Back to school

So I'm studying to become a qualified Personal Trainer. This blog post will explain why, what's involved and how I see links with fitness training and other areas of my work.

I've long had an interest in fitness, but particularly in the last 7 or 8 years or so. My interests started on a very personal level as a quest for fitness and a changed image (both physically and mentally) of myself became part of how I reinvented myself after a difficult divorce, giving me motivation and fuel to become someone different, and better. I developed this into doing random endurance challenges to give focus to my fitness training, and learnt more about what fitness was and how to train. I've then developed this into racing in triathlons and from there fitness training has become a valued and indispensable part of my life.

I also have a professional interest in it. As a senior HR figure in several organisations I have had overall responsibility for health and wellbeing, and on occasion full blown health and safety too. I understand the links between physical and mental wellbeing, employee engagement, productivity and performance, and know that there is significant evidence to suggest that a fit and healthy employee (in every sense) will out perform one who is unfit and unhealthy. So I push these things at work too.

And I'm doing the qualifications to further my own knowledge and seek recognition or accreditation for the knowledge I already have. They are likely to help me improve my own training, and help me improve the health and wellbeing programmes I oversee in work.

I'm lucky enough to work for a qualifications provider so I can get easy access to the qualifications, and feel fortunate in this regard as access hasn't been easy in previous roles despite my enquiring!

I've blogged on the HRDirector magazine site HERE about employee wellbeing and how organisations need to be more proactive in promoting it. So I'm following my own advice. .

I've blogged also on Gem Dale's fitness blog HERE about my own approach to wellbeing and the backstory to why I'm interested in fitness. So here's the next chapter. 

There are actually two qualifications I'm completing, one after the other. The first is a Fitness Instructor qualification that in theory would allow me to run exercise classes in a gym. I'm mad keen to run my own spin class for anyone who will turn up and that looms large as a possibility now. The second is the conversion to Personal Trainer status and that would allow me to work individually with anyone wishing to improve their fitness. I'm looking forward to doing that too.

Professionally the qualifications will help me with my understanding of approaches to wellbeing in the workplace and particularly how individuals may benefit from a more tailored approach to wellbeing. They should help me to analyse organisational data on wellbeing and absence (etc) and suggest more appropriate and effective solutions.

They also should help me to coach leaders, something I do regularly anyway, but enabling me to offer a different dimension to looking at performance issues and their resilience etc. This is something Sukh Pabial blogged about very well HERE too. 

Of course, my blog is called The Power of Three and in the About Me page I talk a little bit about this holistic approach to individual development and performance coaching. So in essence all I'm doing is putting this into practice.

Speaking of practice, I'll need people to practice on when I'm doing the Personal Trainer part of it, so if you're interested in being a case study / guinea pig, let me know.

I promise I'll be as mean as you need me to be.

Which is only a little bit meaner than you want me to be.

Don't get me wrong, I'm not looking to change professions and become a full time personal trainer. But I wouldn't mind helping friends, family and colleagues in my spare time to become even better at health and fitness.

I'm hoping I'll be rather good at it.

I'll keep you posted on my studies.

Till next time.

Gary

PS in other news, we are already looking at 2017 holidays and it may be our final one as a whole family before at least one child gets too old (and too cool) to come with us. Now that makes me feel old…

Here we go again

So I'm going to the Ball...again. And by Ball I mean as part of the Blogsquad for #CIPDACE16 - the annual conference, exhibition and gathering of HR, OD and L&D professionals.

This is very exciting news for me, although I fully accept you may not be quite as excited.

Here's the full Blogsquad, with a "full house" theme this year which I'm sure I can pun my way through.

I was part of the Blogsquad last year, which I wrote about afterwards HERE.  But to be invited back again this year is tremendously exciting as well as ego-boosting - I enjoyed myself so much and felt I contributed a lot last year, and am looking forward to doing the same again this year.

Although the experience of being in the Blogsquad was exceptionally tiring, the positives far outweighed the negatives.  The Conference, the learning from it and the discussions I had with people about it and lots of other things were amazing.

And I love the CIPD Annual Conference.  I haven't missed a year since I first went in 2004, although I do still miss the small town feel that Harrogate had when the Conference more or less took over the town and in every hotel and bar you could find something going on that was HR-related.  But last year Manchester finally came into its own with a top notch programme and set of fringe and social activities (although all the ones I wanted to go to happened on the same evening, which was unfortunate).  As a Conference though you just can't beat it for sheer value and learning potential, even if - like me in years gone by and plenty of others - you just go to the exhibition and free seminars - nothing wrong with that at all and in fact you end up winning just because of the free stuff and learning you pick up.

A few days ago I asked, via social media, why other people go to the Annual Conference.  This is a selection of the quotes I got back, which perfectly illustrate the different reasons people go to the Conference and the different things they get out of it.

David D'Souza: "It has become an unwritten tradition that I'll find a way to humiliate myself, somehow, with the keynote speaker. So there was the awkward moment with Rita Gunther McGrath when I was introduced as 'the guy you've been tweeting about bubble wrap' just before she took the stage and the time I got star struck and asked Daniel Pink if I could move in with him. Both memorable, for different reasons."

Michelle Parry-Slater: "My stand out CIPD ACE moment was Peter Cheese and his "let them get on with their job, next question" statement when asked what he would do if an employee came to work with blue hair and tattoos #LoveIt"

Helen Amery: "My favourite memory is ACE 2013 when I was at the turning point in my career and I met so many great people from Twitter in real life for the first time. A whole new world was opening up to me and it was great to get out and discover more of it"

Mike Morrison: "For me its always the people."

Amy Humphreys: "I go for the atmosphere, the lovely people I get to hang with, and of course there's so much learning to be had!"

Darren Vann: "Going for the first time myself, was really just looking forward to the whole experience but now I'm keen to make sure I don't miss David D'Souza humiliate himself."

I understand what each person gets out of going.  Its the whole experience, and each year its different.  One year I got chatted up, and asked out for dinner, by a CIPD researcher whilst browsing books on their stand.  Another year I totally gatecrashed a fairly posh employment law networking event to which I wasn't invited, ate lots of food, had a drink and then made a dash for it.  Another year I came home LOADED with free gifts for my children and having won a £500 Red Letter Days voucher and some champagne.  EVERY year I make the most of the exhibition, talking to suppliers about what they're doing and how it interests me, catching up with people I've not seen for ages, attending the free seminars, and in recent years I've attended the full conference and got access to the premium content too.

This year's programme looks great, which you can view HERE.  There's so much to choose from and I feel like I want to be in 2 or 3 places at once.  Peter Cheese's introduction always contains a couple of soundbites that sustain many for an entire year, but the keynote speeches are different enough to offer lots of good insight.

The introduction of five different streams and five different types of session gives some structure but to be honest I don't think this was needed as the sessions kind of sell themselves without having the labels around them.  There's some good sessions available this year on what I think is the right range of topics.

The list of free seminars is also impressive and I'll genuinely struggle to decide where I need to be.

I'll be in and around the Conference for its entirety so if you see me wandering around the exhibition or sat in a conference session, please come and say hello.  Aswell as blogging about the content I'll be trying to capture people's views and reactions to the whole thing, so if you fancy appearing in print or on video - here's your chance.

And once again I'll repeat my promise from last year, that if any exhibitors have free neck/shoulder massages available on their stands (or even if they don't but its part of their sales technique) then I will visit and talk to you.  I'm that shallow.

Maybe you could even play Blogsquad Bingo and see if you can tick off the full house of bloggers if you manage to spot us all...

And it always feels like the start of Xmas when the Annual Conference gets underway, often because the Xmas Markets are being built just a few hundred yards away in Manchester.  Roll on November.

Till next time...

Gary

PS In other news, honeymoon has been and gone - astonishingly beautiful (but expensive) place, Norway - and I've decided I'd really REALLY like to live there.

Swipe left, swipe right

In many of my previous posts I've compared the employment relationship to actual relationships and have promised many times to blog in more detail about my comparisons, in particular the ways in which employees fall in and out of love with organisations.

Here's that post.

It obviously has some resonance for me at the moment as I very recently got married. This means I've been reflecting at length on the subject of love, affection, and what it means to be engaged in a relationship both in the marital sense and in the emotional sense.

Now I've had some experience in actual relationships. More than I ever thought I would to be honest. At one point I had a very popular anonymous blog about dating and relationships. So I like to think I know what relationships are about, mostly because I've made loads of mistakes along the way.

But I do think relationships at work are similar to actual relationships, and that the concept of being in love with someone can be equated to employee engagement. After all, accepting an offer of a permanent contract with an employer is as long term as any relationship and in many modern cases, longer.

Hopefully you know what it's like to be in love with someone. You can't wait to spend time with them. You think about them regularly. You find yourself doing nice things for them and seeking praise from them. You talk them up to other people. You enjoy being around them. And there's more besides that, but mainly bedroom stuff and, frankly, this isn't that kind of blog.

But if you're actively and highly engaged with an organisation, it's remarkably similar. You look forward to going to work. You find thoughts about your work passing through your head regularly when you're not there. You find yourself doing nice things for the organisation, commonly known as exerting discretionary effort and going beyond what's expected. You find yourself motivated by good things that happen at work and praise. You talk the organisation up to other people and are an active brand ambassador on social media, regularly promoting its activities and interacting with the brand. And you take part in work social activities and other events.

But what happens when this starts to go wrong?

I've had numerous relationships that have gone wrong. In all cases one party has changed. Sometimes it's so gradual it's not noticeable, other times it can be almost overnight when you wake up one morning and simply don't recognise the person you're next to in bed. I had a marital split that was like that.

And I've had working relationships end in similar ways. I guess everyone leaves a job at some point and if you were 100% happy you'd have stayed. There's something that's made you move on, even if you were largely happy there, it's the small % of unhappiness that has made you move.

Actual relationships are the same. If you are 100% happy you'll not look around for companionship elsewhere or seek another relationship. Often if you're mostly happy you'll stay put too, because it's a big emotional jolt to end a relationship.

And yet, if there's something not quite right, shouldn't you take steps to address that either by putting that right in the relationship or by moving on? Surely you deserve to be happy with someone else than even slightly unhappy?

I've had women end relationships with me using that sentence and it hurts, even though deep down I know they're right.

But does this hold true in working relationships?

If the company culture is strong enough and the line management relationship is similarly strong, then if the employee or employer is slightly unhappy with the other then a conversation will take place and things will happen to make it right again. If these attempts fail, then the employee should be encouraged to move on.

And I say encouraged meaning that there ought to be some kind of inducement or at least support to find another employer. Outplacement and that sort of thing.

But what if the trust has gone completely? What if all the things that attracted you to the employer in the first place and kept you loyal and engaged for, probably, years, have one by one disappeared? What if all the people you trusted and looked to for friendship and support have gone completely or moved to other roles? What if the team you built and shaped and developed are no longer your team? What if everything's different?

In short, what if you don't recognise the employer you're in bed with any more? Can the required conversation even take place? I don't think it can.

It's akin to finding your partner is having an affair. You just don't see it coming but it's devastating when it does.

And here you may start to see the same things happen in both actual and working relationships.

Obviously there will be trust issues presenting themselves. Neither party will wholly trust the other to give 100% of their part of the bargain. There will be a loss of pride in the relationship, in that the employee may no longer feel proud to work for the organisation or to be involved with its work, and may stop telling others who they work for as they may struggle to actually say the employers name. The employee may stop trying, stop giving their discretionary effort and do only the bare minimum to get by. They may, as I've posted about before, become invisible within the organisation and unconnected to it on social media. Presenteeism becomes rife. The employee may get annoyed easily at little things the employer does, and vice versa. And these little things become major issues as neither talks to the other about them. There's a lack of engagement in the relationship, and the spark has gone.

Basically, the employee doesn't recognise the employer any more.

And that's sad. Because it affects how each party views the other. Where once there was love, loyalty and pride, there's now mistrust, fear and antagonism.

And these can build. So how does an employee survive in a loveless relationship?

And I mean loveless in the sense that the love was there once, and is noticed more by its absence as a result. I've been in several relationships where that has happened and inevitably resentment creeps in. It becomes difficult to get through each day in this type of relationship and feelings of wanting to leave the relationship will inevitably dominate. But what should happen here?

In an actual relationship, leaving a long term spouse or partner can be extremely difficult as it may involve separating assets and families. But in the employment relationship it's easier. There's notice to serve but other than that it's a lot simpler. And yet many organisations don't spot unhappy employees or worse don't know what to do with them.

My own view is that if the employee can't become highly engaged again, and is at least not being disruptive or too negative, then the organisation should provide whatever support that employee needs to find a new "partner". When that employee looks back in years to come they will then have fond memories of their parting from that employer, and may come to regret leaving if indeed the grass isn't greener on the other side. They may even come back.

Now this is where working relationships differ greatly from actual ones. If your actual spouse is unhappy then you shouldn't faciiltate them finding a new partner. You don't set up their Tinder account or give them time off to date other people. And if they move on, you don't necessarily want them trying to come back or hassling you with their regret.

But in the employment relationship I think this could work and we could do more to help.

One other similarity is searching for love again after a broken relationship. The first few dates you have are often disasters, while you work off your issues and stop comparing people and things too much. You may become quite cynical about ever finding love again and bounce between relationships, then, when you're not expecting it, BOOM You're in love again.

It may take months, or years. It may be on your first subsequent relationship or your tenth, but if you've been capable of love and being loved again then it will happen again.

There's Plenty of Fish (pun intentional) in the sea, after all.

Of equal importance is the early stages in a relationship when both parties are often assessing the long term suitability of the other. The organisation needs to try as hard as it can to convince the employee to give it 100% of their effort.  If the organisation doesn't try, why should the employee?  In an actual relationship this is very much two-way but in the working relationship I think the onus lies with the employer as part of the settling-in process, and this is where we in HR can really influence things by creating the right culture, coaching line managers on what to do and leading on things like internal communications and L&D.

It's a hard thing when love goes sour in a relationship, but by helping employees to know when to swipe left and when to swipe right, we might heal some broken hearts.  And by making sure organisations do the right thing in the early stages of a new relationship we can help love to blossom.

Here we go again with my "HR as pimps" analogy.

Till next time…

Gary

PS in other news -honeymoon approaches…a Norwegian Fjords cruise!

Wedding Bells

As you might be aware, I get married on 26 August. Here's a blog post about what that means.

Beware, there is very little* HR or leadership or indeed anything professional in this post.

*none

I'm marrying Katie on 26 August at 4.30pm on St.George's Beach in Paphos, Cyprus.  In all likelihood this will be my final blog post before then and for a couple of weeks after (we're back for a week or so then go off on honeymoon for another week).  Its also not very likely that I'll get much internet access whilst out there so my social media output will drop to minimal levels, as indeed it ought to.

I've been married before, and obviously since divorced (in an exceptionally painful and public way).  Someone said to me when I told them I was remarrying that I ought to have learnt my lesson and therefore not do it again.  But I look at it this way - I HAVE learnt my lesson, and this time I'm doing it right because of the learning I got the first time round.

I met Katie through social media, when I had my anonymous dating blog and associated Twitter account. We got talking as a result of that and I was due to be near where she lived for an HR conference in Birmingham soon after so I suggested we meet up.

Without getting TOO soppy, I knew even before I saw her that she was the one, from the email and text conversations and interactions on social media. Meeting her in person merely confirmed what I already knew.

And its been awesome ever since. We really do complete each other and yet, as many have commented, we are quite different in our personalities and like yin and yang in many aspects - but this seems to work - opposites attract and all that.

Katie healed my broken heart and somehow made it larger and better than it was before. She embraced my eldest two children and gave me a third. She moved 80 miles to live with me and gave up more than I ever could, and yet has settled well in our area and found friends, work and a good social life.

She's someone who constantly challenges me, both personally and professionally.  She refuses to let me rest on my laurels and is regularly pressing me to improve myself in lots of ways, and helping me to do so.  She's the best coach I've ever had, and the best friend I've ever had.

She's the parts of me that don't exist, or that are buried deep within me. She's confident, likeable, extroverted, argumentative, creative, loving, passionate and more.

And I love her for what she's been, for what she will be and for how she makes me better.  As a couple we work so well its unreal.

I've yet to figure out what, precisely, I offer her in return, but all I do is treat her with respect and do nice things as often as I can and it seems to get me through most days.

The proposal came in March 2015 on her birthday. I took her to Ironbridge in Shropshire, her favourite place, and got down on one knee on the bridge when she wasn't looking, with a ring borrowed from her mum (until I could take her to choose one, obviously). The wedding we always wanted abroad, partly so it made it a smaller and more intimate affair, but partly so it had a fairytale feel to it.  We chose Cyprus because of some family connections I have there but also because it was accessible without being too far.

We have 9 guests, of whom 3 are our children.  Owen, who will be nearly 15 then, is my Best Man.  I couldn't think of a better person to do it.  I know what it takes to be my Best Man, and I've spent nearly 15 years growing my own.  Faye, 11, and Poppy, nearly 2, will be bridesmaids / flower girls and both will look beautiful.

The ceremony is on the beach with the reception at a local taverna, and then 2 days later we're home.  But only for 2 weeks before we head off on a cruise around the Norwegian Fjords, something on both our bucket lists, and something we may actually be looking forward to more than the wedding itself.  Poppy will be coming with us but the elder two children will stay with their mum.

And in every blog I've done since I started in March 2015, I've mentioned something at the end - "In other news..." - about what was happening wedding-wise.  If you track them back you'll see how things have developed.

When I next blog, after the honeymoon, it'll all be over, and I'll have to find something else to mention in "In other news..."

It will be strange not to have anything major to look forward to and to build towards, but instead to just look forward to married life and the challenges and excitement it brings, and to be one half of a wonderful couple with a great future ahead of us.

Apologies in advance for any soppy wedding photos I share on social media.

And apologies for the non-professional post here, but what's the point of having a blog if you can't write what you want and about what's important to you?  Right now, the wedding is the most important thing happening to me - and I'll happily bore anyone to tears about it.

Till next time...

Gary

PS In other news, its finally here...

How did I get here?

If that hasn't got the Talking Heads song going through your head, nothing will. This is a bit of a reflective post prompted by three separate things happening this past week. 

One is that I have had some conversations with People Management magazine recently, one around giving career advice to other HR professionals (which appeared in print, happily) and another around Personal Learning Networks and how my own has evolved over time. Both of these conversations made me stop and think about the shape of my career and the journey I've been on, and made me reflect on the key turning points in it. 

Two is that the beginning of August 2016 was at one point going to be one of those turning points, long since discarded on my career journey but now that it's here it's prompted a bit of reflection. 

And three is catching a bit of the film Sliding Doors, which made me wonder what would have happened if I'd made different choices along the way at each of those turning points. 

I do wonder whether it's healthy to dwell on past decisions, and it probably isn't when done to excess and when it prompts too much regret or unhappiness. 

But my philosophy is that it's better to regret things you've done, than regret things you've not done. And so that's how I approached this period of reflection - every decision I've made in my career, going right back to my school days, has led me to where I am now, and whilst I do have a moan about things from time to time, I'm happy with my career to date and recognise that even the worst of bad days contains some learning that helps me grow as a professional and a human being. 

I have made some decisions that have led to some unhappiness, that's true, but in the long term they always tend to work out for the best no matter what the short term pain. It's like the value of property, it can dip from time to time but over a long period, it always gains in value. And I think the same is true of career decisions. 

Except sometimes I still wish I'd followed my boyhood dreams and played for Manchester United or become a WWE professional wrestler. 

I can look back on every decision and see the positives that flowed from it, even if they weren't apparent for some months or years at the time.

Here's some things I've reflected on:

- if I hadn't chosen history instead of geography at GCSE I might never have studied history for A level and my degree, which developed my writing style, questioning technique, healthy cynicism and instinctive approach to question, challenge and debate

- if I hadn't been fat as a child and been bullied for this and other physical differences I may never have developed my strong sense of justice and equality, and understood different power bases individuals have and how that plays out in organisations

- if I hadn't flunked my A levels I wouldn't have learnt that you can never rest on your laurels and assume things will be given to you on a plate

- if I hadn't taken a temporary job in a finance team and flirted seriously with becoming an accountant, I wouldn't have developed the financial knowledge that has helped me enormously in later jobs

- if I hadn't stuck at my PGCE despite hating teaching teenagers, I wouldn't have got the in depth understanding of learning and coaching, and developed that in future years, or honed my speaking and training skills

- if I hadn't said yes to being on a process improvement temporary job despite feeling forced to, I'd never have met the people who persuaded me to look at a career in HR and who helped me so much in my early HR career and learnt new skills that have also helped me in all later jobs

- if I hadn't listened to an improved offer from GGHT after turning the job down first time round I'd never have worked for that great company or its great Chief Executive and learnt so much that has helped me

- if I hadn't gone through a painful divorce I wouldn't have had the motivation to get myself fit / recover my health and set myself new personal goals and challenges, nor got into the world of online dating which led to my first experiments in blogging and social media, all of which help me today in my work 

- if I hadn't had the experiences I did at the end of my tenure at my previous employer, I wouldn't have had the motivation to build up my PLN, take a serious look at my professional image and the way it is shaped by relationships, or start this blog, or really research organisational culture and apply that to my work

And there are other decisions that have given me cause to regret or wonder if I did the right thing, but one thing is true of all of these and the ones above - that they shaped me, helped me become who I am, and each left its mark on my PLN in that there are individuals who mattered at each juncture who have remained part of my PLN for specific reasons. 

When I look back, it's possible to see patterns and trends in how my PLN and the associated career I've had has evolved, and if I ever come to write the story of all of this it may come across like a grand plan - but it's not, it is just evolving organically. 

Most of my decisions are questionable, in the sense that they're never 100% guaranteed to work out and it's always possible to question the motive behind them. Many have their downsides and give me cause to regret. 

But what I also find is the longer term picture is always far better as a result of them. 

That if I have a Sliding Doors moment, then I'm definitely on the better path, despite any upsets along the way (of which there are many). 

And regret is fine when it's about things you've done and paths you took. Just don't get regretting things you didn't do or paths you didn't take. 

Therein lies the road to madness. Instead, JFDI. 

Till next time. 

Gary

Ps in other news, my Stag Do is tomorrow! A day at Edgbaston for the test match then out round Birmingham afterwards. It may get messy. 

Culture Shock

How important is culture in organisational success? Recently I came across this report by the CIPD, which was a good and interesting read and which prompted this blog.

The report starts with Peter Cheese telling us that culture is integral to organisation success and to the well-being of our workforces, and acknowledging that changing or creating good workplace cultures is not an exact science, takes time, and is influenced by many variables. He goes on to say that create effective cultures we must consider our employees, their relationships with one another, the jobs that they do, and their connection to the organisation they work for.  He then sets out how and why Boards must consider employee contribution and overall culture if they are to understand overall success.

Hear, hear.

I've observed organisational culture a lot in recent years, looking particularly at how two organisations that join together can have, superficially, similar cultures and organisational values, but not when one digs beneath the surface, and observing organisational culture when I moved organisations earlier this year and discovering just how drastically different places can be, even if again in the face of it things are similar in terms of what is written down. 

So culture matters. 

Of course there's the famous quote from Peter Drucker that culture could eat strategy for breakfast, but it's one I agree with, even if it is a bit of a soundbite. As the report says, culture is hard to articulate and measure, but is nonetheless valuable. The report gives examples of both positive and negative impacts of culture, and it's difficult to argue with these as I've seen both in action. 

It's no wonder, as the report points out, that culture and governance is at the heart of some of the recent scandals in various sectors, and as I've mentioned before, culture is a very important thing to get right when assessing a potential merger or acquisition. I've seen this go wrong before, and even recently a housing group pulled out of a mega merger at the eleventh hour, citing differences in governance and culture that they felt would be difficult to get around. 

How prescient of that particular Board, who have done something that I haven't seen done much in other comings together and have analysed the cultural differences, reaching a conclusion that they were almost irreconcilable rather than ploughing on regardless. The CIPD report shares FRC guidance on culture and governance from a Board perspective, but it's interesting that this guidance is from the FRC and a governance angle, rather from within the HR profession. 

Of course, Boards do have a very important role to play, but not the pivotal one. There's more to establishing culture than a robust approach to corporate governance, important though that is. 

I once ran a culture and values programme that was bottom up, having had some clear and unequivocal feedback from the Board that a top down approach was not the way they wanted to go. They felt the employees, and the organisations leaders, set the culture, and I'm inclined to agree, and attempts by Boards to do so through corporate governance just lead to employees leaving because of the culture, and other employees joining because it's what they want. So Boards CAN set it, but what I'm saying is they shouldn't. 

And that cultural programme worked well too. It focused on leaders, employees and their behaviours, and in particular an aligned set of HR practices including pay and reward, recruitment, L&D, performance management, wellbeing and employee engagement. 

I covered many of these things in my Ignite poem at #cipdnap16 on Amazing Workplaces. Basically, this was a guide on how to create the best organisational culture. Towards the end, I offered my opinion that amazing workplaces are like a house of cards, and can come tumbling down at the slightest provocation. But I also said that within HR we create culture, through those aligned practices and by living the values, so we are both the architects and the guards of this culture - we recruit and train the builders, and we sort out the troublemakers. And more. 

Check it out here if you haven't seen it already. 

In HR, we have a specially developed skill set and a unique organisational position and perspective which most others in an organisation don't have, and it's us who should be providing the definitive advice on culture, not a financial body. 

And I finished by saying we have the power to create the best workplace and culture we've ever known.

But I also said that every workplace is amazing for someone. And that's because someone really loves working there, even if they're the only one. For them, it's great, even if large swathes of employees hate it. 

And this brings me to my often used analogy of likening the employment relationship to actual relationships, something I promise again I will do a full blog on soon. You can fall in love with an organisation because of its culture, and overlook it's faults. You can equally fall out of love with an organisation because of its culture if that changes, and overlook it's positives. 

In this sense, in HR, we are matchmakers. Trying to hook people up with a great culture. Swiping left, swiping right, Tinder-style. 

I was going to take this analogy further and suggest that by paying people to come and work in an organisation and fall in love with it, HR are effectively pimps, but that's going too far altogether. Let's settle on HR being architects of arranged marriages. 

Too many HR functions, though, don't realise the power and influence they have. Lynda Gratton once wrote that companies get the HR function they want, and advised HR leaders that if they don't have that place at the table, to leave - it's not a place they want to be in. 

Maybe we as a profession should listen to Lynda. But maybe we should also look at what we can influence directly, the feeling of happiness and love (however that's manifested) at and for work and work on that. 

One employee at a time. 

One day at a time. 

Let's start a cultural revolution. 

Till next time. 

Gary

Ps in other news, less than a month to the wedding now. Hen party for Katie this weekend in Liverpool, and my stag party in Birmingham next week takes in both a Test Match and evening festivities. I just hope my eyebrows have long enough to grow back before the wedding...

Tail wagging the dog

This blog is on a subject that is uppermost in my thoughts at the moment – that of performance management, and in particular bringing a new approach into my current workplace.  It isn’t a straightforward prospect though and much as I’d like to wave a magic wand and do away with the annual appraisal, it isn’t as simple as that.

Here isn’t the place to discuss the current approach as I’m about to start what I’m calling a “big conversation” within the organisation so I’ll do that there, but here IS a good place to try to put some of my thoughts about performance management down, as much to organise my thinking as anything and prepare me for that big conversation.

I’d be very interested in carrying on this conversation and thinking with you, if you have time and some thoughts to share.  Let me know if so.

There’s obviously a general trend in organisations these days away from the annual appraisal and similar processes.  This article in Personnel Today highlights the oft-cited examples of Accenture and Deloitte moving away from annual appraisals and comments on their thinking.  And this article from the BBC builds on this by talking about building a coaching and performance culture.

So its not new as a concept, and yet many people struggle with letting go of the annual appraisal, despite almost everyone I have ever come into contact with in every organisation slating it.

From my own perspective, in my HR career I think I have designed 4 different, distinct processes that could be labelled as appraisals (but were called something else…something sexier).  Each one I put an awful lot of effort into, consulted people about, researched widely, designed carefully and launched thoroughly.  Each one I thought was a better iteration than the last and by the 4^th version I thought I had something approaching perfection in terms of the annual appraisal.

And all of them failed.

Every one, in the sense that line managers didn’t like them, staff didn’t like them, and the organisations saw them as a tick box exercise that they resented doing because it got in the way of actually doing the job.

So my views on the appraisal have evolved somewhat and I figure if organisations don’t like them and don’t value them, then why keep them?

Is it because we’ve always had them and someone somewhere sometime thought they were important?  Pete Estes, later to run General Motors, said in the 1960s (yes, really) that “if we’ve been doing something the right way for 15 years then in these changing times that’s a sign we are now doing it wrong.” Later he refined this to 5, and even 1 year – and never more is that true than today where the pace of change and technological advance is immense.

So my view is the annual appraisal may have been the right concept back then (I won’t define when “then” was), but the world has moved on.

Of course, organisations need to have a handle on employee performance.  But that isn’t a once a year conversation where both employee and line manager feel awkward.  The examples I’ve cited have brought in a more holistic, continuous process (often using the “check-in” technique) and are more focused on fuelling future performance than reviewing past performance.

But many organisations, despite not liking the “ticking the box” mentality of the annual appraisal, still use it as a comfort blanket and cling to the notion that there must be some good in the process, and push for 100% completion of appraisals as if that makes the system work and proves it is good.

Here, then, is the tail wagging the dog.  Measuring appraisal completion rates says nothing about the quality of the conversation and even if it does result in high completion rates and proves there is an efficient process, it doesn’t make it an effective process.

But I’m struggling to get my head around NOT recording the more continuous “check in” process – lots of organisations need to have some evidence of performance management, but as soon as you start recording it then no matter how good the process, doesn’t it become a differently-timed version of the annual appraisal?

In this article, Deb Siverson argues why changing demographics are at the heart of some of the growing trend towards more regular and continuous feedback, and whilst I don’t want this blog to become a “millennials are taking over” post there is a growing trend towards instantaneous feedback in lots of industries that we need to replicate in the employment relationship.

Here’s some examples:

·         Trip Advisor (and similar) style feedback is now commonplace in many organisations from a customer perspective.  I’m a regular on Trip Advisor, Rated People, Glassdoor, and read reviews on Argos, Amazon, Currys and other places I buy stuff from.  I like being able to see up to date feedback, good and bad, about something I’m about to buy or someone I’m about to do business with.  Why can’t that style of feedback make its way into the employment relationship, with every employee having a feedback rating and comments that builds over time?  Its not the ONLY performance measure, but its an interesting snapshot (even if backward looking) and a way of ensuring feedback is monitored, acted upon and used to measure performance.

·         On almost every social media site there’s the ability to Like, Share, Comment etc on posts you see and read.  That’s another way to look at feedback and it’s a way of life now for those entering the workforce.  And social media is now prevalent in many workplaces, but not necessarily used for performance management purposes.

·         Professional sports all use data and continuous feedback to drive improved performance.  Look at Wayne Rooney – he has access to oodles of data about every game he plays in and probably for all his training sessions too.  He can compare his performance with any other player in his own team or any other team.  He can get feedback from team mates instantly on the pitch in the middle of a game, and can hear supporters likewise.  If he ventures onto social media after a match he’ll see comments from those who watched him.  In this blog I talked about listening to Sir Clive Woodward speak about the use of data and performance analytics in the England Rugby Team, and this still holds true.

I guess what I’m saying is that there are enough examples out there of performance management being done in an instantaneous and continuous way and working very well.  But not enough workplaces are embracing it to manage their staff in a new way and to ditch the annual appraisal. For this to happen, the organisation needs to be clear on what performance actually is.

If they can recognise it, and measure it, then organisations can figure out how to acknowledge it, reward it, or penalise its absence potentially. But that line of sight is critical as its feedback on what is going on. Feedback that ensures that continual focus on performance. 

I often compare the employment relationship to actual relationships and will do so again here.  In a good, effective relationship there is constant feedback from both sides, good and bad.  Holding onto feedback to deliver it at some later stage is never, NEVER, a good thing (trust me, I’ve been divorced) and can create problems and a lack of trust an openness in that relationship.  The same is true in the employment relationship.

But whilst I’ve got the dissatisfaction with the current reality, I haven’t yet got a clear vision of what I want in place of this reality – although I have got a sense of which direction I want to go in.

I am convinced the annual appraisal has had its day, but simply to remove it might mean organisations have no way of managing performance, and no way of evidencing this – so a fine line has to be walked. But how, if you replace the annual appraisal, do you keep some evidence of performance management to show an industry regulator? And how, no matter what format and frequency you install in its place, do you avoid merely substituting one bureaucratic process for another?

I’d be interested in hearing from anyone who’s done any thinking on this or achieved success with this route.

Will the tail always wag the dog?

Till next time…

Gary

PS in other news, Brexit pushed up the cost of our foreign wedding considerably! But we are just over 50 days away now and I've got to start thinking of a wedding speech. Maybe I should do it as a poem like my recent Ignite?