The above term is from The Herman Group’s weekly newsletter (no link but their website is www.herman.net). I love that phrase – it is quite descriptive. Here is the excerpt that caught my attention: Fueled by the publicity frenzy the press is enjoying, the current volatility in world financial markets is affecting many people at all levels of our societies. From the employees’ point of view, this uncertainty engenders insecurity. What will happen to my company? Will it be in business? Will I have a job? The reaction is that they continue “corporate cocooning”, staying in the safety and sanctuary of their corporate jobs, despite their deep dissatisfaction. A number… Read More
Continue ReadingThe Unacceptable Acceptance
CNNMoney.com has an article that really tweaked me this morning – Help! I accepted a job – can I change my mind? The article is the standard reader mail format with some good advice in the answer section. An offer letter – which is usually a brief document describing your position, duties and compensation – is generally less binding than an employment contract – which goes into much more detail and usually states how much notice you must give if you decide to quit. … So just be honest and say, ‘I’m sorry, but my dream job opened up and I really feel I have to take it.’ Most often… Read More
Continue ReadingTurnover Trouble
Turnover is trouble for any company when it is not controlled. To use a timely analogy, it is similar to a forest fire. A controlled burn clears out a section allowing it to be repopulated with fresh, new trees. An out-of-control fire can destroy an entire forest in a short amount of time. Obviously, extreme turnover is typically a sign of a “churn-and-burn” organization. However, a small, controlled amount of turnover is valuable to an organization’s overall health. But what about a company with no turnover? Is it healthy? This question is difficult to answer in a vacuum. Number of employees, company revenue, market trends, etc. all play into the equation. Yet, problems will… Read More
Continue ReadingInvest In Hiring, Save On Firing
We often speak of the costs of making a bad hire especially in sales. One bad sales hire can send prospects to your competition and sully your company’s reputation in the market all while you pay this salesperson. But what if it goes even further than that? In our litigious society, what if an employee decides to make a run at a discrimination lawsuit? BusinessWeek online offers up some incredible examples in Fear of Firing: -Many of the lawsuits may seem ridiculous. IBM is currently defending a case filed by James C. Pacenza, a plant worker it dismissed for visiting an adult Internet chat room while on the job. In… Read More
Continue ReadingAn Indirect Cost Of Turnover
We at The Hire Sense have been focused on employee retention this year. Pretty smart of us, I know (especially when the national unemployment rate is 4.4%). Michael at Hidden Business Treasures pointed us towards the Herman Group’s Trend Alert e-newsletter and I received my first one this week. The topic – wellness programs and their impact on benefits. This shocked me: The financial impact of healthcare spending is indisputable. Starbucks spends more money in one year on health insurance for its employees than it spends on coffee for its customers. The US automakers will spend more money this year on health insurance than they will on the steel that… Read More
Continue ReadingWall Street Turnover
If you think you are experiencing hiring difficulties, be happy you are not on Wall Street: Fresh off some of the richest bonuses ever handed out, investment bankers and traders, especially those who deal with leveraged debt, are in high demand. In some cases, bidding has driven newly hired employees into the arms of a rival in mere weeks. That statement seemed like hyperbole until later in the article: Securities-industry employment rose to 804,000 at the end of 2006 after a third consecutive year of increases. The employment figure is just 4% shy of the all-time high set in 2000, according to the Securities Industry and Financial Markets Association. The… Read More
Continue ReadingSales Skills Trump All Others
There is something about industry experience that is seductive to many hiring managers. The allure of a salesperson who has been “in the industry” for some time is almost irresistible. The same infatuation seems to exist with salespeople once they are on the payroll. The salesperson’s ability to understand the company’s product and service offering is important to the position. But why are many new salespeople judged by their level of product/service understanding? Is this really the best determinant of sales success? In a word, no. At the risk of being overly simplistic, salespeople are hired to . . . sell. Their sales skills trump all other skills. These skills… Read More
Continue ReadingWhen a Raise is De-Motivating
We are asked from time to time about the best way to conduct an employee compensation review. I have to relay a story to you regarding a friend’s annual review. Here’s how it played out. She sat down with her manager and recieved a very positive review. She was told she was one of their better employees – recieving 3’s and 4’s out of 5 in all performance areas. In fact, my friend is the top person in her territory and the territory is ranked 2nd out of 8 in a large corporation. Everything was going well and she received a lot of verbal praise about her performance. Then the… Read More
Continue ReadingThe Day Your New Employee Will Leave
In a recent article from Workforce Management on new employee retention, 7 months seems to be the magic number when it comes to retaining newly hired employees. Office Angels interviewed 1,400 new recruits on this subject. Here are some of their findings. In the first seven months the workplace is viewed as a trial period for: The boss – is he or she ‘lackluster?’ Are there mentoring opportunities available for them? Does the new job accommodate their lifestyle? Another important opportunity new employees look for is the camaraderie between the team. 77% of the respondents find it essential for the team to make a trip to the local pub. No,… Read More
Continue ReadingHire Fast, Fire Fast
From Dick Costolo’s Ask the Wizard blog: Briefly, the “No False Positives” school of hiring says that bad hires are worse than no hire because bad employees infect the company with all sorts of issues. Better to march on with nobody filling an important slot than to bring in a sub-par performer. The hire fast, fire fast approach basically can be boiled down to “it’s really almost impossible to understand whether a person is going to be a killer A+ match before they start working with you day to day, so best to find somebody that seems close enough, and then remove them quickly if they don’t work out.” This… Read More
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