An update on this week and next

It has been a couple of very busy days since I last posted, here is a brief update.

On Wednesday I started my new job at Nortel, and my feet have not really touched the group.  The thing about going back to a place you use to work at is many of the traditional “first week” activities and issues are either resolved very quickly or do not exist.  Even after a 6 year absence many of the processes and procedures have not changed a huge amount, although many of the people have.

One of the new tools to get use to is the Multimedia Communications Server that is being used by a majority of employees.  The tool essentially turns your desktop PC into a unified messaging platform allowing you to have voice calls, IM, video, file sharing, and conferencing all from a single piece of software.  The software also links with your phone extension, which means if someone calls you office extension your PC rings, no matter where you are in the world, very cool.
That’s it from the work front for now.

Tonight we head off to Fiji for 8 days staying at Castaway Island, returning late in the evening of 21 May. I then hop straight on another plane up to Sydney for a few days.  This means regular posting will not begin again until around 25 May.  If you are looking for something to read check out community.hrblogs.org.

links for 2006-05-08

Google’s Ten Golden Rules of Management

Late last year Eric Schmidt and Hal Varian published in Newsweek 10 Golden Rules that Google has implemented to help effectively manage knowledge workers.

  1. Hire by committee
  2. Cater to their every need
  3. Pack them in
  4. Make coordination easy
  5. Eat your own dog food
  6. Encourage creativity
  7. Strive to reach consensus
  8. Don’t be evil
  9. Data drive decisions
  10. Communicate effectively

As they mention in the article non of these items are new, nor are they really that revolutionary. The success of the items seems to be directly related to the way and consistency of implementation.

The also go on to highlight several “challenges” currently faced by Google:-

  • “Techno arrogance”
  • The not-invented-here syndrome
  • The maturation of the company, the industry and work force
  • With growth communication procedures need to keep pace with the increasing scale
  • The final challenge listed is managing day-to-day operations in one of the worlds largest most complex environments

Worth of your time to read.

Also worth your time to read is the post pointed to by Marc Cenadella on Google’s approach to business, kind of at the opposite end of the spectrum.

New blog features

I have been playing with a couple of new features on my blog before looking to add them to selected themes on hrblogs.org.

In no particular order

  • A list of the last 10 posts on the side bar
  • A list of 5 related posts on each post
  • Using Notable, you now have the ability to submit the post the many of the popular social bookmarking/taging sites.
  • I have also added a “view” counter to track the number of views an individual post gets. Look for a popular posts listing very soon.

Getting noticed in the HR blogosphere

A couple of weeks ago there was a big discussion on link-swapping over at Recruiting.com that caused all manner of conversations to break out. I also got into the conversation by letting everyone know about communiy.hrblogs.org an aggregation come directory of HR blogs that I have found or been submitted.
The communities resident SEO expert, Joel Cheesman, seemed to finish up the conversation saying :-

If you want to start ranking well in search engines, your time is better spent creating quality, remarkable content than it is playing verbal tennis and link swapping.

While Joel is right it does not help new bloggers get noticed, regardless of their topic. So what is a new blogger to do to get noticed?

My suggestion, head over to ProBlogger and check out Darren’s 31 Days to Building a Better Blog series. Darren is a full time blogger who is more than qualified to give advice on building a better blog.

You could also drop me a note and I will add you to communiy.hrblogs.org or use the Submit site form.

Seth Godin talks about Recruiting

(Thanks to Dave Lefkow for the pointer)

Seth Godin provides Todd Raphael, editor in chief of ERE, with an interview on recruitment and the intersection with marketing.

The quote I really like from the interview:-

Employee satisfaction is entirely related to the respect and autonomy employees are given. Over and over again, it has been found that you cannot buy employee happiness, but you can earn it by treating people with respect and giving employees the autonomy to make decisions.

And I have to agree with Dave that this is a great nugget:-

 ..the very best applicants don’t come to you after you’ve run a blind box ad in the newspaper. They come to you because employees bring them to you. They come to you because customers bring them to you. They come to you because you have a blog that gets read by 80,000 people a week, and you mention an opening, and 4,000 people show up and say, “I’d really like to take that job.”

I can understand where Dave is confused with Seth last point about Monster (job boards) being “classic permission marketing”. Maybe I just don’t get it or could Seth have missed the point?

AHRI Victorian HRIS SIG Discussion Forum

The Victorian HRIS Special Interest Group is running a discussion forum to review HR systems over the next 10 years. Discussion forums provide an informal and flexible face to face environment for people who are interested in HR systems to meet, discuss and network around a specific topic. We will not have keynote speakers, presentations, and so forth. There is no distinction between presenters and audience; every participant can contribute to the conversation. Members of the SIG organising committee will be on hand to lead groups covering four difference aspects impacting the future of HR systems, during the discussions please feel free to move among the groups as you see fit. The different topics will be:-

  • Globalisation

How is globalisation impacting on HR Systems and what can we do to prepare for these changes? How should HR Systems be developing to meet the requirements of business globalisation?

  • Culture

Deployment of HR systems can’t be successful without an accepting, innovative, flexible culture that embraces change. How do we drive cultural change and the embrace of new systems and processes? What works? What doesn’t?

  • Business

Integrating HR data with key business data provides powerful evidence of viability and sustainability. Over the coming years to what degree will your business viability/sustainability be dependant on your HR System? Is it relevant now?

  • Technology

HR systems by their very nature are heavily reliant on technology; this technology seems to be changing at an increasing speed. How do changes in technology impact your HR systems? Should you be paying attend to the current trends such as Open Source, Software as a Service, and Mobility in making purchasing decisions?

Date 9 May, 2006
Time 7:30am -; 9:00am
Venue Green Cat Café 161 Collins St Melbourne (Seating Area at the back of the Café)
Cost Free, you can purchase coffee and muffins at the Café
RSVP Michael Specht (michael@specht.com.au) by Monday 8 May 2006

If you have colleagues who you feel would be interested in attending please feel free to pass this invitation on to them.