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This Needs Immediate Special Management Attention
| Marginal performers. I love that concept. I just saw it in an article (registration required) about the larger concept of things you can do that have “big ripples.” Chances are, you can think of a name or two from your workforce that would come under the heading of marginal performers. Think about what you have done to handle this situation. Anything? Does it even seem like a high priority to you? Is it even your responsibility to handle these workers?
Check out what author of the article, Michael Winston, says (italics mine):
“Individuals identified as marginal performers need to be given immediate special management attention. Marginal performance is a management problem which must be faced squarely and resolved by increased goal clarity and support, performance-enhancing coaching and counseling, reassignment, training and education, or replacement.”
Let’s elaborate on those italicized items:
More on this next week. Be ready to face this squarely. |
Posted on: October 12, 2007 08:38 AM
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Another Reason Your Employer Causes Your Workforce Mgmt Problems
| I just got back from time away in inspiring Mother Nature. It got me thinking about inspiration. What gets you inspired? Would you count your organizational vision statement on that list? Probably not, and that’s too bad, because it’s supposed to be the core of your inspiration.
This article describes what a good vision statement should be like, and what it should not be like. Compare the vision statement for your organization to it. If your vision statement could be used as the “bad” example in this article, then it is the rotten core behind your chronic workforce management problems.
Without a clear description of an exciting future to work toward, workers will find it impossible to master change collectively. Instead, they will resist change efforts or work for their own goals (personal, team, department, division). The interventions that you attempt will often end in frustration. There will be no compelling reason for workers to conform to your project goals or standards. You can replace all nonconforming workers with other great candidates, but you will not solve the problem. (I said that I was inspired, not optimistic.)
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Posted on: October 10, 2007 07:14 AM
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Employers Not Ready for Brain Drain
| We seem to be constantly returning to this topic, but the more we learn, the more we can manage the problem. And the problem is the brain drain caused by Baby Boomer retirement. Important institutional knowledge may be lost even in your organization. A recent Monster survey (Building and Securing an Organizational Brain Trust in an Age of Brain Drain),reveals that only 12% of human resource managers surveyed report that knowledge retention is a high priority, despite a third of the same managers estimating 20% of their current workforce will be eligible for retirement over the next several years.
In a previous post, I mentioned that many of these potential retirees will not actually retire on schedule, but there still needs to be some program in place to ensure you retain knowledge, such as
Hey, look, you can benefit from this wisdom! Right now, does your organization exhibit these two problems areas?
(1) No formal method to identify knowledge that needs to be protected and retained, and
(2) No reward or even encouragement to share organizational knowledge.
If the answer is Yes, then initiate action or push an existing group to “Maintain the Brain”. Some examples from the survey recommendations:
Start now, before it is too late! |
Posted on: October 02, 2007 12:35 PM
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Will You Make The First Call?
| The return on investment for programs that identify and treat employee depression is now clearer after a study published yesterday in the Journal of the American Medical Association. The study showed that lower costs overall was likely for the employer that has established such programs. The savings come from improved productivity and reduced absenteeism, both of which we have known for a while are the costly workplace outcomes from depressed workers. The study found that telephone psychotherapy even works!
OK you don’t have the power to establish a program within your project, but if you perceive your worker productivity is being eaten from the inside out by depression, then you should be a supporter of depression treatment programs in your company. Hey, in today’s project environments, you may end up making the first call! |
Posted on: September 27, 2007 11:36 AM
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Get Emotional About These IT Metrics
| If you are like most IT managers, you are mismanaging metrics in one way or another. At least that’s according to an unnamed author of a very interesting recent article. Even if you have defined and publicized organizational metrics, the author warns, they are probably traditional IT metrics that do not stir the blood of corporate leaders. And you want to stir their blood in a good way! You want to show you are having clear positive business impact.
Some interesting examples are provided that are consistent with my workforce management theme:
Traditional Metric: 30% of PCs were replaced this year. (Leader judgment: Boring!)
“Emotional” Metric: Computer replacements helped improve user productivity and lowered maintenance costs by $60,000 this year.
Traditional Metric: IT resolved 1,200 tickets this month. (Leader judgment: Is this all you do for me?)
“Emotional” Metric: 20% of IT staff time was devoted to resolving tickets. 40% of requests were related to the operating system. Windows Vista training for users could reduce the number of requests and save $5,000 per month in IT productivity.
See how the “emotional” metrics can hit home when reported to leaders?
There’s more. Here’s the link to the article, although there is free registration required. Also beware that the web content manager must have been coming down from a meth binge, because some HTML flotsam and jetsam appears in the text. And there was no author’s name when I looked at the article. Must need metrics in that department. |
Posted on: September 25, 2007 09:42 AM
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