The HR Paradox, Part 3 – The Value Worker Model

At the end of every day, company success is dependent upon every employee adding value in the area where they work. Otherwise, why pay them?

We believe that there are several types of employees. These differences are discrimination neutral and quite simple. Either they want to work and contribute to company success or they want to be paid without working or they are want to work but are so self-focused that company teams and other employees are adversely impacted. I call those who want to work and contribute to company success as “Value Workers.”

Those who want to be paid without really working, I call “Loafers” or “Blood-Suckers” (they suck the life blood out of companies). Those who are self-focused may appear to be highly successful but result in sub-optimizing long term results. I call this group the “Selfers.” They create a highly inefficient company that is usually inward focused, slow moving, and often bureaucratic.

Which group would you want in your company? Value Workers, Bloodsuckers, or Selfers?

Yet in most companies, all three profiles exist. What is that costing your company? How is that impacting client sales, client satisfaction, product quality, company branding / image, profit, response times, employee turnover, employee development, and company teamwork? How is it impacting your company alignment and leverage?

Yet somehow HR is expected to have a magic wand to “fix the problem.” Top management is busy focused on growing the business and assumes that just hiring a HR team will transform the organization, or just spending more money internally will fix the problem, or outsourcing HR will fix the problem. Unfortunately, even the best HR team in the world cannot “fix the problem.” That is part of the HR Paradox.

Just as finance does not create the money it helps to manage. Just as technology does not create the business requirements it seeks to automate. Just as procurement does not specify the products or services it seeks to purchase. HR is only one out of four components to “fixing the problem.”

Unfortunately, unless HR has the right team in place there is no one else in the company whose job it is to coordinate the solution. Executive management does not have time. Managers do the best they can but are time pressed and do not have the tools or training. Even if the rare manager “fixes her department,” that does not fix the entire company. The individual employee has the least personal impact, responsibility, authority, skills, time, or ability to help. Even Value Workers are impacted when Bloodsuckers and Selfers exist throughout the company.

So strategically, how can a company resolve the HR Paradox?

Next week we will discuss the HR Paradox Solution.

The HR Paradox, Part 2 – A Top Management Opportunity

C-Level Management is usually focused on three areas: product development, marketing, and sales. Everything else is in support of those three functions, unless the goal is to grow and flip (sell or go public) the company. Then strategic finance is added to the decision making table. Every other function is in support of or part of those areas. For example, R&D is part of product development. So are manufacturing, product outsourcing, and product management. But at the end of the day, if you have no product to take to market, no marketing effort to communicate that you have a product, and no sales effort, then you have no company.

In some cases the product is HR, Finance, IT, Consulting or other product/solution. However, even in those companies there is usually a distinction between what they productize for clients from what they run internally.

Of course you can outsource some product development (e.g. license from others), outsource portions of marketing, and even tactical sales but the strategic decisions of what products/services to develop, how to market, and how to sell is usually the primary focus of top management.

Support functions that are integral to the product or go-to-market process usually become part of the strategic trusted advisor team. Examples would be IT and Finance. However, HR is usually not integral in product development, marketing, or sales daily discussions and often becomes an afterthought.

We believe it is up to senior management to understand how HR could become a competitive differentiator and contribute to company profit. The challenge is that most HR organizations do not know how to cross that bridge and communicate the value that world-class HR organizations provide to the C-Level executive team. This gap is one of the reasons why we created Integrated Success™. We have strategic processes to help management include strategic HR solutions that add company value while providing a tactical umbrella to align HR support with the business and company direction.

Our model allows us to help top executives, support strategic HR executives, help HR learn how to become more strategic, and provide tactical processes and resources that add value to the company. 

If the company goal is to design the right structure with the right roles, hire the right people and put them in the right seats, help those people develop personal and team value, set up a culture of innovation and value add, and align with the current direction of the C-Level team while still fulfilling the daily tactical duties of HR, then we believe our Integrated Success™ model can help.

 

Hopelessness Versus SEE

I imagine that we all understand “hopelessness.”  Hopelessness usually leads to defeat and cessation of even trying to keep going. For some, it can lead to self-destructive behavior.

In this Christmas season, there is spiritual hope for those who seek it. Personally, my greatest hope is in Jesus Christ, in His Promises, and in His Future Return. This is the foundation of hope that I build upon.

However, there is also a secular way of dealing with hopelessness. In my opinion, there is always hope but it is difficult for those under pressure to see it, to see opportunities, and to grab those opportunities.

Some have suggested that the reason for hopelessness is the insistence that they want what they want, how they want it, and they want it NOW! If they can’t get it, then they lose hope. If that is true, then many in America are losing hope; but they don’t have to lose hope. They just have to be willing to see the world through a different lens. Old paradigms must be replaced by new paradigms. What used to be true is not necessarily the world we live in today. The world is changing and we must change with it or lose out.

So how does one usually make those changes, redefine what is their hope, and move from defeat to victory?

I call the process “SEE”. It stands for Significant Emotional Event.

When we grow up, we learn ways of thinking that impact our perception of reality, our dreams, and whether we see the world as full of empty promises or incredible opportunities. You may be thinking about the motivation principles of positive thinking but that is not what I am referring to. Positive thinking can change an attitude but it cannot change a fact. However, changing your attitude, identifying opportunities, and going after those opportunities can change your circumstances.

Here is an example. I have heard that the Chinese writing that means “Chaos” can also mean “Opportunity.” Many successful businesses today were started during the Great Depression. Most successful entrepreneurs failed and even went bankrupt several times on the way to making fortunes. You may see Chaos. However, there is Opportunity all around you if you are willing to change your view of the world.

That is where “SEE” comes in. I used to use it when I ran a global organization to help people become successful when they were on the edge of being fired. It is a process to grab someone’s attention, shake them up, and force them to make a decision to either change (in the way that spelled success in our company) or leave for an opportunity in another company (that meant they would be fired or leave voluntarily).

If you are in transition, you are undergoing a significant emotional event. If you are in a job that you hate, you are undergoing a significant emotional event. Whatever or whoever caused it does not matter. What matters is how you respond to it.

For example, one person who read Jobpreneurship™ 101 took notes and is implementing every step. He sees the opportunity of how to compete in the marketplace and should do well. Another person read my book and told a supplier of mine that there were so many good ideas that he did not know where to start – so he didn’t do anything. You want to give that person a swift kick in the you know what! The book is a road map. You start with one step. Do it. Go to the next step. Do it. Then go to the next step… Our upcoming Jobpreneurship™ 201 is a Career Success and Mentoring Guide which combines the road map to teaming with a mentor to leverage your success opportunity.

Success is one day at a time, one step at a time, and looking for ways to succeed. If you follow these principles, you will eventually be successful.

If you feel hopeless, I encourage you to take that Significant Emotion Event turn it into opportunity. To paraphrase a famous Latin quote, “Seize the day”…by starting today!

Have a great Christmas and New Year!

Are You Willing to Make a Career Change?

No one likes the word “change.” Change is hard. Change means moving around priorities. Change may include personal and financial cost. So, why would you consider a career change?

Here are some typical reasons:

1. Your specialty / trade has moved overseas.
2. Your town is a one company town and that company closed down
3. Your profession, such as real estate, has fallen on hard times
4. Competition for your job from those younger and lower cost left you the one on the street
5. Your age or prior salary cost is too high for companies to want you.
6. New regulations or legislation is killing your industry
7. Company management wants to remove layers of management; which means you

We could go on all day. Here are some examples for college graduates:

1. Industry wants specialists, not liberal arts degrees
2. No one is hiring in your field
3. Your GPA and accomplishments are average. Companies are looking for outstanding

You get the idea. The markets may drive you to consider a career change.

Here are some other reasons that may entice you to want to make the change:

1. You are burnt out where you are
2. You are never home and need to spend more time with the family
3. Your passion lies elsewhere.
4. You are no longer challenged. You feel like you are just putting in time without going anywhere.
5. You’ve had it with politics and cultures that you can no longer tolerate.

Regardless of the reason, there are times when you need to consider a career change.

The point is that career changes are far more common than most of us realize. In fact, we are told that the next generation will have up to six different careers! Just ask an average college student how many times they changed majors.

So, where do you start?

First, your industry may merely be in a down cycle. You feel that it will return to an up cycle if you can just wait it out. That may not be necessary. Consider flipping your career or branching out in a related area within the same industry.

Here are three real estate agent examples.

1. You decide to tighten your belt and continue as an agent. You will work harder, longer, and with a lower expected return. That is an option.
2. You decide to work with banks and investors who need to flip distressed inventory. New skills may be required to put together the financial portfolio, or to coordinate crews to fix issues, or to coordinate auction and selling events.
3. You decide to shift to the property management side of the house. You no longer sell but you still work with tenants and ensure that the tenant rate is high.

These changes are slight changes. You can easily modify these examples for your situation. For example, a union cement worker may be able to provide high quality concrete repairs or projects for high-end home owners. You can remain in the union and still be able to take on union work when it is available. Later, you can choose to go full time in your own business or return to union work when the economy recovers.

For most of us, if you like the field you have chosen, thinking creatively in these areas may be your best alternative for the least impact to your family – and make you even more competitive when the economy recovers. After all, how many others will have had such a broad range of experience in the same field but from different perspectives?

What Will You Do For Me?

So, you can do the job. Great. So can the long line of candidates in front of you and behind you.

You can make friends. You can play the political game. You are a subject matter expert. You are a whiz kid. You are a world leader. You walk on water… Nice. You should make it to the top list of final candidates.  But you have not answered the next key question.

You can do many things; but what will you do for me?

What I want is almost never on the job description.

What I want is usually never volunteered to you.

Before you can answer “what will you do for me?” you need to find out what the decision maker and his or her team wants. Yes, I said team. Most hiring or promotional decisions today are with a number of players, each having their own ideas, agendas, and “wants.” This means doing your homework and learning to ask skilled questions.

Second, you need to decide if you want to give them what they want. Sometimes what they want is not what you should or want to give. You do have choices.

Third, you need to start thinking in the shoes of the management team. The company may want more revenue, more profit, more prestige, more public notice. But the hiring and promoting manager is more likely to want to get themselves promoted, get a larger bonus, or get personal recognition.

Can you give them what they want?

Fourth, you need to start practicing how you will communicate how you can help them get what they want. You need to use sixth grade English to ensure they understand what you are saying. You need to keep the comments short, with a maximum of a one minute answer and preferably only a 10-15 second answer.

When you are networking with others, internally or externally, you can start learning what the management team wants. Ask questions. Ask advice. When others are doing the talking a lot will be shared; including what they are really looking to find. In other words, “what they want.”

Now, with some homework, you should have the best answer of any candidates of the question, “What Will You Do For Me?”

 

How to Take Advantage of a World in Turmoil

No matter who wins the White House in 2012, the die is cast. We are in an economic hole that has been dug for the past 30 years.

Moneynews.com published last year an article entitled, “Economists: Unemployment Won’t Drop to Normal Until 2018.” “American households have lost $14 trillion of their net worth in the recession” said Albert Niemi, dean of the Cox School of Business at Southern Methodist University. The resulting shock is causing a slow down in consumer spending, which is typically 70% of the economy. When you get burnt, you don’t want to get burnt a second time.

2018 is so far out, who really knows what our economy will be like in the future? Unless our government debt and long-term obligations are reduced, the picture could become even worse. The European bailout begun yesterday by the FED is raising the risk for further global financial pressure.

Between now and the 2012 elections most businesses will take a wait and see attitude before risking major company expansion. However, companies will still be hiring and promoting those who they perceive as adding the most value.

Now for the more good news!

If you are seeing hundreds or thousands of people looking for the same jobs that you are, you can get depressed. The good news is that your competition is also getting depressed. Most depressed people will quit showing up and quit trying to get a job. If you choose to keep looking, you are ahead of the pack.

If you are employed, now is the time to double your efforts to network within your company, to add more value in your work, and to be sure that you are visible to decision makers. The goal is to first survive and then thrive. We have written a new guide that will be released next year on how to create career success through a combination of your personal development and through asking a key manager to help mentor you with you making it easy for them to help you.

So how do you get started?

First, get on the new train before it leaves the tracks. The world has changed. Grieve over being caught in today’s mess. Realize that you cannot control the economy. You can control your response. Don’t be a victim. Choose to learn how to be competitive in the new economy. Do what it takes to be successful.

Second, quit listening to old world thinking. What used to work is not working. So, find out what is working and do it. Listen to leaders who understand the roadmap to success in today’s world economy. Follow them.

Commit to a change of thinking from being entitled, being taken care of, being helped, being rewarded for just being alive. Instead, take ownership for your future. Help others. Deliver value to others who then will reward you because you earned it.

Third, start learning. Learn what your passion is. Learn what you really want to do. Learn how to communicate with others what you want to do. Learn how to brand yourself. Learn how to effectively network in the area you want to work. Keep learning as a lifestyle.

If you do these things, you can be successful regardless of the economy or who is in Washington DC.

Unemployment may still be high in ten years; but not for you.

 

Expansion Announcement – Integrated Success™

We are pleased to announce a major breakthrough and strategy expansion.

Our expansion adds to our job search and outplacement focus three related initiatives combined into one global solution that we call Integrated Solutions™. Integrated Solutions™ addresses three major components of company success. The first is Leadership. The second is Organizational Transformation and Company Alignment. The third is Individual Personal Transformation (Career Success) and Team Alignment.

In other words: Company Teams Aligned with Leadership Direction and Empowered by Motivated Individuals are the Key to Organizational and Individual Success. Our model shows you how to strategically and tactically win at all levels. We will explain more details in future blogs.

So, why are we expanding our scope and offering?

1. Job seekers still need individual and outplacement assistance to compete in a global economy to find work. This emphasis will continue.
2. When job seekers land as employees, managers, or executives they need assistance to survive and thrive. Survive when the average job may last two years. Thrive in developing career success. So, we have expanded Jobpreneurship™ to include seeking one’s dream job in both the job search and company environments.
3. Employees succeed most when they are on the right bus (company), in the right seat (role), and going in the right direction (alignment with company and team goals). We will be soon announcing a new Career Success and Mentoring Program beginning with our new guide entitled Jobpreneurship™ 201. The guide is designed to help both the employee and the company to improve everyone’s success.
4. Poor teams, misaligned teams, dysfunctional teams, or any other description that results in low performance and low productivity impacts individual employee success, the team leader’s success, and ultimately company success. We have created a new organizational improvement model called Teampreneurship™ which helps company executives and leaders to either strategically pursue transformative changes resulting in high performance success or tactically pursue performance improvements depending upon the cultural and leadership environment. This model is designed, from a company perspective, to find the right people to put on the bus, to be in the right seat, to go in the right direction, to personally develop more value for the company, to have more career opportunity, and to be sure the right people are let off the bus. Teampreneurship™ is designed to help individuals, teams, and the company win together against a global, rapid changing and highly competitive marketplace.
5. With partners, we offer company executives assistance to improve their direction and communication to their organizations. Clear company strategic and tactical direction is the foundation for companywide synergy that helps organizational teams align with top management and gives individual employees a roadmap for career planning, development, and success. Top performing companies focus on leadership direction, team alignment, and employee development, value, and results.

By combining all three initiatives we believe we can help companies, teams, and individuals succeed together in a challenging world. That is why we call our new model Integrated Success™.

 

How do you Get Referrals?

The goal of networking is to identify people who you need to know, need to develop a relationship with, or who you can help. However, rarely is the networking meeting the appropriate forum to spend more than a few minutes talking to each other. There are too many distractions for a relationship building meeting. You don’t have to go have coffee. You can go to a ball game together, attend a school sports game, or any bonding experience. However, at some point you need to spend some quiet discussion time together to get to know each other, get a feel for who they are, get an impression of their personal potential and their potential to help you.

If they can help you, then you need to help them to help you. This is where the Marketing Document is used. If they wish to refer you, the Marketing Document gives them the value proposition, what you want to do, and how to contact you. If they want to see if they can help you network, your list of networking venues tells them where you are networking and let’s them see if you are already going to places that they know of which might help or even invite you to their networking venues. If they want to understand what company profile you are looking for, the Marketing Document will provide the profile. If they wish to see your top ten target companies, then they can see them to talk about them and introduce you to people whom they know or even suggest additional companies that you may wish to consider and people at those companies whom you might wish to meet. Finally, when you leave, you can leave a copy of your Marketing Document so that if they later think of something or someone who can help you, you have given them a tool to help you.

The primary goal of a referral meeting is to get to know each other better, see how you can help each other, and get other referrals to people who can help you get where you want to go.

Once you finish the meeting, you need to follow-up with a thank you note and mention the actions you have agree to take – and then do them. I use email for this purpose. So do most of my contacts. On a rare occasion someone writes a handwritten note. That is nice but not necessary in today’s fast paced world. Besides, I can’t electronically save or file a handwritten note.

If you get a referral and subsequently meet with someone else, be sure to keep the referee in the loop. Remember, their reputation is on the line. Also, copying them in the emails lets the referred person know that the referee is interested in following the results of the referral. Wouldn’t you be interested?

Most of this is common courtesy. However, in today’s world common courtesy is not too common. If you honor them and the referee, they will remember you even if they cannot help you. In a sense, referral meetings are still a numbers game. The difference is that you are playing with qualified loaded dice.

The best referral meeting is by a trusted influencer, advisor, or friend into the decision maker. This one-on-one meeting is usually out of their office and away from phones. The table is set. The opportunity is yours. If they want to hire you, they will bring it up. Your goal is to let them know who you are, what your value is, answer questions, ask them questions, and get to know each other. Worst case, they may refer you to someone else. Best case, they may want to help you get a job in their company. You win either way.

In every case, after the meeting, let the person who referred you to know what happened. This is a common courtesy by a trusted friend. Thank them and ask them again how you can help them. That is what friends do.

 

The Third Major Paradigm Shift of Jobpreneurship™ 101

 

 

If you have followed all the steps of the process, you will likely be finding opportunities and people who will want to help you and hire you. That doesn’t mean you should want the job. Some employers will not offer you the opportunity, location, compensation, culture, and situation that you should take.

It is better to be as careful in choosing where you should work as the company should be careful of whom they should hire. Both parties have risks. Rewards only occur if the right decisions are made.

If there appears to be a fit, the hiring manager or decision maker will emotionally want to hire you. She may even ask you to write a job description for the job she wants you to do.

However, the process is only moving to the next phase.

When procurement gets a buying specification, they still have to source and select who will get the job. There will be many factors and there should be other competitors. You are not guaranteed of getting the job. By company policy (and sometimes by law) the process has to be followed. However, if you have the emotional support of the decision maker and even wrote the job description, the odds of you getting the job are extremely high.

When HR gets an approved job description to post, company policy and often laws may require them to still source a slate of candidates. The wise decision maker will follow these policies. Who knows who else is applying for the job? Who knows if the process identifies red lights in who you are? Who knows what legal challenges or violations of state and federal law may occur?

The situation is that you have the emotional buy-in but still will likely need to go through the process to get a formal job offer. The difference is that, through Jobpreneurship™, you should have the inside track.

So what is the paradigm shift?

First, your resume should be accurate but crafted to match the job description; particularly if you wrote it! In sales, this would be a sales woman writing a response to a Request for Proposal (RFP) based upon the company proposal that she helped to write! The resume should be solution focused (your value proposition tailored to what they want) backed by factual evidence, stories, work history, and key words that match the job description.

Second, when you are asked to go through the multiple levels of interviews, you treat them as sales calls. Each sales call is to a different audience who will have different interests and objectives. In Jobpreneurship™ 101, we discuss the three major levels that most job seekers will encounter.

Third, when you are given a formal job offer, it is merely a step in the negotiation process. The higher your level, the more room there may be for negotiations and how to proceed. You would be wise to ask for help, including legal counsel if the offer is in the form of a legal contract.

Fourth, when you get the job, you have just started the next phase which is how to succeed in the company, get promotions, and to implement Jobpreneurship™ within a company framework. The same process works for career development.

Fifth, as you are succeeding in your career, you continue to apply Jobpreneurship™ as a lifestyle with external relationships and friends. Most jobs today only last for a couple of years.

The difference is that now you know how to fish for your next job. Jobpreneurship™ is a life skill you can use for every job transition and career progression. You will only get better at it as you continually practice each step.

Finally, as you master Jobpreneurship™, we encourage you to teach others how to fish. Not only will you learn more by teaching others but your brand (reputation) for helping others will increase. Besides, it is how to mentor others and to help your friends, family, and children learn the same insider secrets that you have mastered.

 

 

What is the Tenth Step of Jobpreneurship™ 101?

The tenth step is to ask for referrals.

Friendships and trusted relationships are the foundation but if you don’t ask for help most people are too busy and focusing on their issues to consider that you may need or want help. So, you need to let them know what you are passionate about, what your vision is, what you want to do, where you are looking to do it, what your value is, and how they might be able to help you.

Rather than ask like a beggar, the best format is to ask them how you can help them – and then help them. Either during the conversation or later, they will ask how they can help you. If you have done your Jobpreneurship™ homework, you are ready for that discussion.

When you ask for help, it may be in a networking meeting or it may be in a private meeting. Generally, I try to introduce people and be helpful in a networking meeting but where I sense that I can really help someone, feel like this is someone whom I want to get to know better, or believe that they may be able to help me, I recommend that we meet for coffee, breakfast, or lunch to get to know each other better. If they have heard of me, are interested in me, or others suggest that they meet with me, I usually get their cooperation to later set a time and place to meet.

One of the best ways of helping others is to refer them into your network. But I almost never do so unless, at a minimum, I know them and have met at least one time with them. The best referrals that I give are if I have known them in different settings and seen them in action over a period of time.

Still, many of us are shy about asking for referrals. If you are a trusted and accomplished individual, they are usually honored to be asked by you. You would be foolish not to ask. If they cannot help you, at least now you know. Perhaps something will come up two weeks later and they can help you. A situation could develop the next day or the next year, but if they don’t know you need help you will not come to mind.

Ask for help and referrals.

 

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