“Figures don’t lie, but liars figure.”

Mark Twain

The leadership and talent management “facts” just don’t stop coming. In fact (no pun intended), thanks to some readers, I now have even more to share with you!

1.  42% of men compared to 34% of women say the definitely want to work beyond 65 years of age (Chartered Institute of Personnel and Development Survey 2007).

2.  Only 25% of baby boomers expect to have a “traditional” retirement–71% of those surveyed said that the “perfect retirement” was to work in some capacity with 50% not planning on ever stopping work unless they are unable to (Merrill Lynch New Retirement Study).

3. The U.S. Department of Justice reports 25% of all employees will become victims of workplace violence. 20% of all women murdered at work are committed by their partners (Victim Services of New York).

4. The Octovber 2006 survey by the Bureau of Labor Statistics suggests that only 30% of all companies have a formal program or policy in place to deal with workplace violence despite the fact that 1 million days are lost each year due to workplace assaults.

5. 17% of all workplace fatalities involve family members.  The June 2003 Workplace Violence Study by the Society for Human Resource Management (SHRM) suggested that verbal threats, verbal abuse, and inappropriate language were the most common workplace incidents reported by employees.

6. The SHRM report and other research from Mattman Security Management Consultants suggest that those most prone to cause workplace violence tend to: a) use threats or verbal abuse; 2) make suicidal comments; 3) demonstrate anger without obvious reasons; 4) express paranoid thoughts; and 5) experience increased family or home problems and challenges.

7. Executive coaching is often offered for various presenting problems.  The top reasons for coaching according to a recent survey of 2,556 human resources executives by Boston based Novations group suggested that 72% were to address performance problems, 69% to communicate performance standards and expectations, and 69% was to accelerate growth of high performers.

8. Ever wonder what executive coaches charge?  A recent survey from Sherpa Coachng suggests a range of less than $75.00 per hour to more than $500 per hour.  Approximately 41% charge between $150 to $299.00 per hour.

9. In a recent 2008 survey by Right Management of midlevel and senior leaders, the top reasons employees are leaving their jobs include: 30% for lack of new internal opportunities, 25% due to poor leadership, 22% because of poor relationships with their boss and 21% because they felt their efforts were not valued.

10. In the same Right Management survey, only 43% of those staying with their organization reported being engaged and commited to the company. 

“A statistician drowned while crossing a stream that was, on average 6 inches deep” so tread lightly with these “facts”….Be well….

Technorati Tags: talent management, succession planning, coaching, executive coaching, executive development, surveys, retentin, engagement, workplace violence, turnover, kenneth nowack, ken nowack, nowack

HOT READS FOR THE PRACTIONER

Title: Smart Talent Management

Competencies: talent management, strategic planning

Who benefits: organizations

Consultant Usage: senior level business and organizational consultants

What’s it about? I have just finished reading my colleague Ken Nowack’s most recent posting (see posting immediately below this one) about talent retention and I am having a Sherlock Holmes moment.  In particular the one in which he refers to the dog barking and Watson replies to the effect that no one reported a dog barking.  Holmes’ response was “precisely Watson, precisely” (I didn’t fact check this, it’s from my memory and it is close enough). 

It is what’s missing from the posting that intrigued me.

Dr. Nowack reports on two recent studies on the challenges facing organizations and the individual initiatives being taken by organizations to retain key talent.

He also sites Dr. Beverly Kaye’s well-known and powerful leadership guide Love ‘Em or Lose ‘Em: Getting Good People to Stay along with his own research on the down side of poor management practices. 

All of this is well and good.  And there is a massive amount of similar information out there that confirms what is written in his posting. 

What is missing for me is the organizational view.  How do you approach talent retention from an organizational or systemic perspective?  Which is why I am excited about a book, Smart Talent Management: Building Knowledge Assets for Competitive Advantage, coming out September 8. 

I suspect the book will have limited appeal, in part because of the price.  And it’s not for everyone.  The book is written for academics, executives and senior level consultants.  Yet it appears to cover the much-needed global picture. 

I have only been able to access excerpts, however what I like the most is how the multiple authors fuse talent management strategies with knowledge management.  Here is an interesting quote from the previews: “The generation and acquisition of ideas and knowledge, their internal transfer and application throughout the organization, and the cross-border transfer of knowledge – all through the effective management of human talent – have become integral and important parts of contemporary management.”  The quote is also a reminder of the academic nature of the book.

The four main sections give you a pretty good idea of the book’s scope: (I) HR Planning and Staffing, (II) Training and Coaching, (III) Performance Management, and (IV) Organizational Learning and Development. 

In summary, think of this book as an add-on to the previous posting.  You do what Bev Kaye suggests.  You do what Ken Nowack suggests.  And you have organizations strategies, systems, and procedures that support the leadership and management practices needed attract, train and retain key talent and the knowledge those critical employees possess. 

Technorati Tags: retention strategies, employee development strategies, turnover, coaching, training, performance management, knowledge management, staffing, human resource planning, organizational learning, strategic planning, leadership, management practices, talent management, envisia learning, bill bradley, william bradley,   bradley

“It is not how much you do, but how much love you put in the doing.”

Mother Teresa

The topic of engaging and retaining talent seems to be even hotter. 

By now you have purchased and read the best selling book by my colleague and friend Beverly Kaye (Love em or lose em) and know all the strategies for keeping your best talent.

However, a recent study by ClearRock, an executive coaching firm located in Boston found that holding onto high performing talent is challenging–whether you love em or not.

Their recent survey of 94 worldwide organizations suggested that almost one-third reported an increase in high potential talent leaving the organization.  As a result 56% of the organizations instituted some specific retention strategy to help onto the key talent of the future.

These findings were consistent across industries with the following the most difficult to retain top talent:

1. Operations/Production
2. Computer
3. Sales/Marketing
4. Customer Service

ClearRock’s study also highlighted the ways organizations are tying to hold onto their best and brightest:

• Improving selection 63%
• Improved Training 61%
• Coaching 54%
• Onboarding/Better Orientation 51%
• Mentoring 53%
• Flexible Work Schedules 42%
• Retention Bonuses 27%
• Health Insurance 20%

In today’s globally competitive climate, turnover is important and losing your best is a critical issue both from a financial and productivity perspective. Latest estimates have nearly seven out of ten employers noting the cost (of recruitment, training, severance and productivity) of replacing a bad hire at two to three times an employee’s annual salary¹.

In a recent ASTD International conference presentation by Booz Allen Hamilton identifying the top organizational objectives for executive development, it was very clear that the main goal was to keep the best of the best.  Their study indicated the top reasons (percent responding to High or Very High Degree):

• Engage and retain individuals with high potential 79%
• Improve general strength/pipeline 74%
• Succession planning for specific positions 66%
• Increase ability to translate organizational strategy 60%
• Increase ability to meet changing market needs 60%
• Foster a “talent magnet” mindset among executives.

It still pays to be nice though….Our own research suggests that leaders who are rated low on management practices create a psychologically disengaging culture².  In our study, poor leadership resulted in statistically significantly lower job satisfaction, increased perceptions of work/life stress and increased likelihood of leaving the organization within the next 12 moinths.

In today’s free market, talent can and do go when and where they want.  But treating them better just might delay their departure a bit longer….Be well…

Technorati Tags: envisia learning, retention strategies, turnover, coaching, mentoring, leadership, talent management, kenneth nowack, ken nowack, nowack

1. Right Management. “Lower Employee Morale & Decreased Productivity Are Biggest Consequences of Bad Hires & Promotions.” Press release www.corporate-ir.net, April 11, 2006. [↩]
2. Nowack, K. (2006). Emotional intelligence: Leaders Make a Difference. HR Trends, 17, 40-42 [↩]

HOT READS FOR THE PRACTIONER

Title: Simplexity 

Competency: self-development

Who benefits: anyone interested in expanding her or his horizons

Consultant Usage: recommending this book to others may enhance your credibility

What’s it about?  Look, simply put, this book is not for everyone.  It is unlikely that anyone who reads this book will learn anything that is helpful to her or him in their day-to-day job.

Having said that, I found this book to be as fascinating as a book can be.  I couldn’t put it down.  Why do some things look oh so simple – and turn out to be incredibly complex.  And why do some extraordinary complex things have incredibly simple solutions?

I was not previously familiar with the author, Jeffrey Kluger.  My bad.  But when I stumbled across this quote from Publishers Weekly I had to know more: “Kluger makes the modern world comprehensible….”

Today’s post is exceeding simple.  No need to make it complex.  If you want to know more about human behavior, or are a fan of Freakonomics or Blink, or you are just a curious person, then don’t miss this book. 

The end!

Technorati Tags: simplicity, complexity, simplexity, human behavior, bill bradley, william bradley,   bradley

“I love to play hide and seek with my kid, but some days my goal is to find a hiding place where he can’t find me until after high school.”

Author Unknown

It is common in most of my coaching engagements to hear my clients share perceptions of high levels of work–family balance challenges and work stressors. Perceptions of stress are often quite high, with 40 to 60 per cent of all clients reporting very high levels caused by both work and home pressures and challenges¹. 

The most recent figures from the University of Wisconsin’s National Survey of Families and Households show that the average partner in a “wife role” does 31 hours of housework a week while the average “husband” does 14 — a ratio of slightly more than two to one (I wonder when I’m asked to clearn the bathroom again because it “really doesn’t look like I did it” helps to counteract this statistic).

So, does having children make you psychologically healthier, happier and less prone to depression?

Or, does it make more sense just to be the best aunts and uncles you can and remain childless throughout life?

One recent review of over 100 research studies found that parents report significantly lower marital satisfaction than non-parents.  In a recent meta-analytic review of the subject, only 38% of mothers of infants have high marital satisfaction, compared to 62% of childless women².  Other findings included:

• A significant negative correlation between marital satisfaction and number of children (d = -.13, r = -.06)
• The effect of parenthood on marital satisfaction is more negative among high socioeconomic groups, younger birth cohorts, and in more recent years

In general, parents are approximately 7% less likely to report high levels of well-being than partners/couples who are childless³.

A study by Florida State University professor Robin Simon and Vanderbilt University’s Ranae Evenson found that parents have significantly higher levels of depression than adults who do not have children. Even more surprising, the symptoms of depression do not go away when the kids grow up and move out of the house⁴. Additionally, empty-nest parents were not less distressed than their childless counterparts with respect to depression in their 2005 findings.

Evanson and Simon’s analyses were from the the National Survey of Families and Households, which was based a national sample of 13,000 U.S. adults. Using 12 items from the Center for Epidemiological Studies Depression Scale, the researchers went beyond looking at emotional well-being and researched the relationship between parenthood and symptoms of depression.

So how can you raise your level of happiness if you have kids? Maybe just pray–in Brook’s 2008 book one surprising finding was that religious people are on average almost twice as likely to be happy as non-religous people….Be well…..

Art from Brad Sachs bdsinla@hotmail.com

Technorati Tags: happiness, parenting, maritial satisfaction, envisia, envisia learning, psychological well-being, kenneth nowack, ken nowack, nowack

1. Nowack, K. (2008). Coaching for Stress: StressScan. Editor: Jonathan Passmore, Psychometrics in Coaching, Association for Coaching, UK, pp. 254-274 [↩]
2. Jean M Twenge, W. Keith Campbell and Craig A. Foster, “Parenthood and Marital Satisfaction: A Meta-Analytic Review,” Journal of Marriage and the Family 65 (August 2003): 574-583 [↩]
3. Brooks, A. (2008).  Gross national happiness: Why happiness matters for america and how we can get more of it.  New York: Basic Books [↩]
4. Simon, Robin W. (2008). “Life’s Greatest Joy?: The Negative Emotional Effects of Children on Adults.” Contexts [↩]

HOT READS FOR THE PRACTIONER

Title: Talent: Making People Your Competitive Advantage

Competencies: talent management, visionary leadership, strategic planning, strategic problem analysis

Who benefits: boards of directors, executives, organizational consultants, graduate students in human resources

Consultant Usage: internal and external organizational consultants

What’s it about?  I am without reservation a BIG fan of the author, Ed Lawler.  And I highly recommend his latest book…but not for the obvious reason.  The book is about talent management.  If you are like me, your first thought is “coaching”.  Nope.  I am not recommending it to those of you looking for a good book on coaching.  There are many better books on how to coach.

This is also not a “quick fix”, short-term book on how do we get more from our people.

It is not a book about how to train employees. 

This is a serious, no nonsense, well-balanced book for leaders, organizational consultants, boards of directors, and students of organizational design and human resources.  It is a book about creating and sustaining what Lawler calls the Human Capital (HC) Centric organization. 

It is a book about how to optimize talent attraction, retention and performance by having the right structures, systems, processes, and practices in place. As he elaborates, he points out that all too often organizations have great people but do not manage or support them correctly.

As he also fairly points out, not all organizations need to be HC-Centric.  It may not be necessary in low-tech organizations where good is good enough.  But companies that are competing on innovative products and services for which employee contact with customers is central, an HC – Centric approach is essential and critical.
 
This book is about companies that need to “get better” in the present and “get different” in the future.  Here are some of the subjects he addresses:

1. Performance management is one of the most important activities. (My note: I love people who know the difference between performance management and performance appraisal!)

2. The information system gives the same amount of attention and rigor to measures of talent costs, performance, and condition as it does to measures of equipment, materials, buildings, supplies, and financial assets.

3. The HR department is the most important staff group.

4. The corporate board has both the expertise and the information it needs to understand and advise on talent issues.

5. Leadership is shared, and managers are highly skilled in talent management.

So if you think those topics are important in your world, by all means get and devour this book.

Before I close, you may be idly wondering where I got the title for this posting.  I love humor and there is a laugh-out-loud moment in the book when Lawler cites one of his favorite Dilbert Cartoons: The pointy-haired boss says, “I have been saying for years that ‘Employees are our most valuable asset.’  It turns out that I was wrong. Money is our most valuable asset.  Employees are ninth.”  (My note: apparently employees finish just behind number 8, carbon paper.) 

How’s your organization doing?

Technorati Tags: talent, talent management, retaining talent, human capital, human centric, hc systems, reporting systems, compensation, organization structure, information systems, ed lawler, edward lawler, bill bradley, william bradley,   bradley

“Everyone is a moon, and has a dark side that he never shows to anybody.”

Mark Twain

My coaching “batting average” keeps dipping just like my favorite San Francisco Giants team.  Maybe I should start working with unflappable seniors instead of my current portfolio of successful and high powered professionals.

I’ve often wondered just how much our core personality really changes as we get older.  Can we really teach “old dogs” new tricks?

Although we associate personality as a stable and unchanging set of attributes and traits that are highly genetically predetermined (about 50% of the variance in any personality trait is pretty well set at birth) there is some new research suggesting a plasticity over time.

Maybe “zebras can change their stripes” as we they get older.  Or maybe they just fade.  What do you think?

A study by Dr. Florin Dolcos and his colleagues at the University of Alberta identified brain patterns that help healthy older people regulate and control emotion better than their younger counterparts¹.

During the study, participants were asked to evaluate the emotional content of  images as positive, neutral or negative. Their brain activity was monitored using functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) machine which takes a picture of the brain while it is functioning. The older participants over the age of 60 rated the images as less negative than the younger participants. The scans showed increased interactions between the amygdala, a brain region involved in emotion detection, and the anterior cingulate cortex, a brain region involved in emotion control (both related to emotional intelligence).

Bottom line it suggests that as we get older we improve our ability to deal with adverse situations. 

Apparently, as we age we tend to adapt and become less affected by upsetting situations.

In a groundbreaking study by Brent Roberts and Daniel Mroczek at the University of Chicago, they found that personality indeed seems to have the greatest plasticity between the ages of 20 and 40 but we still continue with personality shifts well into old age.  In general, people show enhanced confidence, emotional control, empathy/sensitivity and tolerance of stress as they age².

Their summary of personality change over time found the following:

• Gregariousness appears to decrease late in life
• Agreeableness increases significantly between the ages of 50 to 70
• Conscientiousness remained pretty stable in adolescence but dramatically increased in young adulthood and into midlife
• Emotional stability increased into young adulthood (late 30s) and then remained fairly constant as we age

Taken together, "older wine indeed matures" as we become more calm, confident, warm, and responsible. People demonstrate really unique patterns of development throughout their entire life--all related to the experiences they have during specific stages of life.

I guess I really can't wait to get older.....Be well....

Technorati Tags: personality, amygdala, emotional control, aging, trait changes in adulthood, plasticity of emotions, leadership, engagement, productivity, kenneth nowack, ken nowack, nowack

1. St. Jacques, P., Dolcos, F., & Cabeza, R.(2008). Effects of Aging on Functional Connectivity of the Amygdala during Negative Evaluation: A Network Analysis of fMRI Data. Neurobiology of Aging [Epub ahead of print - May 2008; doi:10.1016/j.neurobiolaging.2008.03.012 [↩]
2. Roberts, B. & Mroczek, D. (2008). Personality trait change in adulthood.  Current Directions in Psychological Science, 17, 31-35 [↩]

HOT READS FOR THE PRACTIONER

Title: Reaching Your Potential

Competency: career management, self-development

Who benefits: those making or managing personal career choices

Consultant Usage: career counseling

What’s it about? This Harvard Business Review article is near and dear to my heart.  The article raises the question: Are you satisfied with your efforts and accomplishments, yet still have an annoying or aching sense that you are unfulfilled?  Is your sense of professional success determined by family, friends, and colleagues?  Worse yet, is your sense of professional success determined by what you think your family, friends and colleagues expect from you?

I plead guilty.  I plead guilty to making decisions about my life based on what I thought others might think of me.  There was a time when status, money and job title were my ambitions regardless of how satisfying the work or how happy I felt inside.  And as I look back now, I realize that none of my friends or family expressed anything but positive comments…all those “shoulds” were in my head, and my head alone.

What really attracted me to this article was the sub-heading: “Fulfillment doesn’t come from clearing hurdles others set for you; it comes from clearing those you set for yourself.”

As I read that I couldn’t help flashing back decades to a line from an old Ricky Nelson song (and if you remember Ricky Nelson make sure you are planning your retirement!) “You can’t please everyone, so you might as well please yourself.”

This article is about that mantra – what pleases you you.  What gives you fulfilment.  If your career isn’t going exactly where you want it to go or if you can at least can acknowledge a lack of professional satisfaction and fulfillment, this article is for you. 

If I had to summarize the article in less than a sentence, I would say that it is about reaching your potential rather than reaching the top. 

And that means some active career management.  If you need some, I urge you to read this article.  And even if you skip over some of the paragraphs, jump to the sidebar Career Counsel: Follow Your Own Path.  It is the best three paragraphs on career management I have ever read. 

I began this article by saying it was near and dear to my heart.  The article applies to those of us retired or semi-retired as well.  The article reinforces a decision I made a year ago to devote significant time in Southern town in Mexico working with children at a very poor school.  I assure you that no paycheck ever made me feel as good or as happy as being hugged at the end of the school day by a dozen or more third and fourth graders who don’t even speak my language!

Mucho gusto! 

Technorati Tags: career, managing your career, career management, reaching your potential, developing potential, self-development, fulfillment, robert kaplan, bill bradley, william bradley,   bradley

“I feel my best when I’m happy.”

Winona Ryder

Emotions do indeed play a role in productivity, morale and customer service.

Any guess what medical condition or health risk is the most costly to employers?  If you guessed stress, smoking, obesity, inactivity or diabetes you are way off the mark.  In fact, the most costly is depression  and can affect 20% of any of us during our lifetime¹.

Depression takes a pretty heavy toll on the U.S. workplace, affecting about 6 percent of employees each year and costing over $30 billion annually in lost productivity and absenteeism.

In a recent study in the Journal of American Medical Association, researchers reported on how a telephone treatment program had a substantial impact on cost savings, return to work and minimizing the length of the depressive symptoms compared to a control group².

The study involved 604  workers at 16 large U.S. companies and included included pilots, lawyers, bankers, truckers and janitors.  The study participants completed an online questionnaire that measured health risk factors including depression. Half of those identified were encouraged to seek a mental health specialist or contact their doctor.  The other group received cognitive behavioral therapy over the phone.

Employees who received the telephone intervention worked, on average, about two weeks more during the yearlong study than those in the control group and more workers in the intervention group were still employed at the end of the study. Finally, the intervention employees were almost 40 percent more likely to recover from depression during the year long study.

Preliminary cost savings from more hours worked averaged about $1,800 per employee compared to the program’s initial $100 to $400 per worker cost.

It would appear that work/life balance benefits, including mental health insurance, would be something that employers would see value given just how prevalent and devastating depression can be in the workplace (Clinical depression affects about 7% – 18% of the population on at least one occasion in their lives, before the age of 40).

Furthermore, recent research with 24,324 employed workers, suggests that increased levels of job strain and a lack of social support at work are associated with higher risk of depression³.  Here are some keys to identifying depression in bosses and co-workers:

SIGNS AND SYMPTOMS OF DEPRESSION

One of the following major elements are typically observed for at least 2 weeks to suggest that an employee is experiencing depression.  These include:

1. Depressed mood (feeling sad, helpless or hopeless etc.)

or

2. Loss of interest in normal daily activities (e.g., having little interest in activities you typically enjoy).

It is sufficient to have either of these symptoms in conjunction with five of a list of other symptoms over a two-week period. These include:

• Feelings of overwhelming sadness or inability to feel emotions.
• A decrease in amount of pleasure or interest in almost all daily activities.
• Intense feelings of guilt, nervousness, helplessness, hopelessness, worthlessness, loneliness and/or anxiety
• Disturbed sleep. Sleeping too much or having problems sleeping can be a sign you’re depressed. Waking in the middle of the night or early in the morning and not being able to get back to sleep are typical.
• Trouble concentrating, maintaining focus or making decisions and have problems with memory.
• Changes in appetite with weight loss or gain.
• Agitation. You may seem restless, agitated, irritable and easily annoyed.
• Fatigue (mental or physical) and loss of energy.
• Low self-esteem. You feel worthless and have excessive guilt.
• Less interest in sex. If you were sexually active before developing depression, you may notice a dramatic decrease in your level of interest in having sexual relations.
• Recurrent thoughts of death, dying or suicide.
• Feeling and/or fear of being abandoned by those close to you.

The good news is that depression is typically treatable and for employees, getting some help would appear to be a direct cost savings for employers…..Be well….

Technorati Tags: envisia learning, mental health, depression, worksite wellness, health promotion, leadership, engagement, productivity, kenneth nowack, ken nowack, nowack

1. Goetzl, R. et al. (1988).  The relationship between modifiable health risk and health care expenditures: An analysis of the multi-employer HERO health risk and cost data base. JOEM, 40, 843-854 [↩]
2. Philip S. Wang, MD, et al.  Telephone Screening, Outreach, and Care Management for Depressed Workers and Impact on Clinicaland Work Productivity Outcomes: A Randomized Controlled Trial.  JAMA, 2007, 298(12), p. 1401-1411 [↩]
3. Emma K. Robertson Blackmore, Stephen A. Stansfeld, Iris Weller, Sarah Munce, Brandon M. Zagorski, and Donna E. Stewart (2007). Major Depressive Episodes and Work Stress: Results From a National Population Survey. American Journal of Public Health, Sep 2007; doi:10.2105/AJPH.2006.104406 [↩]