PODCAST: #HRHappyHour 311 - Creating a Culture of Performance Based on Feedback

HR Happy Hour 311 - Creating a Culture of Performance Based on Feedback

Host: Steve Boese

Guest: Marie-Claire Barker, Global Chief Talent Officer, Wavemaker

Listen to the show HERE

This week on the HR Happy Hour Show, Steve is joined by Marie-Claire Barker, Global Chief Talent Officer at Wavemaker. a  global media, content, and technology agency to talk about modern approaches to performance management and creating a culture of feedback.

Wavemaker is a 8,500 person strong, global organization serving many of the world's leading brands, and recruits and develops talented people across many domains - creative, technical, and people who can envision and develop a shared future with their clients. 

On the show, Marie-Claire shared how at Wavemaker they have developed and implemented an intentional, performance-driven culture, where organizational and individual goals are visible and shared, feedback (both public and private), is a point of emphasis and leveraged for professional measurement as well as personal growth, and how this culture of feedback and transparency contributes to organizational and client success. This is one of the best examples of how a traditional 'HR' process like performance management has been re-imagined and turned into not just an 'HR' program, but rather a key driver of business and operational success. 

Marie-Claire shared how this culture has and is impacting the organization positively, as well as some advice for HR leaders who want to re-invent performance management too.

You can listen to the show on the show page HERE, or by using the widget player below:

This was an interesting and informative show - thanks Marie-Claire for joining us.

And thanks to HR Happy Hour Show sponsor Virgin Pulse - www.virginpulse.com.

Reminder to subscribe to the HR Happy Hour on Apple Podcasts, Stitcher Radio, or wherver you get your podcasts - just search for 'HR Happy Hour'.

Postscript: On the show, Marie-Claire mentioned Reflextive, the software tool they use at Wavemaker for employee goals and feedback. Refelktive has been an HR tech startup success story and just announced new funding this week.

The changing mix of employee compensation increases

TL:DR - More and higher one-time bonuses, fewer and less annual salary/wage increases

In the aftermath of the recent tax reform legislation passed by the US Congress and signed by the President, you certainly must have noticed a pretty long list of major organizations who reacted to the reduction in the US corporate tax rate by (among other things), awarding bonuses (oddly, almost all exactly in the amount of $1,000) to their employees.

Here is just a short list of select companies who have shared this windfall with their employees in the form of one-time bonuses:

Alaska Air, American Airlines, AT&T, Bank of America, Comcast, Disney, Home Depot, Lowe's, Southwest Air, Walmart, Waste Management - and there are lots more.

The companies above, (and plenty others) have directed the employee rewards portion of their expected tax cut windfall to these one-time bonuses, while a few others (Aflac, Boeing, Cigna, FedEx, Honeywell, UPS, Visa), have either supplemented these one-time bonuses with other employee rewards improvements - increases hourly wages, 401(k) contribution enhancements, and/or stock-based rewards.

But the vast majority of publicly announced employee rewards increases as a result of the corporate tax cut have been these seemingly ubiquitous one-time $1,000 bonuses. It is almost odd, (and if you are a conspiracy lover, curious), that so many companies in different industries all settled on this same bonus amount. Weird...

But these tax cut bonuses also draw our attention to a larger trend in employee compensation increases, one that pre-dates the recent surge in one-time tax cut bonuses - the trend of companies allocating more payroll budget towards one-time and variable awards, and relatively less budget to annual (and in theory, recurring), salary/wage increases. Said differently, more and more of the compensation increase that an average worker might see is tied up in discretionary and variable methods, like one-time bonuses. Check out this chart from a piece in the NY Times, reporting on an Aon Hewitt study of the topic:

Back in 1991, for example, variable pay (like one-time bonuses) took up about 3% of total compensation budgets, while the budget for annual salary increases was 5%.

Fast forward to 2017 and the amount of budget allocated to one-time bonuses has risen to 12.7% while the amount earmarked for annual salary increases has fallen to 2.9% (the 'getting 3%'ed to death phenomenon).

A closer look at the data shows that after taking an expected financial crisis/recession dive in 2008/2009, compensation budget allocations have not really recovered to their pre-recession levels, while the budget for one-time bonuses and awards has continued on a slow and steady climb. This makes sense for a few reasons. The harsh economic environment from the recession era is still on many CEO's minds, and the need to be more flexible and adaptable, (especially when it comes to employee compensation), has become standard operating procedure and many companies. E

Given these recent tax cut bonuses play into that line of thinking - CEOs can't be sure these tax cuts will be permanent, a change in control or philosophy of Congress could alter the landscape at almost any time. Giving one-time bonuses instead of 'permanent' salary/wage increases allows companies to respond to market, competitive, and economic conditions in almost real-time, whereas granting (and potentially removing), salary/wage increases is a much more difficult challenge to manage. Have you ever known any worker who will accept a salary or wage cut cheerfully?

But beyond that, companies still need to keep worker's desires in mind, after all the labor market remains extremely tight. The Times reports that a second Aon Hewitt survey showed that when asked what they wanted their companies to do with their tax cut windfall 65% of them said they wanted a pay raise, far more than other options like a bonus or an increase to the 401(K) contribution. Interesting stuff for sure.

Compensation is a tough job for sure. And oddly, it doesn't get that much easier when there are more dollars to spread around.

Have a great day! 

PODCAST: #HRHappyHour 310 - The H3 "Hot 3"

HR Happy Hour 310 - The H3 "Hot 3"

Hosts: Steve Boese, Trish McFarlane

Listen to the show HERE

This week on the HR Happy Hour Show, Steve and Trish launch a new series for 2018 - The H3 'Hot 3', where Steve and Trish break down three topical issues in the world of work, tech, sports, pop culture and more - and tie them back to the workplace and HR. This week on the inaugural 'Hot 3' episode, we take on pay equity and disparity on the Today Show, what happens when an organization has a leader whom no one seems to be able to say 'No' to, (Harvey Weinstein, Donald Trump), and the importance of demonstrating both emotional and quantitative benefits when convincing people to change - told through the story of Trish's new toothbrush, (trust me, it makes sense when you listen).

Additionally, Steve and Trish teased the HR Happy Hour Annual Oscar preview show, we talked about LRP's acquisition of HRM Asia, and announced new HR Happy Hour video content. Finally, thanks once again to 2018 HR Happy Hour presenting sponsor Virgin Pulse - www.virginpulse.com.

You can listen to the show on the show page HERE, or by using the widget player below:

This was a really fun show, and we hope you enjoy it (and tell a friend!)

Links - Sonic Care toothbrush, The 9x 'Better' principle, Adam Grant TED talk, and 2018 Oscar nominations.

Subscribe to the HR Happy Hour Show wherever you get your podcasts.

How important is knowing the product for a new hire?

I riffed yesterday about how JetBlue is leaning into a pretty serious shortage of pilot candidates by expanding the talent pools and significantly increasing their investment in training and development in order to essentially 'build' the candidates they are having trouble finding otherwise. And while 'airline pilot' seems like one of the last kinds of job ads you'd see with a 'no experience required' listed in the job req, JetBlue is trying to make it work in order to meet their recruiting goals.

I thought about that case study/experiment again this morning when I saw the announcement of the newest appointee to the Twitter Board of Directors, (not quite having the responsibility of an airline pilot, but hang in their with me for a minute). Turns out the newest member of Twitter's board is not really a user of Twitter.

From a piece in Business Insider titled Ex-Google CFO Patrick Pichette is joining Twitter's board, and he just tweeted for the first time:

Twitter's board is swapping Pepsi CFO Hugh Johnston for ex-Google CFO Patrick Pichette.

Johnston is leaving Twitter to join Microsoft's board, he said in a series of tweets Tuesday. Pichette is joining Twitter's board after retiring as Google's CFO in 2015 and completing a two-year sabbatical.

Interestingly, Pichette doesn't seem to be much of a Twitter user. His account says he joined the service in February 2017 and his first tweet was published Tuesday announcing his appointment to the board

Ok, so the dude was a successful C-suite exec, had a high-profile gig at one of the world's most admired companies, and then cashed out to take two years having fun and whatever it is people with lots of cash and time on their hands like to do. He didn't have time to Tweet at all, but then again, being CFO of Google probably consumes a ton of time and energy and those two-year sabbaticals can be exhausting. I mean, just think about how you feel after your two-day sabbatical at the end of every week. Then multiply that feeling by 350 or so.

But I digress.

The point is the newest member of the Board of Directors for Twitter, a company that has been around for a decade, and for better or worse, has been a pretty significant influence on news, politics, social causes, and more for most of that time, has never really used Twitter.

I would imagine in the last ten years there must have been a time or two where Mr. Pichette at least considered setting up a Twitter account and testing out the product/service and each time decided, 'That's not really for me.'

Which is certainly his prerogative. I imagine there are lots of successful, accomplished, smart types who have decided not to engage on or otherwise use Twitter. But usually those kinds of people don't get appointed to executive or board-level roles on Twitter. And this isn't a knock on Mr. Pichette and his ability to do a great job on Twitter's board. His CFO experience might be just what Twitter needs right now.

But just like the JetBlue story, the appointment of Pichette, seemingly a person who does not know all that much about the product of Twitter to the Board speaks to the increasing importance in tightening labor markets of taking a more expansive view of the addressable talent pools.

Train someone to be a commercial airline pilot who has never flown a plane of any kind? 

Sure.

Put someone on the Board of Directors of a company who has never used or experienced the product?

Ok.

Hire someone for your next Marketing Manager role who doesn't actually have 'Seven years of progressive experience doing exactly the job we want you to do here in the same industry that we are in?'

Why not?

Have a great day!

PODCAST - #HRHappyHour 280 - Dave Ulrich, Victory Through Organization

HR Happy Hour 280 - Dave Ulrich, Victory Through Organization

Hosts: Steve Boese, Trish McFarlane

Guest: Dave Ulrich, University of Michigan, RBL Group

Listen HERE

This week on the HR Happy Hour Show, Steve and Trish welcome Dave Ulrich, author of the recent Victory Through Organization, over 30 other books, Professor at the University of Michigan, one of the foremost experts on Human Resources, and known as the "Father of modern Human Resources" back to the Happy Hour to talk Human Resources, creating organizational capability, and how Human Resources can continue to evolve to support the organization.

Dave talked about the new book, the key can be summed up in the very first sentences of the book - "HR is not about HR. HR begins and ends with the business." From that launch point, we talked about Dave's research (with data from over 30,000 respondents), the importance of HR as the enabler and driver of organizational capability, why the famous McKinsey "War for Talent" is only partially relevant to HR leaders, and some of the ways HR leaders need to adapt and grow in order to support the creation of organizational capability.

We also talked about NBA basketball, the Oscars, and the Spice Girls, (yes, and every one of those topics tied back to the overall theme of the show, that organizational factors have a far greater impact on business performance than do individual factors). 

You can listen to the show on the show page HERE, or by using the widget player below:

Dave's most recent book, Victory Through Organization, is available here.

And thanks to the HR Happy Hour Show sponsor Virgin Pulse, learn more at www.virginpulse.com.

This was one of the most interesting, informative, and fun shows we have done. Thanks Dave for joining us!

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