By now, you’ve heard that George Steinbrenner (owner of the New York Yankees) fired a manager with 4 World Championships – Joe Torre. While firings happen and the big wheel keeps on turning, it made me think a little bit about the cost of talent and what your money actually buys you. First, a little history. The Yankees have always …
All Stars, No Ditchdiggers – The Ocean’s Eleven/Netflix Staffing Model
Remember Danny Ocean from Ocean’s Eleven? Ocean had all stars because he had referrals (he knew exactly who to hire for each job), he was offering lots of cash and gave each specialist lots of flexibility to run their part of the show. I recently riffed in my Workforce.com column that the world needs ditchdiggers too, meaning all of us …
Recruiting Brand 101 – Candidates Think Your Hiring Managers are L.A.M.E.
How’s your recruiting brand? Got the website, collateral for candidates, maybe even some video? Cool!!!! Do your hiring managers reinforce the brand you are trying to create? Or are they lame, non-communicators destroying all the brand equity you’re building in your company as an “employer of choice?” Stop and think about this one. A while back, I riffed that the …
Is Google Smarter Than Your Company With Talent?
I may have to turn comments off on this one – such an obvious question for most people that I expect the caveman, ALL CAPS responses like "H#@! YEAH!!"… Thanks in advance, Nostradamus…. In news you might have missed in 2007, Google announced it was missing its quarterly earnings targets, in part because it overhired. From the wire report: “We …
Too Sexy For This Job – Do You Discriminate In Hiring Based On Looks?
I don’t. You? I’m not so sure… There’s an article on Forbes detailing the land mines in hiring within the hospitality industry. Here’s a shocker – the competition is fierce in Manhattan and elsewhere in pubs, coffee houses and eateries for attractive candidates. It seems as if having attractive individuals work for you is good for business, but slippery from …
Will Your Company Be Using Facebook to Manage Talent in the Next Year?
Don’t look now, but Facebook, that social networking site that has long been the avenue for college kids to share those crazy pictures from last weekend’s party – is growing up. What’s that mean for you? Maybe nothing. But if you are a part of a Fortune 500 company looking to build internal knowledge networks or training applications, assist employees …
Talent Nugget: The Value of the Receptionist
If you want to get upstream as a HR Pro, start reading Seth Godin. Blog, books (some listed on the side), whatever. Seth’s a marketing guy who understands the value of the brand in recruiting and talent. Case in point – One of Seth’s recent posts hits on the value of the receptionist (including value to your recruiting process): "Being …
Talent Watch – Best Available Athlete
I have a recurring talent conversation with 3-4 colleagues I really like talking to – and it involves hiring generalists vs. specialists. Simply put, once you get away from some very specialized positions in your company, are you open to finding the smartest available person to take the challenge you have or are you forever trying to match an overly …