Experts Its time for the C-suite to step up and lead

Experts Its time for the C-suite to step up and leadExperts Its time for the C-suite to step up and leadIts been said before, and Erika Brown will say it again If companies want change, they cant rely on human resources or an outside consultant to make it happen. Their leaders have to own the change they want to see.Brown,Goldman Sachs chief diversity officer, made the comment at the first-ever Hispanic Leadership Summit at the United Nations Headquarters on Dec. 10. She was on a panel about how to get more Hispanics into C-suite roles, which because of pipeline problems is more difficult than one might think.According to the Hispanic Association on Corporate Responsibility, only about 7% of board members at participating companies were Hispanic, while more than 17% of the employee workforce identified with the ethnicity.We need to make aya that diversity and inclusion really is inclusive, Brown said.Just as Brown talked about how corporate action must come from the C-suite itself, T ammy Tyler, an employment law compliance manager at payroll, human resources, and benefits outsourcing service provider Paychex, recently said that sexual harassment prevention requires a company culture that starts at the executive level.It needs to come from the top down in those companies. And its a culture, Tyler told Ladders.Youre fostering respectful behavior, and making sure that everyone understands that from the beginning.And so the experts are in agreement For businesses to meet their ethical standards and diversity goals, their top players need to be involved in the process. HR can be helpful, as can consultants and other outside groups.But when it comes down to it, a company is its leadership, and those leaders have to be intentional in the way they run their businesses. Otherwise, all the lip service is just for show.

Crosswords can be the secret to staying sharper in life, study says

Crosswords can be the secret to staying sharper in life, study saysCrosswords can be the secret to staying sharper in life, study saysThe secret to staying sharp in old age might be as simple as doing crosswords and puzzles, according to new research.A study from a UK-wide PROTECT published in the International Journal of Geriatric Psychiatry found that adults over 50 who did puzzles like crosswords or number-based puzzles like Sudoku scored higher on cognition tests, meaning their brain functioned better than those who didnt.Follow Ladders on FlipboardFollow Ladders magazines on Flipboard covering Happiness, Productivity, Job Satisfaction, Neuroscience, and moreWeve found that the more regularly people engage with puzzles such as crosswords and Sudoku, the sharper their wertzuwachs is across a range of tasks assessing memory, attention, and reasoning, said lead researcher Anne Corbett. The improvements are particularly clear in the speed and accuracy of their performance.Researches from the University of Exeter and Kings College in London examined nearly 20,00 people between ages 50 to 93 and asked participants how often they completed puzzles. Participants completed the test online and were quizzed each year. Researchers then had participants take cognitive tests that measured attention, information processing, and memory. These tests included word-matching and number puzzles.The results showed that participants who did daily word puzzles had better short-term memory capacity and was eight years younger compared to someone who didnt do puzzles.The same went for brain function with participants who performed daily crosswords having brain function the equivalent to someone 10 years younger.We cant say that playing these puzzles necessarily reduces the risk of dementia in later life but this research supports previous findings that indicate regular use of word and number puzzles helps keep our brains working better for longer, added Corbett.You might also enjoyN ew neuroscience reveals 4 rituals that will make you happyStrangers know your social class in the first seven words you say, study finds10 lessons from kleine Franklins daily schedule that will double your productivityThe worst mistakes you can make in an interview, according to 12 CEOs10 habits of mentally strong people

13 things successful people do in the first 3 months at a new job

13 things successful people do in the first 3 months at a new job13 things successful people do in the first 3 months at a new jobYour first three months on the job can lay the groundwork for major achievements down the road.Successful people know this when they start a new job. When it comes to your first few months in a new workplace, its important to set goals, prove the worth you sold in your interviews, and make social ties outside of your own team.Heres what else successful people do in their first 90 days on the jobThey say yes to exciting opportunities, even if theyre bedrngnis quite sure how to execute themEven if youre not sure how exactly to complete the task or what its benefit to you might be, if youre offered with an exciting opportunity, go ahead and say yes.Say Yes, absolutely even though you have no idea what lies ahead and maybe this is the right decision or maybe its not but who knows and who cares, author and speaker Danny Rubin wrote in a geschftliches miteinande r Insider post.They make sure they have achievable goals establishedCareer strategist Miriam Salpeter previously told Business Insider that its important to have goals that you can use to measure your success.Otherwise, you might not know what youre working towards every day.Hopefully your boss developed goals for you to accomplish during your first six months or year of work - whether thats a sales goal, a number of projects to complete, or something else. Those goals should be clearly linked to your job description and the overall goals of the company.Did your boss not give you any goals at all? Then, Salpeter advises you develop those goals yourself.Then, they reflect regularly on those goalsIts easy to set lofty goals, then forget about them. But you should reflect regularly on whether youre actually achieving what you promised to do in the outset of your job.Whatever you sold them on in the interview, make it your mission to demonstrate that youre going to do it, Amanda August ine, a career advice expert for TopResume, told Business Insider.Examine how your goals have changed and how you can improve your workflow to get more done and become the version of yourself you wanted to be on Day 1.They find a way to solve problems on their teamWhen youve just joined a new organization, faults in their structure or business model might be instantly clear to you.But dont just tell your boss what you think is wrong with your team, or leave the issues for more seasoned employees. Discuss what youve noticed, and present a solution.I love employees who have a passion for tackling problems versus avoiding them, Weebly CFO Kim Jabal previously told Business Insider. I want to be surrounded by employees who want to take the steeper hill because they know there will be a big sense of accomplishment at the top as opposed to those that prefer to coast on the easy road.Jabal recommended saying something like this to your boss We have a huge opportunity to fix something that h as gone wrong. Here are a few ideas. Id love your input.And, be sure you dont cousine your analysis on how your old company functions. It can be irksome when a new employee just talks about their old workplace and constantly compares the two.They reevaluate their social group and branch outIts easy to become comfortable with our office neighbors - but once you know them, its time to branch out and meet other people in the company. You may want to start by asking for their advice and perspectives.People are willing to talk about themselves, Rachel Bitte, the chief people officer at the software recruiting firm Jobvite, previously told Business Insider. People are willing to share what they learned being in that field. So dont be afraid to go leverage that network, just to even learn.They sit in on meetings around the company and talk about what they knowAugustine previously told Business Insider that starting in your first week, you should be showing up to meetings and conversations .Those are great venues to discuss your own experience and insights. During those meetings, you can start to establish where youre an expert and become the go-to person in the company for those topics.They continually work on developing good habitsCharles Duhigg, the author of The Power of Habit, wrote in his bookTypically, people who exercise start eating better and becoming more productive at work. They smoke less and show more patience with colleagues and family. They use their credit cards less frequently and say they feel less stressed. Exercise is a keystone habit that triggers widespread change.Other positive activities that can improve your work might include meditation, writing, painting, or reading.They try to figure out what their leadership needs, and how they can fit into that visionSuccessful people will always demonstrate how much value they bring to their respective roles.I never think in terms of convincing anyone of anything - I think in terms of inspiring them, F BI agent Robin Dreeke, who co-authored The Code of Trust An American Counterintelligence Experts Five Rules to Lead and Succeed, previously told Business Insider. If you want to move into a position of leadership, or you want to move up in the company, the first thing to ask yourself is, How can I inspire them to want me?He added Youve got to understand whats important to them. How do they see prosperity? What can you do to make their job easier?They track how they spend their time, so they can lay the groundwork for doing more of what they loveYou probably overestimate how much time you have to spend doing those parts of your job youre not super into, productivity expert Laura Vanderkam told Business Insider.Start with keeping a log of how you spend your time. Then, see what tasks you spend time on that you dont really adore. Theres a good chance you dont have to spend that much time on them, or that you can eliminate them.To be sure, its not always so easy to eliminate tasks you d ont like, particularly at work, Business Insiders Shana Lebowitz wrote on Vanderkams research. But theres a chance that if you simply identify the tasks that arent working for you, you will in fact be able to limit the time you spend on them.They seek feedback early onAfter a month or two on the job, you can consult with your boss to ensure youre on the right track to becoming a superstar at your company.This is a great opportunity to get some early feedback on what you are doing right, what needs to be done better, and how you can spend your time next week for the greatest benefit of the team, Natalia Autenrieth wrote on TopResume.They chat with the CEOWhether youre making small talk about the holidays or discussing the companys business model, successful people chat with the company leadership when theyre new additions to the company.It can be tricky to find a way to meet your companys C-suite without being awkward, though. Try setting up a networking coffee with them, and develop a list of questions beforehand to show your interest in the company and their work.And dont be afraid to introduce yourself if you happen to bump into them in the elevator.They take every opportunity to network with coworkersNetworking sounds intimidating, but its as simple as grabbing coffee or talking Game of Thrones with your coworkers.Joanna Coles, the former editor-in-chief of Cosmo and Marie Claire, said connecting with your peers is just as important as connecting with your bosses, if not more.The thing that I always try and say to young people starting out is your peer group is really the most important influence on your life because you are going to rise and fall together, she previously told Business Insider. And I have always got jobs through the loose ties of friendships and someone knowing someone who might know a job.They rekindle their relationships with former coworkersAugustine previously told Business Insider that near the start of a new gig, new hires should go b ack and reconnect with people at your old company and ask for LinkedIn recommendations.The best time to get referrals isnt when youre hunting for a job, but well before you need it.Dominic Umbro contributed to a previous version of this article, whichfirst appeared on Business Insider.

13 Summer Jobs That Will Kick-Start Your Future Career

13 Summer Jobs That Will Kick-Start Your Future Career13 Summer Jobs That Will Kick-Start Your Future CareerThe term is over and you can finally let your hair down and enjoy your well-deserved freedom.Nothing wrong with having a bit of fun during the summer, butdoesnt it feel somewhat idle tospend the best years of your life doing notlagehing? Many grads regret not doing more for their professional and personal growth during their college years. Learn from their mistakes, work to improve yourself and get a summer jobImagine you want to apply for a job after you graduate. How do you want to impress the hiring manager?You need to bring some value to the table. Even though there are plenty of graduate or entry-level jobs, fresh graduates who already have some work experience or skills beyond the college education are much more valued than those who spent their summers drinking beer and sunbathing. Start building your work experience while youre still in college and learn things they don t teach you at school. Youll see it paid off once you start looking for a full-time job.Here are some inspirations for you on how to spend your summer productively. And keep in mind, working on improving yourself doesnt mean you cant enjoy your summer1. Start a blogIf youre passionate about something, may it be traveling, cooking, politics, philosophy, fashion or beauty, why not start a blog? It doesnt even have to be a super successful blog. Think of it as a perfect place to store your thoughts and practice your writing skills. Also, its a great way to build up your portfolio. You can create your personal professional website and link it to your blog. Its a great way to connect with future employers and showcase your writing portfolio in one place.2. Be a freelance writerDid you know that there are plenty of websites that will pay you for writing content? If youre a talented writer or aiming to find a job as a content writer or copywriter in the future, try signing up for one of th ese platforms and start earning your summer money. If you dont know where to look, weve picked these five sites for youiwriter.comfreelancer.comscripted.comtextbroker.comtextmaster.com3. Learn to codeFor a young prospective professional, the basics of programmingaresimilar to learning alphabet for a first grader. The big advantage is that its that kind of expertise you dont need to learn at uni. You can learn to code either by online courses, self-learningor by attending a summer course that would teach you the basics of programming languages and web design. Try codecademy.comor coursera.org to teach you the essentials. Some courses are for free, some for a couple of bucks, but its definitely worth the time and money. If youre good, you can then teach others or get paid projects on several other websites, such as crew.co,simplilearn.com or toptal.com.4. Read books that will make you smarterIf you want to gain some extra wisdom, opening a book is always a good idea. There are plenty of great self-improvement books in which you learn things they dont teach you at college. Here are must-read books we recommend.Jim Collins Good to GreatDaniel H. Pink Drive The Surprising Truth About What Motivates UsSeth Godin Whatcha Gonna Do With That Duck? And Other ProvocationsJason Fried ReworkRobin Sharma The Monk Who traktament His FerrariJohn C. Maxwell Failing Forward Turning Mistakes Into Stepping Stones For SuccessPeter Thiel Zero to OneTimothy Ferris Four Hour Work WeekNapoleon Hill Think and Grow RichCharles Duhigg The Power of HabitYoure welcome ??5. Make websitesIf youre already skilled in HTML, you can create your own stunning website and turn it into your online resume or a portfolio page. And if youre really good you can advertise your skills and make websites for other people or companies. Its a great way to improve your skills and youll earn some really good money, too.6. Be a photographerWith the amount of online content that currently runs on the int ernet, stock photos will always be in high demand. If you love photography and youre good at it, summer is a great time for you to make some money taking pictures. There are plenty of websites that provide beautiful royalty-free photos, where you can sign up as a freelance photographer and then sell your photographs. Try stocksy.com, fotolia.com, lobster.media, or500px.com.7. Work outdoorsIf you want to both enjoy the sun and get a bit of pocket money, whats better than an outdoor job? There are plenty of possibilities you can work as a lifeguard at the beach or a pool, register to become a tour guide, look for jobs in a national park or at the farm. You may think this sort of job wont bring you any other benefit aside from money but this is not entirely true. Many successful people started out as manual labourers and all agree that these jobs sometimes teach you more about life and work than white collar jobs.8. Volunteer for an NGOYou can learn loads of interesting stuff and acqu ire plenty of useful skills at non-governmental organisations. If youre studying humanities or have an interest in socio-political causes, volunteering at an NGO can be a great stepping stone for you. More than that, volunteering is a great way to boost your resume. Many hiring managers say they prefer candidates who have experience in volunteering for people who are willing to give time for a good cause for no pay appear conscientious and dedicated.9. Get a summer internshipIf you already have a clear path you want to take in your future career, a summer internship at a company thats close to your area of interest is a great idea. Youtypically need to apply for a summer internship months before it starts, so it might already be too late at this point, but you can still look around for available internship opportunities. Even you dont find an advertised internship offer at the company you want to work for, give it a go and schmelzglas them you might have a luck on your side.10. Get a job at the campusEven in the summer, university campuses dont close and theres a lot of work to be done prior to the start of the new academic year. Contact your uni student services department or student union and they might welcome a helping hand. If youre keen on getting academic experience, you can ask to work in the labs or assist university researchers. 11. Take an intensive language courseThe more languages you know, the more you are human they say. Be more human and learn another language. Bilingualor multilingual people are always more valued with the hiring managers. Summer is a great time to invest in your language versatility.If you want to travel a bit too, think about spending your summer in a foreign country. After all,the best way to learn a languageis to live where people around you speak it.12. Be a tutorIf youve already mastered a certain area of expertise, may it be maths, languages, programming, etc., why not pass your knowledge and skills on and help other k ids improve? ? Tutoring is a popular way of earning some extra money. A big advantage is that youre the boss of your time, money and the number of tutees. You dont necessarily need to do one-on-one personal sessions. You can do tutoring via Skype or online. Try skillshare.com, coach.me, savvy.is, or udemy.com and become an online teacher.13. Take care of little creaturesAnd the little creatures will pay you back with their love and gratitude. If youre a caring type, love children or animals, try babysitting, pet sitting or dog walking. Its fun and aside from extra money, youll get a great satisfying feeling. You wont probably learn anything new, butitll definitely boost your personal development.Share Your Feedback or Ideas in the Comments

Life After Resume Correct Spelling

Life After Resume Correct Spelling The Awful Secret of Resume Correct Spelling You should not outline your requirements in the cover letter. Time is going to be saved when you make usage of templates. Every word you use needs to count, must have an objective. If you hire me isnt a sentence. The issue with using these texting shortcuts is that almost all people wind up getting too utilized to the spelling shortcuts and so forgetting or never learning the appropriate spelling of many words. Spelling is an auditory process-it isnt a visual approach. Moreover, theres no strong reason behind retaining the very first accent in the English word. Also if you would like to show off what excellent language abilities or vocabulary youve got, restrain yourself when youre drafting your resume. Yes, language is continuously changing, but it doesnt make grammar unimportant. Understanding Resume Correct Spelling Because youre already acquainted with your resume, its tough to pick up err ors. The primary reason is because your resume will probably be mixed in with different resumes, thus by getting your contact information for a header, there wont be any doubt that the hiring manager is looking at yours. In case youre looking for employment, it is likely that you know you call for a great resume. Your latest job ought to be the peak of your career thus far. Manager and Supervisor are often used interchangeably. Resumes are well known to play a vital role in presenting a better impression before the employer. A resume needs to be distinctive and different from the rest of the resumes. If a resume is distinctive and different from the rest of the resumes coming in for the very same post, it will become simple for the interviewer to pick from the other thousands of resumes. To produce the paper in agreement with the original water content. All the men and women who have made use of templates can testify to the fact they have at least made it to the very first interview. There are quite a lot of websites on the web that present out a very simple layout, easily understandable format allowing anybody to create a resume through them. Using a lot of distinct typefaces will make it appear cluttered and untidy. A Secret Weapon for Resume Correct Spelling Explore the positive things which you have done for your prior employers, and if there were any negative conditions, find the positive side inside them in the event you are asked. Simply take a small sum of your time to be sure you dont commit this mistake. Fantastic grammar is credibility, particularly on the world wide web. Based on the degree of job applied for, in case you have already had a couple of jobs or thus, you do not need to elaborate on your performance at university or college. Optionally you can also include what youve got to offer the business. Our company knows the way to give essay help for company and academia because weve been doing it for several years. It is co mpletely plagiarism free What is Actually Happening with Resume Correct Spelling Youre going to be surrounded by writing professionals throughout the plan of buchung placement, and when you choose to purchase essay and select an allocated writer, things are likely to get even more exciting. Keeping that in mind, you should begin thinking about what mistakes you commonly make and search for them. In fact, a seasoned writer can get the job done much faster than any student as theyve been writing academic assignments during their entire life. Turning into a writer for our firm is extremely challenging. Not to the point in which you dont even know what youre saying, but instead utilize words that explain you and the work that you do. It can be frustrating when searching for a job. If you own a thought, make certain you finish it. Conscious, detached thought, and a little bit of research, are expected to sort out the issues decisively.

Introverts Can Make the Best IT Leaders

Introverts Can Make the Best IT Leaders Most people who consider themselves introverted would never think that they could be a leader professionally or personally, and this can be especially true in the IT industry. Because many IT professionals consider themselves to be introverted, they may not go after leadership positions that could make them more money and advance their careers. However, theres no need for introverted IT professionals to hide any longer. According to a recent article in Forbes.com, often introverts can excel in leadership positions, despite long-held beliefs to the contrary. As many as 40 percent of executives reported that they were introverts, according to Jennifer Kahnweiler of Forbes.com. Many famous leaders are introverts, including perhaps the most famous technology leader of them allBill Gates. How does this work? Introverted people can excel in leadership positions if they turn what they might think are weaknesses into strengths. Here are five qualities of introverts that make them great leaders.EmpathyMany introverts are great listeners, and they will take the time to understand another persons point of view before they make a decision. Having empathy for others is a great quality for a leader to have because they will be able to put team members at ease and understand the differing needs of executives.DepthIntroverts also tend to drill down and get to the heart of the matter instead of gathering a little bit of knowledge about everything. This can be an excellent quality for a leader to possess because it allows them to thoroughly understand a problem instead of rushing into half-baked solutions. The ability to delve into problems and issues is also a valuable communication skill, as it allows introverts to ask pointed questions of team members in order to get to the heart of a problem.A Calm DemeanorHaving a calm demeanor in the face of press ure or others stress is also a quality that both great leaders and introverts share. The ability to speak calmly in high-pressure situations can be invaluable to a high-level IT professional. Even though speaking in front of others is a common fear in introverts, many introverted executives have learned ways to calm themselves and exude confidence even in the face of stress.Writing SkillsAccording to psychological experts, many introverts are more comfortable writing down their thoughts rather than speaking. While this may seem like a drawback, it allows introverted IT professionals the opportunity to present well-written and thoughtful reports, documents and written geschftlicher umgang communication. Because of a preference for the written word, many introverted professionals also do well with social media and conducting business in an online environment.

A Tool Kit to Identify Energy Solutions in Off-Grid Areas

A Tool Kit to Identify Energy Solutions in Off-Grid Areas A Tool Kit to Identify Energy Solutions in Off-Grid Areas A Tool Kit to Identify Energy Solutions in Off-Grid Areas A new package of data-collection and decision-making tools helps communities with poor energy access make informed decisions about how to meet their most pressing energy needs. MIT D-Labs Energy Assessment Toolkit is aimed at organizations that work closely with communities that have been overlooked in the work to provide energy to everyone around the world.While aid organizations tend to focus on dense populations where infrastructurecan serve the most people, and private geschftliches miteinander seeks optimum markets, hard-to-reach and sparsely populated communities can fall through the cracks.In 2015, MIT D-Lab began working with Mercy Corps to develop the tool kit with a goal to create a means by which organizations with strong connections in off-grid communities can assess energy needs and select market-bas ed solutions for residents and businesses.Expertise in the energy sector is leid necessary to use the tool kit. The essential qualifications are a strong presence in the community and the ability to take action based on the opportunities identified. Organizations that have used the tool kit include community-based businesses, nongovernmental organizations, and civil society organizations. They all have ongoing programs in off-grid regions and are looking to further develop energy access programs that leverage their existing connections with communities.The Energy Assessment Toolkit, which is open-source and available online, includes surveys and interview guides that an organization can use to gather information from a range of stakeholders, such as community residents, business owners, government officials, and others.Lamine Keta (left) preparing for an interview in Segou, Mali. Image Eric Verploegen / MIT D-LabThe kind of information the surveys and interviews explore includes cur rent energy access and expenditures, aspirational energy needs,existing supply chain,community institutions, and stakeholders (private sector, government, NGO).The tool kit is modular, allowing the organization conducting the assessment to determine the scope and scale of the study. In addition to the data collection tools, the tool kit includes data entry and visualization tools that can be used to analyze data and guide the design of the assessment plan by identifying technologies and business models that address the most pressing needs in a specific area. The goal is to enable organizations to collect the information needed to make informed decisions about how to meet the particular needs in their community through market-based initiatives.An example is an assessment conducted by Mercy Corps in Mali, which identified the need for households to reduce the money spent on cooking fuel.It also found that the major reason why efficient cookstoves had bedrngnis reached this market was a poor supply chainbeset by security issues in the northern part of the country. Mercy Corps is now helping facilitate the distribution of cookstoves by connecting manufacturers in southernMali to wholesalers and entrepreneurs in northern Mali.The Energy Assessment Toolkit is part of a larger suite of initiatives developed as part of the MIT D-Lab Off-Grid Energy Roadmap. D-Lab is also working on developing and curating resources to help organizations identify technologies and business models that can meet the needs of off-grid communities and guidance for designing pilot programs and market deployment.MIT D-Lab is known for its work in Creative Capacity Building, an approach to international development that trains people in resource-poor settings around the world to create or adapt technologies that will improve their lives and strengthen their communities. In this way, people become active creators of technology, not just recipients or users of technology. The Energy Assessment T oolkit approaches development in a similar way it views organizations with a strong local presence as powerful agents of change and provides the tools and training necessary to assess community needs and implement the right solutions to meet the energy needs of the community in which they work.Eric Verploegen leads the MIT D-Lab Off-Grid Energy Group.

Employee Engagement for Dummies

Employee Engagement for DummiesEmployee Engagement for DummiesEmployee Engagement for DummiesEmployee Engagement for Dummies PDFNote Youll need Adobe Reader to view the PDF file above. Download Adobe Reader.Wednesday, October 22, 2014Youve heard of employee engagement, but how do you take it from an idea to an actionable plan?is pleased to partner again with Bob Kelleher as he shares highlights from his latest work, Employee Engagement for Dummies From the author of Louder Than Words, and Creativeship, comes this all-inclusive, step-by-step guide to all things employee engagement.Join for this captivating, high energy, and humorous FREE webinar as Bob takes attendees on a jurney through his brand new book. Hell explain concepts, tools, and best practices that will help you foster employee engagement at yur company (or with your team).Specifically Learn aboutThe latest employee engagement researchThe state of the workforce Gallup claims up to 70% of employees are disengagedLearn what emotions drive engagementDiscover what emotions drive disengagementThe importance of building your Employer BrandThe importance of building transparency in your communicationLearn how to improve employee engagementPresented byBob KelleherAuthor, Speaker, Founder of the Employee Engagement GroupBob Kelleher is an award winning author, thought leader, keyelende speaker and consultant, and travels the globe sharing his insights on employee engagement, leadership, and workforce trends. Bob is the author of the bestselling book, LOUDER THAN WORDS 10 Practical Employee Engagement Steps That Drive Results, CREATIVESHIP, A Novel for Evolving Leaders, and the just released EMPLOYEE ENGAGEMENT for Dummies.Bob can be seen or heard on national and is a frequent guest writer and contributing editor on many national publications.Bob is also the founder of The Employee Engagement Group (EmployeeEngagement.com), a consulting firm that works with leadership teams (many from the A/E industry) to imp lement best in class leadership and employee engagement programs.Prior to become a writer, speaker and consultant, Bob designed and lead award winning employee engagement schrittes at large global organizations as Chief Human Resources Officer.Check out Bobs Book Chapter 7, Chapter 10, Chapter 14Webinar Transcript Employee Engagement for Dummies.Good afternoon, Im Jim Thompson, senior writer with Monster. I would like to thank you for joining us today for this exclusive webinar hosted by Intelligence. Todays webinar is entitled Employee Engagement for Dummies.Bob Kelleher, founder of the Employee Engagement Group will be presenting this afternoon.In todays webinar, Bob will explore what it takes to be a thought leader, and why it matters. Before we get departureed, I would like to mention a few housekeeping items.Todays presentation, and a copy of the recording will be deutsche post aged on hiring.monster.com within the next two to three geschftsleben days. Please click on the resou rces tab, and navigate to HR Events to obtain your copy. All registered participants will also receive an email with a direct link to todays materials.Intelligence helps HR professionals improve worker performance, retain top talent, and enhance recruiting strategies. We analyze and collect data from 1000000s of unique job searches performed on each day. We invite you to visit hiring.monster.com and read our in depth reports and analysis. For our latest materials, click on the Resources Center tab when you visit the website. After the presentation, there will be time for questions. Our meeting manager will help facilitate the QA. Please feel free to font your questions into the available space during the event and well make every effort to include them in todays QA session. And if youre listening to todays presentation via telephone, youll be distributions-mixd on mute until the QA session begins.Now, Id like to provide some background on our speaker Bob Kelleher. Bob is an award-wi nning author, thought leader, keybedrngnise speaker, and consultant. Bob travels the globe sharing his insights on employee engagement, leadership, and workforce trends. He is the author of the best-selling booksLouder Than WordsTen Practical Employee Engagement Steps That Drive ResultsCreativeship A Novel for Evolving Leadersand the just released Employee Engagement for DummiesBob has been a guest of several national media programs, and is a frequent writer and contributing editor for countless industry publications. Bob is also the founder of the Employee Engagement Group, a consulting firm that works with executive teams to implement best-in-class leadership and employee engagement programs. Prior to his writing, speaking, and consulting career, Bob designed and led employee engagement initiatives at global organizations as chief human resources officer.Welcome, Bob, Ill now turn the webinar over to you.Why thank you, Jim.I am delighted to be here with you today, and Im even mora delighted that is partnering with me. I go way back with Monster, both of us being native Massachusetts companies. Although being from Boston, Im sure it is a surprise to many of our listeners, because I dont really have a Boston accent. On that bedrngnise, a little bit of background, I am not a life-long consultant or author. I spent many, many years working for organizations in human resources and in the organizational development field and even spent a couple of years as Chief Operations Officer for a large global company. But, it really welches probably in the late 1990s in which I started focusing full time on putting in employee engagement programs and initiatives. Some of unterstellung ideas Ill be sharing with you today.Employee Engagement for Dummies will be todays theme, but let me take a step back. When I left corporate America in 2009, I wanted to take the best practices I had implemented and put it in a book. So, the book Louder Than Words became a best seller. Many, m any people started asking me to talk about the book and that led to the evolution of my writing into a fable Creativeship A Novel for Evolving Leaders.And then, out of the blue one day, I got a call from Wiley Publishing, asked if I would pen Employee Engagement for Dummies.And to be honest, when I first got the call, I really welches struck, Should I or should I not write Employee Engagement for Dummies?I was concerned about my audience, my clients, and conference attendees. But, the mora I learned about the Dummy series, I found that it was a 250 million and growing in terms of size. Its the largest book franchise of its kind in the world. In fact, they claim its the most recognized book series in the world. They challenged me to write a book that would be 350 pages that would be translated in over 30 languages. Then I started really investigating the Dummies series and quiz time the first Dummies book came out in what year? Well, if you guessed DOS for Dummies,you were correct , and that was written in 1998. The best-selling Dummies book today? My wife would claim Wine for Dummies,but she would be wrong. The best-selling book today in the Dummies series is Windows 8 for Dummies.And Ive schwefelyperit count Employee Engagement for Dummiesis doing quite well.I always try to give people a tool or two when they sit through a keynote talk or a webinar, so my special thank you to you will be to offer you three very practical employee engagement tools that I think are best-in-class that you can literally start using. During my years as an internal practitioner, I would often sit in conferences or webinars, and just try to take away one idea, one tool that I could implement. In addition to, hopefully, listening to some really fascinating data Ill be sharing, pay attention when I tee up these three tools, because I really do think they are terrific.Lets just jump right in. I will talk a little bit about the state of the American workforce as part one. And I will f ollow the outline of the Dummies book. Part two will be Employee Engagement for Dummies, and I will breeze through some of these chapters. Just a key point to keep in mind, has, on its website, a couple of chapters that are complimentary chapters, so feel free to download either chapter 7 or 10. I believe they have chapter 14, which will be available for your downloading pleasure following todays webinar.Lets all jump right in.The State of the WorkforceAs you can see from those photos, the recessionary window that we entered in 2008- 2009 really took its toll on the workforce. In fact, according to many studies, were at a pretty low engagement level. And let me use this metaphor, picture if you and the employees in your company were represented by a crew team, and imagine if only 3 out of 10 of your crew members were actually working really hard, giving above and beyond efforts. Imagine if only 5 of the 10 person crew members were just casually looking at the scenery going by, and w orse yet, imagine if 2 are actually trying to sink your boat. Well, according to a landmark study published by Gallup at the end of 2013, that really is the state of the American workforce, in which they claim based on a North American poll that up to 7 out of 10 employees are either disengaged or actively disengaged.And, in fact, to look at the studies specifically, based on 150,000 employee respondents, they concluded 3 out of 10 are engaged, 52 percent are disengaged, and almost 2 out of 10 are actually trying to sink your boat. I was so struck by this particular study, as well as countless other studies that Ive been reading and compiling over the past couple of years. I decided to focus my energy on looking at organizations not only to boost their engagement, but also to evaluate the level of disengagement.Were going to do a quick little poll and youll see the poll on your computer screen. Take a quick minute and check if you believe the employees that you work with, 7 out of 10 are disengaged. Put a check if you believe half of the company that you work with are disengaged, and if you are looking at 25 percent disengagement, check the 25 percent. And if you dont have a clue, please check box D. So, well give you a few seconds to gauge your estimate and lets close the poll, and it will take about 10, 15 seconds to pull the poll up.In the meantime, I invite you to do the following. I created a video called Whos Sinking Your Boat,which has gone viral 273,000 views at last count. It is a wonderful four-minute education on engagement. It tees up the Whos Sinking Your Boat concept. It makes a business case. What were finding, many leadership teams are using this video as a rallying cry. It also provides some hope. Now, looking at what you are telling us, we have 43 percent indicating 25 percent of your employees are disengaged. Thirty-one percent are saying half of your organization is disengaged, and 13 percent of you believe 7 out of 10 are disengaged, an d 12 percent dont know. Whats fascinating when you think of this engagement, thats not asking, Are you engaged? It really is a snapshot of the employees who arent even working at a baseline engagement level. Lets continue.Lets define engagement, and were going to jump right in with my definition. But before I define engagement for you, I want to tell you what it isnt. Employee engagement is not about satisfying your employees, because the worst thing you could possibly have is an under-performing but satisfied employee. If your goal is just to satisfy your employees, that is very one-sided, and you run the risk of having satisfied but under-performing employees. You can also throw money, and titles, and things at your employees as a way to build employee satisfaction. And what I like to tell clients, when you focus on satisfiers, you are building a culture of employee entitlement, not a culture of employee engagement.So, lets talk about the difference. Satisfied employees, generally , are there to get things from the company, think tangible things. Engagement is about forging relationships. Its about what can I do for you, but what can you do for the organizations, this shared commitment. Its having common goals. Its about developing your staff. Transparency and communication. Its the culture that defines who you are. Its about having a culture of high performance.Lets look at it a slightly different way. I like to define the word engagement as a mutual commitment. It is my job as the company or my job as the babo to unlock the potential of my employees to help drive company performance. See, it is a quid pro quo. We will help you as the employee reach your potential, but there has to be a mutual aspect to it. How are you going to help your organization reach its potential? And this bond between the two the intersection is were in this togetherand what transpires is magic dust in discretionary efforts when your employees go above and beyond. Now, I have often worked with highly left? grade executives who are very analytical.And theyll often want us to justify if I focus on engagement, what are the business intangibles? Is this a business driver or is this a touchy-feely schriftart of initiative? And, based on my experience, if you engage your employees, they drive customer or client satisfaction and the two of those things done well, usually leads to success. So, based on a lot of research, if you can focus on engagement, if you can get your employees to give above and beyond, there are concrete quantitative facts and statistics that will prove that an increase in engagement will increase employee revenue, will increase your ability to hire and retain the best employees, will increase your ability to develop great leaders internal. And it will increase your ability to be able to respond to market changes and market conditions. It also allows you to better plan for the future. So, you are not just investing in today. Engaged employees he lp you plan in investing in tomorrow.In a decrease in engagement, you will see on the decrease side 28 percent of organizations that have engaged employees experience less downsizing, 40 percent lower turnover of high performing employees, and 17 percent voluntary turnover decreases overall, when you can see a boost in employee engagement. By the way, this is just one metric, a study from Burson. You can go on employeeengagement.com my website youll see in the resources section, were trying to archive a lot of the business metrics in order for you to be armed with data concrete evidence that, hey, if we focus on engagement, there are tangible business results.Now, lets continue. Hows this for a startling statistic? Disengaged employees cost the US economy 370 billion annually, according to a Forbes article. And if you have employees with low engagement, they are four times mora likely to leave their jobs than those employees who are highly engaged. But there is trouble in para dise, as this picture depicts. According to a recent study by Silk Road, less than 40 percent of companies even focus on engagement, and I believe what happened post the recession, many organizations saw their voluntary turnover numbers shrink.In fact, during the depth of the recession that we were in, voluntary turnovers decreased two-thirds. So, if your voluntary turnover was 15 percent in 2006, it was 5 percent in 2010. And what happened, I believe, was organizations started focusing on survival. Counting paperclips, increasing sales, and many organizations lost sight of their talent management programs, as evident by this particular study. And what were seeing today, with the far healthier economy, the job market doing significantly better, were now seeing many organizations rethinking their talent management strategies because of the burning platform, which, historically, has been voluntary turnover.Employee EngagementNow, lets talk about engagement and motivation. Let me start off with one of my all-time favorite entertainers. For those who have ever heard me speak, youll know that Im a Beatles junkie. And last summer, I had a wonderful opportunity to hear Paul McCartney in concert. And as I heard Sir Paul rocking Fenway Park, it dawned on me that this 72-year-old entertainer, who by all accounts does not need to work, based on being quite wealthy, what was driving him to give a three hour concert? Why was he working, at his age, to drive his band to deliver this amazing concert? And I turned to my wife during the concert and I remarked that Paul McCartney is engaged. And, of course, my wife joked, Bob, you really need to be thinking about something else. But what I was realizing, seeing Paul, is that we all will go above and beyond if we really love doing things that we love to do, or if we are practicing things that we have a particular skill at.And what Ive learned over the years in business, that the intersection of these three areas what the employ ee wants to do, what the employee is good at, and what the company needs to get done that intersection is an engaged employee. And someone like Paul McCartney or Bruce Springsteen or Tom Brady or the New England Patriots, they happen to be quite fortunate in that theyre very, very good at what they do. They obviously love what they do and the market in which they get to play or pursue their craft. In the workplace, we all end up with things that we dont like to do. But the more that you can see overlap, the more that youll see a boost in engagement.Now, on that note, for some reason the visual didnt come out, but we have a terrific tool that weve created thats based on these three circles. We like to call it the performance appraisal form for the future. Most millennial dont really tolerate 15-page performance appraisals all that well, so what weve done is work with a subset group of our clients to develop what we think is a terrific, easy, best-in-class performance appraisal form, based on these three circles. And at the end of the webinar, I will share with you how to get your hands on this particular tool.Now, lets talk about engagement and emotion. I do a lot of partnering with Dale Carnegie, and in fact, we will soon be launching in partnership with Dale Carnegie, an employee engagement certification course. Look at employeeengagement.com for more details. But based on Dale Carnegies research with MSW, they have concluded that there are emotions that drive engagement, and emotions that drive disengagement.There are a series of positive emotions, that if your employees feel valued, confident, inspired, enthusiastic, and empowered, there is a high probability that you will have an engaged employee. Conversely, if your employees experience negative emotions, if they are bored in their job, if they are disinterested, if they are working with a project group of employees, or on a lethargic brand, or a group of managers, if they are irritated, if they see some one who was just hired in at a higher salary than themselves, if theres a perception of unfairness. If they feel manipulated in any way, if they are uncomfortable, if they feel vulnerable. Part of the reason I believe Gallups study, that states record low levels of employee engagement, has to do with this feeling of vulnerability.The past five years, weve asked employees to do more with less. Weve seen spouses, neighbors, relatives, friends, parents, siblings, and children lose their jobs or not be able to find jobs. And even if weve been actively or gainfully employed, I believe that has created a level of insecurity, and collectively, weve seen this negative cloud that weve been under drive a level of disengagement in the work place.Why even care at all about emotions? Well, employees who feel negative emotions are ten times more disengaged than employees who feel positive emotions. So, are your employees working within a positive culture or a negative culture? And negative emotio ns are more contagious, in fact, based on MSWs research with Dale Carnegie, negative emotions travel four times faster than positive emotions. If you are working in a toxic culture, you can see the significant disengagement effect of negative emotions.Let me take a step back and move in to our second poll.What do you believe is the number one influencer of emotions in the work place?If you believe money, check off A. If you believe training and development, check off B. If you believe leadership, check off C, and if you believe my boss, check off D. Well give you another couple of seconds. Okay, lets close the poll. And let me just take a step back and let you know that the number one influencer of emotions is the number one influencer of engagement, and is also the number one influencer of disengagement. So, let me jump in with the answer.The number one driver of both positive and negative emotions, or I like to say the number one driver of engagement, is also the number one driver of disengagement, and its my relationship with my boss. Now, that came in second place with 39 percent. You folks said leadership at 46 percent. Now, I can tell you organizationally-wide, having trust in leadership is a significant engagement driver, but when it comes to the individual level, what makes me positive, what makes me negative, what makes me engaged today, what can drive disengagement, its my relationship with my boss. So, if I was to do nothing else, if I was on this call and I was on a member of your leadership team, focusing on making sure that you are selecting and developing the right people to manage people.Lets continue. The importance of communication in my first book I called communication the cornerstone of engagement. So, lets talk a little bit about what I call line of sight. Based on extensive research, organizations that are able to crystallize their mission and vision values, in a way that it creates line of site with their employees, lets their employees understand what the company stands for. They understand where theyre going, the purpose, and the overall mission of the organization to outperform companies that dont, and have higher levels of engagement. Its actually quite simple. This is my job, and I understand how my job fits in with where the organization is going, and that line of site has been proven to be a significant engagement driver. In fact, this is a 2012 study by the research firm Aberdeen, in which they actually claim the top way organizations can drive engagement is by establishing a process in which they will align the goals of your employees with the business priorities.I work with companies in all industries today, and I must say, this is an area that many organizations struggle with. That they try to have too many goals, too many priorities, and the employees dont really see how it relates to the job that theyre actually doing. Its even more pronounced in these days, because of the overwhelming number of commu nication sources, communication experts now claim that we dont hear something as an employee unless we hear it or see it 13 times. Are you communicating your values 13 times? Your mission? Are you communicating your operating goal 13 times in a way that resonates with your employees? Are you building redundancy and variety into your communication messaging? We do a lot of workshops now with organizations on how to lead and engage the millennials. And if youre not bringing in texting and mobile technology platforms to help you communicate with the millennials, I believe you really run the risk of disengaging that population.Now, there is a terrific tool that Im going to offer. Its called My Communication Protocol.Its highlighted in all three of my books, because I think its so critically important. How do you build a cascading message approach in which this is what the CEO is going to communicate? This is the frequency. This is the audience. This is the venue, and this is what the direct reports of the CEO communicate. And you can build a communication protocol all throughout your organization, and we have found when you put this blueprint in place, you create line-of-sight, you create a healthy communication culture, while also reinforcing your communicating alignment 13 times. So, we are offering up our communication tool. I absolutely believe this tool is worth the hour of your time today and well give you some idea of how to implement this communication promise in your organization at the close.PurposeNow, lets talk about purpose. If youre trying to get the discretionary effort of your employees, you need to capture not only on the minds of your employees, but you need to capture the heart of your employees. So, think of both the intellectual and the emotional aspect of your employee population. And, based on extensive research, organizations that focus not just on what it is they do, but also focus on the why and the who, outperform their peer group. So, let me give you a homework assignment. At the close of this webinar, Id like you to go on your organizations website and see what jumps out at you. I would speculate that your firm, your organization, your institution does a terrific job of telling the world what it is you do, what you sell, what you manufacture. But I would suspect that you struggle with telling the world why do you do it and who you are.Now, lets take a case study Whole Foods. This is a case study of an organization that has done a terrific job of articulating the why. In fact, Whole Foods has proven that they can actually charge a premium, and customers, if they feel an emotional connection to the brand, they will actually take more money. And look at their value statements, their purpose statement. We provide choices for nurturing the body, the community, and the planet. Now, a second, vastly different company is a management consulting firm, and I learned recently that Bain and Company came in number one on g lassdoor.coms best employer, both in 2012 and 2013. So, I went on Bain and Companys website, and what did I see? I see this slide. The very first slide is not telling the world what it is they do, its telling the world who they are. And only when you stay on their website a bit do you see a toggle and you realize theyre a management consulting firm. So, when I see these messaging aspects to a brand, it makes me understand why Bain scores so well on best place to work surveys, because theyre not just telling the world what it is they do, theyre also articulating both the why, and in this case, their who.Well, by the way, if you focus on purpose, it is doing well by doing good. In fact, evidence by Jim Collins and Jerry Porras, if you can somehow articulate your purpose and values better than your competitors, you will out-perform your peer group six times. And I believe it plays direct to the engagement of your employees, because youre capturing both their intellect and their emotion al connection to the business.BrandingNow, lets talk about branding. Sometimes I feel old when I look at this song by Looking Glass Brandy, Youre a Fine Girl.My kids tell me Im a dinosaur, because theyve never heard of that song. But lets talk about engagement in your brand. Well, based on the same Gallup study that I created Whos Sinking Your Boat, 59 percent of employees do not know what their company stands for, or what makes its brand different from its competitors brand. What an opportunity lost. I sometimes will work with a client, after a couple of weeks, Ill circle back at the leadership team, and Ill say, Great news. You dont have an engagement issue. You have a hiring issue. You have a selection issue. You dont understand who you are. If you dont understand who you are, youre going to struggle with hiring the types of people that can succeed at your culture.I always work with organizations human resource groups to try to get them to understand the importance of creating an employer value proposition. What is unique, what is different about working here? We tend to run in the same road race that everyone else runs in, and therefore, we cant articulate, why are we different? And if you cant articulate why you are different, then you cant differentiate yourself, and I believe you struggle with creating that unique value proposition. When I worked on the corporate side, I used to focus on getting organizations to understand the importance of linking their employer brand with their product or service brand. So, think Southwest Airlines. As a customer to Southwest, we will experience a fun culture. Its a different flight experience compared to some of the major US-carriers. Well, its not by accident. Their employment brand is very much on, how do we identify employees who are fun type of employees to work here?Now, there is a third dimension, which I find quite fascinating, its a concept that I call tri-branding, which is highlighted in Employee Engagem ent for Dummies,as well as my second book, Creativeship.Let me talk a little bit about tri-branding. Tri-branding is when you can link your employer brand with your product or service brand in such a way that it not only resonates with your employees fostering employee engagement but it resonates with your clients and customers in a way that theyre not just satisfied, but they are engaged.See, employee satisfaction is passive, employee engagement is active. Customer satisfaction is actually passive. If someone calls me and asks if I enjoy the product that I purchased, I might say yes, but if Im an engaged customer, I might initiate that telephone call, go on Trip Advisor, go on Yelp and proactively be a brand ambassador. In each one of these brands you see on the screen, I believe are all benefiting by this magical aspect of tri-branding, in which not only do you have engaged employees, but you have also engaged customers who are helping to leverage your brand. If you live in the Boston area, or if you do not live in the Boston or New England area, Id like to share a very recent case study on tri-branding. Arthur T was the CEO of a supermarket chain in New England called Market Basket. This past year, Market Baskets board of directors replaced the CEO, Arthur T. Arthur T was a very enlightened, engaged leader. He was very much focused on providing a great work experience and a great value proposition for his employees. He also cared deeply for his employees. This is a non-union supermarket chain.Upon the firing of Arthur T, the employees stopped coming to work at all of the Market Basket stores. Customers stopped shopping at Market Basket, and this was such a fascinating employee engagement case study. It also was a fascinating case study of an employer brand and the customers relationship with that employer brand, and it became such a fascinating case study and a business reality for Market Basket that the board had to bring Arthur T back. And Arthur T ende d up buying the entire organization, bringing both the employees back to work and the customer base back to work as well. And ask your leadership team the following if your CEO is replaced by the board of directors, do your employees stop coming to work?I know some of you are probably laughing, but you should be asking your CEO or your leader, If not, why not? Picture the engagement level when employees are so engaged in the leader and the brand, in which collectively employees and customers stop coming to work. I encourage all of you on this call to Google Market Basket. Share it as a case study with your leadership team, because there are fascinating lessons.We all struggle with our employer value proposition we tend to struggle with vision, mission, and purpose. Weve created what I think is a terrific tool to have you work with your team to help create your own employer value proposition. So, lets continue. How do we measure engagement respectively in our organizations? Well, be fore I give you the answer, let me ask you, what is your top metric that you use in your firm to measure your current levels of engagement? If it is a baseline employee engagement survey, check A. If you look at voluntary turnover as your top metric, check B. Employer referral percent, check C. If you dont measure engagement at all, check D. If there is another metric, please check E.Okay, key employee engagement metric that Ive seen organizations use, and I wont share with you what I think your top should be, because I think its very customized. But voluntary turnover of key staff, now that is a very different metric than voluntary turnover. I will work with some clients and I will say that their voluntary turnover is not high enough. A low voluntary turnover in and of itself is not a measure of engagement. What if you have a group of disengaged employees who are staying? Again, low turnover can be fools gold, but looking at voluntary turnover of key staff is a very valuable metric . I believe every organization should do some baseline employee engagement survey. And your baseline becomes a historical snapshot in which you can measure your engagement progress. It also allows you to benchmark how other companies in your industry are doing.Employee recognition, almost every engagement survey that Ive ever participated in, employee recognition shows up as a low score, meaning employees want more of it. And I happen to believe recognition is one of those areas that we need to measure recognition, budget for recognition, and plot its progress. And you will see businesses at a higher level of recognition usage, usually have a higher a level of employee engagement. Employee referrals are you referring? Or, do you see an increase in referrals? If you do, you usually see an uptick in engagement. Recognition of budget, are you measuring and budgeting for recognition of people and spending dollars to recognize? Chances are, there is no recognition taking place in traini ng and development.Okay, we see our survey. Take a couple of seconds, check which is your top metric A, B, C, D, or E and we will close the survey right now, and in a few seconds, we will show you the results.Rewards in EngagementLets talk about rewards in engagement. If I were talking to a general employee population, I would probably never say to a younger group of employees that money doesnt matter. Okay, let me just take a quick look at our poll. Okay, engagement surveys 29 percent of you use engagement surveys as your top metric. Only 17 percent use voluntary turnover. Only 5 percent use employee referral percent as a top metric. Forty-six percent dont measure engagement at all. Let me just caution that if you want to make engagements, part of your strategic initiative inside your company, you have to measure. Thats how you get the attention of your operational leaders. You can make a quantitative case that engagements drive business results if you can build in some quantitati ve metric. So, again, if you dont have any metrics at all it seems like half of you dont I strongly encourage you to introduce some metrics.Okay, the role of money. Well, Im going to share a fascinating commercial with you, which we cant play live. Some of you may have seen it. Its a metaphorical point on the role that money plays in engagement. See, I dont believe money is a driver of engagement. I believe the perception of unfairness drives disengagement, and thats where money comes into play. So, at the end of this webinar, go on YouTube and type LI Bank.And youll see this neat little commercial, but let me explain it to you. There is a social experiment technician with two young girls, and he asked the very first girl, Would you like a pony? And the girl has a big smile on her face and she says, Sure. And he takes out a little toy pony, and you could see that shes thoroughly engaged with the little toy pony, until he asked the second girl, Would you like a pony? and he brings out a real pony to the second girl. Watch the facial expression of the first girl. That is the face of disengagement.When you introduce unfairness in your compensation practices, in your reward and measurement practices, you will introduce disengagement. Money, based on my experience, is not a long-term engagement driver. It is, if you can somehow introduce reward and behavior in a relatively quick window of time. If you are a waitress or a waiter, or a bartender or a doorman, I would argue that in those professions, money does drive engagement. Youll see the behavior.The behavior is so quickly reinforced with a reward. In the vast majority of our jobs, if we pay people fairly, money does not play into engagement. If theres the perception of unfairness, meaning you are paying me low, you paid someone more than I think should be paid, I cant believe my bonus is less than Henrys bonus. I know Im a higher performer. Then you run the risk of seeing disengagement. So, theres some fascina ting sections on money, and the role that money plays, both the plus and the minus in Employee Engagement For Dummies, but I tend to believe it plays more a factor in disengagement.Fairness rules its about fair pay not high pay. Rewards dont necessarily drive engagement, but they do reinforce achievement, and achievement does drive engagement. So, for those on the call who are wrestling with this, your employees are driven to achieve, money reinforces achievement, and its the achievement that is the engagement driver. In closing, and we try to finish with a few minutes of a QA, I know we promised you three tools, if you go on our website employeeengagement.com, if you look on the right hand side click on that website and youll be able to sign up your three tools and well send them asap, and I think youll find them to be terrific tools. With that, part three to take your questions and well have questions books coming in via chat and I believe were taking calls as well. So, QA. Jim , turning back to you.Great, thank you, Bob. Id like to thank Bob for sharing his inside knowledge with us today. At this time, Ill turn the webinar over to our meeting manager, who will help support our questions and answers section.Question and AnswerThank you. Ladies and gentlemen, if you would like to register a question, please press the one followed by the four on your telephone. Youll hear two tone prompts to acknowledge your request. Your line will then be accessed from the conference to obtain the information. If your question has been answered and you would like to withdraw your registration, please press the one followed by the three. If youre using a speakerphone, please lift your handset before entering your request. One moment, please, for the first phone question.And Bob, while were waiting for the first verbal questions to come through, weve got a couple on our end all ready.Ill start right off.The first is, could give us your thoughts on the impact of engagement for companies that do community work?Yeah, companies that do community work and Im assuming, Jim, youre doing community work like corporate social responsibility type of focus areas. Companies that get involved in the community, based on my experience, will see a lift in engagement, and in fact, one of the things I tell organizations if they dont have much money, or if they dont have a budget, is that getting your employees involved in community activities Walk for Hunger, Habitat for Humanity, a volunteerism you will see a spike in engagement. It is fascinating, and I think it has to do with the connection of both the head and the mind. My mind is connected with my job, my heads connected, but if I want to reach down into my heart, how do get at that purpose, how do I really see that my company is connected with the community, and I can be a participant?There are fascinating case studies. Timberland, the manufacturer of boots and shoes, they showcase in my first book. Not coincident ally, a group of Timberland employees just helped in my community finish our bike trail. So, a group of employees on their own were building a bridge over swamp land. Kind of giving back, and if you know anything about Timberland, every employee at Timberland has to sign up for a week community service with pay. And Timberland claims that it is a huge difference. So, in my experience, those organizations that reach out, get involved with the community, see a boost in engagement. And the CFOs amongst us will say thats a cost. My experience is the above and beyond effort, that discretionary effect that comes from your employees head and their heart, in the company, more than offsets whatever potential cost might come from a balance sheet.Excellent. Thank you, Bob. Id just like to say the questions are coming in fast and furious now on my end. Im guessing we may have some verbals as well. If we do run out of time, well make sure to get these to Bob, and hopefully get as many as we can to drafts.Next up on my end, the next question is what has more impact on engagement, the companys culture or personal career growth? Yeah, I think a companys culture can really help. A great culture can even sustain a lousy boss experience. However, that line-of-sight, right, where am I going? There are many studies that say line-of-sight is so important. So, if Im working in a terrific culture, but yet Im in a dead-end job, right? There is no professional development, and at some point in time, Im going to change jobs. And at some point in time, I would encourage that person to change jobs.So, its the reason why companies say, Grow or die. And even great cultures, unless youre growing, allowing for opportunities for people to grow, I think a companys culture will be not enough to sustain a high level of engagement. I also think they go hand-in-hand. I think if a companys not growing, no matter how great your culture might be temporarily, lack of growth means youre probably not win ning in the marketplace youre in. And if youre not winning, its really hard to maintain a positive long-term culture.Excellent, thank you, Bob. Weve got quite a bit of engagement here on the question-side of things that Im going as fast as I can to keep up here.So, Ill keep right on going on my end. Could you describe the first steps youd recommend when starting off an employee engagement initiative? Where should an organization start off?If you have the budget, the first thing I would do is to say a baseline employee engagement survey. Ask your employees what they think, because you run the risk of assuming that we should focus on this, and your employees telling you something very, very different. I will share with you a real life example. Once upon a time, I was owned by a firm that was German owned, and we went to a management lead private equity pot lid ownership transition, and our private equity partner a terrific company, a terrific group of owners wanted to come in and do something really cool for the employees. And one of the things they wanted to do was to double the 401k company match. Now, on the surface you could say, Wow, thats a terrific thing to do, lets do it.And the cost to the organization to do that would have been $1 million. However, we decided to before we launched down that path, we decided to do a baseline employee engagement survey. And we had about 1500 employees, and of 1500 employees surveyed, not one employee in the narrative comments asked for a more enhanced 401k plan, but the number one request from the employees was to have a best-in-class training and development culture. So, we were ready to spend $1 million in an area that was of no need from our employees.So, what we did was we allocated the funds and we built what ultimately became an industry best learning culture in a corporate university. And they were able to do that at a fraction of the cost, compared to investing a million dollars. So, if you can do a baseline su rvey, there is a tremendous level of intelligence that will be gathered to help you know what to do first. The other thing I would caution is to embark on an engagement journey with small steps. Dont come out of the gate and try to build Rome tomorrow. The worst thing you can do as an organization is to over commit and under deliver. So, when we work with clients, we always try to tell them to do a couple of big impact things first, in year one. Communicate effectively and look to year two to tackle maybe the second wave, but dont try to do too much, because your organization has many competing priorities, and if you cant sustain it, it becomes a flavor of the month.Great advice. Thanks, Bob.Lindsay, Ill check in with you now. Do you have any questions going up on your end?There are no questions at this time. However, as a reminder, to ask a question on the phone, please press the one, followed by the four.Were approaching the top of the hour. Im going to sneak one last question, if you dont mind, Bob. Do you have any suggestions on how to engage part-time staff? As companies do hire more and more part-timers, is there a tactic you could share with us thats helpful in that space?Yeah. I love that question. We struggle with part-time folks. We tend to treat part-time people like theyre second-class citizens in many organizations. My personal opinion with part-time employees, they are as valuable as gold. A great part-time employee gives above and beyond. Theres a lot of discretionary effort that comes from that part-time employee. And if you want to engage them, do not limit their career progression based on the number of hours they work.Continue to evaluate the capability, the potential of the employee, whether they are part-time or whether they are full-time. Do not discount their need to be on task teams, to be flexible in scheduling department meetings so your part-time employees can participate. Really look at your policies, do your policies treat your par t-time work forces this contingent workforce as second-class citizens? If so, how can you change your policies to really allow for full engagement in the involvement of the part-time workforce?The definition of the job is radically changing, and if your organization is still treating the job as a full-time role, boy, youre not paying attention to the evolution of the job in the American workforce. And the variability in the workforce and the new role and what defines companies and its a really melting pot of full-time employees, part-time employees, consultants, independent contractors, and freelancers. The definition of the job is radically changing, and part-time workforce, I believe, are incredibly valuable, so treat them as such.Excellent, thank you, Bob. And we are now at the top of the hour.If I could ask, Bob, if you could reiterate how folks do access the free tools you mentioned?Yeah, if you just go on employeeengagement.com thats our website. Youll see the icon right on the website. Just click that icon. I hope you enjoy it. Employeeengagement.com is also a great resource, and theres a resources section, we post the latest articles. There are a number of articles Ive written for that are posted. There are free downloads, so please, look at that as a resource. Twitter, you can follow me at Bob Kelleher. Were always posting new factoids and research projects. We try to comb the Internet for the latest and greatest case studies, research, and send them out to you, so you dont have to. Thank you Jim, thank you, Monster. Thank you to the hundreds of folks who have joined me today.Thank you, Bob. We appreciate you sharing your expertise.This does conclude our webinar today. A recording of this event, as well as the presentation materials, will be available shortly on our hiring website. You can access that at hiring.monster.com. Just look under the Resources Center tab for the information. Thank you for joining us. Please visit us at hiring.monster.com for additional webinars those are also located in the Resources Center tab.Have a great day.

Comfort from the Cold

Comfort from the Cold Comfort from the Cold Comfort from the ColdThree freshman engineers at Rice University who call themselves Team Comfortably Numb have been tasked with making a needle puncture much less painful, especially for children. They have come up with the idea of applying the same endothermic reaction used in cold compress packs to numb skin before the needle punctures it.The device is currently external. The next step is to incorporate the endothermic device inside the cap of a needle for more convenient use.The gruppe is made up of computer science major Greg Allison, bioengineering major Andy Zhang, and mechanical engineering major Mike Hua. They currently have a functioning prototype that has been shown to produce a measurable numbing effect in 60 seconds, which in turn reduces the pain from an injection.The team got started on the project by taking a class called Introduction to Engineering Design, taught by Ann Saterbak and Matthew Wettergreen. Students elect to en roll in this class and are placed into interdisciplinary konzept teams to work on one of the offered projects, which include design for disabilities, enrichment devices for the Houston Zoo, medical devices, and solutions for low-resource settings.In the course, the student teams learn and apply engineering design to solve a challenge. The teams are also eligible to compete in the annual Rice Engineering Design Showcase. The course lasts for one semester, but students can continue their work when the semester is over.The device numbs the skin by producing a rapid chemical reaction. Image Rice UniversityTeam Comfortably Numb was given the project by its sponsor and co-inventor, Mehdi Razavi, a cardiac electrophysiologist at the Texas Heart Institute. The students were asked to design and make a low-cost, easy-to-use numbing system that would be compatible with existing hypodermic syringes.Our device is 3D printed and consists of two sealed chambers containing the chemical ammonium nit rate and water, said Mike Hua, the mechanical engineering major. A simple twisting motion moves the chambers into alignment to allow the chemicals to flow through the chamber to produce a rapid endothermic reaction. We then numb the skin by contacting the devices metal surface to the patients skin.The team has also done further work for both prototype development and testing. For example, they are still working on optimizing the temperature to numb the skin and are also working on miniaturizing the device.Currently, the team has filed for a provisional patent. The students are thinking of either starting a company around the product to commercialize it or to license their device and idea to a medical device company.The students are not authorized to actually puncture anyones skin with a needle. Razavi, their project sponsor, has experience in the area of medical testing. He said the team will need approval from an institutional review board before it can test the product on people.T he bioengineering major, Andy Zhang, said commercialization of a product is still a bit down the line for the team, but in mass production the cost of their device will be comparable to that of a syringe and a needle. They estimate that it will cost roughly $2 if it is mass produced.Learn about the latest developments in bioengineering at ASMEs Global Congress onNanoEngineering for Medicine and Biology For Further Discussion Our device is 3D printed and consists of two sealed chambers containing the chemical ammonium nitrate and water.Mike Hua, Rice University