{Labor} Relations and this HR Pro

As an HR professional and leader, I have touched just about all there is to touch in day-to-day organizational HR and after being in this game for over 18 years, I have come to the conclusion that I {suck} at labor relations.

Actually, I am pretty good but you have got to know that the very nature of the labor-management relationship can stress the people pleaser in me.

Collaboration, mediation, hold your line, give an inch, negotiation, agendas, partnership, and positions . . .  labor relations can be a running reel of contradictions.

When faced with contradictions in your HR life, what do you do?

Although I may come face-to-face with the desire to go tit-for-tat, it's just not in me to operate that way. I feel strongly about "no surprises" and even when the upper hand is mine, it is not often that I will lead with it. I never walk into a meeting unprepared yet as the ultimate optimist, I believe we can work through anything together - even if that means working to the point of agreeing to disagree.

That's not where my problems arise.

My problems arise when I break the #1 rule of business, human resources <and life actually> and I take things personally. 

You'd think after so many years of being in this game, I'd know better. Try as I might not to, it happens anyway and when it does, I can see it coming like a Mack truck. Thanks to a wonderful support system and creative coping techniques, I get it together rather quickly.

Labor relations. Pshw. My gig is up. You know as well as I do that this really has nothing at all to do with labor - pick a relationship, any relationship at all and the dynamics for me are the same. Relationship is the color of the glasses I see my world through.

Over the years, on request, I've tried to change the color of my lenses, but in the big scheme of things it's simply not happening. Nothing is going to change. I am not going to change.

Don't like it?

Sue me.

Photo credit iStockphoto

Lisa Rosendahl. Leadership. Human Resources.

Could you lend a blogger-girl a hand? Google me. Seriously.

I once wrote a post, Jingle Bells, Confidence and Fage Yogurt, and even now - one year later (!) Google and Squarespace analytics both show that Jingle Bell(s) is the number 1 search term that lands people here.

I know, I don't believe it either. Nonetheless, SEO Ninja that I am not, I know this isn't good news for a Leadership and HR blog.

This holiday season, it is my mission to knock you know what from the top spots of my search term Christmas tree and replace it with "Lisa Rosendahl," "leadership" and "HR."

Interested in spreading my holiday cheer? Click on the listing below or search "Lisa Rosendahl" and then click through to the blog when you see this listing:

Let's see if we can turn this thing around <without upsetting Google cheer.>

Nothing personal Santa.

Update on December 7, 2011 by Lisa Rosendahl

For the past 3 days, "Lisa Rosendahl" has been holding the top search term spot . . .  yeah! Thank you for playing along with me.

Make an HR Difference

An introvert and a commitment walk into an HR conference . . . .

and make it all the way to lunch when - scanning the swag bags and sensible shoes - I get the cold sweats. Heart starts racing, fight or flight kicks in and I depart the area for the nearest coffee shop wondering, "What the heck?"

It was suffocating.

Hands on the wheel, sun on the face and open road ahead - I drove. It was too much. Too much drinking the same Kool-Aid, accepting the same ideas and morphing into one indistinguishable HR mass.

I can't morph. I won't morph. And you can't make me.

You can come talk with me, but you can't talk with me about HR. Ok, you can talk about HR but not the way you usually talk about HR. Don't talk with me about FMLA, benefit programs, award calculations or market based-compensation.

Talk with me about reenergizing a wall-flower incentive awards program, linking everything workforce development to the strategic plan or responding to changes in leadership styles. Talk with me about LPN to RN upward mobility and whether tuition programs are a benefit of employment, a talent management tool with expectations or something completely else.

Talk dirty to me <no, not that kind of dirty - remember the brand> but the kind of dirty that really messes with the HR status quo.

Talk with me about relationships. Talk with me about how we are not in the HR business but how we are in the relationship business.

Listen to me when I tell you that my job satisfaction, my view of HR as a profession or my assessment of my own abilities can be so utterly dependent on the state of my relationships at the time. My boss has my back and I am unstoppable. Leaders (union included) question my motives and I am temporarily stalled.

Relationship is how work really gets done. And credibility is the key that unlocks the door, the coin of the realm, the thing that makes this whole thing work.

If I were to hop onto the stage to talk about credibility, would you come and listen to me?

An introvert and a commitment walk into a conference . . . and walk out with purpose and direction.

Photo credit iStockphoto

Leadership and Bananas: A Day in the Life Sunday

I heart Barnes and Noble. I like the vibe of the store, the look and feel of the Nook and Starbucks in the back corner. Outside of Barnes and Noble I'd easily pass up Starbucks for Caribou Coffee but once inside the bookstore, I can't stay away.

After a quick scan of the Moleskine rack and the babysitting guides, the kid and I headed to the coffee counter. Cappuccino for me and a mango banana smoothie for her. I drank mine but she didn't finish hers. She didn't really like it and decided she wasn't going to order banana in her smoothies anymore.  She likes mango and she likes banana but the banana flavor in a smoothie "dumbs it down," she said

Dumb it down? Where did she hear that? It's not exactly how I would have described the flavor combination but I knew exactly what she meant.

I've bristled at dumb it down comments from leaders and may have even channeled Frank Roche as I cautioned HR staff from doing so in  our HR communications - but it's not a phrase I use regularly.

Nonetheless, with both this phrase and interactions between leaders and followers on my mind today, I have to wonder how leaders can think so little of their staff - or conversely, so much of themselves.

The Lead Change Group recently posted an article, "Leadership Style: Blinders, Beacon, or Both?" In it, the author asks leaders a number of thought-provoking questions that include:

• When there's a problem in the office, do you create a new policy to handle it? Or, do you work with others to figure out the root cause and fix that?
• Does your firm want employees to provide feedback yet shoot the messenger?
• Is the messiness of innovation embraced, recognizing that failures to happen? Or, is innovation part of your mission statement yet failures are counted and are part of performance reviews as a negative?

Leaders, grab yourself a smoothie, ponder the questions and answer this one question for me: are you the top dog . . . or the top banana?

Photo credit iStockPhoto

Supervisor Training: You Get What You Pay For

Time for a little rant from the corner office.

Maybe it's because I don't really have a corner office, because I am a good supervisor who knows I haven't been doing a great job lately, or because I don't like Fred Pryor <actually, I've never met Mr. Pryor> but nonetheless, a brochure for a 1-day seminar, "How to Supervise People" got me going.

Attend this seminar and you'll walk away knowing how to develop a keen sense of timing for taking corrective action or firing an employee - and know the legal implications of your decisions, prevent hassles by using the best hiring practices and interviewing techniques, and control absenteeism and tardiness.

All this plus 7 more key deliverables for only $99.00.

I am not buying it. What scares me is that so many others will.

Even though the company set high expectations with their wording, I get that the trainers are not intending to address the legal/technical/HR aspects of these topics and instead, provide only basic at-your-fingertips tools and techniques.

Others may not get that and leave thinking they know much more than they really do about the topics presented.

For overall supervisor development, I'd put my money, and yours, on Eric B. Meyer <free blog> or Wally Bock's Three Star Leadership <$39.99>, send HR staff to #TNL Chicago - National Recruiting Conference <$159.99> so they can train and better advise supervisors on recruitment or up the stakes and get all access G5 Leadership <$129/year>.

Now this is some good stuff. Anything less is pure silliness.

Hat tip to Kris Dunn and Fistful of Talent for G5 Leadership and photo credit to iStockphoto

How To Edit a Multi-Contributor Blog

There is a lot written about developing a blog: how to establish your voice, build your readership and get an actual post from your head to the page. Much of the advice is focused on what you can do for yourself, but what about doing this for others?

What about developing a multi-contributor blog where the focus is not on your voice, your readership or your posts and it's more about what you can do for others?

Just so happens that I am the editor of Women of HR, a multi-contributor blog. I've been at this for over a year now so it makes me an expert, right? Not by a very long shot but it does make me someone who has experiences to share with anyone considering doing the same.

My advice focuses on style, voice and detail.  

Style

Scan the book shelf to my left and you will see the 2011 AP Stylebook, The Elements of Style, On Writing Well, Grammar Girl's Quick and Dirty Tips for Better Writing. Sometimes I follow technical style to a "T" and sometimes I don't. The hard part is overwriting what is etched in my mind. Bad habits are hard to break.

Stepping back from the guides for a moment, take a look at the post on the page. Does it look good? Does it flow? Is it easy on the eyes to read and without any obvious gramatical faux paus? How's the karma? Styles vary and your site's style can either attract or repel your target readers. How's your style?

Voice

Women of HR gives others a place to write and let's me be the ying to their creative yang. I do it for community and to develop editing skills of my own. All that considered, the scariest part of taking on the editing of the site was - by far - reviewing other people's writing. Who was I to judge?

One of the most valuable posts I read was from Problogger, How To Assess Blog Content Submissions. In fact, I have it tucked in my Women of HR Moleskine within arms reach all. the. time. The author asks you to see your site "as a product in itself" and seeing Women of HR as a product made editing less about me judging and more about me being the keeper of the voice.

My one major pet peeve? Self-promotion. If it looks like self-promotion, it is self-promotion. Don't get me started.

Details

What does it take to get a post to the page?  A little Sunday morning behind the scenes work.

I review the posts, schedule them to offer a variety of topics each week, maintain a submission schedule, prepare a weekly "What's Up With Women of HR" email to our writers, tinker with the site and refer anything beyond a simple tinker to our website designer, Lance Haun.

I aim for having 2+ weeks of posts in the cue so I can sleep at night, plan for 2-8 hours/week depending on how many posts I am editing and much tinkering there is to do and I see photos as a necessity. I start with iStockphoto and when I can't find the right picture, I go to Deirdre Honner. Ready for action?

Putting it All Together

Before we opened the door for post #1, we looked across the social sphere for multi-contributor blogs and took the best of what we liked. I reached out to 2 editors I most admire for the work they've done with their multi-contributor blogs: Jessica Lee, Fistful of Talent and Ann Bares, Compensation Cafe' and their insights were invaluable.

To sum it up in at all up in 25 words or less, if you are considering establishing a multi-contributor blog:

Start with a martini and friends, mix in a community of talent and strength, and stir things up with style, voice and detail. And don't move on to the next nightclub until you stop and buy the domain. Now, if I could turn back time <inside joke>

So, what questions do you have or what tips could you share about editing a multi-contributor blog?

Photo credit iStockphoto