Tough Talks – You could land in hot water if your supervisors and managers are avoiding an important part of setting the right work climate: having a difficult conversation with an employee about unacceptable behavior. If your supervisors are tongue-tied or uncomfortable, you may be able to help them by providing some scripts. Maybe even a little role playing? Time Warner Cable’s VP of Employee Relations Paul Falcone can help you get started with his post about scripting difficult conversations at HR Daily Advisor. He also talks about how to handle “requests” for resignation. More Falcone “difficult conversation” tips in prior posts: inappropriate off-the-record comments, body odor, and attitude problems and handling excessive absenteeism and FMLA abuse.
Going graphic -In other communication news, if you are looking for a way to give your new hire orientation presentation a little pizazz or to overhaul your employee benefits communication program, Steve Boese has a few ideas for you: Consider
going graphic or adding interactivity.
Recruiting: How the cool kids do it – Amybeth Hale gives a window into how Twitter recruits and hires in a great post at ERE.net. She goes right to the source, interviewing Oliver Ryan, Twitter’s People Wrangler (that’s “Director of Recruiting” for you old school types). Good post, and the short takeaway: “Twitter practices what it preaches. It uses its own product effectively to recruit, but focuses on what’s most important: the people and the relationships.”
Catching up with labor – For his Labor Day posting, John Hyman of Ohio Employer’s Law Blog asked if organized labor is making its resurgence with a roundup of links to recent news blog postings on the matter.
Grace under pressure – Executive coach Scott Eblin has a posting about what we can learn about leadership from the Chilean miners that is well worth a read.
Law of Unintended Consequences? – At Human Resource Executive, David Shadovitz asks if smoking bans are hazardous? He reports on a recent study that finds reduced smoking in the workplace may lead to higher rates of obesity. This points to a need for employers to do a better job approaching things in a holistic fashion, including issues such as stress and weight gain as a part of smoking cessation initiatives.
Pop Quiz: Are You Hiring and Breeding Greedy and Selfish Employees?
Executive decorating tips – The current decor is a tad drab for our taste, but you have to admit that it has a certain authority. Vote for your favorite.
In case you missed it… – Life gets busy so you might have missed the terrifying cruise from hell video that was making the rounds this past week – take your anti nausea medication first. Related: the follow-on investigation report.