I’m so excited! It’s time for me to host the famous Carnival of HR for the first time!

It’s also the midpoint of summer here in the US, meaning it’s almost time for the kiddos to head back to school (which according to Staples – and many parents – is the most wonderful time of the year), so I’ve got class schedules and degree programs on my brain as the parent of an incoming freshman at THE Ohio State University. (Go Buckeyes!)

In the spirit of education, I thought I’d whip up a quick online degree program for HR Pros, Recruiting Rockstars and Talent Management Geeks everywhere by organizing the great Carnival of HR submissions I received into an educational opportunity and featuring some great bloggers Teachers just for you!

So grab your assigned seat, take out your pen and paper, bring some chocolate an apple for your Host and check out all of the posts! I’m confident you’ll find some great new blogs and bloggers you’ve not yet discovered and you’ll also be a wiser and more educated professional for having done so.

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Corporate Culture

Leadership Belief and Building ‘People-Centric’ Culture – Professor Tanmay Vora of QAspire Blog.

Class Summary: The Leader’s choice to treat people as “humans” or as “resources” and how that can affect an organization’s culture.

The Perfect Corporate Culture Doesn’t Exist – Professor Jennifer V. Miller from The People Equation.

Class Summary: Explore how even the best of corporate cultures aren’t perfect.

Diversity & Inclusion

Inclusion Measurement – Tracking the Intangible – Professor Erik Samdahl of The Productivity Blog.

Class Summary: Learn some indirect measurements for gauging inclusion success in an organization.

The Act of Including – Professor Joe Gerstandt of Our Time to Act.

Class Summary: The not so fine line between being unintentionally exclusive versus being deliberate, intentional and proactive about being inclusive.

Employee Benefits

Survey Says: Employees Don’t Want Their Benefit Information Tweeted – Professor Lexi Ruben from the Precept Employee Benefits Blog.

Class Summary: To tweet or not to tweet benefits information? That is the question.

Employee Relations

Anniversaries Matter. Jobs Matter More. – Professor Kari Quaas of the Seasonal Human Resources Blog.

Class Summary: Don’t be schmucks.

Rehire Fired Employee? – Professor Susan M. Heathfield from the Human Resources Blog on About.com.

Class Summary: How following the recommended steps for firing an employee might influence that decision.

Why Do Companies Punish Whistleblowers? – Professor Suzanne Lucas from the Personal Success Blog on BNET.

Class Summary: Establishing a process for reporting and investigating problems within your company to keep communication lines open.

Global Human Resources

Future Imperative – Professor The HRD of My Hell is Other People.

Class Summary: Discuss the seismic changes taking place and globalization of work – and whether or not organizations are prepared.

Salary Inflation II – Professor Frank Mulligan of the Talent in China blog.

Class Summary: Explore the effects and consequences that recent increases in wages in China are having on the nation’s & region’s economy.

Upside of a Global Organization – Professor Amy Wilson from the TalentedApps team.

Class Summary: Learn about some of the challenges and tremendous leverage of working in global teams.

HR Technology

Top Three Challenges of Implementing an HR Automation Software – Professor Gireesh Sharma of the Grasp e-Marketing blog.

Class Summary: Review the top 3 challenges during the software implementation cycle based upon Gireesh’s experience.

Leadership

Make Sure You “Hug” Your Top Performers During Times of Change – Professor Dan McCarthy from Great Leadership.

Class Summary: The importance of not taking top performers for granted and making sure they know they’re valued.

Responsibility and Leadership – Professor Wally Bock of Three Star Leadership Blog.

Class Summary: When Dwight Eisenhower gave the order to launch the D-Day invastion, he faced the real possibility that things could go wrong. But he was willing to take the responsibility.

Stop Trying to Make Others Happy – Professor Mary Jo Asmus of Aspire Collaborative Services.

Class Summary: Personalizing rewards and recognition to motivate employees.

Legal & Compliance

Dear Evil Skippy: The FMLA Expands Family Trees – Professor Jim of Evil Skippy at Work.

Class Summary: FMLA definitions, communication and navigation. (Note: This required class is sure to be a riot. Good times.)

What You Need to Know About Floating Holidays – Professor Kim Urban of Kim’s HR Potpourri blog.

Class Summary: The intricacies of handling Floating Holidays in the state of California.

Organizational Psychology

Trains and Perception – Professor Steve Boese of Steve’s HR Technology blog.

Class Summary: What we call programs and activities in our organizations can influence the perception of their importance as well as the approach and enthusiasm of the people involved.

$5000 or a Stranger’s Happiness? - Professor Drew Tarvin of Humor That Works.

Class Summary: Learn how surrounding yourself with happy (or unhappy) people impacts you.

Performance Management

Performance Management is a TOOL and not a CHORE – Professor Cathy Missildine-Martin of Profitability Through Human Capital blog.

Class Summary: Decide whether Performance Appraisals should be 1 question, 3 questions or 435…

Recruiting

In Defense of Recruiters – Professor Bill Boorman of Norton Folgate: The Recruiting Unblog.

Class Summary: 5 ways to fix the process and build better relationships between Recruiters and HR departments.

The Need for Speed – Professor Mervyn Dinnen of T Recs.

Class Summary: Debate whether finding the “best” candidate for clients is hindered by expectations of speedy submissions.

Social Media for HR/Recruiting

Developing a Social Recruiting Strategy: From Bigot to Believer – Professor R.J. Morris substitute teaching for yours truly right here on the Unbridled Talent blog (good stuff in case you missed it).

Class Summary: Case study of one man and one company’s approach to developing a social recruiting strategy.

How to Get Started in Social Media with Mike Vandervort – led by Professor Ben Eubanks of UpStartHR.

Class Summary: Learn how HR practitioner Mike Vandervort is using social media to create a competitive advantage for his employer.

We’re Social Media Hippies Who Live in Mamby-Pamby Land. I can dig that. – Professor Kevin W. Grossman of HR Marketer Blog.

Class Summary: Explore the risks and the values of using social media in the workplace – while saying cool words like Mamby-Pamby.

Talent Management

If Lebron Went Corporate: A Cautionary Tale – Professor Aaron Ziff from the Respectful Workplace Blog. Class Summary: Talent management lessons from the real-world case study featuring basketball hero or zero (you decide) Lebron James.

Talent Management Best Practices for a Post-Recession World – Professor Lois Melbourne of Aquire.

Class Summary: Talent strategies to keep your top talent as the economy improves and employees have more choices.

There Is No “I” in “Team”. But There Is a “Me”. – Professor Benjamin McCall of ReThink HR.

Class Summary: Talent Management and succession planning lessons from the world of sports.

Tour de France’s Lessons for Human Resources and Management – Professor Michael D. Haberman from HR Observations.

Class Summary: Review some lessons from the Tour de France related to talent, teams and planning that are important for businesses today.

Talent Selection

How to Hire People Who Understand the Values of Your Organization – Professor Amit Bhagria of Young HR Manager.

Class Summary: Review a case study and examples of how to shift the focus of your interview process to asking questions that reveal a candidate’s self beliefs and value system.

Low Performers Are Laid Off First – Professor Chris Young of the Maximize Possibility Blog.

Class Summary: The importance of pre-employment assessment validity.

Winning the War on Talent – Professor Mark Stelzner of Inflexion Advisors.

Class Summary: Review a case study that could change sourcing, screening and assessment processes to ensure hiring candidates that match an organization’s culture.

Workforce Development/Career Management

Making Employees Career Competent – Professor Lance Haun of Rehaul.com.

Class Summary: HR’s role in helping today’s workforce develop new skills to improve employability.

New Generation – Professor Laura Schroeder of Working Girl blog.

Class Summary: Debate whether the new generation is owed an express ticket to executive management because they’re willing to work hard and have black belts in social media – or not.

Extra Credit/Self-Study

Ten Minutes with Vinnie Mirchandani – Industry Expert – brought to you by The Devon Group.

Class Summary: Hear from the author of the book “The New Polymath: Profiles in Compound-Technology Innovations”.

Top Summer Reading for Business Leaders – compiled by Professor Trish McFarlane, the HR Ringleader.

Class Summary: What thought leaders in HR, recruiting and academia are reading this summer.

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Whew! Well there you have it folks. A crash course in all things HR, Recruiting and Talent Management.

If you read all of the posts and passed the exams, give yourself a pat on the back. You just graduated from the Carnival of HR Online Degree Program! Now be sure to leave a comment on this post so I’ll know how many seats we’ll need at the graduation party…

Thanks to all who submitted great posts for the Carnival of HR! Next up, the August 4th Carnival will be hosted by Drew Tarvin at Humor That Works. Be sure to check it out!

In an effort to highlight HR, Recruiting and Talent Management professionals who are developing and implementing Innovative People Strategies every day in their workplaces, I’m starting a regular guest post series here on the Unbridled Talent blog to share some of their work and best practices. Today’s guest post is from R.J. Morris, the corporate Director of Staffing at McCarthy Building Companies, Inc. I first became aware of R.J. through reading his guest posts on Fistful of Talent and soon began following him on Twitter. My impression was that R.J. is a recruiting professional who “gets it” and I had the opportunity to confirm my suspicions when I met him in person at the recent Social Recruiting Summit at Best Buy in Minneapolis, MN.

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Nine months ago, I would tease my wife when she logged into her Facebook account after the kids went to bed. In a horribly superior tone, I would ask her if she was 15 and IM’ing her BFF. I was neither classy nor witty. Like my mom ten years ago when she talked about “that internet thing,” I sounded like a complete idiot—a social media bigot, if you will. Thankfully, my wife is a very cool lady and recognized that I made fun of Facebook because I did not understand it. These days, I write guest blog posts, tweet and am helping to implement social recruiting in my organization.

Now? My wife makes fun of me daily.

How do you go from bigot to believer? I was, of course, initially afraid I had missed the boat. I kept hearing that companies were using social media to drive recruiting and business results—my limited exposure to Facebook made it seem like it was a tool that told me “Sally’s excited about shopping today” or “Heather has completed the Bugs Collection” on Farmville. Twitter? That was for folks who wanted to follow Ashton and Britney. I was hopeless and overwhelmed.

Thankfully, the social media community is very welcoming, and I began to learn. Progressive HR professionals were soon interacting with me, offering outstanding knowledge and resources. The challenge was how to translate that knowledge to the business that I support. “Look how much professional development I get from colleagues on Twitter,” is quite different than, “Here’s why we think we need to develop and implement a social media strategy across multiple communication channels supporting distinct organizational goals.”

We still don’t have it all figured out. We are trying to be deliberate, not splashy. Our team is responsible for recruiting activities nationwide, so we looked through that prism. LinkedIn was a safe first play. Executives at the company understood the tool, and many were active on the site. For our recruiting efforts, LinkedIn has tools that aligned well with our sourcing strategy, so we went there first. It is, of course, the least social/most controlled network, but it allowed us to establish a presence outside of the corporate website and show some results.

Facebook was next. Yep, my wife enjoyed mercilessly making fun of me each night as I logged on to check out competitors and review top page designs. Mashable became a good friend as we matched user demographics to our national recruiting strategy. I was scared that selling Facebook as a recruiting tool to a conservative organization in a down economy would be tough. Nope. I work with smart people, and they quickly saw the potential power. They realized we were going to have a social media presence regardless—either we would be heavily involved in crafting that presence, or someone else would.

Next up is integrating Twitter and an employee blog to make our people more accessible as we tell our story and show off who we are. We are also reviewing communication material we developed for internal use over the past 12 months—much of that can be leveraged to ensure we can share ongoing and engaging content.

Like most companies, we are still figuring social recruiting out. When we did not know anything about social media, I was upset and felt we were behind. Now, we realize we are working with emerging communication platforms with dynamic rules and usage—getting social recruiting integrated is a process. When I talk with companies that want to start, I tell them to engage with people in the community and learn.

And, no matter what, don’t make fun of people for using the tools.

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R. J. Morris is the corporate Director of Staffing at McCarthy Building Companies, Inc. – an ENR Top 10 building company based in St. Louis, Missouri. McCarthy has offices and projects nationally and they recruit really smart people who want to join a company where everyone is an owner.  R. J. is responsible for leading and directing all national recruiting activities using both tried and true old school tactics and the implementing the latest methods (including social recruiting) to support the growth needs of the organization.

The 2010 SHRM Annual Conference is officially in the bag and after making my way back across the country, I’ve taken some time to reflect on the conference, the experience and what I took away from it all. There will be more information to share in the coming days, but as someone who attends quite a few conferences, I can safely say that this was one of the best that I’ve been to!

To share some of the highlights of my experience, I thought I’d give out some Awards – all voted on and selected by a committee comprised of yours truly. So without further adieu, I present to you, the first annual (assuming I get to go back) SHRMmys!

Category: General Session/Keynote Speakers

Best Keynote Speaker – Marcus Buckingham. If you’re a fan of the strengths-based movement, have read any of Buckingham’s books or have seen or heard him speak before, Marcus didn’t share anything new. What he did do was focus his talk on the audience (HR pros) in an entertaining and engaging way. It doesn’t hurt that he’s pretty handsome, speaks with an English accent and used lots of humor. The ladies weren’t the only ones who noticed. There were quite a few Marcus #fanboys in attendance as well.

Most Surprising Speaker – Al Gore. The former “next President of the United States” skipped the Power Point for his keynote on the second day and won over the audience with a talk that was about 75% focused on challenges and issues that businesses and HR pros are facing  today. He lost a little momentum when he moved into sustainability and global warming, but that was brief and not unexpected for a guy who won a Pulitzer Prize and an Oscar for his work in that area.

Rising Star - Ray Jefferson. In his brief moment before the keynote by Steve Forbes, Mr. Jefferson was well-spoken and inspiring, speaking directly to the audience and calling for HR to make a difference by hiring our nation’s Heroes. “In this time where it’s critical to do more with less, it’s more important than ever to hire great talent.” More than a few attendees suggested that Mr. Jackson would have been a better choice for the opening session speaker.

Best Speaker at Some Other Conference – Steve Forbes. Someone forgot to tell Steve that this was the largest HR conference in the world, not a stop on his 1996 or 2000 Presidential bid tours. We definitely need to understand business/economic issues in HR, but an inspirational/actionable keynote this was not.

Category: Exposition Hall

Best Booth – Since I was a part of the #monsterlive Social Media Street Team, I’ll recuse myself here, but let’s just say the Monster booth was pretty awesome. Check out my Behind the Scenes Tour of the Monster.com SHRM10 booth before the Expo Hall opened and I’ll let you be the judge.

Most Intriguing Booth – Corporate Lactation Services, Inc. With a tag line like “Professional Excellence in Corporate Lactation”, what’s not to love about this entry? In my book, they deserve an Award just for that.

Best Swag – iPads dominated the giveaways and drawings, but branded USB’s, hand sanitizer and carryalls useful to haul tons of swag that can be repurposed as “green” grocery bags ranked high on my list.

Most Coveted Swag – The focused swag grabbers quickly headed for the headgear (Dr. Suess style hats, toboggans, crowns, etc.), Hawaiian leis and Monster Trump dolls. Where this stuff ends up is anyone’s guess, but on Sunday night, they were “must-have” items.

Lamest Swag – Nothing says “we’re in the low budget section” like having a booth full of pens, key chains and refrigerator magnets. My recommendation? Spend less money next year and buy one i__ (insert name of hot Apple product) and do a drawing for a giveaway. You get names for lead generation and up your cool factor exponentially.

Category: Event Coverage

Best Official Event Coverage – SHRM. From the official Conference Daily’s waiting outside hotel room doors in the morning to General Session opening videos (including 3 attendee’s journeys to the event, the opening session Flash Mob and Undercover Boss with SHRM CEO Lon O’Neil and Board Chair Robb Van Cleave) – everything was top-notch. SHRM also embraced social media coverage this year with the implementation of the first “official SHRM Blog Squad”, the first tweet from the SHRM CEO and SHRM10TV “On the Couch” interviews with Manager of PR & Social Media Relations Curtis Midkiff in the Social Media Lounge.

Best Video Coverage – The SmartBrief.com/Monster.com Interview series. SmartBrief Senior Editor on Workforce Mary Ellen Slayter and the MonsterThinking crew teamed up to offer a high-quality, informative and well-done video interview series with HR thought leaders, authors and bloggers like Libby Sartain, Gerry Crispin, Dave Ulrich, Nicole Williams and more. Extremely well done and a great resource archive!

Best Social Media Coverage – Monster.com went all out this year to provide coverage for SHRM10 from an attendee’s point of view through blogging, vlogging and tweeting. Ben Eubanks and I were fortunate to be a part of the #monsterlive Social Media Street team and were encouraged to tweet, blog, video and comment on the conference activities in our own voices and as practitioners to provide a sense of what it was like to be there for those unable to attend. I was super impressed with the planning and effort that went into the Street Team coverage, as well as the participation of the Monster crew – SVP of Global Communications & Social Media Janet Swaysland, VP of Client Adoption Eric Winegardner, Director of Social Media Relations Kathy O’Reilly, Social Media Relations Manager Matt Charney and Manager, Client Training Lisa Watson – and therefore can’t take them out of the running for the top prize in this category just because I was involved. Well done!

Rising Stars – Laurie Ruettimann and Jennifer McClure. (Yay!) While trolling the Expo Hall on the first night doing video interviews with attendees, Laurie and I happened upon SHRM Board Chairman Robb Van Cleave and snagged an exclusive interview with him, where we “broke news” about the next day’s General Session speaker. I’m sure he’ll never forget us and will always cherish the sombrero that Laurie gifted him with at the end. As budding serious journalists, we’re now looking for Agents to handle all of the requests for live event coverage…

Best Blog Coverage – Charlie Judy of HR Fishbowl and John Hollon of TLNT.com. A fixture in the Press Lounge with headphones and game face, Charlie was on fire covering the event with speedy and insightful commentary and observations. John Hollon brings a seasoned journalist slant to his coverage of the conference each year ripping Steve Forbes, praising Al Gore and summing up his thoughts in straightforward posts.

Most Tweets – For sheer volume, it was a close race between Jessica Miller-Merrell of Blogging4Jobs.com and myself. Hopefully, our followers and those keeping up with the #shrm10 hashtag found some value in the volumes of information and observations that we shared.

Best Twitter Coverage – Eric Winegardner and Mark Stelzner. It’s always a pleasure to follow Eric and Mark at any event that they attend. Both are able to provide useful, informative, critical and often hilarious insights in 140 characters or less. Favorite tweets include Eric’s observation following SHRM CEO Lon O’Neil’s Tweetup announcement and Mark heading off the rails during a “social media is evil” session.

Funniest Tweets – Laurie Ruettimann. Laurie’s Twitter stream is a riot most any day, but at conferences, she can be particularly fun to follow. She does a great job of sharing her cynical and educated views in few words and hilarious photos on Twitter.

Category: Social/Networking Events

Best Party – The SHRM / Monster Social Tweetup & Afterparty. This was the first year for SHRM to hold a Tweetup and they teamed with the Tweetup experts – Monster.com. From the bacon chocolate cupcakes, drinks with glowing neon ice cubes, swag bags for attendees and lively networking, this event was first class in every way. Check out photos from the evening and see for yourself.

Best Entertainment – Hall & Oates. For all of the pre-conference bashing that the Hall & Oates choice received, there were plenty of attendees who were jazzed about showing up to hear the duo sing classics such as Private Eyes, Maneater and Rich Girl. While I didn’t personally care to relive the 80’s by attending, those who did all had a great time.

So there you have it, my picks for the 2010 SHRM Annual Conference. If you’re a winner, we’re reducing our carbon footprint and going “green” this year, so consider this a virtual high five for your efforts.

Overall, it was a well-organized event in a fantastic location. I’m already looking forward to SHRM 2011 in Las Vegas!

What Awards did I miss? Award some of your own in the Comments!

Day 1 of the 2010 SHRM Annual Conference in San Diego, California is in the books and in my opinion, it’s off to a great start!

In the Opening Session, the event kicked off with a surprise Flash Mob dance before SHRM President & CEO Lon O’Neil and SHRM Board Chairman Robb Van Cleaves welcomed everyone and shared that attendance for this year’s event is up over 4,000 from 2009 – topping 11,000 attendees and including over 800 international members from 73 countries!

O’Neil and Cleaves were followed by a brief message from Assistant Secretary for Veteran’s Employment & Training Services – Ray Jefferson, a true American Hero who lost all five fingers on one hand while serving his country and protecting his teammates from a hand grenade prematurely detonating. Jefferson offered up one of my favorite quotes of the day – “The death of a dream can be the birth of a destiny”. Nice.

Next up, O’Neil introduced SHRM’s “We Know Next” initiative, positioning HR at the center of changes taking place in business today. He also encouraged HR professionals to use the latest communications tools like LinkedIn and Twitter (yeah, Twitter!). He’s even jumped on Twitter himself and you can follow him at @SHRMCEO.

Steve Forbes was this year’s Opening Session keynote and while his talk sent a few heading for the doors early and a few in my row to focus on the back of their eyelids, when I spoke to many of the attendees later on the Exhibit Hall floor, several mentioned that they really enjoyed what he had to say and felt his talk was very good. Blogger John Hollon begged to differ and quickly shared his thoughts via a post on the new (and very good) HR & Talent Management site TLNT.com – illustrating the challenge of an organization as large as SHRM to find a speaker that can please everyone. They can’t.

After the Opening Session, it was time to hit the SHRM Exposition. This year, I’m attending the conference as part of the Monster.com Social Media Street Team and my goal was to capture some of the sights and sounds of the chaos in the Expo Hall once the doors were opened. I was lucky enough to grab Laurie Ruettimann of Punk Rock HR for some commentary on various vendors and their swag and I’ll share a video of her adventures at a future date. (It’s late here ya’ll.) I also did over 20 brief video interviews with some interesting folks I stopped throughout the evening to ask about their plans for the conference or just to comment on their copious or outrageous swag finds. Below are a couple of my favorites that give a flavor of what it’s like. (Email subscribers – click here to view.)

Stay tuned for more live coverage of SHRM 2010 here on Unbridled Talent from me, and follow the conversation via Twitter using the hashtag #shrm10 and #monsterlive. You’ll also find posts daily from the Monster.com Social Media Street Team on the Monster Thinking blog, from fellow Street Team member Ben Eubanks on Upstart HR and the SHRM Blog Squad over at the official SHRM Conference Blog!

Image Credit 1.00 FTE - Impressions of Corporate Life

Several years ago, back when I was working “in the trenches” as an HR Manager in an organization experiencing an insane amount of growth, I often partnered with an outside consulting firm to assist us with various recruiting, leadership development and training initiatives.

Once, during a training session led by the firm’s owner – a wise and engaging gentleman with almost 40 years of combined experience in the corporate and consulting worlds – I remember thinking:

“He’s got the best job in the world. Some day, I want to run my own business too.”

And at that moment, an entrepreneur was born. [cue heavenly music]

But I still had so much to learn…

Fast forward several more years (and no, not over 40 for those of you doing mental math) through a career in Human Resources leadership roles, a second career as an Executive Recruiter and Executive Coach and a third as a professional speaker and trainer – it’s finally time to take that step.

Ladies and gentlemen… Please allow me to introduce my new company – Unbridled Talent, LLC!

Want to learn more about Unbridled Talent?

Below is a short interview (click here if you can’t see the video) I did recently after speaking at the Louisville, KY SHRM Chapter’s monthly luncheon and also leading an afternoon workshop on Using Social Media in HR & Recruiting. In the video, I share a little about my background, a smidge about Unbridled Talent and a bit of my theory on why HR and Recruiting pros need to use social media – all in under 3 minutes!

I’m excited to be able to create a role and a business where I can combine my experiences in Human Resources, Recruiting, Coaching, Leadership, Speaking and Training into one title – President of Unbridled Talent, LLC. It’s the right time for me personally and I also believe it’s a perfect time to work with companies and business leaders to develop and execute Innovative People Strategies!

So here’s a few updates and changes I’d like to share with you:

• This blog has moved! With the help and patience of the fab Lance Haun, I’ve made the change from TypePad to WordPress, and the name of the blog and site address have also changed to Unbridled Talent and http://unbridledtalent.com/blog. If you’re a subscriber via email or RSS (and if you’re not, I’d love for you to subscribe for automatic updates here or here), then nothing should have changed for you. The feeds still deliver – and during the changeover delivered multiple times. (oops.)

• There’s a new website and logo – and new business cards that arrived this week! The website is up and running, but will be evolving. I’m a big believer in getting the right expertise involved to create amazing things, so Elaine Suess at beyondbeing llc (who also developed the new logo) will be working with me to make sure that the messaging, benefits of working with us and service offerings are crisp and on point.

• We’re on Facebook! My goal is to provide unique and personal content on Unbridled Talent’s Facebook Page as well as resources related to Attracting, Recruiting, Developing and Engaging Talent. Trust me, it won’t be just a feed of posts from this blog. There will be pictures, videos and “behind the scenes” content that you won’t see elsewhere. I’d love it if you’d “Like” it!

• We’re on Twitter! You can still find me on Twitter at @cincyrecruiter and I’ll still be as lovable or annoying (you decide) there as ever. My Twitter strategy has always been to share resources, learn, connect with people, connect people to other people and to be myself – so that won’t change. By following @UnbridledTalent, you’ll get even more resources and information – not duplicate posts of stuff you’ll see if you’re following me elsewhere. It’s my goal to be a valuable source of information in the areas of Talent Attraction, Innovative Recruiting & Sourcing Strategies and People Development – not just noise.

• My LinkedIn Profile has been updated (if we’re not connected – connect with me!) to reflect my new role, new company and my continued partnership with the fine people at Centennial, Inc. Centennial’s clients often use them as a resource and for assistance with Talent Strategy issues and many of my clients and relationships need Executive Search and Career Coaching Services, so we believe a continued partnership is mutually beneficial. I’m very grateful to the team at Centennial for being extremely helpful and supportive of me in taking this step and I’m excited that we’ll be continuing to work together in the future!

Where We Go From Here

I had much to learn back when I first made the decision to start my own business some day — and thankfully, I still do. I thoroughly enjoy being a student learning from others within the industry and then sharing what I’ve learned with my clients and relationships.

I hope that you’ll join me on this next phase of my journey. Because now, the person who has the best job in the world is… ME!

_________________

Note:

Stay tuned here on Unbridled Talent, “Like” the Facebook Page and follow us on Twitter to catch my coverage this week of the SHRM 2010 Annual Conference in San Diego June 26 – June 30th. I’ll be there as a member of the Monster.com Social Media Street Team / #monsterlive blitz. We’ll be sharing highlights and what’s happening so you can be there – if you couldn’t “be there”.

It’s possible that you may even see more than one post a day on the blog during this next week. Don’t faint. And please don’t unsubscribe.

Today’s guest post is from Steve Browne – Executive Director of Human Resources at LaRosa’s, Inc. – a regional Pizzeria restaurant chain employing over 1,400 Team Members. Unable to attend the HRevolution 2010 UnConference held this past weekend in Chicago, IL due to family obligations, Steve kept up with the discussion via the #HRevolution hashtag on Twitter. His post conference thoughts as an HR practitioner and passionate member of his profession are below.

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I am so geeked after following #HRevolution this week on Twitter and also reading many of the “Post Revolution” blogs. Really, that’s not just shameless flattery.

You see, I’m an HR practitioner!!

And, may I add, I am unabashedly proud and passionate about that, and Human Resources in general!!

All of the pieces I’ve read have made me even more insanely jealous that I wasn’t able to attend this wildly successful UnConference. I wanted to meet the folks I’m connected with on Twitter and be part of an HR Think Tank. It is brilliant and I hope it truly is only the start of a continued effort to gather thought leaders who are changing the face of a profession. It’s a healthy forum and I’m so encouraged that it hasn’t fallen into the traps that a traditional environment can offer.

The one thread I keep reading through the summaries is “What do we do next?” or “What do I do next?”.

That’s an obvious response to the great energy that was created and it is another encouraging sign that this isn’t going to be some short-lived fad or electronic supernova.

As someone who didn’t go, let me offer this as a possible “next step”:

We need to bridge the gap between the HR practitioner and the Social Media folks who are constantly putting out more and more phenomenal material and resources.

I can hear the “Duh!” from you as the reader already!

However, your “Duh!” isn’t being heard or read. You see, I’m one of those odd HR practitioners who is connected and loves it. The VAST majority of my peers aren’t connected, don’t “know how” to be and many are frankly (and mistakenly) afraid to be connected.

This isn’t a social media thing. It’s just exponentially more visible now how entrenched and hidden HR has become. People are more afraid of what to do to the point that they are paralyzed by this both within their organizations and in their profession.

Countless blogs, articles and sessions take HR and bemoan its shortcomings, faults and predicted demise.  Makes you want to go into the field – doesn’t it?

I think the contrary. This is the MOST exciting time to be in HR and #HRevolution proves that. The question is:

“Are the most connected HR voices going to continue to communicate with each other – or are they willing to step forward to be evangelists to the masses who aren’t connected?”

It’s so cool talking with folks around the globe through Social Media, but I’m already noticing that I’m talking to the same people (and so are you). How can we be evangelists? Is someone (or a group of people) willing to do this?

I think that it’s not only needed for HR, but for the people who are the thought leaders as well. I would love to see a list of Connectors who are HR practitioners go where the other practitioners are (chapter meetings, state conferences, SHRM National) and preach the “message” of where the future of HR is going and how to get connected. We can’t keep trying to reach them on Twitter if they don’t have an account!

#HRevolution brought together a great gathering of people who already share some forum of common space in Social Media. It’s time to build the bridge to the “New World” and show the profession the value of what’s being done. I’m excited and putting on my evangelist sandals even now . . .

What’s your next step?

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Steve Browne, SPHR is an HR pro who is passionate about connecting people. He runs an internet message board – (the HR Net) – with over 5,500 global subscribers  and facilitates monthly HR Roundtable meetings in Cincinnati. Steve actively serves on the Ohio HR Conference Committee and is also a popular speaker at HR Conferences, HR Associations and business/community groups. His HR street cred includes serving as a past President of the Greater Cincinnati Human Resources Association and being named HR Professional of the Year in Greater Cincinnati.

Want to be a part of the HR Net? Let Steve know! Follow him on Twitter at @sbrownehr.

The original Social Media Revolution video from July 2009 was quite “revolutionary” and has been viewed over 1.8 million times. I’ve personally seen it about 10,000 times at the beginning of various presentations on social media and the background music is on a continuous loop in my brain. But it’s full of amazing and interesting information, and thankfully has finally been updated with new stats and figures.

If you’re still of the mindset that you can wait for this stuff to blow over, maybe this new video will cause you to think again…

Email subscribers click here to see to view the video.)

Some interesting stats from the video include:

• Facebook now tops Google for weekly traffic in the U.S.
• 80% of companies use social media for recruitment
• YouTube is the 2nd largest search engine in the world
• Wikipedia has over 15 million articles
• There are over 200 million blogs
• 25% of search results for the world’s Top 20 largest brands are links to user generated content
• 78% of consumers trust Peer recommendations – only 14% trust advertisements

The current and future implications that social media has on your Talent Attraction methods, Recruiting processes and Employee Development systems are huge.

Are you ready?

You may have heard this phrase before:

“It’s not who you know… but who knows you – and what they say about you.”

I believe that statement is very true, but since we live in an increasingly online world, maybe it should be modified to:

“It’s not who you know, or what they say about you… it’s what Google says about you.”

Case in point – a short email I received last week:

Wondering if Curt was on to something, I Googled the phrase “best recruiter in the world” and here’s what I found:

The first two unpaid hits out of over 2,200 results came from a tongue-in-cheek post on this blog from July 2009:

I’m no SEO expert, but I did choose the title intentionally back then, assuming that it’s possible people (ideally client companies) sometimes go to Google and start with that phrase when looking for a Recruiter. A long shot I know. But nothing ventured, nothing gained right? As someone responsible for developing my own business, I try to use every option available to me.

Looks like my title strategery worked a little better than I expected – or at least it worked well enough to give me a laugh. And Curt got a nice response for being a little more creative than the too often used – “I see you’re a Recruiter. Can you help me find a job?”

This cheeky little example was a good reminder for me of how important it is to be mindful of what I put out there on the interwebs. Like it or not, your credibility (and mine) is being judged every day by people searching Google (and other search engines) who are finding your blog posts, tweets, LinkedIn profile, etc.

Thankfully, Google got it right this time.

Let’s be careful out there…

As you can probably tell, I really enjoy speaking to groups and traveling to various places to meet new people. Recently on her blog, my friend and HR Blogger Lisa Rosendahl asked for some suggestions to help her overcome The Anti-Speaking Demon. I responded in the comments with a short novelette that I thought I’d also republish here, since it may be helpful to others interested in developing as a speaker as well.

*

To get started, I’d suggest making people in your network aware that you’re interested in speaking to some groups and some examples of topics you could talk about or do a workshop/seminar on. You’ll likely be surprised at how many opportunities are out there – especially if you’re willing to speak for free. Once you’ve gotten several under your belt, you’ll likely be referred and recommended to other groups who are willing to pay you for your time and expertise.

Beyond your network, here’s a few additional resources I’d suggest contacting:

1)  Schools or universities in your area. Usually, the Career Development offices are dying to connect students to business leaders who can talk to them about what it’s like in the “real world” and also provide networking and job search tips.

2)  Job search support groups or networking groups in your community – In Cincinnati, there are a number of groups that meet regularly to help people in career transition. Most have a speaker as part of their meetings and they’re thrilled to have someone from HR/Recruiting come to talk with them and answer questions about how to approach their job search.

3)  Check with your local HR Association or Recruiting groups. While most local chapters tend to book their lunch speakers months in advance (and it seems they like to book out of town speakers to add some “cred”), it’s likely they’d be interested in having someone in the trenches like you offer to provide a seminar, breakfast or lunch talk about one of the many topics you could speak on.

A few more tips:

1)  Add a Speaking page to your blog. List topics you can or have spoken about. Not only will your blog readers find you that way (and you’ll get opportunities from it I’m sure), but you’ll also get found through search engines. My Speaking/Workshops page on my blog gets daily traffic and more than once I’ve booked a speaking gig because someone Googled “Using Social Media in HR & Recruiting” or “Using LinkedIn for Job Search”, etc. and landed on my blog. I’ve also gotten interview requests from magazines, radio shows, etc. through being found by this page.

2)  Add that you’re a speaker, or open to speaking, on your LinkedIn profile. Same as above, I’ve booked speaking engagements and interviews as a result of being found on LinkedIn.

3)  Don’t be shy about asking attendees to write a recommendation for you on LinkedIn if they found your talk to be of value. I’ve not been comfortable with asking myself, but I know several speakers who have tons of great recommendations on their profiles – because they asked. Once your LinkedIn network starts seeing recommendations pop up for your speaking, you’ll start getting more requests to speak. Subtle marketing works.

4)  Bring your own evaluation sheets if the group doesn’t provide one. The feedback will not only help you understand what resonated with the audience, but also what you can improve upon. As you start speaking more and filling out Speaker Proposals, often they ask for evaluation results from some recent engagements.

5)  Eventually make sure you get a good video of you speaking to a group. Same as #4, it will help you see what you do well and what you need to improve and it’s also frequently requested for more high profile speaking opportunities.

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Where You Can Find Me

Since some of you may subscribe
to this blog via
RSS (I hope you ARE a subscriber!), you may not have noticed the link
on my blog to the Speaking/Training/Workshops page before. Take a
look there, and you’ll notice that April, May & June are thankfully
shaping up to be pretty busy for me as a Speaker including:

RecruitCamp
- Raleigh, NC – April 22, 2010. Thanks to RecruitingBlogs.com
I’ll be leading a session at this event and I’m looking forward to the
Keynote by my friend Laurie Ruettimann of Punk Rock HR!

HRevolution
- Chicago, IL – May 7 – 8, 2010. Special thanks to Lisa Rosendahl
for asking me to co-lead a session on “Can HR Be Trusted” to continue
the discussion started with my recent post. (This should be good – can’t wait!)

Louisville
Kentucky SHRM Chapter – June 8, 2010. Thanks to a recommendation
from Crystal Peterson, I’ll be joining LSHRM as their
luncheon speaker and also leading an afternoon workshop on Using Social
Media in HR.

I’m also super excited about speaking
at the Ohio HR Conference in September thanks a connection
from my friend Steve Browne and also the Sm@rt Social Media
Conference Reno/Tahoe in December thanks to Dr. Bret L. Simmons.

You’ll notice in the engagements I’ve highlighted,
there was at least one person from my network who helped me to connect
with the opportunity. I’m grateful to each of these people and appreciate their support very much. My network rocks and if you’ll be attending any of these events, I’d love to meet you in
person to get to know you as well!

*

What did I miss? What would you
recommend to someone interested in developing their speaking skills or
becoming a professional speaker? I’d like to learn from you!

Ah, it’s April Fool’s Day and the pranks and jokes are flying in offices all around the world and especially on the Interwebs. Hey, I’m a Fan of fun and a decent practical joke, but having a specific day unofficially sanctioned for these activities means that it’s not safe to go on the internet, step out of your house or speak to any of your friends.

Bah. Humbug.

Of course I may be jaded a bit after a good (or was it bad) trick that was played on me (and quite a few others) a couple of years ago. I had just caved in and finally joined Twitter (on March 26, 2008 to be exact) after reading this post from Jim Stroud indicating there were only 85 recruiters were using it. A few days later, on April 1st, I started my day as usual and noticed a tweet from Scott Allen, mentioning a post on his Linked Intelligence blog with a big announcement from LinkedIn – that they were eliminating their free service as of May 1, 2008.

Immediately after reading the post, I spun into a tizzy. How could they do this? I’d been using the free version of LinkedIn for a couple of years and had also spent a considerable amount of time teaching and encouraging other professionals – especially job seekers – to sign up and get involved. I knew that many of these people wouldn’t be willing to pay for the service and as a result, its usefulness would soon be gone.

I sent Scott a couple of tweets asking how this could happen. No response. I searched the internet for the “official LinkedIn announcement” that was referenced in the post. Nothing. I Googled, went to LinkedIn related Forums and scoured the LinkedIn site and blog. After losing far too much time and productivity, I went back to Scott’s post (which has since been removed – bad for LinkedIn SEO I guess) to see if I could find more information there. As I scrolled down to the bottom just above the comments, in very tiny font, I saw this:

*April Fools

I was mad. And frustrated. I’d lost a lot of time and productivity (my fault – not Scott’s) by following this April Fool’s boondoggle. But after I thought about it a bit, I was thankful. It was a great wake up call to remind myself that I must be sure to never depend on any one tool or any one thing that is controlled by someone else to manage my relationships and do my job.

So thanks for the Punk Scott! I deserved it – and I even learned from it.

Now if you want to see some good April Fool’s hijinks, this one is perfect. (Link to the picture referenced is here.) Couldn’t have happened to a better target guy.