The Real Source Con: Packing Pipelines and Smoking Hashtags
Posted on October 1, 2014 2 Comments
My very first job title ever was as a “sourcing analyst,” which had the necessary gravitas at the time to make me not feel bad compared to my B-School buddies who selected, rather than scrounged, for their gigs. This role was, essentially, how sourcing is still largely defined: name generation and verification.
My job was really pretty simple: find as many potentially qualified candidates as possible, verify that their information was correct, and then enter that record into the applicant tracking system. Of course, this was in 2005, and the explosion of publicly available personal information that’s so ubiquitous today was, at the time, still in its infancy.
The Deal With the Hat
Posted on September 26, 2014 4 Comments
I give presentations on really complex topics, as a rule, and while I try to simplify it as much as possible, I fail to believe, as happened the other day at a user conference, that no one had a single question about inbound recruiting.
Not one. Normally, this is an hour, and it still feels rushed – I actually added slides (which I stole from, but credited to, the brilliant Bryan Chaney – dude’s good). 62 slides, 45 minutes, somehow still found 5 for Q&A.
Crickets.
Shady Characters: The Performance Art of HR
Posted on September 24, 2014 5 Comments
For those of you who didn’t sink tens of thousands of dollars into an ultimately worthless liberal arts degree or aren’t fans of the performing arts genres of the late Renaissance (for $500, Alec), you might not have heard of Commedia Dell’Arte: literally, “The Comedy of the Profession.”
Without getting too deep, it’s basically the Venetian equivalent of “In Living Color,” utilizing stock characters and sweeping stereotypes as the basis for what amounts to a satirical indictment of social mores and cultural values. Kind of like a Tyler Perry movie but without the evangelical undertones and cross-dressing.
Fashion Faux Pas: Funkyzeit Mit HR
Posted on September 8, 2014 2 Comments
If you’ve seen me at a conference, this is going to be hard to imagine. But when I was immersed in the world of Fortune 50 HR departments, the professional equivalent of a home ec class, I thought the best way to fit into a world where I was an obvious interloper was by simply dressing the part.
I was a sweater vest aficionado, preferably anything in Argyle. The socks, naturally, matched whatever pattern I happened to be wearing – a fact that makes me want to go back in time just to kick my own ass. I had 10 pairs (or a laundry cycle’s worth) of Express for Men Producer pants, and a revolving rack of Banana Republic button up shirts. Plus I always had some cardigan ready, just in case it turned chilly. I wish I could go back and kick my own butt, frankly.
Harder, Better, Faster, Stronger: The Daft Punk of HR Tech
Posted on August 25, 2014 Leave a Comment
In his immaculately researched, incredibly detailed corporate biography “Intel Trinity: How Robert Noyce, Gordon Moore and Andy Grove Built the World’s Most Important Company,” author Michael Malone writes of Moore’s Law,
“The equation proved so precise that it captured the entire Zeitgeist … And even after the integrated circuit itself is obsolete, it is possible that Moore’s Law will still dominate human existence as what it has always been: not really a law but a commitment to perpetual progress.”
Just as integrated circuits and microprocessing replaced mainframe computers and led to one of the most explosive, sustained periods of innovation in human history, the rise of SaaS – that cloud cover that’s ubiquitous in the recruiting industry these days – is finally enabling HR and recruiting technology to progress at the same bell curve of innovation (albeit slightly stunted) as the rest of the consumer electronics and software industries.