Piece it Together
There’s always something to talk about, so pull up a chair and let’s Piece It Together. Through articles written by our consultants, we share with you our take on the latest news, trends, and changes in HR, leadership and the workplace.
Read our latest posts or peruse our past articles. Please let us know if you have any comments or want more information on how we can help your organization.
Pulling Over for Directions – Mapping Your Employees’ Careers
Whenever I discuss career goals with young adults, I emphasize that life is a journey, not a race. They frequently respond that things change and are done differently than I did when I was beginning my career. While this isn’t the point I was trying to make, I agree with them… thing are different!
Change in the workplace is truly inevitable. When my father was a young man, fresh out of the service with no college degree, he went to work for a local manufacturing company. No one gave dad a road map on how to advance his career and he felt it was inappropriate to ask for this […]
Elevating Your Organizational Brand to Recruit Talent
Recently I gave a presentation in Kansas City about elevating your organization’s brand in an effort to recruit and retain the best talent. The feedback and enthusiasm for the topic from the audience mirrored that of many of my clients. Many of our clients are struggling to recruit talent and retain talent. As we see the economy picking up, this will continue to present a challenge, especially as Baby Boomers start to exit the workforce. What do I recommend to counter this pervasive trend? When is the last time you completed an employer brand assessment?
Usually this question catches organizations off guard. Often most organizations constantly evaluate and adapt […]
Shades of Grey in Employee Handbooks
Last month one of our team members, Mary Lake, wrote a blog about unlimited vacation and employees taking extended holidays. Interestingly, after its posting, a colleague of mine called to share an issue around his extended vacation.
My colleague had planned a two-and-a-half-week vacation at the end of the year. This allowed him to minimize the impact to clients and his teams due to the slower period of the year. He had accrued over 110 hours of PTO and was going to utilize 88 hours on his holiday.
When he returned from vacation and received his PTO balance from him employer, he discovered that instead of […]
PTO Policies for Wanderlust Employees
My last blog addressed the trend of employees failing to utilize vacation time and what employers could do to encourage them to take their well-deserved time off. Since the blog’s publication I have been personally exposed to some additional generational and cultural trends concerning paid time off.
In November, my son announced that he was taking a three-week vacation to a part of the world with little Internet and email capabilities. Although, I was aghast at the idea of taking three consecutive weeks off from work, he had absolutely no concern. He had the accrued PTO and was well prepared to have his workload covered by his colleagues […]
Making Organizational New Year Resolutions
What’s your New Year’s resolution going to be? Gym? Less television? More reading?
Although our intentions are good, unfortunately, these resolutions are often cast aside in fairly short order after the beginning of the year. However, the New Year affords organizations’ leadership the opportunity to collectively decide on key resolutions and changes for the coming year.
Unlike your personal resolutions which is typically a singular act, sitting down, discussing and building consensus with your leadership team or other key stakeholders about the direction for your organization increases the chance of success.
Whether you need to more effectively engage your employees, reevaluate your corporate culture, implement knowledge capture programs and processes – […]
Reading the Tea Leaves on 2015
As the year draws to a close, I find myself scouring the Internet for 2015 HR predictions and talking with my team on what the next year holds for our field. While often I find that many of these predictions seem to roll over year after year and the articles repetitive, I do find a few once and a while that catch my attention.
Before turning to an article that I found interesting, one thing I feel that organizations want to consider for 2015 is how the rapid advancement of technology will continue dynamically and at time dramatically change the workplace. Whether it’s how to utilize social media more […]
Five Steps to Creating a Positive Culture
I recently had a conversation with a colleague about culture in the workplace. Her firm is experiencing low morale, high turnover, and a general air of negativity. She asked me, “How can we create a positive culture and where do we begin?” For days after our conversation, her question still had me thinking. The words ‘culture’ and ‘values’ are always tossed around when organizations look to improve morale. Talking about it seems to make the issue more manageable and, in turn, seems to be a step in the right direction. But, is it? Is it even possible to ‘create’ culture?
In thinking about this topic, I actually looked up […]
Work or be Fired? Well Bah Humbug to You Too!
I took a break from planning my Thanksgiving activities the other day and was perusing the Internet when a story about Kmart’s Thanksgiving policy caught my eye.
For those of you that don’t know, Kmart has alerted its employees that if you don’t show up on Thanksgiving, you’re going to lose your job. In fact, Kmart plans to open its doors at 6am on Thanksgiving morning for consumers buying pleasure.
Now while these early start times in the retail industry aren’t really anything that new or shocking any longer, what I drew from these ultimatums has more to do with how we as organizational leaders need to reevaluate the […]