We know that employers spend a lot of time and energy on the entire employee lifecycle: from sourcing to onboarding straight through retention, engagement, and, of course, exit interviews.How can HR professionals grapple with that lifecycle if they can’t predict the terrain of the HR landscape 5 or even 10 years from now?We are very fortunate t ...…

Employers invest considerable time and money in hiring and training new employees and therefore want to ensure a job candidate is going to be the right fit. Information gleaned from references – in contrast with a polished interview and resume – is pure gold for employers who are working hard to find the ideal matches for their positions. After ...…

In Episode 71, we're diverging slightly off our typical subject matter, but with good reason. We want to discuss something even more important than strategic HR best practices or company profitability—we're going to talk about how HR can literally help save lives.Our guest, Anna Mittag, Vice President of Operations at LifeSpeak, believes that t ...…

Our guest for Episode 70, international business coach Howard Partridge, says the solution to engagement and organizational success is rooted in community--something that's ultimately achieved by tapping into the human need to connect and feel valued by others. Howard provides us with 6 steps leaders can take to build community and transform th ...…

"A new revolution has begun and AI is providing a new way of interacting with technology in a much more fun, enjoyable, and human way," explains our guest on episode 69 of HR Works: The Podcast for Human Resources. That's right: Emily He, Senior Vice President, Human Capital Management Cloud Business Group at Oracle says Artificial Intelligence ...…

We often talk about how HR professionals can help their workforce achieve success and how to drive success in this podcast—but today’s guest is going to talk with us about failure, and how important it can be to an organization’s success.Courtney Branson is Director of People and Culture at Square Root, an Austin-based technology startup that c ...…

We talk a lot about culture these days, and one of the companies that often comes up in those discussions is Netflix, renowned for its special culture. Today’s guest, Patty McCord, is the architect of that culture and the creator of the Netflix Culture Deck, a popular resource that has over 20 million views. Sheryl Sandberg called the Deck perh ...…

Old hierarchies and organizational silos are disappearing—today work is often done on an ad hoc basis, based on collaboration and accomplished by teams formed and reformed to address changing priorities and needs. However, as many of us have found, forming teams is easy; forming productive, collaborative teams is hard.Our guest on Episode 66 of ...…

Today, we accept distracted as the norm, says our guest, keynote speaker and author Neen James. We are so focused on technology, our never-ending to-do list, and our lack of time, we fail to pay attention to the people, priorities, and passions that are truly important to us. But it’s not a time management crisis, Neen says— it’s an attention m ...…

Suddenly it’s slim pickings for top candidates—nobody’s having an easy time recruiting. And for hard-to-fill roles, it can seem to border on the impossible.But there’s hope! Today’s guest, Lindsay Stanton, Chief Client Officer for Digi-Me, is an expert in recruiting technology. She talked with us at BLR’s RecruitCon conference about trends and ...…

Recruiting is on every HR manager’s front burner these days, yet many organizations find they can’t get candidates they want to recruit to engage with or respond to them. Today’s guest, Angie Verros, founder of Vaia Talent, is going to help—she’s got suggestions for creating compelling messages that get the responses you’re looking for. She als ...…

Following protests and a firestorm of controversy after two black men were arrested inside a Philadelphia Starbucks, the coffee purveyor closed its U.S.-based retail stores and corporate offices on May 29 to provide racial-bias training to its workforce. Incidents such as this one, as well as similar issues that have since involved LA Fitness, ...…

We’re all posting job openings, and our postings are competing with hundreds of others to grab the attention of top candidates. How do you fight through to be sure your posting gets in front of the kinds of candidates you seek, and then entices them to respond?Today’s guest, Elena Valentine, CEO at Skill Scout, has advice on how to add the “Wow ...…

Engagement and retention. We’ve covered these twin topics many times, generally agreeing that if you have an engagement problem, you’ll have retention problems—as well as productivity issues, morale issues, and so on.Best-selling author and consultant Bob Kelleher has a different perspective he says in most companies with which he has consulted ...…

Neil Bedwell and Andrew Osterday often describe themselves as reformed marketers. Their company, Local Industries, is a change marketing consultancy. Put simply, they apply consumer-grade marketing expertise to drive real cultural change inside organizations by focusing on their most important asset—people. In this episode of HR Works: The Podc ...…

We’ve talked about engagement a lot on HR Works: The Podcast for Human Resources, and the general thrust of our discussions has focused on engagement as a cure-all for all organizational woes. Today’s guest has a different take on this—he says the approach is misguided and he has data to prove it.Dr. Scott Mondore is a predictive analytics expe ...…

Everyone’s talking about engagement and retention, but many of us aren’t sure what steps to take to create meaningful change in our organizations.Our guest on Episode 57 of HR Works is the CEO of a company that’s achieved “best Places to Work” status, and has a 5-star Glassdoor rating. Rajeev Behera is co-founder and CEO of Reflektive, the mode ...…

Transparency—an issue that many organizations struggle with—how much to reveal, when to reveal it, how to reveal it.To help us sort this out, we’ve asked Dan Harris to join us on Episode 56 of HR Works: The Podcast for Human Resources. A Workplace Insights Analyst at Quantum Workplace, Dan aggregates data to tell stories. Currently working on h ...…

Talent acquisition has quickly moved front burner for many organizations and most realize that they’re going to have to do more to attract—and keep--top candidates than they’ve had to do the past few years. Our guest has some great ideas and practical tips to help us with that--and one key component is the role of about content marketing.John H ...…

Many times, HR managers and executives know that something’s wrong—the organization is not functioning at as high a level as it should. Departments are butting heads and pointing fingers. But what’s really to blame? Do you have a people problem? Or is something else at the root cause? Today we’ve got an expert at diving into organizations, find ...…

L&D—learning and development—is moving to the forefront for HR managers, not just for the importance of developing skills, but to maintain engagement and retention of employees who demand to stay up with new developments in their fields. Of course, there are new developments in L&D as well, and one of the most challenging today is the fact that ...…

Retention is a major concern for most every organization these days. Changing employee demographics and expectations, evolving business needs, and rapidly advancing technology add complexity to the challenge. And for sure, as the unemployment rate drops, it’s even tougher to keep your best talent.On the plus side, all this means that talent dev ...…

Talent management has moved to the front burner for most organizations as the economy has improved. Today's guest, Magi Graziano, has developed a talent strategy system that gives business leaders the actionable steps to align their corporate strategy with their people strategy, thereby maximizing employee performance, engagement and innovation ...…

In episode 50 of HR Works: The Podcast for HR Professionals, John K. Coyle, founder and CEO of The Art of Really Living, joins us to discuss “design thinking”—an approach to innovation and problem solving that could be useful to HR managers.John won an Olympic silver medal in speed skating—an achievement he attributes directly to his design thi ...…

Gamification can be a way that companies use learning software not only to educate employees, but also to increase productivity. It also encourages and fulfills employees' desire for social interaction, competition, and collaboration. But as our guest today explains, proper design is crucial to how successful your use of gamification will be. C ...…

We hear a lot about how technology solutions will or can make HR's job easier—and many of us, but perhaps not all—have implemented tech into facets of one or more of our major functions: applicant tracking, development of our 'talent pools' (and recruiting passive candidates), onboarding and pre-boarding, performance management, succession plan ...…

There's no shortage of reminders these days that harassment is still a major issue for employers. And it’s particularly challenging—as we’ve seen all too often lately in the news—when an executive is a harasser or when a company culture implicitly condones or perpetuates sexual harassment or a hostile work environment. With increased attention ...…

Every HR manager faces this situation—a great employee, one the organization wants to keep, but the person is in the wrong job. For whatever reason, it's just not a good fit, or maybe it’s time for the person to move up—or over—to another position. Our guest—Scott Ragusa, President of WinterWyman Contract Staffing—calls this "Right Bus, Wrong S ...…

The ability to influence others is perhaps the most important ingredient of leadership. Stacey Hanke, a trainer, coach and mentor to C-suite executives, thinks that most leaders are not as influential as they think they are, and not as influential as they could be.In this interview, we explore her views as expressed in her newly published book, ...…

We hear a lot of talk expressing concern about the underrepresentation of women in corporate boardrooms. And we know that one substantial factor that can slow down the professional advancement of women is starting a family. But what can actually be done to minimize the disruption of women's career paths, particularly for working mothers? Today, ...…

Employee engagement—everyone agrees it’s important for productivity and retention, but not everyone is able to describe it or measure it. To help us boost engagement at our organizations, representatives from Keurig Green Mountain join us for Episode 43 of HR Works: The Podcast for Human Resources.The company is known a great place to work and ...…

Does your onboarding process mainly consist of new hire paperwork and introductions to staff and management? Mimi Jerkan and Marina Vasich of SilkRoad, a global leader in talent activation, say that onboarding should involve much more than the new hire experience, and should encompass the entire employee journey. They call it 'strategic onboard ...…

We often look to sport teams for examples of engagement and passion and motivation, and we use sports metaphors for several workplace situations. In keeping with the start of the NFL season this week, a few of the many football metaphors used in business include "kicking off" a new project or product planning process, "Monday morning quarterbac ...…

Workplace teams can be the cornerstone to the success of an organization when they are functioning at a high level. But unfortunately, as nearly anyone who has been part of a workplace team can attest, that isn't always the case. And the symptoms of a team that isn't working well are probably also too familiar—unclear goals, poor communication, ...…

HR professionals and in-house trainers know that in a world of non-stop communication and distractions, effective employee training can be challenging. But our guests—Sharon Lucas, President of CDT3 Training and Jessica Du Preez, a Graphic Recorder—have experience in making training more engaging, memorable and impactful by incorporating storyt ...…

In many workplaces across the country, managers feel pressured by company leaders to achieve specific goals or levels of productivity, and become focused on winning no matter what it takes, using motivation by fear to get their employees to work faster, harder and for longer hours. These tactics may work in the short term, but lose their effect ...…

Organizations are spending more and more time focusing on conveying their employer brand when recruiting candidates—generally, these efforts are intended to give potential candidates insights into company culture, as well as what they might expect in their day-to-day experience at the company. But one area that employers may overlook when craft ...…

Retention, engagement, and branding—as the battle to find and keep top talent intensifies, this trio of topics continues to gain in importance for all HR managers. BLR recently completed a survey on these topics, which was sponsored by SilkRoad. To help us gain additional perspective we asked SilkRoad's Mimi Jerkan to join us.Jerkan explains th ...…

HR execs are getting better and better at the basics of HR management and many have also improved at the strategic level. Dave Ulrich, the man some call the “father of modern HR,” joins us to discuss the roles and skills HR executives must assume and acquire in order to both earn a proverbial 'seat at the table' AND have a significant impact on ...…

Measuring current performance is no longer sufficient because performance ratings don’t often correlate with business performance, explains Kelli Hinshaw VP of Strategic Development at Cy Wakeman. In response, she and her colleagues have developed a new approach to performance management and measurement they call an “employee value equation.”Ou ...…

Traditionally, workplace diversity dealt with race and ethnicity, and then gender—but now the term seems to encompass just about everything from generational differences to political ideologies to gender identity. We wanted an expert’s perspective on what diversity “looks like” in 2017 and its role in organizational success.Susan Scott, founder ...…

Culture—it seems everyone is currently talking about it, pondering how important it is, and how employers might go about changing it. Today we're joined by Karen Whalen Senior Vice President, Human Resources of data management firm First Data, an organization that recently experienced a successful cultural transformation.Karen addresses what pr ...…

To get some hard data on today’s recruiting landscape and provide fresh insights on emerging trends in the U.S. labor market, we’ve sought the insights of talent acquisition expert Josh Wright, Chief Economist at iCIMS.In this episode of HR Works, Josh provides an overview of the current state of the job market; detailed information on recent i ...…

Given the current talent economy, organizations are challenged to consistently attract and retain the right caliber of talent. BLR, with the kind sponsorship of SilkRoad, has just completed a survey about several interesting aspects of recruiting today. To help us interpret some of the survey data, we’ve asked Alexandra Levit to join us. She is ...…

There’s a sea change going on in the world of performance appraisals. Many organizations are moving away from the once-a-year-focus on past performance to a system with more frequent encounters, more focus on the future, and more time spent discussing employee development and opportunity. To help us understand this change better, we’ve asked An ...…

Suddenly, with the improving economy, recruiting is on the front burner again. Organizations from all types of industries are experiencing difficulty hiring workers at all levels. For some guidance on how to kick start your recruiting, we’ve asked Arte Nathan to join us.Arte is the Principal of Strategic Development Worldwide and also serves as ...…

How should employers practically and realistically address the sensitive topic of romance in the workplace, which can have potentially serious workplace implications if left unchecked? In this encore presentation of our inaugural episode, BLR Senior Legal Editor Jennifer Carsen, JD, joins us to discuss how employers should address romance in th ...…

It’s easy to agree on two things: it’s getting harder and harder to recruit and great employees, and social media are playing a major role. And the question is, how can we leverage our social media profiles and presence and activity to support our recruiting efforts? It’s all about the employment brand. To help us get some practical advice arou ...…

It’s hard to listen to the news without hearing about an act of violence, and an unfortunate number of those happen in the workplace. No employer or employee is immune from becoming a victim and many employers are “soft targets” for violence.But it’s hard to know exactly what steps to take to protect your workers. To help us with practical tips ...…

For years, HR managers have been working to eliminate discrimination against women in the workplace. And, not to suggest that that’s no longer a concern, but today as women leaders progress in the workplace, they often face more subtle barriers that hold them back from fulfilling their true potential.To help us to understand these barriers bett ...…