We asked our athletes that question, and this is what we got –> the Ultimate Generator Group Workout Playlist.

Did we miss anything? Add your workout favorites in the comment section and we’ll update the playlist to include your selections!

Great ride out of Scappoose (the hometown) on the old Vernonia-Scappoose hwy.  A bit of a choppy road heading up into the hills off of the Columbia River side.  Gradual climb for 3+ miles then gets to be a bit steeper grade for about 4 miles before flattening out on the backside of the ridge that runs alongside the Columbia.

Incredible day for a ride with little to no wind in the trees. Right before Hwy 47 the road has been recently paved so it makes for pretty smooth riding along the Nehalem river. We stopped in Vernonia for a little lunch then headed out towards Hwy 26 on 47.

We made the mistake of getting on the bike path on the East side of 47 which is pleasant until you run out of pavement somewhere around 7-8 miles out of Vernonia, if I remember correctly.  No fun.  Gravel road riding for a couple of miles until we could trek back down to the 47.

Once we hit 26 it obviously got flat and monotonous with some head wind.  No fun.  We hit North Plains and headed up into the hills on the southwest side of Skyline.  This was a longer gradual climb that went on for 4+ miles.  It hurt.  After 60+ miles behind us we dropped down to Hwy 30 on one of the best descents in town, Rocky Point road.  Very fun.  Overall a good days ride along 70 miles of mostly pleasant roads.

– Jeremy Barnaby, Partner and COO

Over the course of the next four months our staff will undergo a rigorous training and diet regime, pitting recruiters vs. recruiters and partners vs. partners in the name of competition.

Starting this today, stay tuned for all the insider information, including everything from workout playlists to training updates to the smack talk that has already started.

Team 1: Patent Pending

ATHLETE PROFILES:

Heidi Barnaby – half mile swim
Heidi spent her high school days either skiing down the slopes or tearing up the soccer field. Not only has she run two  marathons, but with multiple triathlons and Hood to Coast runs to her name she is hardly new to this game. But, if you ask Heidi, she’ll tell you her most impressive athletic feat is being a mother of two boys under age of seven.

Workout mantra – “It is a rough road that leads to the heights of greatness”…. we will be spending some time on the road.
Favorite athlete - Andre Agassi
Biggest threat on the other team – Art, the other team’s swimmer, since we are going head to head in the water.. or, actually, fin to fin.

Jeremy Barnaby – 19k cycle
As a t-ball Coach for Scappoose, Jeremy regularly deals with the intense pressures of competitive sports. Although he is a former high school wrestler with multiple triathlons and Hood to Coast runs under his belt, his passion is cycling, biking as far as Seattle to Portland. As with Heidi, Jeremy attributes his athleticism to the fact that he has to keep up with his two boys (both under the age of seven).

Workout mantra – Pain is temporary, quitting lasts a lifetime.
Favorite athlete – George St. Pierre
Biggest threat on the other team – The biggest threat is the ride itself.

Kevin Servino – 5k run
Kevin’s long and impressive history of high school athletics positions him as a fierce competitor. He was a 3 year high school varsity football player, co-captain and recipient of “Most Inspirational Player” award, as well playing 2 years of varsity basketball. Additionally, Kevin was a  member of the Oregon class 3A State Championship team (Astoria). Like Jeremy and Heidi, he now runs around with his boys, both below the age of five.

Workout mantra - Shake… and Bake
Favorite athlete – Walter Payton
Biggest threat on the other team – Enrique Washington, just the former collegiate record holder in the 800m for Seton Hall. But he is going down!!! But honestly, the real threat is that I will be recruited to join the U.S. Olympic team and have to leave the sport of Recruiting.

Team 2: Mo’GO™

ATHLETE PROFILES:

Cody Johns aka Ceej – 19k cycle
In high school Cody lit it up on the basketball court, ran cross-country and aced her serves on the tennis court.

Workout mantra – Keep going!!!!
Favorite athlete – Right now my favorite athlete is Ashley Fiolek, 5′ 2″ 18 year old fastest female motocross racer  — and she’s deaf.
Biggest threat on the other team – Jeremy because he has been putting in 60 mile rides on the weekend.

Elaine Lees – 5k run
Elaine’s claim to fame is having won a three legged race with her husband for three years in a row.

Workout mantra – This too shall pass.
Favorite athlete – Oprah.
Biggest threat on the other team - Kevin, he has been leaning up.

Enrique Washington aka Roadrunner – 5k run
Enrique is known for his victory at a sprint contest eating a box of Cheerios. His prize? Bruce Springstein box seats.

Workout mantra – Take out the competition!
Favorite athlete – Major Taylor.
Biggest threat on the other team – No one threatens me.

A successful team-based performance appraisal system will define and use appropriate performance measures and will incorporate useful approaches to assess team performance that include: direct measures of outcomes, multisource assessment and integrated assessments of objectives. Finally, communication is necessary to ensure clear performance expectations.

Successful team performance relies on three critical components in the appraisal process. These components are an absolute must when measuring teams and are not usually considered outside of the team environment. They are:

1. Supply an adequate system of information that can be utilized to impact the team’s success. It is difficult to successfully evaluate the team on its level of success when team members do not have all the information to be successful.
2. Provide the team with an opportunity to design its own measurement systems to address the contextual factors that impact performance but are beyond their control.
3. Combine direct measures of performance and multisource assessment into one an integrated assessment. This will allow the team members to understand and balance the needs of short-range team goals with the needs of long-term strategic goals of the organization.

Considerations to make regarding these areas to produce valid assessment for individual performance from these settings include the following.

1. Identification of relevant competencies and the communication of desired behaviors.  Behaviors related to self-management, communication, decision-making and collaboration are critical for the development of individual assessment in a team setting.
2. Establishing performance criteria that will account for contextual factors that impact team performance and individual performance.
3. Establishing a periodic review of evaluations to ensure ratings meet reasonable standards for reliable measurement. In addition, validity should be a part of the review process since conditions and work processes change.

If you’re interested in learning more, check out Performance Appraisal: State of the Art in Practice, by James W. Smither.

– Enrique Washington, Partner and CEO

I had the opportunity to meet Dr. Jac at a conference in the mid 1980s where the attendance for his session was a small but intense group of HR professionals.  At the time, his views were extremely unorthodox.  He wanted HR to be measured, improved and held accountable.  He wanted HR to be able to prove how it contributed to the bottom line.  Today it makes sense – back then he was talking heresy. It was a long hard road to advocate, educate and influence the business world, but several books, awards and successful companies later, he’s still going. Recently, he was cited as one of the 50 people in the past 50 years who has significantly changed what HR does and how it does it.

When I met him again, it was 20 years later. He was standing in our boardroom in Beaverton, Oregon greeting our team and considering becoming a part of an advisory group for our talent management software. I spoke with him of the earlier meeting and he told me that was the time when the Saratoga “Institute” was a desk in his bedroom.  From that desk he grew his benchmarking service to cover 2,000 companies in a dozen countries.

Today, Dr. Jac, is in his mid-70s. He sold the Saratoga Institute when he turned 65 but he did not retire. He formed a new company and continued his research. His latest book, due out in May, is entitled The New HR Analytics where he goes beyond benchmarking. As he explains, benchmarking is about the past and we can’t manage the past. In his new book, Dr. Jac reveals how to predict the continuing value of present and future human capital investments. I’m really looking forward to hearing his new methods and approach.

By the way, I could have hired Dr. Jac as a consultant to my company that first year I heard him speak.   I knew what he was onto would change the world of human resources – but, I hadn’t found my voice yet. I didn’t think I could convince my executives to spend the money it would have taken to hire him – but here’s the catch – I didn’t even ask. Did I miss a transformational moment? Or was it too ahead of its time? (as Dr. Jac says, it took many, many years, before people “got it.”)

As we’ve been talking to people about our new Talent Management practice, we’ve found people who don’t get it, too. It’s OK. We know we’re ahead of the curve. It’s a good place to be.

– Elaine Lees, Partner & VP Talent Management

One of the biggest complaints from internal recruiters and hiring managers is the quality of candidates.

Are you setting clear baseline requirements with your agency recruiter or representative? Express in direct terms that candidates must have A and B or they are not a fit. Create some dialogue around flexibility on the ideal candidate profile as well. Explain how a candidate with A, not B, but is really good at C, may be a fit and why. Giving clear requirements, in addition to what you’re willing to consider outside of those competencies, creates an accurate success profile for the recruiter to run with.

After scouring the internet and making a bunch of calls, many recruiters resort to sending over grey area candidates when they cant find the ideal person.  If they have absolute certainty that the person they want to submit will not be considered, they are much less likely to do so in the first place. And if they still submit those candidates, it might be time to reevaluate who you are partnering with. Also, request to see some benchmark resumes after your conversation.  This is a great way to see if the recruiter on the other end is getting the picture.  Plus it saves time because you wont waste a week while they’re out looking for the wrong person.

If you’re stranded on a tropical island, what’s the first thing you do? Look for low hanging fruit. The first steps most agency recruiters are going to take are:

1. Look at their network
2. Post the jobs
3. Search Monster, Dice, CareerBuilder and so on.

It’s a mixture of frustration and embarrassment when an awesome Monster resume comes over from an agency with a 25% markup on his or her head.  Pssst, if only you had spent that extra 10-15 minutes to look on Monster, cross your fingers no one finds out! Create a prayer shrine the hiring manager won’t dig the candidate either. This sort of thing invalidates paying for expensive tools like Monster and Career Builder in the first place. It’s easily avoidable and perhaps one of the most expensive oversights you can think of.  Before handing over your precious jobs, make sure all the base-line options are taken care of.  It will save you money and leave the more difficult and time consuming passive candidate generation to those savvy agency cats.  You are paying them an awful lot of money to do this, let’s make them work for it.  Once you have completed rolling out this strategy, make a list of the people you have or are in the process of considering.  Detail where you have posted and what resources you’ve tapped as well. Send this out with your request to agencies.  Now they know where you’ve been, thus saving them time on delivering you quality candidates you have not seen yet.  It is about partnering and making sure your hiring manager is a happy camper with quick results.

– Art Amela, Recruiter