HR Carnival: 20 Great Reads for May 12th

Today I have the good fortune to be the host of the HR Carnival. And what a good one it is! A couple of themes popped out in the submissions. One of these dealt with "conversation".

First we have Wally Bock's Conversation: A Key Supervisory Tool. And it is. I have always been amazed to find supervisor who don't know how to talk to their employees. So heed Wally's advice at Three Star Leadership.

How about a "lack of conversation"? Well that is always frustrating, especially when you are an applicant waiting to hear back from a recruiter. Read the advice that Suzanne Lucas, The Evil HR Lady, provides to an applicant in I Interviewed and the Recruiter Won't Get Back To Me.

Exit interviews are usually conversations. Or are they? Sharlyn Lauby, The HR Bartender, reveals The Real Reason for Exit Interviews.

You cannot get more conversational than an actual interview and that is what we have in Drew Tarvin from Humor That Works talks to Zohar Adner about the Gift of Stress.


How about a conversation with you the reader. In her vlog Barbara Hughes of Intellectual Capital Consulting actually talks to us in Making Customers Matter: Eight Things You can do Right Now.

Another theme running in the submissions dealt with performance appraisal. The first of these is from Cathy Martin at Intellectual Capital Consulting.  She asks the question Managers and Appraisals: Why Don't They Get Along? 

Dan McCarthy of Great Leadership tells us How To Be Accountable and Hold Others Accountable. This is a story all of us can identify with.

Part of being a good manager and doing good performance appraisal is being a good listener. Kevin Eikenberry of Leadership & Learning tells us how to listen better in Want to Be a Better Listener?

The final blog in this catagory deals with facilitation, a key skill for any manager in making a group perform better. Mark Stelzner of Inflexion Advisors offers us 5 Tips For Great Facilitation.


The next set of submissions dealt with improving or discussing the field of HR. Always a popular topic. A few of these posts offered interesting perspectives. Such as:

• Paul Smith of Welcome to the Occupation discussing Gay At Work: I need to know straight up.  There is a "Wow" moment when you start reading this.
• Benjamin McCall of ReThink HR tells us Human Resources: Be Like a 1-year Old and he wants to know if you think he is full of poop.
• Shauna Moerke, The HR Minion, tells us, with cartoons, that HR is not a cult. Some of your managers and employees may think differently. This will help.
• Eric Samdahl of i4CP sends us Mary Ann Downey's post on the much desired Real-world Application of the Strategic Business Partner Role .

Ben Eubanks of Upstart HR offer us 30+ Ideas for SHRM Chapter Leaders. A great read that all HR leaders need to pay attention to.

Jason Seiden tells us to be wary about When Employees Have Personal Brands: A Cautionary Tale. And given that everything written is telling employees to have personal brands this needs to be read.

A couple of submitters talked about training. These include:

• Maj. Gen. B.K. Bhatia of The Talent Junction tells us about Employee Training: A Management Perspective and gives us the results of discussions with management and line employees.
• Tanmay Vora of the QAspire blog offers Training and Development – A Holistic View. This is a key point about how to view HR as a system and not discrete programs.

Lastly in this set of submissions two writers express pride in their employees. Being proud of your workers speaks well of the company and these two folks sing the praises of their people.

• Chris Young of the Maximize Possibility Blog tells us about Three Critical Success Factors of Rainmaker Sales People.
• Lois Melbourne of the aquire BLOG tells about The Finest Software Professionals in the World

And of course I would be remiss if I did not include myself in this fine mix. I would like you to think about the future in a Strategic Planning Alert: The Changing Face of America at HR Observations.

HREvolution was held May 7th & 8th. The next Carnival of HR will be hosted by Ben Eubanks at Upstart HR and will deal with posts from that UNCONFERENCE. So stay tuned for that.
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Super Bowl Edition of the Carnival of HR

The Carnival of HR, the Super Bowl edition is posted over at Steve Boese's HR Technology. This edition has some of the best HR blog posts from the last two weeks. The topics include professional development, personal development, leadership, unhappy workers, turning around your HR department, profit center development and much, much more. So improve your HR reading by taking a look at this Super Bowl edition.

On a side note I am happy to say that the Fistful of Talent blog rankings came out today and HR Observations was tied for 7th out of 160 blogs considered. We are proud of this ranking and proud to be among this fine group of bloggers. Check out the entire list at Fistful of Talent.

The HR Carnival: Dead of Winter Edition

Lisa Rosendahl, who writes Simply Lisa, lives where it is very cold. As a result snow, ice and winter sports are at the forefront in her thoughts. Using the theme of winter sports she has put together a very good Carnival of HR using hand warmers, luges, snowshoes and more to display a very large and well done collection of blog posts. Leadership, terminations, HR budgets, social media, career transitions, jobs and more can be found in this Mid-winter edition. So check it out by visiting Simply Lisa's Carnival of HR.

When It Comes to Leadership Companies Are In a World of Hurt

Talent Management Magazine reported the results of a leadership survey that presented eye-popping numbers on the lack of leadership many companies are facing in their future. The article, Many Companies Do Not Have Enough Future Leaders Onboard, reported the results of a survey done by OI Partners. They survey 212 large and midsized companies and found:

• 54% of companies in the survey said they do not have enough qualified successors now working for them to succeed their executives and managers.
• Only 32% of companies report currently having enough management successors in place.
• 14% of companies are not sure whether they have enough future leaders already in their organizations.

My experience in working with small companies is that their leadership situation is even more dire.

The rest of the survey went on to describe what an opportunity this presents to employees or prospective employees. And indeed this is true. But from a company standpoint this is very worrisome or should be.

Where does your company fit into this survey? Do you have enough leadership talent? You had better look around. If it the talent is not there it will not automatically appear. Yes, some very ambitious employees may take it upon themselves to read and study and get personal experience to make themselves better leaders, but you cannot count on that.

Unfortunately many companies have the approach that once we give someone a title they are automatically imbued with all the supervisor, managerial and leadership skills we would want. "DING, you are now imbued with great leadership skill, go forth and lead." Well, it does not work that way. So how can you give people the leadership experience? Here are some of my suggestions:

1. Mentoring. But this only works if you are a good leader and teacher.
2. Structured classes and structured reading. If you do this test the knowledge and try to have it applied quickly.
3. Project work. Rotate various employees through project leading opportunities.
4. Allow mistakes. Errors produce learning, but only if the opportunity to correct is allowed. Immediate punishment leads to learning the wrong thing.
5. Get your employees involved in postions on nonprofit boards. It is amazing how much you learn, both good and bad, while serving on a board of directors.
6. Have your employees read leadership blogs, such as Great Leadership by Dan McCarthy and Three Star Leadership by Wally Bock.

What am I missing? How do you develop leaders?

The Carnival of HR: The New Year Edition

Melissa Prusher at the Devon Group is the host of the first edition of The Carnival of HR for 2010. Happy New Year! This one is filled with several posts about predictions and top 10s. There is also several posts about learning, such as Trish McFarlane, at HR Ringleader’s Blog, sharing some favorite quotes in What Dr. Seuss Taught Me about Succeeding in Business and how many of his quotes can be applied to the business world. My good friend Cathy Missildine-Martin, at Profitability Through Human Capital, presents A New Year’s Resolution for HR Volume 2, a collection of thoughtful resolutions aimed at reducing costs, improving performance and increasing profitability. There is a thought-provoking piece on why people should NOT be promoted on merit and much, much more.

So set aside sometime and start the new year off right by reading this great collection of blog posts. In fact, make that a resolution! Resolve to read every Carninval of HR through the coming year. Talk about self-improvement!

HR Carnival of Giving

Mike VanDervort, of the Human Race Horses, put together a group of 86 blog posts on a wide variety of HR topics in the HR Carnival of Global Giving. He also combined each with the writer's favorite charity in the spirit of the season. He also personally donated to these charities and encourages everyone to think of someone less fortunate. So far $1765 has been collected for the charities. Good information and tugs at the heartstrings. What more can you ask for?

(He did make an error on mine, however. He listed the Atlanta Childrens' Shelter as my charity. It is a fine charity, but I had put a link in my post to the National MS Society. Either way someone benefits.)

So spend sometime, get educated and feel good at the same time.

Sometimes You Lead from the Back: Lessons from the Tour de France

I am a big fan of cycling, the Tour de France and Lance Armstrong. I have had the opportunity to see one race in person (2004 when Armstrong won his record breaking 6th TdF). So I definitely watched with interest as he made a comeback this year in a bid to win an eighth title. There were all kinds of questions about Armstrong, his team and his bid. They had the strongest team, that was a given, but there was potential conflict amongst the team members. There were three potential leaders, Armstrong, Levi Leipheimer and Alberto Contador. Armstrong and Contador were previous winners and the third (Levi) had finished 3rd in 2007. Experience was in Armstrong's favor, but he had been absent from cycling for over 3 years, he was recovering from a broken collar bone and of course he was approaching the "old" age of 38 years. He had more to lose than he did to win.

From the start there was dissension in the leadership. Who was going to be the leader? Johann Bruyneel, the coach and director of the team, stated that "leadership" of the team was going to be sorted out on the road. The best rider was going to be supported by the others. Early on Contador tried to establish himself in that position. He violated the team plan and make a breakaway in one of the early mountain stages. He showed that he was very good in the mountains and established himself as the team "leader." Or more correctly the "rider to support for win." In my opinion he did not establish himself as a leader. Contador made it apparent from the beginning he was there for himself by both his statements and his actions.

Despite the fact that only one person rides a bicycle in this sport it is very much a team sport. No one rider can make it without the support of the team. And this is where Armstrong showed his leadership. Rather than making a big show and trying to be competitive with Contador he put aside his personal ambitions and supported his team and his team "leader." He conducted the race from the peloton (see here for the Wikipedia explanation) and made sure Contador stayed in position to win the race. He was careful in the interviews not to make an issue of the tension on the team or the fact that Contador did not follow the rules. And Armstrong was interviewed alot. He realized that it was best for the team. And this was very tough for the VERY competitive Texan. But his maturity and leadership paid off. Contador was the champion, the team was the best team and, by the way, Lance was able to still make the podium in 3rd place. Not bad for a personal comeback and very lucrative for the team. Contador's win, Lance's 3rd place and the team's placement garnered over $900,000 in prize money alone.

The lessons on leadership for us in this sporting example are:

1. Leader's have to realize the race is not about them.


2. Support is necessary at all times, even if there is some dissension.


3. You don't air your differences in public.


4. You keep focused on the goal.


5. You deal with issues after the goal is achieved.

Lance Armstrong's comeback showed that you can lead from the back.

Photo Credit: This is my photo taken in Paris in July of 2004 on the Rue de Rivoli.

March Madness Comes to the Carnival of HR

The Carnival of HR is visited by March Madness. It is a tournament of the best of HR blogs. Take a look and vote for the "teams" you find the most interesting. This is a unique way of reading the best and expressing an opinion at the same time. Of course I would like you to vote for me, but I will leave that to your discretion. So go visit March Madness.

Charisma and Success In HR: Is There a Connection?

I read in a Brian Tracy newsletter the following "There is a close association between personal charisma and success in life. Probably 85 percent of your success and happiness will come from your relationships and interactions with others. The more positively others respond to you, the easier it will be for you to get the things you want." Charisma is a powerful thing and we can think of many past leaders who have successfully used their ability to attract people by force of personality. Even today many attribute Barak Obama's success in getting the Democrat Party nomination on his charisma.

This got me to thinking of human resources and the effect of charisma. Is it a prerequisite for being successful in HR? Do you get promoted to the Vice Presidential level as a result of it or can you achieve that level without it? That may depend on your definition of success and your definition of charisma.

To me charisma is the ability to attract people to you. That attraction is made up of likability, trustworthiness, the ability to instill confidence and the perception of competence. Given that definition I think charisma is critical to success in HR. You must be approachable, you must be trustworthy, you must make people feel like you know what you are talking about and they must feel that you will accomplish what you say you will. Without that your knowledge of HR and you time in the field counts for little.

To make it to VP I think you need to add the ability to spur people to action and the abiltiy to clearly communicate your ideas and vision. This adds that very visible component of charisma.

Of course we all know people in HR positions, even VPs, who do not have this charisma. They may be great technicians, but they are not approachable and thus not charismatic. This is unfortunate for the profession. What is worse is the people in the job who are not only uncharismatic, but also not technically sound.

If you are not currently the charismatic leader you would like to be, the good news is you can change that. You can:

• Work on how you communicate (Writing classes)


• Work on how technically sound you are (PHR, SPHR)


• Work on being trustworthy (keep confidences)


• Work on your speaking ability (Toastmasters)


• Work on your self perception (See Brian Tracy, Earl Nightngale, Dale Carnegie, etc.)

Although I have never met him in person Kris Dunn of The HR Capitalist has charisma. VP level, superb written communication, attracts talented people and spurs them to action (Fist Full of Talent bloggers) and is very technically sound. So if you are looking for an example he is a good one to start with.