The Carnival of HR: Unbelievable Learning Opportunity

This months version of the Carnival of HR is hosted at Jon Ingham's Social Advantage in his post The HR in the Social Business Carnival. The learning opportunities are unprecedented. We are talking use of social media, strategic HR, recruitment, networking, bad HR, good HR, snooping on employees, answering job seeker questions, and an  the intrguing title of  What keeps American HR Managers awake at night: the thought of bare legs. (The picture is an attention-getter.)

So, make some time and plan on alot of click-throughs. You will feel like you just completed your Master's degree in HR when you get done.

Leadership Notes from a "Good to Great" Company

I had the opportunity to hear John G. Rice, Vice Chairman of GE, speak on leadership. GE is one of the companies Jim Collins wrote about in "Good to Great". In fact Rice's introducer said it is the only remaining company written about that continues to excel.

Rice talked about GE in general, his schedule as Vice Chairman, and about some of his leadership principles. At 51 years of age he is bright, energetic and has an incredible schedule that takes him around the globe meeting with "movers and shakers." Some of the points on leadership include:

• Teamplaying is a leadership skill.
• Leaders have to be flexible and adaptable. He does not expect his employees to work his schedule of time, he does expect them to produce the results he desires.
• A leader has to be "inclusive." If you can't handle diversity you will not be an effective leader.
• Leaders provide consistent and constructive feedback. No suprises at review time.

As he was talking about people he used a phrase that caught my ear. He referred to people's "strengths and development needs" instead of "strengths and weaknesses." That was pretty revealing of his people philosophy.

I know alot has been written about GE, both good and bad, but if Rice is an example of what kind of leader develops within that system then perhaps we should all pay a great deal more attention. I think I will be doing some more reading on GE. Anyone one have any suggestions?