Currently browsing Professional Development

Did you hear the sonic boom the evening of November 6^th?  I did, but that was only because I was on hour 10 of my 12 hour drive from home in Tallahassee, FL to HRevolution in Louisville, KY.  Fifty or so HR bloggers and social media advocates came together for a two day event to share, discuss, eat, drink and be merry.  My experience was truly amazing.  I plan to have more details of the happenings in a later post, but first a self-indulgent top 20 list of things I learned about fellow HR bloggers.

1.   @sexythinker can eat a mad breakfast is both sexy and a thinker!
2.   Do not give @HR_Minion replicas of Louisville sluggers, your laptop will never be the same.
3.   @BenEubanks has Diet Mt. Dew coursing through his veins and can walk on his hands.
4.   @ADowling sees dead people, specifically “ladies in white” that haunt the Seelbach.
5.   @SteveBoese is seriously concerned about the ROI of wearing pants!
6.   The airlines have been saved by @MarenHogan – she purposely misses flights.
7.   @TheLance pays members of the audience to shout out that he is the “smartest man in the room.”
8.   Did you know that @lruettimann is a bifurcating trophy wife? @kenruet is one lucky guy!
9.   @ewmonster will in fact cut a b*$@!.
10.   Apparently @blogging4jobs is an extrovert – who knew?
11.   @tlcolson may wear steel toed work boots to work but she will look damn good in them!
12.   @joanginsberg IS taller than her avatar.
13.   Don’t worry, according to @stelzner, he really is a man.
14.   You can place blame on @akaBruno, he’ll accept.
15.   The Ultimate Twitter Lurker is @logicwriter.
16.   @TrishMcFarlane is a freak wrangler.
17.   @theredrecruiter gladly takes requests to sing Kumbaya.
18.   Shh, @BKRecruiter is secretly THE Burger King!
19.   @designtwit is an enabler of our need for bacon love. I think someone ate their bacon pin!
20.   I @SteveMGHarrison enjoy driving…A LOT.  Next time can HRevolution be in Europe? I will take a canoe!

Enjoy HRevolutionaries and feel free to add your own in the comments!

I have a birthday coming up next month.  It is not a traditional milestone birthday, but as I have gotten older, I tend to look at each birthday as a milestone and they become a time of celebration and reflection.

The Beatles

I am of the generation that reveled in change.  We went from the Cuban Missile Crisis and “duck and cover” drills to the Beatles, bellbottoms, and protesting war. We were going to change the world and, in so many ways, we did. 

Last year around this time, I began a list to remind me of how much there is for me still to learn and do.  It is my “Firsts after Fifty” list and it grows monthly.  Some of the items on the list are career oriented, such as earning my SPHR certification. Others are more personal, such as beginning to study piano or meeting George McGovern. All of them represent my need for growth, development, and change. 

The generation of change is now watching the world change around us. Retirement funds have diminished with the economy and many of us will not be able to retire at the age we had hoped.  We will work more years than we planned, but we are less certain as to where we will be working and what we will be doing.  Some of us have lost our jobs due to no fault of our own. Others have seen their career growth slow down or stall.  Many of us are searching for new jobs and wondering if we are too old to find one. We have another 10+ years to contribute to the workforce, but will we be doing something we enjoy and working where our contributions will be valued?  

Growing up in change, we are resourceful and resilient and it is still our mission to change the world.  In order to do that, we “fiftysomethings” need to sharpen the image of older workers.  Let it be known that we are not resting on our laurels and counting the months and days to retirement.  We are not unwilling to learn new technology.  We are a valuable resource that is too often left untapped.  

HR professionals need to be looking at ways to engage and develop our “seasoned” employees.  There is a need to nurture and use our institutional knowledge and mentoring/coaching skills, and better train supervisors to ensure that employees of our generation continue to not only give valued service, but feel valued. 

We still have a future, but only the present is ours to change.

As a child I was definitely a “plays well with others” kid. That’s one of the reasons that I love Human Resources.  I enjoy working with others. I like the face time, the relationships, and working with other people to facilitate change. 

I am also in the midst of two overlapping HRIS projects.  You know the kind – they involve an enterprise system that is being modified to develop some previously paper-driven HR function into a technologically amazing process and workflow.   

Although I was excited about the projects, I found the meetings with the HRIS programmers difficult. Even for someone who “enjoyed working with others,” it was trying.   I would ask questions, but because I was not fluent in “techno speak” it was easy for key elements to get lost in translation. Wondering if it was just me, I talked with other HR professionals across the state and found my experiences were common. Technology continues to change the way we do business. We all know we need to improve our processes, but the road to change is not marked in signs that we can easily read. As I discussed the issue with my peers, several key questions arose: “How can HR ‘people-people’ and ‘policy geeks’ meet the new expectations of the profession?”; “Why can’t these programmers talk to us in a way that makes sense?”; “Can we ever learn the techno language well enough to express our needs and concerns?”

One of my hobbies is learning Italian. My husband and I share a grandson with a wonderful couple in Sardinia, Italy, with whom we look forward to visiting.  Their English is improving faster than our Italian.  So after trying various books, we made a significant financial investment last spring in a computer program that literally immerses the student in the language. There are no translations – the student learns Italian as any young child learns a language – through visual and verbal immersion, one word and concept at a time. As I sat down to study Italian one weekend afternoon, I began to think of my recent HRIS issues.  How could I be learning Italian and still be struggling with “techno speak”? Why is learning a foreign language so much easier? What is the difference?

Then I realized I was struggling with “techno speak” because I wasn’t immersing myself in the language.  Immersion might be the key!  Realizing I had nothing to lose but my time, I began going to optional meetings with HRIS staff.  I volunteered to do data entry, test modules, asked questions, entered more data, attended more meetings, asked more questions, ran queries, and corrected anomalies. It took all summer, but I am finally beginning to speak and understand the language. In fact, I am actually enjoying working with the HRIS people!

Technology is a critical aspect of our HR world. We can wait for techies to learn how to communicate with us or we can learn their language and how to use it to our advantage.  Jump in, immerse yourself, and progress at your own pace.  You might find that you can learn this new language the same way you learned your first language, one word and concept at a time.  You might even find you can enjoy working with HRIS people once you’re able to break through the communication barriers.   Simply making the effort to take on technology as a second language can make all the difference.