Why "Help Wanted" Is Not A Good Sign

Coming out of a recession, the last thing that should be cluttering the sides of roadways are "Help Wanted" or "Now Hiring" signs. Here's why: with unemployment rates the highest in years, you would think that people who are out of work would be taking the initiative and applying for jobs that are not being advertised - at companies that they would WANT to work for - not just those that happen to have an opening. If the job-seekers have not taken the initiative to be proactive, are these really the kinds of workers you want working in your organization?

Also, your "Help Wanted" sign sends a message to job seekers and your competitors that you don't have a lineup of people who are clamoring to knock down your door and come work for you. That means that your corporate culture is not attracting the best and brightest minds or you would be flooded with resumes all the time and never have to place an advertisement or a roadside sign.

Do you think Google has a road sign of neon red letters which reads, "Now Hiring?" No, of course not. Google has thousands of applicants everyday trying to join their company. And they have a full complement of HR administrators who sift through the thousands of resumes submitted daily and make contact with each of them. They even tell you on their web site that if you can differentiate yourself, you have a good chance of getting an interview. Does your HR department operate like that?

If your HR department is only accepting resumes when there's an opening, find a new HR director. You don't get the best and brightest minds when you advertise a job opening. You get whomever is available. That's not how you build a strong culture that attracts more of the best. It will simply attract more of the available - you know, the people who couldn't find work elsewhere.

Half of the North American workforce are actively looking for new work in 2010 (according to Right Management Survey results). Just because there may be no openings today, doesn't mean you can't start a conversation with potential candidates today.

Oh, and if you're a job-seeker and you see a big "Now Hiring" sign or big ad in the newspaper on Saturday don't get terribly excited. It probably hasn't got much of a culture of innovation or leadership or people would be busting down the doors to work there. It'll probably be just like the last job you had - kind of mediocre.
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Attitude w/ ATTITUDE by Kevin Burns - Corporate Attitude/Culture Strategist

Creator of the 90-Day Strategy to Greatness Culture


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7 Ways To Detect Fake Job References

News that job-seekers are now buying fake references in an effort to jump ahead of deserving candidates struck me as being the lowest of the low. Even the slimy name of the company helping these liars makes my skin crawl - CareerExcuse.com. These guys, for money, will build a great reference for you, create a fake past employment history, create a fake company with accompanying phone number, fake web site, fake logo and even a fake LinkedIn profile.

This is a site for people who don't work well with others, are jerks on the job, get fired often, show up drunk or high and put their co-workers at risk or who have done criminal acts while on the job. In other words, this is a blantant attempt to avoid accountability and personal responsibility.

How popular is this site? Well, they aren't taking any more subscribers at this time because they are full. That means thousands of job-seekers are lying their way into companies and organizations as we speak. Thousands of organizations are falling victim to unscrupulous job-seekers and their accomplices. Possibly, organizations will be stolen from in short order: recruitment and training time, training budgets, deserving candidates and expertise.

But, HR Directors can unite and fight back. Follow these 7 strategies to ensure that liars and cheats are NOT infiltrating your organization and rotting your culture from the inside-out:

1. Build a network of real people on the ground who can check addresses and business licenses to ensure that the companies are real before you accept the reference at face-value. Fake companies don't have real business licenses and real addresses. Google search the address. Google search other businesses in the area and call a business across the street or in the same building to see if they can see the sign on the building from across the street and if it really does exist.
2. Spread the word. When you discover a fake business and/or a fake reference, let your network know about it immediately. Hold nothing back. You would like to know if the business is a fake before you hired wouldn't you? Well, so would your fellow HR Directors.
3. Don't stop checking after the candidate has been hired. There may have been enough window-dressing to keep you distracted while a fake reference made its way through. Follow up monthly while the candidate is still on probationary period and tell the candidate up front about your plan.
4. Stop placing so much emphasis on the reference. If an HR Director is following potential candidates on social networks long before they ever get close to hiring, they will discover the truth and not rely solely on a piece of paper.
5. Track the candidates on social networks like their Facebook, LinkedIn and Twitter accounts and look for things out of the ordinary. Watch how the candidate interacts with others and messages he or she may leave on the walls of others.
6. Watch for job titles that don't make sense in the context of the organization. Question someone who was "director of personnel" for a five-employee company or "vice president of production" for a service organization that doesn't manufacture anything.
7. Trust your gut. If something seems hinky, it probably is. Ask the candidate to provide any personal particulars of their former workplaces (or fake workplaces) like how many worked in the department, the receptionist's name, the name of their favorite co-workers, the name of their co-worker's dog, spouse's name, co-worker's golf handicap, etc. Liars are never prepared for questions like that and get very nervous when asked.

I look at it this way: there are some things that past employers won't tell you (because they are afraid of lawsuits).  So take the offensive. If you have just discovered an employee who falsified his resume, fire him and sue him for the expenses incurred by recruitment and training. And don't forget to sue the accomplices like CareerExcuse.com. Make them feel the pain of consequence too. A good dozen or so lawsuits ought to shut down their motivation to continue to lie. It also sends a very strong message to your employees that you will not stand for lying. A great way to foster a culture of honesty is to toss the liars.
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Attitude w/ ATTITUDE by Kevin Burns - Corporate Attitude/Culture Strategist

Creator of the 90-Day Strategy to Greatness Culture


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70% of HR Reject Applicants Based On Facebook

70% of HR Directors surveyed say they have rejected job applicants because of questionable activity and photos on social networking sites like Facebook.

As part of Data Privacy Day, Microsoft says it conducted a survey of 2,500 people that included, consumers, HR managers and recruitment professionals in the US, the UK, Germany and France, with the goal of learning more about attitudes toward online reputation and how this information can have real life consequences. The survey found that the top online factors for rejecting a job applicant are unsuitable photos/videos, concerns about a candidate’s lifestyle and inappropriate comments written by the candidate. (Techcrunch.com)

That photo of you and your girlfriends in lewd poses with beers in hand - that video of your drunken escapades at the house party - the use of four-letter words when writing on someone's wall - all good ways to get you rejected by an HR Director.

Do you think you're invisible? People are watching you all the time. But then I said that just two weeks ago.

Clean up your drunken photos. Clean up your lascivious behavior. Clean up your language on-line. People are watching you.

Parents, open your own Facebook accounts and start watching what your kids are up to so that when they complain to you that they didn't get the job, you can show them why they didn't.
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Attitude w/ ATTITUDE by Kevin Burns - Corporate Attitude/Culture Strategist

Creator of the 90-Day Strategy to Greatness Culture


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Somebody's Watching Your Public Conduct

Times are different now. There used to be a time when you could visit another city other than your own and make a fool of yourself and no one would know who you are. But that's all changed now thanks to web sites like YouTube and Facebook. One person's indiscretion can be easily captured and posted for all the world to see. There's not much you, as the perpetrator of acts of future embarrassment, can do.

So you would think that a university student, who probably spends a few hours each day watching YouTube videos, would be cognizant of these facts.

So while I rode the train home last night from the Calgary Flames game, it seemed strange that six male university students from the University of Calgary would get on the train inebriated and shout the foulest of foul language and discuss things that would make a porn-star blush, knowing that anyone could be recording their antics on video-cam. Their testosterone-charged sickening discussions included, within earshot of a packed train car including ladies and children, the size of their genitals, which conquest they had (descriptive) sex with, which girls (by name) preferred oral sex, which former professional football player's daughter had been one of the conquests and how they were heading to another campus bar to find another girl willing to sleep with them tonight.

Had only it all been all caught on video and posted to YouTube so that in a few years, when these clowns finally graduate (or at least apply for a job), an HR director could embarrass them with the video in their job interview and then have security show them the door. Even mom and dad could gather around the computer screen and pay witness to and be proud of their parenting skills when their little angels are on their own.

As we pulled into University Station, a round of applause erupted from the remaining passengers as the six exited the train. I have never seen a round of applause break out for the departure of train passengers. How bad did it have to be to get strangers to applaud?

The HR directors of today are doing background checks on you on-line. They're watching the videos, checking out your Facebook page, Googling your name so that if any photo tags come up, you're busted. When you're at social functions or just spending time away from work, decorum is more important now than ever. Somebody's watching and possibly recording. If there is something you wouldn't be proud of in a year or ten from now, then don't do it today. The Attitude of Connectedness shines a light into every dark corner of your life. We are all connected. Your indiscretion today could be the YouTube embarrassment of tomorrow.

Oh, and if someone applauds when you leave the room, that might be your first clue that you need to pay more attention to your conduct in public. 
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Attitude w/ ATTITUDE by Kevin Burns - Corporate Attitude/Culture Strategist

Creator of the 90-Day Strategy to Greatness Culture


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The Sharpest Tool In The HR Shed

Have you seen the newest Microsoft commercials featuring a four and a half year-old girl who can’t read what’s on-screen but knows how to operate the PC anyway? This is a prime example of the workforce of the future – Generation Z. You will need to at least be as sharp as these people to lead them. In ten years, 100 of the Fortune 500 companies will be using technology that hasn’t even been invented yet. Are you prepared to attract or even recognize that kind of talent?

The VP - HR in the organization of the future will need to be the sharpest executive in the organization. Not just a merely competent person but the most dynamic, most creative, cutting-edged person in the organization. The new Director of HR needs to be the person who can spot trends before they become trends, be willing to toss everything they know about HR and not be bound by tradition or limited thinking. They will possess leadership abilities which far surpass those of the CEO. People will hang on every word of the VP-HR. They will become a superstar to the HR world.

The HR department of the future will transform from an “inbound” philosophy where benefits are prepared, future hires resumes are filed away neatly and ads are prepared for newspapers and sites like Monster. (OK some HR departments aren't like this but most are). The new HR department of the future will have an “outbound” focus rivalling marketing and sales. The department itself will operate like a political campaign war-room and be abuzz with activity from early morning to late at night. The members of the HR team of the future will operate like sports scouts who go out and find the top talent. The HR scouts will go out across the nation, search out top talent, do their research and return to the war-room with their findings. Large numbers of team-members will sit around the table poring through mountains of paper, stats, YouTube videos, blogs, Facebook and Twitter sites, LinkedIn and a whole lot more. They will openly discuss the precise placement of each candidate within the organization. No longer will a position be advertised and be filled by just some warm body.

Human Resources will be headed by the brightest, sharpest, most creative minds in the organization in order to attract the brightest, sharpest and most creative minds in the world.

It won’t matter in the future how bright the CEO is. The people under that CEO are going to be a lot brighter anyway, faster, more connected and able to find out anything about anything in mere seconds. If the organization is full of really talented leaders, do you really need a really sharp CEO anyway? The faces of organizations are going to change drastically from the “top-down” model we suffer through now to the “collaborative philosophy” of the future.

Now, this is the part where it gets a little ugly and I am going to take a lot of flack for this one but it needs to be said. If you are currently heading up your organizations' HR department and you know that you are not the brightest, sharpest, most creative executive in the organization, then you, in the near future, will need to voluntarily step aside and make room for the brightest minds to take your position - if you really care about the future of your company, its future ideas, its future performance and its future survival. Otherwise, you will be standing in the way of organizational progress.

If you, as the current director of HR don't already possess the brightest, sharpest and most creative mind in your organization, then how in the world would you be able to recognize that kind of talent? From a resume? The resume is dead - especially with Generation Z getting ready to be hired in a few years. They will have no experience, no background and best of all, no fear about trying anything new. And they will be good at whatever they try to do because they will have viewed hundreds of thousands of videos posted on YouTube and be able to master whatever they watch in one viewing.

In the future, the young, energetic, bright-minds will run the HR departments because they will know where their peers can be found. They will speak the same language, they will interact the same way and they will be able to spot talent amongst their own better than any Director of HR who is five years away from retirement.

If you think technological changes come fast, wait until you see what happens with the organization of the future. Any organization that desperately clings to the current top-down model of today will be overtaken quickly by organizations that operate collaboratively.

How do you best engage and spur an entire workforce? Make them part of every decision. Collaboration. It’s coming. Are you prepared?

The Attitude of Intellectual Capital

"Intellectual Capital" is buzzword these days. For the most part, it refers to the hidden-genius within an employee - the part that wasn't necessary in the job-description.

Too many organizations today are still using last century's model for hiring: developing a position and then sticking a body in it regardless of what else that body brings to the table. Today's model should be geared towards discovering the strengths of the applicant and finding something for them to do that taps those strengths.

So as organizations around the world resist the idea of changing their hiring practices to get the best from their people, they have given it a buzzword to make it seem kind of "foo-foo" and "out there." But the truth is, Intellectual Capital is really a description of all of the talents and aptitudes that someone possesses for which there are no categories on a resume. It's why the resume is dead.

ATTITUDE ADJUSTMENT: The easiest way to tap into Intellectual Capital in any organization is also the hardest way: ask. Ask for ideas and then shut up and make sure everyone else at the table shuts up too. Don't ever allow anyone to poo-poo any idea. If you're going to ask for an idea, you CAN NOT summarily dismiss the idea without risking any future ideas. The first indication that an idea is hare-brained is the moment you start to go into deficit in Intellectual Capital.

There are no bad ideas or crazy ideas. There are only those who can't see value in an idea because they don't understand it. Don't let the dimwits of your organization stifle the hidden creativity of the closet-geniuses because "no one else has ever done it." What a horrible thing to do - shooting down an idea because you don't get it. If someone can conceive of an idea, then someone can turn it into a reality.

If you want Intellectual Capital, there's a cost: everything you ever believed to be true must first be tossed out the window or nothing changes.