by Janine Nicole Dennis | Sep 22, 2014 | Featured, Guest Post, HR Innovation, HR Technology, HR Technology Trends and Tips, Mobile, Talent Management
We are a company that believes trusting and supporting the power of individuals will lead to greater things in the workplace. After more than a decade of building HR portals, we realized it was time to revolutionize the way we work, because the reality is that traditional methods are simply not meeting the needs of today’s changing workforce.
Consider the thoughts of a worker: “My work influences who I am and what becomes of me, not only as a worker but as a person. So anything that supports me in being more connected at work and more effective in life is something for me”.
The workers of today are self-taught digital managers. Outside of our working hours, we are used to having all the information we want at our fingertips through apps on our mobile devices. It doesn’t have to be different at work. People also want to be connected and trusted to contribute, without being constantly monitored. Self-service combined with intranet tried to capture this, but is cumbersome for employees, particularly for remote employees without access to computers or email. Adoption is a problem, particularly in a generationally changing workforce where millennial’s represent a growing majority of the work population.
But how do you capture this as an employer? How do you relate to this and support your own goals–and theirs– in a cohesive and non-invasive way? The answer is trust. Trust both frees and motivates.
Trust is a backbone of relationships in work and life. It is often perceived to be granted from the employer to the employee through social collaboration tools, which however are generally attached to strict guidelines or monitoring policies. Employees in turn often view these limitations as undermining the purity of that trust. Facebook or WhatsApp are popular tools among dynamic workforces, but the enterprise cannot really utilize these platforms effectively. Corporate social tools implemented and monitored from the top down are all too often unsuccessful. Workers fear exposing themselves. At best, they use them cautiously; at worst they reject them wholesale. It is a key aspect of why many HR practitioners do not get the results that they would like out of intranet and collaboration initiatives currently.
Hunite sees itself as a connecter within the “black box” of any enterprise, especially among dynamic workforces. By actually entrusting them to a tool that promotes self-organization and growth, employees can become better at what they do and can be recognized within their teams or self-made networks. Employers can positively influence this disconnected realm where there is little reach or control. The key, though, is respecting the balance between control and trust for everyone involved.
Our mission: to access the potential of workers within enterprises for the good of all. By adopting this tool, that mission can be fulfilled for both individual and enterprise. Individual workers can effectively support themselves not only in work, but also in life, while enterprises can reach out to connected workers with meaningful information in a non-invasive way.
Free from fear, workers can begin to learn—and love—an unencumbered and self-organizing way of life, while employers and HR practitioners reap the benefits of increased employee contribution, motivation, efficiency & success.
Hunite will play an important–and revolutionary–role in transforming and building competitive workforces to drive revenue. Help your people be connected in work and more effective in life!
Author Biography
Kym Lukins works as an Industry Specialist at Hunite. He investigates the needs of workers in dynamic workforces. Previous work in customer focused industries such as hospitality and retail along with study in international HR management has spurred an interest in engagement and connectivity of workers on an international level. He is a firm believer that mobile will play a huge role in improving not only the ability for people to communicate in work and life, but also the chance to balance it in a more effective and cohesive manner.
by Janine Nicole Dennis | Sep 15, 2014 | Business, Featured, Guest Post, HR Innovation, HR Technology, HR Technology Trends and Tips, Recruiting, Recruitment, Talent Acquisition
Only in the last few years has the amount of social data begun to scale, allowing data-driven individuals to begin to search for hiring trends. Within this social data, there are strong indicators of when a top performer is about to “come to market,” or pursue their next career opportunity. As a result, it’ll be the job of tomorrow’s recruiter to figure out how to leverage big data and predictive analytics to find the right candidates when they aren’t yet actively looking.
The majority of recruiters lack the time to gather all public data on each of these professionals. They lack the ability to run multivariate regressions needed to identify the one in 200,000 professionals who are both qualified for and open to a new opportunity. These recruiters will need a tool to do these things for them. Until now, no one’s done a good job of building one.
That’s why we’ve built Entelo. It takes the average recruiter a half-hour to manually collect all available information on just one candidate. Entelo does all this work for you, providing the most comprehensive view of talent available and saving you from hours of research. Entelo Search includes rich profiles of over 30 million candidates, each filled with data from social sites such as Github, Dribbble, Quora, Twitter, and more.
Entelo also uses this wealth of data to help recruiters identify those candidates who are about to change jobs, using our first-of-its-kind More Likely To Move™ filter. Our proprietary algorithm analyzes over 70 variables indicative of upcoming career changes to tell you the right candidate to speak with at the right time. We track everything from layoff announcements and M&A activity to length of time at current company and social profile activity. When a candidate is flagged as More Likely To Move™, they have a 30% likelihood of changing jobs in the next 90 days.
We feel we’ve only scratched the surface of what this data can do to help HR professionals build great teams. We launched Entelo Diversity in April, which helps you find candidates whose social profiles indicate a high probability of meeting specific gender, race or military experience requirements. It’s our hope that this latest element of our algorithm will help companies of all sizes reap the benefits of building strong, diverse teams. Studies show that a more diverse workforce is more creative, more productive and less likely to turn over.
We’d love to show you and your organization how Entelo can help you hit your hiring goals and build a great team. For your free demo of the Entelo platform, visit www.entelo.com/demo.
Author Biography
Kyle Paice runs the Entelo Marketing Team. Previously, he was the Head of Marketing for RentJuice, a real estate software company that was acquired by Zillow. Before RentJuice, Kyle built inbound marketing software as a Product Manager at HubSpot, and consulted to investment banks and other financial services institutions with Deloitte. He has a B.A. in Economics and Political Science from Boston College.
by Janine Nicole Dennis | Aug 6, 2014 | Business, Featured, HR Innovation, Sponsored Post, Talent Management
Campaign/FTC disclosure: I will receive compensation for promoting this campaign. I only work with companies I feel have great products, services and offerings. In accordance with my blog disclosure statement, I will only work with and showcase products and/or companies I believe my readers will benefit from. Xerox has hired me as a brand ambassador for this campaign because of my influence on social media and in talent management. I am not formally employed by Xerox. I am disclosing this in accordance with the Federal Trade Commission’s 16 CFR, Part 255: Guides Concerning the Use of Endorsements and Testimonials in Advertising.
Image courtesy of Deviantart.net
According to Merriam-Webster, Optimism is defined as “a hopefulness and confidence about the future or the successful outcome of something.” I believe every new employee starts out with an abundance of optimism for their career pursuits with a company. It’s sort of like you waking up with an abundance of money in your bank account, but due to cost of living and other expenditures the money becomes less and less and more often than not- it is depleted. Optimism works the same way. The pot of optimism is essentially there to be nurtured, invested and increased. The issue is companies that are unaware of its value and impact will blindly deplete it.
Where does the love go?
We are still hearing reports about 70% of the workforce being disengaged. Why don’t more companies get it? The problem is business leaders understand the business but they seldom have their finger on the pulse of the true motivations, intentions or wishes of their employees. Furthermore, they seem to be missing the mark on keeping that account of optimism funded as the employee continues to work for them.
Being able to harness and sustain the enthusiasm for the company’s objectives as well as providing meaningful work experiences will be key factor in deploying a successful talent strategy in the future. Today’s top talent comes with high expectations, fleeting loyalty and a drive to make an impact. Companies that are able to inspire and sustain enthusiasm will likely be most successful in being able to retain and mobilize their employees to achieve business objectives.
All along, we thought that retention was about nurturing employees such that they would remain with a company. Given this notion that Xerox puts forth of the Return on Optimism (ROO), we come to understand that when individuals are recognized and understood by the business-the company realizes increased productivity, teams are more innovative, clarity around business objectives is commonplace and in return the company retains happier employees.
It’s not a generational thing
It doesn’t matter what generation you belong to, most people prefer to do work that is meaningful for them. If we had to define what ‘meaningful’ would look like – it would be a cross between something you are great at and something you are passionate about. Businesses have a choice of having a miserable workforce that will likely be unproductive and even destructive to the business or they can intentionally ensure that they do all that is possible to help people succeed in their careers.
How many times during the course of your career, have you been asked about what you are good at and the work that you enjoy?
In my case, I have seldom been asked this question. Admittedly, it is a loaded question since the answer will vary from person to person. What do we gain if companies looked at aligning people to their goals; while also satisfying individual career goals and aspirations? All things being equal, you would have your people doing what they love and excel at-which would in turn empower them to give you 100% of their effort in achieving business outcomes. There would be less heavy lifting where it comes to performance management, because we all would be speaking the same language of constant improvement and building on successes. Sounds like a simple solution to a nagging business issue.
How do you see “return on optimism” being used to develop talent strategy?
Want to see how your company stacks up? Take Xerox’s “Return on Optimism” quiz for further insights from top executives at Xerox and other Fortune 500 companies. Click here. Also, see my survey results here.
by Janine Nicole Dennis | Jul 29, 2014 | Business, Employment Branding, Featured, Human Resources, Talent Acquisition, Talent Management
Image courtesy of deviantart.net
Once upon a time, I started a position somewhere (they shall remain nameless) where the grass seemed to be greener than my last pasture. I had a great boss, supportive and competent co-workers and challenging work- what more could one want?
It appeared throughout the interview process that this company was very concerned with attracting a competent HR professional that could help them ignite a more progressive HR delegation. I assured them that I was their woman wooing them with my credentials, education, past projects, notable employers and enthusiasm for the discipline of HR.
So said, so done…
I came on the scene and started effecting change quite immediately- to my then bosses’ delight. The problem was my co-workers weren’t delighted. You see at the same time that I was wowing my boss, the love and courtesy from my co-workers started to wane. Suddenly, the “good mornings” stopped, invites to lunch ceased and I was conspiring to take their jobs or so they thought.
What did they do next?
Daily, they would whisper and gossip about the many ways they could undermine my prowess and I knew it. What I did was return the favor, by not saying “good morning” or even looking their way. I just kept my head down and did the work. Before you get all mighty on me, it was fair treatment. I had just come out of a toxic environment that took everything from me and almost my health. I had no more tolerance for petty office shenanigans (insert the expletive of your choice for good measure).
In any event, their conspiring led them to my boss one day to complain about my lack of “good mornings” and reluctance to be “more social”. In turn, my boss called a meeting with me to ask me the following:
He said: “Janine, could you just be the bigger person and try a little harder- like be their friend.” To which I responded with a synopsis of my daily dealings with them. They wanted to dig into my personal life, meet for breakfast with spouses after church on Sunday; oh and I was to report to them the where, what, when and why- anytime I met with the Director of HR on a new project.
His answer…
“I didn’t know all of this was going on, but could you just try a little harder- you’re stronger than them.” Keep in mind that, I was working for this company for maybe six months at this time.
What did they know about me?
That is the problem and the question. They knew nothing about me, my likes or dislikes, my work habits or my boundaries. All too often, we make judgments about the new guy or gal on the job based upon our own insecurities and biases. In this instance, these two were essentially uncomfortable because I was quickly productive and my ideas were welcomed. They had spent years doing mediocre work and I was shaking things up. Nevermind, that one of them hired me and gushed about the company and their need for a progressive person. That went out the window the day they realized I was a serious professional that got sh%t done.
Here’s why these situations are problematic for Talent Acquisition:
1) I was the new person. Instead of being supported, I was being bullied into being more social than I was ready to be at that time. I was told during the hiring process they wanted “productive and progressive” and that’s what I was doing.
2) The onus was placed on me to rectify a situation that my boss should have been able to handle quite decisively.
3) I could have quit and they would have been left wondering why. Toxic environments create turnover.
I didn’t quit, because I wasn’t about to let two bad apples ruin what was a dream opportunity.
As talent acquisition professionals, we need to remain cognizant of the fact that first impressions not only extend to how candidates impress us, but how we impress them. We can’t advocate for competencies and skills in the hiring process but then try to deter the person when they come barreling out of the gate providing the very same acumen you recruited for. Furthermore, you better be sure that you keep a close watch on those in a position to hire, on-board and mentor new employees. There is nothing more costly and embarrassing than to someday find out that your turnover is high and moreover, that it is high because someone in your organization is undermining your otherwise benevolent efforts to retain employees.
Some level of foolery exists in most organizations, but be sure your leaders are prepared to act swiftly, decisively, and consistently to prevent occurrences like these.
In the end, one of the co-conspirators left the company. The remaining one and I established an amicable work relationship.
Need to get your talent acquisition team refocused. Contact me for a free consultation.
by Janine Nicole Dennis | Jul 23, 2014 | Featured, Human Resources, Leadership development, Talent Management, Turnover
A friend of mine posted this blurb on Facebook from an audio book he was listening to (note: I don’t know the name of said audio book):
“Numerous studies have shown us that those given authority are more likely to lie, cheat and steal, while also being harsher in their judgments of others for doing these same things. Science tells us people with power feel less compassion for the suffering of others.
Previous experiments also show us that those who are obedient to authority are capable of the worst forms of murder, and tolerant of the worst forms of abuse. They will even chastise those of us who resist corrupt authority. They become facilitators of evil, believing that obedience to authority absolves them of personal responsibility. “
This blurb above is an explanation of today’s cesspool management and hierarchy that permanently resides in many companies. Although we speak very seriously and regularly about the importance of leadership development as HR practitioners, the truth is very rarely are managers chosen with care. In fact, I have personally observed companies who promote people to management or leadership roles based on their ability to be obedient and play the game.
What happens is the road to leadership then becomes a chess match played by cheaters. The rules are not static, but changed on an as-needed basis to suit the players. People like myself and my colleagues never stand a chance in being promoted or even surviving as an employee, because we live and work by a code of conduct. The code of conduct isn’t some arbitrary manifesto we write down to make people believe we are responsible, discerning, fair individuals; but a construct that guides our work and how we treat others in and out of business.
When we say that employees don’t leave jobs they leave bosses- we really mean they leave regimes. Within the companies of some of your most beloved brands and products lies a regime that takes pride in beating its talent to a pulp daily with unkind words, unreasonable expectations and in some cases bullying- just because they can.
Recently, I read an article of the CEO of a company I used to work for. The article interviewed him about how he runs this large conglomerate and of course highlighted all of the philanthropic work he does for the community. Great article, nice man, toxic company. It’s his job to speak highly of his business, but what I know after working there in HR is that the leadership from HR to the actual facilities (in many cases) are toxic and a good 3/4 of the employees are disgusted; but remain there out of necessity.
Turnover is directly linked to these toxic environments. The age of obedience and subservience is dead. People want meaningful work and positive work environments. If they remain in your employ, it is purely out of necessity. Necessity breeds a paycheck- which also means that they couldn’t care less about the success of the company.
I’m not sure when it became cool to lead from a place of pure malice and fear, but it needs to stop. If the ultimate goal of talent management is to retain the right talent in organizations, it’s time we (HR and everyone else) took personal responsibility to be ethical, fair, equitable, and provide a workplace free of toxic leadership. That may mean getting rid of a manager that has high turnover even in light of his or her considerable contributions to the company. It could mean reprimanding a manager for being a jerk, even if he or she is your happy hour cohort.
A lack of personal responsibility, the inability to tell and own the truth; as well as unethical behavior are among the many reasons why your turnover may be high. Pay attention to your workforce. Don’t look the other way and cover your ears when it matters the most. Your talent is your brand. Treat them with the same respect and humility you would want for yourself.
How are you being more intentional about being better leader?
Contact us to help you build a strategy for developing positive leadership.
