Carnevale delle Risorse Umane: 18 February 2009

 

      It’s Carnevale di Venezia and today’s main event is a gondola tour starting in calle Vallaresso and ending with dinner at Do Forni. So grab your costume and prepare for a cocktail of delights in this round of the Carnevale delle Risorse Umane.

 

Banking Bonuses and other Business

There’s a clear focus to this carnival – and it’s not a sexy one – it’s recession. Many bloggers have dealt with the causes, problems and potential paths out of the crisis, including:

• HR with Balls who offers thoughts on bank bonuses and Nick Jefferson who links this to the role of HR.
• David Wentworth at I4CP’s Productivity Blog who suggests laying down the law on executive compensation.
• Peter Reid at People Management’s Specialist blog who warns that protectionism and xenophobia are the real dangers, not Italian subcontractors (the Carnevale is in Italy after all!).

 

Plus there’s my own post on sexism in the City.

 

RIFs

Not surprisingly, many of the posts deal with redundancies / reductions in force, including these from:

• Chris Young at Maximize Possibility, who asks who whether employee layoffs or paycuts are preferable.
• Lucie Phillips at People Management’s Editors blog who deals with the particular issues around part-time workers.
• Shauna Moerke the HR Minion who shares her experience of outplacement support.

 

As well as these, you can step up your own efforts to avoid redundancy with Steve Boese's thoughts on the need to be multi-dimensional at his HR Technology blog.

Or if you’ve already been riffed, John Agno at the Leadership Blog introduces a new Career Forum  and Lisa Rosendahl advises on getting the job offer  at HR Thoughts.

And if you want to help others who have already been made redundant, Mark Stelzner at Inflexion Advisors introduces the Job Angels.  In addition, Susan Heathfield at Guide to Human Resources offers tips for coping when coworkers lose their jobs and Denise O'Berry at Ask Team Doc looks at the case of a Team Leader leaving.

 

Impacts on other Areas

Of course, the recession plays through into all areas of HR, including:

Team management: Dan McCarthy at Great Leadership offers tips on leading a global virtual team.

Performance management: Gireesh Sharma at Talent Junction considers why performance appraisals are sometimes ineffective and Ken Klaus at TalentedApps asks whether the bell is tolling for the bell curve.

Leadership development: Wally Bock at Three Star Leadership offers his advice.

Employee motivation: Mark McGuinness provides some Wishful Thinking  and Anna Farmery at the Engaging Brand suggests one solution may be providing certainty.  These are particularly important issues given that, as Kari Quaas at Cool Works reminds you, your employees are talking about you, and that just 15% love their job enough to marry it (see Alice Snell's post at Talent Management Solutions).

 

Some companies are apparently still recruiting, although their methods are changing. Frank Mulligan at Recruit China notes that e-recruiting is down, Benjamin Yoskovitz at Standout Jobs questions whether you’ll get fired for posting on Monster and Mike McClelland ponders recruitment process outsourcing at Advorto.

 

Preparing for the Upturn

But this is a carnival and supporting the party mood, some posts deal with the need to encourage innovation and plan for growth. Nina Simosko offers four pillars providing smart growth for leaders  and Paul Herbert at Incentive Intelligence notes the importance of incentivising innovation.

 

The Future of HR

Other posts deal with HR’s own development during the recession and beyond.  Sharlyn Lauby at HR Bartender asks what Is the new HR?  Chris Ferdinandi believes Renegade HR is an art (but you should act like a scientist) so of course you need to understand when to use qualitative vs quantitative research – see the advice from Tess Walton at Strategic Workforce Planning.

Gautam Ghosh at White Spaces provides some critical skills for HR professionals and a couple of posts deal specifically with social media in HR: Lucie Mitchell at HR Zone considers the use of Twitter and Michael Haberman at HR Observations looks at social media and EFCA.

Of course, we can only predict the future if we understand the past and Rick at Flip Chart Fairy Tales wraps up our Italian themed carnival by considering the lessons the Romans can team us about organisational culture.

 

That’s it for this round. The next carnival event will open at Kris Dunn’s HR Capitalist on 4 March.  Until then, arrivederci.

 

Photo credit: pikaluk

Technorati Tags: HR,Carnival,February,2009