Keeping Your Best Hands on Deck in Times of Uncertainty

John Whitaker Change, John Whitaker, Uncategorized

You know there’s a funny fact about mosquitoes…only the female variety of mosquito will bite you, while only the male mosquito makes an audible “buzz” when it flies. So the saying goes, it’s when you hear nothing that you should worry most. At DentalOne, we’re currently going through one of those transitory phases where change & uncertainty abound. Needless to …

How Much is Too Much When It Comes to Relationships with Your Direct Reports?

John Whitaker Culture, Employee Engagement, Engagement and Satisfaction, John Whitaker, Performance, Performance Reviews, Recognition, Recruiting, Retention

You know that side-job you have as the informal HR Advisor for any/all of your friends? It can be enlightening at times, even uplifting, when you hear some of the ridiculous sh*t people are forced to put up with in their workplace. For the situation to reach the “Mind if I run something by you?” stage, it usually entails the …

3 Ingredients Needed for New Manager Success

John Whitaker John Whitaker, Recruiting

Howdy folks, welcome to Texas, home of the folksy colloquialism. In today’s edition, we learn how to make chicken salad! No, no, not the delectable combination of poultry and love scooped on your plate at Corner Bakery. I’m talking about doing the impossible – making chicken salad out of chicken-feathers (this is the SFW version.) This comes to mind whenever college …

new boss

Meet The New Boss….

John Whitaker Career Paths, John Whitaker

Being the “new guy” is always an exciting position – something about that clean slate is invigorating, and you have the added benefit of saying “I’m new” for that 3 or 4 week honeymoon period when everybody loves you [shelf life of that phase varies]. It’s obviously a little different when you come into a leadership role; the “excitement” also comes with a …

Show Me The Shekels

John Whitaker Compensation/Cash Money, HR, HR (& Life!) Advice, John Whitaker, Organizational Development, Recruiting, Retention

My buddy KD just wrote a piece about the importance of the Employee Development Plan when targeting the performance “middle-class.” It makes a lot of sense; you have 20% of your people who don’t want development, 20% who manage their own development, and a huge population in the middle who are waiting to be captured by one camp or the other. …