Archive for August, 2008
Putting the “Super” Back in Supervise
Aug 29, 2008
If you’re a manager - and stop me if you’ve heard this one before - it really helps your employees to not be a jerk. The Onion recently released this “study” that, as is typical of the satire newsmagazine, made me laugh: “Not Being an A**hole May Boost Employee Morale.” Ah, it’s funny because it’s true.
As a refugee former employee at a company that made the dysfunctional atmosphere of Wernham Hogg look like Google, I can relate (more than I’d prefer to) with David Silverman’s recent post in the Harvard Business Review about the “11 Habits of the Worst Boss I Ever Had.”
- Comments 12 Comments
- Categories Employee Engagement, Employer Advice, Generational Hiring
Time to Jump on the Employee Training Train?
Aug 27, 2008
Today, CareerBuilder.com announced the launch of CBInstitute.com, a site designed to help workers improve their skill sets and make themselves more marketable through online courses.
The courses are designed and created by leading industry specialists and content is gathered from years of research in areas such as: computer, business, and management and leadership skills, sales and language training, licensing and certifications, and various assessments.
- Comments 1 Comment
- Categories Employee Retention
No Money, Sex, Religion…but what about Politics?
Aug 26, 2008
How much election coverage should your co-workers really be covering?
It’s safe to say that the hype of the upcoming U.S. presidential election isn’t going to die down anytime soon. The dust barely had time to settle from Barack Obama’s acceptance speech at last week’s Democratic National Convention before the drama surrounding Sarah Palin, John McCain’s newly announced vice presidential candidate, caught on media fire.
Update: Sarah Palin to give what some are dubbing the “speech of her life” tonight at 10:30 EDT…
- Comments 14 Comments
- Categories Economy, Employee Engagement, Employer Advice, Social Media
Be Careful What You Conserve For…
Aug 25, 2008
If your company is making a conscious decision to “go green” - and not just for appearance’s sake - I genuinely applaud you. Just don’t make the same mistake that Texas-based canning company WHH Ranch did, using shredded checks from a nearby bank to package their shipped goods to customers.
As good as their intentions might’ve been, they probably could’ve made a wiser decision about which paper products they chose to recycle…perhaps something a little less identity-thefty, no? (And, as Consumerist.com points out, “It’s great that WHH Ranch agreed to stop packing goods in shredded checks, but what sort of insanely reckless bank was handing them out to begin with?!”)
- Comments 4 Comments
- Categories Branding, Employee Engagement, Going Green
The New Interview: More Real than a 3-D Screening of Jaws
Aug 25, 2008
I gave a pretty interesting interview last week. In this interview, I tried a new technique that could be called 3-dimensional interviewing. You should know up front that I made a big interviewing mistake a few years ago and suffered tried to make it work for about eight months before finally concluding that I had to let an employee go. As a result of this experience, I’ve spent a lot of time researching and trying different interviewing techniques to hopefully avoid such a mistake in the future. Obviously, it’s impossible to be a perfect interviewer, but there are ways we can all be better. I’m interested to know what you think about this one…
The individual (Mr. X) who came into our office to interview was set up for success. He interviewed well with someone else who was responsible for evaluating his soft business skills. My task this time was to verify the soft skills and to validate his technical skill claims. When someone says that they are proficient in certain technical skills, it’s often hard to get a good feel for their level of proficiency without having them do some work, right?
- Comments 9 Comments
- Categories Employee Attraction, Interviewing
Should Women in the Work Force be Outraged? Battle of the Sexes Rages On…
Aug 21, 2008
It’s Wednesday, and it’s been a hellish week already. You’re sitting at a swank bar in town (read: cheesy chain establishment that’s conveniently located across the street from your office) with the usual happy hour crew, and the waitress is giving you looks while desperately trying to swipe your second - or is it your fifth? - vodka tonic from your hands. But what you lack in size you make up for in strength, and you win the Absolut battle. She glares and shuffles off.
After the usual diatribes from Bob and Katie about everything from the boss’s poor tie choices to proper water cooler etiquette to the last-minute project no one was given advance notice of, Judy takes a sip of her beer and leans in. She then utters two words that make the entire table of co-workers shudder.
- Comments 12 Comments
- Categories Survey Results
Loading ...