Among HR executives and professionals, social media usage outpaced editorial and vendor content consumption. Respondents used social media at a rate of 3.77 hours per week, compared to 2.77 hours of online editorial content and 2.13 hours of online vendor content.

The survey indicated active participation in social media is an important part of the HR job role and acts as a resource for experience-based knowledge in the workplace. Respondents said staying current (78%) and networking with peers (71%) as the most popular uses of social media.

Additionally, more than half have responded to a question asked by a peer in an online community, while nearly 50 percent have built their personal knowledge network by making connections with peers.

"This survey proves HR professionals have been fast adopters of social media, not just for networking but for improving their value as professionals," said Mike O’Toole, president at PJA  Advertising + Marketing.

"They clearly identify social media channels as a way to increase their expertise and build their professional reputation."

Key highlights from the survey include:

*Social media represents 43% of total media consumption among HR respondents (compared to 32% for editorial and 25% for vendor content).

*Deep experience is seen as the most important attribute in a social media expert, followed by thoughtful and detailed responses.

*Nearly half of respondents say that a social media presence greatly increases or increases their value as a job candidate, while more than 50% claim that social media is important or very important in building their personal brand.
 

The idea is that this will help recruiters tie their dollars directly to their results. The recruitment community will get its first look at the product at the upcoming Society for Human Resource Management conference starting June 28 in New Orleans.

"Recruiters are being asked to find top talent using fewer resources than ever, and Yahoo!’s Pay Per Candidate model gives them the tools to increase the accountability of their listings," says Yahoo! HotJobs Vice President and General Manager Chris Merritt." With recruiters facing resume overload in today’s job market, the Pay Per Candidate solution will allow them to spend their time and budget on only the best candidates."

According to Yahoo’s site, Pay Per Candidate lets users:

- Closely manage costs for your online recruiting needs.

- Cap the number of Applies per job and re-allocate unused Applies to other jobs throughout the term of your contract.

- Save time, because when you use the HotJobs application process, you no longer have to evaluate candidates that haven’t been pre-screened by your questionnaire.

Recruiters can choose one of two application methods when using Pay Per Candidate: candidates complete the entire job application on the HotJobs site, or candidate clicks-through to their company’s hire site. With the first option, recruiters have the ability to pay only for pre-screened candidates. With the second, recruiters keep candidates on their career website for the application process.

More information about Pay Per Candidate can be found on this FAQ page (pdf). What do you think about the concept? 

Crystal Bell, fortunately, wasn’t humiliated via any public communication; her boss sent notice via private message. According to the Calgary Herald, Bell, who’d been employed at a spa only two weeks, skipped a staff meeting on a day she wasn’t scheduled to work.

This answers Smokey’s question: How the hell you get fired on your day off?

Other questions go unanswered, though, as those who are not self-employed may be taken aback by the impersonal method of termination. Bell’s boss defended the move saying she tried to call but Bell ignored her phone.

Still it raises the question of whether this is an isolated incident or the wave of the future: getting the digital ax via email, social network, instant message, yikes—Twitter? Will someone get fired in leet?

Blaise Alleyne at Tech Dirt plays out that scenario:

@unfortunatesoul btw you’re #fired sry

Unfortunatesoul’s likely response: @bgboss i can haz welfare chek? 

As someone with a communication background, let me say that this probably isn’t the best way to go about it. If management is unconcerned with the employee who is fired, management should consider the remaining staff and how they perceive the act. As they internalize and empathize, such indifference may contribute to I’m-just-a-cog-in-the-wheel bitter disloyalty in the future. 
 

What, exactly, it produces the article doesn’t say, but I’m going to fall back on my undergrad and say the usual love-drugs: dopamine, serotonin, oxytocin (which are the body’s natural supply of cocaine, prozac, and addiction), along with some other things I shouldn’t mention because they’re gross.

The Sun article cites a study by "Italian sexologist" Serenella Salomoni, who found that 20% of poll respondents admitted to an affair at work, and that they were "happier, more energetic, and more productive."

Except for men, who often fell asleep on the job afterward. Just kidding. That’s not what she said.

The Italian sexologist actually said that women were nearly twice as likely to have an office fling as men were, and a third admitted to having an affair to advance their career.

I have a few questions that aren’t addressed in the Sun’s post.

1. An Italian sexologist? First, how does one earn the title of "sexologist?" Second, doesn’t that sound like part of a bad pickup line from a Rocky-wannabe: "Hey yo, Shirley, what ya doin for the next 10 minutes or somethin’ like dat?"
2. Where can I find this study? Sun doesn’t link to it, and has been duped before. Google News brings back the Sun article, and a Washington Post blog that bit, hook-line-and-sinker, and linked back to the Sun article, the only place the info appears to be.
3. How do I know Serenella Salomoni is a professional sexologist, or which sexology organization she’s with? Google Scholar brought back some results for Salomoni, which were in Italian, which I can’t read, unless I pretend it’s a blend of French and Spanish and use them to decipher, which never works so well.
4. Were these European or American women having all that sex at the office? That’s important because I know a few guys that will be applying across the Pond tout d’suite.
5. Is this going to affect our team-building activities? Because the three-legged race is already more intimate than I want to get with some people.  

Perhaps it’s just the mere thought that their coworkers get to pass the day in their pajamas and see their kids before 7 pm, that they don’t have to get up, get dressed, make the drive, and rush to get things done at lunch.

The study didn’t really get into those details, just that employees that remain at work while coworkers telecommute tend to be less satisfied and have a lower probability of remaining with the company. The greater the prevalence of teleworkers, the higher the chances are employees at the office aren’t happy about their station.

The study comes from Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute and was published in a recent issue of the journal Human Relations. It looked at a sample of 240 professional employees at a medium-sized company. That could be telling as well; the study doesn’t seem to measure the culture of that particular company and what, if any, impact that may have had on employee satisfaction.

About 37 percent of US-based and foreign companies offer flexible work arrangements like telecommuting, and the number is growing at about 11 percent a year. The increase is spurring interest in the impact such policies have on employees.

"Interest and research in telework as a work modality to ease conflicts between work and family domains has grown tremendously," said Timothy Golden, associate professor in the Lally School of Management & Technology at Rensselaer.

"Studies to date however, have investigated telework’s impacts on the teleworkers themselves, rather than on those who work with teleworkers but remain in the office. This study shifts the research lens to investigate the impacts of telework on non-teleworkers in the office."

Golden acknowledges that other factors may come into play to increase or decrease job satisfaction or intentions to leave the company. These include the amount of time coworkers telecommute, how much face-to-face interaction occurs, and the amount of job autonomy allowed to employees.

Employees who have to come into the office while coworkers telecommute may tend to find the workplace less enjoyable, have fewer and weaker emotional ties to coworkers, and feel less obligated to the company.

"While reasons for the adverse impact on non-teleworker’s satisfaction are varied, it potentially could be due to coworker’s perceptions that they have decreased flexibility and a higher workload, and the ensuing greater frustration that comes with coordinating in an environment with more extensive co-worker telework," said Golden.
 

"In addition, it may be that with a greater prevalence of teleworkers in a work unit, non-teleworkers may find it less personally fulfilling to conduct their work due to the increased obstacles to building and maintaining effective and rewarding co-worker relationships."

That doesn’t mean allowing telecommuting is a bad idea, though. It has very positive impacts on the employees who are able to do so. It may mean that employers need to be more vigilant in ensuring employees at the office get the face-time and autonomy they need. 

But don’t expect them to like neckties or high heels.
 

That doesn’t seem quite fair, does it? Haven’t all of us said or done something at least a little untoward? Is the googler calling the googlee a sinner? What of the googler’s past? Spotless?

Yes, the job market is competitive. Yes, I’m heavy on the throw the first stone philosophy. Yes, a candidate should shine their shoes and practice their handshaking and eye contact. But is it too presumptive, too hasty to toss out a candidate based on their googlability?

(Google’s going to love me for using their brand name with such license, but lets get real – it is a word now.)

I wonder this because I’m starting to see a trend, at least as I am perceiving it from the piecemeal coverage I see. We already know quite well that Bill Gates didn’t finish his degree – and that would have hurt him in the job market if he hadn’t made brilliant strides of his own.

Alarm:clock reports that Craig Newmark, the founder of the wildly successful Craigslist, was "too odd" to land an engineering job. "Too odd" meant the head engineer didn’t like his "anti-capitalist ideas."

The raging success of Craigslist has to have Newmark sitting back in his chair and chuckling at a statement like that.

Just before that little nugget, Valleywag asks "Is 30 too old to start a company?" The question arises because, according to Valleywag, venture capitalists assume tech entrepreneurs "peak" at about 26.

As a 30-year-old, I think that just plain sucks. Admittedly, rounding that corner hasn’t been exactly fun – spicy foods are quickly becoming the enemy and my knees and back just aren’t what they used to be – but my mind is sharper than ever.

What was I saying?

Oh yeah, it seems employers (and investors) would be wise to take a second look at the talent they’re throwing off the table for some rather arbitrary reasons. And to borrow from an overused corporate buzz phrase, that’s not exactly "thinking outside the box."

Genius rarely comes in conventional packages. Just ask Einstein, who I hear had trouble just tying his shoes (but that could be an urban legend).  

The element that appears to be increasingly missing from HR management is the human element. The increasing importance placed on reducing the costs of employee recruitment and administration, benchmarking remuneration and implementing “systems” to control HR activities has slowly, but surely eroded the human purpose of HR.

The reduced emphasis on people starts with recruitment.

Advertisements which appear in newspapers or on the internet fall largely into two categories.

The first category is the generic category. The advertisement lacks life. It probably has come from a generic job description, more on which I will comment later. The advertisement could be for a role in almost any industry. The advertisement lacks specificity to the job, the organisation, the challenges and the opportunities. It lacks a human element.

The second category is the super-person category. The skills required are a long list of attributes which most of us who have worked in business for a long time have never seen in the one human being an certainly not at the level of seniority being advertised.

Applications and CVs are scanned by computer for key words to select potential interviewees. The only certainty the use of computers to select keywords has is to breed a generation of people adept at stuffing their CV with generic key words popular with HR systems.

The extended use of computer systems, whilst reducing the cost of managing HR, has necessitated the use of increasingly generic job descriptions and generic competency profiles.

There was a time when job descriptions were written with the purpose of allowing an employee to understand what their role in an organisation was, what their duties and responsibilities were and what behaviour skills and knowledge were required to execute their job.

The detail was related to the job, the function in which they worked and the business environment in which the organisation found themselves. They were a pain in the neck to keep updated but they did give new and aspiring employees a good idea of what was required of them.

Now they are easy to update because they are rarely need updating. They are written in a generic format that hardly ever changes and is easy to record in a database. The form is so generic that an engineer in an organisation that deals with mainly civic construction will have the same job description as an engineer dealing mainly with electrical circuits and systems.

They serve no useful purpose for the people fulfilling the roles and very little purpose for people aspiring to the roles. They do, however, fulfil a purpose for benchmarking remuneration.

Benchmarking of any kind requires a common language and common standards. Writing job descriptions that actually describe each individual role in an individual organisation in a defined business environment is of little use for benchmarking. In improving their ability to benchmark, HR professionals have made job descriptions of little use for line managers and their staff.

A “competency development framework” has been introduced into the HR lexicon over the last ten to twenty years. Most of the frameworks in the early stages were large and complex with fifty to sixty individual competencies being defined in an organisation. They became very difficult to manage, it being very difficult to assess the competence of individuals across such a large set of competencies.

Competency frameworks reasonably quickly morphed to the core competencies required to execute a role, the number of competencies being reduced to around twelve for each role. In most frameworks competencies were also defined at up to five different levels of ability.

These frameworks required commitment to make them work. When the commitment was evident they were very successful in helping individuals and the organisation understand the gap in competency individuals had compared with that required to execute a role well.

Competency Development Frameworks built at a functional level within an organisation were and are very useful in understanding training needs, career development paths and recruitment requirements.

Now, however, a new generic framework approach is emerging in large organisations to cover the whole organisation. The competency definitions are generic, the levels of capability have disappeared and undoubtedly, they are easy to record on a computer system for the whole organisation.

These new competency frameworks are of now use to line management. They do not help with training needs analysis except for, you guessed it, generic training programmes.

Generic training programmes, often delivered by computer based training are conducted with employees to close competency gaps that are by their nature specific to the people, the function they are in and the business environment in which they are working.

HR management is becoming more streamlined, more computerised and more efficient. However, as the human component becomes less and less important, I doubt that it is becoming more effective.

Line managers are either not utilising the systems provided for them or developing their own “translations” of the generic systems so that the can be made effective in day-to-day management.

The result either way is reduced productivity at the organisation level.

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Kevin Dwyer is the founder of Change Factory. Change Factory helps organisations who do do not like their business outcomes to get better outcomes by changing people’s behaviour. Businesses we help have greater clarity of purpose and ability to achieve their desired business outcomes. To learn more or see more articles visit http://www.changefactory.com.au or email kevin.dwyer@changefactory.com.au 2006 Change Factory

The same principle can be applied in the corporate world. It is easy enough to hire new employees rather than keeping them satisfied in the workplace and making them stay on their current jobs.

Take a look at these quick facts:

- Companies find it ten times more costly and time-consuming to hire and train a new employee rather than keeping an existing employee.

- An employee who leaves a company does not usually voice out his or her exact reason for leaving. Although the most common causes are dissatisfaction with the salary, co-workers or the work environment, there are real reasons behind the supposed reasons why employees leave their jobs.

- Most companies fail to hear out the concerns of their employees when it comes to compensation and other work-related concerns.

Basically, the thrust of these facts is that it is more difficult and time consuming to hire new employees rather than keep the new ones, so why not just keep your existing personnel satisfied and not give them any reason to leave their jobs?

One of the most effective ways to know your employees are thinking is by distributing human resources surveys. Here are the advantages of human resource surveys:

1. You would have an idea if your employees are satisfied with their current compensation.

The rule is, you will never know unless you ask. You might think that a clerk or your receptionist is earning enough, but what if she thinks otherwise?

Most employees feel that they are overworked and underpaid, and isn’t it better to know beforehand what exactly they are thinking before they hand you a resignation letter because they were offered a higher salary by a competitor?

2. You can get a feedback about work-related issues.

When distributing human resources surveys, be as direct and specific as possible. Ask you employees what they think of the food in the pantry.

Are their earning enough money? Do they feel as if their requests regarding employee benefits are being processed on time? How do they feel about their immediate superiors?

What do they think of the existing office rules and company regulations? How do they rate the overall operations of the company from a scale of one to ten, ten being the highest?

By asking such important questions, your employees will feel that you care enough to ask them about what they think and send a message that you are going to do something about the matters that they find dissatisfactory.

3. You can figure out potential problems.

From the feedback and results of the human resources surveys, you can point out potential problem areas about the general operations of your company.

If there are a lot of complaints and negative feedback about the slowness of the processing of employee benefits, you can take action and see to it that the process is improved. You can further work on the perks and benefits that your employees find satisfactory.

All in all, human resources surveys are the key into the minds of your employees. Your goal as a company is to provide the best products and services that you can offer, while maintaining the satisfaction of your local personnel and turning your company into one of the best places to work for.

By having a glimpse of your employee’s minds, you would know what to do about their complaints and take measure to improve the things in your company that they find lacking. Thus, you will have a satisfied work force who will help your company climb its way to the top.

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Rita Craig, president of the Craig Group and a long-time professional HR consultant, said the role of HR has changed from a primarily administrative position to one that is more strategic.

Times certainly have change from those days when the HR department was called the “smile and file” department since in that era, the primary qualifications for HR were simply a friendly disposition and an ability to file.

She said that the emerging trends in HR call for HR professionals to take the lead in planning for the future and becoming strategic business partners in their organizations.

She identified several other trends in the industry, as follows: (1) a shrinking talent pool,! (2) An increase in outsourcing, (3) A more intense focus on work/life balance; (4) Changing workplace demographics, (5) Greater need for talent management, (6) Ethics requirements, and (6) Globalization.

But the key appears to be strategic planning. With the changing landscape of Human Resources management in the years to come, strategic planning will be the key for HR to meet those needs and to succeed.

The key to HR planning for the future begins with one simple question that HR professionals have to ask themselves, says Craig: “If we are successful in the years to come, what will our customers and competitors be saying about us?” With the answers to this question, HR practitioners can formulate a clear, shared vision and a sense of direction for the organization.

As a possible starting point in providing answers to the key question, Craig suggested the following: Focus resources on key goals and strategic measures, create and sustain long-term performance, and create a living document that can change when necessary.

In closing, Craig warned against “powerful and pervasive barriers” that prevent HR professionals from being effective in their roles. She pinpointed these as resistance to change, failure to implement plans, the wounds of past strategic planning failures, and failure to anticipate the impact on people, process and organizational structure.

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The name change was mainly due to the change in social and economic activities throughout history.

Industrial Welfare

Industrial welfare was the first form of human resource management (HRM). In 1833 the factories act stated that there should be male factory inspectors. In 1878 legislation was passed to regulate the hours of work for children and women by having a 60 hour week.

During this time trade unions started to be formed. In 1868 the 1st trade union conference was held. This was the start of collective bargaining. In 1913 the number of industrial welfare workers had grown so a conference organized by Seebohm Rowntree was held.

The welfare workers association was formed later changed to Chartered Institute of Personnel and Development.

Recruitment and Selection

It all started when Mary Wood was asked to start engaging girls during the 1st world war. In the 1st world war personnel development increased due to government initiatives to encourage the best use of people.

In 1916 it became compulsory to have a welfare worker in explosive factories and was encouraged in munitions factories. A lot of work was done in this field by the army forces.

The armed forces focused on how to test abilities and IQ along with other research in human factors at work.

In 1921 the national institute of psychologists established and published results of studies on selection tests, interviewing techniques and training methods.

Acquisition of other Personnel Activities

During the 2nd world war the focus was on recruitment and selection and later on training; improving morale and motivation; discipline; health and safety; joint consultation and wage policies.

This meant that a personnel department had to be established with trained staff.

Industrial Relations

Consultation between management and the workforce spread during the war. This meant that personnel departments became responsible for its organization and administration.

Health and safety and the need for specialists became the focus. The need for specialists to deal with industrial relations was recognized so that the personnel manager became as spokesman for the organization when discussions where held with trade unions/shop stewards.

In the 1970′s industrial relations was very important. The heated climate during this period reinforced the importance of a specialist role in industrial relations negotiation.

The personnel manager had the authority to negotiate deals about pay and other collective issues.

Legislation

In the 1970′s employment legislation increased and the personnel function took the role of the specialist advisor ensuring that managers do not violate the law and that cases did not end up in industrial tribunals.

Flexibility and Diversity

In the 1990′s a major trend emerged where employers were seeking increasing flexible arrangements in the hours worked by employees due to an increase in number of part-time and temporary contracts and the invention of distance working.

The workforce and patterns of work are becoming diverse in which traditional recruitment practices are useless.

In the year 2000, growth in the use of internet meant a move to a 24/7 society. This created new jobs in e-commerce while jobs were lost in traditional areas like shops. This meant an increased potential for employees to work from home.

Organizations need to think strategically about the issues these developments raise. HRM managers role will change as changes occur.

Information Technology

Some systems where IT helps HRM are:

- Systems for e-recruitment;

- On-line short-listing of applicants;

- Developing training strategies on-line;

- Psychometric training;

- Payroll systems;

- Employment data;

- Recruitment administration;

- References;

- Pre-employment checks.

IT helps HR managers offload routine tasks which will give them more time in solving complex tasks. IT also ensures that a greater amount of information is available to make decisions.

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