The Conference Board

For the last couple months, I’ve been thinking about ways to simplify the way I work.  From being more organized to blocking off time to focus on specific projects, I’m beginning to see a difference.  I was inspired to do this after meeting the author of One Page Talent Management, Marc Effron.  Mark was a guest on the HR Happy Hour Show in early October and he talked with Steve Boese about ways to take the complexity and layers out of an organization in order to better connect with the talented people in your organization.

I encourage you to listen to the replay:

HR Happy Hour episode 67

If you like what you hear and want to meet Marc and learn more, there’s a great opportunity coming up.  Marc will be moderating a discussion “Good Money After Bad?  Making Talent Investments Deliver on their Promise” at the upcoming Senior HR Executive Conference. He’ll be speaking with panelists Lucien Alziari, Senior Vice President, Human Resources and Corporate Responsibility of Avon Products Inc. and Mary Humiston, Group Vice President, Global Human Resources for Applied Materials, Inc.

Click here to register and enter code TM1 to receive a $500 discount.  Hope to see you there!

The Conference Board

So often in my career, I see opportunities come and go and people make all kinds of excuses as to why they can’t embrace them.  I’ve found that the more I say “yes” or “I will make this happen somehow”, the more I progress in my career.  One of those game-changing moments came last December when I attended the Senior HR Executive conference in New York City.  I knew that being able to surround myself with CEO’s, CHRO’s, and other business executives would only help me learn and network.  I made some great connections and now, just one year later, I have used many of the things I learned at that conference to change my life.

So, now’s your chance.

The Senior HR Executive conference, hosted by The Conference Board, will be November 30- December 1, 2010.  And, if you use code TM1, you can save $500 off your registration fee. Space is limited, so I encourage you to register today!  Come join me as we explore how Human Resources is advancing globally.  Here are just a few of the intriguing sessions offered:

• Keynote: Speed, Complexity and Organizational Agility: Surviving and Thriving in the New Normal

Susan Chambers, Executive Vice President, People Division, Wal-Mart Stores, Inc

• The Role of the CHRO in Advancing the CEO’s Agenda

Moderator
Marilyn Draper, Partner, Oliver Wyman Delta

• Leveraging Social Networking: Communication, Innovation and Engagement

Eric Mosley, Chief Executive Officer, Globoforce

• Keynote Address with Deputy Secretary of Labor Seth Harris

Seth Harris, Deputy Secretary, U.S. Department of Labor

• Global Chief Human Resource Officer Study

Moderator
Maria-Paz Barrientos, Partner, IBM Global Business Services

• Performance with Purpose

Cynthia Trudell, Senior Vice President and Chief Personnel Officer, PepsiCo, Inc.

• Good Money After Bad? Making Talent Investments Deliver on their Promise

Moderator
Marc Effron, Author, One Page Talent Management

If you’ve never been to a Conference Board event, I assure you it is different than any other conference.   The focus is purely on your learning.  If you have any questions, let me know in the comments.  Also, let me know in the comments if you’re attending. I hope to see you all there!!

Sugar and spice and everything nice?  No, that doesn’t sound right.  Maybe it’s more like Steve Austin, the six million dollar man- building someone who is stronger and faster.  No, that’s not it either.  So what does it take to build the perfect HR professional?

I’ve heard people who say that in order to be successful in human resources, you must have a Human Resouce degree.  Others say you MUST have a PHR or SPHR certification in addition to your degree.  Still others say you should not have a HR degree or certification, you should be an MBA with real-world experience.  Just this past week at the Senior HR Executive Conference I heard some of these ideas plus executives who believe that you can take someone with operations experience and turn them into the perfect HR pro.  So, who is right?

The answer is simple: there is no “perfect” recipe. It depends on the company, work environment, culture, and role the person will fill.  Certain skills are paramount to being a strong business professional regardless of whether that person is in HR, marketing, advertising, finance, or operations.  What this conversation and debate tells me is that there are currently HR professionals out here who could be doing more to demonstrate their value.  I assert that if you only have a HR degree, certification, MBA, or operations experience, you will not be the ideal HR pro.  You need to have skills from each of these components in order to truly be a successful business leader.  There are some key skills you can focus on obtaining or improving that will ensure you will be able to remain relevant in 2010 and beyond.

Strong human resource knowledge

This is a MUST.  Now, obviously this can be learned in a degree program or by studying for certification, but it goes beyond that.  It involves REAL LIFE experience working with employee issues.  You must have experience

• actually picking up the phone and recruiting candidates
• interviewing candidates in person for all levels in the organization
• investigating reported issues
• coaching and counseling
• understanding and applying HR related laws
• handling the compliance (I-9′s, Visas, etc.)
• developing talent through strategic and tactical approaches to training

Finance and Internal Communications

These are areas where many HR professionals are weak.  From a finance and accounting standpoint at a bare minimum you must be able to understand general accounting principles and be able to read and interpret a balance sheet.  If you cannot do that, you need to set that as a goal.  How can you advise your CEO, CFO, and other company leaders if you cannot interpret the financial results of the company?  Strong financial acumen will help you drive the business forward.  Then, in terms of internal communication, you need to be able to effectively communicate the policies of the company in a way that aligns with the company strategies.  For more detailed information on how to improve your skills in this area, check out the HR 101 series by Victorio at the Creative Chaos Consultant blog.

Innovation

The HR professional of today and the future needs to have the spirit to innovate.  It is critical to success.  If you plan to sit back and just do the day-to-day role, you will not help move the company forward.  Our world changes fast and innovative ideas will be the catalyst to propel your HR career.  Challenge yourself each day or week to come up with an innovative way to handle something differently.  Hold your feet to the fire to make sure you are accountable for keeping your department from getting stagnant.

Global Effectiveness

Technology has made the world a much smaller place.  More companies are global than ever before, so more HR professionals need to have an understanding of what is going on in global markets.  Are you making yourself aware?  Are you reaching out to gain understanding of other countries laws, financial systems, and culture?  This is something you should focus on if you are not already.  Today’s HR leaders are responsible for driving the success of people around the world.

HR Technology

To the average HR generalist or specialist, HR technology is the “big bad wolf” of the story.  It’s the one thing we’re all afraid of.  In order to really be successful at running an effective human resources department, you need to have a solid understanding of your current HR technologies as well as staying abreast of emerging technologies.  You will need to understand how to evaluate your systems effectiveness as well as be able to identify technologies that will support the data needed to make strong business decisions for the company.  A good place to start is by reading and following blogs by Naomi Bloom, Steve Boese, Michael Krupa, and Bryon Abramowitz.  You should also follow the writings of Bill Kutik at Human Resource Executive Online.

So, how do you measure up?  What other skills do you believe are critical to being a successful HR professional in the future?  Let me know in the comments.

The Senior HR Executive Conference.

Just hearing those words for most of my career made me picture some off-limits, highly secretive conference where you have to know the secret knock or secret handshake to be allowed entry.  That and a wealth of HR experience under your belt.  It was the one conference I did not know if I would ever make it to during my HR career.  Well, my perception could not have been farther from reality.

I was asked to participate in this year’s conference in order to give feedback on how The Conference Board can bring more aspects of social media for HR into the future events and how the conference can expand it’s reach to Gen X and Gen Y.  I’m excited to tell you that as an organization, The Conference Board is fully embracing social media and the up-and-coming generations.  Now, it’s up to all of us to reach back as they are reaching out to us.

As an attendee at the Senior HR Executive Conference, participants are in store for more learning than most other conferences out there offer.  Each informative session is presented by a top global HR executive, so it is challenging to determine where to begin in sharing what I learned.  I have decided to begin at the end of day one, the Keynote session.  This session was presented by Fiona C. Laird of Unilever.  Fiona is the Senior Vice President of Human Resources and Communications for the Americas.

So, picture it.  You are in a ballroom of the Intercontinental Hotel in New York City.  You are seated with 100 of the top HR executives from around the world.  Then, Fiona is announced.  Two things immediately strike you; first, she is incredibly polished and professional.  Her presence fills the room.  Second, as she begins speaking, you realize that her storytelling style will engage this challenging crowd in ways that more speakers dream of.

Fiona’s keynote,  “Enabling the Future Workforce” accomplished several things.  She told the story of Unilever, a world-class company that provides over 400 brands of personal care, home, and food globally.  Brands you use such as Hellmann’s, Lipton, Dove, Vaseline, and Surf.  What is truly different and unique about Unilever is they are so forward thinking when it comes to their people.  Fiona told us their story of bringing an agile workplace into play at Unilever.

What is an agile workplace?  It is something that goes several steps beyond just the talk of work flexibility.  The agile workplace focuses on three areas; practices, facilities, and technology.

1. Practices- In order to implement an agile workforce, you will need to offer agile and flexible work experiences to all or as many employees as possible.  This means that performance is measured on the output of work, not on the hours you work or where you work them.  At Unilever, they were able to offer this flexibility to all employees.  It was a huge change that forced managers to have trust that employees would get their work done.  It also was a process where managers had to have ongoing discussions with employees to ensure that it was working.
2. Facilities- Much like your home is divided into different rooms with different functions (kitchen for cooking, bedroom for sleeping, etc.) an agile workplace throws out the use of office space in a traditional office/cubicle layout.  In an agile workspace, there are areas to focus and work independently, then employees can move to areas where they can connect and collaborate with other employees.  There are also areas for vitality like break rooms, kitchens, and cafes.  Unilever was able to reduce their real estate footprint when they moved to this model.  They are using approximately 40% less space.  The key is that ALL employees, from the non-exempt to the executives, are expected to use the same work areas.  It is working for Unilever.
3. Technology- You must invest in technologies in order for an agile workplace to work.  First, virtual collaboration technologies such as telepresence meetings can help reduce the cost of global travel for employees.  Second, advanced mobility technologies will need to be used to facilitate employees having ease of working from other locations.

When an agile workplace is in place, there will be a cost savings on the real estate footprint.  Tech costs increase initially, however travel costs decrease.  It really is a trade off.

So, do you see this type of work environment gaining popularity in the future?  How do you think this would impact HR and providing service to employees?

For the past two days, I have been participating at the Senior HR Executive Conference hosted by The Conference Board.  This conference is viewed in the HR community as one of the top conferences for HR executives to attend.  The speakers are some of the brightest HR leaders from top companies in the US (Humana, Inc., General Electric Corporation, , The Boeing Company, PwC, Xerox, Corning, and Unilever, to name a few) and the content is top notch.  For more information on the conference and The Conference Board, please click on this link http://www.conference-board.org/conferences/conference.cfm?id=1980.

There are several HR bloggers in attendance and I encourage you to read their accounts as they are posted.  Bloggers include Steve Boese, Laurie Ruettimann, and Frank Roche.  We are excited to be assisting The Conference Board with incorporating social media into the conference experience for future events.  We are also advising on how future conferences can begin to incorporate Gen X or Gen Y participants.

I will be posting conference content later today.  In the meantime I have three questions for you:

1. Are you familiar with The Conference Board and this conference in particular?
2. Is this a conference you aspire to attend?  Why or why not?
3. What generation are you part of?

Please respond in the comments.  I will share them with The Conference Board to help guide how future conferences will be planned.  Now is your opportunity to help shape the future of HR conferences.

More soon…