Thought Leadership from Ben Baran Ph.D., top management consultant in Ohio, educator, speaker. Expert in high reliability organizations, organizational agility, leadership training based on military, leadership methodologies, human resource strategy, human resource management, latest science on human resources.
Feel free to check out any of the content I have here, but also be sure to check out my newest content at Reckoning and Elevating What Works.
On Nov. 1, 2018, about 450 people from manufacturing, education, the public sector, and other organizations at the intersection of workforce matters and the manufacturing industry met in Columbus, Ohio, at the Ohio Manufacturers’ Workforce Summit 2018.
Read MoreThe future of human resources (HR) lies at the intersection of strategy, data analytics, design thinking, and a new set of practices and mindsets ushered in by the world of agile methods and organizational agility writ large.
And the time is ripe for HR professionals to have the bandwidth necessary to devote themselves to such matters. Numerous HR services—particularly those that are
Read MoreExciting changes in the world of human resources (HR) abound. As noted by Stephen Barley (University of California Santa Barbara), Beth Bechky, and Frances Milliken (both of New York University) in their recent article in Academy of Management Discoveries,
“Few people would deny that the nature of work and employment has changed over the last four decades, not only in the United States but in many countries worldwide. Moreover, the nature of work is likely to continue to change as we move further into the 21st century.”
Such changes make HR work continually dynamic, with evolving practices with regard to new technologies, the increasing prevalence of contingent workers, and more. Barley and his coauthors also mention the rise of artificial intelligence and the rise of project-based work as fundamental shifts that will influence careers and even how people think about themselves in relation to their organizations and society.
These changes alone are enough to keep HR leaders and other executives up at night.
Yet I wonder
Read MoreRecently, I had the wonderful opportunity to engage with hundreds of people from around the world as part of a webcast titled, "What Everyone in HR Needs to Know About Change." The Human Capital Institute (HCI) hosted the webcast, and afterward, HCI gave me the recorded version so that I could share it with people who weren't able to join the live presentation.
Here it is--enjoy.
Read MoreModels for planning and executing organizational change abound—for example, Kotter’s eight steps, among many others. These models are helpful in highlighting many of the critical aspects of organizational change, and I highly recommend immersing yourself in them.
That being said, I find that such models often deal more with planned organizational change than with unplanned or continuous organizational change.
And in an increasingly turbulent world, it’s important for human resources (HR) professionals and the HR function overall to
Read MoreI spend a fair amount of time around the human resources (HR) profession. Sometimes, that’s in the form of consulting and problem-solving alongside HR leaders; other times it’s through research or teaching graduate students. I’m also an HR officer in the U.S. Navy Reserve, and I maintain my HR certifications like thousands of other HR people.
But I’m often critical of HR. That’s not at all because I think HR people aren’t doing good work; rather, I think every profession should be critical of itself in an attempt to improve continually and stay relevant. We should all be on the lookout for how we can get better at what we do and how we do it.
In particular for HR, I see two areas in which HR could improve substantially.
Read MoreMy fascination with the military—and the U.S. Navy, in particular—started before I was 10 years old. And during the decade between then and when I was commissioned as an officer in 2002, I acquired a whole set of ideas about what actually being in the Navy would be like.
These ideas came from books, movies, stories from veterans and myriad other information sources around me.
Some of those ideas turned out to be accurate; others weren’t. For example, most of what you experience on a day-to-day basis in the U.S. Navy—especially if you’re a ship driver like I was—bears little to no resemblance to Maverick’s job as a fighter pilot in the 1986 movie Top Gun.
But other patterns of behavior such as respect for rank structure, commitment to teammates, and aspects of selfless leadership that I’d learned about turned out to be
Read MoreIt’s easy to fall into patterns and comfortable routines.
Some of those are great. Take, for example, dental hygiene. Or strength training.
But if our routines too often keep us around the same people, we run the risk of stagnating. It’s even worse if we’re isolated—or insulated, depending on how you look at it—from other ideas.
That’s one reason why I enjoy professional conferences. Even if you’re around people in a similar area of expertise or interest, you’ll learn a great deal from their different perspectives and experiences.
Last week, I spent a few days at the annual conference of the Society for Industrial and Organizational Psychology (SIOP) in Anaheim, Calif. And in between all of the
Read MoreIn four weeks from today, I’ll be enjoying the company of thousands of organizational psychologists at this year’s annual conference of the Society for Industrial and Organizational Psychology (SIOP) in Anaheim, Calif. This is a fun-loving crowd. It’s probably also one of the few crowds in which you’ll find passionate debates about topics such as psychometrics, leadership assessments or classical test theory.
At last year’s conference, in fact, a structured debate took place on the topic of performance appraisals. Yes, you read that correctly.
Read MoreIn a recent post and in some of my research, I’ve been exploring the role that human resources (HR) plays in organizational change. This includes both HR as a function and HR professionals themselves as they get involved (either proactively or reactively) in change efforts.
And there’s one key aspect of organizational change that I think is helpful for HR people to consider.
Read MoreIs human resources (HR) the organizational function that must lead when dealing with organizational change?
Or is managing change a fundamental leadership competency that a wide array of people from every function should have or develop? If that’s the case, should HR professionals themselves try to be change agents?
What works best in organizations that are dealing with a particularly turbulent business environment?
These are a few of the questions that I had the pleasure of discussing last week in a lively conversation in Cincinnati with
Read MoreOne increasingly common trend is, well, trend reports. Professional organizations, research firms and consultancies frequently publish what they see as the latest developments or top predictions for the future. Depending on the source, these trend reports can be thought-provoking and insightful.
At the very least, I find it interesting to see what various leaders see on the horizon.
Recently, three
Read MorePositive thinking is sometimes overrated. In fact, too much positive thinking can be disastrous. While optimism can help people and organizations bounce back from tough times, when allowed to dominate the psyche during good times, it can blind us to the possibility of what could go wrong.
It’s important, periodically, to think creatively about potential doom.
Read MoreDuring a recent conversation I had with a senior executive, I brought up some of my efforts to promote strategic thinking and using data to guide decision-making among human resources (HR) professionals. She nodded in agreement, but then she interrupted.
“You know, there’s one thing I hate about our HR department,” she said. “They think like gate keepers, when they should be thinking like service providers.”
She went on to describe how
Read MoreIn the American television comedy series "The Office," the hostility between Michael Scott, regional manager of the mythical paper company Dunder Mifflin’s branch in Scranton, Pa., and Toby Flenderson, the branch’s human resources director, is a recurring theme.
During one particularly humorous scene, Michael learns suddenly that Toby—who had left the office previously—has returned.
Michael’s reaction?
Read MoreIt’s about supply and demand, human-resource style. Remember when the unemployment rate in the United States was less than 5%? According to the U.S. Department of Labor’s Bureau of Labor Statistics, that describes about five of the past 10 years. That also describes times when employers spent much of their energy on recruiting talent, or wooing top performers to apply for jobs.But times have changed. The unemployment rate now sits at 8.9%, which means employers everywhere are coping with huge numbers of job applicants for a small number of job openings. Recruiting is still important, and valid selection is always important. In a labor market flush with talent, however, figuring out whom to hire from the crowd is all the more crucial—and tricky.
So what really has changed?
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