Your Employee Matters

In its research report, The Conference Board CEO Challenge 2013, American respondents ranked concerns about operational excellence, government regulation, customer relationships, and innovation above challenges related to human capital (human resources). This fifth-place ranking is the lowest among CEOs surveyed around the world. Let’s think about the role of human resources in all of this:

1. HR should be directly involved with improving operational excellence by understanding total quality management and similar tools. Bring this same level of excellence to the HR function.
2. HR should manage government regulation as it relates to human capital. This job is considerably more difficult in states like California and if you have offices abroad. There’s no substitute for audits, surveys, training, and running data to make sure you’re meeting these obligations.
3. The quality of customer relationships depends primarily on how well HR supports the hiring of these employees. HR can also work with the marketing department to brand the importance of great customer service to the workforce.
4. Finally, HR has to improve its willingness to innovate. Most people view HR as boring, unimaginative, non-innovative, etc. – largely because it is! How many HR experiments have you implemented in such areas as of hiring, retention, performance management, generating employee suggestions, and so forth?

This survey tells me that American CEOs continue to undervalue the opportunity in human resources. The challenge for HR professionals is to step up and give these executives a reason to change their minds.

According to the 2013 Inc. 500 CEO survey, the top three attributes of outstanding leaders are trustworthiness, sincerity, and a capacity to inspire. This survey can be viewed as a self-prophecy. Perhaps this is how most of the CEOs view themselves. Of course, they see themselves as trustworthy, sincere, and inspiring. But is that how their employees view them?

According to Inc. magazine, likability was the last of 21 characteristics for making great leaders. In my experience, you don’t have to like a boss to work for him or her, but the chances are you won’t work there very long. However, if you like the boss, you’re likely to stay remain much longer, even if you could make more money elsewhere. To see the survey results, go to http://www.inc.com/magazine/201309/how-the-inc.500-approach-leadership.html.

The California case, Rope v. Auto-Chlor System reinforces the futility of an employer trying to terminate an employee so as to avoid liability. Plaintiff Scott Rope informed his employer at the time of his hire that he planned to donate a kidney to his physically disabled sister. He had requested to be given leave to do so. He later requested that leave be extended and paid under newly enacted Donations Protection Act, which was to take effect January 1, 2011. Rope was fired two days before the DPA came effective; with Auto-Chlor clearly hoping to avoid the 30-day payment obligation. The court agreed that the employer could not be held liable under a law that had not yet taken effect. However, it added that, under the circumstances, Rope had a potential claim, because the disability of his relative was a substantial factor motivating the employer’s decision, otherwise known as “associative discrimination.”

The court cautioned:

“Our holding should not be interpreted as a siren song for plaintiffs who, fearing termination, endeavor to prepare spurious cases by talking up their relationship at work to a person with a disability; such relationships do not, by themselves, give rise to a claim of discrimination. An employer who discriminates against an employee because of the latter’s association with a disabled person is liable even if the motivation is purely monetary. But if the disability plays no role in the employer’s decision, there is no disability discrimination.”

The case was sent back to the lower court to determine whether the plaintiff’s disability or that of his sister played any role in the employer’s decision. If it was purely an economic choice, there was no disability discrimination. (The court indicated that Rope himself did not have a disability as the result of donating a kidney, nor did the company act as if he had one).

You either choose your story for yourself or let others choose it for you. As Don Miguel Ruiz reminded us: we can become domesticated into our stories. This means that they’re often not of our own making. As I say, they are gifted to us. Often these stories are so familiar to us that we’re unaware that they even exist. They can affect us both good and bad for a lifetime.

It took a revealing experience in my mid-thirties which caused me to become an independent thinker. In a workshop, I had the highest winning score ever in a betting game designed to teach win/win thinking. The only instruction they gave, or would give, was to win as much as you can. There was a guy in the corner with a megaphone continually barking out this instruction to the participants.

I dutifully manipulated the game (as instructed) and won more than anyone else by a large measure. Heck, being a lawyer, the game of manipulation came natural. Of course, this meant I helped generate a number of really bad…and upset… losers. During a group de-briefing afterwards, I was asked if I could see that I could have played a win/win game where all participants could prosper. I said sure I could see that, right away in fact, yet I justified my high score by saying “I was only following instruction! Those were the game rules and we lawyers are trained to follow rules. In addition I was raised by a 6’3” Marine Corps Sergeant. (I felt like his last soldier at times.) You better believe I learned about following rules early on in life!”

The facilitator then asked me an insanely powerful question: He said “Do you always listen to the noise?” My brain stopped dead in its tracks! Wow. The noise. Why did I blindly follow instruction? What other “rules” am I following that aren’t of my own making? Do they really make sense? As Gurdjieff might ask, “Am I truly an automaton?”

From that day on, I determined to think for myself; to become 100% responsible for my lot in life. I decided that I could no longer do the safe thing, the thing I had trained myself to do, the thing I did so well; but rather to evolve and do what I should do. For 17 years as a plaintiff’s attorney, I had been feeding off the story that litigation was how I could make a difference. When I stopped listening to the noise and reality hit, I had a midlife crisis. I couldn’t live my passion using litigation to actualize it. Nobody wins a lawsuit. There had to be a better way!

Sometimes we question our sanity when reinventing ourselves. Change is fearful even if it’s exciting. Will they let me champion this idea I have? Is this new career or business going to survive? Am I going to go bankrupt – again? Will a competitor come along to put me out of business? Do I really want to do this anymore? Am I too inexperienced to do it? Am I nuts?

If you try to do the exact same thing, the exact same way for the next three – or 30 – years, you’ll be guaranteed to turn into that automaton and regret missed opportunities.

Don’t listen to the noise. Don’t let others decide what your story will be. Think for yourself.

Eggnog, latkes, old friends, parties – and a lot of beveraging! HR That Works wishes you a safe and happy holiday season! As the host of your company party, you have a legal obligation to make sure that attendees get home safe. Here’s our list of tips to help you meet this responsibility:

• Make party attendance voluntary.
• Hire bartenders trained to spot and handle intoxicated revelers.
• Provide non-alcoholic beverages.
• Give each guest a limited number of drink tickets, instead of an open bar.
• Serve filling food – not just chips and pretzels – whenever alcohol is available.
• Cut off alcohol service at least an hour before the party ends.
• Stop serving intoxicated guests immediately; don’t wait until they’re ready to leave.
• Never ask an apparently impaired guest if they’re able to drive home – they aren’t.
• Provide a taxi service for guests who require or request it.
• Have a friend or family member pick up intoxicated guests.
• Arrange for discounted rooms at the event location or a nearby hotel.

Finally, have a fun party. Think like good ‘ol Mr. Fezziwig!

Accommodating Religious Needs

The holiday season is an ideal time to focus on religious accommodation in in the workplace. Title 7 of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 prohibits discrimination based on religion. We’ve seen more of these claims in recent years, with thousands of claims filed in 2012. Unsurprising, many of these cases include allegations of discrimination based national origin (i.e. someone claims discrimination because they’re of Arab origin, as well as Muslim).

The EEOC offers this definition of “religion:”

“In most cases, whether or not a practice or a belief is religious is not an issue. However, the EEOC defines religious practices to include moral or ethical beliefs as to what’s right and wrong, which are sincerely held with the strength of traditional, religious views. The fact that no religious group espouses such beliefs, or that the religious group to which the individual professes to belong might not accept such belief, will not determine whether the belief is a religious belief of the employee or prospective employee. The phrase ‘religious practices’ includes both religious observances and practices.” Also, bear in mind that:

• It’s unlawful for an employer to fail to accommodate reasonably the religious practices of an employee or prospective employee, unless the employer demonstrates that accommodation will mean undue hardship in conducting its business.
• An employer may not ask about an employee’s religious background unless justified by business necessity.”

For more information on religious expression in the workplace, check out: 1) EEOC guidelines and FAQS on religious discrimination: 2) an EEOC memo on accommodating religious expression; and 3) religious accommodation practices at the University of Missouri ( a great education, period).

Once upon a time, HR was viewed as a boring corporate wasteland “Oh no! Sally got transferred into the HR department… her career is over. Poor Sally!” Even though companies hired, managed, and fired people all the time, management still saw HR as an administrative backwater. That view gradually changed. Books such as Good to Great helped owners and managers understand that hiring great people was essential for greatness; and that to do so required strategic initiative. They began seeing they couldn’t rely on yesterday’s performance management approaches, created in an industrial era, when working primarily with knowledge workers. Managers such as Jack Welch, Herb Kelleher, Howard Schultz, James Sinegal, and Tony Hsieh used a strategic HR approach to build great companies – GE, Southwest Airlines, Starbucks, Costco, and Zappos. The result: cutting-edge executives and managers realized that HR provided a competitive advantage.

Then the recession struck – and management neglected HR to concentrate on survival and building productivity. When the economy began recovering, valuable employees moved on to greener pastures, either working for themselves or for a company where they could feel fully engaged. Once again, businesses became desperate to reduce turnover and find good hires.

Tomorrow’s successful companies will win the talent wars by attracting and challenging the best, brightest, and most productive employees to grow and innovate for themselves and their employer. This shift in culture will have the unintended effect of reducing workers comp, employment practices, cyber-liability, and other insurance exposures – with HR helping lead the way.

Businesses will see HR as a strategic resource that’s as essential as sales, operations, and finance. That’s the new HR story.

In early 2013 Yahoo! CEO Marissa Mayer decided to eliminate telework, with an eye towards innovation and collaboration. “Some of the best insights come from hallway and cafeteria discussions, meeting new people and impromptu meetings,” said EVP of People and Development Jackie Reses, adding that “speed and quality are often sacrificed when we work from home.” Best Buy also announced it was canceling its Results Only Work Environment (ROWE) program, largely supported by telecommuters.

Many believe that occasional telecommuting allows people to deal with one-time events and promotes a less stressful work environment – however, it comes with a price!

To learn more about the pros and cons of this issue, check our Telecommuting ThatWorks Training Program, which includes checklists, policies, forms and a training video. If you don’t have access to HR That Works send an email to don@hrthatworks.com and I’ll email you a copy of the report.

I do a lot of reading. Here are some thoughts inspired by the latest round:

1. No person who produces from the heart will go for naught. Career success requires both inner and external engineering.
2. As the scope of your life becomes bigger, less will be under your control.
3. “I will be happy….. when” is meaningless. Be happy now!
4. Comfort is an illusion if sought from the outside. Do you want to be comfortable or awesome?
5. To map your career path, ask “Where can I help the most people with the least amount of energy?”
6. When overwhelmed by information, we lose clarity of thought, which comes in the spaces between information – yet another reason to meditate.
7. Do you identify with your limitations – and let them define you?
8. Have these “limitations” blocked you from career success?
9. Personal peace is about our internal chemistry. All happiness, despair and other human experiences have a biochemical basis.
10. Every person is an energy field functioning at different levels of capability.
11. How loyal, how engaged, and awesome do you want your people to be?
12. You can’t bullshit yourself into well being.
13. Situations don’t make you – they expose you.
14. Use time off to reward employees.
15. Personality comes from the word persona, which in Greek drama meant a “mask.” Like a mask our personality is a construct – a story we tell ourselves about ourselves.
16. All creativity is an imitation of nature.
17. Conduct scavenger hunts, field trips, lunch-and -learns, suggestion meetings, crossword puzzles, jeopardy games, volunteer projects, blood donations, fun clubs, etc.
18. If people feel good, they will______________
19. Over-committed heroes end up becoming martyrs. Avoid this behavior pattern!
20. Can you be peaceful where you are or must you go someplace to feel that way?
21. HR’s focus on the negative does a disservice to human well being.
22. Work doesn’t cause stress; your reaction to it does.
23. Have a plan for where you and your business will evolve.

When Jim Collins, author of Good to Great and other excellent books, spent some time among West Point cadets, he came away with additional insights into the characteristics of successful leaders. Based on this experience, he wrote an article in Inc. magazine that describes a three-part formula for successful leadership in the workplace. Here’s an excerpt:

“If you want to build a culture of engaged leaders and a great place to work, you need to spend time thinking about three things. 1) Service to a cause or purpose we are passionately dedicated to and are willing to suffer and sacrifice for; 2 Challenge and growth – what huge and audacious challenges should we give people that will push them hard and make them grow?; and 3) Communal success – what can we do to reinforce the idea that we succeed only by helping each other?”

Collins has observed these principles at work in in a number of great companies he studied during their best years – including IBM, Apple, Johnson & Johnson, Southwest Airlines, and Federal Express.

Not a bad way to look at the leadership in your company!

Work is as meaningful as we decide to make it, no matter the business we’re in. If your company has low-wage workers, follow these guidelines to hire – and retain –quality employees:

1. See the lifetime value of a worker in the same way that marketers evaluate the lifetime value of a client.
2. Brand your company as something more than people who clean toilets, serve burgers, or wash cars.
3. Consider paying a few bucks more than the competition. As the saying goes “when you pay peanuts, you get monkeys.” In-N-Out Hamburger has exploited this insight for more than 30 years with great success .Their hiring page, www.in-n-out.com/employment/restaurant.aspx, allows them to hire the top 10%.
4. Attend job fairs and work with community agencies, colleges, churches, and so forth.
5. Advertise online on Craigslist, Facebook, Twitter, MySpace, etc.
6. Put some juice into employee referral programs, and use referral cheat sheets – one page documents that describe the opportunity and provide contact information.
7. Consider an online application process, including kiosks for people who don’t have convenient computer access.
8. Keep your look and logos fresh and see if you can make them “cool” or “green. Talk about how you provide environmentally advanced or nutritionally satisfying products (Chipotle does this well. See their hiring page at http://careers.chipotle.com/en-us/careers/get_rolling/get_rolling.aspx). Worked for me
9. Focus on the fact that yours is a steady industry, with room for advancement; encourage your current employees sell the career opportunities. Again, Chipotle does this well.
10. Show that you care by offering workers cool soccer shirts, English classes, company events, etc.
11. Have an employee page on your website with video, etc.
12. Stress the advantages that you offer employees, such as flexible work schedules, paid time off, health insurance, retirement plans, car allowances, and so forth.