retention

December 2, 2014

Changes to Legal Immigration Programs

While everyone is focused on illegal immigration, don’t lose sight of President Obama’s executive actions intention to make things a bit easier for employers to access and retain legal immigrants. Business leaders have pleaded with Congress to pass an immigration reform bill. Tom Donohue, President and CEO of the U.S. Chamber of Commerce stated this reform would boost productivity, attract worldwide investment, raise the GDP (Gross Domestic Product) and slash the federal deficit. Immigration reform is needed to alleviate labor shortages. The technology sector struggles to find qualified candidates. A recent survey conducted by Adecco found there is one unemployed […]
May 28, 2014

Stop assigning numbers to people!

Performance appraisals may finally be a human resource system of the past. Tons of evidence and our guts tells us they are ineffective measures of performance. Often, the best performers do not get the highest performance scores. The more we try to fix the appraisal process, the more convoluted and difficult to administer it becomes. The appraisal process is threatening for both the evaluator and the person being evaluated. Seldom has the evaluator been trained in judging performance, have a clear understanding of the position’s expectations and have frequent opportunities to observe an individuals’ performance. Recent findings reveal the ratings […]
January 28, 2013

Optimize the Most Valuable Asset

Several terms depict managing a workforce: human capital management, talent development and performance management. The understanding of each of these terms is varied. Perhaps the new terms are an effort to move from a narrow view of employee discipline to making the best of each employee’s work-life. Yet, many organizations continue to focus on discipline or corrective action; others add the performance appraisal process; and some look at the effort to optimize the employee’s life from recruitment to retirement. There are several strategies to increase employee engagement, and many can be considered performance management, or talent development strategies. Performance management […]
July 2, 2012

Engaging Employees

Companies with a highly engaged workforce have 26% higher revenue per employee, according to a WorkUSA survey of over 13,000 respondents. This survey’s analysts linked engagement scores with business measures. Those measures may include sales, customer satisfaction, profit, absenteeism and turnover. There are many definitions for engaged employees. This survey defined engagement as the combination of commitment and line of sight. Committed employees are proud to work for their companies and motivated to help drive success. Line of sight refers to the focus and direction that guides employee efforts. These employees can see how their efforts contribute to the company’s […]