Lines Of Excellence Consulting LLC » corporate

Hiring… an art form

Erica Rivera — Thu, 11 Feb 2010 23:59:54 +0000

Making good hiring decisions is one of those areas which is so darn costly when done incorrectly. It can be so difficult to consider all the factors:

1. Does the candidate fit our corporate culture
2. Does their personality match those already on the team
3. How will their unique skill set combine with those of the existing team
4. Will they challenge the status quo and creatively improve performance & profit
5. Where will the fall-out occur if this isn’t a good fit
6. What if the team is unwilling to accept the new-hire
7. What kind of on-boarding will be necessary to help the new-hire succeed

These are just a few of the questions to consider, and yet, they barely skim the surface when important decisions need to be made, particularly at crucial times in business development and growth. One of the ways we can make the right decisions is to look at current successes and blunders of leaders & their teams. We’ve had quite a few excellent examples in the very recent news to evaluate:

1) Conan O’Brien lets his staff know that changes are pending, but that he’s got their back and to prove such, he’s worked a severance deal that includes over 200 of his staffers. Certainly a popular guy right about now. Would you want to bring in a ‘Conan’ to your team?

2) Toyota CEO Akio Toyoda apologizes briefly for a mistake that affects millions of cars and undoubtedly millions of dollars for the company founded by Toyoda’s grandfather. Yet, where’s the team? Fresh-on-the-scene US Toyota leaders speak out as well, but the automaker is not sending a message of unity and from the scarce and well overdue appearance of Toyoda, it seems as though it’s uncertain who is actually managing this dire problem. Would you want to bring in an ‘Akio Toyoda’ to your team?

3) John Edwards staff member goes above and beyond the call of duty (an understatement at best). At what point does leadership adversely affect the career of team members. Who really wins here?, and who are the losers? Would you want a ‘John Edwards’ leading the team and putting his staff in unthinkably awkward situations, or for that matter, would you really want an ‘Andrew Young’ on your team?

Examples to learn from… Hiring decisions are not to be taken lightly, nor made hastily.

Ode to monkey wrenches

Erica Rivera — Thu, 04 Feb 2010 22:00:34 +0000

There’s always that one monkey wrench that gets thrown in your way at some point on a project, in your path on the way toward a goal, hanging in the sidelines, dooming completion, throwing you for a loop, — and it’s okay, really.
We have this tendency to want order in our efforts – of course everyone wants things to stay the course, go as planned. But that’s just not the way things often roll out – right? Particularly in tenuous times, and times of big change, with strategy and planning crucial to risk assessment. Meeting after meeting, analysis reviewed, organizational aspects in place, it’s still difficult to be certain.

So what can you do about it? Instead of fretting about what was supposed to happen, what you hoped would happen, consider this: monkey wrenches enable

1) Strategy evaluation
2) reorganizing
3) Creative thinking
4) Expansion of ideas
5) Opportunity for employee growth
6) New analyses of current, past and future
7) Change for some who need just that
8) Opportunity in a way previously not realized or foreseen

“Everything we do has some effect, some impact.” His Holiness The Dalai Lama

Leadership – a case in point

Erica Rivera — Fri, 23 Oct 2009 22:15:46 +0000

Yesterday I noticed Jack Welch posted a comment on Twitter questioning how companies with executive compensation limits would compete in the war for talent. Today NYT writer Kristof post stated that “Half the Sky” made the NYT best-seller list for the 4^th week, calling it a “triumph for bleeding hearts!” “Half the Sky” is a book about the strength of women across the globe, atrocities they endure, and the potential they have as the force that hold up, metaphorically, half the sky. The next post I follow came from Zappos (twenty something year-old) CEO, Tony Hsieh, noting that a neighbor whom he’d never met stopped by to give him pumpkin bread (homemade & warm at that!) and declared that he needed to “figure out how to clone her.” Points of view, expressions of gratitude, business advice, themes of society – got to love twitter.

Every once in a while we find profound examples of personal and leadership development trajectories. These are great moments essential to the teachings of leadership skills, highlighting personal honesty, integrity, leading by example, motivating teams, seeing the forest through the trees, and the ability to admit when things have gone array. All leaders, and human beings for that matter, need to take a step back and evaluate their path at different points in their lives. For some, the opportunity to re-evaluate is thrust at them from an external source of tension, which appears to be the case for many executives in this current economy. At other times, a personal change occurs from within. Either way, a true transformational leader identifies and acknowledges the opportunity and seeks greater growth and transformation during these times. Case in point – Citigroup’s CEO Vikram Pandit. Here’s a leader who last February took a step back and for reasons either personal, professional, or a combination of both, determined his salary to $1.00 per year until the company was back to acceptable fiscal health. Yes, you read that correctly – one dollar annual salary, no bonus. True, I can psychically hear many of you saying ‘that doesn’t account for compensation beyond salary and bonus.’ Nonetheless, in the short term, what it does signify is a commitment and responsibility for him to Citigroup and its success. In the long term it points to a level of ethics and responsibility that needs to be at the forefront of business management. This could explain why terms like Corporate Social Responsibility and Social Entrepreneurship are getting millions of hits on google these days.

My life shattering to do list ….

Just think about it.

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