“U.S. minorities now represent more than half of America’s population under the age of 1, the Census Bureau said, a historic demographic milestone with profound political, economic and social implications.

The bureau – defining a minority as anyone who is not “single race white” and “not Hispanic” – released estimates on Thursday showing that 50.4% of children younger than 1 were minorities as of July 1, 2011, up from 49.5% from the 2010 Census taken in April 2010.

“2011 is the first time the population of infants under age 1 is majority minority,” said Robert Bernstein, a Census Bureau spokesman.”

So, what does this mean for you the HR Pro?  First off you better call the printer and have them change your art work on all of your employment branding materials – you know the ones – with the Black Female, Asian Male and guy in wheelchair – and just have them put a 40 year old white dude that is prematurely balding.  It seems like everything in HR eventually comes back full circle and I’m so thankful to be a part of this full circle experience as well.  Yes! I’m a minority!

The first thing I’m going to do as the “new” minority – white male – is to cancel all of these Diversity Councils and Committees we have – Young Black Smokers, Lesbians who don’t like the WNBA, Asian’s who suck at math, but are good at driving – and just go back to the one true Diversity Committee we need – White Dudes.  I mean no one understands us White Dudes – they think we look all alike and all we do is Fantasy Baseball and talk about how sweet our new minivans are – but we are far more than that!  We need a voice.

I also want to be the first to say – as the “new” minority group – I don’t think us White Dudes want any special treatment when it comes to hiring.  So, please, no special hiring policies that force you to put one of “us” in your interview pool.  As other minorities in the past, we want to be hired on our own merits and not a quota system.  But we would like to have our bowling teams added to the list of events which allows us to leave 30 minutes early on Thursday evenings.

I’ve been white almost all of my life, that I can remember, I mean I probably tried being something else a few times in high school and my wife always tells me – “You wish you were born black” because of my taste in music and love of the NBA – still I can’t imagine a United States – where the White Dudes are the Minority! Can You?  White Dudes run just about everything in this country – business, politics, entertainment, etc. – the only things we don’t run are gas stations and lawn services.  Being a minority is certainly be a shock to some of my white brothers and sisters!  I’m sure they are taking this news hard.  I’m hoping they aren’t reading this now for the first time or you’ll see a whole bunch of Volvo’s leaving the road and hitting trees!

I wonder how the diversity departments in organizations will begin to change?   Instead of Cinco De Mayo taco buffets they’ll have to switch up the menus  – what meals do what white people like?  I’ve been feed such a “diverse” diet of stuff from our diversity teams over the past 20 years I can’t even remember what “we” eat.  I mean I know the Canadian whites like donuts and beer, from what I hear – what do American whites like?  What schools will they go to, to recruit?  Probably all those small liberal arts schools on the east coast – they’re pretty milky white – those will be good sources of hires.   They need to start white kid scholarship programs to ensure we get enough white kids in the pipeline to build our future.  Wow – we’ve got a lot of work ahead of us!

White’s as the new minority – that is going to blow some minds in the U.S.!  Hey, quick question – what’s the number at the EEOC – I just want to have it on file in case all of you organizations don’t get in line?

90% of them are garbage.  90% of them are offered, proffered and pushed by people who do not have a clue how incentive and reward programs should be structured.  I know it is bad form to call out people – and I’m not going to name names.

Read the whole post at Paul Hebert’s I-2-I (an FOT contributor blog)

Register for this FOT webinar and your hosts will provide you with the following insights on using video as a fundamental part of your HR and recruiting strategy: 

• Employment Branding - See how to build a more robust and impacting employment brand by using video to build transparency to the outside world – including candidates for your open positions. 
• Recruiting - Learn how today’s technology transcends the old cliche “video conference” system, allowing you to vet candidates more effectively without wasting time with early-stage face-to-face interviews.
• Role Play for Managers - Find out what smart companies are doing to weave role play scenarios into all managerial training and to ensure managers can perform in tough situations on command.
• Training Shorts Delivered via Mobile - See how to enhance your training effectiveness by creating just-in-time training shorts that can be delivered via mobile.
• A “How To” Guide to Get Started with Video in Your HR/Recruiting Organization - We’ll cover how companies are building light infrastructure to deliver on the potential of video – without breaking the bank.

Register now and the gang at Fistful of Talent will send you a special FOT toolkit – “Lights, Camera, Hired: How to Use Video to Land Your Next Hire” – once the webinar is complete!

Make all of your employees eligible for to become free agents every three years.

Allowing your employees to become free agents (and in fact, forcing them to become free agents) has several possible outcomes:

• the employee shops their skills around to competitor organizations to get a true sense of their value
• the employee negotiates a new (better) deal with their current company and agrees to stay
• the employee finds themselves a better deal and jumps to a new company
• an employer has the opportunity not to “re-sign” a particular employee

Right about now some of you probably think this is a stupid idea – why in the world would a company want to encourage an employee to look elsewhere?  Well, first off, I have a news flash for you – your employees are already looking for new jobs from time to time, just under the radar and with none of the potential benefits of an “open” process.  Here’s why I think creating a free agency period could be important:

• Your Current Job May Begin to Look Much Better:  all of us have complained about our current jobs at different times – too much of this, not enough of that, or I’m ready for something more.  But the funny thing is once you go out and interview with another company you’ll often view you current job in a whole new (often positive light).  Turns out the grass isn’t always greener.

• Your Skills Have Changed:  Three years is enough time for an employee to have learned and mastered a new set of skills.  In fact, depending on your industry, three years of experience can have a significant positive impact on your compensation.  Marketable skills = more $.  On the other hand, if an employee’s skills have declined or haven’t kept pace with new advances in the marketplace, a company should have the right to adjust compensation accordingly.

• Motivation:  If an employee knows that every three years they’ll have an opportunity to test the market value of their skills there’s a higher likelihood they’ll make the investment to learn something new.  This goes both ways – if a company knows that it runs the risk of losing top talent every three years I’d be willing to bet they would make a greater investment in professional development.

Now of course, most of us probably wouldn’t be able to implement such a policy at our companies but the point of the post is this:  transparent choice.  Whenever possible, create an environment where you talk about employment choices with your employees and be honest about what needs to change (on both sides) for the partnership to continue.  In my opinion, it’s better to be up front than to find out later when it’s too late.

“Can you have respect and power? We (the HBJ) found that it’s hard to gain both”.

In addition they said, “Decisions about high-level promotions most often center on perceptions of power, not of fairness”.

Read the whole post at Dawn Burke’s The HR Insomniac (an FOT contributor blog)

Long version – the name of the webinar is Five Ways to Use Video to Raise Your HR and Recruiting Game.

You know you need it.  So sign up.  We’ll cover ways to get your video game going with your employment brand, interviewing, training and this one I want to talk about today – management training.

Your management training is lame.  You know it is.  So we’re going to use a real life training opportunity to go through how to use video to make your managers better…wait for it…. managers…..

Check it:

We’ll break it down for you by showing you a real life tool we need to train on:

Then, we’ll show you the wrong way to use video…  Lame video of a Pat Sajak-like character repeatedly hitting on a woman in harassment training anyone?

But wait!!! We’ve got the right way!!  We’ll break down the best way to use video to engage your managers in whatever it is that you want to train them on, and they’ll actually have a chance of being able to display the wisdom you’re imparting on them if you use our approach!

Who’s this sharp guy featured in the training?  Clooney?  A young Pat Riley in a corporate office?

Sign up here. You’ll be glad you did.  So will we.  See you on Wednesday.

I occasionally checked out their match, however, and it soon became obvious that they were not working up any sweat, either. The goal of their game, apparently, was to hit the ball as close to the opposing player as possible.  If a player hit a shot right at someone, the other players would cheer; a ball that was in bounds, but out of everyone’s reach, brought silence.  No extra effort, very little movement and limited stress.  Their range was one step away from wherever they were standing.

Lazy Tennis:  Four average dudes standing around, watching shots bounce out of their reach, with no effort to expand their range.

Corporate version of Lazy Tennis:  Asking an average leader to hire a potential succession candidate.

A hiring need opens, senior executives and HR pros look at the dynamics of the group / business and say, “Hey Sally, let’s make this hire a potential succession candidate.  Let’s work to identify someone who has the potential and interest to grow into your role in the next 2-4 years.”

If Sally is solid in her role, then she understands this is a good thing.  The company is committing to a comprehensive search of the market and perhaps a more lucrative comp package to hire the right person.  The company is also planning on providing Sally the potential flexibility to move up in the organization. Good news.

On the flip side, the average or poor manager freaks out.  Sally the average manager does not want to find someone who is going to push her.  Give her a candidate that is stronger than her, and she starts to sweat.  To continue the tennis analogy, she wants someone within a step of her, but no more.  She will find all sorts of reasons for rejecting good candidates who she will never let get through the process.

How do you fix this?  For bad managers, Tim Sackett suggested taking hiring authority away.  I agree—a bad manager needs to have other people assign talent to his team.  Tough call, hard conversation, but critical.

But how do you handle the “just average” manager?  This gets a bit tricky.  A former peer’s answer was that the senior exec for the group needed to see all first round candidates.  This might feel weird if this level typically only sees finalists, but it seemed to work.  The senior exec could engage early to provide the wider view that the average manager needs and that top candidates will want.

 ”Hey, Sally.  I just saw the résumé and summary of Tina Smith that Tim sent over.  Looks pretty interesting.  I would like to sit in on the interview when you bring her in to meet your team.” 

If you don’t coach your exec to make this play, the manager won’t stretch for the shot.  The manager will sit there while top candidates pass by, like the guys watching shots go by in Lazy Tennis.  He wants the recruiting folks to find someone within just a step of himself.  Don’t let it happen.

1. From Cubicles, Cry for Quiet Pierces Office Buzz. As many companies knock down walls to create open-air communal space, their employees are unhappy and seek a new wall to cut out workplace distractions.

2. Saying Meetings Futile, SHRM Transparency Group Issues Survey. A group of former SHRM leaders have declared that attempting to resolve differences with the current SHRM board face-to-face is futile and have issued a survey to employ help for what steps to take next.

3. Can a side gig help your career? Certain types of moonlighting can actually help you in your main job and foster creativity and drive entrepreneurial  spirit and wise organizations should support vs object employees desire to take on a secondary role.

4. Monster Post Sale Signs as Numbers Continue to Tumble. Monster Inc.  announced for they were for sale two months ago and has attracted a number of suitors, including the private equity firm Silver Lake Partners. Despite claim that the back-end company that supports Monster and a few other boards is stronger than it has been in the last eight years, Monster stock prices continue to drop.

5. What You Can Learn from Zynga’s Cool Company Culture. Take a photo tour of Zynga and pick up some ideas on how to make your company culture rock.

Have a great week!

I don’t have any statistics on the opportunity cost of college degrees against the GDP. And I don’t imagine many people emerge with positive earnings to debt ratio when they graduate. But, I do know that if our sole measure of value is in lifetime cumulative earnings, we have missed the point.

I graduated with the most useless (in terms of gainful employment) degree anyone could have dreamed up. German Literature just doesn’t feature often, not even in Germany. And yet, I’m a functioning member of society with a real job. I can also count on one finger the number of people I know that use their field of study in their daily work. So, why get a degree at all if it doesn’t prepare you for your job? Because it prepares you for life. It doesn’t matter what you study as much as it matters what you become as you study. Chew on that, grasshopper.

There are a few things that college gives you within a cocoon of safety that come at a much higher price in the real world.

Make Way for Stupid!

1. College gives you a runway to be an idiot on your time, before you get to your first employer, and it’s on your permanent record. Employers won’t suffer fools long, so it’s best you get your stupid out early — on your dime.

 2. If you’ve never failed before, Intro to Statistics will make certain you do. You will soon learn there is someone better than you at anything you do. Just check out the 9 year old piano prodigies on YouTube. That doesn’t mean you shouldn’t do it. Embrace that early, and you’ll be fine. In fact, you’ll be ahead of the game because you know what your strengths are and how to ask for help.

 3. You are not the center of the universe. Motherhood taught me that I don’t even rate in my own household, but I digress. College provides you a worldview that few other experiences do.

Now, could I have saved $100k, opened up a pet massage business, and come to the same self-aware me? I really don’t think so, and here’s why…college instilled in me a lifelong passion for learning and inquiry — done without even a modicum of expectation that it would help my employability. It was pure self-discovery and personal development for the sake of it. The way my math works is that my earning years max out at about 50. My learning years, statistically speaking, (see, Stats did pay off) will exceed that. And if I had based every decision on maximizing my earnings potential, I’d be one miserable oral surgeon.  As it stands, I rock the NY Times Crossword. Even Sunday.

I know what you’re thinking…America needs a highly skilled workforce, not one conversant on the intricacies of Elizabethan poetry. America cannot compete on scale or efficiency. Where it can compete is in the area of innovation and creative problem solving—the kind of intellectual curiosity that college inspires.

So, should 18 year olds save their parents’ money and skip college? Well, as Goethe said, “Everybody wants to be somebody; nobody wants to grow.” See that, you’ve just been hit with a little higher learning, German Literature style.

I’ll admit it – I’ve been known to ramble… as I am now.

The point of this post is that sometimes it’s much more impactful to say something simply.

Recognition Is No Game

This occurred to me last Sunday night as I watched “Game of Thrones” on HBO.  A wonderfully written and acted series.  If you’re not a Lord of the Rings fan – you probably won’t like this – it’s got sorcerers, dragons, magic and all that good stuff wrapped in a medieval cloak.

During one of the scenes a character explained that he had put his reputation on the line and he could potentially be branded a liar.  In that scene he said…and I’m paraphrasing…

“A man is what others say he is, and no more.  If they say he is a liar, his word is worth nothing.”

The recognition connection you ask?

“A person is what others say they are, and no more.”

Isn’t that what recognition really is?  A public definition of one’s value to the organization.

Recognition within a company creates the value proposition for each and every individual.

Without public recognition – there is no common value.

Oh, we can believe it internally – we can have a high opinion of ourselves..  I can think I’m important and have all the value in the world.

But the others, the others have no anchor.  Unless you’ve worked directly with someone they have no knowledge of your value… or your potential value to the organization.

And neither do the managers and executives who are making decisions for succession and promotion.

Without a public recognition system there is nothing to determine “who” employees are.

Think about it for a bit…

“A person is what others say they are, and no more.”

Simple.  To the point.

Recognition systems give your company the ability to solicit and socialize “what others say you are.”

That is what recognition is… what others say you are.