Category Archives: HR

Update Your Resume, Now!

My friend Chris Fields is on a resume writing crusade and has been sharing some interesting insights as he does his part to help get good people back to work. One observation that he recently shared is that there may not be the large skill gap in this country’s workforce that many recruiters and pundits suggest; the problem is that too many people’s resumes suck. Poorly written resumes fail to articulate an applicant’s skills, and do nothing to tell his/her story.

While I understand that most people update their resumes when they’re in job search mode, I am surprised by how few bother to keep their resumes fresh and updated when they are still fat, dumb and happy in their existing roles.

You Are Not That Great

If you haven’t seen Dr. Daniel Crosby’s TEDx Huntsville presentation by this same title, I highly recommend that you check it out here. While the concept may be hard to swallow, it is the truth. Unless you are self-employed, and in a sole-proprietorship, you can most likely be replaced by someone younger, better looking, more educated, and less expensive. It comes down to a matter of value. Value is ultimately an economic measure.

Job Searches Are Time Consuming

Writing a great resume (one that demonstrates your economic value) takes a lot of time, effort, feedback, and knowledge about the recruiting game. If you find yourself unexpectedly searching for a new job without a great resume in hand, get some help. Your job search efforts should be focused on networking, not writing. I strongly suggest investing in the services of a qualified resume writer, or job search coach. Chris Fields and Sabrina Baker are two professionals I know who have solid HR experience, and who provide this service to job seekers.

You Never Know When Opportunity Will Appear

Imagine that you go to a local networking event and meet a highly successful entrepreneur. You have a long conversation, and she indicates that she is very interested in your skill set and your vision. She describes an opportunity to you that is your dream job on steroids. She says, “Why don’t you email me your resume, and I’ll give you a call to talk about the opportunity further.”

Are you ready to pounce? If you aren’t ready now, then you should be when the real conversation takes place.

Is your resume up to date?

What reasons would you add to the list for maintaining an updated resume?

It’s Not You, It’s Me

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Before you dive into this post, I want you to pause and place your fuzzy, warm thinking cap squarely on top of your melon. Think about the most pathetic breakup line you’ve ever heard? Perhaps it is a line that YOU have used to end an intimate relationship? A line that boggles my mind is the proverbial, “It’s not you, it’s me.”

Now think about the most pathetic breakup line you’ve heard in an employee-employer breakup. Please tell me that it is not one of your’s. The most pathetic termination line I’ve heard of – outside of anything discriminatory – is, “we are going in a different direction, and your services are no longer required.”

Photo Courtesy of nuttakit

In either case, the breakup lines say absolutely nothing! We’ve ended relationships with people who have been an important part of our lives/organizations, yet have managed to give them no feedback, reasoning, rationale, or explanation for our decision. In a word, this is “cowardice.” But, what if it is true?

Employer Breakups are Easier to Do

When the decision to end an employment relationship is our’s as employees, we tend to sing a different song. How many disgruntled employees do you know who have written, “it’s not the company, it’s me” in their bitter letters of resignation? When we leave a job, particularly out of anger or frustration, we almost always put the blame squarely on our employers. In fact, we are quite effective at rationalizing why the sour relationship wasn’t our fault. It is clearly ________’s fault.

The Grass Isn’t Any Greener Over There

I have hit the wall a few times in my career. These are times when I become profoundly frustrated by my inability to get things accomplished. While I am as happy as anyone with swimming in abstract ideas, and visioning grand plans to solve employee engagement issues forever, in the end I need results – that’s what I get paid to deliver. I always expect to accomplish that which I set out to do. I take pride in delivering measurable organizational results. And, when I am unable to deliver results, I become frustrated.

Like many, I have been quick to blame others for the barriers and resistance that have prevented me from achieving my goals, and initiatives. I have broken up with employers. The funny thing is that given enough time, the same frustrations inevitably appear in subsequent roles.

Hindsight is Always 20/20

The common theme in my times of frustration is that they occurred during times of change. Conspicuous organizational changes (e.g., mergers, CEO changes, organizational structure redesigns) have always precipitated my periods of frustration. I’ve blamed organizations, leaders and colleagues for creating these unnecessary barriers. I am a master of narrating elaborate stories to justify my vilification of these good people – privately, of course.

What if my frustration had less to do with outside changes, and more to do with my inability, or unwillingness to change my leadership approaches to achieve results in a new environment?

That Question Just Sucks!

What if it really isn’t them, and it is me? Simply asking a different question forces our brains to search for a different answer. If it is done honestly, we sometimes won’t like the alternative answers that we realize. I’ve learned that just because I am an HR leader, experienced in organization change, and knowledgeable about helping others through change, it doesn’t mean that I am personally exempt from the same change experiences. I now understand that many of the times I have blamed organizational dynamics for my woes, it was really about me.

I would love to hear some of your best breakup lines!

Photo Credit: nuttakit at freeddigitalphotos (dot) net

Trench HR: Closing the Credibility and Impact Gap?

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I recently conducted an informal, unreliable, and not-too-scientific study. The kind of study that many of us do to support our hunches.

I went to a couple of websites for HR associations and pulled up the agendas for their most recent annual conferences; I read the speaker bios for the keynotes and breakout sessions. I then went to the monthly magazines for a few HR and benefits associations to which I belong, and I flipped through a few of the most recent editions to read the articles’ author bios.

The question I had was this: “How many of the conference sessions and article contributions were from Trench HR practitioners?” What I found was that roughly 85% of the conference speakers at these events were professional speakers, consultants and vendors. The article submissions, except for one, were from staff writers, consultants and vendors. While the voice of the HR practitioner is growing in the non-traditional media spaces (e.g., blogs, websites, etc.), it seems to be largely absent from the more traditional “media” venues.

So What?

I had the opportunity to attend the Health Care Social Media Summit at Mayo Clinic a couple of weeks ago. One of the many interesting stories that I heard was from a social media pioneer named Dave deBronkart (@ePatientDave), who delivered one of the best keynotes I’ve ever experienced, in which he explained how he used social media in his fight to beat stage IV kidney cancer. In his keynote address, Dave demonstrated how new media (e.g., blogs) gives us freedom of the press, but that it is still the traditional media that gives us credibility and impact. In other words, we may have the ability to share our Trench HR wisdom more freely through the new media platforms, but we will not have mainstream credibility, or impact, until our message is published through traditional media.

Even if you don’t necessarily agree with the gap that I am proposing, Trench HR pros still seem to be largely voiceless on the conference platforms, and in our own professional publications. To me, that speaks volumes about the perceived gap in our credibility. If the traditional media theory is true, I can’t help but notice that it is easily remedied.

What do you think? Why aren’t more Trench HR practitioners speaking and publishing?