#NEXTCHAT: Is HR Tech Really Making Our Jobs Easier?

Note: Today at 3:00PM ET, I will participate in SHRM's We Know Next #Nextchat, a Twitter conversation that SHRM has created to continue to explore important issues in the workplace. Below is the 'preview' post I wrote for today's #Nextchat.

There is no doubt that HR Technology plays an increasingly important role inside our organizations today. Whether simple, in-house developed tools for tracking employees in a very small organization, more complex and comprehensive ‘enterprise grade’ systems in use by most large organizations, or any of the myriad of newer HR technology solutions that are deployed via the web, in a Software-as-a-Service (SaaS) model - the influence and importance of workplace technology continues to grow.

But making sense of this fast-moving and changing market can be tough for the HR pro that has about a thousand other worries on their plate, and it can be easy, tempting, and expedient to only think about technology solutions as a kind of band-aid, or worse, as a necessary evil, deployed only to ensure essential processes like Payroll and Time Tracking get carried out correctly. And while today’s savvy HR professional knows there are a growing number of areas where new -- and existing -- solutions offer them, and the organization, fantastic opportunities to increase efficiency, gain better insights on their talent, and help leaders, managers, and employees make better decisions, it still can seem like a long climb -- and possibly an insurmountable one -- to get where they really want to be.

For several years, I taught in an HR Master’s degree program conducting a kind of seminar, or overview, of HR Technology, a pretty wide and deep subject, that’s getting more complex with each passing year. While we don’t have a 13-week semester together to talk and learn from each other about the state of HR Technology, we will try to hit some of the more important questions, ideas, and concepts in the HR Technology space today.

I’d like to see that the chat not be about specific solutions, really. Simply shouting out one product name or solution provider that you like or use, while it might make sense for you, often makes no sense at all, or doesn’t fit well in another organization. Rather, I think it will be more useful and beneficial to talk about the reasons behind why certain decisions were taken and certain projects were pursued, and to share more universal tips around getting a great return on your investment and supporting and promoting user adoption. That way we can focus on what matters more to HR professionals, and how to better think about, understand, and hopefully utilize HR Technology solutions in our organizations.

I am looking forward to the chat on August 15, and I hope you will be able to join in!

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Please join @weknownext on August 15 at 3 p.m. ET for #Nextchat with Steve Boese (@SteveBoese). We’ll be chatting about HR Technology and will want to know your thoughts on the following questions:

Q1. What is ‘HR Technology’ anyway? What does HR technology encompass, and how is that changing?

Q2. What are some of the key considerations when making an investment in HR technology?

Q3. What are some ways HR can realize the expected benefits of technology investments?

Q4. How can the HR professional become better educated on the current HR technology market?

Q5. What are some of the leading-edge developments in workplace technology that the HR professional should understand?

Q6. What single HR or recruiting technology has made the largest positive impact in your organization?

Possible Reasons I Will Be Speaking at SHRM 2012

Last year about this time I published a kind of whiny, (hopefully) slightly amusing recount of the possible reasons I was not selected to present at the 2011 SHRM National Conference. Long story short, I had submitted a session proposal that involved the staging of a live HR Happy Hour Show from the SHRM event, incorporating a live guest panel, in-person audience questions, and questions and comments from the show listeners and the Twitter backchannel.

It would have been epic. And a real pain in the neck to stage properly, to get the audio and internet connections sorted, and execute the live show effectively. Plus, there would have been the added challenge of explaining what the heck the HR Happy Hour Show is to the average SHRM conference attendee, probably ensuring low interest in the session. So looking back on it now, SHRM probably made the right call in passing on the session proposal.

Fast forward about one year, and in the interests of fairness and openness, I am pleased to report that next year, at the 2012 SHRM Annual Conference in June, I actually will be speaking, or more accurately participating on a panel discussion on Social Recruiting along with Robert Hohman, Glassdoor.com Co-founder and CEO; John Sumser, Industry thought leader from HRxAnalysts; and Chris Hoyt, the Recruiter Guy from PepsiCo.

Our session is called 'Is Social Recruiting Really Working?', and during the session we will take a closer look at the changes and influences on recruiting brought on by the rise in importance of social networks, how behaviors and approaches by job seekers and organizations are changing with respect to social, and some thoughts on the direction and future of social recruiting. It should be a fantastic session and I am really pleased that it was selected, and that I will get a chance to share the stage with such an esteemed group of experts.

So back to this post's title, and a closer look at the possible reasons that the session was selected?

Well, first and foremost it was mostly due to the excellent work and ideas from the team at Glassdoor.com who had the idea for the session, and kindly offerered me the chance to participate. No doubt their professionalism and demonstrated domain expertise was far superior compared to the sad attempt I made at presenting at SHRM in 2011. Second, I think with each passing year 'mainstream' Human Resources and SHRM move more and more to embracing and addressing the impact and importance of social networking and social media in the HR and recruiting functions. Our topic, Social Recruiting, fits well with this emerging area of interest to SHRM and its members.  And finally, the ability to assemble such a solid panel of varied backgrounds and expertise all but ensures a diversity of thought, wide range of perspectives, and hopefully lots of insight and actionable advice for attendees next June.

So big thanks to SHRM, Glassdoor, and to my fellow session co-participants. I am looking forward to the event and to seeing lots of old friends and meeting many new ones. 

Notes from #SHRM11 - Day 2

Trying to come up with four or five notes from SHRM Annual Conference and Exposition - Day 2 has proven to be a little more difficult than I figured. Mainly because I have realized I am not actually attending the event, but rather participating in it in kind of an odd way. I have not had a chance to go to any concurrent sessions, and have only caught parts of the keynotes.

I have spent most of my conference time hanging out in the Dice booth, taking a few meetings with some interesting vendors, and catching up with some of the HR Social Media posse that has descended en masse on this event. The booth work has been fun, a little crazy at times (fuzzy dice are a really popular swag item), and we have had a chance to meet lots of nice and interesting people.The bass player looks like Rick Fox

So we'll give the SHRM Day 2 notes/rundown with a nod towards some of the ancillary activities and sights and sounds surrounding the event. 

1. Expo Hall and other circles of Hell

I finally had a chance to stroll around the Expo Hall yesterday and after a few minutes it becomes a kind of numbing experience. Sort of like all the casinos here in Vegas. Similar kinds of displays, giveaways, pitches, and sort of hard to differentiate providers from each other. Sure, here and there you'll see a few innovative ideas, but honestly one of the most effective ones I saw simply involved giving away water to tired and slightly dehydrated attendees. I think you can stand-out by doing a few simple things, rather than massive, over-the-top demonstrations of force. 

2. Vegas - Part 4.

The only thing I have left to offer is that it is kind of amazing that a city so dependent on the tourist trade makes it so difficult to actually get from one place to another in a reasonable amount of time. Cab lines, hotel check in lines, interminable waits in numerous hotels to have simple requests answered and addressed somehow are not enough to keep people away. I guess the potent combination of gambling, sunshine, and Elvis impersonators make for too compelling a draw.

3. Industrial Pipe Manufacturing

The best question that Laurie Ruetimann and I got in the Dice.com booth was from an HR professional at a traditional, B2B manufacturing company about how she can better promote, organize, educate, and support social media efforts in her organization. It was a great question, and while I hope Laurie and I offered a few decent suggestions about how she can try to move the needle in the B2B space, it reinforced to me how there is still a huge swath of the workplace for whom 'social' is still new and scary territory.

4. Parties

The Monday night combination of the SHRM/BranchOut Tweet-Up followed by the Monster.com party/concert made for a big night. You know you are in the right place when you see a Tim Sackett in the front row of a Natasha Bedingfield concert. Natasha put on an excellent show, cementing her place in the illustrious category of 'singers you think you have never heard of but once they play a few songs you say, 'oh yeah, I know her'.

5. Tony Hseih is not smarter than you

I am writing this while listenting to Zappos.com CEO's Tony Hseih speech. Tony's speech really stands out compared to the last two keynotes since it is seems much more personal, a bit less formally structured, and more directly relevant to HR professionals in the audience. Ideas about company culture, hiring and firing for cultural fit, specific approaches to interviewing and onboarding are all practical and meaningful to the SHRM population.  Sure your company can't simply mimic Zappos, and Tony agrees that you shouldn't, but that you can take the lessons from Zappos (and others), and apply them in your organization.  But the takeaway really is most if not all of the success of Zappos stems from simple things - hire people that fit, stay true to your cause, find a higher purpose than making money. Tony Hseih is not smarter than you, really. But he makes it happen, and most of the rest of us get stuck in rhe reasons why we can't make it happen.

That's it for now, probably only one more of these posts coming to try and wrap-up the event.

#SHRM11, TLNT, HRevolution, FOT, and Nirvana

Tomorrow I am heading out to the SHRM 2011 Annual Conference & Exposition in Las Vegas, the first time for me attending the big annual SHRM extravaganza.  While I am there I'll be spending time with my friends Laurie Ruettimann, China Gorman , and Terry Starr from Dice as part of Dice.com's event programming. You can learn more about what Laurie, China, and I will be doing, and see our schedules for Dice's booth #2616 here. Dice.com is the leading careers site for Technology professionals and for the companies looking for them, and it is 100% true that the best job I ever had I found on Dice.com.

And also out at SHRM I'll be joining the crew from TLNT.com for the debut of TLNT Radio, broadcasting live from the SHRM Social Media Lounge on Tuesday June 28th at 2PM ET / 11AM PT. Lance Haun and John Hollon from TLNT will be on board, and we have a great lineup of guests slated to join us for the first show.  You can learn more about the show on TLNT.com and listen live next Tuesday on the show page here.

And don't forget that tickets for the next HRevolution event, this one taking place in Las Vegas on October 2, 2011, are on sale here. The early discounted tickets are all gone, but there is still time for you to be a part of the most exciting event happening in the HR space today.

Also, today is my turn on Fistful of Talent, with a take on change, electric cars, and anxiety - Range and Change Anxiety: Electric Cars Are More Like Your Company Than You Think..... I'd love for you to give it a read and let me know what you think.

And last thing, the 'Nirvana' in the post title is in recognition that this coming September marks the 20th anniversary of Nivana's essential album 'Nevermind', and this week the band's label Universal, announced plans to celebrate with a bonus-packed reissue. Nothing like the 20th anniversary of a seminal album to make you feel old. Maybe grabbing up the 'bonus-packed' reissue will help you relive some of that teen spirit yourself (email and rss subscribers click through)

Have a great weekend and if you'll be at SHRM National please come by the Dice.com Booth #2616 and say hello.

Possible reasons I won't be presenting at SHRM '11

Monday morning started early this week, in a breezy and crisp ‘autumn is pretty much over and winter will be here very soon’ kind of way.  Me, semi-staggering from the early hour and the too-much Halloween candy from the night before cobwebs managed to have a reasonably productive start to the week only to be interrupted by an unfamiliar visitor, the mail guy, who dropped off an official looking letter addressed to me.

Sort of odd, because in the short time I have been here I don’t think I had received any snail mail at all, in fact, I can’t imagine the career prospects for folks that actually still deliver snail mail in corporate campuses to be all the bright.

This letter was from SHRM, the Society for Human Resources Management.  A few months ago I, along with many of my colleagues and friends had submitted presentation proposals for next June’s SHRM Annual Conference.  In fact, I want to say I submitted the presentation for consideration about a year before it would be (theoretically) delivered, SHRM had better hope nothing significant changes in the world of work and HR for twelve months.  But I digress.

As you can tell from the post title, and from the image on the right, my proposal was rejected.  For the purposes of full disclosure, my proposal was not for a formal or traditional presentation, it was a pitch to do a live, on-site version of the HR Happy Hour show, and I offered as my ‘proof-of-performance’ the archive of 70-odd shows that we have done, highlighting some of the best episodes that featured leaders and well-known experts like Dave Ulrich and Andrew McAfee.

The form letter I received informing me of the rejection offered nothing specific about why the session was rejected - my theory - the folks that evaluated the session had never heard of the show; but a close read of the text does offer some clues as to perhaps why the HR Happy Hour show will not be on the program at SHRM ‘11.

Possible reason 1 - ‘We strive to offer a balanced program of educational sessions’

Likelihood - Thinking no, as I can’t imagine there were any other ‘live radio show’ sessions pitched.  So including the HR Happy Hour could not have ‘unbalanced’ anything.  In fact, something like the show would have been a good counterweight to the 13 sessions given by lawyers.

Possible reason 2 - ‘(we) select proposals that best fit the overall programming framework of the conference’

Likelihood - Pretty high I think.  Assuming that the ‘overall programming framework’ doesn’t include ‘different’, ‘unique’, or ‘innovative’.  Can anyone actually describe this framework anyway? But this had to be the main reason for the snub.  The Happy Hour show just does not fit the typical and expected template.  And I do believe that SHRM does know what its members want.

Possible reason 3 - ‘Please understand that we receive many proposals with several on the same topic’

Likelihood - On the ‘many proposals’ part - sure; on the ‘several on the same topic’ - no way.  No one else is crazy enough to keep organizing, producing, and presenting a weekly show on HR and Workforce topics.  Maybe I should take that as a sign there really isn’t much of an audience for this sort of thing.

The end result is that the HR Happy Hour show will not be broadcasting from SHRM ‘11 next June, at least not as part of the ‘official’ proceedings.  I am not trying to whine and complain about being rejected, I quite honestly did not put that much effort into the submission, but I did want to let listeners of the show (all seven of you) know what was going on.  From experience broadcasting from several prior events, I have come to the conclusion the only way to reach anyone outside the core audience is to get on the 'official' conference program. Whether or not that will ever happen is another story.

Regardless, after writing this piece, and processing all the information, I actually think I figured out where I went wrong.  Instead of pitching a live HR Happy Hour show, the pitch should have been ‘HR Professor Steve Boese will interview a panel of legal and communications experts on the perils of unfettered access to internet radio in the workplace’.

I bet that would have matched the overall programming framework.