Hot HR Tips from Edward Navis, SPHR

What the hell are ethics, anyway?

Well, if you took a course in business ethics in college, you might recall that ethics have only a one-way relationship with the law. There are numerous business decisions that are unethical, yet perfectly legal. We can, however, say that if it’s illegal, it’s also generally unethical.

On a recent assignment for a client that shall remain nameless (you know me: the picture of discretion), I consulted with some local execs about their business decisions. I was sent there because they closed a lot of deals, but lost most of them in the ensuing months and costing the company annoying financial losses in refunds.

Believe it or not, it was an ethical problem. They were quick to promise product and service in the name of a fast profit. Close the deal, to hell with the consequences. We’ll worry about them later.

Do the names Madoff and Enron mean anything?

Do you try to get your employees for less than you could pay? Do you put off annual performance appraisals to avoid salary increases? Check your practices before a lawyer wrecks your practices!

Yes, ethics are personal and often change, but taking money from someone simply because you can is just plain wrong. I don’t care how you slice it.

So here’s the moral of this story. I don’t want to sound like I’m anyone’s conscience, because I have enough trouble with my own temptations. But if you own a business and ethical considerations are not a sound part of your human capital strategy, you’re asking for trouble. You’ll likely be the first victim of your employees’ unethical decisions.

If you’d like to learn more, contact me at 973-256-3757 or via email at ed@FullSpectrumHR.com.

Back in Virginia for part two of the project. I just wish businesses, like hotels, would take the subject of air conditioning more seriously. I’m sweating gray matter here. But I digress.

This year is the twentieth anniversary of the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA). Before you dismiss this as liberalist nonsense, please consider the following strategic points.

1. The ROI on hiring the disabled is higher; you don’t spend as much time and money trying to find them.

2. We should be judging candidates and evaluating employee performance based on their ability to do the job, not their outward appearances. (You can’t run your business like a modeling agency if you sell widgets.)

3. The ADA opened a lot of doors for people who were previously excluded from the workforce for inappropriate reasons. Good results, yes, but still a long way to go.

4. Yes, some people try to abuse the ADA with frivolous lawsuits, but please don’t advocate throwing out the baby with the bathwater.

5. Disabled Americans are often highly motivated to work harder because of their struggles. They have different and quite valuable perspectives on life, work, and how the two intertwine.

A few years ago, I got called into an interview already in progress. Our call center needed reps that could type a minimum of 60 words per minute, and according to the green HR person, we had a problem because there was an applicant with no arms.

He said he could type 85 words per minute without errors, but could type 95 if he used spell check. He used his feet, which, he added, were cleaner than most hands in the world. All we’d have to do is let him sit in a corner and put the computer on the floor.

We did, and yes, he did type that fast. He even completed and signed the application more legibly than his non-disabled counterparts. (“I’m right-footed”, he said with some pride.) We got him a legless chair to sit in so he could work in the same area as his colleagues. He became a manager within a year, and was coincidentally responsible for $1.2 million in viable cost cuts.

Remember: you’ll sure need the ADA there if you ever become disabled. You’ll want to comply with it because it’s the law, and because it’s a wise business strategy. Most important, you’ll want to comply with it because it’s the right thing to do.

If you’d like to learn more, contact me at 973-256-3757 or via email at ed@FullSpectrumHR.com.

Greetings from the home of the great T. Jefferson, beautiful Virginia! Seeing some clients here and working hard to bring their strategies into compliance. Truly a great company!

I’ve been on the road quite a bit of late, and as I’m using hotels, airlines, and car rental companies a lot, existing human capital strategies that directly affect customer service have moved into the forefront of my observations. With all the highly motivated people out there who would do anything for a paycheck, it never ceases to amaze me how large employers – whose business success depends entirely on the public’s perceptions, mind you – continue to hire “warm bodies” with barely enough mediocre talent to fill critical, customer facing positions.

My bigger fear is that the American public has developed immunity to poor service, thereby letting employers off the hook. Why bother to live up to a higher standard? No one will notice if you don’t.

So just to show you how much chutzpah I actually have (and how fed up I am with all the bad business practices that affect customer service), I’m asking a small favor. Over the next month, please do the following:

1. If you come across bad service, let the management know that you’re watching and that you expect them to hire and manage better in the future. Tell them you plan to tell 3 people about your bad experience.

2. Ask two friends to do the same, and ask each of them to ask two friends, and so on.

I know this sounds like an old Breck shampoo commercial, but this might just be the way to make some changes here. Let’s teach America’s service industry that it really does matter how you interview, whom you hire, and how you manage those people over the long haul.

If you’d like to learn more, contact me at 973-256-3757 or via email at ed@FullSpectrumHR.com.

How unlike me: such a long gap between blogs! I’ve been (thankfully) busier than a BP engineer stationed in the Gulf, and am just now, if you’ll pardon the expression, coming up for air.

The Good News: The new book is coming along fine, as is a PeopleThink guide to finding and hiring the best available talent. This continues to be a challenge for hiring managers nationwide as they realize that “gut instinct interviewing”, or simply “seeing how you feel” about a candidate, just does not work and continues to cost corporate America billions of dollars annually.

More Good News: I’ve asked Tom Crimmins of Business Technology Services in NYC to help me with my website makeover. I think we can make the summer deadline, as long as I can get a few minutes to send his people the information they need. But you’re going to love the end product.

And on a more critical note: include in your human capital strategies a way to save money for increased taxes over the coming year. The recent high unemployment caused a massive shortfall in funds for our municipal, state, county, and federal governments, and they’re all going to need a handout soon. To learn the identity of the first person they’re going to ask for the money, just look in your bathroom mirror

If you’d like to learn more, contact me at 973-256-3757 or via email at ed@FullSpectrumHR.com.

Several states are concerned that employers are using interns as free labor. I’ve seen this happen time and again.

Few employers take the time to define a job with any level of specificity or accuracy, and the lost productivity costs them billions each year. Even fewer plan educational experiences for interns. Interns have told me that they run personal errands for the executives, clean bathrooms, and file paper. They are supposed to learn.

Employers lose out in this deal. When these kids talk about their internships – and they will – they will speak poorly of the company. That translates into lost future business. It also increases recruitment costs exponentially: an intern with a poor perception of the company will never return after graduation to work there, and neither will anyone he knows. Think of all the time and money wasted to recruit and train a new employee because there’s no possibility of calling a trusted ex-intern and offering them a job.

If you’d like to learn more, contact me at 973-256-3757 or via email at ed@FullSpectrumHR.com.

My Web Site: Click here or paste this url into the browser: http://www.FullSpectrumHR.com

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President Obama announced recently that he wanted to overhaul our education system. A noble endeavor, indeed.

Like our President, I believe this is a good idea. I see the results of poor education every time I pick up a resume or read an email sent by some of my clients and colleagues. The language can barely be categorized as English. I see resumes in which people misspell their own names or their hometowns, partial sentences, improper grammar, and God knows what else. For the record, if you are not meticulous enough to care what’s on your resume, then you’ll certainly be a lack-luster employee on the job. I won’t hire you.

One more critical point: I’ve offered to volunteer as a teacher for several years now to numerous school systems. I want to teach a course on employment and work ethics; how to find a job and become a great employee. No takers yet, but if their current product, the young workforce, is any indication of how they prepare their charges to meet the world’s challenges, then a mere overhaul is simply not enough.

If you’d like to learn more, contact me at 973-256-3757 or via email at ed@FullSpectrumHR.com.

My Web Site: Click here or paste this url into the browser: http://www.FullSpectrumHR.com

My Blog:  Click here or paste this url into the browser: http://blog.FullSpectrumHR.com/

Our pedestrian work ethic in America has once again reared its ugly head. And once our very predictable response has been…well, underwhelming.

Last month, a twenty-year veteran air traffic controller at JFK brought his eight-year-old daughter and ten year old son to work and let them give departure and landing instructions to several pilots. Everyone, at the time, thought this was cute and no problem whatsoever.

But now the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) says this is a “serious lapse in judgment”, and other controllers are rallying to their colleague’s defense by saying “no harm, no foul”. A few passengers even chimed in for the news crews that flooded JFK today, and offered that very typical American response to anything work-related: “What’s the big deal?”

The obvious safety issues aside, we must consider this piece of disturbing logic: egregious behavior at work does not strike from out of the blue in an employee with a solid work record. I’m willing to bet that this errant father has had performance problems over his long tenure, and that most of these problems were either ignored or ineffectively managed. This is, in all likelihood, a perfect example of bad hiring, bad management, and bad work ethics. You don’t get these overnight. They are generally endemic to a work environment. It is more than disquieting to remember that the people in this work environment are responsible for a major part of the world’s airline safety.

It’s time for a system overhaul.

And one more thing: The news today said that the FAA has “suspended all unauthorized visits to the tower”. Excuse me, but does that mean that since 9/11, while we’ve all had to submit to near draconian security checks to prevent terrorism, a suicide bomber could – until today - just walk unannounced into the tower? Thanks for the comforting news, guys. Now I have to go. I’m flying to Florida to see my father, and I have to pack.

Sigh.

If you’d like to learn more, contact me at 973-256-3757 or via email at ed@FullSpectrumHR.com.

My Web Site: Click here or paste this url into the browser: http://www.FullSpectrumHR.com

Another lesson in business ethics:  success in any company relies entirely on its people and the ways they are hired and managed.

I’ve been looking for a new car, and I’d seen a few models and gotten some decent offers.  But I knew I could not seal a deal before returning to the place that sold me my current car ten years ago.  I have a good relationship with the sales guy, John, and we tried for a few weeks to find time to meet.  We finally did, and he showed me a great car.  Enter the sales manager.

Resembling a spoiled teenager with an over-inflated ego and methamphetamines on board, this yutz walked over and tried to double-talk me into an immediate sale by twisting numbers and applying gross hyperbole to a rather mundane situation.  He then walked away, leaving me to talk to John.  I expressed my concerns about this guy, but before I finished my sentence, chuckles returned and glibly asked, “Are you done simmering yet?”

I told him I liked the numbers but – as I stated at the beginning of our discussion – I would not make a decision for 24 hours.  The reasons for this are irrelevant.  I told him I’d have a final answer the next day.  He began to berate me, and yelling that I really did not want to buy a car, among other choice words that I’m a bit too classy to repeat.  I got up to leave.

The floor manager came over and apologized, and said he’d take another $500 off the price.  I told him that I’m not that cheap, and that I was genetically unable to give money to any company that would hire such a loud-mouthed lout.  If they treat me that way before they get my money, how will they treat me afterwards?  If this is the lack of esteem they have for their customers, then how long will it be before we start hearing about more faulty gas pedals?  Will we have the right to be surprised by the news?

Global promises are rarely wise.  But I do guarantee this: when the American public shows these companies that basic human dignity is a critical component in business ethics, then their products will improve, their prices will come down, and we won’t have to listen to endless news reports about big business scandals.

Just my two cents.

If you’d like to learn more, contact me at 973-256-3757 or via email at ed@FullSpectrumHR.com.

Please visit my web site at http://www.FullSpectrumHR.com.

In my last blog, I alluded to the importance of measuring performance and giving rewards when earned, not as part of an initial hiring agreement.

The response to that email was overwhelming, and a good friend pointed out to me that not all banks are guilty as charged. TD Bank, for example, never took any government funds and appropriately bonuses their execs. Yet they are asked to pay that very high tax the government is imposing to recoup the money it so inappropriately awarded the wayward banks and execs with less than stellar performance.

Not fair. And that brings me to today’s topic: inappropriate punishment.

If I had a nickel for every time a client sent out a company-wide email or made a grand announcement chastising the entire group for the mistakes of the few, I’d have retired long ago and instead you’d be reading an email about Russian wives for sale or cheap Viagra, or something like that.

Let’s be very clear about this. If one person makes a mistake, address the issue with the mistake maker. Tell him what he did that you don’t like, and ask him to fix it and never do it again. And remember: you’ll catch more flies with honey than you will with vinegar, as my very wise father always says.

And if you are mistaken, as I was by lumping all banks together, be sure to apologize. You are human, and you are allowed to make mistakes as long as you (a) recognize them, (b) apologize for them, and (c) extend the same compassion to your employees when they make mistakes that are not business-threatening.

If you’d like to learn more, contact me at 973-256-3757 or via email at ed@FullSpectrumHR.com.

Please do not be shocked by what you are about to read. It was, after all, as inevitable as the sunrise.

Executive bonuses in banking have returned to pre-crisis levels. Now that the government is planning to tax these bonuses rather heavily, the banks are scrambling for a lobbyist to get the tax bill defeated, or at the very least, watered down. In the process, they have redefined audacity. My people would call it “chutzpah”, but that’s for another blog.

I’m not here to offer a political opinion, but a bit of HR analysis. Bonuses, by definition, are a form of compensation awarded for above and beyond performance; a recognition of greatness. The fact that the banks were so poorly managed that they had to beg the government for money to pay out obviously undeserved bonuses last year strikes me as the epitome of an oxymoron.

I’ve consulted a lot in the Wall Street environs, and I can tell you that most job offers there spell out specifically how much the exec will get at year’s end, regardless of performance. They simply do not want to hear that attaining a goal that is specific, measurable, action-oriented, realistic, and time-bound (“SMART Goals”) is a true reason to give a bonus. It defies logic at all levels to bonus an employee, regardless of rank, based on a promise made at the time of hiring.

It’s time to stop screaming “show me the money,” and to start screaming, “Show me the performance!”

Performance management is a lot easier than you think.

If you’d like to learn more, contact me at 973-256-3757 or via email at ed@FullSpectrumHR.com.

I suppose it was inevitable, what with times being as tough as they are, but even I took a step back when I heard this.

A couple of entrepreneurs have opened businesses that provide good employment references for a price. I spend a lot of time teaching my clients how to get references and test their validity, but this type of nonsense further complicates an already complex task.

Here are some tips for verifying true references.

1. Use the Internet and directory assistance to get the telephone and/or address of past employers. Relying entirely on the applicant’s word may lead to trouble.

2. Inquire about letters of recommendation from previous employers to verify that they did, in fact, write them.

3. Use a well-qualified and seasoned HR professional – not a recruiter – to verify employment status.

4. Make sure your offer letter states that if you later find that the employee and/or his references are less than truthful, you will terminate his employment.

5. Remember a common candidate scam. A candidate gives you the name of a past supervisor who, like the candidate, was downsized from the company for which they both worked. He supplies you with a home number at which you can reach his past boss. In some cases, neither the candidate nor the supervisor ever worked for the company. Verify the story.

There are other ways to authenticate legitimate references, and ways to use that information properly. If you’d like to learn more, contact me at 973-256-3757 or via email at ed@FullSpectrumHR.com.

Believe it or not, the ways in which your people answer the phone are clearly in the domain of HR. After all, if performance management is an HR property (and believe me when I tell you it truly is), then answering the phone is as well.

It’s also an important customer retention tool, and one of the singularly most important guarantors of your revenue.

But most companies allow their employees to answer in a singsong, barely understandable manner. Customers nationwide send entirely too much time on hold, listening to generic recordings about how important the call is. Newsflash: if I’m on hold for more than a minute, then recorded claims of concern are considered both bogus and moot. So here are five things an employee should never say or do on the phone, and suggested alternatives.

1. “Please hold.” [Click]: Instead, ask if the customer minds holding and wait for an answer. It happens in every industry, but medical offices are by far the worst offenders.

2. “No…” at the beginning of a sentence: Even if it’s something your employees cannot do, have them talk about what they can do. The customer called for a reason, and hearing “no” was not one of them.

3. “I don’t know. I’m new here.”: Instead, have your employees say something like, “That’s a good question. I’ll find out the answer for you. May I ask you to hold while I call someone who can help?”

4. Don’t chew gum, food, or drink while on the phone. Also, watch out for sighs, tongue click, and other errant mouth noises.

5. “Sorry, we’re all out of the Nimbus 4000.”: Instead, try, “I have some great products that are comparable, like the Tango 8690. It costs a little less and many of our customers like it just as well as the Nimbus. We’ll get the Nimbus in about 2 weeks.”

This is just a beginning, and the possibilities are endless. There are lots of creative ways to get your employees to answer the phone better. As always, contact me for more information: 973-256-3757 or via email at ed@FullSpectrumHR.com.

Okay, so you own a small business, and you’ve done some reading about succession planning, but you don’t think it’s for you.

This could be the biggest mistake you’ve ever made. Consider the possibility that you are too sick to work for a period of time. Who will keep the business running while you’re gone? What if your busiest manager decides to leave? Who will replace her? And though no one wants to consider the possibility, what if, God forbid, you get run down by a cross-town bus? Shouldn’t the business keep running for your family’s sake?

All good questions. Succession planning is critical to small business, and not only in the aforementioned scenarios. Employees who see opportunities to grow will be more loyal, will work harder, and are more likely to stick with you when the going gets tough.

There’s a lot to succession planning, and it requires a strong eye for strategy. Give me a call. We’ll talk about your needs. I’m at 973-256-3757 or via email at ed@FullSpectrumHR.com.

One of the ways to classify an employee as “exempt” (meaning exempt from overtime payments) is to classify the employee’s job as one in which the “primary duty consists of the performance of work requiring knowledge of an advanced type in a field of science or learning customarily acquired by a prolonged course of specialized intellectual instruction and study.”

In November of this year, the 2^nd circuit court reaffirmed that this exemption is available only to those jobs that require specific education and degree.

This is huge. Surveys show that many small businesses inappropriately classify positions as exempt or non-exempt in order to avoid paying overtime when employees work more than forty hours per week. In fact, one business owner once told me that it “is my business and I can do as I please.”

Not so much. I’ve seen these audits that make the Inquisition look like a round of “Wheel of Fortune”, and believe me when I say that they are anything but fun. And they cost a lot. Always.

Please: be sure your employees are properly categorized as “exempt” or “non-exempt”. And while we’re on the subject, inappropriately paying people as “consultants” on a 1099 will anger the IRS, and I know you want to stay on their good side. Make sure the “consultant” meets the IRS standards, or the money you save now might be paid out later one hundred fold.

As always, contact me for more information: 973-256-3757 or via email at ed@FullSpectrumHR.com.

Okay, so I was working at a client’s brand new locale in Northern NJ (a well-developed and highly populated area full of office buildings), and had to step out to get some air. I asked some of my fellow consultants if they wanted anything for lunch. They screamed pizza, and asked me to get some menus for future reference.

I found the nearest pizza joint and asked if they delivered. No, they said. I asked if they had menus. No, no menus either. Despite my sense of foreboding, I ordered a couple of pies and returned to the office just a few doors down.

One of the pies had human hair on it.

In this economy, it seems we have to do all we can to draw customers closer, not alienate them. This place’s ridiculous policies and practices spit in the customer’s eye. “We don’t care what you need. We do things our way, and that’s that.”

Employees treat customers the same way they believe their manager treats them. That’s why customer service is an HR issue. Without the people and the systems to exceed customer relations, you can kiss your customers goodbye.

By the way, we found a place a few blocks down. We can look at their attractive menus and order a hairless pizza for delivery on very short notice.

Just thought you’d want to know…

As always, contact me for more information: 973-256-3757 or via email at ed@FullSpectrumHR.com.

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As President Obama ponders his next move in the war, I cannot help but draw parallels between his indecision about how many troops to deploy and an executive’s decision of when to hire and how many people to add.

Like the President’s situation, strategy is key. Because of haphazard hiring, we frequently hire people only to find out that we did not need them for as long as we anticipated, or we discover that the new employee’s ability and willingness to do the job have a mere passing acquaintance with the story he told in the interview.

Here are some tips on strategic hiring.

1. List the tasks you want this person to perform. Be as specific as possible, and ask candidates for examples of specific instances in which they’ve accomplished these tasks in the past.

2. Think about your business in 3, 6, and 12 months. Will you still need that person to do that job? What other tasks can they do to avoid downsizing if their primary function suddenly becomes superfluous?

3. Plan appropriate funds for this job, and ensure – as much as possible – that you’ll still be able to afford that position next year.

4. If money’s tight, consider a temporary employment agency. That way you can “try” the employee before you “buy”.

As always, contact me for more information: 973-256-3757 or via email at ed@FullSpectrumHR.com.

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Very recently, the entire country held its breath as it anxiously waited for news on a six year old who allegedly got himself trapped in a runaway balloon. The fascinating response of the whole world – to follow every moment of this hair-raising event by Twitter, video, radio, TV, and who knows what else – only highlighted the very human fascination with hot news and our impressive ability to spread it around, regardless of its veracity.

And then there was the confession of the Balloon Boy’s mom that the entire event was nothing more than a hoax on steroids, which made me think of the trouble many businesses have with rampant gossip among employees.

That rumor mills will always exist is less troubling than the fact that they are often damaging to morale, plans, and initiatives. Of equal concern: we frequently expend futile efforts trying to quash the rumor mill as opposed to using it to our advantage.

In fact, it can be a pretty powerful resource. Tell the company gossip about an act of great performance, and if you do it in a dramatic enough manner, you might just have a new and higher performance standard on your hands. Whisper about an imminent new project that will make the company stronger, and your gossip will hoist it up the nearest flagpole and have your employees saluting with teary eyes and chests full of pride.

Of course, once you’re sure your gossip is spreading only good news in a truthful manner, start thinking about using their great story telling skills in your training programs. Anecdotes are a very effective learning tool.

As always, contact me for more information: 973-256-3757 or via email at ed@FullSpectrumHR.com.

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Okay, so you’re one of the many small business owners who responded enthusiastically to my last blog because you want to know more about fair raises, bonuses, etc.

So here are some hints.

1. Make sure you have a relevant and reasonable company mission and a list of clear values.

2. Give employees goals that will direct your company towards your mission. (I tell my clients that they should be able to draw a direct line from every task to the company mission. If not, it’s wasted energy.) Make sure the goals are “S.M.A.R.T.” goals: Specific, Measureable, Action-Oriented, Reasonable, and Time-Bound. Measure their performance throughout the process, and then review periodically. Things might happen to hamper progress that the employee cannot control. Adjust goals as needed.

3. When you negotiate a salary for a new employee and say that the salary is one amount and the annual bonus is another amount, you are in essence telling the employee that the compensation is a combination of the two amounts and they can expect that amount at the end of their first year. Bad move. Tell them instead that there is an opportunity for a bonus, but it is merit based. Tell them that they’ll receive specific performance goals, and their eligibility for a bonus will depend on if and how they reach these goals. You can mention a bonus range (in either dollars or percentages), but reaffirm your commitment to merit based raises and bonuses.

Certainly, there’s more to learn about this mission critical topic. Read anything you can about it, and keep everything “S.M.A.R.T.”!

As always, contact me for more information: 973-256-3757 or via email at ed@FullSpectrumHR.com.

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Last week, President Obama received the Nobel Peace Prize.

This is not a political discussion about the President’s true eligibility (or lack thereof) for the award, nor is it an argument about the point of view that the venerable Nobel prize may be more political spin than a hallowed recognition of a life’s work. It’s the atypical controversy about the nomination that snags my interest today. (Barak Obama was, after all, President for a mere ten days before the Nobel Prize nomination deadline.)

I think this is, however, the perfect entre into a brief discussion about financial rewards for performance. Many employers give across-the-board raises on a periodic basis. They justify this by saying it’s to adjust salaries for cost of living, while others prefer this because it’s a reason to avoid a serious performance management system. Some employees work harder than others, and they are obviously more productive. When you give an across-the-board raise, you send a clear message that you value the low performer as much as the high performer. You are clearly saying, “If you want a raise, just do enough to squeak by”. You devalue the high performer’s dedication, loyalty, and hard work, and soon your superlative employees will, like the President’s detractors, question the validity of the raise. Too often, they leave for a job with a better and more logical compensation system.

The answer is a performance management system that delineates clear performance requirements and goals. It helps you decide who gets a raise, the quantity of the reward, and which employees have not earned a raise at all. The system must be strategically designed, allowing for growth and economic fluctuations. The Nobel Prize is still a major life accomplishment. I simply hope that this venerable award does not lose its luster, like the raise given to goal-confused employees who think it’s nothing more than a hollow gesture.

Be sure to contact me for more information: 973-256-3757 or via email at ed@FullSpectrumHR.com. 101309

Please consider this a wake up call.

Last week, David Letterman admitted that he’d slept with several people on his staff. I don’t think he knew what he was getting himself into, no pun intended.

First, the truth. Many associations that began on a professional level morph into loving, wonderful personal relationships that enrich lives and last for many years. This is a good thing.

Now, a dose of reality. Whenever a work relationship crosses the line from professional to personal, there’s a heightened risk of severe legal problems that can cost millions if either the professional or the personal relationships sour. If one of the people has more authority than the other, there’s an excellent chance that a charge of quid pro quo (Latin for “this for that”) harassment will surface if the lower level employee is ever disciplined, transferred, or fired. Employees on the same level can file suits as well, alleging hostile environment harassment.

The big question that faces CBS, the Letterman Show, and its star is one of consent. If any of the women say – accurately or otherwise – that she slept with the star to advance her career or to facilitate or avoid changes in her employment (meaning without consent as opposed to consenting for whatever personal reason), then good old Dave’s in trouble. If any other employee notices that one of Dave’s partners gets a promotion perceived as underserved or any other preferential treatment, there’s also the possibility of third party harassment. All in all, none of these are attractive options.

Mr. Letterman will, if he has any understanding of the law, spend the year following the end of the last relationship worrying that someone will file a suit of sexual harassment before the statute of limitations expires. The court could decide to attach his personal assets and earnings. And I’m sure that no one in legal will be going home on time this coming week.

The best course of action? Keep your work relationships professional in nature, and encourage everyone at work to do the same. Manage workplace romances appropriately, ensuring that one of the people involved does not manage the other. And if you have any questions about the many steps you can take to keep working relationships productive, be sure to contact me for more information: 973-256-3757 or via email at ed@FullSpectrumHR.com.

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An employee who works for a client of mine works three days per week. My client asked me if the employee could be classified as exempt, meaning that on the weeks that the employee worked in excess of forty hours, he’d be exempt from overtime. If he prorated the employee’s part time salary ($11.80 per hour), the employee would earn more than the $455 threshold required for exempt status.

His thinking was faulty at two levels. First, the law prohibits employers from prorating salaries. If the employee generally earns less than $455 per week, he cannot be exempt from overtime requirements. Second, passing the salary threshold by itself is not enough. The position must also include tasks that qualify the job as non-exempt: making critical business decisions, hiring and firing authority, managing a substantial amount of the performance of several employees, and the like. My client’s employee met neither standard, and therefore must be paid overtime of he works more than forty hours per week.

Be sure to contact me for more information: 973-256-3757 or via email at ed@FullSpectrumHR.com.

092909

Unbeknownst to most business owners, there is a quiet war waging in the courts and legal offices around the country. The core issue is an employee’s appearance, and it’s an ugly battle. First, let’s tackle the easy part. An employer may, at will, dictate a dress code to the employees. You can decide if you want business casual, and can define what business casual is – or is not. You can tell employees they may not wear jeans to work, insist they wear jeans to work, or have them wear a uniform. It’s up to you, with one small proviso that has caused a chasm in the work world.

You cannot direct an employee add or remove garments when that directly violates their civil rights. For example, you cannot force a Jewish employee remove a yarmulke (skull cap) or insist that an observant Muslim woman remove her head covering.

You may, however, tell an employee who shows up on Monday morning with purple hair, tattoos, and facial piercings that this is unacceptable attire in the workplace - if that’s in fact the case and you apply this standard equally to all employees. The law does not protect these choices, as they do not fall into a legally protected category like religion, ethnic background, gender, age, disability, etc.

A company may tell its employees that it requires a certain look to work in its environment, especially if it is customer facing. (If a financial advisor dresses as though he can’t afford a new suit, customers will not trust his advice.) But a company cannot tell a devout employee that she may not wear a religious symbol around her neck, unless her intent is to proselytize.

The only time an employer may refuse to hire or promote someone based on his membership in a protected category is if that decision is based on a clearly defined Bona Fide Occupational Qualification (BFOQ). For example, Playboy Magazine may legally refuse to hire a male model as a centerfold, and airlines may impose height/weight restrictions on flight crews who in an emergency must be able to access tight areas of the aircraft. They may not impose these restrictions, however, on their bookkeepers.

But for most employers and their positions, it’s too easy to cross that hair-thin line between a good business decision and discrimination. Watch out for the two types of discrimination that relate to appearance:

Systematic Affirmative Bias: If a company says, for example, that its typical customer is a white male and therefore only hires white males because it’s easier for customers to relate to them, that’s a form of discrimination.

Discrimination by Individuals/Unconscious Bias: Many companies employ hiring managers and (sadly) HR people who tend to hire and promote people just because they “like them”. In dealing with bad apples such as these who have unethical practices, you must be both diligent and proactive. And as we all tend to be most comfortable around people who are like us, hiring and promotion based on nothing more than personal taste is a Pandora’s box of legal problems just waiting to be opened.

The road to balance between the ensuring the employee “look” that conforms to your brand and ethical, legal practices that conform to the law begins with a sound strategy. It’s a matter of common sense, thinking through your decisions, and having well written documents that back you up in the event of a legal challenge.

Be sure to contact me for more information: 973-256-3757 or via email at ed@FullSpectrumHR.com.

Every executive has, at one time or another, been faced with an immediate need for someone to fill a position in the company. When this happens, you or your managers will look for someone with a pulse, ask if he can do the job, he’ll says “yes”, and before go to lunch, he’s hired and has a direct impact on your income.

Hiring an employee is a critical business function of the highest order. Every employee represents a sizeable cost, can easily make or break your business, and can cost you up to three times their annual compensation when he leaves – much more if he’s in sales and takes his book with him.

Successful management of humans – by far your most vital and expensive asset – starts with a sound hiring strategy, and that’s something few businesses will do. Even the simplest of strategies can give you a sharp competitive edge. Here are just some of the aspects of a successful hiring strategy.

· Know how many people you’ll need to hire over the following year. Find this out by looking at your business plans, planned initiatives, and anticipated market changes and figure out a reasonable human capital response. (Tip: You can ask one person to do two jobs, if they comprise a reasonable workload.)

· Set and keep to a reasonable budget for this position. Be sure to include costs for benefits, time off, insurance, etc. These expenses can cost as much as 60% of the annual wage.

· Ensure that everyone who will take part in the hiring process (advertising, networking, interviewing, negotiating, and hiring) has completed a well-designed course in behavior-based interviewing. It’s the only hiring technique that ensures your new employee is willing and able to do the job.

Don’t flounder without a strategy. You’ve worked too hard to let a fly-by-the-seat-of-your-pants hire jeopardize your business.

Meanwhile, be sure to contact me for more information: 973-256-3757 or via email at ed@FullSpectrumHR.com.

082709

Employee Classification

I recently heard about a NJ business owner that was audited by the Department of Homeland Security. They checked the files for his 73 employees and found that one of the two people he’d hired “off the books” to clean the offices at night had no legal standing to work in the USA; their I-9s were missing.

The I-9 is a simple form that’s readily available online. (Go to http://www.uscis.gov/files/form/i-9.pdf.) It includes a list of acceptable documents that illustrate an employee’s eligibility to work legally in this country. The form takes about three minutes to complete.

But this owner wound up in jail for three months and had to pay a $250,000.00 fine. He knew full well these people were not eligible for employment. To make things worse, Homeland Security sent the file over to both the state wage and hour board and the federal Department of Labor. (The latter is the branch of the government that administers the Fair Labor Standards Act.) They audited his employee time sheets from the previous 2 years. As he was not able to produce all of the records they’d requested, the auditors decided to estimate how many employees were paid off the books for all that time, how many employees were erroneously classified as exempt (“salaried”) when they should have been classified as non-exempt (“hourly”), and how much overtime he owed these people for all those years.

When the punitive damages were added in, the staggering total went into the millions of dollars and the business is now closed as the government proceeds to collect its pound of flesh. (The appeals are in process, but it’s not looking terribly good for the business owner.)

I suppose you could argue that this is an example of an over-inflated government unduly exercising power where it should have none. But the law’s the law, and this business owner could have prevented this problem easily and with little financial expenditure. It’s a pity, really, and I find myself having little sympathy for a person who I’m sure is nothing more than a business owner trying to make ends meet.

Meanwhile, be sure to contact me for more information: 973-256-3757 or via email at ed@FullSpectrumHR.com.

081809

“Thank God It’s Friday (TGIF) has become a considerable fixture in our lexicon. The never-ending American desire to not work and engage in any other activity has spawned a wildly successful theme restaurant chain, countless end-of-the-week declarations by radio disc jockeys and news casters, and has even bled into the middle of the work week, now affectionately named “hump day”. On Wednesday, you’re over the hump and halfway to TGIF.

But what would your revenues and productivity be like if you and your employees declared “TGIM” – Thank God It’s Monday? It would mean a career that was a source of joy and fulfillment, as well as a way to earn a living. It would mean new challenges that sparked personal and professional growth, and a never-ending drive to always do better. You’d hire only the best available talent, and would be able to retain them and manage them so long-term excellence in performance would become a day-to-day occurrence at all levels of the company.

Yes, it starts at the top, but it requires a lot more than a good role model and wishful thinking to create this type of environment. Your hiring practices must be seamless, customer-driven, and second to none. Your performance management system must breed “terrific-ness”, and your company’s practices must have both legalities and sound HR strategies in their design and execution. Your interpersonal working relationships have to be based on trust and camaraderie.

If every one of your employees is not driven to provide excellence simply because they know it’s good for the company and everyone working there, your revenues are probable a lot lower than they could be. Think about it; that’s all I ask.

Meanwhile, be sure to contact me for more information: 973-256-3757 or via email at ed@FullSpectrumHR.com.

081409

One of the secrets to great performance is a sound performance management system, and that includes periodic performance appraisals. Here are some basics:

1. Evaluate everyone’s performance on an ongoing basis. Keep informal notes so your quarterly/semi-annual/annual appraisal will be fair.

2. Discuss performance all year long. There should be no surprises in the appraisal.

3. Be fair.

4. Use behavioral terms in your appraisals, avoiding words like “attitude”.

5. Set reasonable, clearly stated goals and measure the employee’s progress frequently. Adjust the goals as needed.

6. Give raises fairly and when earned.

In addition to helping you get great performance, sound performance management will also protect you in the event of termination. If you must terminate someone’s employment, you’ll be a sitting duck for a lawsuit without proper documentation. (Even in the 49 states that are at-will employment states, you must be able to defend yourself against claims of discriminatory firing.)

We’ll be discussing this more in future issues of Navis News. Meanwhile, be sure to contact me for more information: 973-256-3757 or via email at ed@FullSpectrumHR.com.

080409

Contrary to popular belief, leadership is neither a trait nor a skill. It is, in fact, a situation.I know this may come as a shock to some, but a leader is someone that people want to follow. Sometimes it’s the CEO, other times it might be the shipping/receiving clerk. Most commonly, it’s someone’s executive assistant.

A leadership situation is a combination of the leader’s personality, the immediate needs of the followers, the group’s beliefs, practices, rites, and rituals, and some other factors like the company’s history, industry situation, the economy, and more. Simply put: if someone offers to teach you leadership skills, they know less about leadership than you do.

A smart CEO is a good manager. Be as consistent as the sunrise so your employees will anticipate your responses. Find out what’s fair and do that all the time. Listen well to your people and do everything you can to gain their loyalty. And know your HR law; nothing detracts from a potential leader like an employee lawsuit, justified or not.

Yes, you can become a leader, but you have to work within your company’s specific situation. You might have to lead through someone else. But f your goal is to get your people to want to walk in the direction you designate, the name of the person who influences them to do so is insignificant.

Be sure to contact me for more information: 973-256-3757 or via email at ed@FullSpectrumHR.com.

072809

Like most CEOs, you spend a lot of time talking and thinking about your employees, especially those that pose problems.

But firing them is expensive, and managing them seems so difficult it makes a trek up Mt. Kilimanjaro in January seem like a stroll through the park in May.

There’s quite a bit behind the psychology of “difficult behavior” at work. We often tend to chalk it up to attitude. And while I cannot tell you everything you’ll need to know to manage these folks and turn them into super-employees here in this limited space, I can tell you one important thing. When trying to address the behavior, “attitude” is the one word you must NEVER use.

You see, if you discuss the problem with the employee and say something like, “There’s something wrong with your attitude”, the employee will counter with, “It’s not my attitude, it’s yours! You’re the one with the bad attitude!”

Focus instead on the specific behaviors that bother you. For example, “Whenever I say good morning to you, you cross your arms, scowl, and say, ‘Yeah…what’s so good about it?’ I wish you would stop doing that. Instead, tell me if something specific is bothering you and we’ll discuss ways we can both make things better. But please cut back on that sarcasm. I need to maintain a positive environment here.”

The employee might take this opportunity to tell you about things that are very wrong in your company. You can either take it as a personal insult, or try to see if there’s any good information in the complaint. Try to end the conversation on a positive note, and plan to follow up. But be sure to make a note about the talk, as termination might be the inevitable outcome if the behavior does not change.

Be sure to contact me for more information: 973-256-3757 or via email at ed@FullSpectrumHR.com.

071409

If you tend to be one of the many business people who fall into the all too common trap of interviewing potential sales people on gut instinct or measuring their capabilities by seeing the size of the book they’ve promised you, then you might be hiring someone for all the wrong reasons, and that’s never good.

Remember: use behavior based questions to determine the candidate’s willingness and ability to do the job. Try statements/questions like: “Tell me about a time when you had to persuade a very reluctant customer to buy your product. Why was he reluctant? What exactly did you do and say to change his mind?” These will get you more information than a hypothetical question like “Have you handled reluctant customers?” (The answer to that question, true or not, is inevitably “yes”, and it doesn’t give you any idea what the candidate means when he says “reluctant”.)

And by the way: if a candidate is willing to steal customers from his current employer and bring them to you, he’ll steal yours as well when he moves on. Hire these people at your own risk! You’ve been warned!

Be sure to contact me for more information: 973-256-3757 or via email at ed@FullSpectrumHR.com.

070709

Okay…so two of your employees begin to spend time together. They fall in love, move in together, and even name their first child after you. It happens a lot, and many happy families begin with a work-based relationship.

But there is a dark side to the entire affair. What if they break up and one decides that working in the same zip code as the “ex” is just slightly less pleasant than shoving a rusty nail in your eye? What if they are both valued employees and you (like most people today) cannot afford the inevitable cost of 2-3 times the departing employee’s base salary just to keep peace in the family?

A more bothersome scenario: what if someone decides to file a sexual harassment suit? Believe me – courts have recognized lawsuits for far more than just the “traditional” type of suit in which a supervisor withholds a promotion or discipline by demanding…ahem…favors. Even the employees who work with our two lovebirds can file suit.

So what’s an entrepreneurial CEO to do? Well, there’s no stopping love, but there are modifications you can make to your handbook that will protect you. For example, there should be a statement that says that two people involved in a relationship cannot work on the same team, nor can one be in a supervisory relationship over the other. There are many other options, but they need to be customized to your business and your ambiance, if you will. After all, you don’t want to appear like you’re going to swat cupid with a two by four as soon as he flies into the room.

Be sure to contact me for more information: 973-256-3757 or via email at ed@FullSpectrumHR.com.

062509

The Customer Service Question

I’ve long known that world class customer service in any company is a function of sound HR strategies. Consider this:

GIGO – Garbage In, Garbage Out. Your customer service reflects your hiring abilities. In many cases, poor service was evident in the hiring process, but no one knew how to look for it.

Systems – Many system choices made independently of HR and its knowledge of the human capital’s ability can cripple your customer service function. Case in point: a client once hired me to teach his new CRM to his employees. The system was hefty and quite complex, and required many costly hours of training. Further, there was no remote access to the program, limiting an employee’s ability to service customers while on the road or to telecommute. Finally, the underlying database was proprietary and made the space shuttle look like a little red wagon. There were very few people who knew how to service it, and that created a whole new drama around staffing.

The Axiom: I’ve found that employees treat your customers as they believe the company treats them on a day-to-day basis.

The answer? Have an HR strategist help you with your customer service plans and policies. Customer Service is, at the end of the day, a predominately human function.

Be sure to contact me for more information: 973-256-3757 or via email at ed@FullSpectrumHR.com.

062409

A client recently asked me how long she must retain applications and resumes. It’s a good question.

Federal antidiscrimination laws require that you save employment applications and resumes for at least two years after you receive them. This applies only to documents from applicants you did not hire.

You’ll want to set different document retention standards for those you do hire. Though not required by law, hold on to the applications and resumes of those you do hire for the duration of their employment plus three years (at least).

Be sure to contact me for more information: 973-256-3757 or via email at ed@FullSpectrumHR.com.

061809

The topics of same sex marriage and legal protection for members of the Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, and Transgendered communities have been in the news quite a lot lately.

Regardless of your personal feelings, here are some hard cold facts:

1. While federal law does not yet provide protection for the LGBT community, it’s clearly a matter of time before that will change.

2. Many states and municipalities currently do provide such protection. To name a few: New York State, New York City, New Jersey, Massachusetts, New Hampshire, Vermont, Dade County, and many others.

3. Lawsuits for violations of these can cost you millions of dollars.

4. Asking the wrong interview question or making the wrong remark to an employee could land you in court.

It’s time to create a friendly, positive, and safe environment for all Americans, regardless of their affectional status. Make sure that your benefits provider allows for domestic partner benefits, and that your employee handbook says so. In your non-discrimination statement, be sure to include sexual orientation, gender identification, and affectional status as protected from any form of discrimination in hiring, promoting, or work opportunities.

Why? Because it’s the law in many places, and will soon be so nationwide. More important, you’ll want to do this for one very monumental reason:

It’s the right thing to do.

Be sure to contact me for more information: 973-256-3757 or via email at ed@FullSpectrumHR.com.

061609

Assigning a “buddy” to all new hires is a good way to help a new employee acclimate to your company, its informal rules, and the various proven roads to success.

Your buddies, chosen from your veteran, high performing employees, should be selected wisely. They become the voice of the company for new people and set examples for existing employees. They should be the role models you want everyone else to emulate.

Of course, they will need some education on mentoring techniques, and we need to ensure that they have the bandwidth for and an interest in these new responsibilities.

Customize your buddy program to your company’s needs and atmosphere. For example, have the buddy take her new employee to lunch weekly for the first two or three weeks. (You, of course, pick up the tab.) Make sure the buddy and the new hire get to spend time together, and have the buddy perform unannounced checkups to be sure the new employee is “doing well” and feeling good about the decision to join your company.

These are simply some beginning ideas. There’s much more to buddy selection, management, and retention. Be sure to contact me for more information: 973-256-3757 or via email at ed@FullSpectrumHR.com.

061109

Brian Staker, a brilliant business writer working with a leading magazine called “Utah CEO Magazine”, has written a terrific article about recruitment and retention. It’s great reading. Click here or paste this url into your browser: http://www.utahceomagazine.com/article.php?id=327

Be sure to contact me for more information: 973-256-3757 or via email at ed@FullSpectrumHR.com.

The “I’ll work for peanuts” employee could spell more trouble than savings.

In an economic downturn, job seekers often try to entice employers by offering their services at a greatly reduced rate.  Sometimes that rate is a mere fraction of that of similarly qualified employees.  As tempting as the offer may be, you could find yourself defending a pay discrimination lawsuit down the road.  Remember: regardless of the economy, you should still hold the standard of equal pay for equal work and qualifications if the cut-rate employees are members of a federally or state protected class (disability, race, religion, age, etc.)

On a similar note, a recent court decision found in favor of a sixty year CFO facing a job loss because of tough financial times.  He offered to take a steep pay cut, bringing his salary down to $60,000 annually. His offer was rejected, but he later found out that his replacement, much younger than he, was earning more than that.  He filed an age discrimination claim, and things aren’t looking too good for the employer right now.

041409

There’s no lack of discussion about millennial employees (born circa 1987) anywhere on the web or in business journals. The reviews on this generation are still coming in, but “mixed” seems to describe those we’ve received thus far.

Words describing millennial employees range from “technically brilliant” to “cocky,” from “frighteningly expedient” to “lazy,” and “impressively exact in their work” to “lacking work ethic.”

They can be a bit impatient, wanting now the six figure salaries that their predecessors labored for years to achieve. Often their take on work is that if they can get a full day’s work done in an hour, why shouldn’t they take the rest of the day off?

A friend of mine, a CEO of a company with 300 or so employees, got just that response when he came upon a group of new employees sitting - yet again - in the lunch room working on what must have been their ninth cup of designer coffee and playing games on their credit card-sized phones. He asked them why they were still there as opposed to doing their work. They explained that they’d all completed their assigned projects within a few hours, and felt that it was now perfectly reasonable to spend the rest of the day in repose. “After all,” one of them said, “it hardly seems fair to penalize us because we work faster than the older employees.”

Foul! Unless the employee had contracted to receive pay on a per project basis (and my friend swears that’s not the case,) then this particular style of thinking smells like a trout that’s been rotting in the sun for a week in August and is only half as useful.

Here’s a piece of fact to chew on: for all his talent, expedience, technical savvy, and exactitude, this millennial forgot an important point.  His employer, my friend, was paying not only for the product he produced, but for his time as well. If he finished his project early, a more constructive tack might have been to find something else to do: to raise the bar on his own performance, so to speak. That’s how “the older guys” got those six figure salaries: by showing dedication and commitment: by managing their careers like they were important. I’m not suggesting that 16 hour days are the only acceptable path to professional success, but I’m sure that an approach of doing “only what they ask me to do” just won’t cut it, now, in this economy, nor any time in the future.

Be sure to contact me for more information: 973-256-3757 or via email at ed@FullSpectrumHR.com.

The CEO of one of New York’s many high tech start-ups recently told me that he’d “saved the day” by convincing a resignation-bound employee to stay. The employee had cited a competitor’s offer of a substantially higher salary as her reason for leaving.

My client felt that the best strategy here was to “gently grill” (his words, not mine) the employee for facts about the new job. She said they’d offered her a bigger base and a larger bonus structure. He told her he’d beat their numbers by 10%, if she’d give him the chance. Miracle of miracles: she did. She rejected her new offer and promised her current employer that she’d stay with him.

I guess he showed her.

But she’s really running that company, and I told him so. He should remain abreast of the compensation trends and his employee’s needs. Most employees resign because of a poor relationship with their manager, and as they do not know how to fix that problem, allow the lure of financial reward to influence their judgment. For every employee that resigns for a bona fide, substantial increase in salary, there are hundreds who look at the counter offer and ask, “If you truly appreciate me enough to do this, why couldn’t you say something about it before I resigned?” In other words, “I had no idea you even cared.”

There’s a little secret about salary offers that many execs ignore when an employee claims they’ve been offered a really big increase by another employer. When hiring, most employers use the new hire’s last salary as part of their calculation of what they are going to offer. Few will offer a salary that comprises more than a 10% increase. There’s no real formula or theoretical reason for this; the hiring company simply feels that this is a “reasonable number.” There are a good number of employees who threaten resignation because of a higher salary offer (particularly those with skills in high demand,) who are simply blowing smoke as a ruse to get more money.

As I suggested to this now somewhat deflated CEO: counter offers are the corporate equivalent of swallowing a slow-acting poison. It surrenders the management of your company to someone motivated entirely by a paycheck, instead of passion for the cause and loyalty to the employer. And when it gets around that this technique works (and it will get around - believe me when I tell you this) others will line up with their letters of resignation in one hand and their wallets in the other.

So the next time an employee tells you he’s resigning because he was offered more money, ask him when his last day will be (because you’re going to hold them to it) and get an HR professional to do an in depth exit interview to find out what’s really going on. Then take a cold, hard look at the ways in which you have or have not built trust and loyalty with your employees. That relationship is the key to retention – and profit.

Be sure to contact me for more information: 973-256-3757 or via email at ed@FullSpectrumHR.com.

022409

In my book, PeopleThink, I describe at length that the basic element required for professional success is a strong business relationship between people at all levels of the company.

This relationship was never more important than it is now, in these difficult economic times.  If you’re an executive who’s recently downsized some employees, this relationship will help repair the inevitable (and very expensive) problems caused by layoffs, such as reduced morale, mistrust, etc.  If you are an employee or a manager, remember that your relationships with each other, colleagues, and the executive level will also greatly improve the quality of your work life. 

It’s something we all must work together to achieve.  Take your eyes off the recession and focus on making things better.  The alternative - continued mistrust and anxiety that normally go hand in hand with these tough times - will only lengthen the recession and allow more water in a company boat that may already be teetering on disaster.

021409

There is an increasing fervor around video/podcast resumes.  Of course, I have my two cents…

I regularly advise my clients, whether job seekers or hiring companies, to avoid pictures, videos, podcasts, and the like.  Let’s look at it from these two different perspectives.

Job Seekers:  When you opt for a visual format for your resume or decide to attach a picture, you are asking the hiring manager to make a judgment based on your appearance alone.  You’re hoping he will see the professional demeanor, hear the timbre of your voice, and then decide that you are the greatest thing since the microchip.  That’s not going to happen.  At best, the hiring manager will view your document and decide to call you in because your picture enhances your candidacy.  (It’s more likely that you’ll get a call because he/she is sexually attracted, and that’s a dangerous place to be.)  At worst, you’ll get rejected because you remind the reader of a disliked relative.  In fact HR advises hiring managers not to view resumes with pictures, so the chances are good that your visual c.v. will end up in a trash file.

Hiring Companies:  Opening a resume with a picture or a podcast from an applicant places you in the unenviable (and legally dangerous) position of knowing the gender, approximate age, and race of your candidate, and you jeopardize your ability to claim that you rejected the resume solely on its lack of merit.  Make it a firm policy to delete such submissions and you’ll save yourself untold legal fees and headaches.

Be sure to contact me for more information: 973-256-3757 or via email at ed@FullSpectrumHR.com.

020909

While most of us were either sleeping or partying on January 1st of 2009, a new law went into effect that dramatically increases your chance of getting hit with a very expensive lawsuit.

The American with Disabilities Act (ADA) dictated to employers that it was illegal to discriminate against an employee or candidate because they had a disability.  

The ADA Amendments Act (ADAAA), which became law at 12:01 AM on New Year’s day, did away with a few specific and critical words previously in the ADA. Previously, a disability had to be “substantially limiting” of “major life activities” before the courts would consider it a true disability, and therefore worthy of protection under the ADA.  Now, the standard for ADA classification is much lower.  

There are other changes as well.   The ADAAA’s definition of “major life activity” is substantially broader than that of the old act.  In short, this means that there are more opportunities to get sued.  And the change came during a tough economy, an historic hotbed for increased employment litigation. 

The answer?  Just like sexual harassment and discrimination prevention training, include ADAAA training on your annual list of “must dos”.   With a little creativity, you can make it a short affair that employees actually enjoy and learn from.  Be sure to contact me for more information: 973-256-3757 or via email at ed@FullSpectrumHR.com.

020209A

I’m a firm believer that any level of success is dependent upon good relationships with good people.  I have been fortunate to have some great strategic partners, and I wanted to take a moment to introduce them to you in case you’ve not had a chance to read about them on the Web site.  Either way, you can find them on my strategic partners page at http:www.fullspectrumhr.com/strategicpartners.html.

Wendy Weiss, “The Queen of Cold Calling”, is an absolute master at creating great sales people by demystifying cold calls and making them an important tool for any sales professional.  Her “Cold Calling College” is a terrific learning experience, as are all her products.  Her Web site is www.WendyWeiss.com.

Remington Business Group enables small companies do business in the USA and other countries, and helps small American companies do business overseas through its partner network. Through extensive knowledge, dedication, creativity, efficiency and hard work, Remington Business Group ensures that its clients’ business needs are met anytime, and every time. Yoav Amiri is the owner.  Visit: www.remingtonbusinessgroup.com.

Russ Korins is an experienced process consultant and attorney who uses his innate knowledge and experience in consensus building to help corporations decide on business development and marketing strategies. A graduate of Yale and NYU Law, he is a bright and welcome addition to my network. More information: www.russkorinsconsulting.com.

012609

I usually do not ask for favors in my blog entries.  But after a few weeks of reading the scores of resumes I’ve seen for jobs of all types and at all levels, I feel compelled to enlist everyone’s assistance.

I’ve noticed that almost all of these resumes – with very little exception – list something I call “Boy Scout Traits”.   They include statements like “very organized”, “great under stress”,  “loyal”, “hard-working” (though most ignore the need for a hyphen), “great sense of humor”, and many more.

I do not meant to slight the Boy Scouts, nor do I want to insinuate that anyone might list something on the resume that’s not true.  But whenever I see one of these entries, I remember my scouting days – miserable as they were – when I stood there saluting and swearing that I’d be honest, true, healthy, wealthy, wise, that I’d take a shower every day, and who knows what else.

That’s why I need your help.  If you are looking for a job, PLEASE stop doing this.  Don’t just tell me you can multitask, handle tough calls, shine in stressful situations, or can leap tall buildings in a single bound.  Give me concise examples of your skill.  And if you are not job hunting, but happen to know people who are (and who doesn’t?), please tell them I’d like them to stop as well.

 This will, of course, make my job easier.  But it will also, coincidentally, improve your chances of a meaningful response.

An important part of having exempt (or “salaried”) employees is the fact that they do not earn overtime.  (The term means that they are “exempt” from the Fair Labor Standards Act of 1938.)

But you can fall into a costly trap if you are not careful.  Allowing an exempt employee to use paid time off (vacation, sick time, personal time, etc.) in increments of less than a full day (i.e. “half a vacation day” or hourly increments) can jeopardize the employee’s exempt status.  A complaint by a disgruntled employee will trigger a wage and hour audit (an experience that makes an IRS audit look like a day at an amusement park) and you’ll have to pay back overtime for the duration of an employee’s tenure, and probably some hefty fines as well.

So remember: exempt employees must take paid time off in full day increments only.

In my book, PeopleThink, I describe at length that the basic element required for professional success is a strong business relationship between people at all levels of the company.

This relationship was never more important than it is now, in these difficult economic times.  If you’re an executive who’s recently downsized some employees, this relationship will help repair the inevitable (and very expensive) problems caused by layoffs, such as reduced morale, mistrust, etc.  If you are an employee or a manager, remember that your relationships with each other, colleagues, and the executive level will also greatly improve the quality of your work life.

It’s something we all must work together to achieve.  Take your eyes off the recession and focus on making things better.  The alternative - continued mistrust and anxiety that normally go hand in hand with these tough times - will only lengthen the recession and allow more water in a company boat that may already be teetering on disaster.

While most of us were either sleeping or partying on January 1st of 2009, a new law went into effect that dramatically increases your chance of getting hit with a very expensive lawsuit.

The American with Disabilities Act (ADA) dictated to employers that it was illegal to discriminate against an employee or candidate because they had a disability.  

The ADA Amendments Act (ADAAA), which became law at 12:01 AM on New Year’s day, did away with a few specific and critical words previously in the ADA.  Previously, a disability had to be “substantially limiting” of “major life activities” before the courts would consider it a true disability, and therefore worthy of protection under the ADA.  Now, the standard for ADA classification is much lower.  

There are other changes as well.   The ADAAA’s definition of “major life activity” is substantially broader than that of the old act.  In short, this means that there are more opportunities to get sued.  And the change came during a tough economy, an historic hotbed for increased employment litigation. 

The answer?  Just like sexual harassment and discrimination prevention training, include ADAAA training on your annual list of “must dos”.   With a little creativity, you can make it a short affair that employees actually enjoy and learn from.  Be sure to contact me for more information: 973-256-3757 or ed@FullSpectrumHR.com.

Bad hiring decisions continue to abound.  While I can fix most of them, some are beyond repair and hit the bottom line with a cost of many thousands of dollars.  Please: use behavior-based interviewing.  That means you’ll ask the candidate for specific examples of how they’ve handled like circumstances in the past, and drill down with follow-up questions.  Want to learn more? Contact me at 973-256-3757, via e-mail at ed@FullSpectrumHR.com, or go to my Web site at www.FullSpectrumHR.com.

In shaky economic times, it’s common for employees to feel  nervous and uncertain about their continued employment.  This results in dropped productivity, less effective overall performance, and premature job searching.  (After all, employees tend to feel layoffs are imminent, especially if they’ve seen coworkers laid off in the recent past.) 

Honest feedback about day-to-day accomplishments and problems will go a long way to improve performance. If a problem exists, talk about it directly, honestly, and without emotion.  State what you are looking for and what you’re willing to do to help the employee achieve that goal.  Be reasonable, however. One of the most common reasons for employee attrition is poorly identified/articulated goals.  Each goal should be specific, measurable, action-oriented,  reasonable, and time-bound.

Give honest, “from the heart” feedback when the employee does something well.  Make sure the feedback is timely, specific, and sincere.

Lilly Ledbetter’s case stood before the Supreme Court in 2007 and was denied.  Now there’s a law named after her - the Lilly Ledbetter Fair Pay Act - and it expands the employee’s right to sue for unfair pay practices.

Until now, employees had one year from the date of the offense  to file a lawsuit.  This new act all but abolishes that time frame, and renews the one year time limit with each successive pay check.

In Lilly’s case, she worked at the same company for many years and only recently discovered that her salary was lower than those of less tenured and less qualified men in her job class.  Her gender discrimination suit sparked this law, surely to be signed into law by President Obama.

What does that mean for the rest of working America?  Ensure that your pay scales and salary changes are evenly balanced and not subject to charges of discrimination.  Any consultant worth their salt can help you with that.

I’ve recently seen a few “off-the-shelf” handbooks that have contradictory statements that will lead to legal problems for those who use them.  Most notable are statements that contradict a state’s at-will employment statutes and entire sections that will make it virtually impossible to discipline an employee.  This reaffirms something I’ve been telling my clients for a long time:  handbooks should be written specifically for your company by someone who’s spent the time to get to know you and your business, and who is knowledgeable in federal, state, county, and municipal laws.  You might spend a little more now, but will no doubt save many times that in the near future.

There are several reasons that employers are having difficulty finding the right employees to meet their needs, even in this, a buyer’s market.  First, we are in the first stages of a severe worker shortage that the HR industry has been worrying about for some time now.  As the baby boomers begin to retire, they will leave gaps in service that this country is numerically unable to fill.  (The baby-boomers were of the “zero population” age and produced far fewer children than did their parents.)  We’re already seeing the effects, and many businesses reluctantly hire younger, less experienced, and less mature replacements.

As well, there are numerous people who do not design jobs appropriately, and that reflects in their job postings.  Frequently unclear, they often do not represent the type of candidate the company really needs.  It’s not uncommon for a new client to describe a  job to me and then show me a completely inadequate – and thus far ineffective – job posting.  I break down the requirements for them, and recommend that they list first a general description of the job, and then have a list of “must haves” and a list of “nice to haves”.  If a candidate is missing one item on the “must have” list, we drop him from consideration.  Both lists must be reasonable.

I’ve found that a lot of employers do not source well, either.  Most jobs in this country, regardless of the economic state du jour, are gotten by networking.  Savvy employers (and all of my clients) network with potential candidates whether they are hiring or not.  You should not wait until you’re dying of thirst before you begin to dig a well. 

Foreign companies are taking advantage of the lower dollar to explore opportunities in the American marketplace.  They are hiring, and I’d recommend looking into them as potential sources of job leads.  Meanwhile, a hint about job boards: don’t expect any serious response to your posted resume if you post it under “anonymous”.  (They all offer this option.)  Why?  Because unscrupulous search firms post anonymous resumes and use the responses to get leads on job openings.  (If Recruiter A responds to an anonymous resume with an E-mail and tells of an opening in a certain company, the recipient - Recruiter B - tries to steal the assignment and fill it before Recruiter A knows what’s happened.)  As a result, few recruiters will respond to these resumes.

Bad hiring decisions continue to abound.  While I can fix most of them, some are beyond repair and hit the bottom line with a cost of many thousands of dollars.  Please: use behavior-based interviewing.  That means you’ll ask the candidate for specific examples of how they’ve handled like circumstances in the past, and drill down with follow-up questions.  Want to learn more?  I’m teaching these principles – and many more – in “How to Hire Great Sales People.”  Click here to register, or paste http://www.fullspectrumhr.com/teleconference-2.html into your browser.

If you are job searching, you also have a responsibility to ensure that the hiring decision is a good one.  Make sure you pursue (and eventually accept) a job that’s truly a good match.  Many people are now grabbing any job they get, but that’s a recipe for disaster.  (It’s a lot like marrying the next available single person because you don’t want to be lonely.) Answer all the interviewer’s questions (regardless of how he asked them) with true examples of how you’ve performed in the past.  (That’s a behavior-based answer to a behavior-based question.)  For more information, sign up for Job Seeking University by clicking here or pasting http://www.fullspectrumhr.com/teleconference.html into your browser. 

Remember that each person has a profound effect on the day-to-day course of his job.  When you replace someone (for whatever reason) be sure to examine the job as the rest of the company currently perceives it.  Perhaps the exiting employee added something that’s now critical, or deleted something that the others still need.  Write a comprehensive job description.  When you write your posting for the job boards, break it down into the following headings:

Overall Job Description: No more than 5 sentences giving a high level overview of the job.

“Must have” skills and experience: if any of these are missing from the resume, discard it.

“Nice to have” skills and experience: those that will enhance the minimally qualified candidate.

About the company:  A description of the company and why applicants should consider you.

In Return: As much info as possible about compensation.  Contrary to popular belief, there’s nothing wrong with listing a salary, but that’s your decision.

Despite the histrionic reports you’ve heard of late about the economy, this is more a crisis of Human Resources than anything else.

Why?  The economic downturn directly affects how money goes from the employing company to the employee’s pocket.  That’s a critical HR element.

Lately, I’ve been addressing three groups in my newsletters: small and mid-sized businesses, recruiters, and job seekers.  It’s at times like this that we all seem to relearn how valuable HR is to our livelihoods.  For example, I’m learning how my inside knowledge of recruitment strategies and tactics helps job seekers.  When I provide these clients with this information and they follow the advice, they get jobs faster than they otherwise might have.  

Employers are realizing that adjusting to this new economic trend might include downsizing, but more commonly requires human capital budget control and organization redesign.  HR does that.  Another point in the HR column.

Finally, recruiters are also re-learning business in this new economy.  Employers are far less willing to spend 20-30% of the base salary for someone who harvests resumes and passes them on.  They must rethink how they do business, and begin to use sound interviewing techniques on each candidate PRIOR to submission.  I know a small handful of recruiting firms that are thriving in this economy.  They all have one thing in common: they interview candidates BEFORE they send in the resume, and they conduct this professional interview on a face-to-face basis.  They also have skilled HR people in their arsenal of resources.  Once again, it’s HR to the rescue.

I guess the bottom line is that HR is not a cost center for anyone but, in fact, a mission critical profit center that’s well worth the investment.

Where would the work world be without HR?

The Society for Human Resource Management (SHRM) completed a survey in 2008 in which it explored the impact of social networking on recruiting efforts.

It’s clear: more hiring departments are using social network sites to check out potential candidates, and the information they find does influence their hiring decisions.  More than half said they’d be disinclined to consider a candidate who’d posted questionable information about themselves.

Many still expressed concern over the legalities of using social networking information.  After all, that which offends a hiring manager might be a “statement of self” to a candidate.  The fact is that using some of this information in a hiring decision could violate federal and state employment laws.  But until there’s actual or case law to establish that fact, America’s hiring managers are “kind of winging it”.  

I’ve always told my clients not to use the Internet to perform unofficial background checks, nor should they look at profiles on MySpace, Facebook, etc.  I stand by that advice.  There are better ways to examine a candidate’s readiness and ability to perform the job, like behavior-based interviewing.

For job seekers, the advice is clear.  If you have a social networking page, be sure to keep it “professional” in its contact.  If you would not want your grandmother to read it or if you would not want to see it on the cover of USA Today as a quote under your picture, then don’t post it. 

If your company does not have an active union avoidance program - regardless of the number of employees you have - then the new Employee Freedom of Choice (EFCA) is a warning.  Unionization will soon become terrifyingly easy.  If you have three employees and two of them sign the union’s card at the representative’s request, then your company is now a union shop, and you can kiss productivity, innovation, and the employee’s desire to do a good job goodbye.

Union avoidance is a complex process, and most effective when begun in advance of a unionization effort.  Call for more information: 973-256-3757.

I recently found a great resource! Go to http://jobradio.fm.  It’s live talk radio about jobs and careers, 24/7.  While I don’t agree with everything I heard, every show is professional, thought provoking, and informative.  It’s well worth your time to listen in while you continue your search.

If you constantly change pay and schedules for exempt employees, you could be in hot water for violating the Fair Labor Standards Act.

“Exempt” status (often called “salaried status”) is reserved for those employees whose jobs meet certain administrative, managerial, or executive criteria.  In addition, they must also earn in excess of $455 per week, but the job description must satisfy BOTH criteria.

If the employee’s responsibilities and/or pay do not meet these criteria, you MUST pay him as a “non-exempt” (sometimes referred to as “hourly”) employee who is eligible for overtime.

Be careful.  Wage and hour audits are nasty.

The I-9 form is the federal government’s tool for ensuring that every employee in the US is legally entitled to be an employee.  You must have one for every person classified as an employee, including yourself.

The form takes just a few minutes to complete.  Keep them in an “I-9″ folder separate from other employee records.

Start using the new I-9 form for all new hires in 2009.  You can find it at http://www.uscis.gov/files/form/I-9.pdf.  

Many small businesses neglect this simple and quick requirement of the federal government.  Doing so can be costly.  Fines reach up to the many thousands of dollars and can include jail time if the feds determine that you acted intentionally.

This is an easy fix.  Just do it, and you won’t have to worry.  

As always, call if you have questions: 973-256-3757.

The trend in American businesses to downsize when times get tough has (again) begun its ritual backlash.  

According to the Society for Human Resource Management, the world’s largest professional HR management association, companies that have laid off employees in the past are now experiencing unwanted, increased attrition among their highest performers.

In addition, there’s always a ripple effect that accompanies layoffs.  Remaining employees produce less over the long haul because they are upset and frightened by their colleague’s departure.

Try alternatives to downsizing.  Ask your employees to help you save money.  Go to a four-day work week for a while: it will slash your payroll by 20% and your employees will be more likely to stay.  Create an arrangement with other companies to “loan out” your employees for a limited period.

The American workplace has experienced this phenomenon over and over again.  We are continually “surprised” by the economic downturn and therefore aim at the biggest target (payroll) to reduce costs.  As a result, our businesses barely survive the downturn and take longer to “get back on their feet.”  That’s the best case scenario.  The worst case scenario is that of an otherwise vital business sinking beyond redemption because its executives did not hire strategically, prepare for downturns before they happen, or explore alternatives to downsizing.

There was once a time when the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) required a fair and confidential election before allowing a union to represent your employees.  Soon these elections will be a relic of the past.

President-Elect Obama co-sponsored a bill allowing unions to claim victory simply by getting employees to sign a card requesting representation.  And he has promised to sign it into law once he gets into the White House.

Currently, a union must obtain signed cards from 30% of the employee body to demand an election.  EFCA will change that.  Soon, they will need nothing more than signatures from 50% plus one employees.  Once obtained, unionization is mandatory and your employees do not have the ability to vote in a free and confidential election.

Unionized organizations historically struggle to maintain a reasonable bottom line.  Union contracts promote mediocrity in performance, limit a business owner’s right to manage the company, and add expensive bureaucracy to daily business practices.

Unions notoriously use lies and strong arm tactics to get these cards signed.  Employees would traditionally sign them to get the requesting representative to stop bothering them, and then vote against the union in secret ballot.  But with the removal of the secret ballot proposed by EFCA, unionization is just a few signatures away.

The best way to avoid unionization is to become your employee’s best advocate. Learn to trust them and help them trust you.  But this is easier said than done.  I began my HR career by fighting unions, so I know that the employee’s attempt to organize is usually in response to management that does not have insight.  It is, I believe, an organizational temper tantrum.

It’s easiest - and now imperative - to fight unionization before your employees start to talk about it.  Be sure to contact me for more information: 973-256-3757.

Verifying your employee’s eligibility to work legally in the US is a requirement that a lot of small businesses in this country fail to meet.  Violating this requirement could cost you serious fines and even jail time if the federal government determines that you knowingly ignored or violated the law.

In the updated version of the form, fewer documents meet the standard of “acceptable proof”, and expired documents, previously allowed, are no longer acceptable as they are more prone to tampering.  

On hire, ask your new employee to provide you with the documentation required to prove eligibility as specified in one of the three pages of the new I-9.  Ensure that this is done on the first day of employment.

Keep completed I-9s in a separate file, and be sure to make clear provisions for the document’s security.

You can find the new I-9 form at http://www.uscis.gov/files/form/I-9.pdf.   

As an HR consultant who designs and implements strong people-based business strategies for small and mid-sized businesses nationwide, I teach my clients to rely predominately on networking - social and otherwise -  for their recruitment and hiring strategies.  Approximately 85% of all hiring done in the US is a result of networking, and my clients have saved as much as 86% when they use it to hire as opposed to traditional methods.  

The following is a conservative cost comparison between traditional recruiting strategies and those associated with social networking. We’ve based this example on a position paying $75,000 per year.

Traditional recruitment cost is $36,365 vs. $5,004 for a hire in which the company successfully uses networking to find candidates.  (Get the complete breakdown on these figures by sending a request to ed@FullSPectrumHR.com.)  

When calculating advertising costs, we allot for one ad while networking to gather one or two alternate candidates. We calculate other costs accordingly as well.  We also assume that hiring managers in our sample company have received education in behavior-based hiring practices. Companies with uncoordinated and gut instinct-based interviewing practices can expect longer interviewing and search periods, often lasting 16 weeks or longer.

These are costs related to recruitment only. Please note that the actual cost to replace an employee is 2 to 3 times the employee’s base salary, as there are costs associated with employee attrition not relevant to this comparison.  All numbers are rounded to the dollar.

 For the past two years, I’ve been helping job seekers as well by sharing my inside HR knowledge and experiences with them.  People who network generally cut their job search time in half.  I’ve had clients who use LinkedIn, Plaxo (for the legal community), Twitter, and other online sites.  As well, they use industry-based organizations for networking.  I even had one client who started his own networking group by posting it on www.meetup.com.  He found a job in 6 weeks, and continues to host the invitation only group.  

I’ve also noticed that candidates who network for opportunities (as opposed to using only the job boards) generally get jobs twice as fast as candidates who rely exclusively on advertising.

I’ve long believed that laying employees off in an economic downturn is a tragic mistake.  It costs an employer about 2-3 times the employee’s base salary.

But that’s old news, and I’ve long encouraged my clients to take cost saving measures instead of downsizing.  Some examples:

1. Reward cost saving measures proposed by employees.  (Delta Airlines had a famous example of this that moved along the journey to non-smoking flights and saved them millions each year in fuel costs: an employee recommended removing the little trays in the ashtrays that the crew would have to remove and clean after each flight.  Reducing the plane’s weight by removing these little trays and reducing turn around time saved millions.)
2. Ask employees to postpone education by 1 or 2 semesters, reducing tuition assistance (if you offer it).
3. One of my clients had to hire temps to fill in gaps left by busy workers.  We found out that of his 125 employees, about half spent 20 minutes each day taking personal calls on their cell phones during work hours.  The average employee earned $31/hour.  He simply asked them to stop making personal calls during work, unless it was a true emergency.  They agreed, and saved the company almost $155k per year, saving 3 full time equivalents.  
4. One client in NYC was losing money every day because employees typically arrived at work around “9-ish” and then ordered breakfast and didn’t start working until 10 or so.  My client offered bagels to those employees who arrived at work by 9, thus eliminating costly delays.

Contrary to popular belief, HR people get downsized as well.  And when it comes to a job search, they often need the same support that the rest of the world needs.

Today, I’m going to speak for an In-Transition group of a central NJ chapter of the Human Resource Management Association (HRMA).  It’s a perfectly good opportunity to remember that when it comes to our own job searches, the toughest thing to find is objectivity.  Job searching is tough for everyone, even the hiring professionals.

That said, I’d like to remind everyone that patience is far more valuable than any other resource right now.  The employment roller coaster is about to enter some tough spins and turns.  Your patience, though it sometimes seems hard to come by, will be your best friend.  And rest assured: the roller coaster ride will end.  

I promise.

As an HR consultant, I’ve been a part of a lot of people-related business decisions.  I’ve observed that businesses often use an economic downturn as an opportunity to rid the company of poor performers.  So the first tip is to make sure that you are indispensable to the company every day of the year.  If this is the first time you’ve thought about increasing your net worth for your employer, it might be too late.

That said, these are some other tips that have helped people keep their jobs.

1. Meet with the boss and ask how you can help improve the company’s numbers. Suggest non-traditional things like offering to give back some vacation time, offer to take on extra assignments, or using paid time off if work is very slow.  I even know of one employee who offered to work 2 days a month without pay for the following three months.
2. Find ways to save money and suggest them to the boss.  Make a thorough business case for each suggestion.  Don’t suggest downsizing others as this will read as a bit cut-throat.  (When the FAA deregulated airfares in the early 1980’s, a Delta airlines employee figured out that removing the little trays in the ashtrays in the non-smoking sections of each flight would save the company millions each year in saved fuel costs.  (Each flight was lighter.)  That’s the type of creative thinking we need to see!  As well, take a cold hard look at your job and suggest cuts on convenient resources you could truly do without.
3. This tip is for non-sales people:  if you can go out and get a new client.  Tell the boss you did this just to help: no financial reward needed.
4. Exempt employees:  if you tend to be a clock-watcher and start promptly at 9 and end at 5, stop it.  This is an “all hands on deck” situation.
5. Finally, think like the CEO does: lower costs and higher revenues now rule the business world.

A client recently asked me if exit interviews were really necessary, and if a “stay” interview (exploring ways to convince the resigning employee to rescind the resignation) was a good idea as well.

I believe well-conducted exit interviews are critical for the obvious reason: it helps a company learn about ways they can improve retention.  Stay interviews are another story.  They do not work because of the following reasons:

1. Once the employee has resigned, my only tool to lure him back is, in all likelihood, a salary increase.  Great employers do not engender loyalty with money, but with relationships.
2. I’ve seen more than one example in which employers play “Let’s Make a Deal” with an employee who threatens to leave, and it never works out.  Inevitably, the employee “threatens” to leave again 6-12 months later.

The best way to retain employees is to combine solid compensation with a strong interpersonal relationship.  If the employee has resigned (or is thinking of resigning), then the relationship is not strong and would take a long time to repair.

It’s been quite a week!  First of all, my latest book, Confessions of an HR Professional: Secrets for Getting Your Foot in the Door has hit the presses.  To order a digital copy, go to http://www.FullSpectrumHR.com and click on the “HRCoachNow” or Products tab.  The paper back copy will be available later in the week at the same site.

This brings me to more news.  The Web site is getting a much needed facelift.  It should be done Tuesday afternoon.

FInally, I’ve also gotten some great press.  The Times Union was kind enough to invote me as a guest blogger.  To see the blog, please go to: http://blogs.timesunion.com/classconflict/?p=890%C2%A0.  

Check them out.  Thanks!

Amidst all of the noise about the economy, it’s important to keep a few critical points in mind if you are looking for a job, or if you think you might be looking for one soon.

First, stay focused and remain optomistic.  Lots of companies are hiring, despite what you’re hearing.  (I’m as busy as I’ve ever been.)

Make sure your resume is tight and customized to the specific opportunity for which you are applying.  You’re asking an employer to shell out thousands and thousands of dollars for someone he does not know, and to do so during economically stressful times.  Truthfully highlight your skills and experiences as this potential customer needs to see them.  Make sure your resume is error-free, easy to read, and contains relevant information.

Networking is the holy grail of a job search.  In all sorts of economic times over the past thirty-some years (and yes, there have been times that were worse than this one), networking has always been responsible for 80-85% of the hiring in this country.

Finally, I have three new resources.  My latest book, Confessions of an HR Professional: Secrets for Getting Your Foot in the Door is now available for download from my Web site, www.FullSpectrumHR.com.  Click on the “HR Coach Now!” tab.  Also on the same page: Two teleconferences specifically for job hunters:  Secrets of a Great Resume, and Job-Hunting in Tough Econoic Times.

Last month, I informed a client of mine about the effects of a recent and now pervasive habit in his workplace. His employees were using their cell phones to text and make calls during work hours (not break times), and it was beginning to interrupt his work flow.

His company has 34 employees and the average salary there is $37 per hour.  If each employee spends only ten minutes on the phone or texting every day, it costs him…are you ready?…$50,592.00 per year.  That’s the cost before we factor in the cost of lost business, on-the-job accidents resulting from a misdirected attention span, and other costs.  Interestingly, his employees feel overworked and have asked him to hire another employee.  If they’d just cut their phone and texting time in half, that new employee would be much easier to afford.

Employers pay not only for the employee’s physical activity, but their attention to detail and focus on work as well.  They pay for these products for the duration of the time that the employee is at work.  Texting or talking on the cell phone at work to handle non-urgent personal matters is selfish and inconsiderate, and comes at the expense of production and customer service.

And if you happen to be unlucky enough to ride on a train in which the conductor is texting while on the job…well, the news speaks for itself.

Just because we have technology does not mean we have to use it constantly, and I wish there were more people out there who remember the times before cellular phone technology during which we all went to work and maintained appropriate contact with people in our lives by calling them on our breaks or from home.  Sure, we could always call from the office to check on a sick relative or to handle a crisis, but there is no way you can convince me all those cellular calls and texts during business hours are true emergencies.

Just my two cents.

There was a time when an employee getting downsized would receive a few weeks of notice and a farewell party on her last day.

Times sure have changed.

A recent survey by Cyber-Ark revealed that a full 88% of IT administrators admitted that they would steal valuable password and access information should the company fire them.  These rarely altered passwords give the terminated employee access to payroll, client records, employee files, and operating codes.  In the wrong hands, this data allows someone to do everything from altering and deleting financial records, selling client contact and pricing data for sale to the highest bidder, and accessing other passwords to crashing all or part of the entire system.

Prevention is easier than it seems.  First, change passwords and access codes on a regular basis.  New passwords should be completely different from all other passwords in every way.  (A client told me he once learned this lesson the hard way.  He routinely rotated the system access passwords to contain the name of one of his three children.  An ex-employee used this data and hacked into the system.)

Second, have a brief conversation with your highest level IT person just before you terminate the employee. Tell her to deny the terminated employee all system access immediately after seeing you bring the employee into the office for the termination discussion.  (Alternately, ask the terminated employee to come to the office, and then ask them to wait a moment as you step out to call IT and request the system access denial.)

Accompany the terminated employee back to his desk.  Help him pack up or offer to send his personal belongings to his home address.  Do not, under any circumstances, allow the employee to use the computer.

Some terminated employees can adopt hostile behaviors.  Because one employee can do so much damage with so little effort, the days of the long pre-termination notice and farewell parties are over.  It’s sad, but unfortunately a necessity in today’s server-based workplace.  

It may seem like something said by a person who’s been living under a rock, but believe it or not, hiring continues and is even rising in some sectors.

How is this possible?  Well, the media’s reporting techniques tend to rely on government collected information.  They also tend to hyperbole, trying to generate higher sales.  

But the fact is that smaller businesses are continuing to look for employees at all levels.  The general concerns over our economy are influencing the manner in which they hire.  Decisions are slower and more deliberate, but the hiring continues nonetheless.

I tell my clients that there’s both less and more to economic fluctuations than meet the eye.  On the one hand, the downturn is nothing more than an expression of fear as opposed to a result of true economic indicators.  It lacks any tangible cause and is probably more generated by the press than anything else.  (Yes, I know the sub-prime market crashed, but the true ripple effect of that event has yet to be isolated and accurately measured.)

While the psychogenic aspect of an economic fluctuation brings comfort to some, it is worrisome as well. The fact that emotions drive this enormous part of our lives only increases the unknown element, and the unknown increases anxiety.

So my message to both job hunters and employee seekers is simple.   If you are in need of people, make sure the need is real and definitely long term, and then proceed with your hiring.  If you are on the job search side, take a deep breath and continue looking.  You will find a job.  The bottom line for both: Keep moving. This will end sooner than later, and the road ahead will seem more clear and easy to navigate

There’s no lack of discussion about millennial employees (born circa 1987) anywhere on the web or in business journals. The reviews on this generation are still coming in, but “mixed” seems to describe those we’ve received thus far.

Words describing millennial employees range from “technically brilliant” to “cocky,” from “frighteningly expedient” to “lazy,” and “impressively exact in their work” to “lacking work ethic.”

They can be a bit impatient, wanting now the six figure salaries that their predecessors labored for years to achieve. Often their take on work is that if they can get a full day’s work done in an hour, why shouldn’t they take the rest of the day off?

A friend of mine, a CEO of a company with 300 or so employees, got just that response when he came upon a group of new employees sitting - yet again - in the lunch room working on what must have been their ninth cup of designer coffee and playing games on their credit card-sized phones. He asked them why they were still there as opposed to doing their work. They explained that they’d all completed their assigned projects within a few hours, and felt that it was now perfectly reasonable to spend the rest of the day in repose. “After all,” one of them said, “it hardly seems fair to penalize us because we work faster than the older employees.”

Foul! Unless the employee had contracted to receive pay on a per project basis (and my friend swears that’s not the case,) then this particular style of thinking smells like a trout that’s been rotting in the sun for a week in August and is only half as useful.

Here’s a piece of fact to chew on: for all his talent, expedience, technical savvy, and exactitude, this millennial forgot an important point.  His employer, my friend, was paying not only for the product he produced, but for his time as well. If he finished his project early, a more constructive tack might have been to find something else to do: to raise the bar on his own performance, so to speak. That’s how “the older guys” got those six figure salaries: by showing dedication and commitment: by managing their careers like they were important. I’m not suggesting that 16 hour days are the only acceptable path to professional success, but I’m sure that an approach of doing “only what they ask me to do” just won’t cut it, now or any time in the future.

5/22/07

We’ve all seen them before: the handbooks that large corporations give to new employees on their first days on the job.  They usually make for pretty boring reading, much of it in legal-eze. 

But these are important documents, not only for large employees, but smaller companies as well, and I recently worked with a company after the owner learned this lesson the hard way. 

Gabe started his high tech business after closing his 20 years of tenure at a Fortune 50 company, taking a $350,000.00 package along the way.  His dream was to build a place where his employees would feel at home: safe and secure, unlike the years he’d spent at the corporate grindstone.

A year later, Gabe’s business had grown to five employees.  His technical genius, Steven, was hired only 2 months after opening the doors and became the company’s third employee.  After several months, Steven expressed his concern over the new company’s financial stability, and that’s where Gabe made his big mistake.  In a good-hearted effort to help Steven feel more secure, Gabe, said, “It’s OK Steven.  You’ll always have a job here.”  Two other employees overheard the conversation.

Not long after that, Steven’s performance began to slip.  He was frequently late and often left work incomplete.  Gabe confronted him repeatedly, and finally decided that there was no other option; Steven had to go.

Three weeks after his termination, Steven filed a lawsuit claiming that Gabe had violated a verbal agreement that promised him perpetual employment.  Steven’s attorney alleged that as there was no handbook outlining the company’s employment practices, and therefore his client had every right to interpret the statement “you’ll always have a job here” as an employment contract.

To make a long story short, the case never went to court and Gabe’s attorney was able to convince opposing counsel that there was, in fact, no real grounds for a lawsuit.  But it was close, and in addition to the nearly $20,000.00 in legal bills, Gabe lost another employee who maintained a close friendship with Steven.  Business faltered and service dropped as Gabe scrambled to replace his two employees.

He’s now back on his feet and growing again, but Gabe learned that a solid Employee Handbook not only expresses clear performance expectations, but states that he’s an at-will employer who can terminate anyone with or without reason or warning, and that nothing – save a written document signed by him – can change that.

The CEO of one of New York’s many high tech start-ups recently told me that he’d “saved the day” by convincing a resignation-bound employee to stay. The employee had cited a competitor’s offer of a substantially higher salary as her reason for leaving.

My client felt that the best strategy here was to “gently grill” (his words, not mine) the employee for facts about the new job. She said they’d offered her a bigger base and a larger bonus structure. He told her he’d beat their numbers by 10%, if she’d give him the chance. Miracle of miracles: she did. She rejected her new offer and promised her current employer that she’d stay with him.

I guess he showed her.

But she’s really running that company, and I told him so. He should remain abreast of the compensation trends and his employee’s needs. Most employees resign because of a poor relationship with their manager, and as they do not know how to fix that problem, allow the lure of financial reward to influence their judgment. For every employee that resigns for a bona fide, substantial increase in salary, there are hundreds who look at the counter offer and ask, “If you truly appreciate me enough to do this, why couldn’t you say something about it before I resigned?” In other words, “I had no idea you even cared.”

There’s a little secret about salary offers that many execs ignore when an employee claims they’ve been offered a really big increase by another employer. When hiring, most employers use the new hire’s last salary as part of their calculation of what they are going to offer. Few will offer a salary that comprises more than a 10% increase. There’s no real formula or theoretical reason for this; the hiring company simply feels that this is a “reasonable number.” There is a good number of employees who threaten resignation because of a higher salary offer (particularly those with skills in high demand,) who are simply blowing smoke as a ruse to get more money.

As I suggested to this now somewhat deflated CEO: counter offers are the corporate equivalent of swallowing a slow-acting poison. It surrenders the management of your company to someone motivated entirely by a paycheck, instead of passion for the cause and loyalty to the employer. And when it gets around that this technique works (and it will get around - believe me when I tell you this) others will line up with their letters of resignation in one hand and their wallets in the other.

So the next time an employee tells you he’s resigning because he was offered more money, ask him when his last day will be (because you’re going to hold them to it) and get an HR professional to do an in depth exit interview to find out what’s really going on. Then take a cold, hard look at the ways in which you have or have not built trust and loyalty with your employees. That relationship is the key to retention.

An employee’s ability to do harm to a company has grown exponentially over the years. Twenty years ago, a disgruntled employee had to be able to crack a safe or forge a signature to steal money. Now, any employee with minimal computer knowledge and a mouse that works can do serious damage, especially to small businesses with fewer security layers and simpler systems.

There’s a common thought that if you are going to give an employee access to the company funds, use of a credit card, or other such privilege, that you must run a credit check to ensure a healthy credit rating. After all, if the candidate has shaky credit, s/he is more likely to abuse the system, steal money, and God only knows what else.

The rather standardized practice of running a credit check on a potential employee is, in fact, wasted effort and money. It could as well disqualify otherwise terrific candidates.

The fact is that someone’s credit rating can go south for many reasons, none of them remotely connected to honesty. A divorce, a pending mortgage application, illness, or an extended period of unemployment can equally lower a rating. Not all cases of poor credit resulted from someone who just decided not to pay his bills and mishandle his finances. And remember: the guys at Enron had terrific credit ratings.

One more point: there are no studies proving that people with poor credit are any more or less likely to steal or mismanage company funds than anyone else.

A criminal background check is a far better indicator of possible future problems. A candidate with a felonious conviction is statistically far more likely to commit another crime than someone who had never violated the law. Make sure that your job application states your intention to perform the criminal background check, and make sure the employee signs the application. As it’s best to perform the check after the employee has begun work, be sure that your employee handbook and your offer letters clearly state that all job offers are contingent upon the satisfactory completion of a background check.

It’s no secret that the government requires all employees to meet basic legal eligibility standards for employment in the United States. But apparently many companies do not know that they have to be ready to prove eligibility, as a recent report from HR.com shows a marked rise in hefty fines and even jail time for employers who cannot prove their employees’ legal right to work in this country.

Sparked in part by the Department of Homeland Security’s actions in a post-9/11 world, and in part by the current debates we have about eligibility for citizenship, this increased vigilance translates to a simple fact for American employers: you must have documentation for each employee – including yourself – that shows legal employment eligibility.

The form you must use for this is a federal form called an I-9. (The government link for the form is http://www.uscis.gov/files/form/i-9.pdf, but you can also Google “i-9” to find the link. Don’t buy the form; it’s free at this link.)

Have the employee complete the top of the form, and you (or a designee) will complete the lower half. The link also contains a list of acceptable documents the employee can use as proof of eligibility. Divided into three groups, the employee may choose one document from Column A, or one each from Columns B AND C.

If the employee’s status is temporary (for example, an H1-B visa be sure to redo the I-9 as soon as the employee receives their new documents. Their eligibility must be continuous; even a week’s lapse can be problematic.

I recommend to my clients that they photocopy the employee’s proof, draw a line through the picture, initial it, and note the date on which they viewed the original. While there is no part of the law that requires photocopies of the proof, inspectors do ask for them. Best to stay on the inspector’s good side.

Keep the completed forms in a separate folder (probably marked I-9) and keep it locked up securely.

I-9 compliance is an easy and quick way to avoid huge fines. And if you feel you can’t make the bright orange prison jumpers work, I-9 compliance will help you walking among the free.

If you have any comments or questions, please feel free to leave them here or via email at ed@FullSpectrumHR.com.

Clients frequently ask me about the best way to ensure that the candidate for one of their positions will, in fact, be willing and able to do the job, and do it well.

The answer lies in a technique called “behavior-based interviewing.” In this technique, I’ll ask a candidate to describe - in detail - a specific time when he’s used this skill in the past. For example, instead of testing a programmer on his knowledge of C# (the responses to which could be nothing more than those he “studied” just before the interview,) I ask him to describe the last project in which he used C#. I follow up with questions like:

“Which employer was this for?”

“What were some of the problems you encountered?”

“How did you fix them?”

And so on…

Other examples:

“Tell me about the most difficult customer you had at your last employer. What made him tough to deal with? How did you handle it? What was the response?”

“Tell me about a specific time when you disagreed with your manager. How did you handle it? What was the outcome?”

“When was the last time you had to complete a project with little or no help from your manager. How did it work out? What did your manager say? What problems did you encounter?”

“Tell me about a specific instance when you had to respond to more than one urgent request in a short time period. How did you do it? Did you ask for help? What was the response?”

Asking hypothetical questions like, “Can you multi-task?” will get you hypothetical answers. Unless the candidate can describe - in detail - a specific time when he’s actually performed the task, then you won’t know if he’s actually had the experience. The best predictor of future behavior is past behavior…and that’s what behavior-based interviewing helps you explore.

Feel free to respond with questions or comments here or via email at ed@FullSpectrumHR.com