The book is a series of short, actionable tips for job seekers. It contains articles by some of my favorite HR bloggers, including Lance Haun of Rehaul, Ben Eubanks of Upstart HR, Kris Dunn from the HR Capitalist, and Laurie Ruettimann from Punk Rock HR.
In response to my recent post on doing less, Rebecca Thorman from Modite commented on the importance of, “making sure everything on your plate has meaning.”
I talk a lot about providing employees with meaningful and engaging work. That said, I think meaning is overrated. Here’s my response: Keep reading…
I had a really interesting discussion the other day about whether or not work should be fun.
The resounding opinion was that work isn’t fun – it’s satisfying. Doing challenging things. Helping others. Doing work that’s well aligned with someone’s passions and strengths.
Fun, people felt, comes from the relationships with their coworkers. From the work environment. From the culture.
One of the standout presentations was by Gentry Underwood of IDEO, a design and innovation consulting firm.
During his presentation, Gentry defined three key principles for creating innovation at an organization. Here’s my take on them.
3 Principles for Creating Innovation
Empower people, not ideas. Ideas come and go. They’re cheap. They don’t always fit your organization, your workforce or your current business strategy. The people who generate those ideas, though… they’re priceless.
Create a platform that brings people together. Historically, this might have meant things like brainstorming rooms and dedicated “innovation spaces.” In an increasingly global and dispersed workforce, it often means some sort of social media tool.
Facilitate and reward participation. More specifically, remove every single microscopic barrier to entry. The biggest problem with creating an innovative culture is adoption, usually because managers don’t support it or it’s integrated into other aspects of a person’s job.
One of the ongoing themes at the Enterprise 2.0 Conference was the power of social media to drive collaboration and community at organizations.
My Take: Social media is just a tool.
It doesn’t create collaboration. It doesn’t create community. It just helps facilitate it.
People create those things. Social media tools simply amplify and enable your culture.
If you want more collaboration and community, social media can definitely help. But you need to make sure you’re creating a culture that supports those things first.
What if the goal of the HR operation was to put itself out of business? Not as a way of moving on to a better type of HR but as an end in itself. Why shouldn’t HR be responsible for solving a set of problems and then closing the door?
Part of HR’s Public Relations problem stems from the idea that HR should be a permanent fixture. What if that just doesn’t make any sense at all? Who says that the problems HR addresses can’t be settled, wrapped up and dispensed with? Why shouldn’t having an HR function demonstrate a lack of maturity in an organization.
So what do you think?
Me? I think John makes some good points, but I also believe there will always be a need for leadership readiness, sourcing, strategic compensation, and all the administrative crap that needs to get done. And I don’t believe those are all things organizations can handle internally without an HR department.
But HR as we currently do it? Sure. Let’s put that out of business permanently.
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