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August 2020

Great HR Pros Learn to Ask Very Specific Questions...

Deep thoughts for my HR friends and managers of people doing hard work in the field this week:

“Life punishes the vague wish and rewards the specific ask. After all, conscious thinking is largely asking and answering questions in your Mentors own head. If you want confusion and heartache, ask vague questions. If you want uncommon clarity and results, ask uncommonly clear questions.”

— Tribe of Mentors: Short Life Advice from the Best in the World by Timothy Ferriss
https://a.co/crLGIsN

I'm a big believer that all of us can be better negotiators. At times, that requires cutting through the bulls**t and rather than dancing around the issue, asking very specific questions designed to box someone in related to how they feel and what you want - rather than worrying about this thing some call "feelings".

Examples of the specific ask by HR pros:

--If I source these candidates for you, are you actually going to hire someone?

--I'd like to be in charge of that project. Will you support me in that and assign it to me?

--Why did you offer that person less than the person who went to your Alma Mater?

--Did you put both of your hands on Janet's shoulders? (follow up: "creepers")

Ping me with your specific asks/questions from the HR hall of fame. And they next time you're dancing around the real issue, remember this advice from Tim Ferris and start asking uncommonly clear, specific and direct questions.

You'll be shocked at the results you get. Nobody dies, and you either get what you wanted or save 3 hours doing follow-ups trying to get to the same point.

Advantage: You.


Imposter Syndrome: When's the Last Time You Questioned Your Ability?

Uh...Yesterday?

Imposter syndrome is real my friends, especially when you're in the middle of a Pandemic. That's why I took the time via BEST HIRE EVER to talk to John Whitaker, EVP and CHRO at National Partners in Healthcare about onboarding executives.

We discuss what new leaders get right, where it goes wrong and what new leaders need to think about as they enter a new organization. We discuss the condition called "Imposter's Syndrome" and provide our hot takes on the best way out of the funk. John shares his experiences onboarding into companies as a new leader and tells me what he's learned.

If you want to hear more from John, go subscribe at HRHardball.com, read Whit’s back catalog on FOT, and look for the HRHardball podcast debuting October 1st!”

Please subscribe, rate and review (Apple) and follow (Spotify) to get the latest delivered to you.  Click here if you don't see the player below!

SHOW HIGHLIGHTS

2:10 - John and KD start by talking about Texas A&M (John) and Auburn (KD) football, the pandemic, et al. John shares that his road trip to Auburn was better than the one he took to Tuscaloosa (Alabama).

4:20 - John talks about his recent move from Sage to National Partners in Healthcare as an HR Leader, how the pandemic encouraged the move.

6:05 - KD and John talk about not knowing the language in a new industry, and John shares the fact he had his own slang he was throwing around to new teammates. 

8:25 - Topic is being an incoming new leader at an organization – what do coming leaders generally mess up related to this?  John and KD talk about where they feel like they've failed before?  Announcing presence with authority is discussed.

13:00 - What the heck is “Imposter Syndrome” when it comes to new leaders?  We talk about how it impacts women, men, etc.

19:50 - John and KD talk about what type of new leader doesn't feel imposter syndrome. 

24:00 - KD and John discuss Imposter Syndrome at lower levels in the organization, good movement in companies on asking individuals to Lean In and learned roles in gender and beyond.

26:55 - What are the coping mechanisms for imposter syndrome? John tells the story of challenges he's faced from direct reports early in new roles, etc. John and KD discuss the agendas of people who come to you first, share their opinions about others, etc.

30:00 - John and KD discuss two profile new leaders meet in new roles - the "The Quiet One" and the "Apple Polisher."  

38:00 - John and KD discuss whether onboarding for a new leader is necessary, or whether it's better for a new leader to figure it out on their own. "That's what the money is for" is discussed.


WORST BOSS EVER: Just Watch How They Treat Others When Off Camera...

It's a line as old as time itself. The wisest person in your family gave you the following advice when it comes to the true test of any individual:

"If you really want to know who someone is, watch how they treat others when they think no one is watching"

Without question, you've heard that saying or a variant of it. And it's 100% true. 

This wisdom was on full display last week on a virtual Senate hearing. Here's the rundown from New York Mag:

In the middle of Postmaster General Louis DeJoy’s testimony before (a video-chat version of) Congress on Friday morning, Delaware senator Tom Carper experienced the kind of tech hiccup so many of us have while working from home over the last few months. And Carper — not realizing his screen and audio were being recorded for everyone to see — didn’t hold back his frustration.

After being called on to speak and almost missing his window because of the technical difficulties, Carper suddenly appeared, directing his ire over the problems at a masked staffer to his left. The senator intoned “f**k, f**k, f**k,” after which the poor man fiddled with Carper’s setup — which had already been restored.

What's interesting about this is that the Twitter mob, quick to cancel almost anyone, played it off and said words to the effect of "that's so 2020" and "who has not faced this?" - which are both correct sentiments.

But you know me. I like to dig a little bit deeper. My folks did tell me to watch how someone treats others when they think no one is watching - because it matters. Let's run through what I saw.  First, watch the whole video multiple times below (email subscribers click through to view or click this link):

OK, got it? Here's what I saw:

1--Yes, this can happen to anyone. Which is why patience is valued in these circumstances.

2--It's not so much that he said the F word, it's how he said it. He turned directly to a staffer who was there to help him, and he didn't say words to the effect of "please help me" even with some cursing included, he basically turned to the staffer (turning away from the camera) and just started abruptly saying, “f**k, f**k, f**k"

3 - That whole deal - turning to a staffer and doing the whole grumpy, abrupt, “f**k, f**k, f**k" without actually asking for help basically puts you on the list of worst Bosses alive. It's a big list, but act like this and you're on the list.

4--Also notable is the fact that he couldn't handle the tech after being coached 100 times, and then clicks on something as he's turning to lambast his help and opens up the mic right before he turned to the staffer to drop f bombs - classic. It means he took responsibility for the tech, but then couldn't handle it, then kind of bullied someone under pressure.

The mob that usually cancels people was quick to play it off. To be clear, I'm not into the cancel thing, so I'm not interested in that angle. I'm not calling for anything.

But dig a little deeper on the mannerisms and call it for what it is. Powerful guy with awful habits related to how he treats people.

Worst Boss Ever - he's on the list.

 


Gap Years Are Sexy, But They Come At A Cost...

As COVID drags on, there's a popular topic that's coming up more often in families with college age kids - THE GAP YEAR!

What's a Gap Year? Here's how Wikipedia describes it:

"A gap year, also known as a sabbatical year, is typically a year-long break before or after college/university during which students engage in various educational and developmental activities, such as travel or some type of regular work."

Ah, the Gap Year. If you've had people in your family who have taken a Gap year to travel and "find themselves" and it was even remotely funded by your family, raise Saving-gap-year-backpacker-khaosan-road-thailand-istock your hand. That's a definition of comfort and privilege, regardless of your race or any other identifier.  I'm not hating on it, but it's a very comfortable thing.

As they used to say back in the day, "It's good work if you can get it."

But Gap Years are back in the news, more the result of the pandemic than of privilege.  Two factors make it a hot topic:

1--Remaining fears about the safety of being on campus and in a general college population, and more to the point, 

2--The fact that almost EVERY FREAKING COLLEGE IN AMERICA trumpeted the fact that they would be BACK ON CAMPUS this fall, only to move everyone in, secure the local economy for another 4 months (annual leases on and off campus) and CASH THE CHECKS before announcing they were moving back to a primarily virtual learning environment.

Thus, some people feel smart for taking a Gap Year this term, and others are considering taking one starting in the winter and spring terms, now that the cat's out of the bag related to "yeah, we didn't really ever think we would be back on campus - sorry!"

But the Gap Year ultimately has a cost, primarily in lifetime earnings.  More from USA Today:

A new study out this week  by SimpsonScarborough finds that 40% of incoming freshmen are likely or highly likely to not attend any four-year college this fall. Last week, Harvard reported that more than 20% of its first-year students are deferring enrollment.

But there could be a downside to delaying college by a year: the potential loss of $90,000 in lifetime earnings, according to a study from economists at the Federal Reserve Bank of New York. That might seem counterintuitive, given that the pandemic has pushed the jobless rate higher, prompting questions from families about whether it’s the best time to make a pricey investment in a college degree.

The pandemic has made a college degree more valuable, not less, partly because the prospects for people with only a high school diploma are far weaker in the pandemic than for those with a bachelor’s degree.  

So how does that $90,000 in lost income come about? Mainly by foregoing the first year of income earned by a college degree – about $43,000 on average, the study found. A gap-year graduate would start earning that same income a year later, and never quite catch up. For instance, a 25-year-old gap-year student would earn about $49,000 on average, compared with about $52,000 for a grad who didn’t take a year off. That adds up over a career to $90,000, the study noted.

As a parent with a kid in college, it's tough to see him back at school but not getting the true college experience. I'm OK with paying, as his 4-years is a reasonable cost ticket, which I'm thankful for.

But I suspect there's been a lot of trust that's been decayed with Universities in their relationships with families and students.

I suspect the new Gap Year will change over time to the Virtual Year, where families and students pick the lowest cost option to make progress on degrees from virtual locations, wait out COVID and transfer credits in to the brick and mortar school when this is all over.

Congrats colleges - glad you got paid. You should hope this COVID thing gets solved by Summer of 2021, because if not, the economy in your towns and cities is going to crater.


The Best Study I've Seen on How Work is Changing in a COVID World...

There's been a lot of guessing related to how the world of work is changing in a COVID world, especially for white collar professional jobs who have the ability to work remotely in the lockdown. Hot takes include the following:

--Remote work is here to stay, pack up the office.

--Productivity is at an all-time high! 

--Everyone hates Zoom.

Are any of those true? Maybe, maybe not - I find the truth always lies somewhere in the middle. 

But the best study I've seen to date is the one below from NBER, which looks in depth at the impact of the COVID lockdown on a specific topic - meetings - across meta-data from 3 Million users. Yes, 3 million!  So meaningful that we talked about it on a segment of one of my podcasts, HR Famous.  See the top line notes from the study below and then take a listen to the podcast for discussion.

More meetings. More participants in those meetings, shorter meetings in length, longer workdays.  Best study yet, check it out and take a listen to the pod segment as well.

More from Marginal Revolution:

Using de- identified, aggregated meeting and email meta-data from 3,143,270 users, we find, compared to pre- pandemic levels, increases in the number of meetings per person (+12.9 percent) and the number of attendees per meeting (+13.5 percent), but decreases in the average length of meetings (-20.1 percent). Collectively, the net effect is that people spent less time in meetings per day (-11.5 percent) in the post- lockdown period. We also find significant and durable increases in length of the average workday (+8.2 percent, or +48.5 minutes), along with short-term increases in email activity.

That is drawn from data from Europe, North America, and the Middle East, in this new NBER paper by Evan DeFilippis, Stephen Michael Impink, Madison Singell, Jeffrey T. Polzer, and Raffaella Sadun.

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In episode 27 of The HR Famous Podcast, long-time HR leaders (and friends) Tim Sackett, Kris Dunn and Jessica Lee discuss theories on why meeting times have decreased during the pandemic (but the number of meetings is up) and workplace relationship issues that have reemerged surrounding former McDonald’s CEO Steve Easterbrook (McLovin from episode 2 of HR Famous).

Listen (click this link if you don’t see the player) and be sure to subscribe, rate, and review (Apple Podcasts) and follow (Spotify)!

SHOW HIGHLIGHTS

1:00 - The resident ginger of HR Famous is back from vacation! Welcome back Tim!

4:40 - Tim got some flowers for his wife and tried to share the great deal with the HR Famous crew and Jlee had to kindly reject (she doesn’t like roses!) and KD had bought flowers for his wife 30 minutes prior to Tim's text. Jlee also implores her vast knowledge of flowers onto the men of the group. 

7:00 - First topic of the day - a new study was released from the National Bureau of Economic Research about changes in the workday. The study shows that the number of meetings and number of attendees per meeting have increased during the pandemic, but there is a reduction in meeting length. 

9:20 - Jlee thinks the reduction in meeting time can be attributed to less travel time from meeting to meeting and the convenience of meeting remotely. How far do you have to travel to get to meetings in your office? KD thinks the reduction is due to having more meetings. Tim thinks it can be attributed to the digital platforms. 

12:30 - KD had to lead his first in person, socially distanced, masked up long meeting recently and he said it was horrible. He would prefer to do it through Zoom. 

15:00 - One more stat from this study: the average work day has increased by 48.5 minutes while working remotely. Tim doesn’t believe people are actually working more but they are just working at different times of the day. 

17:15 - How early do you schedule your meetings? Jlee is a fan of 7:30 am meetings. 


HR Leaders: How's the Quality of Your Direct Reports on Your Team?

Ah yes. The leader is only as good as their team. It's true everywhere, so why wouldn't it be true in the world of HR?

So HR Leaders, the question is this - how good is your team of HR direct reports? Do you have a world class team or did you settle? If you're not a leader, look around - how is the 9 facesstrength of the HR team around you? Perhaps the bigger question is this - how do you evaluate whether your team of HR direct reports is world-class or something far less?

Here are 3 questions to answer to give you guidance from Mark Efron and the Talent Strategy Group:

As a CHRO, you may believe that your HR team already performs at a high level. We hope they do, but we would like to hear your answers to three questions:

1--Would your company’s best leaders and employees say that your core HR processes are flawlessly executed, easy to use, and getting the results that top executives and employees need and want?

2--Are your team members able to influence top executives on difficult topics, changing the executive’s mind where needed through a deep understanding of the business and strong command of the relevant facts? And, perhaps most importantly,

3--Does the executive team trust your direct reports with their corporate lives?

If you can affirmatively answer each of those questions, you’ve built an outstanding CHRO team and your CEO should be thrilled with your deep succession chart.

A typical CHRO’s response to those questions ranges from “sort of” to “we’re still working on that.” When we ask about the specific plan to elevate the quality of their team, there is none.

I like all of the questions provided, but I like a mix of #2 and #3, which can be combined effectively when evaluating each member of your team with the following question:

Would you send your direct report to any meeting on your behalf with limited prep and be confident that they wouldn't hurt you?

Any meeting is code for one with important people - top executives, key clients, etc.  The same influence and trust topics outlined kind of all come down to whether you'd trust your direct report to represent you - and at the very least, do no harm, but in more ideal circumstances - help progress the meeting to an outcome you'd be proud of. An extension of you.

What about it? Go through your direct reports - would you send them to any meeting to represent you?

I'm fortunate to have hired a lot of people in my career about whom I can answer that question as "yes". But no one hits every shot.

For deeper notes on the construction of an HR Team, check out my book - The 9 Faces of HR.


Meetings In-Person vs. Video: See You On the Zoom Thing, Suckers...

So, I did it. We had a client who asked to do a face-to-face meeting in early August, socially distanced and with masks on in a conference room.

I was expected to handle about 40% talk time/time of possession across 90 minutes. Here's what I learned.

It freaking sucked.

I'm not super alarmed about doing an in-person meeting with all the right protections as described above. We sanitized before and after, had the masks up and were socially distanced in the conference room.

But it was awful. Here's what I learned and why I would dramatically prefer a Zoom meeting to the in person, masked version:

1--It's hard to talk for long periods of time through a mask. Running a meeting with a mask is not going into a store with a mask. Talking for any period of time is hard, forced and awkward.

2--I have a big a## head. Uni-size, one size fits all masks are not made for me. If you feel any pressure on your ears, that means the mask is tight on your face and that's going to make talking difficult for any period of time.  As they said in Jaws, you're going to need a bigger boat mask.

3 - Life and conversations are hard without facial expressions. You think you can smile with your eyes? I think you look like a hostage when you do your eyes that way.

4 - Almost everything is better with a Zoom call when compared to a masked, in-person meeting. Audio is better. Visuals are better. You build better understanding. You don't feel like you're in a bad movie that ends with zombies running said meeting.

I looked forward to the face to face meeting - a chance to get back to normal. I was wrong.

I'm pro-mask (why not?), but I'm not pro-mask, live meeting.

If you can, save the in-person business meetings for when we beat this thing. For all the essential people doing it day to day, you're professionals - I salute you! 


Clickbait Reporting on HR Issues in Today's World...Sucks (The HR Famous Podcast)

Look, I get it. We live in a clickbait society designed to write a great title to any story and get everyone enraged about whatever the issue of the day is.

Politics. Masks. All issues on COVID. You can list all your other examples in this box - <insert here>.  It's clickbait all the time, Blizzard-entertainment-cover-photo and few reporters take the time to present a balanced account of the issues at hand.

But I'm an HR leader by trade, and since the clickbait has firmly landed in the world of HR, now I'm mad. 

What am I mad about? The uptick in articles on business sites citing issues in workforces at American companies. Full disclosure, if there are big issues at any company, that's on the company and people like us to get in front of and make better.

But reporters have lost their way in reporting on these issues.  Case in point, this recent Bloomberg article about employees at Blizzard entertainment not making enough to eat.

Things this article didn't do that should be required in standard reporting on workforce issues:

--They didn't share any details to build credibility on source documents provided by a source (in this case, an internal salary spreadsheet created by one or more employees)

--They didn't share how many employees they talked to for the article. I've seen articles describing big problems at a company with as little as 6 employees cited. This one doesn't even say how many employees they talked to.  The company in question (Blizzard) has 5,000 employees. Duh.

--They didn't use publicly discoverable information (Glassdoor, any salary site) to provide context related to what the limited number of employees they interviewed told them.

I could go on. If there are issues, HR is responsible for helping fix those issues and should be accountable if things aren't right.

But reporters should be accountable too. But, in today's world, too often they are not. They get three data points out of 5,000 available, don't do research, write a sexy headline and publish.

Reporters: Do Better. DO YOUR JOB.

This rant is why the latest episode of The HR Famous Podcast features me and Jessica Lee discussing the recent Bloomberg article that attempted a takedown vs Blizzard Entertainment related to pay issues - including some employees passing around a cloud spreadsheet listing salaries they make at Blizzard. Along the way,  we discuss what quality reporting looks like around this type of issue, messaging as part of damage control when a company finds itself under scrutiny, and we also look for clues related to the depth of pay issues at Blizzard on the company's Glassdoor page.

Take a listen below!

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Listen (click this link if you don’t see the player below) and be sure to subscribe, rate, and review (Apple Podcasts) and follow (Spotify)!

SHOW HIGHLIGHTS

1:30 - Tim is gone (again) this week on another vacay! KD and Jlee talk about what they think Tim is doing on his Lake Michigan getaway. Ginger people don’t tan!

12:00 - Next topic of the day - Blizzard Entertainment, famous for making many popular video games like Call of Duty, has a situation where employees circulated a salary document internally that showed major pay disparitiesThe salary document was first reported by Bloomberg - but the gang has questions.

15:00 - Jlee praises the person who circulated the Google sheets form for being efficient. If anyone has the link to the spreadsheet, HR Famous would love to see it! KD wonders aloud how many columns are on the spreadsheet?  Are there names? The gang doubts it.

18:00 - An Activision spokesperson says that they compensate their employees fairly and gave their top performers a higher salary increase than in prior years. KD compares this issue to an episode of The Office where they have to decide who to give raises to and how.

21:00 - KD comments on the quote from the Activision spokesperson that says “a 20% increase on salaries compared to other years” was questionable language. KD and Jlee give high marks to this language that is a little clever to the untrained eye. 

25:00 - KD points out that Blizzard has thousands of employees and not everyone could be consulted for this article. He's kind of over articles that splash, but make no mention of how many employees a reporter talked to.

26:00 - What do you think Blizzard’s Glassdoor rating is? KD is a little surprised by Blizzard’s rating and thinks that their rating isn’t indicative of some of the problems this article addresses. 

29:00 - KD finds the reported Blizzard salaries on Glassdoor by job and finds that many aren’t too far off the industry average/ KD guesses the problems are in customer service and QA based on low hourly rates.

32:00 - Jlee feels for Blizzard and their HR department in these tough times for their company. KD wants reporters to tell a full story and do their job right. He encourages them to take their clickbait titles for traffic, then tell whole story.


The Unintended Consequences of Federal Unemployment in a COVID World...(Best Boss Ever Podcast)

As I write this, the Federal Unemployment Benefit of $600 per week as part of the COVID stimulus package expired on 7/31, and with the Democrats and GOP deadlocked related to a new stimulus package, President Trump stepped in with an executive order to serve as a bridge until congress could negotiate a deal in the same area.

This post isn't political. But any and all compensation issues in a pandemic are interesting to me, which is why I had one of my Robotsfavorite compensation experts - Ann Bares - join me on my BEST BOSS EVER podcast to talk about managing compensation strategy in a pandemic world.

One of the the things that came up (I asked Ann!) was the fact that a lot of companies felt that the $600 per week federal unemployment benefit was preventing capable people from re-entering the workforce. As a leader in a recruiting company, I would tell you that our clients believe this to be true.  Ann had a great response, telling me that beyond the reality of whether people with access to federal unemployment were slow to return to work, she's more concerned and focused strategically on the 2nd and 3rd order consequences/impact of any comp program (including expanded unemployment as an example of that).

That was a "mind blown" moment for me, and I ended up wondering aloud whether difficulty finding needed labor may encourage companies to invest and go "all in" in areas like automation at this point.  Which ultimately harms employment for the sector of jobs in question.

That's the thing about unintended consequences - you never see them coming.

Check out my podcast with Ann Bares below!

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Welcome to Best Boss Ever, the podcast dedicated to helping you develop managers who build great teams. In this episode, Kris Dunn talks about the issues with Managing Compensation Strategy in a Pandemic World with Ann Bares, his favorite industry compensation expert at Altura Consulting Group and writer at Compensation Force.

Don't forget to subscribe to this podcast on Apple PodcastsSpotify or Google Play. Rate and Review if you like what you hear!

On to the show (email subscribers, click here if you don't see the podcast player)...

Show Highlights:

2:00 - Ann talks about her transition from an undergraduate in social work to the world of compensation, where she found an affinity for quantitative methods.

5:30 - Ann and KD discuss what the transition looks like for companies on compensation strategy as we move from a 10-year expansion to the recession we’re already in.

8:00 - Ann talks about unevenness of the pandemic flavor of the recession - some companies are struggling, but some are expanding and thriving.

12:00 - Ann and KD discuss the most likely changes to come for companies that are in pain from a compensation perspective - think prioritized skill set investments for reinvention, etc. Ann and KD also talk about how adjustments are being made to common components like annual increases, etc.

16:00 - Ann and KD talk about when across the board salary cuts might be reinstated in the marketplace.

17:41  - Ann and KD discuss how WFH changes the landscape of competing for talent from a compensation perspective - what's your pay market when a large % of your workforce is remote? Fluidity is a new reality.  Kris also focuses on the fact that flexibility for personal wants and needs related to WFH preferences creates a new standard for HR pros.

24:10 - Ann talks about whether companies become less aggressive in benchmarking compensation vs the market in recessions. 

27:00 - Kris and Ann talk about whether there Is a brand of company out there that thinks of recessions as a great opportunity to pick up talent. How does their strategy differ from a defensive position on comp?

34:00 - Ann and KD talk about the federal unemployment benefit as part of the stimulus plan, and whether it discourages some people from returning to work. The conversation goes beyond that surface-level topic, as Ann and Kris discuss the 2nd and 3rd order consequences/impact of any comp program. KD notes that any difficulty finding needed labor may encourage companies that are slow to invest in areas like automation to go "all in" at this point.

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Ann Bares on LinkedIn

Compensation Force

Altura Consulting Group

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Boss Leadership Training Series

Kinetix

The HR Capitalist

Fistful of Talent

Kris Dunn on LinkedIn

KD's Book - The 9 Faces of HR


Pandemic/Recession Notes: It's Going to Get Hard to Recruit Candidates in Stable Situations (The Best Hire Ever Podcast)...

If there's one thing I learned in the last recession that's going to help me this time around, it's this:

All things being equal, when we are deep in a recession, reasonable people in stable employment situations are less likely to jump to a new job.

I know what you're saying - you've got multiple examples where that's not the case. I hear you, but note the start of the statement above - "all things being equal."

When we're in a recession, which we are as I write this in 2020 (pandemic, even!), it's harder to get stable people to move. Good boss, decent job, seems stable - why would they take a chance on you, especially when the pandemic flavor of the recession we're in makes them even less confident your company is going to survive?

Candidates ALWAYS have imperfect information on the companies they're moving to.  Will the company make it? Is my new boss secretly a crazy person?  The unemployed are relatively easy to recruit in recessions - they need a job, and they need it quick - the employed are harder to move when times are tough.

Your best chance is really good, incredibly transparent marketing related to your open job. Think job postings and everything around it.

That's why I recently chatted with Katrina Kibben, CEO and Founder of Three Ears Media, on my podcast BEST HIRE EVER. We talked at length on the value of great job postings and marketing materials, and I had Katrina break down the elements of a job posting that generates results and talk about influencing candidates through great copy writing across all job marketing materials.  

Please subscribe, rate and review (Apple) and follow (Spotify) to get the latest Best Hire Ever podcast delivered to you.  Click here if you don't see the podcast player below.

SHOW HIGHLIGHTS:

1:05 - "What up, KD?"

1:30 - KD is a ray of sunshine as he delivers the Q2 GDP numbers and connects it to great job postings.

2:52 - A bit about the artist known as Katrina and Three Ears Media.

5:15 - KD wants to know about the the decision for Katrina to specialize and go DEEEEEEEEEEP in the job posting/job attraction space – why?

9:30 - What are 3 things people can improve on related to their job postings?  Katrina breaks down the problems with 1) content being way too long, 2) bad intakes lead to bad content (buzzwords), and 3) Guessing and winging it.  Katrina goes deep in each area and drops incredible knowledge.

16:10 - KD asks Katrina for the most challenging personas across hiring managers. A story about Missouri is part of the magic!

19:30 - KD focuses on what he views as the the pandemic/recession dilemma. You’re a hiring manager and need great talent. How do you convince people that your company will make it through and they can jump from where they are and be OK at the company you’re a part of?  Katrina acknowledges the challenge but talks about people who have great jobs who are looking for more.

22:25 - Katrina and KD talk about the isolation via the Pandemic creating time to complement career paths with talented people.

24:00 - Katrina gets technical and breaks down the "Human About Us" portion of a job posting as being the place to create confidence in your company. Don't cut and paste a press release. Talk about where you're at right now. Acknowledge the past, talk honestly about the bounce back, etc. #transparency

29:00 - KD asks Katrina how hiring managers can make candidates believe in them as a candidate. 

35:10 - Katrina and KD wrap it up with WNBA talk.

RESOURCES AND SHOW NOTES:

------------Katrina Kibben

Katrina Kibben on Linkedin

Three Ears Media

------------Kris Dunn

Kris Dunn on LinkedIn

Kinetix

The HR Capitalist

Fistful of Talent

Boss Leadership Training Series

Kris Dunn on Twitter

Kris Dunn on Instagram