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The Top 50 Problems With Performance Appraisals

by on Dec 30, 2011, 12:10 PM  |  No comments yet
Performance review

To Our Readers: This week, TLNT is continuing our annual tradition by counting down the 30 most popular posts of this past year. This is No. 1 – the top story of 2011. Our regular content will return on Monday Jan. 2, 2012.

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“(Some) 90 percent of performance appraisal processes are inadequate.” – Salary.com survey

In conversations with HR leaders and employees, the talent management process that suffers from the most disdain around the world is the performance appraisal. It’s one of the few processes that even the owners of the process dread.

If everyone hates it, but it still gets done nearly everywhere, you might assume some asinine government regulation requires it, but in this case there is no such regulation. The only legal justification pertains to showing just cause for termination and other disciplinary action. Read more…

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New Study: The Top 10 Best Practices of High-Impact HR Organizations

by on Dec 30, 2011, 11:20 AM  |  No comments yet
fast-company-issue-97

To Our Readers: This week, TLNT is continuing our annual tradition by counting down the 30 most popular and well-read posts of this past year. This is No. 2. Our regular content will return Monday January 2, 2012.

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Few magazine articles have had such a monumental impact on an entire profession the way that Fast Company’s “Why We Hate HR” did on the world of Human Resources after it was published back in 2005.

Not only was it discussed, debated, and argued about about ad infinitum (and still is, some would say), but it articulated the notion that strategic, high-value HR executives should have a “seat at the table” with an organization’s other high level leaders, but, that this was simply a pipe dream for many in HR.

Many think that the “seat at the table” debate has been debated to death, but it is back in a new research study by Bersin & Associates of The Top Best Practices for the High-Impact HR Organization. In the Executive Summary (and you can get a copy here), Bersin principal analyst Stacey Harris references the article and writes: Read more…

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Salary Increases 2012: If You Liked This Year’s 3%, You’ll Love Next Year’s 3%

by on Dec 30, 2011, 10:30 AM  |  No comments yet
Salary increase1

To Our Readers: This week, TLNT is continuing our annual tradition by counting down the 30 most popular and well-read posts of this past year. This is No. 3. Our regular content will return Monday January 2, 2012.

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In case you weren’t sure about the pace of America’s economic recovery, here’s another sign: average salary increases “in each employee category inched upward,” according to the 38th annual WorldatWork Salary Budget Survey.

Or to put it another way, 2012 pay increases are projected to be right around 3 percent, as they were this year.

According to WorldatWork, “more than 2,200 U.S. compensation and HR professionals responded to the survey, and though the 2011 actual numbers didn’t quite make what they projected in last year’s survey, the numbers in each employee category inched upward and are projected to continue in that trend next year.” Read more…

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A Lesson at Time Inc: How Long Do We Keep Those Out of Touch With the Culture?

by on Dec 30, 2011, 9:30 AM  |  No comments yet
Jack Griffin only lasted six months as CEO of Time Inc.

To Our Readers: This week, TLNT is continuing our annual tradition by counting down the 30 most popular and well-read posts of this past year. This is No. 4. Our regular content will return Monday January 2, 2012.

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It was like a surgeon strategically wielding a scalpel taking out the organ that the body rejected.

“I concluded that his leadership style and approach did not mesh with Time Inc. and Time Warner,” Time Warner CEO Jeff Bewkes stated in a memo. And with that, it was over and done with.

The Chairman and CEO of Time Inc, Jack Griffin was fired on Thursday evening by Bewkes. Six months was all it took and the decision was made.

As I worked out on Friday morning, this announcement flashed across the TV screens. My reaction? Wow. How many times as HR professionals have we seen that happen? Read more…

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3 Tips to Help Guide Your Social Media Check on a Potential New Hire

by on Dec 30, 2011, 8:45 AM  |  No comments yet
Backgroundchecks

To Our Readers: This week, TLNT is continuing our annual tradition by counting down the 30 most popular and well-read posts of this past year. This is No. 5. Our regular content will return Monday January 2, 2012.

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By Eric B. Meyer

According to this recent SHRM survey, only 18 percent of companies have used social media to screen job candidates. Most cite the legal risks of screening candidates as the reason for not implementing a social-media background check.

While a social media background check may not be useful in certain instances, I can imagine many situations in which a company would benefit from checking up on candidates online before filling a job opening. Heck, consider that 89 percent of employers plan to use social media for recruiting this year.

Have I piqued your interest? Here are some suggestions about how your company can safely run a social-media background check. Read more…

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Talent Management Insanity, or Why the Performance Appraisal Must Die

by on Dec 30, 2011, 7:35 AM  |  No comments yet
Performance reviews

To Our Readers: This week, TLNT is continuing our annual tradition by counting down the 30 most popular and well-read posts of this past year. This is No. 6. Our regular content will return Monday January 2, 2012.

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A definition of insanity I’ve heard many times is this: “Doing the same thing over and over, expecting a different result.”

Under that definition, it is clear to me that the practice of traditional performance appraisals is insane. And yet, we continue to do them within our organizations — by the millions.

It’s a perplexing situation. A few weeks ago, I asked a large room of recruiting professionals at a conference to raise their hands if they felt that traditional performance appraisals were a reliable and consistent way of measuring performance. Not one hand went up. Not one. Houston, we have a problem. Read more…

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When It Comes to Workplace Incentives, Just Show Me The Money

by on Dec 29, 2011, 12:30 PM  |  No comments yet
showmethemoney1

To Our Readers: This week, TLNT is continuing our annual tradition by counting down the 30 most popular and well-read posts of this past year. This is No. 7. Our regular content will return on Monday January 2, 2012.

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A couple of weeks ago, I was listening to the HR Happy Hour Internet radio show and the subject drew my attention. It was about rewards, motivation and incentives and how they best operated in the workplace.

Paul Hebert and Trish McFarlane were co-hosting the show and I thought I would call in about the question I always have about incentive programs: Why don’t we just use cash as the incentive of choice?

The problem I always have with incentive programs is that the incentive is always some sort of hat with a company logo, an iPod, a gift card, a trip or some other non-cash reward. Those are all great as long as I want any of those things (and I generally don’t unless the trip is all expenses paid to Mexico with my wife). But what if I don’t want any of those things? Read more…

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Salary Increases for 2011: What Part of 3% Don’t You Understand?

by on Dec 29, 2011, 11:42 AM  |  No comments yet
Photo illustration by istockphoto.com

To Our Readers: This week, TLNT is continuing our annual tradition by counting down the 30 most popular and well-read posts of this past year. This is No. 8. Our regular content will return on Monday January 2, 2012.

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Raises have been pretty slim the last couple of years – guess that’s what happens when you have the worst economic downturn in 70 years – and the good news for 2011 is that the early forecasts say that they will be better.

But don’t hold your breath, because it doesn’t look like they will improve all that much.

New research by the global consulting firm Hay Group shows that planned salary increases for 2011 are expected to be 3.0 percent, and although that a sustained uptick relative to the low point in March 2009, it’s still well below the 4.5 to 5.0 percent increases at the beginning of this decade. After factoring in annualized consumer price index growth for 2010 at 2.0 percent, the final result is a “real” salary gain of just 1.0 percent overall next year. Read more…

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The NLRB’s New Social Media Guide: What Employers Can (and Can’t) Do

by on Dec 29, 2011, 10:50 AM  |  No comments yet
NLRB_Social-Media

To Our Readers: This week, TLNT is continuing our annual tradition by counting down the 30 most popular and well-read posts of this past year. This is No. 9. Our regular content will return on Monday January 2, 2012.

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By Eric B. Meyer

On Friday night, I read the just-released National Labor Relations Board‘s Acting General Counsel report on social media investigations. In fact, I read it twice cover-to-cover. (No, I won’t be winning the “Coolest Person In America” Award this year).

Dorkiness aside, I was able to distill the report down to the points that employers will need to know if they hope to avoid federal scrutiny.

The report details the outcome of investigations into 14 social-media cases. You can read the NLRB’s press release here. You will find the report here. Read more…

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The Latest Word on Salary Increases: For 2011, it Looks Like 2.8%

by on Dec 29, 2011, 9:40 AM  |  No comments yet
Salary increase1

To Our Readers: This week, TLNT is continuing our annual tradition by counting down the 30 most popular and well-read posts of this past year. This is No. 10. Our regular content will return on Monday January 2, 2012.

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Here’s the latest on salary increases for 2011, and if this all sounds vaguely familiar it’s because the latest survey and forecast is not far off from a lot of other surveys and predictions you read about here over the last six months.

Global consulting firm Hay Group‘s latest 2010 U.S. Salary Budget Spot Survey now says that U.S. employees can expect median base salary increases of 2.8 percent this year, up slightly from actual median base salary increases of 2.4 percent in 2010, but down slightly from an expected 3 percent increase for this year that an earlier Hay Group survey forecast back at the beginning of July.

How you view a 2.8 percent salary increase depends on your perspective, of course, and that may vary depending on whether you have had a pay freeze, salary cut, furlough days, or perhaps even a period of unemployment in the past year, but the Hay Group’s analysis in its 2010 U.S. Salary Budget Spot Survey is somewhat bullish and even a bit upbeat. Read more…

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