What will attract and then retain the most valuable workers?

Workforce of One

In Workforce of One: Revolutionizing Talent Management Through Customization, published in 2010 by Harvard Business Press, Susan M. Cantrell and David Smith share results from the Accenture workforce of one study (2008). On a scale of 0% to 100%, respondents were asked to rank various attributes preceded by to “I would be more likely to be attracted to and remain at an organization where:

When I work is based on my unique needs and preferences: 67%

My physical work is highly conducive to the work I do and suits my unique needs and preferences: 78%

My mix of benefits can be customized based on my unique needs and preferences: 73%

My mix of cash, stock options, and other forms of compensation can be customized based on my unique needs and preferences: 67%

The incentives, recognition, and rewards my organization gives me are relevant, meaningful, and tailored to what motivates me best: 83%

Performance appraisals are relevant, meaningful, and tailored based on what I do and how I receive feedback best: 75%

What, when, and how I learn is based on my unique needs, preferences, and learning style: 73%

My organization supports me in a customized career path where subsequent jobs are based on my unique interests, needs, and capabilities: 78%

My list of job responsibilities can be tailored based on my unique strengths and interests: 79%

My organization customizes its recruiting approach based on a candidate’s unique characteristics: 55%

Hiring decisions are based on a rich and thorough understanding of the whole person and their unique traits, strengths, weaknesses, and capabilities: 71%

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You can read an excellent article co-authored by Cantrell and Smith featured in Accenture’s Outlook, its online journal for high-performance business by visiting: http://www.accenture.com/Global/Research_and_Insights/Outlook/outlook-journal-2010-workforce-of-one.htm.

Susan M. Cantrell is a Research Fellow at the Accenture Institute for High Performance and also leads her own research firm. David Smith is the Managing Director of the Accenture Talent & Organization Performance practice.

Amy Gallo on how to prevent hiring disasters

Here is an excerpt from article written by Ann Gallo for the Harvard Business Review blog. To read the complete article, check out other articles and resources, and/or sign up for a free subscription to Harvard Business Review’s Daily Alerts, please visit dailyalert@email.harvardbusiness.org.

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Hiring someone can be a time-consuming and nerve-wracking task. In an ideal situation, you find the perfect person for the position — someone who hits the ground running, increases your unit’s performance, and eases your workload. In the worst-case scenario, your seemingly perfect hire turns out to be far from it and you spend months dealing with the aftermath, including finding a replacement. Either way, it can feel like a referendum on your judgment. So how can you be sure your experience is more like the former than the latter? If you outline and adhere to a disciplined process, you can greatly improve your chances.
What the Experts Say


Claudio Fernández-Aráoz, a senior adviser at Egon Zehnder International and the author of Great People Decisions and The Definitive Guide to Recruiting in Good Times and Bad, argues that hiring decisions are pressure-filled for a reason. “It is crucial to get hiring right not only for the hiring entity, but also, and very importantly, for the person being hired,” he says. A new hire isn’t to blame for a bad hiring decision, but will shoulder much of the burden when a role doesn’t fit.

A carefully crafted hiring process can help avoid most mishaps. Adele Lynn, founder and owner of The Adele Lynn Leadership Group and author of The EQ Interview, urges that companies regard hiring as more of a science than an art, or worse a leap of faith.
Prevention is the best medicine


You can greatly reduce your chances of getting hiring decisions wrong by following a clear and consistent approach that includes knowing the traits valued across the organization (such as humility or an entrepreneurial spirit); conducting fair, structured interviews that include multiple people from the organization; and agreeing on a standard ranking system to evaluate candidates.

Getting the right person for the job requires time and discipline. Be careful of the time trap, warns Lynn. “Often, companies are desperate to fill a position, so the interview process includes some generic questions and some information about the position,” she says. Needing to fill the role yesterday is not an excuse for shortchanging the process.

Know the specific competencies you’re looking for


Fernández-Aráoz says we are hardwired to hire people who are like us or make us comfortable — but that does not always yield the best candidate. In fact, you need to be aware of what he calls the “typical unconscious psychological traps” that lead one to make inferior people decisions (e.g. overrating capability or making snap judgments). Outline the specific competencies — above and beyond the traits you look for in all new hires — that the ideal candidate needs. What skills are required? How much does experience matter? What behaviors does he need to exhibit in the role? For example, this is a role requiring seven years of computer programming experience but also an ability to work collaboratively with team members on high-pressure projects.

Screening for the right soft skills is critical. Seasoned hiring managers will tell you that it’s much harder to coach behavioral issues than it is to teach someone the technical aspects of the job. “And people who fail in a new job mostly do so because of their inability to develop proper relationships not only with their boss but also with their peers and subordinates,” says Fernández-Aráoz. To assess relational skills and emotional intelligence, “the interview should include behavior-based questions and motive and reflection questions,” says Lynn. For example, “Tell me about a time you had a conflict with a co-worker and explain how you resolved it.” The aim is to uncover the candidate’s true colors. Does he blame others for his mistakes? Does he rationalize his behavior? Or does he accept responsibility? “You get a much more thorough understanding of how a person will behave in the future,” says Lynn.

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To read the complete article, check out other articles and resources, and/or sign up for a free subscription to Harvard Business Review’s Daily Alerts, please visit dailyalert@email.harvardbusiness.org.

Ann Gallo is a frequent contributor to the Harvard Business Review blog.

When is the best time of the day to fly?

Mark Di Vicenzo

That is one of several hundred questions that Mark Di Vincenzo answers in Buy Ketchup in May and Fly at Noon: A Guide to the Best Time to Buy This, Do That, and Go There, published by Harper in 2009.

“Noon. Commercial airline pilots will tell you it depends on which airport you’re flying out of, but generally noon is the time when you’ll avoid airport rush hours, which often coincide with workday rush hours. Weather also factors into this. For example, West Coast travelers know morning fog often delays flights, as do afternoon thunderstorms in the East. “You want to be on the ground by two in the afternoon in the summer,” said one pilot who flies east of the Mississippi. Another view: According to a few of the persons who decide to cancel flights for U.S. airlines, evening is best because carriers usually work hard to get planes where they need to be in the morning for the next day’s flight schedule.”

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Mark Di Vincenzo was a journalist for 24 years before launching Business Writers Group, a company that writes for corporate clients.

A Quick Graphic Overview of The Big Short

I presented my synopsis of The Big Short, by Michael Lewis, for a private client this past week.  It was quite an experience.  These were highly educated, quite successful folks.  Many had read the book.  Two had seats at a table the week before with former President George W. Bush, and he had said:  “I’ve got a book you’ve got to read:  The Big Short.”  The day that I presented it, there was an article on the Huffington Post, ‘The Big Short,’ By Michael Lewis: Why Politicians Love This Bestseller (taken from Politico) describing how the book is the most quoted book on Capitol Hill.  (yes, Republican George W. Bush and Democrats on Capitol Hill are both recommending this book.  Amazing!).

So many have tried to wrap their arms around the issues that led to the financial meltdown of the last couple of years.  The effects are far-reaching, and sadly, nowhere near finished.  Lewis’ book is so valuable because, 1) he is a great story-teller, and 2) he comes close to making the incomprehensible comprehensible.

Consider these two quotes from the book to help understand the difficulty of the comprehensibility problem:

“There was so much confusion about the different terms,” said Charlie Ledley.  In the course of trying to figure it out, we realized that there’s a reason why it doesn’t quite make sense to us.  It’s because it doesn’t quite make sense.”  …  “The Wall Street firms just got the ratings agencies to accept different names for it so they could make it seem like a diversified pool of investments.”

It’s too much to expect the people who run big Wall Street firms to speak in plain English, since so much of their livelihood depends on people believing that what they do cannot be translated into plain English…

I have created a graphic (with a little corrective help from a financial advisor friend) to give a summary of the issues in The Big Short, the issues that led to this crisis.  Take a look.

Click on image for larger view

Some brief explanations:

• Top left – in the old days, people put 20% down (of their own money) and the lender financed 80%.  That % down kept decreasing, so that in the worst days of the looming mortgage crisis, lenders were literally loaning more than the house was valued at.

• Bottom left – in the old days, the loan was paid off, in its entirety, over the long haul (30 years), to the original lender; frequently a Savings & Loan. – In the mortgage crisis days, the loans were immediately sold (“originate and sell”), thus, mortgage makers/lenders got their fee up-front, and for too many, getting the loan approved was the only goal.  The loan was sold, immediately, to another entity to service (collect!) the loan payments.

{By the way, one reason all of this collapsed was the false believe that if loans were defaulted on, it would not matter so much – because the value of a house would only/could only go up.  So, after a default, the value would be higher anyway}.

{And, by the way, part 2 – many; way too many!; up to 75% in the craziest period – of these loans were adjustable rate mortgages, with loans that began with 2-year teaser rates, which meant that it was inevitable that there would be plenty (lots!) of folks who could not make their “new” payments after the two year teaser rate period was completed}.

• Bottom middle – these mortgages were bundled into bonds, sold through Wall Street Firms.

A quote from the book:

In short order, the Salomon Brothers trading floor gave birth to small markets in bonds funded by all sorts of strange stuff:  credit card receivables, aircraft leases, auto loans, health club dues.  To invent a new market was only a matter of finding a new asset to hock.  The most obvious untapped asset in America was still the home.  People with first mortgages have vast amounts of equity locked up in their houses; why shouldn’t this untapped equity, too, be securitized?

• Top Middle, and Right – Now it gets really complicated.  There were additional investment instruments, with portions of mortgages kind of “sliced up” and interspersed throughout, and then “synthetic” investments that had less and less connection to actual mortgages, all of which were made to look like “good investments” by the ratings agences, which were under staffed, and certainly faced a conflict of interest in that they were paid for by the Wall Street firms to begin with. (In just the last week, or so, hearings have revealed the depth of these problems).  And, there were other “instruments” that were taking the opposite approach — while everyone was long on the sub-prime mortgages and the ever-more-divorced-from-actual-money investment instruments, a handful found a way to go short…

A quote from the book, (with a rather graphic metaphor):

More amazing was their circularity:  CDO “A” would contain a piece of CDO “B”; CDO “B” would contain a piece of CDO “C”; and CDO “C” would contain a piece of CDO “A”!  Looking for bad bonds inside a CDO was like fishing for crap in a Port-O-Let:  The question wasn’t whether you’d catch some but how quickly you’d be satisfied you’d caught enough.

And another quote from the book, from Steve Eisman (one of the two key players who “got it right” – my apology for the language.  It is a direct quote):

Eisman:  “The credit default swaps, filtered through the CDO’s, were being used to replicate bonds backed by actual home loans. There weren’t enough Americans with shitty credit taking out loans to satisfy investors’ appetite for the end product.  Wall Street needed his bets in order to synthesize more of them.  They weren’t satisfied getting lots of unqualified borrowers to borrow money to buy a house they couldn’t afford.  They were creating them out of whole cloth.  One hundred times over!  That’s why the losses in the financial system are so much greater than just the subprime loans.  That’s when I realized they needed us to keep the machine running.  I was like, “This is allowed?”

I think the graphic partially captures the environment that led to the collapse.  The story is a lot longer than this, and I have left much out.  But I took my best shot at the bare essence of the story.

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Disclaimer:  I am trained in communication.  I am not a financial expert.  So I welcome corrective comments.  If I’m completely wrong, or mis-read The Big Short, please let me know.

Four Generations of Clients – People really are different!

Have you ever heard an expert present a quick synopsis of her expertise?  It is a wonder to behold.

This happened yesterday at our bonus program following the First Friday Book Synopsis.  Linda Thomas, a certified image consultant, presented her program on The Four Generations of Your Clients:  What do They Really Want From You?

The entire program was excellent.  Linda was helped by her able intern/assistant/colleague/technology coach, Gen Y (Generation “WHY”) representative Krista Estes, who added greatly to the experience.

Linda has discovered, in her “image consulting” business, that image is only one piece of a bigger picture.  It starts with image; then it goes to nonverbal communication issues; and now it has gone to generational understandings and issues.

First, let me explain the first sentence in this blog post: “Have you ever heard an expert present a quick synopsis of her expertise?” Linda’s presentation was not on image – but she summarized her wisdom on this issue in a handful of sentences that were breathtaking and close to brilliant in their simplicity, common sense, and helpful wisdom.  She really does know what she is talking about!  (I learned why it is always better to wear long sleeves.  I almost always wear long sleeves — now I know why).

And then, the rest of the session was just a terrific discussion of the way different generations work and think and act…  A self-described former “hippie,” Linda has sought to understand just what makes each generation different – and, thus, different to work for and with.  Here is her summary of some of the key differences of the generations.  It is worth looking at carefully.

If you need some image consulting, I encourage you to contact Linda Thomas.  And if you are in need of a good session on how to work better dealing with multiple generations of folks, consider her program on this also.  She has done her homework, and will help you think more clearly and work more effectively.

Some Very Troublesome Ripple Effects of Joblessness

I’ve written before about the different aspects of my professional life.  I am increasingly calling myself “The Book Guy,” because I read books and present briefings of these books to different audiences – different kinds of audiences.  I speak to companies, organizations, nonprofits, independent consultants…  the diversity of experiences really is fun, and keeps me hopping.

One of my audiences is the remarkable group of folks who attend the Urban Engagement Book Club.  (I have been presenting monthly at this gathering for quite a few years).  Sponsored by Central Dallas Ministries, this audience is a mix of business folks, nonprofit leaders and employees and volunteers, and some people who have had a genuinely tough time of it (some current and formerly homeless people attend these sessions).  There is no other mix of people quite like it that I know of.  The books all relate, in some way, to poverty and social justice.  This month’s book is about a serious problem, which its effected by the jobless rate, especially in our most troubled communities.

For many who read the First Friday Book Synopsis blog, the jobless rate is a concern from a macro perspective.  Most of us have food to eat and shelter to call home.    Thus, we think about joblessness as a problem “out there.”  (Though there are always some people “in transition” who attend the First Friday Book Synopsis).  But there is a large number of people, unfortunately growing, for whom this is a much more ever-present reality — people that are not so confident of finding and/or keeping these basic necessities.

This week, I presented a synopsis of the book Imprisoning America:  The Social Effects of Mass Incarceration, edited by Mary Pattillo, David Weiman, and Burce Western.  This is a collection of essays, all revolving around the issue of the effects on people, families, and communities, of mass incarceration.  This book grew out of the 2001 Conference, “The Effects of Incarceration on Children and Families,” hosted by the Institute for Policy Research at Northwestern University.

Without overwhelming you with statistics (fully documented in the book), let me summarize by saying the prison and jail population is dramatically higher (both in percentage, and in real numbers) than it was a few decades back.  The numbers are unsustainably high for those who have not finished high school.  Especially for the males who do not finish high school.  And highest for the people of color who do not finish high school.  Thus, the phrase in the title, “Mass Incarceration.”

Here are two brief excerpts of the book:

Criminal involvement increases when men are unemployed, when their wages are low, and when entry-level jobs are scarce.

Except for those who die in prison, all individuals sentenced to imprisonment come back.  “Reentry,” then is the inevitable result of imprisonment.  Reentry is not a form of supervision, like parole.  Reentry is not a goal, like rehabilitation.  Reentry is not an option.
How can prisoners be best prepared for the inevitable return?…  A focus on prisoner reentry is an “elevating goal” for the corrections field.

As I read about the jobless rate, and especially about the unsustainably large jobless rate among the poorest in our society, I see more clearly how the ripple effects are truly devastating.  Particularly in the most troubled communities.

When there is a lack of jobs, such a circumstance brings an increase in criminal behavior.  And when there are few (very few) jobs available for those who have been incarcerated, this adds substantially to recidivism, leading to the downward cycle of going in and out of prison.  This results in families breaking up, families not being formed, children without fathers…  As I said, the ripple effects are devastating.

In every way, the task of creating and maintaining jobs/the task of providing work for people, simply has to be a very high priority for everyone.  When there aren’t enough jobs, everything goes down – the economy, civility, self-esteem…  the list is long, and the problems are real.