Looking for a HR Pro? Roll Like John McCain, Find a Sarah Palin, and Change the Game...

Let me start this post by saying that I'm not a political guy and I don't play one on TV.  I stayed at an Embassy Suites last week, so I can't even get the "I did stay at a Holiday Inn Express" academic credit.

Sarah Palin. Interesting.  Now both parties bring something historic to the game.

Democrats and Republicans alike are waiting for Ashton Kutcher to walk around the corner and yell "Dude, you just got Punk'd!!!"

Let me use the news of Sarah Palin (Governor of Alaska) being named the GOP VP candidate by John McCain to give you a non-political thought.

Next time you have a HR opening, change the game.  Be like John McCain and do something the operations folks don't expect you to.  Find a candidate who's a better communicator than your last five hires and has behavioral traits that are different then anyone else you've had on your team.  Here's the secret - you can't let the prospects of the sideline observers telling what he/she doesn't have chase you off. 

Hire someone that's not like you.  Don't be afraid of the criticism.  Look for the strengths that you don't have.

Sarah Palin's a solid conservative choice in many ways, being a lifetime NRA member and pro-life to boot.  She's also different from the standard fare in many ways - a woman, runs the state of Alaska, is a former beauty pageant queen and a high school hoopster, grew up hunting, is a working mom with 5 kids including a special needs child, has a pregnant teenage daughter and a husband who is a union member. 

What??? 

She's about as different as you can get for the GOP.  What's the equivalent for your next HR Manager hire?  Someone who's never worked in HR before, has a Mathematics undergrad and a Master's of Fine Arts, has been a Marketing Manager in a past role, runs the local Toastmaster's club and <insert your unique background point here>? 

In the next couple of weeks, I suspect we'll hear more about why John McCain felt compelled to take the risk.  I suspect we won't hear a lot from the Obama camp regarding any perceived lack of experience, because their ticket has the same issue, just in a different slot.  I also suspect we won't hear a lot of harping about experience on the democratic side from McCain's camp due to the presence of Palin.

That seems healthy to me. 

Meanwhile, don't get sucked into the vortex of the talking heads and negativity.  Apply the lesson, and the next time you have an opening, change the game.  Don't do what they expect.

Think different.

Comments

[Rebecca]

Alternately, another way to look at it is, don't hire unqualified tokens.

[Michael Haberman, SPHR]

I like it. I think it is great to shake things up. Is anyone going to listen to you? I doubt it. We (HR) are all afraid of being too safe. (sorry I am in a grumbly mood this morning.)

[Dan]

Wrote about this as well...although not as good. Good points as always Kris.

[laurie ruettimann]

Kris,

While this post scratches the surface of the Palin selection and its relationship to doing things differently, I would love for your readers to discuss the selection of Palin in a more thoughtful way.

Some argue that Palin was only selected as a product of affirmative action -- something that most GOP (and DNC) followers abhor. Tom Ridge and Bay Buchanan have both said as much (i.e., picked because she's a woman), and they are on opposite sides of the GOP tent.

Furthermore, some argue that selecting Palin was an obvious move. She's an evangelical who is strong on guns and Jesus and holds anti-abortion positions. I heard GOP strategists argue that a true example of shaking up the status quo would be hiring Condi or Carly as the 2nd in command. Both women are fundamentally different than McCain and bring a wealth of experience and freshness to the party.

Finally, I heard that Palin secures the evangelical base and was tapped as an insult to Romney, who blew up the selection of McCain's first choice: Lieberman. In that sense, McCain plays the same old politics-by-retribution game that so many people play in Washington DC. He's not strong enough to follow his gut instincts and choose Joe, but he's strong enough to stick it in Romney's eye.

In my mind, this Palin choice is disappointing. McCain could have been a true maverick and made a better choice -- one that tapped into his desire to do things differently in Washington and make history, too.

My two cents, yo.

Thanks for letting me get this out.

- Laurie

[Dan]

First of all, I really do hate disagreeing with you Laurie...even if it doesn't seem like it lately.
I am just wondering what kind of standard you are holding McCain to? While I won't argue about politics being "rough". Coalition building is what politics is all about. Bringing more people into the tent. A Lieberman pick would not have done this effectively. Sometimes your brain has to rule your gut in order to be more effective.
If Palin was an obvious move, then more of the talking heads would have been picking her to begin with. She wasn't the obvious choice...barely anyone thought she even had a shot.
The Biden choice wasn't necassarily a compliment to Hillary Clinton and I would say even more of a slight than the supposed stick in the eye to Romney.
Above all, I am just trying to figure out why you have written off Palin so quickly. Condi's ties to the administration would never have flown with a candidate who is trying to separate himself from W. Also, while she may not have been his first choice, my read on Mccain is that he would never pick someone for that slot that he wasn't comfortable with. The fact that he thought of and tried to push through Leiberman in my mind lends support to that argument. A guy with an ego like him doesn't lose without getting something in return.

[KD]

Rebecca - As in corporate life, my stretch/out of the box hire is someone else's token and vice versa. Time will tell, as it always does.

Michael - So cynical on the HR connection! I'd sing the song from "annie", but somehow I don't think you'd cheer up from that.

Laurie - not interested in the lengthy political dissection, although I won't stop it in the comments. What I said in the post is how I feel. While she's conservative choice in some areas (guns and choice), she's a crazy candidate for the GOP in others as noted in my post above, which I think is very interesting. I think getting outside the box is healthy in any situation where the staus quo has ruled for a long time.

Plus, knocking experience is really off the table for both sides, with the GOP potentially having an infusion of youth that was previously claimed by the Dems. I think that's healthy. That's as deep as I'm willing to go. Supporters of both parties love to knock the other's candidates and provide lengthy analysis of why a pick is wrong. I'm part of the great middle, watching it all, discounting most of what I hear and making up my own mind. All without caring about what Tom Ridge, the Huffington Post or Fox News said about the selection.

Dan - I agree with your take on bringing people into the tent. There's a lot of different reasons to make a hire. I think the thing that bugs the Dems on this one is that it's harder to dismantle than Romney or Liebermann.

And that's healthy in my eyes.

[Kim Bailey]

OK, taking this back to an analogy to politics, rather than a political commentary (I'm sure we all have passionate views there), I have to agree with the main points from the original post. When our HR department decided to "try someone different" we did so from inside the organization. We had an opening that people with various backgrounds (but NOT HR) applied for internally and we selected one of them. We have done so a couple of times and so far the experiment is working! In one case, the employee later applied for a manager role in another area of the company and having worked in HR, they are now one of our biggest proponents. In another case, the new HR person recruites for an area they used to work in (talk about understanding what they really need when hiring!). While we also sometimes need some HR knowledge when we hire, when we don't, finding "outside the box" insiders is a really good option....try it!!!! The worst thing that could happen is that you have to try again later.