HR Happy Hour - Live from Chicago

Day 2 of the HR Technology Conference was full of interesting sessions, meetings with vendors, and a fair bit of meeting and getting to know some old and new friends.

I have lots of ideas and comments about the state of HR Technology in general, and about some specific technologies in particular.  But before I start in on that, I want to talk about the HR Happy Hour show we broadcast live from Chicago.

Simply, this was the best HR Happy Hour show yet. Not only because of the fantastic insights from Mark Stelzner, Jason Seiden, Laurie Ruettimann, and Lance Haun, but because of the fantastic and inspiring presence of the many friends and gifted HR and HR Technology professionals that wanted to participate and be a part of the show.

We thought we were going to be putting on a little show with a three or four of us in a small hotel room and we ended up having to scramble to find a big enough conference room to hold everyone.  Many, many thanks to Jason Seiden for organizing the location and keeping cool the entire time.

The show covered a wide range of topics, from making HR more strategic, to the adoption (or lack thereof) of technology in HR, and even a bit about generational differences in the workplace.

But more important than any specific topic that was discussed was the vibe, the feeling of connection and sharing the absolutely surrounded the room and the show.  It was really remarakable to have such a diverse, talented, and passionate group of professionals in one room, taking time out of the conference festivities to participate in the show.

For that I am truly thankful, and very much humbled.

Take a listen to the show, and I hope you feel the energy and excitement that was in the room.

O Canada

This week has been crazy, first getting accosted in a mall parking lot on the way to RecruitFest, and then the fantastic RecruitFest event itself (and an even better party afterword), and followed on Thursday a chance to meet the team at Rypple and Halogen.

If you don't know about Rypple, you really should take some time and check out their service.

Designed to enable individuals to solicit anonymous feedback from trusted advisors, colleagues, friends, customers, or students, it is a fantastically simple, yet powerful solution.  Users craft a simple and concise question, and get feedback that they can use to improve their performance.  The feedback is stored by Rypple, so users can track their performance over time.

Rypple was selected to present as the Cool New Technologies session at next week's HR Technology Conference, and I recommend you check out what is happening at Rypple, the team is constantly improving and innovating and some really interesting new features are in the works.

I left the team at Rypple to head to Ottawa, home of Halogen Software, a provider of strategic talent management solutions and a long time supporter of my HR Technology class.  Halogen continues to innovate in the talent management space, with the recent release of next generation Talent Profiles and and a new Activity Tracker, that collects all activity related to performance and development and presents the information in a consolidated feed.

And most fun of all, today Friday September 26 at 6PM EDT the folks from Halogen will be my guests on the HR Happy Hour show - 'Talent and Technology'.  We will be talking about the role technology can play in helping organizations manage, assess, and optimize talent to help the organization meet its strategic objectives.  Since we are in Canada, I imagine we will also talk a little hockey and perhaps enjoy a few Tim Horton's donuts.

Thanks again to Connie, Maggie, Brent, Donna, Sean and the entire Halogen team for welcoming me to Halogen and letting me broadcast the show from Halogen HQ.

HR Happy Hour - The Job Seeker's Show

I have been trying to keep all the HR Happy Hour show content over on the new HR Happy Hour site - www.hrhappyhour.net, but since this week's show is pretty important to me, I thought I would post about the show on both sites.

Episode 10 - The Job Seeker's Show - September 18, 2009 8PM EDT

The show is back to our 'regular' time slot this Friday night, September 18, 2009 at 8PM EDT.

Episode 10 - The Job Seeker's Show

Shauna Moerke, the HR Minion, and I will welcome a fantastic panel of guests from the Recruiting and HR world to share insights, give advice, and highlight available resources for the job seeker. We will talk about strategy, use of social media, resumes, and anything else on your mind.

The call in number is 646-378-1086 and Press '1' on your phone to come on the show.

Scheduled to appear this week:

Jennifer McClure - Twitter -CincyRecruiter, and blog Cincy Recruiter's World

Paul DeBettignies - Twitter - MNHeadhunter - and blog MNHeadhunter

Robin Eads - Twitter - imjustagoyle - and blog imjustagoyle

April Dowling - Twitter - adowling - and blog PseudoHR

Deirdre Honner - Twitter - thehrmaven - and blog HR Maven (does everyone on this show have a superhero alias?)

I hope you can tune in and pass along the show information to anyone you know on the job market that could use some great advice. 

New Site for the HR Happy Hour Show

Regular readers of this blog will have noticed every two weeks or so a few posts about the HR Happy Hour Show appear, to promote a little Blog Talk Radio show I host along with Shauna Moerke, the HR Minion.

Shauna and I figured the show needs its own unique place in the blogosphere so we have launched a new site, www.hrhappyhour.net, for the show.

All the archives for prior shows will be there, as well as places to submit show ideas, or to let us know that you want to be on the show as a guest.

We will also post there about all the upcoming shows, and make the site available for show guests and fans to contribute their thoughts as well.

Take a look at www.hrhappyhour.net and let me know what you think.

HR Happy Hour - Episode 8 - HR and Sports

The wildly popular HR Happy Hour Show is back live, tonight August 28, 2009 8PM EDT

Episode 8 - 'HR and Sports' - August 28, 2009 - 8PM EDT

What are the connections between Sports and HR and Talent Management? Is managing superstar employees at all like managing superstar athletes? What can coaching Little League baseball tell you about management? Are my beloved Jets going to get the Super Bowl? Shauna and I will talk about these topics and who knows what else with scheduled guests Tracy Tran, Todd Kmiec, Lance Haun and Kris Dunn

You can listen to the show using the player below and also via the call in number 646-378-1086. Press '1' after calling if you want to come on the air.

It should be an awesome show and I hope you can listen to the fun.