Respond to Every LinkedIn Query?

Dear Liz,

What's the protocol associated with responding to LinkedIn requests?
I respond to most of them, but some of them are off the wall. If I
get a piece of LinkedIn mail from a non-connection that seems like
dreck, I deep-six it. Should I be responding to everything I get on
LinkedIn?

Yours,

Kaylie

Dear Kaylie,

Great question! Most of the mail on LinkedIn moves between first-
degree connections - it's those connected people communicating with
one another, or more distant connections being introduced by their
intermediate contacts. I think you need to respond to all of those.
If you have a first-degree connection who really shouldn't be your
connection, you can snip the cord without too much trouble.

As for InMail from un-connected LinkedIn users, I think it depends.
If it's pure spam, delete it. I have one in my inbox I'm sitting on
right now. It's not spam but it pushes the bounds of my tolerance for
the kind of presumption that borders on bad manners. I don't really
feel like responding but I don't want to be rude, either.

A guy has asked me to come and speak at a conference in Dubai in
June, and says "I know it's a long way to come and present, although
if you have travel plans in the area at the time it may be feasible"
-- and then, presuming that I won't be able to make it, asks me for
helping finding speakers. Who want to get to Dubai under their own
steam to speak at this conference. In June, when the temperature in
Dubai averages between 104 and 107. Yeah, I'm deleting that message.

Your "delete" finger has a voice of its own. I say let it ring!

Cheers,

Liz

Super Secret HR Stuff

I've gotten a few questions lately that ask about "secret" HR stuff. So, I've decided to spill the secret HR beans and blab about all our secret handshakes and stuff. Except if there are any, no one has given them to me. I suppose this is because I don't belong to SHRM. Why? My employer won't pay for it and I'm too cheap to join myself. So, there's a secret for you!

The first question deals with a woman who fought the HR director and lost and then was coincidentally laid off shortly thereafter. In the past she's had no problem finding new jobs, but now the interviews go well, but then no one ever calls back. She asks:

The real question - the HR recruiter from my last company is well connected with recruiters all over the Bay Area which I can tell from our connected LinkedIn accounts. Is there a protected website for HR professionals where references are available that are not the type that would be given on the phone? Negative references that could lead to lawsuits? I just have this feeling that something else is in play here that I have no control over.

No secret, password protected sites that I'm aware of. (Again, maybe I just am not evil enough to get the passwords.) But, what you can do is follow up with the companies you interviewed with. Don't be pushy, but inquire about the position. If you really believe it's because of a negative reference from this woman, have a friend call her up and ask her for a reference for you.

If the reference is negative, you can then deal with that. If it's positive or neutral (many companies have policies against giving references--managers don't follow that but HR does), that's not your problem.

But keep in mind--the economy isn't going well. There are tons of applicants on the market and companies are sometimes hesitant to hire if they are afraid they will have to fire later. Also, make sure you provide references. Not everyone will restrict themselves to just calling people on the list, but many will. Control as much of the process as you can.

The next secret HR dealt with tattling to the authorities:

I recently applied for a job and as par for the course was required to consent to a criminal background check, credit check, physical.... Everything, it seems, except my blood, which i might add.... They took. Anyway, I'm worried that I may have a bench warrant from over ten years ago for a traffic violations. My question to you is, if this is true, can my prospective employer notify the local authorities?

Sure they can! Your neighbor can too. I don't know anyone that would--for traffic violations. Sure, if it comes up that you are wanted for armed robbery, I'd make that phone call myself. (Although I don't know how our attorneys would feel about that, but frankly, I'm more afraid of armed robbers than attorneys.)

Your real concern is that you've got something in your past you don't want to come out. Why not deal with it head on? Hire an attorney and have him contact the state in question and see what can be done to clear up your little mess. Pay your fines, take your punishment and get on with life. I don't know how bad this is, but I imagine the state would rather get money from you than throw you in jail, so why not face it head on and get over it?

HR really isn't in the business of law enforcement. We run background checks because we don't want bad people working for and with us. If you get angry and go shooting people up, we don't want to hire you in the first place because you might come after us when we eventually fire you.

So, deal with it and then you can stop worrying. Unless you are applying for a driving job, people don't care about traffic tickets. We do care if warrant comes up for you in a background check because that scares us a little. If we could legally not hire you because of it, I honestly don't know. Probably not. But, still, take care of it.

So, now you have learned some super secret HR stuff. Hope it helps.

You've Been Upgraded

The Workplace Professor Blog brought a fabulous new way to label a termination to my attention: To Upgrade. As you've been upgraded immediately so you can go get a new job.

Seriously. Come on, people, this is an embarrassment to a grim reaper like me.

When HR Should Act To Save Money

Phillis Dewitt was fired from her job as a nurse. The hospital maintains it was due to insubordination. Dewitt claims it was because her husband was dying of prostate cancer and costing the hospital a boatload in insurance claims.



Obviously, I wasn't involved in any termination discussions, but I imagine HR was. And perhaps they were overridden in any objections, but this is a situation where HR needs to be assertive and lay out the problems with a termination in this situation.



1. Employment in most situations (and no union was mentioned in the article) is at-will. This means that you can quit or be fired whenever. No warning. No severance. No notice. In practice, this hardly ever happens. The hospital had a practice following a formal disciplinary protocol. This was ignored in Dewitt's case. HR should say, "We understand that she was insubordinate, but we have to treat everyone the same."



2. Managers, even ones with medical knowledge, should not be suggesting that someone's spouse enter hospice care. Hospice is end of life care. It is deciding that it is time to let go and not attempt to prolong life. The manager claims she was trying to be compassionate. I would buy this if she didn't turn around and fire Dewitt for not coming in for a meeting while she was on a scheduled vacation. HR should say, "We understand that you believe they are making the wrong choices and that those choices are costing the company money, but this is not an area which you should be involved. If her performance suffers, then we'll talk about how to handle this. But, you are not to attempt to influence medical decisions."



3. Except in extreme circumstances, employees can opt for COBRA to continue their health coverage. Which Dewitt did. Therefore, the company only saved the $900 a month that Dewitt paid in, to keep coverage that was costing over $100,000 a year. HR should say, "You realize that this termination is highly suspect and will not save the company any money due to COBRA anyway."



4. For the reasons above, this termination is a law suit waiting to happen. The reality is, whether the hospital was legally justified in terminating this employee, HR should have brought the following information to the attention of the decision makers:

The termination did not follow policy.

The employee is highly likely to sue.

Lawsuits, whether successful or not, are very expensive. Expect to spend several hundred thousand dollars defending a lawsuit of this nature.

The employee is highly likely to opt for COBRA, therefore the savings you hope to achieve by termination will not happen.

This termination is a knee-jerk reaction to a financial problem. Any proposed solution will end up costing more than allowing the employee to continue working.

This is a public affairs nightmare. This is the type of story the media will pick up on. This will go public.

Any HR person worth her paycheck should have been able to present the above. Sure, she could be overridden (and I hope HR did the above, because otherwise they don't deserve to be respected).



This is a situation where keeping the employee working is actually cheaper than the "cost-saving firing." This is true even if Dewitt deserved to be fired. I certainly can't speak to that, but there are costs to terminating people that HR should understand.



(Via The Happy Hospitalist.)

Go vote!

Hey, everyone, our favorite Ask-a-Manager is up for the Best Business Blog award for 2008. Go here and vote for her.

You can vote once every 24 hours. She's awesome. And I'm not even jealous that she's a finalist and I'm not.

Year End Crunch

I work as an administrator for an accounting firm. Each December we seem to be understaffed due to vacation time to handle year end and month end client responsibilities. We are working to create a restricted vacation policy for the period of 12/15 through year end. There is no motive behind this other than the fact that we're an accounting firm, and by the nature of our business year end and month end responsibilities must be met. Do you have any suggestions for a fair policy?

Yes, HR gets whatever they want off and the rest of you have to suffer! Ha! Ha! Oh dear, I've had a little too long on vacation. (In fact, I'm actually tired of having fun. Well, having fun and cleaning out the basement.)

Yes, you see, my company shuts down between Christmas and New Year's so coverage isn't a problem, because we're all out. But, we're not an accounting firm. So, let's talk about a good policy.

Wait, let's ask a question. Why aren't your employees meeting their month end responsibilities? Because that's what I really wonder. In my set of beliefs, it doesn't matter what days you take off, you schedule your vacation around your work responsibilities.

I think you need a culture shift. Not that I'm advocating people selling their souls to the company. Not at all. I'm advocating people recognizing that their clients--their responsibilities--are important. If all your clients are taken care of, take a vacation. If not, well, you get to work!

But, then you could argue, what about administrative and support staff? They can't control what the actual accountants do with their clients and if there is no one to make copies then you've got troubles.

I also understand that clients are procrastinators and you can plan and plan and plan and promise your mother-in-law you will be there (and perhaps your mother-in-law will call you to tell you that it might be a good idea to bring a blanket for the baby because you, of course, wouldn't think that snow=cold and that babies need to be kept warm, but I digress), but the client will still call on December 23 with new requests and when you say, "is this everything?" they will say yes, but on December 31, they send you new "updated documents" via courier. So, yes, it's always going to be a problem.

But, this is predictable, so again, I have to go back to the old "you work when there is work to do." Which stinks. So, don't work for an accounting firm.

But, I haven't given you any new and exciting vacation policies. I don't have great ones. You can always do it by seniority, but if you have low turnover it makes the new people feel unappreciated and bitter. You can do it first come-first serve, but then you have people requesting vacation time for December in January and it becomes a big mess.

You can also limit December vacation altogether. Or close down December 24-26 and say that's it. Then clients know as well that you won't be available.

If I had to make a policy I would do it on a rotating basis. I would figure out the bare minimum of staff needed during December 15-31, and then have the other spots available for vacation. If you got to take vacation this year, next year you are last in line for vacation spots. You also limit the number of days they can take during that time period--3 days, or 5, so that more people get the opportunity to take off.

It's not pleasant, but that's why they call it work. Any other suggestions are welcome.

It's the Culture, Stupid

Story: It's the Culture, Stupid (from the Boulder Daily Camera)

When my family arrived in Boulder some years ago, our big kids were little and our little one wasn't born. We wanted to meet people and keep the kids busy, so we signed up for every kid activity under the sun.

Skating lessons at the downtown ice rink: delightful! Swimming with Curt Colby: tremendous! Avid4Adventure, Bits, Bytes and Bots and Renaissance Adventures: magnificent! The kids had a blast. I enjoyed meeting the parents. Everyone was happy.

There was only one dark spot on our family activity schedule that year: my daughter's ballet class. The ballet school was unfriendly and poorly run. It felt like a stereotype, a striver's dream, built for parents hell-bent on seeing their kids dance in the Joffrey.

The school had a music program in addition to dance classes. We tried that one, too. Ick! Through the heavy wooden door I could hear the teacher screeching at my third-grader. No thanks! The school was broken, and the malevolent culture was palpable to me as a parent. That's the thing about organizational culture: it's loud.

Years later, I heard the back story. The original, grassroots, warm and inviting music school had undergone a disruptive and unpopular change in control some years before. When we hit town, the effects of that unfortunate series of events were evident. When a culture is broken, clients can tell.

There's an old New Yorker cartoon that shows a CEO barking to an underling, "Get me a corporate culture by Monday morning!" The joke is that, of course, every organization already has a culture. We may love it or hate it or be oblivious to it, but it's there. Whether the culture supports our goals is another question.

I got a call from a CEO this week who said, "I must be crazy calling you now, when conditions are so tough in the marketplace. But I think we could be working together more effectively in my company.

"Our employees aren't rallying around the mission just because we're under competitive pressure. I guess I don't blame them. We need to figure out how to manage in this new environment. I can't afford to have my best people quit on me now, and I need every person's best efforts."

I give the CEO credit, because it would be easy to say "I'm not expending one iota of mental energy on soft-and-squishy people issues now, when our company is under siege." The CEO understood that turnover and motivation and culture are all related. If employees don't care about the game plan, a Dave and Buster's gift certificate will not do much to change their views.

As a newcomer to the broken music-and-dance academy (now out of business, no surprise) my gut told me that the culture was awry. The CEO's gut told him the same thing about his organization.

He decided to act rather than wait for the malaise to magically disappear on its own. He told me "My instinct says that I'd better dig into this topic now, before it badly disrupts my business."

Instinct, gut -- if you can't pay attention to those trusty scouts, who can you listen to?