Onboarding the algorithms

During the Ideas and Innovators session at the HR Technology Conference last month, my pal Michael Krupa gave an outstanding talk about automation and advanced 'learning' kinds of technology, and some of the implications for HR and organizational leaders who are choosing to incorporate these technologies into their people and talent management programs.

In the talk, (and once I get the video of this, I will be sure to update the post with the link), Michael used a great expression to illustrate the deliberate and measured approach HR should take to adoption of these 'smart' tools. He called it 'Onboarding the algorithms'; a way of comparing the introduction and deployment of these technologies to the structured and immersive process that most organizations follow when onboarding new employees. The larger point - HR and business leaders need to carefully evaluate, understand, assess, and introduce algorithms and other advanced, intelligent, (and often predictive), tools carefully, and insert them into the HR and talent processes intelligently and intentionally - just like we do when hiring and welcoming new employees.

I think Michael's analogy was a great one as it serves as a kind a warning to HR and business leaders eager to adopt these kinds of advanced and predictive tools for functions like evaluating a slate of job candidates, making decisions about which employees should be considered 'high potential', and thus granted more development and growth opportunities, scheduling the 'optimal' mix of employees for a given day or shift, or to provide intelligence and decision support to managers making decisions about the allocation of salary and bonus pools.

I have no doubt that organizations and HR leaders will seek to adopt these kinds of tools more and more in 2017, but at the same time I think it also we be important, to use Michael's phrase, to 'onboard' these tools and algorithms effectively, in order to ensure we not only utilize the tools to their potential, but we also understand how these tools are actually designed and how they are performing. Kind of like how we know the background of every new employee that comes onboard the organization and how we like to keep track of their assimilation and performance - usually in a pretty structured 30-60-90-180 day kind of manner.

This is a pretty important and complex idea for sure. One that can't be completely explained in one blog post. But I think one good place for HR and business leaders to start is to have really open and honest conversations with their HR technology providers of these smart tools and algorithms to gain a better understanding of how they are designed, how they work, (or are meant to work), and how transparent are the machine's thought processes they end up in a decision, (or at least a recommendation, i.e. 'Hire this person, and not that person.').

A great starting point for HR leaders who need to know what questions to ask of your HR tech providers is the Principles for Accountable Algorithms statement from the  Fairness, Accountability, and Transparency in Machine Learning organization. They break down the five key guiding principles for algorithm design, (responsibility, explainability, accuracy, audibility, and fairness), that HR leaders can look for, (and seek answers about), from their technology providers. Of course there is plenty more for HR leaders to consider when evaluating and deploying these tools, but the FAT/ML document provides a good starting point. You can learn more about that organization and what they do here. 

Just like every good HR pro knows that we just can't toss new employees blindly into the fire and expect that they will produce desired outcomes, (and be happy), we can't expect that we can simply insert new technologies, no matter how 'intelligent', and think we will get optimal outcomes. If these tools are meant to become a fundamental element of you and your leader's talent and people management playbook, then you need to understand them as well as you need to understand all the members of your team.

And you need to be able to tell when the algorithm is wrong too.

Have a great week!

HRE Column: On Recruitment Marketing

Here is my semi-frequent reminder and pointer for blog readers that I also write a monthly column at Human Resource Executive Online called Inside HR Tech that can be found here.

This month, in the aftermath of the recent Talent Acquisition Technology Conference and thinking about all the innovative and potentially disruptive HR and talent acquisition technology solutions that continue to appear in the market, I thought about how much I have heard and seen lately about the concept or category of 'recruitment marketing.'

Both at Talent Tech and at the recent Smashfly Transform event, the strategies, tactics, and technologies that HR and talent acquisition leaders are employing to define and communicate their unique employer brand and value proposition, as well as find, engage, and convert their targeted candidate communities were on full display. This field or category of recruitment marketing has seemingly emerged from the combination or confluence of a tight labor market, powerful and purpose-built technologies, and HR and talent acquisition strategies that are leaning heavily on consumer marketing precepts and concepts. 

It is a really exciting, interesting, and fast-moving time in this new recruitment marketing space, and I thought it would be fun and hopefully valuable to share with HR Executive readers my thoughts about this new and emerging space. I came up with a few observations for my latest HR Executive column.

From the HRE piece:

One of the highlights of the recently concluded Talent Acquisition Technology Conference was the emphasis on recruitment marketing as an emerging new recruiting discipline. The definition of recruitment marketing is pretty straightforward: "the strategies and tactics an organization uses to find, attract, engage and nurture [sought-after people] before they apply for a job, called the pre-applicant phase of talent acquisition." (As an aside, you know a new concept has "arrived" when it has a Wikipedia page for its definition.)

In some ways, recruitment marketing is just the natural extension of the widely discussed "HR should act more like marketing and/or sales" argument that has become popular in recent years. While that argument has indeed proven durable, it may not always be appropriate in all cases, as George LaRocque from HRWINS, one of the conference speakers, pointed out. LaRocque correctly showed that, while most consumer marketers serve only their ultimate external customers, recruiting leaders and recruiters often serve several kinds of customers: candidates, hiring managers, and even HR and organizational leaders.

But even if there is not a perfect analogy between recruiting and sales/marketing, many progressive organizations and talent-acquisition leaders are successfully using consumer-marketing strategies, tactics and approaches to more effectively "market" their organizations and employment opportunities to potential candidates. This discipline of recruitment marketing has indeed emerged and grown more prominent in just the last few years and since not all HR leaders might be completely familiar with the concept and approach, I'd like to explore at least a few important points and share some thoughts on how HR and organizational leaders can begin to incorporate these ideas into their talent acquisition strategies.

Why is recruitment marketing different than just posting job ads?

In her closing keynote at the conference, Stacy Zapar presented a comprehensive review of the many strategies organizations can and perhaps should employ to more effectively define, communicate and market their unique employer brand and employee value proposition to the candidate marketplace. While posting specific job ads on the company careers page and ensuring these ads are distributed to additional outlets such as Indeed or LinkedIn are certainly part of most organization's candidate-attraction strategies, Zapar correctly emphasized that these efforts are only a small part of the optimal overall recruitment-marketing strategy.

Read the rest at HR Executive online...

Good stuff, right? Humor me...

If you liked the piece you can sign up over at HRE to get the Inside HR Tech Column emailed to you each month. There is no cost to subscribe, in fact, I may even come over and rake your leaves car or clean out your gutters or even help you re-purpose the Thanksgiving leftovers. 

Have a great, long Thanksgiving weekend!

PODCAST - #HRHappyHour 268 - We are grateful

HR Happy Hour 268 - We Are Grateful

Hosts: Steve Boese, Trish McFarlane

Listen to the show HERE

This week on a special Thanksgiving-themed HR Happy Hour Show, hosts Steve Boese and Trish McFarlane each run down their 'Top 5' things they are thankful for this year, as well as talk Thanksgiving  foods, sports, and travel. 2016 has been a crazy, eventful, and sometimes trying year for many of us, so we thought it would make sense for the Thanksgiving week show to try and focus on the positive - on the people, places, and things that we are thankful for as we head into the holiday this week. We didn't share our 'Top 5' lists prior to recording the show - have a listen and see just how similar Steve and Trish's lists ended up being.

Additionally, Steve and Trish talk Thanksgiving foods, NBA basketball, and some great 'Thanksgiving' moments from some famous TV sitcoms. Note: Steve really shows his age with his favorite Thanksgiving TV highlight.

You can listen to the show on the show page HERE, or by using the widget player below, (Email and RSS subscribers click through)

This was a really fun show, and we hope you enjoy it and we hope all the HR Happy Hour listeners have a wonderful Thanksgiving. 

And of course we are thankful for our wonderful show sponsor Virgin Pulse - learn more about them at www.virginpulse.com.

Remember to subscribe to the HR Happy Hour Show on iTunes, Stitcher Radio, and all the major podcast apps - just search for 'HR Happy Hour' to subscribe and never miss a show.

Have a great Thanksgiving everyone!

Learn a new word; Word of the year finalists, ranked

Earlier this week the good folks over at Oxford Dictionaries released their pick for 'Word of the Year' for 2016, and they went with 'post-truth', an adjective defined as ‘relating to or denoting circumstances in which objective facts are less influential in shaping public opinion than appeals to emotion and personal belief."

Seems like a fitting choice for the current social and political climate, where it seems that how you say something has become more important that what you are actually saying. You can read more about 'post-truth' and the reasons why Oxford tapped it as the 'Word of the Year' over at their site.

There were nine other words that qualified as finalists for Oxford's Word of the Year for 2016 and taken together they paint a picture of a not-so-great year overall. 

But as Fitzgerald suggested many years back, we beat on, boats against the current and all that...

So let's end the week with some fun, and rank the Oxford Word of the Year finalists, and crown our own Word of the Year.

As a reminder, these rankings are unscientific, unresearched, subjective, and 100% accurate.

Here goes:

Here are the Oxford Dictionaries Word of the Year shortlist choices, definitions, and my revised rankings:

10. alt-right, n. (in the US) an ideological grouping associated with extreme conservative or reactionary viewpoints, characterized by a rejection of mainstream politics and by the use of online media to disseminate deliberately controversial content. Find out more about the word's rise.

9. Brexiteer, n. British informal a person who is in favour of the United Kingdom withdrawing from the European Union.

8. post-truth, adj. relating to or denoting circumstances in which objective facts are less influential in shaping public opinion than appeals to emotion and personal belief 

7. glass cliff,  n. used with reference to a situation in which a woman or member of a minority group ascends to a leadership position in challenging circumstances where the risk of failure is high.

6. Latinx, n. (plural Latinxs or same) and adj. a person of Latin American origin or descent (used as a gender-neutral or non-binary alternative to Latino or Latina); relating to people of Latin American origin or descent (used as a gender-neutral or non-binary alternative to Latino or Latina).

5. hygge, n. [mass noun] a quality of cosiness and comfortable conviviality that engenders a feeling of contentment or well-being (regarded as a defining characteristic of Danish culture):

4. woke, adj. (woker, wokest) US informal alert to injustice in society, especially racism.

3. chatbot, n. a computer program designed to simulate conversation with human users, especially over the Internet.

2. adulting, n. [mass noun] informal the practice of behaving in a way characteristic of a responsible adult,especially the accomplishment of mundane but necessary tasks.

1. coulrophobia, n. [mass noun] rare extreme or irrational fear of clowns.

I have always been a little leery of clowns.

Of course, you can disagree with these rankings, but as it turns out, you would be wrong.

That's it from me - have a great weekend!

PODCAST - #HRHappyHour 267 - Recruitment Marketing, Branding, and Technology

HR Happy Hour 267 - Recruitment Marketing, Branding, and Technology

Hosts: Steve Boese, Trish McFarlane

Guest: Jared Nypen, GreatClips

Recorded live at SmashFly Transform in Boston, Massachusetts

Listen to the show HERE

This week on the HR Happy Hour Show, Steve Boese was joined by Jared Nypen, Director of Talent Acquistion for GreatClips, With more than 4,000 franchised salons throughout the United States and Canada, Great Clips is the world’s largest salon brand. Great Clips franchisees employ 40,000 stylists who receive ongoing training to learn advanced skills and the latest trends.

On the show, Jared shared how he and his team support the GreatClips franchisees with their talent acquisition, recruitment marketing, and employer branding programs and needs. Jared shared his perspectives on the emerging category of recruitment marketing, and how recruiters need to develop and sustain their own employer brand distinct from the consumer brand through these marketing efforts.

Additionally, Jared shared some of the strategies and technologies that he and his team have engaged with in order to enable, scale, and measure the effectiveness of these branding and strategy programs and ultimately help GreatClips get more than its fair share of the available talent in a competitive labor market.

You can listen to the show on the show page HERE, or by using the widget player below (email and RSS subscribers click through)

This was a fun show, thanks to Jared for sitting down with us, and thanks to SmashFly for having the HR Happy Hour at the Transform event.

And of course, thanks to our HR Happy Hour Show sponsor Virgin Pulse - www.virginpulse.com.

Reminder: subscribe to the HR Happy Hour Show om iTunes, Stitcher Radio, and all the podcast player apps - just search for 'HR HappyHour' to subscribe and never miss a show.