Who Is Better in Human Resources? Men vs. Women…

Since there’s a timeless dispute between men and women concerning who is better at something, I decided to fuel it as well by asking the challenging question of “Who is a better HR person – men or women?”  Tough one…

Well, to be able to decide upon that, let’s see what a real HR person should be like:

• Should be sociable since work involves people every day;
• Must like working with people;
• Must be patient and understanding of others’ problems;
• Must be empathetic and must easily sense people’s feelings;
• Must see below the surface and by that I mean being able to read hidden body language, gestures, expressions below standard verbal language – people don’t always say what they mean – an HR person must be able to get that;
• Must be well organized since the volume of work is quite high in all areas of HR;
• Must be a good mediator quite often; since a lot of people have trouble communicating, HR must help them do that;
• Must be a good listener;
• Must be always ready to help;
• Must be a good diplomat – do the job even if you don’t like the people you work with;
• Must understand that inside the company, the employees are your clients and that clients’ needs come first – I really dislike this one, but it’s true unfortunately so you must deal with it; you know –client is king, client is always right and all that;

That’s more or less all there is to it. Foreign language skills or PC skills are useful, but not always top priority in this job. There are people who can help you with reporting or translations. Working with people is your main job.

And to make it more interesting, I would like to tell you about men and women from Alan Pease’s perspective. This is a fragment from one of my articles on www.lady-driver.com:

“Allan Peasein Why men don't listen and women can't read maps (very smart and funny video showing years of experience in the field - you can find it on YouTube):
Women:

• focus more on relationships and feelings rather than on facts; better social skills than men;
• can't point North;
• have a brain that is more complex;
• are multitasking - can perform more simultaneous non-related tasks because their brain has more connections;
• have poor sense of direction;
• can't read maps; have the tendency to rotate them to face the direction they are traveling;
• estimate distances poorly and need great exercise to improve; 
• have parking issues and speed and distance estimation problems;
• can use both hands simultaneously without much difficulty;
• sometimes have difficulties telling left hand from right hand;
• see better at short distances rather than long distances;
• have good peripheral eye sight ranging up to 60 degrees;
• can't look at information three-dimensionally - poor visual skills;
• prefer to park in a large space and walk rather than squeeze the car in small dangerous spots.”

Some are not relevant, but I preferred to include all just for you to understand women better and look for Alan’s video.

Now, coming back, since there aren’t so many men in the field, women must be better, right? In all the companies I have worked for, I had only 2 men colleagues in HR out of around 20. Also, I have never been at a workshop or conference where there were more than 10% HR men. Well?

Women must be better since they have better communication and social skills. This however doesn’t mean that man should completely stay out. A lot of HR men are very good at what they do. But women rule in HR as men rule in jobs like air traffic controller, pilot or aerospace engineer. 

Just to make it fun, I have placed a small survey on the left of the article. Please reply with your opinion concerning this debate. Who do you think is better in HR? Men or women?

July 8th: Survey is closed - please find results below:

 

Thanks and take care,

Geo

Have You Heard of “Fast Food Hiring”? I’m Not Talking About Burgers…

I have recently came across this funny new term and decided to share it. At first it seemed funny but after a deeper analysis it seemed to me that this is not that funny especially considering the fact that it happens to recruiters more than it should – during my 10 years of experience in recruitment and selection, I have to admit that around 20% of the positions that I was supposed to fill were done through “fast food hiring”. This is a lot considering the consequences.

What is “Fast Food Hiring”? Thinking about fast food, it’s easy to understand what “fast food hiring” is. When you feel really, really hungry, you grab the bite that is closest to you, no matter the damages to your health – you accept what you can get fast and cheap, no matter how much time you get to fight later with the extra weight, heart problems and stomach ache. In a company, your managers ask you to fill a position very fast, under stress, with high pressure allowing you to accept any candidate that meets as many requirements as possible considering the short time available. What happens then? You find out after a while that the candidate is not that great, that he has some hidden issue you didn’t investigate enough. Of course, exceptions are possible – you may be lucky to find someone great, but in most cases insufficient testing and investigation leads to inappropriate hiring. 

Pluses and Minuses of “fast food hiring”:

·         Pluses:

o   Position gets filled very fast, operations can move on;

o   Your task as a recruiter is done, you can get back to your other tasks;

o   Even if the new employee doesn’t meet all requirements, at least the team has a new colleague who can start taking a few of their tasks – as many as he can and as efficiently as a new employee can;

To be honest, that’s more or less all I could think of; no matter how hard I tried to find more.

·         Minuses:

o   Most of the time the new employee doesn’t meet all requirements and he needs additional training and additional time from the manager of the team and colleagues to become functional;

o   Since he will learn slower, the team will be able to function at full capacity after a longer time;

o   New employee may prove not motivated enough and may leave the team sooner than expected, the position becoming available again; this means a new recruitment process, new trainings, more time and money wasted;

o   Insufficient testing and interviewing may lead to hidden flaws that could be really serious: an employee with insufficient knowledge, with personality issues and problems to integrate within the team, a criminal record, medical problems, unexpected disciplinary matters, you name it;

o   Tensions may appear within the team when the old team members are introduced to someone new that should help them but instead is difficult to handle, to train, that lacks knowledge and needs too much time invested to become functional;

o   The manager may lose the team’s respect and support when they see what new member he has decided to hire – I know it’s tough and not nice, but people are cruel to others when their own time and money are affected – they may need to stay overtime to help the new guy do his work and they may not appreciate it, blaming the manager for the situation;

o   On the long term, the company loses money due to extensive training and time needed by the new employee to become fully efficient – and even more if he decides to leave after discovering that the job is not suitable for him; this happens often with “fast food hiring”;

Why does “fast food hiring” become necessary sometimes? Considering these reasons may help managers avoid them:

o   Fast, unplanned increase in operations which leads to a certain number of positions being open over night;

o   New contracts being signed fast without proper communication between HR and Sales; HR doesn’t find out on time about new positions and contractual terms force them to fill the positions fast;

o    Unexpected attrition/turnover – key members of the team decide to leave unexpectedly and they need to be replaced fast – this can be sometimes foreseen and avoided by proper communication between managers and the team members;

o   Poor communication between HR and Operations who know about people leaving or increase in number of team members, but don’t start working together on time to fill the positions – either Operations don’t tell soon enough or HR don’t communicate recruitment time frames or don’t start recruitment on time;

o   Positions difficult to fill – rare requirements that are not always available on the market like special languages or technical skills – when deadline gets closer, manager may be forced to accept anything due to time constraints;

o   Improper Induction training for new hires or improper communication of contract details – the new employee may find out details he may not like after getting hired and may decide to leave on the spot (legal specifications allowing that most of the times), the position becoming available sooner than expected and needing a new candidate no matter what;

How to avoid “fast food hiring” – considering the minuses mentioned above, I support the idea that this type of hiring must be avoided as much as possible. It must remain an exception not a rule in hiring techniques:

o   Planning, planning, planning – don’t leave things to chance, plan ahead all the resources you may need as a manager;

o   Good communication between HR and hiring manager – always decide together what is there to be done in order to always have the best resources on time;

o   Proper Induction training and proper communication of contract terms for all new hires;

o   Proper market research in order to make sure that resources are available within a certain area – if they are not and still they need to be hired, training must be considered.

That’s all for now. Any thoughts you may have on the matter or any of your own experiences you may like to share, please feel free to comment.

Take care,

Geo

Why Won’t Your Company Give You More Money? Your HR Knows But Can’t Always Tell

One all of the most important concerns for all employees is money. Let’s face it – that’s why you are working, right? The number of people that have other income sources and work only for the pleasure of it is very low. Most of us work for the money: to support our families, to buy a house, a car, to buy nice stuff, to go on vacations, to prove our social status, to feel important…

I am also sure that you must have tried at least once to get some more money at some point in your career – and you did this by going to discuss with your manager, by quitting your job and by getting a new one or by applying for a promotion. A lot of times you have been told NO when you asked for more money. Ever wondered why?  I’m sure you have… the reasons are multiple, but I will deal here with those that have proven background. So, let’s begin…

1.       Huge social taxes that companies pay to the state. Besides your base salary (out of which you pay some income taxes), the company is overwhelmed by other taxes on salaries as well. Sometimes, just for you to get 1 USD or 1 Euro, or whatever, your company needs to pay 2 more to the state. This is overwhelming and sometimes companies pay money to the employees on the black payroll just to avoid those taxes. It’s not nice because those taxes go to the Retirement Office, to the Health Office or to Unemployment Fund for unemployed people, but sometimes companies have to in order to survive.  Here are some examples of taxes paid in Europe: UK and France – 26% (it means that for each 100 pounds or Euros in the employee’s contract, the company pays 26 more to the state), Germany and Austria – 30%, Italy – 32%, Norway – 36%, Denmark – 41%, Belgium – 43%; all these are huge amounts for a company to handle;

2.       Global Company Policy to lower costs – it’s no longer surprising to anybody that companies exist for profit – not for charity, not to make employees happy, not to make the world a better place – profit is king. So, don’t be surprised when a huge corporation announces that it closes a 2000-employees plant in Western Europe to move it to India. Imagine you work in France, you have asked for a salary raise but they just won’t give it to you? Still wondering why? Well, think that employees in India accept salaries 10 times lower than yours and are happy. Don’t be surprised if in a year your job will be transferred there. Eastern Europe and India and now hot locations due to the low level of salaries that people accept. Sometimes, it goes even further. Renault – Dacia in Romania has unofficially started thinking about moving their plant to Morocco because Romanian workers have asked for more money and costs in Morocco are even lower than Romania – workers in Romania earn around 300 Euro/month. Guys in France, what do you say? 300 Euro started to be considered too high for the company to be profitable. Sad, isn’t it? But let’s face it – the group doesn’t care about any of you in France, Romania or Morocco. They just strive for profit. If Mars will turn more profitable, they will find a way to move there;

3.       Global Company Policy to lower the number of older employees – this is sad and disturbing but it happens. I must admit that this measure is currently closer to me than you may think – this is the target of our HR department for this year. The idea is to accept a certain rate of attrition/turnover just because this means older, more experience employees with higher salaries will be replaced by young people that are just learning and who obviously earn less. Nobody cares that all these people need to be recruited and trained. It’s not the job of VPs or top management – it’s the job of local HR and local managers and as long as profit and money keep coming, which VP do you think cares? If they are on their yacht somewhere in the Caribbean, they don’t care. Do you get it now why you are not receiving more money? Keep asking and asking and you will be welcome to leave. They will replace you with someone who accepts less money.

4.       Top managers get annual bonuses as percentage of company savings – this is disturbing but true. I have faced it in one of my former companies where management used to cut a lot of the sales guys’ bonuses just to make annual savings higher. Everything in the company was very carefully monitored – even office supplies. This is a fact and it happens around you more than you think. And since your manager may get a higher bonus if he saves more, do you think he’s motivated to give you a pay raise? Stop dreaming…

So, guys, sorry about this bitter article – this is just a dose of reality for those who still dream of a pink corporate world. Wake up! It doesn’t exist. Nobody (except those who work around you - your colleagues, your direct manager sometimes, your local HR) cares. You are just a small gear in the corporate mechanism that produces profit. You are replaceable if you break down…

Be back soon hopefully with a more optimistic article.

Take care,

Geo

Why Do Top Performers turn suddenly into very Poor Performers?

I am sure that all experienced managers have had at some point in their career one of these guys in their teams – smart, capable people, top of the list, better than anybody else today and then bored, tired, annoyed by any task they get, sometimes dragging everybody else down the next  day. Sounds familiar?

Well, managers, did you think that you may be doing something wrong? Did you take the time to think about what may be happening? Here are the potential causes that you need to investigate deeper:

1.      Employee is bored – the average time that an employee should stay on the same position with exactly the same tasks is maximum 2 years, sometimes less depending on each individual. After that, the natural tendency, especially if we are dealing with young and ambitious professionals is to get bored and start seeking for new responsibilities and challenges. Managers need to make sure that the employees seek inside the company and not elsewhere and that their newly acquired skills are not wasted. What should you do as a manager? Prevent this by constantly discussing with the employee and by constantly trying to involve him in some new projects and challenges;

2.       Employee no longer trusts his manager – if this happens, then gaining trust back is very difficult to do. What may cause this? The manager doesn’t know how to deal with poor performance – he doesn’t know how to offer different rewards depending on performance (sometimes the manager may be impresses by the poor social status of a team member and award him bonuses even if they are not deserved – be careful, it may backfire!), manager is not fair, manager offers only negative feedback, manager is not a good example (i.e. he asks the employees to be always on time at work, but he rarely follows his own rule), manager is too weak when tough decisions should be made – reasons may go on and on; spotting this is not always easy to do – employee may no longer follow rules, may no longer do tasks on time, may visibly question authority. What can be done? Work hard to gain trust again – involve employee in decision making, offer fair feedback to all members of the team, reward good performance properly, be an example to follow for the team;

3.       Poor communication from the manager down – employee doesn’t have clear goals so he can’t know if he’s performing well or not,  employee is not aware of changes implemented or changes are being implemented via force, employee doesn’t understand his role within the wider picture, employees are not encouraged to express their opinion;

4.      Poor differentiation and recognition of good performance – manager must always be fair and reward good and bad performance accordingly; top performers must know they are top performers and the team should know why they were rewarded so they can gain their respect among their colleagues;

5.       Lack of feedback - manager never has time to discuss with an employee about his performance; he is always kept in the dark not knowing whether what he did was good or bad or if any objectives were actually met. What to do?  Meet at least once a month to offer the employee feedback or if something good or bad has happened, offer feedback instantly;

6.       Poor tools offered  -this may be really frustrating – not having a computer fast enough, not having all the software the employee needs,  not having access to the printer, the internet sometimes, books or even wanting to do something and not having access to all the information – all these may turn an employee from a top performer to one who doesn’t care;

7.       Professional growth not supported properly – this may be caused by not having enough positions in the company to offer the employee (and this is something that can’t always be fixed as it is connected to the business and the company policy only); however, some small things can still be done: allow the employee to learn from others by assigning him some of their tasks from time to time, delegate some of your tasks as manager, allow the employee to teach others and develop his training skills and last but not least try to find time to allow the employee to participate in the trainings he is interested in (even if sometimes this may lead to him wanting more and leaving the company – at least you motivated him to do his best while he was in your team);

8.       Poor measurement of performance – in terms of performance measurement companies are part of either of the 3 categories: those who don’t measure performance at all (there are employees who have been working for the same company for 7 years and  nobody bothered to offer them any feedback or give them any targets to achieve), those who have implemented some measurement system but this is not too good (either reviews are not done on clear time frames, are done when the manager remembers to do it or rules, feedback and rewards  are not consistent) and finally those who have a clear performance management system that works (reviews are done on certain dates, rules are clear, rewards for good or poor performance are clear and fair, everybody has clear goals, gets  consistent feedback and knows what comes next);

9.       Poor compensation, not in line with competencies and role – this is also something that may not be fixed if the company doesn’t have the resources; however, managers must at least discuss with the employees to see if they can be motivated by other means: days off, formal and informal dinners, relaxation spaces set up, fitness subscriptions, discounts on company products – all these may matter; also, managers must remember that compensation is an important reason for employees leaving the company, but only up to a certain level. Normally entry and middle level employees care a lot about money especially if they are young (because they want a family, a house, a car, they want stuff).  For the rest money matters only up to a point – after that point you may give the employee whatever amount and find out that they still leave (because of not having enough time to spend with their family, because of not enough development opportunities, because of lack of respect, because of not being involved enough in decisions – list may go on);

10.   No involvement in decision making – employee needs to understand when changes are implemented – so managers need at least to consult the team, even if decision is already made by the board, at least they must get the chance to offer their opinion. Otherwise, they will feel left out and exploited;

11.   No balance for family/personal life – a balanced employee is a happy employee. This is why, no matter what the employee tells you, he still needs some time for himself. Even if he doesn’t have a family, he needs time with his girlfriend, his dog, his parents, time to himself – whatever – he still needs to rest and think of his own problems. Work is NOT his life, even if he is young and doesn’t understand it yet. An overworked employee, even if he does it voluntarily, will turn eventually into an unhappy employee. This is a fact!

Well, did you see all this coming? Lots of potential causes for you as managers to investigate… This may seem a bit disturbing, but you really need to take the time to think about all this because losing a top performer is worst than losing your own pride as manager.

Take care,

Geo