the work gets done as long as it gets done- a nod and a wink for telework. TA Specialists, Recruiters, Sourcers, Coordinators, TA Assistants need career love too. If you are going to hold them responsible for bringing in the talent you are going to have to invest in them as well. Moreover, ensure that they are lead by someone who understands the value and importance of their work- who also relentlessly pushes them to find their passion. That passion will not only make them happier in their work, but it will come through when prospective candidates meet with these people to size up your company.
I was also reminded by colleagues at the summit that the recruitment and/or talent acquisition function will cease to exist in the next 10 years, so while we still have it-let’s show a little career love to the guys and gals in the trenches making it happen one job at a time.
by Janine Nicole Dennis | Feb 4, 2015 | Business, Career, Featured, Human Resources, Talent Management
Courtesy of Pixabay.com
There is nothing more reassuring to a jobseeker than hearing that opportunity abounds in the company you are interviewing with. It isn’t the most important aspect for everyone, but for a good majority- it is the defining factor next to compensation and other candidate bait. There’s very little reason for candidates to doubt your claim of endless upward mobility. That is until they get burned. When they start a job and find out the yellow brick road to career greatness is more like quicksand; it leads to initial disappointment-but they haven’t lost hope in every employer yet. They start to search again and find another seemingly good company. To ensure that they don’t make the same mistake again, they ask your recruiter better questions during the interview process. They join your company with hope and promise beneath their wings; but this time there is a new set of tricks that halt their career progression. Now, it hits the candidate like a ton of bricks that there’s something wrong. Either they are really bad at choosing companies or they aren’t as great as they thought. To put it plainly it is utterly frustrating.
At a time where retention and talent management are all the rage, you would think companies would be more intentional about looking at practices that may be undermining their efforts.Whatever your sentiment is about how employees progress in the company, you have to agree that the following practices are pretty lame and counterproductive to your talent management strategy.
1) Bogus Job Postings– Here we have those highly-coveted positions where you have quietly identified your candidate of choice, but decide to waste your employees’ time, energy and emotions as they fawn over a job they have no possibility of attaining. The worst part about this is the imposition you put both your recruiters and candidates in. Both parties know how it’s going to turn out, but instead they have to go through the motions because you want it to appear that you conducted a competitive search.
2) Sneak-Attack Promotions- When you feel the need to confidentially promote employees followed by a celebrity-worthy press release announcing your decision- morale is going to plummet. It doesn’t say very much about your leadership ability, when you don’t think enough of your team to give them a chance to apply and interview for positions they are qualified to do.
3) Hold em’ and Fold em’- Are your managers undermining your employees’ ability to transfer by creating performance issues and personality narratives that never existed? This is typical when opportunity presents internally, but the manager does everything in their power to keep the employee from progressing further by sharing off-the-record performance fodder that influences the selection process. The problem with this is the employee catches on eventually and realizes they’ve been blacklisted.
4) The Relic on the Shelf- Poor tenured employee who has done well in becoming the go-to gal or guy in their department, but can’t seem to get any further. So you mean to tell me that this person who has been with the company for 30+ years with nary a bad performance review and happens to be fluent in the company rules, norms and culture is suddenly not good enough for any other opportunities in the organization or even their own department? Stop the madness!
5) Give Me More… more education, more experience, more skills, a third arm, the stem cells from your first child- I get it-you don’t have time to train and you need them up and running like yesterday. How do more KSA’s help when you haven’t established what is absolutely essential to your operation? In addition, why is it necessary when you have promoted and continue to promote people with no credentials? If you’re going to ask someone to go back to school or learn more, the request needs to be consistent and operationally-warranted. Last time, I checked Jesus Christ already has a job.
Here you have five scenarios where there is likely a disconnect between your intention and practice. The moral of the talent management story is this: if someone isn’t performing well, don’t promote them. However, have the decency to have a conversation about how they can fix it. When they do fix it, don’t hold their past performance mistakes and deficits over their head indefinitely. Strike a balance between what you want and what is needed. You may think you “need” someone with a PH.D and the ability to read minds for that receptionist role, but does it have to be so?
For God’s sake be thankful for your tenured employees, if not for them many of your triumphs and financial gains would not be possible. If they aren’t trained to the standard of the current workforce, blame yourself for not investing in them and insisting that they continue to grow professionally. Speaking of growth, stop hiding and withholding opportunity from your workers. Be transparent about present and upcoming opportunities. Allow your employees to apply for internal opportunities aligned with their backgrounds and interests. The best case scenario is you could find out you have been missing out on some unknown strengths of your employees. The worst case…you hire the right person and your employee carries on knowing that you at least gave them a chance.
Lastly, no more bogus searches. External and internal candidates alike know when you are full of sh%&! Stop putting out external postings knowing you want a qualified internal candidate and stop posting internal positions knowing there’s a VIP in mind. Interviewing for a job is stressful and we have all been there. There is nothing considerate about making someone go through the scrutiny that is synonymous with the interview and selection process for no reason. Being honest about opportunity is just one more way of building rapport with your employees. It also ensures that prospective employees aren’t deterred from joining your company because you haven’t committed to a consistent and fair talent management strategy.
