Recruiters, are you really servicing your clients?

I can hear some of you saying what do you mean “are we really serving your client?” Of course we are, otherwise we would not still be in business. In response I would ask when was the last time you asked your client what they really needed. When was the last time you took the time to sit down and really listen to what the needs of their organizations are?

The focus of this white paper, number seven in the DBAI White Paper Series, is a look at the question of whether you as recruiters are really serving your clients to the ultimate level that you can. Are you really earning the fees you collect for your services? Are you ethically performing what you think the client is asking for in return? When does your responsibility as a recruiter really end?

We have seen many changes occur in the global workplace over the past several decades. Unemployment has been on a roller coaster ranging from very low to record heights. A question of loyalty to our organizations on the part of our human capital assets has been paramount in many businesses. We have also seen an increase in the number of employees jumping to new opportunities because it looks good in their portfolio of skills. We fully cognizant of the fact that as time goes by, things will change.

Read any number of professional journals within the organizational environment – from CFO to HR magazine- one continuing theme is that C-level executives are having trouble sleeping at night over the concerns as to where the talent of the future will come from. They are concerned with locating the right person for the right position at the right time and in the right location. This does not mean ruling candidates out, it means finding attributes among possible talent that can enhance the organization.

In 1973, Allan Cox wrote a classic work entitled “Confessions of a Corporate Headhunter” which laid out the entire process of sourcing, recruiting, referring and collaborating on the hiring of new executive talent. Mr. Cox was an executive with one of the largest retained search firms in the country. In his book he defined your role as that of a mediator between executives who don’t understand their problems and candidates who are out for the fast buck. Assuming Mr. Cox is correct in his views the techniques and resources that are used may have changed, but your primary function has not. As an executive recruiter you are charged with the responsibility to assist your clients in locating, reviewing, and selecting the best possible candidate for the client’s talent capital vacancies. One aspect of this process should be ensuring that both the client and the candidate are well informed as to the total picture of the process. The only party to the process that can readily inform the parties is the recruiter.

We have talked to many recruiters who tell me that despite the definition above, all they do is receive the position requisition and send over the most likely candidate. We do not dispute the intention, however when you confine yourself to a narrow perspective, you have not assisted your client in finding the best person for the job.

Consider these real life examples,

• Where a recruiter made the statement that she would never send on to a client any candidate with grey hair.
• Sony Ericcson and others made it clear to the workplace that if you were unemployed you should not waste their time by applying for the position.
• Recruiters who are set in their silo that they won’t look at functional resumes which better describe the breadth of experiences that they have.

Your client has a problem. They have an open position in their ranks that is costing them dollars. Remaining staff must make up the workload. They are incurring the costs of recruiting new talent. The difficulty maybe that they may not understand what their problem is. You as the recruitment specialist are the route to solve their problem but only if you have a clear idea of what the problem is.

Having been on both sides of the desk we would suggest that to better serve your client you need to change your perspective on your role by following the strategies below:

Strategy 1: Stop playing the game of musical chairs

As children, we all have at one time or another attended the birthday party of a friend where the height of the party was the game of musical chairs. While it was a party standard, it also got old fast as the number of players dwindled. Here you are years later and you are still playing the party game. The difference now is you are not playing based on music but just moving people from place to place with no regard to where it all ends. Take Mary Smith from ABC Corporation and place her in ABD Corporation. Move John Smith from XYZ Corporation and put him in Mary’s position at ABC Corporation. Eventually you will run out of people to move. Whether you want to or not eventually you will have to take talent from one client to fill a position in another one. Where is your sense of ethics regarding your clients?

Strategy 2: Become a true partner with your clients

You receive a call from a client regarding the need for an executive. What you do next determines whether you are service provider or a true partner. Using the tools of the voice of the customer you need to get a complete picture of the needs of your client. Do not settle for a preliminary picture of the need. Work with your client to understand why the position is really open. Understand why they are going in a certain direction. Do not be afraid to question why a decision was made. As we suggested earlier it is time for you to sit down with your client and understand what the expectations of your clients are regarding the open position.

Strategy 3: Recognize the value a candidate brings to the picture

Every person has their own attributes that they bring to the table. As we have moved deeper into the information age, the candidate’s knowledge skills are more important than where he/she has worked. You have taken the time to really understand the needs of your client. Look for the skills that will solve the problem. Take the time to match candidates to positions based on those skills, not some assumed picture of what you think the client wants.

Strategy 4: Don’t stereotype your candidates

In line with the strategy above, each candidate brings a unique mix of experiences to the table. Eliminate from your vocabulary any decision based on pre-conceived thoughts. Just because a candidate has grey hair, doesn’t mean they are past their prime. Just because someone has lost their source of employment during hard economic times does not mean that their skills are no longer of any value to the workplace. Just because a candidate has not remained with one or two corporations for their entire work career does not mean they have lost the skills that your client needs.

Strategy 5: Be willing to take a certain level of risk

You need to determine whether you are a paper pusher or true consultant. Be willing to explain the business case why a particular candidate is the one to solve your client’s problem. Do not settle for working within the narrow view that your client might be imposing. Remember that if you don’t ask the why questions you may not have the real needs that the organization has.

Strategy 6: Gain a sense of ethics

By no means am I lumping every recruiter in this fishbowl but a fair number of recruiters have begun to tell candidates that before they apply for a position they should call the recruiter in order to see if the recruiter has a contact at that employer. Many use this as a source of leads for open positions. Think about how you would feel if someone used you in the same manner.

Strategy 7: Be prepared to present the cost benefits of talent acquisition

Be aware of the cost of various scenarios in the hiring process. In the long run it might be more cost beneficial to offer mobility services then to hire someone, have them stay two months and then have to go through the hiring process all over again. The common assumption is that if you hire someone and they leave within the first year it will cost your client 175 percent of the annual salary to replace, train and get the replacement up to full productivity.

We have tried to present the business case for a new model for the recruitment industry centered around the voice of the customer and understanding the true needs of your client. Your pursuit of this changed model determines whether you are a paper pusher or a true partner with your clients to place the right person in the right place, in the right position, at the right time. Whether you positively respond to the opening question depends totally on how close you come to completing the strategies we have outlined. We totally understand that our suggestions are not human nature as you operate today. Only you can understand how important serving your client’s needs are to your organization and your career.

Posted via email from hrstrategist@Net-Speed

Changes from the Healthcare Law

Both the House and the Senate have passed legislation and sent on to the President a repeal of the provision in the Healthcare Law that would have required 1099's be issued to all vendors paid over $600. While the intent was good to make up for lost revenue to the coffers of the country, it would have been a nightmare for businesses during the operation of their businesses.

Posted via email from hrstrategist@Net-Speed

New ADAAA regs: the untold story!!!

The law firm of Constangy, Brooks and Smith posted this discussion about the new ADAA regulations rules released by the EEOC.

As most people in the Human Resources and employment-law worlds are aware, the U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission recently issued its final rule interpreting the Americans with Disabilities Act Amendments Act.

The ADAAA, which took effect in January 2009, was enacted toward the end of the administration of George W. Bush, with the support of disability rights advocates as well as the U.S. Chamber of Commerce and the Society for Human Resources Management (both of whom were trying to head off a version that would have been worse for employers). The ADAAA dramatically expands the population that is considered "disabled" within the meaning of the ADA but does not change the ADA's provisions on, for example, reasonable accommodation, medical examinations, or confidentiality.

There has been a lot of commentary about the new regulations, but here are some points that I have not seen anywhere else:

1. The 40-or-so pages of dense preamble and regulations, and the EEOC's "Interpretive Guidance," can be summarized in one sentence, as follows: It is now unlawful to discriminate, not just against individuals with "disabilities," but against anyone because of a medical condition, whether actual, past, or perceived. (Please note that "medical condition" also includes mental/psychiatric conditions and learning disabilities.) The only exceptions might be, for example, a person suffering from the common cold or the flu, or someone who wears eyeglasses or contact lenses. But not necessarily. The new definition of "disabilities" in the ADAAA is as loosey-goosey as the definition of "serious health condition" in the Family and Medical Leave Act. 

2. Individuals who are "regarded as" being only impaired are protected. The only perceived "impairments" that don't count are those that are both transitory (duration of less than six months) and minor. Because it's going to be so easy to qualify, the EEOC is actively encouraging individuals to always sue under the "regarded as" prong as long as they aren't challenging an employer's failure to provide a reasonable accommodation. (For obvious reasons, reasonable accommodations do not have to be provided to individuals who are only "regarded as" being impaired, so an individual seeking a reasonable accommodation would have to establish either an actual "disability" or a record of a "disability.")

3. Thanks (but no thanks) to this law, I expect to see some class action lawsuits alleging ADAAA violations in connection with post-offer medical examinations and terminations at the end of extended medical leaves of absence. Under the prior version of the ADA, these cases were normally unsuccessful as class actions because an individualized analysis was required to determine who could be a member of the class (that is, who was "disabled"). But now that the determination of who is "disabled" is virtually automatic, disability discrimination cases will be more susceptible of class treatment.

4. Most ADA case law on who is "disabled" is no good any longer. The ADAAA explicitly overruled some excellent Supreme Court decisions, including Sutton v. United Air Lines (1999) and Williams v. Toyota Manufacturing of Kentucky (2002). However, our court system is slow, and so we are still seeing ADA decisions that take a restrictive view of who is "disabled." This is nothing to be excited about, unfortunately. Be sure to read the fine print: If the facts alleged in the case occurred before January 1, 2009, then the court is applying the old ADA, which really was a pretty good and reasonable law. (On the other hand, if you see a pro-employer decision based on facts that occurred after January 1, 2009, then you may have reason to open a bottle of champagne.)

So, what should an employer do to comply with the ADAAA?

*Always assume that everyone has an ADAAA "disability." You will be right 99.9 percent of the time, and the rest of the time you'll be erring on the right side.

*Brush up, if you need to, on your legal obligations concerning reasonable accommodations. You will have to consider reasonable accommodations in many more cases than you did in the past. 

*If you think a "medical condition" disqualifies a person from performing the job, go through the full-blown ADA/reasonable accommodation analysis. If you think you will be unable to accommodate, consult with counsel before making any irreversible decisions.

*If you require post-offer medical screening, review what you are doing and make sure that your medical department (or outside physician) is not automatically rejecting everyone who has certain conditions. All medical rejection decisions should be considered "preliminary" until they have been reviewed and approved by someone in Human Resources and/or a lawyer. (This may require the offeree to sign a HIPAA authorization that will allow the medical department to share relevant information with HR/Legal.)

*Review your medical leave/termination policies and practices, and be especially on the lookout for any provisions that seem to call for "automatic" termination without an individualized assessment or consideration of reasonable accommodation options.

*Make sure your "paws" know the laws. Now that we have the potential for cat's paw liability, be sure that your front-line supervisors and other managers know at least that the ADA has been amended and that it will cover significantly more people than before.

Posted via email from hrstrategist@Net-Speed

Can you answer "YES" toe ach of these questions?

Do you have a seat at the planning table?
Do you know your total business operation?
Do you know how to improve your processes for positive results?
Can you make the cost ratio presentation on your human capital processes?

Everytime I attend a HR conference a recurring theme I hear is that HR needs to learn the language of business in order to continue to be a thriving part of your organization now and in the future. So, just what does that mean? Either by design or just evolution many departments within our organizations have become silos or islands unto themselves. The problem is that when we do this we lose the grasp ont he bigger picture --our organization. Some of you are probably already saying but this does not apply to me or our department. However if you turn to the writings of Dave Ulrich (HR Transformation) he will explain to you that this is a dangerous way to go.

The business world we liv ein changes on a daily basis, The new world calls for us to be proactive not reactive to events in the workplace. It calls for us to function as part of cross-functional approaches to our trials and tribulations. Mikel and Schroeder in their work "Breakthrough Management" suggest that we don't know what we don't know and if we don;t know what it is that is causing the problems then we can't act on the solutions.

Manufacturing for years has used the six-sigma methodology to improve their processes. These same tools can be used highly successfully in the transactional world where HR resides.The methodology will enable you to know your total business. It will enable you to observe the problems in your processes. We are not asking oyu to use it to lower your FTE levels, this is not about pointing blame on an employee and saying this is the solution (although in some casses it might) but six sigma suggests the problem lies within your process.

Corporations like GE Healthcare, Cummins Engine, XCek Ebergy, IBM and others have seen the benefits of the six sigma approach and have used it to great improvement on the bottom line.

So, do you wat to answer yes to these five questions? Check with your local insitutions of higher education and see if they offer six sigma training and bite the bullet and enroll to learn the ins and outs of how it works, It will literally be the first day of the rest of your career, if you have one going forward.

Posted via email from hrstrategist@Net-Speed

I am so Sorry

I placed a call to a friend on her birthday and during our phoen conversation she asked me for my opinion on a situation she is involved with. It seems that a large national big box store has made the decision that it makes business ssnese to provide spanish lessons to all their exempt and non-exempt employees. During this training program they are shown a video in which one of the actors who is made out to be a WASP in appearance as possible, turns to a customer who is of hispanic descent and says " I am sorry that I do not speak your language,"

The causasian employees and the jamaican employees are highly offended at the scenario and have made their views known to management. In one north American city, the employees have been approached by spanish speaking customers who have said if you do not learn my language you are out of a job.

Diversity initiatives are vital to organizations in this global workplace that we find ourselves in, but is it really necessary in the name of diviersity to alientate the rest of the workforce. I would suggest not. In most deveoped countries of the world, English is the language of business and whether we are speaking about diversity of language training it serves no purpose to the organization as a whole to satisfy one block at the expense of another.

I am not suggesting that learning a second language is an adverse thing in any means. I wish I could do so myself. I took two semesters of spanish in college and do not remember any of it. But when in Rome do what the Romans do, and leanr the language of hte workplace. It hinders our organizations when we try to force feed one way of doing things on the rest of the workforce.Instead of trying to change everyone in to a fluent spanish speaking employee make sure that you have employees on staff who do and can be referred to when a fellow employee has a language problem with a client.

What are your thoughts?

Posted via email from hrstrategist@Net-Speed

Canadian Court hands down technology decision

An Ontario Court of Appeals issued a ruling in a case where a school teacher was issued a laptop that he was entitled to take home to use on non-scheduled work hours. During his spare time he was looking at pornographic images which were uncovered during a police search of the computer. The Court of Appeals decision stated that if you issue a employee a laptop or a smartphone and let them take them home or on vacation, the employer has given the employee explicit  permission to use the devices for personal use and thus they have the right to expect a reasonable amount of privacy.

While we recogize that Canadian law is not viable in the US, we would suggest that part of your corporate policy needs to clearly state the expectations you want from employees that you have on 24/7 status. Clearly delineate what they are able to do with those devices. If you don't want them usig the devices for personal use say so. You decide the direction your organization goes in this social media world we are living in.

Posted via email from hrstrategist@Net-Speed

You are our greatest asset!

For over 30 years we have been a customer of a chain of coffee shops (not Starbucks) and part of their offerings has been a loyalty program for frequent customers. We would get a punch for each drink bought or each pound of ground coffee purchased. Last weekend we stopped in one of their stores and was informed that as of the end of April they were discontinuing the loyalty program. Whe asked why after 30 years they were doing so, the response I got was that the business had to stay in business.

As a coffee shop or your organization your primary purpose is to acquire and maintain customers. You acquire customers in your business by hiring the human capital and by providing the services that meet the requiremets of your hiring managers. In order to maintain them as customers you need to take steps to listen to the voice of the customer. Google the term voice of the customer and look for a six-sigma tool called the voice of the customer matrix and complete oe for each customer segment. Based on the results, make changes in your service delivery to match their needs.

Many managers lament about the lack of engagemet on the part of our human capital assets-i.e.our employees- but what have you done for them lately. Are they treated as an afterthought or do you treat them as vital parts of your organization? Do you as human resource professionals treat managers as customers and fellow team members or do you treat them as an imposition who are there to make your life miserable.

The quality of your workplace is in direct relatioship to the level of your customer satisfaction deliverance. That means satisfied employees and satisfied hiring managers. And while you are at it, do't forget your outside vendors.

Posted via email from hrstrategist@Net-Speed

Supreme Court issues ruling in FLSA arena

Petitioner Kasten brought an antiretaliation suit against his formeremployer, respondent (Saint-Gobain), under the Fair Labor Stan-dards Act of 1938 (Act), which provides minimum wage, maximum hour, and overtime pay rules; and which forbids employers “to dis-charge . . . any employee because such employee has filed any com-plaint” alleging a violation of the Act, 29 U. S. C. §215(a)(3). In a re-lated suit, the District Court found that Saint-Gobain violated the Act by placing timeclocks in a location that prevented workers from receiving credit for the time they spent donning and doffing work-related protective gear. In this suit Kasten claims that he was dis-charged because he orally complained to company officials about thetimeclocks. The District Court granted Saint-Gobain summaryjudgment, concluding that the Act’s antiretaliation provision did notcover oral complaints. The Seventh Circuit affirmed.
Held: The scope of statutory term “filed any complaint” includes oral, aswell as written, complaints. Pp. 4–15.
(a) The interpretation of the statutory phrase “depends upon read-ing the whole statutory text, considering the [statute’s] purpose andcontext . . . , and consulting any precedents or authorities that informthe analysis.” Dolan v. Postal Service, 546 U. S. 481, 486. The text, taken alone, cannot provide a conclusive answer here. Some diction-ary definitions of “filed” contemplate a writing while others permitusing “file” in conjunction with oral material. In addition to diction-ary definitions, state statutes and federal regulations sometimes con-template oral filings, and contemporaneous judicial usage shows thatoral filings were a known phenomenon at the time of the Act’s pas-sage. Even if “filed,” considered alone, might suggest a narrow interpretation limited to writings, “any complaint” suggests a broad inter-pretation that would include an oral complaint. Thus, the three-word phrase, taken by itself, cannot answer the interpretive question. The Act’s other references to “filed” also do not resolve the linguistic ques-tion. Some of those provisions involve filed material that is virtually always in writing; others specifically require a writing, and the re-mainder, like the provision here, leave the oral/written question un-resolved. Since “filed any complaint” lends itself linguistically to thebroader, “oral” interpretation, the use of broader language in other statutes’ antiretaliation provisions does not indicate whether Con-gress did or did not intend to leave oral grievances unprotected here.Because the text, taken alone, might, or might not, encompass oralcomplaints, the Court must look further. Pp. 4–8.
(b)
Several functional considerations indicate that Congress in-tended the antiretaliation provision to cover oral, as well as written, complaints. Pp. 8–14.
(1)
A narrow interpretation would undermine the Act’s basic ob-jective, which is to prohibit “labor conditions detrimental to themaintenance of the minimum standard of living necessary for health,efficiency, and general well-being of workers,” 29 U. S. C. §202(a).The Act relies for enforcement of its substantive standards on “infor-mation and complaints received from employees,” Mitchell v. Robert DeMario Jewelry, Inc., 361 U. S. 288, 292, and its antiretaliation pro-vision makes the enforcement scheme effective by preventing “fear ofeconomic retaliation” from inducing workers “quietly to accept sub-standard conditions,” ibid. Why would Congress want to limit the en-forcement scheme’s effectiveness by inhibiting use of the Act’s com-plaint procedure by those who would find it difficult to reduce theircomplaints to writing, particularly the illiterate, less educated, oroverworked workers who were most in need of the Act’s help at thetime of passage? Limiting the provision’s scope to written complaintscould prevent Government agencies from using hotlines, interviews, and other oral methods to receive complaints. And insofar as the provision covers complaints made to employers, a limiting reading would discourage using informal workplace grievance procedures tosecure compliance with the Act. The National Labor Relations Act’s antiretaliation provision has been broadly interpreted as protecting workers who simply “participate[d] in a [National Labor Relations]Board investigation.” NLRB v. Scrivener, 405 U. S. 117, 123. The similar enforcement needs of this related statute argue for a broad interpretation of “complaint.” The Act’s requirement that an em-ployer receive fair notice of an employee’s complaint can be met byoral, as well as written, complaints. Pp. 8–12.
(2) Given the delegation of enforcement powers to federal administrative agencies, their views about the meaning of the phrase should be given a degree of weight. The Secretary of Labor has con-sistently held the view that “filed any complaint” covers both oral and written complaints. The Equal Employment Opportunity Commis-sion has set out a similar view in its Compliance Manual and in mul-tiple briefs. These views are reasonable and consistent with the Act. And the length of time they have been held suggests that they reflect careful consideration, not “post hoc rationalizatio[n].” Motor Vehicle Mfrs. Assn. of United States, Inc. v. State Farm Mut. Automobile Ins. Co., 463 U. S. 29, 50. Pp. 12–13.
(3)
After engaging in traditional statutory interpretation meth-ods, the statute does not remain sufficiently ambiguous to warrantapplication of the rule of lenity. Pp. 13–14.
(c)
This Court will not consider Saint-Gobain’s alternative claimthat the antiretaliation provision applies only to complaints filedwith the Government, since that claim was not raised in the certio-rari briefs and since its resolution is not a “ ‘predicate to an intelli-gent resolution’ ” of the oral/written question at issue, Caterpillar Inc. v. Lewis, 519 U. S. 61, 75, n. 13. Pp. 14–15.
570 F. 3d 834, vacated and remanded.

Posted via email from hrstrategist@Net-Speed

What will they think of next?

An Employer's FMLA Nightmare? Hooters Offers Fake "Doctor's Notes" to Skip Work During NCAA Tourney

Posted by Jeff Nowak on March 17, 2011

Over the upcoming weeks, when Carl the Custodian is missing from your workplace, you may want to give your local Hooters Restaurant a call.  He just might be there watching the NCAA tournament. 

Hooters has unveiled a marvelous marketing ploy to get customers through their doors during the NCAA tournament -- the Company is offering doctor's notes excusing employees from work on March 17 and 18 for any one of a number of basketball-related "medical" issues.  Of course, the doctor's note, entitled "Hooters National Hooky Day," is fake and nothing more than a ploy to rake in a larger share of college basketball fans.  In fact, Hooters' official Rules (pdf) make it clear that the employee should look for alternative employment if he/she submits the doctor's note as "an actual excuse to stay out of work."

But Hooters clearly is onto something.  According to a report by Challenger, Gray & Christmas, Inc., an outplacement firm, employee time spent viewing NCAA tournament games online during the work day will cost employers 8.4 million hours in lost productivity which, when multiplied by “the average hourly earnings … among private-sector workers [makes] the financial impact exceed $192 million.”

Take your best guess as to how FMLA leave will be impacted by the NCAA tourney.  Suffice it to say, however, that HR professionals and leave administrators may have a busy next couple of weeks.  To combat Family and Medical Leave Act abuse during the NCAA tourney (and throughout the year), feel free to browse our previous posts on the topic here and here.

From Franczek Radelet P.C via Employment Law Information Network

Posted via email from hrstrategist@Net-Speed

Ultimate Improvement Cycle: A Six Sigma Approach to Human Capital Management Course Offerings expand

We are have now scheduled our unique course on the role of Six Sigma in HR in several locations:

March 21 and 23, 2011  Hillsborough Community College Institute for Corporate and Continuing Education Tampa, FL

April 4 and 6, 2011        Polk Corporate College Lakeland, FL

July 21 and 22, 2011     North Central Florida SHRM Gainesville, FL

July 26 and 27, 2011    Hillsborough Community College Institute for Corporate and Continuing Education Tampa, FL

August 2011 (TBD)       Strategic HR Partners Columbus, GA

Posted via email from hrstrategist@Net-Speed

Has your organization evolved with the times?

In a conversation recently with Russ Moen, VP of Human Resources at ExpressPro, he suggested that I should pick up a copy of the book Intellectual Capital by Thomas Stewart. The book looks at the new role of human capital within the business community. If we still look at employees based on the "position they hold" rather than the skills they bring to the table, we are suffering from a death spiral. Released in paperback in 1999 it is still very timely looking at the world we are operating in.

Stewart presents some guidelines for us to consider:

First, he discusses new signs of trouble to show us that our jobs might be in trouble. They are 1) Are you learning? 2) If your job were open, would you get it? 3) Are you being milked? 4) Do you know what you contribute? 5) What would you do if your job disappeared tomorrow? 6) Are you having fun yet? and 7) Are you worried about your job?

From these seven questions, Stewart discusses the new career model for the coming journey. Has your organization changed with the times? Have you recognized the tenants of the new career model? Let's look at the tenants:

1. A career is a series of giigs, not a series of steps - When you look at your human capital assets, are you viewing them from the pervue of a ladder or are you looking at what new skills they bring to your organization separate from what department they report to?
2. Project Management is the furnace in which successful careers are forged. We are looking at organizations that have learned that corss-functional teams are what generates innovation. In doing so the old model of silo mentality and rising within your silo is gone.
3. In the new organization, power flows from expertise, not from position. There is an old adage among professionals seeking new employment that it is not who you know, it is who knows you. Part of this is being recognized for the knowledge that your human capital assets have gained over their working career. When you are recruting new talent are you looking for their previous position or for the knowledge assets they bring to your organization?
4. Most roles in an organization can be performed by either insiders or outsiders. If you are hiring based on expertise, then the talent does not have to be working within your doors today. They could just as easily be a consultant who comes in for the project and moves on to the next project and client when yours is finished.
5. Careers are made in markets, not hierarchies. Charles Handy suggests that all of your human capital assets should be self-employed. If this is so the way you approach your human capital assets has to change. You do not hire them nor own them. They are leasing their services to you on a project basis for the nature of their intellectual assets.
6. The fundamental career choice is not between one company and another, but between specializing and generalizing. The new human capital assets are loyal to what they do not to your organization. If asked they do not begin by saying they work for your organization, They talk about what they do. This means they are far more concerned with the expertise they have rather than the industry you are in. The expertise crosses industry lines as easily as water.
7. Intellectual capital is the source of wealth for individuals as well as for the organization - and it is held in common between them. Your organization is valued on what you bring to the marketplace. That value is derived from what your human capital assets bring to your organization. The resulting inte4raction means that you need to change the position they play within your organization.

Your organization needs to make the decision whether you play a vital role in the marketplace or are counting the days until you disappear. A major part of this decision will be based on the position you place your human capital assets into. If you still function with the department hierarchial arrangement where the management tries to drive the organization down on the human capital you will fail. On the other hand, if you recognize the value of the expertise that is housed within your four walls in the minds of your human capital then you have a running chance to evolve as the marketplace evolves. The human capital assets will dictate whether you have the ability to  grow and introduce new innovation to the future business world.

Posted via email from hrstrategist@Net-Speed

Using Facebook at Work? Bay Area IT Consultants Say Change These 5 Account Settings

From PRWire 3/10/11

As it becomes more common to access Facebook in the workplace, the way IT consultants monitor computers within a company has also changed. Security risks to the networks, and therefore to the individuals who are using them, have increased. People 1st, a Bay Area IT consulting firm, recommends making five changes to protect the security of the network and the identity of the user.

The default privacy options for Facebook tend to be loose; information is made available to other users, third-party apps, and advertisers. One of the first things any Facebook user should do to help protect network security and their own privacy is access their account settings and change the default privacy options.

Bay Area IT Consultants People 1st explain how to make five important settings changes people need to make on their computer before accessing Facebook at work.

1)    Applications being used. To view these settings, go to "Account" > "Privacy Settings." Under "Apps and Websites," click "Edit your settings." Click the "Edit Settings" button next to "Apps you use." All the apps that are authorized to interact with the account are listed. Users can select which info they want to allow their apps to access, or delete unused apps entirely. People 1st recommends limiting access to profile information and friends' information as much as possible.

2)    Information friends can share. Many games and third-party apps on Facebook can pull information from a user's friends, even ones who don't use the app. To disable permission for other people's apps to have access to personal information, to "Account" > "Privacy Settings." Under "Apps and Websites," click "Edit your settings." Click the "Edit Settings" button next to "Info accessible through your friends" and uncheck all boxes.

3)    Social ads. These are generated by actions of a user or their friend, and will pop up on the right-hand side of a Facebook page. To turn off this setting, go to "Account" > "Account Settings," click on the "Facebook Ads" tab and choose "No one."

4)    Instant Personalization. When enabled, this feature allows external partner websites like Pandora and Yelp to use Facebook information to personalize their website for the viewer. To disable this feature, go to "Account" > "Privacy Settings." Under "Apps and Websites," click "Edit your settings." Click the "Edit Settings" button next to "Instant Personalization." Uncheck the box under "Enable instant personalization on partner websites."

5)    Remote sign-out. Left work and then realized that Facebook was still open on the computer? This nifty feature allows users to sign out of a computer from a remote location. Go to "Account" > "Account Settings." Click the "Change" button next to "Account Security." Under "Most Recent Activity," computers that are logged in to the account will be visible. To disconnect a remote computer, click "end activity."

Read more: http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/g/a/2011/03/10/prweb8196854.DTL#ixzz1GJLuKJET

Posted via email from hrstrategist@Net-Speed

What would the Founding Fathers Think?

Every business enterprise is continually seeking that next big event that will push the organization to the next plateau in its evolution. One of the center features in this quest is to honor the role that diversity of thought and actions play in this quest. 

If we look around the globe at this place and time, we are confronted with constant reminders that the world at this moment has forgotten about the role of diversity in making our organizations great. You tell me that you want your employees to become  engaged in your organizations, but then you send them the message that this is the way we will think and act. If you have differing views in this regard live with it. Our elected officials in their recent actions have sent the same message to the populous- "There is only one way we can act, My way."

  Our founding fathers came to this country based on the belief in varying views. It was their anticipation that we would be tolerant of others views. We send the wrong message to the citizenry and our organizations when we act and behave differently. Our employees are now in a different role then they were even 20 years ago. They are vital assets to the success of your operation. When we send the message that we know we need you but you are needed on our terms not yours you lose the investment that employees  can bring to your organization.

Let me suggest some strategies for taking your corporation to the next level:

Strategy #1: Place your one mind view on hold and listen to the voice of your employees. They in many cases have a better understanding of your organization then you do.

Strategy #2: Remove all opportunities for silo mentality thinking within your organization. You have a decision to make or a new direction to move into, Get the help of a cross-functional team to assist the travel down the path to success.

 Strategy #3: Take the time to understand the results of your decisions both pro and con so that you totally understand the outcomes of your decision. While a decision may look good on paper, in reality it may have a completely different result once it is introduced. It is just possible that by the time you realize you have made an error in judgment the damage may have already been done.

It is your choice as business enterprise management whether you are able to succeed or fail in this global workplace. It is your choice whether you send the message to your human capital assets that you recognize the contribution that they make or do you tell them that as far as you are concerned they are just another number on the balance sheet.

Posted via email from hrstrategist@Net-Speed

Are you taking a wait and see attitude towards Health Care reform?

SHRM has advised that this is not the right direction to go in order to not being behind the 8 ball in the log run. Today a federal Judge in Penacola, who previously ruled against the health care overhaul, said the states must continue implementing President Barack Obama's health care overhaul even though he has declared it unconstitutional.
He says Obama administration attorneys have one week to appeal.If they don't meet that deadline, Vinson says the states can consider the law invalid. The case is one of several challenges to the health care law, which is almost certain to end up before the U.S. Supreme Court. In his ruling, Vinson says it's in the best interest of the nation to continue with the massive health overhaul while the cases work their way through the legal system.

Posted via email from hrstrategist@Net-Speed

Daniel Bloom & Associates, Inc. announces organizational commitment to new ISO Standard

The International Organization for Standardization, the organization resposible for establishing a series of standards which gover how we operate as a business organization has released a new addition to its growing list (18500 so far). In November 2010 they released ISO 26000 covering the area of Social Responsibility, While voluntary in nature, may countries have signed on to agree to its tenants.

ISO 26000 demonstrates that social responsibility can have a direct positive impact on both the organization operations and more important to the bottom line. It is described as a multi-faceted approach that should be integrated into how we conduct business. It establishes a proactive midset that crosses across planning, execution and stakeholder interaction. It calls for applying the lens of social responsibility across the organization based on seven principles of the standard.

Seven Principles of Social Responsibility

ISO 26000 sees social responsibility from the point of view of seve distinct interdepedent principles:

• Accoutability to those affected by our corporate decisios
• Complete transparecy of our policies, decisions and activitites
• The organization is based on ethical thinkig across the board withinthe organization
• Respect for the iterests of all the stakeholders from employees to our cliets and partners
• Respect for the rule of law
• Respect for the iternational orms of Behavior

Respect for huma rights both within the organizations we serve and our own house.

In return we feel the benefit for Daniel Bloom and Associates, Inc. will be in the areas of:

1. Better decision makig, kowledge of risks, and risk management
2. Enhancement of public trust and strog organizational reputations in the marketplace
3. The development of positive stakeholder relationships
4. Introduction of innovation through exposure to new perspectives and contact with a diverse range of stakeholders
5. Increased employee safety, loyalty and morale
6. Enhanced recruitment and retetio efforts for additional staff
7. Bottom-line savings due to icreased efficiency of resource utilizatio, decreased waste ad reuse of valuable by-products
8. Reliability and fairess of transactions, fair trade and the absece of corruption
9. Enhanced long term viability of the orgaizatio through sustainable atural resources and environmental services
10. Add our voice to the public good, civil society and institutions

 

 

 

 

 

 

Posted via email from hrstrategist@Net-Speed

Two US Supreme Court Decisions that Could Affect HR

Daniel Bloom CEO of Daniel Bloom and Associates, Inc. is not a licensed Attorney or a member of the Bar and our views do not constitute legal advice. If concerned with any of the issues i this post you should obtain legal advice from your corporate legal cousel.

On March 1 the US Supreme Court released two different decisions that could have a direct impact on HR decisions:

The first one was involving an employee who was disciplined by his supervisors because they did not like his serving in the US Military reserves:

Since a supervisor is an agent of the employer, when he causes an adverse em-ployment action the employer causes it; and when dis-crimination is a motivating factor in his doing so, it is a“motivating factor in the employer’s action,” precisely as the text requires. JUSTICE ALITO suggests that the em-ployer should be held liable only when it “should be re-garded as having delegated part of the decisionmaking power” to the biased supervisor. Ibid. But if the inde-pendent investigation relies on facts provided by the bi-ased supervisor—as is necessary in any case of cat’s-paw liability—then the employer (either directly or through the ultimate decisionmaker) will have effectively delegated the factfinding portion of the investigation to the biasedsupervisor. Contrary to JUSTICE ALITO’s suggestion, thebiased supervisor is not analogous to a witness at a benchtrial. The mere witness is not an actor in the events that are the subject of the trial. The biased supervisor and theultimate decisionmaker, however, acted as agents of the entity that the plaintiff seeks to hold liable; each of them possessed supervisory authority delegated by their em-ployer and exercised it in the interest of their employer. In sum, we do not see how “fidelity to the statutory text,” ibid., requires the adoption of an independent-investigation defense that appears nowhere in the text.And we find both speculative and implausible JUSTICE ALITO’s prediction that our Nation’s employers will sys-tematically disfavor members of the armed services intheir hiring decisions to avoid the possibility of cat’s-pawliability, a policy that would violate USERRA in any event. We therefore hold that if a supervisor performs an act motivated by antimilitary animus that is intended by the supervisor to cause an adverse employment action,3 and if that act is a proximate cause of the ultimate employment action, then the employer is liable under USERRA. 4UnderBoth Mulally and Korenchuk were acting within the scopeof their employment when they took the actions that allegedly caused Buck to fire Staub. A “reprimand . . . for workplace failings” constitutes conduct within the scope of an agent’s employment. Faragher v. Boca Raton, 524U. S. 775, 798–799 (1998). As the Seventh Circuit recog-nized, there was evidence that Mulally’s and Korenchuk’s actions were motivated by hostility toward Staub’s mili-tary obligations. There was also evidence that Mulally’sand Korenchuk’s actions were causal factors underlying Buck’s decision to fire Staub. Buck’s termination notice expressly stated that Staub was terminated because hehad “ignored” the directive in the Corrective Action. Fi-nally, there was evidence that both Mulally and Koren-chuk had the specific intent to cause Staub to be termi-nated. Mulally stated she was trying to “‘get rid of’” Staub, and Korenchuk was aware that Mulally was “‘outto get’” Staub. Moreover, Korenchuk informed Buck, Proctor’s personnel officer responsible for terminatingemployees, of Staub’s alleged noncompliance with Mu-lally’s Corrective Action, and Buck fired Staub immedi-ately thereafter; a reasonable jury could infer that Koren-chuk intended that Staub be fired. The Seventh Circuit therefore erred in holding that Proctor was entitled to judgment as a matter of law. It is less clear whether the jury’s verdict should be reinstated or whether Proctor is entitled to a new trial. —————— view as to whether the employer would be liable if a co-worker, rather than a supervisor, committed a discriminatory act that influenced the ultimate employment decision. We also observe that Staub took advan-tage of Proctor’s grievance process, and we express no view as towhether Proctor would have an affirmative defense if he did not. Cf. Pennsylvania State Police v. Suders, 542 U. S.

The secod one involved the question of whether certain corporate documets could be shielded from disclosure under the Freedom of Information Act

Corporations do not have “personal privacy” for the purposes ofExemption 7(C). Pp. 3–12.
(a) AT&T argues that the word “personal” in Exemption 7(C) incor-porates the statutory definition of “person,” which includes corpora-tions, §551(2). But adjectives do not always reflect the meaning ofcorresponding nouns. “Person” is a defined term in the statute; “per-sonal” is not. When a statute does not define a term, the Court typi-cally “give[s] the phrase its ordinary meaning.” Johnson v. United States, 559 U. S. ___, ___. “Personal” ordinarily refers to individuals.People do not generally use terms such as personal characteristics or personal correspondence to describe the characteristics or correspon-dence of corporations. In fact, “personal” is often used to mean pre-cisely the opposite of business-related: We speak of personal expenses and business expenses, personal life and work life, personal opinion and a company’s view. Dictionary definitions also suggest that “per-sonal” does not ordinarily relate to artificial “persons” like corpora-tions.
AT&T contends that its reading of “personal” is supported by the common legal usage of the word “person.” Yet while “person,” in a le-gal setting, often refers to artificial entities, AT&T’s effort to ascribe a corresponding legal meaning to “personal” again elides the differ-ence between “person” and “personal.” AT&T provides scant support for the proposition that “personal” denotes corporations, even in a le-gal context.
Regardless of whether “personal” can carry a legal meaning apart from its ordinary one, statutory language should be construed “inlight of the terms surrounding it.” Leocal v. Ashcroft, 543 U. S. 1, 9. Exemption 7(C) refers not just to the word “personal,” but to the term“personal privacy.” “Personal” in that phrase conveys more than just“of a person”; it suggests a type of privacy evocative of human con-cerns—not the sort usually associated with an entity like AT&T.AT&T does not cite any other instance in which a court has expresslyreferred to a corporation’s “personal privacy.” Nor does it identify any other statute that does so. While AT&T argues that this Court has recognized “privacy” interests of corporations in the FourthAmendment and double jeopardy contexts, this case does not call forthe Court to pass on the scope of a corporation’s “privacy” interests asa matter of constitutional or common law. AT&T contends that the FCC has not demonstrated that the phrase “personal privacy” neces-sarily excludes corporations’ privacy. But construing statutory lan-guage is not merely an exercise in ascertaining “the outer limits of [aword’s] definitional possibilities,” Dolan v. Postal Service, 546 U. S. 481, 486, and AT&T has provided no sound reason in the statutorytext or context to disregard the ordinary meaning of the phrase.Pp. 3–9.
(b) The meaning of “personal privacy” in Exemption 7(C) is further clarified by two pre-existing FOIA exemptions. Exemption 6, whichCongress enacted eight years before Exemption 7(C), covers “person-nel and medical files and similar files the disclosure of which would constitute a clearly unwarranted invasion of personal privacy.” §552(b)(6). This Court has regularly referred to Exemption 6 as in-volving an “individual’s right of privacy,” Department of State v. Ray, 502 U. S. 164, 175, and Congress used in Exemption 7(C) the samephrase—“personal privacy”—used in Exemption 6. In contrast, FOIA Exemption 4, which protects “trade secrets and commercial or finan-cial information obtained from a person and privileged or confiden-tial,” §552(b)(4), clearly applies to corporations. Congress did not useany language similar to that in Exemption 4 in Exemption 7(C).Pp. 9–11.

Our primary concern is with the first case (Staub vs. Porctor Hospital), We fully understand that you cannot control the minds of your human capital assets. The problem comes when you allow those views to guide your human resource policies and actions. As HR Managers we have an obligation to our organizations to insure that any discipliary actions taken in the case of a employee are based on authentic problem areas, not one that is clouded by personal views. It is inherent on HR professionals include this distinction in ongoing management training.

Posted via email from hrstrategist@Net-Speed

Relocation Announcement

Site Selection magazine is reporting that their subcribers have reported a umber of expansion and new locations over the past several months. A full list of these projects can be found at http://www.siteselection.com/impact/link_impact.cfm?c=[ID]&a=189

 

 

Posted via email from hrstrategist@Net-Speed

Planning on sitting for the 2011 CRP Exam

Daniel Bloom & Associates, Inc is offering its 21st annual review class for the 2011 Certified Relocation Professional exam on May 15-17 in Las Vegas at the Caesar's Palace. Attended by nearly 1000 professionals since its inception, this three day review covers the highlights of the 2011 ERC Source Materials. Participants receive a 794 question pre-test, a set of overheads, admission to the seminar ad a second 125 question exam on the last day of the seminar. More information ca be found at http://www.dbaicosulting.com/pages/CRPReview.php.>

Early registration fee is valid until March 31, 2011.

Posted via email from hrstrategist@Net-Speed

We need to take time and smell the roses

Warren Buffet when asked about the way things work is quoted as telling the following parable. "Let's say that it was 24 hours before you were born, and a genie appeared and said, 'What I'm going to do is let you set the rules of the society into which you will be born. You can set the economic rules and the social rules, and whatever rules you set will apply during your lifetime and your children's lifetimes.' And you'll say, 'Well, that's nice, but what's the catch?' And the genie says, 'Here's the catch. You don't know if you're going to be born rich or poor, white or black, male or female, able-bodied or infirm, intelligent or retarded.' I look at this scenario and wonder whether the politicians really get the idea. Do our members of management really get the idea.

Management and members of certain political leanings have forgotten this idea. We as organizations are dependent on the contributions of our human capital. They become engaged with our organizations when they feel that we are providing the atmosphere where they can function and thrive. You as an organization need human capital that want to come to work everyday. This means you need them to have the skills, the talents, the knowledge that is demanded by the global marketplace. This means in order for us to be competitive we need an educated populous. We need a populous that can look at a problem and critically think it through to solution.

What we do not need to be doing in these times is to cut spending to education, health care, the arts and other programs that enhance the well being of our human capital. Management and politicians ought to be required to walk in the shoes of their human talent and see what they really face in the current economic times. See what it is like to be confronted with circumstances which make them less then optimum talent.

Management has to consider that their previous habits have brought on some dire scenarios for our survival and they should not demand of our officials that we know we have been wrong but don't hold us responsible so make sure that environmental regulations clean up our mistakes.

We are in tough financial times but the rush to cut expenses both in society and in our organizations have to be tempered with what is right for the welfare of our human capital. We need to look at what our superstructure needs to meet their needs. Money is tight so you cut mass transit under the guise that no one will use it. You cut outlets to teach critical thinking like NPR. You cut out access to quality health care for the poor because you dislike the philosophy of the delivery vehicle.

In the log run what you end up with is human talent that is unengaged,are non contributors to society, our organizations and the world.

Posted via email from hrstrategist@Net-Speed

We need to take time and smell the roses

Warren Buffet when asked about the way things work is quoted as telling the following parable. "Let's say that it was 24 hours before you were born, and a genie appeared and said, 'What I'm going to do is let you set the rules of the society into which you will be born. You can set the economic rules and the social rules, and whatever rules you set will apply during your lifetime and your children's lifetimes.' And you'll say, 'Well, that's nice, but what's the catch?' And the genie says, 'Here's the catch. You don't know if you're going to be born rich or poor, white or black, male or female, able-bodied or infirm, intelligent or retarded.' I look at this scenario and wonder whether the politicians really get the idea. Do our members of management really get the idea.

Management and members of certain political leanings have forgotten this idea. We as organizations are dependent on the contributions of our human capital. They become engaged with our organizations when they feel that we are providing the atmosphere where they can function and thrive. You as an organization need human capital that want to come to work everyday. This means you need them to have the skills, the talents, the knowledge that is demanded by the global marketplace. This means in order for us to be competitive we need an educated populous. We need a populous that can look at a problem and critically think it through to solution.

What we do not need to be doing in these times is to cut spending to education, health care, the arts and other programs that enhance the well being of our human capital. Management and politicians ought to be required to walk in the shoes of their human talent and see what they really face in the current economic times. See what it is like to be confronted with circumstances which make them less then optimum talent.

Management has to consider that their previous habits have brought on some dire scenarios for our survival and they should not demand of our officials that we know we have been wrong but don't hold us responsible so make sure that environmental regulations clean up our mistakes.

We are in tough financial times but the rush to cut expenses both in society and in our organizations have to be tempered with what is right for the welfare of our human capital. We need to look at what our superstructure needs to meet their needs. Money is tight so you cut mass transit under the guise that no one will use it. You cut outlets to teach critical thinking like NPR. You cut out access to quality health care for the poor because you dislike the philosophy of the delivery vehicle.

In the log run what you end up with is human talent that is unengaged,are non contributors to society, our organizations and the world.

Posted via email from hrstrategist@Net-Speed

Common Sense or Rule of Law

Before I left this morning to conduct a breakout session at the North Central Florida SHRM chapter's expo, I saw a news piece on the television in which a young girl was sent home from school because she violated a school dress code requirement that forbid the wearing of hats, hoods etc. to school. The weather outside was in the twenties and she wore a jacket with a hood to shield her from the cold.

So let me turn the scenario around and ask you whether this could apply to your organization. Whether they are current or not every one of our organizations have a set of rules and procedures to govern the behavior of our employees in the workplace. We are not questioning the importance of their presence. We are asking whether we are so ingrained in their implementation that we fail to use common sense in the way we apply them to the workplace. Are we so set in our ways that we present the appearance that we have a zero tolerance for digressions from the procedures even when the  employee has a valid basis for the actions they took?

While as an HR professional I am not in favor of a wide open range of options, I am also aware that only under certain circumstances does the way an employee dresses have any direct impact on whether they are able to complete the bona-fide duties of their position. I would suggest that we as human capital managers need to begin to consider whether our rules and regulations so set in stone that we can't  allow for some common sense flexibility in the workplace.Our first responsibility to our organizations should be to create an atmosphere that recognizes the worth of each of our human capital assets. This sense of worth may not be indicated by the way they dress in the workplace.

Posted via email from hrstrategist@Net-Speed

Can I require call ins from Employee's on Leave?

From the Jackson Lewis Law Firm:

 

Company Call-in Policy Upheld, No Interference with Employee's FMLA Rights

Date:

2.8.2011

An employer did not interfere with its employee’s rights under the Family and Medical Leave Act by firing her for violating repeatedly the company call-in policy, a federal appeals court in St. Louis has ruled in an unpublished decision.  Thompson v. CenturyTel of Central Arkansas LLC, No. 09-3602 (Dec. 3, 2010). The Court also ruled that the FMLA did not require an employer to provide its employee with written notice of its call-in policy each time she request leave.

Posted via email from hrstrategist@Net-Speed

Be careful what you do!

Green Bay Dressed Beef LLC and OFCCP Settle Gender Discrimination Case

On February 3, 2011, the U.S. Department of Labor (DOL)’s Office of Federal Contract Compliance Programs (OFCCP) announced that Federal contractor Green Bay Dressed Beef LLC (Green Bay) has agreed to settle a gender discrimination case for $1.65 million in back pay, interest and benefits to 970 women who were rejected for general labor positions at the company’s plant in Green Bay, Wisconsin, in 2006 and 2007.

Posted via email from hrstrategist@Net-Speed

National Labor Relations Board announces settlement in social media case

February 7, 2011
Contact:
Office of Public Affairs
202-273-1991
publicinfo@nlrb.gov
www.nlrb.gov

Settlement reached in case involving discharge for Facebook comments

A settlement has been reached in a case involving the discharge of a Connecticut ambulance service
employee for posting negative comments about a supervisor on her Facebook page.
The NLRB’s Hartford regional office issued a complaint against American Medical Response of
Connecticut, Inc., on October 27, 2010, alleging that the discharge violated federal labor law
because the employee was engaged in protected activity when she posted the comments about her
supervisor, and responded to further comments from her co-workers. Under the National Labor
Relations Act, employees may discuss the terms and conditions of their employment with coworkers
and others.
The NLRB complaint also alleged that the company maintained overly-broad rules in its employee
handbook regarding blogging, Internet posting, and communications between employees, and that it
had illegally denied union representation to the employee during an investigatory interview shortly
before the employee posted the negative comments on her Facebook page.
Under the terms of the settlement approved today by Hartford Regional Director Jonathan
Kreisberg, the company agreed to revise its overly-broad rules to ensure that they do not improperly
restrict employees from discussing their wages, hours and working conditions with co-workers and
others while not at work, and that they would not discipline or discharge employees for engaging in
such discussions.
The company also promised that employee requests for union representation will not be denied in
the future and that employees will not be threatened with discipline for requesting union
representation. The allegations involving the employee’s discharge were resolved through a
separate, private agreement between the employee and the company.
The National Labor Relations Board is an independent federal agency vested with the authority to
safeguard employees’ rights to organize and to determine whether to have a union as their collective
bargaining representative, and to prevent and remedy unfair labor practices committed by private
sector employers and unions.
###
News Release
National Labor Relations Board
Office of the General Counsel

Posted via email from hrstrategist@Net-Speed

New added partner to the DBAI partners

For some time we have been seeking the addition of an immigration attorney to our DBAI Partners who followed a similar business model and could advise our clients on issues in this arena.

Today we had a productive discussion with Jon Velie the Managing Partner of the Velie Law Firm out of Oklahoma City, OK and have added the firm to our partner table. The firm will provide a free initial consultation to any organization who has a question regarding the hiring of immigration status talent that you might be considering bringing into your talnet pool.

Look for Jon's posts on our Posterous blog.

Posted via email from hrstrategist@Net-Speed

Relocation Announcement

Copart Inc. will move its headquarters out of Fairfield and shift its head offices to Grand Junction, Texas, the company said Thursday, a departure that jolts California's already wobbly economy.

The company, one of theSan Francisco Bay Area's largest public companies, employs an estimated 334 workers at its Fairfield facility. Copart will exit the current headquarters as soon as late 2012.

Posted via email from hrstrategist@Net-Speed

Growing War for Talents Looms as U.S. Economy Continues to Recover.

Normal 0 false false false EN-US X-NONE X-NONE

MILWAUKEE, Feb. 4, 2011 -- Manpower Inc., (NYSE: MAN) world leader in innovative workforce solutions, has warned that continuing high levels of unemployment are coupled with large numbers of unfilled job vacancies as the January U.S. jobs report, released today by the Bureau of Labor Statistics, showed the economy created 36,000 jobs last month and the unemployment rate fell by 0.4 of a percentage point to nine percent. Manpower announced at the World Economic Forum Annual meeting last week that the world has entered a new age, where employers will be awakened to the power of humans as the future drivers of economic growth as access to talent replaces access to capital as the key economic differentiator. Aging workforces, the collaborative power of rapidly-evolving technologies, the need for companies to do more with less, and the problem of the skills young people are being equipped with not matching the skills businesses need are converging, making talent attraction and retention critical in order for organizations to gain a competitive edge.   "As the economy begins to click into second gear, employers are hiring but they are doing so with extreme caution. They will only hire individuals who have the exact specificity of skills they are looking for," said Jeffrey A. Joerres, Manpower Inc. Chairman and CEO. "The economy will gather strength as 2011 progresses and businesses will need to work with their people to unleash their full spectrum of skills and engage them on a human level to retain their best employees in an era when competition for talents becomes ever greater." Temporary employment was little changed in January, with a fall of 11,000 in the number of people taken on for temporary assignments during the month. This suggests employers still have a degree of uncertainty about the sustainability of the recovery and are opting to grow their flexible workforce rather than risk full-time hires at this stage. Manpower's quarterly Employment Outlook Survey for the first three months of 2011 shows that American employers report the most optimistic hiring intentions in more than two years.   SOURCE Manpower Inc.

Posted via email from hrstrategist@Net-Speed

Federal Court Limits FMLA conditions

The Jackson Lewis law firm in a posting on the Employment Law Information network reported that

 

Federal Court Rules Hospital Employee's Faith-Healing Vacation is Not Protected FMLA Leave

Date:

2.3.2011

An employee’s seven-week trip to the Philippines with her husband, who suffered from multiple ailments, was not protected leave under the Family and Medical Leave Act, the federal appeals court in Boston has ruled.  Tayag v. Lahey Clinic Hosp., Inc., No. 10-1169 (1st Cir. Jan. 27, 2011).  The FMLA entitles employees to 12 workweeks of unpaid leave annually “to care for the spouse … of the employee, if such spouse … has a serious health condition.”  During their trip, the employee and her husband visited family and friends, went to Mass and met with Catholic church officials.  This, the Court determined, did not comprise medical care for the employee’s husband within the meaning of the FMLA.  The Court determined the employer did not violate the FMLA by terminating the employee for taking unapproved leave and affirmed summary judgment for the employer.

Posted via email from hrstrategist@Net-Speed

Who is making the decisions within our organizations?

I was returning from a client's location this afternoon and turned on the local NPR affiliate for the latest news.They are currently conducting a three part series entitled "Post Mortem." In today' segment they discussed the fact that there are 1600 individuals within this country who carry the title of CORNER. In many of them the only qualification to make the decisions about whether someones passing must be reviewed by an autopsy, is that they be of a certain age and that they are free of any felony convictions.

After listening to the segment I began to consider, how the same scenario could be taking place within our organizations. How often do we leave human capital utilization decisions to those who do not understand the implications of their decisions on the human capital outputs. When management tries to make unsubstantiated decisions on what they think is right but without the human resource professional input, the organization will suffer in the long run. The result can lead to miss hires, failures in choosing the right individual to carry the organization into the future. Further the decisions of the organization may not take into the equation the legal issues that are required by the business you are in.

Human resources needs to be forceful about letting the management of our organizations know that we are a critical part of the decision process when considering change to our organizations. We are the ones who via our training, understand the demands on the organization talent and regulatory wise. We are the ones who understand the principles of succession planning so that we can ensure that the future of the organization is present within the talent pool of our business. Human resources department and it's professionals have the knowledge to keep us out of legal morass that is present in many organizations.

While management rightly has a major role in the decisions about the organization, they cannot be made as a silo and rule out the valuable contribution their human resource professionals make to the decision process.

Posted via email from hrstrategist@Net-Speed

Why do we do that?

The corporate mobility industry has for a long time done some things that many people consider strange at best. Back in 2005, Daniel Bloom and Associates, Inc, wrote and published the history of the relocation industry from 1955 to 2004 under the title "Just Get Me There: a  Journey through Corporate Relocation." It explains some of the reasoning on why the relocation industry acts as it does.

The book is now available through Google Books.

Posted via email from hrstrategist@Net-Speed

HireCentrix Post: Are Contact Lists Still Trade Secrets in the Age of Social Networking Sites?

Hirecentrix (http://www.hirecentrix.com) posted a notice today regarding a decision by a federal judge regarding candidate lists

Last week, a United States District Judge in New York approved the report and recommendation of a Magistrate Judge holding that a headhunter’s contact lists were not protectable trade secrets because the information therein was readily ascertainable on social networking sites. Sasqua Group, Inc. et al. v. Lori Courtney et al., 2010 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 93442 (Aug. 2, 2010) (report and recommendation).

If the recommendation is followed in other Uniform Trade Secrets Act (UTSA) cases, businesses may have to rethink the ways in which they protect their contact lists. The case also highlights the value of utilizing employment agreements containing non-competition or non-solicitation covenants.

Sasqua Group, an executive search firm for the financial services industry, sued its recently departed employee and her new firm claiming that use of Sasqua’s contacts lists constituted misappropriation of trade secrets. The contact lists identified decision-makers at financial services firms and traders who might be looking to change firms. Sasqua relied on cases from the 1980s and 1990s affording protection to seemingly comparable lists.

Defendants argued that because the information was known outside of the plaintiff’s business and was readily ascertainable from public sources, it did not constitute a trade secret. During the evidentiary hearing, Defendants walked the Magistrate Judge through how the data could be tracked down in only a few minutes on the internet. Having obtained the names of potential customers (financial institutions) by Google searches, Defendants would use LinkedIn and other social networking sites such as Bloomberg and Facebook.

The Magistrate Judge agreed with the Defendants, acknowledging in a detailed analysis that the world has significantly changed:

Posted via email from hrstrategist@Net-Speed

Results are in and the picture is not pretty

The Nation's Report Card results have been released and it tells us that our students are not making the grade in Science and Math. The Pacific Rim countries are graduating students fluent in English and with better scores then we are.

Every time I turn around someone is saying how we are the source of innovation in the world and that might have been the case in the past. But to be able to be innovative in what we do, our citizenry must be able to think through problems. They must be able to think through the ramifications of their decisions. They must be able to dissect a problem to identify the root causes behind why it is a problem.

Instead we are turning out students who do not have the elementary skills to critically think through possible solution scenarios. We are turning out students who get into the workplace and can't function because they do not understand what the problem is in the first place.

I periodically offer my time as a substitute teacher in the middle and high schools and have seen first hand students are given an assignment as simple as finding locations on a map, tell me that it is either too hard or they do not know how to do the assignment.  What we are confronted with is an educational system which teaches to the test not teaching to develop critical analytical processes. I used to teach full time as a middle school science teacher and part of my lessons plans involved lengthy lab assignments to get my students to think through the results they were gaining. We don't do that today we no longer challenge the students to think through scenarios.

So what does this mean to our human capital utilization. We have employees who flounder in our organizations, not because they are bad employees. The flounder because they do not know the right track to be taking. They flounder because as discussed in the book "The M-Factor" by Lynne Lancaster and David Stillman, they have not had the same training we did when we were in school. For example, the book discusses an employee who was not able to complete a project because the manager's notes were in handwriting and she could not read cursive handwriting.

Innovation and collaboration are critical for us to regain our place in the world marketplace. We can not do that if we do not provide coming generations with the required skills to achieve that goal. We need to forget teaching to the test. We need to challenge our students to become viable parts of the global workplace. We need to provide them with the necessary skills to critical look at the problems in the workplace and seek new and innovative ways to solve those problems. We need to prepare our next generation to be able to compete with the Pacific Rim countries on an even keel. We are not doing that now.

The result are organizations that are forced to expend valuable resources to train the new employees when they join an organization, to gain the ability to exercise the skills the organization requires but were not given to them in their educational environment. We need to work as a team on both side sof the equation to solve this critical dilemma.

Posted via email from hrstrategist@Net-Speed

Merger announcement

Normal 0 false false false EN-US X-NONE X-NONE

INEO RELOCATION TECHNOLOGIES MERGES WITH RELOCATION TAXES, LLC.   Merger positions Ineo Relocation Technologies and Relocation Taxes for strategic growth of its domestic, international and government business.

 

Centennial, CO (PR WEB) January 25, 2011 - - Ineo Relocation Technologies, the leading provider of enterprise level relocation software and expense management services, announced today the merger with Relocation Taxes, LLC the leading provider of federal and multi-state personal income tax preparation, gross-up audits/tax reconciliations and related relocation tax and consulting services for individuals, corporations and third party providers.   This merger will reunite industry innovators Robert F. Sherrill, founder of RMS and co-founder of Ineo, with David S. Oltman, co-founder of The Hessel Group and Relocation Taxes, LLC. Together they possess over 50 years of industry experience and were each instrumental in the origination of technology for the relocation gross-up and home sale accounting process, with hands on experience dating back to the early 1980's.   "This strategic merger is one that will enhance our private and public sector business as well as broaden our global operations. We will continue to offer our clients an ever expanding platform of additional professional resources each vital for compliant navigation in today's complex realm of relocation", said Robert F. Sherrill, Chairman and Ineo Relocation Technologies Co-Founder.   "This merger allows us to bring together two of the most experienced providers in the relocation services industry," said Jason Arnold, Ineo Relocation Technologies President and COO. "The assembly of such well known and experienced management talent continues to demonstrate our commitment to bring the best and brightest in the industry within The Ineo Family, offering our clients the most extensive array of innovative technology and tax services".

"Culturally this is a great fit, as both firms take immense pride in their extensive industry experience  as well as their commitment to delivering superior customer service," said David S. Oltman, CRP, newly appointed Ineo Chief Compliance Officer and Relocation Taxes co-founder.   Debbie Gioiella, Relocation Taxes, LLC co-founder, has been Relocation Taxes Director of operations since 1998. She will continue to lead and expand Relocation Taxes operations and will be responsible for all client relationship functions. Debbie believes that offering unparalleled customer service is the key to success.  Her broad knowledge in taxation, relocation, and association with a diverse client base has given her the expertise to advise clients, keep them compliant and guide them through the demands placed upon them through the ever changing economic and compliance environments.   "We look forward to working together to make this a smooth transition for both our employees and our clients.  "We are truly excited to offer the industry such a broad array of proven products and services" said Gioiella.

 

About Ineo Relocation Technologies At INEO, our business is relocation software, expense management and tax services that are instrumental in providing our customers focused solutions that meet their specific business needs.  Our history in developing relocation solutions exceeds 27 years.  It is our experience and unmatched expertise that positions us as the industry leader in relocation software development and tax services.   Our name, Ineo, is Latin for the term 'to begin'. The name is indicative that, although rich in history and experience, the company is commencing on a whole new way of doing business.  We are committed to our customers with an approach to doing business where Exceptional Service is the norm.   For more information on Ineo Relocation Technologies solutions and services, visit www.ineotech.com or contact: Ineo Relocation Technology, Corporate Headquarters, 7340 East Caley Avenue Suite 215W Centennial, CO 80111; Email: info@ineotech.com; Tel: +1 (908) 735-7196 or Fax: +1(303) 308-1874.   About Relocation Taxes Relocation Taxes, LLC provides personal income tax preparation, gross-up audits/tax reconciliations and related services for individuals being relocated or moving within both the United States and around the world.  ReloTax also provides keynote speeches with regards to corporate and government relocation tax and payroll issues for both local and national conferences.   Experienced tax professionals prepare all tax returns in complete confidence. Each return goes through a review process to insure quality and accuracy. Special attention is given to multi-state (old & new, live & work) taxation issues along with gross-ups including tax equalization and tax protection.   For more information on Relocation Taxes, LLC visit www.relocationtaxes.com or contact: Relocation Taxes, Corporate Headquarters, 372 Danbury Road Wilton, CT 06897: Email: relotax@relotax.com: Tel: +1 (203) 209-7123 or Fax: +1 (203) 529-3021.

Posted via email from hrstrategist@Net-Speed

The doors begin to open Part 2

The US Suprme Court has released its secod employment related decision of the curret term in  Thmpson vs. North America Stailess, LP

After petitioner Thompson’s fiancée, Miriam Regalado, filed a sex discrimination charge with the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) against their employer, respondent North American Stainless (NAS), NAS fired Thompson. He filed his own charge and asubsequent suit under Title VII of the Civil Rights Act, claiming that NAS fired him to retaliate against Regalado for filing her charge. The District Court granted NAS summary judgment on the ground that third-party retaliation claims were not permitted by Title VII,which prohibits discrimination against an employee “because he has made a [Title VII] charge,” 42 U. S. C. §2000e–3(a), and which permits, inter alia, a “person claiming to be aggrieved . . . by [an] alleged employment practice” to file a civil action, §2000e–5(f)(1). The en banc Sixth Circuit affirmed, reasoning that Thompson was not entitled to sue NAS for retaliation because he had not engaged in any activity protected by the statute.

The Supreme Court Held:
1. If the facts Thompson alleges are true, his firing by NAS constituted unlawful retaliation. Title VII’s antiretaliation provision mustbe construed to cover a broad range of employer conduct. Burlington N. & S. F. R. Co. v. White, 548 U. S. 53. It prohibits any employer action that “ ‘well might have “dissuaded a reasonable worker from making or supporting a [discrimination] charge,” ’” id., at 68. That test must be applied in an objective fashion, to “avoi[d] the uncertainties and unfair discrepancies that can plague a judicial effort to determine a plaintiff’s unusual subjective feelings.” Id., at 68–69. A reasonable worker obviously might be dissuaded from engaging in protected activity if she knew that her fiancé would be fired. Pp. 2–4.
2. Title VII grants Thompson a cause of action. Pp. 4–7.(a) For Title VII standing purposes, the term “person aggrieved” must be construed more narrowly than the outer boundaries of Article III. Dictum in Trafficante v. Metropolitan Life Ins. Co., 409 U. S. 205, suggesting that Title VII’s aggrievement requirement reaches asfar as Article III permits, is too expansive and the Court declines tofollow it. At the other extreme, limiting “person aggrieved” to the person who was the subject of unlawful retaliation is an artificiallynarrow reading. A common usage of the term “person aggrieved” avoids both of these extremes. The Administrative Procedure Act, which authorizes suit to challenge a federal agency by any “person. . . adversely affected or aggrieved . . . within the meaning of a relevant statute,” 5 U. S. C. §702, establishes a regime under which a plaintiff may not sue unless he “falls within the ‘zone of interests’sought to be protected by the statutory provision whose violationforms the legal basis for his complaint,” Lujan v. National Wildlife Federation, 497 U. S. 871, 883. Title VII’s term “aggrieved” incorporates that test, enabling suit by any plaintiff with an interest “ ‘arguably [sought] to be protected’ by the statutes,” National Credit Un-ion Admin. v. First Nat. Bank & Trust Co., 522 U. S. 479, 495, while excluding plaintiffs who might technically be injured in an Article IIIsense but whose interests are unrelated to Title VII’s statutory prohibitions. Pp. 4–7.(b)

Applying that test here, Thompson falls within the zone of interests protected by Title VII. He was an employee of NAS, and TitleVII’s purpose is to protect employees from their employers’ unlawful actions. Moreover, accepting the facts as alleged, Thompson is not anaccidental victim of the retaliation. Hurting him was the unlawful act by which NAS punished Regalado. Thus, Thompson is a personaggrieved with standing to sue under Title VII. P. 7. 567 F. 3d 804, reversed and remanded.

Strategy: While it is ever good policy to take out your frustrations on other employees this case plainly tells you to watch out for taking what looks like good actios whe they are not. The federal laws are very clear that you can not take certain steps becuase an employee or member of their families have filed a grievance against the orgaization. This rulig makes it increasingly crucial that you train your maagers to protect the rights of all your employees as well as creating a evironment where these kinds of situations do not arise i the first place.

Posted via email from hrstrategist@Net-Speed

Relocation Announcement

Giant-Vac, a producer of leaf and debris control equipment, is moving manufacturing to Tennessee from Connecticut and could bring in 75 new jobs.

Posted via email from hrstrategist@Net-Speed