Author Archives: Ben

2%-What\’s it to you?

I wrote this piece for our company newsletter recently. I’m a big believer in educating our employees on the importance of saving for retirement, and when I heard about a new tax change this year, I just knew I had to write on it. If you are interested in using it for your own company, feel free to copy/paste this post for your people. Enjoy!

2%-What\’s it to you?

If you hang around the financial news section, then you might have heard something about a change in your withholding taxes for 2011. Why does this concern you? Well, according to CNN Money, only 16% of people are confident in their ability to save for retirement. It\’s frightening to hear news like that, but there is a positive side to this situation.

To adequately prepare their finances for the golden years, Americans need to be saving 6-10% of their salaries throughout their working lives. If you are investing in your 401(k) account to the full match (average company matches 3%), then you are barely reaching the bottom end of the spectrum.

So, what does this have to do with the change in taxes this year? Well, as a result of one of the new laws by Congress, 2% of your normal social security payroll taxes will not come out of your check this year. If you\’ve been holding off on participating in the 401(k) program, now\’s the time to make the leap! If you already contribute, this is a great way to bump up your contribution to make sure you are adequately covered in your retirement savings.

Here\’s a quick example of the power of 2%. If an employee makes $50,000 per year and puts this 2% ($1000) into an average mutual fund in their 401k account for 25 years without adding anything else in that time, that would total more than $17,000. If you\’re not currently participating in the 401k program and that 2% election is eligible for matching, that could double the amount to $34,000. Not enough to retire on, but not something to sneer at, either.

If you\’re interested in learning more, joining the 401(k) program, or just figuring out what is right for you, feel free to contact your plan administrator for assistance.

What do you think? Good? Bad? Ugly? :-)

Working with nuts, fruits, and M&Ms

So I heard that the HR Carnival for this upcoming week was going to be focused on food and HR. For some reason my brain defaulted to comparing the characters in every workplace with a bag of trail mix. Check out the short (kinda funny!) video below for more.

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Notes

Ain’t Bella the cutest? :-)
Fruits-they have been around forever, they are kind of sour, and even if we don’t enjoy them they are pretty boring and don’t rock the boat
M&Ms-these are the best part of the whole batch, but just like in life, we only have a limited number of M&Ms (aka star employees) to work with
Nuts-the nuts make up the bulk of our workforce, they have their little quirks and we spend most of our time dealing with this group

Okay, so it was a fun little exercise. Want to tell a story about a “nut” in your own workplace? I’d love to hear it!

Illegal interview questions and manager training-Guest Post Blitz #9

What do illegal interview questions, video training for managers, and required reading lists for employees have in common? They are all guest posts I’ve done in the past little while! Looks like I’m a little schizophrenic with the varying topics, but each post has its own merits.

These guest posts went live (fairly recently) elsewhere that you may have missed. Some of them might be a bit different flavor than the usual upstartHR offerings, so be sure to check them out!Â If you\’re interested in seeing some of my previous escapades,Â click here for the Guest Post Blitz archive.

Here’s a new hire program I can get behind. Employees are required to read books as a way to introduce them to the culture and encourage them to keep professional development on their radar. Thanks to Matt at Monster Thinking for letting me share!

My friend JT at Careerealism shared this question with me and I just couldn’t pass it up. It sounded like an episode of Jerry Springer and the title is “Can I get fired for this?” The funny thing is I had to read the question ten times and diagram the situation so I could understand and respond.

Ever wondered if those interview questions about when you graduated school are actually legal? I hit on that in this post for Careerealism. (Hint: the question itself isn’t illegal, it’s what you do with it that counts).

This one’s so new it still has the bubble wrap on it. I ran into a snag when I was looking at developing a social recruiting plan for my employer. Apparently social recruiting doesn’t work for everyone. Would love some comments on this one.

Over on RocketHR I posted about creating and distributing video training for managers on an as-needed basis. Having trouble with conflict resolution? Send them the video with some tips and tricks to doing that better. Need some assistance with giving feedback to staff? There’s a video for that one, too.

And finally, I’ve had a lot of comments in person on this post about who is HR’s customer. Is it the employee? The manager? The job candidate? Senior leadership? The garbage man? Yeah, there are a lot of facets to consider and this one isn’t a simple question to answer.

Young professional guide (free eBook)

I\’ve been working as the chair for the SHRM YP (Young Professional) committee since August of 2010. Chuck Salvetti at SHRM put together a great team of people to work on connecting young professionals to chapters and to the SHRM organization as a whole. At this point we are working on a short guide for chapters to use as a tool for attracting and engaging the young professionals in their area.

My mission

When I first started writing this blog, I wanted to help those people who were in my shoes. They were just getting started in the HR field. They knew that school didn\’t teach them enough to be successful. They were ready for an adventure. While my audience has shifted somewhat over time, I\’m always looking for ways to point back in that direction and offer something of value to someone in that situation. This guide is one of those ways for me to be true to my original vision for upstartHR.

My hopes for this guide

I hope it helps young pros to answer a few of the big, scary questions we all face. I hope it helps more experienced professionals to connect with the people who are looking to them for leadership. I hope it helps chapters see how they can serve young professionals by meeting their needs.

Geeky glee

I was overjoyed to see China Gorman, former COO of SHRM, endorse the guide the other day (see photo above). It really meant a lot to me and I can\’t wait to meet her at HRevolution.

Click here to download or print the free young professional guide.

4 things learned from cubicle life

Cube-dwellers are made fun of on a daily basis in many forms of media. And while I love reading â€œDilbertâ€ cartoons, some of the situations hit pretty close to home. If you\’ve never experienced the glorious experience of cramming yourself into a tiny space filled with office supplies and a back-breaking chair, then you are totally missing out on the fun. (Okay, maybe I\’m lying.) Read on to see a few things that I have learned from living in a cubicle.

Sickness-It may completely defy the laws of physics, biology, and chemistry, but a sneeze from twenty feet away can instantly give three people the flu. I have no idea how it works, but it’s universal!
Laziness-To me, laziness is spending Saturday afternoon laying on the couch watching TV. I am such an amateur. There are people that I have “worked” with before who never actually did anything work related after walking through the doors.
Sucking up-I am pretty much always cordial with my supervisors. Keeping that open, candid relationship healthy is a great way to have work you enjoy. While I think I\’m plenty friendly there are others that would happily staple their own forehead to stay on their boss’ good side. I just want to say to them, â€œCome on people, it’s your boss, not your spouse.â€ :-)
Weirdness-I have photos and other things decorating my space, and it helps me to feel more relaxed at work. I once worked with a person with a little dog that bobbed his head all day long. No, it\’s not a bobble head doll. It has a little light sensor that helps the pooch to shake his head at you like he knows something you did wrong…

So, while you may think that it is boring wherever you happen to be, there are always things going on that can turn that around in a hurry. So, if anyone in your workplace is carrying a disease, brown nosing the boss, or freaking you the heck out with weird desk ornamentation, I’d love to hear about it! Drop a comment below with your own funny office story.

A special bonus

And now, a funny short clip from Office Space, one of the best movies to illustrate office life at its nitty gritty core. Email subscribers need to click through to see the video.

Collaboration, passion, innovation, and growth

After that title, I bet you’re wondering if I have a game of business buzzword bingo up my sleeves for the day. Well, sorry to mislead you, but there’s something even better on tap.

The 2011 version of the free Do Amazing Things eBook is here!

There are 21 great, short stories and ideas to get your year moving in the right direction. I already made a copy for my manager and put it on her desk.

A suggestion

Instead of trying to scarf it down in one sitting (which is easy to do!), hold off and read one of them per day. Then try to find a way to do something different that day to align with what you’ve read. Whether it’s simplifying the way you work, looking deeper into your motivations, or innovating your way through a new process, try to make real, actual change in the way you do what you do. I’ve personally seen amazing results from that and hope you do as well.

Click here to download Do Amazing Things in 2011 for free.

Thanks to Chris for putting this together. His efforts are definitely appreciated!

The 1% Solution For Work and Life (Book Review)

Today I get to review the book The 1% Solution for Work and Life by Tom Connellan. I have been doing a lot of reading on working smarter, being more productive, and developing solid work habits lately. With all the balls I juggle, it is often more than a little crazy. When my friend Rebecca reached out to me to see if I wanted to review this book, I couldn’t wait. The last book review I did for them was fantastic, and I hoped this one was on the same level. Lucky for me, it certainly was.

I am a fan of business books written with a narrative story embedded. It helps to put yourself into the situations the character is facing. You can sympathize with the troubles and celebrate with the triumphs. So before I was two pages into the book, it already had that going for it. :-)

The plot

The basic storyline is this: Ken’s life is barely hanging on by a thread in some places. He is sick and tired of just struggling to maintain that level of performance, and that prompts him to start a conversation with a friend who is doing quite well. The friend shares with him an interesting phenomenon illustrated by Olympic athletes. Apparently the best athletes in the entire world are approximately 1% better then those who are just really, really good. It’s not a 50% difference or even 10%. And if they can be the that good by being 1% better, why can’t we be 1% better at lots of little things in life? Continue reading →