TalentedApps

Mike VanDervort has accomplished a notable as well as a worthy achievement with the latest HR Carnival of Giving. He set out to both get the most posts ever in HR Carnival history and as an incentive, pledged to donate $1 for every post to a selected charity. The result was a record-breaking 80+ posts (including ours) and an outpouring of matching contributions from various participants. Well done, Mike!

The HR Carnival provides you a great opportunity to find in one place a collection of specially selected posts from a diverse set of folks in the HR world. With so many contributors, you’re likely to run across one you hadn’t known about before, so this is a great way to discover new sources of information, thinking, and perspectives. Go check out the Carnival!

Logo by Allen Robinson

It’s a common problem, especially in women.  To not feel worthy or able to do a job, unless we have all the skills.  Lucky for us, the inability to believe our own worth becomes self fulfilling, in that people cannot imagine us successful in a role.

In reflecting on this challenge, I was remembering times in my life where I doubted my ability to be successful.

Two stories come to mind.

The first was in college.  I had been accepted to the Entrepreneurship program and was required to submit a business plan proposal at the beginning of the term.

I had worked on this proposal all summer, but I had never done something like this before,  and I had no idea what I was doing.  I found myself lying on the bathroom floor in a blubbering heap the night before I was to turn in my work.  I had convinced myself  I got it all wrong and was going to be laughed out of the program.  Of course, my proposal was actually chosen as one to pursue (essentially, the top 50% of those submitted).

My second story, was my first promotion to vice president.  I was not yet 30, and was being asked to manage a development group who were building a product with a  CORBA architecture and a MFC based presentation.  I had no idea what either of those things were, and I was completely convinced I was going to fail.

Lucky for me, I had a mentor who stopped me cold with his reply to my claim that I was not capable of doing the job.  He said:

I would rather have you managing this project not knowing the technology Meg, than having a technical expert who doesn’t know how to manage.

That belief  taught me something very powerful, knowing that I needed specific skills was helpful, but my doubting I could do the job, was not.

Armed with this belief, I set about to gain the skills I needed.  I can now  sound very smart (and out of date) talking about how CORBA helped  further the cause of Object Oriented Programming.

The lesson is, that if you need skills, quit stressing and get them.

If you need strengths, find someone who has them and befriend them.

If you are doubting your worth, stop, it’s not helping you!

Got this in the old email while I was on vacation (of course this is an abbreviated copy and the pretty red/bold is my creative license)

TEDActive 2010 Approval – Meg Bear
Dear Meg Bear,

I am pleased to tell you that your TEDActive 2010 Membership request has been approved. This includes the conference being held in Palm Springs, California from February 9-13, 2010.

Thank you so much for being part of TED. We are delighted you will be joining us in Palm Springs.

Very best wishes,

- Chris

Chris Anderson • Curator • TED • “Ideas Worth Spreading” • www.ted.com <http://www.ted.com>

I’d like to take a quick moment to express my thanks and give a little We did it cheer.  To everyone who helped, supported, tolerated or just didn’t laugh.

Thanks so much!

Of course, you can expect the full report on the event after it’s over.

Strategy is founded on risk and risk is inherently subjective to the views of the people involved, including employees and management. As a result, HR has a great opportunity to improve the way in which risk impacts strategic success for the business, going beyond the more tactical or operational perspective HR has previously taken.

All economic activity is by definition “high risk”. And defending yesterday–that is, not innovating– is far more risky than making tomorrow.
Peter Drucker

HR and Risk Up to Now

Although it might be over-generalizing, for quite some time, HR has mostly focused on risk in terms of how to identify and address workplace risk items such as harassment claims, EEOC violations, health and safety liability, etc. These are all vital areas to be risk-managed, but to be more strategic, HR needs to broaden that perspective to include how it can positively impact business risk.

Risk is frequently misunderstood and mismanaged[i]. This misunderstanding and mismanagement can have unexpected, even dire consequences due to people’s varying comfort with risk and the complex ways that people in general react to it. Here’s a sobering real-life example of just how that can happen[ii]:

Blowing It on Business Risk and People – an Example

In oil & gas exploration, the odds are high against finding anything, let alone a find suitable for extraction. People working in this field apply their diverse expertise towards figuring which locations are most likely to be profitable. In addition, there is the added pressure to locate larger, more profitable reserves, which are even harder to find.

The decision on whether to bid on a lease and then drill is based on “pessimistic/low, likely/medium, and optimistic/high” estimates[iii] for how much can oil or gas can be extracted. If the “likely” estimate is large enough, then a bid is made and if that succeeds and drilling is approved and the actual output is on track to meet that large estimate, the folks behind that estimate are very happy as they can expect some kind of bonus.

However, it’s easy for a manager to only see the “optimistic” estimate and let that “frame” their expectations. Then, when in fact the more realistic “likely” value does result instead, the manager perceives a “loss” and they can end up taking it out on the troops. This did happen to a team and they were told they wouldn’t get a bonus because “the company wants those higher outputs” i.e. the optimistic level.

And here’s what happened next. The team then saw that only results that met the “optimistic” estimate get praise, so they naturally became more conservative in their estimates. They lowered their “optimistic” estimate to be closer to what they normally would have given as the “likely” estimate. In turn, the “likely” estimate was lowered as well. Because of these more conservative estimates, when budgets were decided, the allocations didn’t go to that team as much because their estimates are now lower than those of other teams. With a lower budget, that unit couldn’t bid as much on the leases (especially the riskier but higher potential ones – remember that the competition is bidding higher because they have higher, non-distorted estimates) so they missed out on more of the big finds.

Since there were fewer large finds returns were lower for the whole company. Investors were expecting higher returns when they chose the company, since they already understood it was higher risk. As a result, lower earnings and less capital were available for the company, it couldn’t compete, and eventually it was acquired.

What HR Can Do

All of this happened because management didn’t understand the relationship between the company business risk and the incentives and motivation of the people working there. If HR had an understanding of the strategic impact (e.g. company survival) of this relationship and had a role in making sure that managers understood it and practiced it as well, this poor management decision could very well have been avoided.

This was just one example from oil & gas exploration, but the same scenario plays out in a multitude of “high-risk” businesses ranging from software development and airplane manufacturing to drug development. However, the difficulty that management in particular has with dealing with the interaction of risk and incentives can even disrupt the competitiveness of “low-risk” enterprises. HR’s ability to apply its expertise with people coupled with a broader, strategic perspective of risk can bring huge advantage to a company.

Photo by hellolapomme

[i] The definition of risk is not well agreed upon, but we will use the following: the existence of more than one possible outcome where some of them are undesirable (e.g. loss or catastrophe). Risk only has real meaning when a decision must be made and human decision makers are decidedly not “risk neutral.” That is, they will not simply choose the highest “expected values” with cold logic, but will favor certain choices over others depending on factors such as current wealth, level of possible loss, gain, framing, ownership, etc.

 

[ii] Credit goes to “Why Can’t You Just Give Me the Number?” by Patrick Leach, an excellent, succinct book that shows executives how to manage risk and make better decisions using probabilistic thinking. Also recommended is “The Flaw of Averages” by Sam Savage and as previously mentioned, “The Failure of Risk Management” by Douglas Hubbard.

[iii] The medium or likely value has about a 50% chance of finding at least that amount. The high or optimistic value has only about a 10% chance of finding at least that amount. In other words, they might happen occasionally, but not on average.

After reflecting on his personal experience at September’s conference and expo and the observations made by many bloggers that attended (including mine), Bill has put together a very good column summarizing his takeaway of the important issues happening in business, HR, and social media. Go check it out.

Bill links together the oft-mentioned “generational issue” with the “digital immigrants and natives” observation and concludes that it might really be different this time. He goes on to make the point that the fear that drives organizations and HR departments to ban social media will put their companies at a competitive disadvantage. I agree and have posted previously how fear can lead to actions that ultimately destroy a company because it can’t learn anymore.

Bill ends his column by asking that those who attended email him with what they’ve learned. Bill is quite up front about his expectations and opinions, but is also just as open to input, so here’s a great chance to have your voice heard in shaping the next conference. This conference has shown to be an important gathering place for not only learning what is going on in HR technology, but also of those in the industry with great ideas and thinking about where and how business and HR can improve.

All you need is a stone and a sling. Neither sword, nor armor.

To borrow some phraseology from Kris Dunn, “Wrong question, Sparky.” The takeaway from Moneyball is not about it being right or wrong, but how it asks you to reconsider the way you look at how talent creates value for your organization. The aftermath of its publication in 2003 teaches us that the larger game never ends; that there is no single optimal answer for all time. There’s no trick to winning either, but rather a way to see what others are currently missing or choosing to ignore, use that to your advantage, and also obtain insight into building a better strategy from it. A lot of people are still missing that point.

Public Service Announcement: This post is not all about baseball nor the ins and outs (no pun intended) of winning baseball divisions. Rather, it asks: Why should HR people still care about the Moneyball story, especially since 1) it has almost been played to death the last six years, and 2) it seems there’s all this proof that it didn’t work.

People still debate the “correctness” of Moneyball. They point out that the stars of the book, the Oakland A’s, didn’t win their division and the Yankees, with the largest payroll, won everything. Even many who agreed with the way in which the A’s had utilized measures that other teams ignored are now observing that it is no longer a competitive advantage since the other teams with larger payrolls were adopting those very measures. Many readers took away from the book that it was just a trick and once the trick had been exposed, the advantage was lost, so what was the point?

The point was that it wasn’t about coming up with a trick. That’s the narrow view. Moneyball told a story about how an organization that had a constrained payroll was forced to rethink the strategy for winning the most games. Rethinking your strategy is the point. That this story took particular twists and turns just made it unexpected, concrete, credible (to some), and in some parts, even emotional (i.e. “sticky”). It should come as no surprise that the specific steps, measures and outcomes didn’t maintain an advantage or last. The fact that your steps and measures don’t produce the same results they used to does not necessarily mean you throw them out, especially to revert back to previously discredited measures.

That is itself another takeaway; competition never rests and you must keep searching for the next thing that will help you win. One very good way to keep winning is to focus, as Peter Bregman writes, on playing the game you can win. Malcolm Gladwell recently wrote a piece for the New Yorker about this very kind of thinking. In “How David Beats Goliath,” Gladwell gets into David’s thinking:

In the Biblical story of David and Goliath, David initially put on a coat of mail and a brass helmet and girded himself with a sword: he prepared to wage a conventional battle of swords against Goliath. But then he stopped. “I cannot walk in these, for I am unused to it,” he said (in Robert Alter’s translation), and picked up those five smooth stones.

In other words, David figured he wasn’t going to win playing by the other guy’s rules, so instead he focused on something less conventional. Conventional wisdom at the time was that you fought brute force with brute force: sword against sword, armor against armor. Nobody thought any other route had a chance, so why bother? It’s not about playing a one-time only trick either; it’s about confronting the harsh reality of a situation and choosing the option that gives you the best chance.

There are people still applying the real lessons of Moneyball (and many other books that came before and have followed) and are finding/rediscovering insights into how to win, how to play the game they can win, or even change the game so they win. Kris Dunn and Tom Davenport show how basketball teams are benefiting from focusing on measures that better reflect the overall benefit to the team when a player is on the court vs. individual measures. This would seem to have some application in business as well. But again, this isn’t all about finding a trick that nobody else has discovered yet. Sure, it’s great when the competition is still looking in the wrong places while you trounce them, but you also want to use this information to get better understanding and insight into how your business and the marketplace, and the pieces that comprise them, actually operate and interact. That is what will really help you continue to win going forward.

Photo by hawkexpress

As you might recall I made a personal goal this year to do a better job networking. 

As I do, I have been working on this a lot in a very deliberate and focused way.  Sometimes it’s been great, other times marginal, but I have made progress. 

I know that I’m not alone in struggling with the part of me that likes substance over flash.

I have never been one to have a lot of casual friends.  I guess you could say I’m an acquired taste.  I become more interesting and useful when people know me well, at first glance I’m either just too much or not very interesting. 

I also really enjoy the kind of trust and collaboration that comes from a close relationship, so surface and casual relationships seem a luxury that I don’t have time for (read I’m too lazy to bother).

In my quest to find a way to network that would work for me, I got some great help from Patty’s workshop.  I was very happy to see that she put this down in a blog for others who struggle in a similar fashion.  So for those of you who would prefer to hide in your office instead of going to a networking event I strongly suggest you read this Authentic Networking post.   I promise it will give you a whole new perspective on the idea of networking.

The key message can be found here:

Instead of thinking about networking success in terms of the number of people you meet at networking events, or getting big numbers on LinkedIn or twitter, think about Authentic Networking as making real connections with people that you would actually like to meet. 

Bingo! 

No longer am I stressed to meet a lot of people.  Instead I’m targeting getting to know better people who interest me.  After I accomplish that, I’ll move on to finding new people who interest me and lather-rinse-repeat. 

As a bonus, I have really been enjoying this goal.  Who knew?

Two years ago today, Meg published her first post launching both TalentedApps and her wacky self into the blogosphere.  Since then, Meg has written a whopping 124 posts, outpacing her goal of 1 post a week (by 20, for those of you keeping score at home).  Through these posts, Meg has challenged us all to think differently, to think bigger, and to take more risks – all in an effort to improve ourselves and the workplace around us.

In honor of Meg’s achievement, we have collected our favorite Meg blogging moments.  We encourage you to vote on your favorites or add some to the list!

1. Meg isn’t afraid to share her unique strengths and personality quirks with us. We’ve learned much about her including her hard-wired desire to get moving.

2. Meg brings out her inner (or is it outer?) “used car salesman” skills to garner votes and launch us into the top FOT competition spot.

3. Meg shares successes and misses.  It takes guts and we learn much from both.

4. Meg went full bore into the world of Social Media.  In this frank twitter auto-biography, Meg explains the whys and hows of getting sucked into the social media obsession.

5. Meg has a knack for putting things into perspective; here, she rants on what users really want versus what buyers are getting for them.  She is also tops at finding a good use for an adorable baby picture.

6. My personal favorite:  Meg pulls suck-age gems from her husband’s peripheral HR experience to teach us all some lessons on the limitations of software.

7. And finally, the crowd pleaser.  Once you get past Meg’s wacky sense of humor, you realize, “wow” she’s got some real substance here.  Substance in her mind … not her butt, people.

What’s your favorite?  Do share!

It’s been two years today since Meg, Mark, and Amy began this blog. While the first year was about us finding our voice and building up our readership, this second year has been a bit more about us drilling deeper into the areas that we see as key in organizations achieving strategic impact from their talent.

This second year also found us building relationships with the rest of the HR, Talent, and Enterprise blogging community. That has been personally rewarding for each of us as well as a terrific way to help get our thinking to a broader audience. We are honored to be part of such an incredibly gifted group of contributors committed to the improvement of this craft.

Our mission continues to be to help create change by improving the awareness and knowledge of our community, in an entertaining and informative way, of how to better achieve your goals through talent. Our thanks go out to our readership, friends, colleagues, and family for their support. We look forward to the upcoming years working together on this mission.

Graphic by Vivian Wong

Ben Eubanks has done a terrific job of collecting and assembling a brand new set of HR blog posts covering a wide range of topics. To top it off, he also enlisted the help of Allen Robinson in the creation of an official HR Carnival logo!

Here’s a excellent opportunity for you to sample a variety of ideas, thinking, and opinions from a diverse set of excellent minds. It will save you time as well as help you discover a blog you might not have known about before.

Be sure to check out the carnival! In addition, take on Ben’s challenge and share what you’ve found with others!

Without a doubt acquiring a new skill is hard.  It takes time, practice and a willingness to fail.  I do not want to suggest that you should only attempt those things that you already know or do well.  That is just silly.

You should challenge yourself every day to try new things and learn new skills, just remember that some skills might not be within reach for you.    You might gain a basic level of competence after a lot of hard work but for some things you will never be outstanding.

This is a universal truth [always remember you are unique, just like everyone else].

So what happens when you are not gaining a job critical competency?  When you find yourself unable to get to an appropriate level of competence in a reasonable amount of time (as evidenced by lackluster performance feedback)  you should probably take a step back and regroup moment.

I’d like to say again, that if you do not have a good job fit you will not be top Talent.

Putting it another way, when you have a bad job fit you are probably getting labeled as a “poor performer”.  If you find yourself in a second performance discussion where the topic is does not meet expectations* I think it’s time to take a serious look at the question of job fit.

Instead of going down the mental path of inadequacy and low self esteem, take a moment and find your strengths (you can get help doing this for approx $14, well worth the investment) and then have a hard look at your job.  Is the job you are doing playing to your strengths (I’m going to take a wild guess that there might be a mismatch)?

Now comes the brave part.

Instead of just having yet another discussion with your boss about your lack of competence, do the adult thing and work with her to see if there is a better way to define your job to play to your strengths.

If this is not possible, you probably need to start thinking about getting a different role somewhere else.

If you don’t take action, you are probably going to live forever in the bottom left box of the Talent 9-box, and I promise you that is not the zip code in which you want to reside.

____________

*Also be on the look out for does not meet feedback hidden under a meets expectations rating, this happens more than I care to acknowledge.

These last two weeks I’ve been asking for a lot of help.  I thought it might be a good idea to give some tips on the subject, for those of you who might find the process troubling or intimidating.

Here are a few tips I’ve learned that can increase the probability of getting the help you need to succeed.

1. Getting help is a bit of a numbers game.  Be willing to ask for help early and often.  Recognize that people do not often say “no” they just fail to come through.   This is part of the process and is nothing to be discouraged about.  It is also nothing to hold against people.  Best to assume that they would help you if they could and that their lack of help reflects upon the fact that you might have asked the wrong thing to the wrong person.
2. Target your requests.  Do not ask a large group as your only strategy.  This *might* work but it probably won’t.  Better to split up what you need and distribute it out as specific requests to one or two people at a time.  Make the request specific and direct to an individual and they are much more likely to know what you need from them and are often more able to help you.
3. It works the best when you ask people to do something they are good at.  This will mean it doesn’t require a lot from them, and it gives you a large benefit.  This is another example of leveraging strengths.
4. Be thankful.  When you get help remember to let people know you are grateful and that they made a difference in your life.
5. Be helpful yourself. Giving back helping others with things that you know and are good at, is the best way to have people wanting to help you when you need it most.

The interesting thing about helping others is that it reflects well upon you and it makes you feel good.  On the other hand, getting help from others also feels really great.

So for everyone who has helped me get this TED application completed (and you know who you are) I am so very grateful. Please do allow me to return the favor when you need access to one of my strengths, it’s the least I can do.

Consider all the goodies you get from Dan’s Great Leadership blog regularly and then multiply that by 30.  That’s a full bag of candy!  Consider taking the day off just to eat read these treats …

including our own post referring back to Dan’s  Talent Management Challenge … oh my, I think I’ve gone into a sugar coma!

I am huge fan of Jason Seiden’s How to Self Destruct.  I read it in July and found it to be funny, insightful, and speaking directly to me as an aspiring leader at Oracle.

Jason is weeks away from unveiling his next book, Super Staying Power (which I have pre-ordered).  In the meantime, he’s giving away as many How to Self Destruct books as he can until this Friday, November 6.

Check it out and get these books for your deserving leaders!

Hey! Come back!

Before you roll your eyes on this one, start having flashbacks to terrible experiences with calculating standard deviations, or trying to wrap your head around multiple regression analysis, and then run screaming from this post, this is not about you trying to become an expert at statistics! Trust me!

It’s about you understanding how analytical tools and methods can help HR have an impact on applying talent to strategic success. Besides, no less than Josh Bersin said at the recent HR Technology Conference® 2009 Talent Management Analyst Panel, “Get used to it.” And that’s a good way to look at it. Too often, HR has been shut out of strategic input because of the perception that it doesn’t speak the language of analytics sufficiently to measure and understand the relationships between various parts of the business (e.g. Human Capital) and profit (or whatever financial result you wish.) Once you have that better understanding, it will enable you to make a stronger case for why HR can provide valuable input and leadership in business strategy and execution.

By now, we’ve had the importance of measuring pretty well pounded in, particularly in the context of Finance. Increasing your financial intelligence is key to participating more in driving strategic decision-making around applying talent to improve business results. Being able to show to senior management the link between what you know about your company’s talent to financial results entails both measuring talent in terms of levels of performance, competency, skills, connectedness, etc. as well as measuring relationships between those measures and the other parts of the business that drive financial performance. What do analytical skills have to do with measuring those parts and their relationships?

Measuring is not Counting

To help answer that question, let’s take an example from “How to Measure Anything: Finding the Value of Intangibles in Business” by Douglas W. Hubbard. Picture the problem of measuring the population of fish in a lake; let’s say in order to know if a restocking effort was successful or not (a good ROI problem). A lot of people will say, “Drain the lake and count the fish.” They could then report there were exactly 22,573 fish and we’ll say that confirms the restocking investment was a success, although all the fish are now dead.

A better approach (certainly for the fish) entails using analytical methods to estimate the population of fish in the lake. If there is sufficient confidence in the estimate of the population before and after the restocking effort, you will be able to tell if the restocking effort was a success or not. Did you have to know every tiny detail of statistics to make a decision based on these estimates and the confidence level? No. How about to show the before and after picture to some “lake executive” who had to give the green light on the restocking effort? No. You just had to know enough about analytical methods to know that the application of them made sense in this case, and either determine you made the right call or get the point across to that executive.

As the authors of “The Differentiated Workforce: Transforming Talent into Strategic Impact” quoted a general manager, “I couldn’t do a regression analysis, but I knew what one was. And the results…made sense to me.” Further, they write, “Improved analytic literacy has a direct impact on the decision making at several levels in a typical HR organization…At the highest level, improved analytical literacy changes the perspective on the financial resources committed to HR…they consider a significant portion [of the HR budget] an investment.”

Principles of Uncertainty

HR labors under the false assumption that everybody else has “precise numbers” and there seems to be a perception that HR can’t come up with the “hard numbers.” The classic story is of the CEO asking the head of HR if they know the company’s headcount and the response is wishy-washy. The thinking is that people are either working for the company or they are not, so what’s the problem? What’s the count? Sure, in a company of a few hundred people, you might actually have a very precise figure. However, we know that depending on the industry, economic conditions, etc. as the number of employees gets larger, it gets a bit trickier to know the headcount with precision. There is a lot going on and even if you are using an HRMS system, the simple fact that humans are involved and entering transactions (or not), makes the number transient and constantly changing. In other words, one minute, you could see 59,268 and a minute later see 59,273.

This is not that different from the folks in Accounting keeping track of Receivables, the folks in Production keeping track of Inventory, or the folks in Development keeping track of Project Completion. In the case of Accounting and Finance, it gets even more interesting when it’s time to report; for instance, general accounting principles require the company to estimate the amount of Receivables that will be uncollectible and there isn’t any hard and fast equation for doing that. Different methods are used to estimate these values, some of them analytical.

The point, as Hubbard writes in his latest book, “The Failure of Risk Management: Why It’s Broken and How to Fix It” is that measurement is better understood as the reduction of uncertainty about the value of something. Once you see it that way and gain enough analytic literacy to feel comfortable with the results from those tools and methods, you’ll be able to move forward more readily with driving and demonstrating positive impact on strategic business results.

Photo by The Michael

The Failure of Risk Management: Why It’s Broken and How to Fix It

Sure this dream is not really on a par with Martin Luther King Jr. or anything, but it’s still a dream.

I really want to get to a Ted Conference in person.  I mentioned this here and here.

Yes, I know this is totally out of my league, and yet I also know that this is something that will be life changing for me and overall a good idea.

Here is the why something like Ted is a uniquely good idea for me

• I love looking at things in a new way — most things I’ve seen recently that have really gotten me thinking have been from Ted
• I love the energy and thinking I do at conferences.  There is something in the process that really works for me.  I get most all my big ideas at conferences and it’s almost always the sum of a lot of little inputs vs. just one talk or presentation or person
• I love learning new stuff – I really thrive on gathering new ideas, facts, etc
• I use what I learn in action-oriented, creative ways.  I make connections others don’t and use those connections to do something specific, concrete and useful.
• I share what I learn.  I blog it, I talk about it I send emails that simultaneously blow peoples minds and bore them to tears.

Sure, all the above bullets probably cement my brand as a geek but I’m no longer in middle school and I think being a geek is cool.

Here’s what I’m not

Particularly well connected in a way that would get me to Ted and I’m also not the best essay writer.

Here’s what I’ve done.

1. Joined the Online Community
2. Started following the Ted twitter accounts here and here
3. Subscribed to the blog
4. Printed out the application and freaked out
5. Targeted the TedActive conference since a) it’s still open for 2010 registration and b) I suspect it’s a little more open to “unknowns”

Here’s what I need

1. Some good suggestions on how to best “stand out” with the questions below
2. Ideas on things I could do in addition to the list above
3. Someone(s) to review my profile and give me ideas to make it better, especially looking for things I’ve left off
4. An idea on how to pick references (I need two).   What kind of references would appeal to the people deciding Ted attendance?

Here is the application questions (remember I want suggestions that are true about me, I’m not looking for textbook perfect answers or anything just better ways to describe me)

1. If a friend were to describe your accomplishments in up to three sentences what would s/he say?
2. What other achievements would you like to share?
3. What are you passionate about (work, creative output, issues, communities…)
4. What do we need to know about you that we didn’t ask?
5. (Optional) Can you share a memorable anecdote from your life that will give us a further sense of what makes you tick?

Thanks in advance for helping with Team Meg!  Direct email responses are also welcome.

Make sure to take a tour of HRBartender’s Carnival of HR! Blogger Sharlyn Larby has assembled a tasty “Halloween Spirits” theme, categorizing a huge number of diverse posts from a wide sample of blogs by drink type (e.g. soda, hot beverage, mixed drinks, etc.)

This collection both saves you time by bringing together submitted posts into one place for you to quickly scan (Sharlyn introduces each with a brief description) as well as provides you with an opportunity to discover blogs you might not already know about.

In addition, Sharlyn has taken the effort to gather all the twitter accounts of the blog authors and put them into a TweepML list so that you can easily follow them all in one fell swoop. Thank you, HR Bartender!

Photo by Bisayan lady

Oh my goodness.  Our friends at FOT have done it again.  They have set a new challenge for Talent bloggers using scientific methods no doubt, and TalentedApps came into the top 30.

Those of you who remember our Cinderella story of yore, will know that we are especially excited that we didn’t have to beg friends and family to vote for us.  (instead we’ve just been begging them to read our stuff which frankly, seems fair…)

Do go check out our friends at FOT, as well as the rest of the rated blogs.  We at TalentedApps, are amazed and honored to be included with such a group.

Amy’s post suggested that we cannot actually ignore our flaws, if they are holding us back, we have to fix them.   I’m sure we all know that is hard.

I have recently decided that one of the reasons it’s hard, is that we keep trying to fix the problem the same way, decide it doesn’t work, and get into a frustration loop.

To illustrate my point, I have another great “Meg can be clueless sometimes” story.  What can I say?  As the heroine in my own novel, I’m a walking wealth of material.

One of the problems with blogging,  is that people might expect you to have decent grasp of grammar.  In my case, I have two fundamental issues with grammar, well, other than never actually “getting it”.

First, I am a bad speller.  This isn’t too big of a problem since there is spellcheck.  This catches the majority of the issues for me and the rest I blame on typos.

Second, I forget things like commas.  This I [mostly] solve by adding a lot of them randomly prior to publish,  hoping no one will notice those that are misplaced and/or missing. [Seriously, the edit process for me typically involves inserting a handful of commas and hoping for the best].

I am also on the lookout for rationalization opportunities, so god bless Penelope Trunk, who told me it’s not important.

Here is the problem, sometimes flaws  sneak out even when we try to mask them.   One of my grammar problems was kindly pointed out to me by my buddy Marcie.  The problem was, my seeming lack of comprehension of a difference between then and than.  Well more accurately, I didn’t seem to realize there were two different words, I only seemed to acknowledge the existence of then [since all coders know it could never be if/than (!)].    Marcie was even nice enough to give me dictionary links to both words, attempting to help me fix this problem.

OK, so now I knew of a problem and was intent to fix it, but I soon realized that the definitions didn’t help me.

In an attempt do something,  I first tried getting comfortable with the word than.  Since it had been under served in the past, I promoted it to prime time and used it instead.  Interestingly, more people noticed that mistake (I’m guessing I’m not the only one who has this problem) and now I was getting more frequent you keep using that word notes.

As I do, I started to ask for more people to help me figure this out (and fix it) and my buddy Louise, made an interesting observation that: Americans pronunciation of then and than are almost identical.

As an auditory learner, I have actually managed to merge the two words into one in my own head.  In fact, the majority of my spelling problems are not really phonics problems as I had always thought, they are pronunciation problems.

When I started hearing Louise’s voice saying then vs. than in my head (yes there are a LOT of voices in my head, don’t judge!) I was on my way to being fixed.  I now read the word correctly, and therefore have context understanding that I can use to my benefit.

The point of this post, is not to bore you with the inner workings of the voices in my head, but to suggest that sorting out the root of the problem, for you, can be very helpful in finding a fix that actually works.

Odds are, the only way you can get to that is getting observations from others, since you are probably not aware of what you are doing in the first place.  Just more evidence that you really do need a team you to help you succeed.

Oh, and now that I’m on to this pronounciation thing, I’m going to take another swing at affect vs. effect (which both sound like uh-fect in my world).  I’m going to give them a long “a” and a long “e” sound and see if I can’t suss out a way to ever use the word affect correctly.    Can’t hurt to try.

Emmett Brown - Scientific Leader

Actually, it’s more than a couple … maybe 100 or so according to Lominger.

But just having missed 2 questions on Dan McCarthy’s Talent Management Challenge , I want to talk about those specifically:

(Take the test here and find the answers here.  You are bound to find some surprises!)

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First, What is the most likely outcome of people focusing exclusively on developing their strengths and doing only those jobs that match their strengths?

A. It would only work well for those with the right strengths to begin with
B. People would be happier and more productive because they wouldn’t have to worry about their weaknesses
C. The strengths would get stronger, overwhelming any weaknesses that might get in the way
D. Strengths are likely to be overdone or not balanced, and unaddressed weaknesses would become blind spots
E. More people would become strong performers over time

I should have spotted the word “exclusively” and realized my answer of “E. More people would become strong performers over time” was overly optimistic.  My team recently conducted a Strengthsfinder exercise and we found it to be very valuable.  We learned a lot about ourselves, a lot about each other, and it seeded us with concrete plans on how to grow and get better.   Apparently, I missed Dan’s excellent post on The Perils of Accentuating the Positive in which he reviews the book of the same name.  “In a nutshell …,” he says “the ‘celebrate your strengths’ mantra is a feel-good, lazy way of side-stepping the hard work required to develop and be successful. It’s giving leaders ‘permission to stagnate””.

Ouch.  That one really hurts.  That will teach me to fall behind in my blog reading!  It also gives me a lot to think about.  I used to beat myself up a lot about my weaknesses.  When I discovered “strengths”, it gave me a refreshing attitude adjustment.  I felt more confident and motivated in my ability to be successful as a leader.  And I think that’s good.  What I’m learning is that beating myself up about my weaknesses too is actually good and healthy.  It’s all part of the wacky self-development puzzle.

(The right answer is D. Strengths are likely to be overdone or not balanced, and unaddressed weaknesses would become blind spots)

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Second, How do high performers rate themselves compared to low performers?

A. Rate themselves higher than others rate them
B. Rate themselves the same as others rate them
C. Rate themselves lower than others do
D. Rate themselves lower than others do and lower than low performers
E. Rate themselves at the same level as low performers

I was pretty sure that A & B weren’t right and I got tripped up on the semantics of C & D, so I picked “E. Rate themselves at the same level as low performers.“

The right answer is “D. Rate themselves lower than others do and lower than low performers.” This question, along with another question in Dan’s quiz (“Who is the least accurate judge of a manager’s job performance?”) tells us that self-assessments are meaningless and 360 feedback is a must.  This makes sense and it’s not surprising, but I’m not sure what to do with this information as I look to advise employees, mentees, not to mention myself.  There is other solid evidence out there that we should be marketing and positioning ourselves for more opportunities as well as developing self-awareness of our goodnesses (in addition to our weaknesses).  So I wonder: should I be advising my people to give themselves credit or be overly humble (as a good high performer should …)?