I am a podcast fanatic. It’s the best way to spend time on my daily commute and to fill the speakers of my car stereo, I have an unending list of podcasts to which I subscribe.
They run the gamut from music related (“Wheels Off With Rhett Miller”), human interest (“Terrible, Thanks for Asking”), travel (“Bittersweet Moment”), and technology (“Reply All”). But my favorite is “Ear Hustle.”
“Ear Hustle” is a podcast about “the daily realities of life inside prison shared by those living it, and stories from the outside, post-incarceration.” One of its recent episodes discussed the realities and difficulties the incarcerated face trying to find employment upon their release from prison.
Bottom line? Once an employer finds out you committed a felony and spent time in prison, your employment prospects drop dramatically. And most learn of this information by an applicant checking the “Yes, I’ve been convicted of a felony” box on their employment application.
Earlier this year, the 5th Circuit Court of Appeals upheld an injunction that blocked the EEOC’s guidance on criminal background checks as unlawful and banned its continued implementation or use.
That injunction is significant for many reasons, not the least of which is that the EEOC’s guidance opined that employment applications that ask whether an applicant has ever been convicted of a felony violate Title VII on their face. Why? Because blacks and Latinos are incarcerated at a rate that is statistically significantly higher than whites.
The movement against employers asking this question on job applications is called “ban the box” — cleverly titled after the box applicants are asked to check if they’ve been convicted of a felony. Nationwide, 35 states and over 150 cities have adopted ban the box laws.
So what’s wrong with laws that are intended to give those with felony convictions in their background a chance at getting past the application stage of their employment search? The laws don’t work.
As illustrated on “Ear Hustle,” ban the box merely moves the criminal background check from the application stage to the formal background check stage. Employers that are predisposed not to hire felons are not going to hire felons. They will just ding them later in the hiring process — after the expense of a formal criminal background check. These laws aren’t changing employers’ minds or attitudes. They are just giving felons false hope.
Moreover, according to two recent studies, ban the box laws are causing more racial discrimination by improving the hiring prospects for whites, while making them worse for blacks and Latinos. The conclusion drawn by these studies is that when employers can’t see who has a criminal record, they still avoid people they think are likely to have criminal records by resorting to guesswork.
As a result, racial discrimination against black and Latino job applicants (especially men) replaces discrimination based on criminal record. In other words, banning the box doesn’t just fail to help those its intended to help, but it also might hurt anyone who happens to be black or Latino.
Thus, if ban the box laws either create a more damaging reliance on unconscious racial biases (as these studies suggest) or push the consideration of criminal backgrounds to later in the hiring process, where employers will still use them to disqualify candidates (albeit with higher transaction costs in the hiring process), why do we have them?
If ban the box laws aren’t working toward their intended results of opening job opportunities for ex-cons, then what should we do to achieve this laudable goal? I suggest a three-pronged approach:
• Job training within the prison system to provide the incarcerated with transferable real-world job skills and a certification they can provide to a prospective employers upon their release.
• Tax credits to incentivize businesses to hire these felons.
• A privilege from negligent hiring and other liabilities for employers that hire certain felons for certain positions (i.e., We still don’t want sex offenders working in schools, but they might able to work in a manufacturing facility if they are otherwise qualified and sufficiently rehabilitated).
We need something to break the cycle of crime, and that something is jobs. Stable employment and steady income will help stem recidivism and keep people from returning to crime as a means of support.
If ban the box isn’t working toward this goal, then local, state and federal governments need to abandon ban the box and look for other solutions to this problem.
As the 21st century dawned, enrollment in university MBA programs was a virtual rainbow of diversity. In the early 2000s, MBA graduates were comprised of 36.2 percent people of color and 40.7 percent of grads were women, while 39.1 percent were white males.
At about the same time, chief executive roles were predominately occupied by males, most of whom were white. More than 89 percent of white men and women occupied the chief executive’s chair as of 2005, with 76 percent of those executives being male.
Considering that getting an MBA is generally a key element to a career path leading to the C-suite, the following years should have seen a succession of female and minority executives ascending to leadership roles.
That doesn’t appear to be the case, according to the research department of Human Capital Media, Workforce’s parent company, which compiled data from the Bureau of Labor Statistics and the National Center for Education Statistics annual digest. The data show that diversity in the C-suite has not kept up with MBA graduation patterns of the past two decades.
In fact, little appears to have changed since that graduating class of 2000-01. As of 2018, the most recent data available, the numbers have barely budged, with 73.1 percent of chief executives who are men and 89.5 percent who are white.
Yet mounting evidence points to diverse leadership as an economic driver. “Delivering Through Diversity,” a 2018 study by consulting firm McKinsey & Co., found that gender-diverse companies are 21 percent more likely to outperform their non-gender-diverse peers financially, and that the number for ethnic and cultural diversity is 30 percent.
A September 2019 report released by global communications company Weber Shandwick meanwhile found that when diversity is closely aligned with the overall business strategy, companies see a positive impact on reputation, employee retention and financial success. Among organizations that align their diversity strategy with their business strategy, 66 percent of diversity leaders said that D&I is an important driver of financial performance, the study found.
Even so, government data show that a diversity shortage continues to afflict executive level positions.
Author Pamela Newkirk
With research showing that the executive pipeline has been filled with diverse MBA graduates for two decades, it begs the question of where did these candidates go? And if diverse leadership indeed pushes the financial needle, as the evidence shows, then why has corporate America turned its back on this pipeline of ready-made diverse executives?
“In the 1960s, we had begun to see change. The doors were finally open to people who had historically been left out,” said Pamela Newkirk, a professor of journalism at New York University whose new book “Diversity, Inc.” takes a deep look into how workplace diversity efforts have done little to bring equality into America’s major industries and institutions.
The 1960s specifically saw efforts like affirmative action implemented to make up for the legacy of slavery and the legal discrimination that followed the end of slavery, she said. These efforts were beginning to see positive results but ultimately saw adverse responses from people who challenged affirmative action with claims of reverse discrimination.
By the 1970s, diversity numbers were barely seeing change in fields from corporate America to higher education to major media.
“Society has not been able to come to terms with ways to address this that don’t trigger the kind of backlash we’ve seen time again,” she said.
With research showing that the executive pipeline has been filled with diverse MBA graduates for two decades, it begs the question of where did these candidates go?
Rethinking the Talent Pool
Most leaders don’t know what it means to lead diversity, said Courtney Hamilton, managing director at The Miles Group, a management consulting company based in New York. Consciously or not, they may lean toward conformity and then lose the wider talent pool along the way.
Building a diverse pipeline for organizational leadership comes down to what companies are doing in hiring and promotions, she said.
Many companies try to “reverse engineer” diversity in their teams when a position opens up, she said. While it’s not bad to think about diversity when looking to hire, that is more of a reactive than a proactive strategy.
“What people miss in building a diverse pipeline and leading inclusively [is that it] needs to be front and center for organizations every single day. There is no Band-Aid. If you want that pipeline of talent, it needs to be a value and priority,” Hamilton said.
Data from Bureau of Labor Statistics and the National Center for Education Statistics show that diversity in the C-suite has not kept up with MBA graduation patterns of the past two decades.
Kevin Groves, associate professor of management at Pepperdine University’s Graziadio Business School, said that many organizations fall into the trap of allowing boards or management teams to follow their intuition to pick new members of the leadership team. This intuitive judgment leads to a less diverse talent pool.
There is a way around this trap, he said: a standardized review process that is not exclusively based on the board’s judgment. This formalized talent review should be parallel to but separate from the annual performance review.
Molly Brennan, Koya Leadership Partners
It’s a tough hurdle to overcome, Groves stressed. It comes naturally to employers to believe that they know their talent best and can be reliant on their own judgment for these big decisions. This isn’t to say that the executive team should ignore their judgment completely, but the starting point for the candidate pool should be something standardized and data-driven rather than intuitive.
What’s especially helpful in diversity hiring is casting a wide net and “not assuming that when it comes to placement of key executive roles, the only place that can come from is an heir apparent,” Groves said.
Deloitte is one organization that has worked to expand its talent pool. While the professional services industry has historically looked toward a small set of specific universities to recruit from, Deloitte is making room for those schools previously overlooked like state schools and historically black colleges, said Terri Cooper, the firm’s chief inclusion officer.
Opening the search to a wider range of people allows for a more diverse group of candidates. But the benefits go beyond that, Cooper said. Looking toward the future of work, candidates with specific skills — rather than candidates with degrees from a specific school — are likely to be the right fit for a role.
It’s important to “make sure that your aperture isn’t so specific that it’s preventing the opportunity to bring that greater diversity into the fray,” Cooper said.
Diversifying the C-Suite
Rising to a C-suite position is the culmination of many experiences that start much earlier in a person’s career, like the opportunity to rise through the ranks in management positions. Such management roles are not particularly diversity-friendly.
Terri Cooper, chief inclusion officer at Deloitte
BLS data show that 60 percent of those in management positions are men versus 40 percent who are women, and 77.9 percent of those in management are white while the numbers are much smaller for black, Asian and Latinx populations. Moving to positions higher up the corporate ladder, the gap becomes wider, with a chief executive population that is only 26.9 percent women and 14.8 percent people of color.
There’s more opportunity to tackle diversity at the management level than the executive level because the population is larger and less competitive. While management positions make up 5.3 percent of the total workforce, chief executives only make up 0.1 percent, according to 2018 BLS data.
Studies show that people in underrepresented groups face many opportunity roadblocks such as fewer mentorship or sponsorship opportunities and fewer opportunities for growth within the organization, said Molly Brennan, founding partner and executive vice president of Boston-based executive search firm Koya Leadership Partners.
“This idea that there’s not a lot of qualified candidates [from] underrepresented groups out there is a false one,” she said. “There’s a whole host of diverse, qualified people who are ready, willing and able to take on leadership roles.”
Cooper said recruiting diverse talent is not the biggest challenge most organizations have. Rather, it’s advancing them within the organization to higher positions.
A key component to ensuring that talent advances is that companies must be more intentional about what an inclusive leader is and how the organization can hold leaders accountable to supporting diversity. This doesn’t mean just the most senior level of leadership but anyone who is in charge of managing people.
Deloitte relies on six components of an inclusive leader, Cooper said. They include a personal commitment to diversity, creating a work environment that allows people to identify bad behavior and being curious about others’ backgrounds and heritages.
The fundamental component here is that leaders make sure individuals can be their most authentic self at work, she said. If people are experiencing bias, it has a negative effect on their productivity, happiness, confidence and well-being, she added.
“Ultimately, if you’re experiencing that, of course you’re going to leave the organization. You’re going to look to find somewhere else where you feel you’re accepted for who you are,” she said.
There are many ways in which organizations can hold leaders accountable, Cooper said. They can set specific diversity goals for leaders and measure their success reaching those goals. They can also have leaders share specifically what initiatives they have taken to create an inclusive environment and what their recent experiences have been on mentoring or sponsoring people who don’t look, think or sound like them.
Further, other people should be able to comment on their leaders, Cooper said. Deloitte holds an expansive talent survey annually, and eight to 10 questions are specifically geared toward how inclusive of a culture they experience. Questions include: Do you feel like you’re being professionally developed? And do you feel as if you belong on your team?
Dissecting this talent data allows Deloitte to see aggregate data at a particular client site, for example, and identify the lead partner there. They can help show if this partner is truly creating an inclusive work environment for their employees.
Deloitte is careful with this data so that no one can be identified based on their answers, and the information “enables us to determine where we need to focus to move the needle,” Cooper said.
A Partnership Between D&I and Recruiting
Lee Jourdan, chief diversity officer at Chevron
Focusing on the relationship between the diversity and recruiting teams is key to Deloitte’s strategy, Cooper said. Deloitte spends a lot of time looking at available candidates and also expanding their awareness of diversity beyond gender and race. How is the company making sure that it considers talent from different socioeconomic backgrounds or neurodiverse candidates, for example.
What’s critical from the recruiters is that they’re aware of their biases, Cooper said. Her department pushed unconscious bias training for the recruiting team, and there has been positive feedback to this.
Chevron also has recruiters participate in bias training, said Lee Jourdan, the energy giant’s chief diversity officer. It’s part of the influence that employee resource groups have had on recruiting.
Such groups have been a part of Chevron for 20 years, and they work with hiring teams by helping them communicate with a broader range of candidates and lead interviews. There are 63 chapters in 12 countries, and the groups represented include women, people of different races and ethnicities, people with disabilities and those from indigenous tribes.
Through bias training and their relationship with the resource groups, recruiters work on mitigating their biases. Jourdan said they have removed the requirement that a candidate has a specific number of years of experience to get a role. This can exclude people who have not been given the opportunity in the past to gain certain experience, he added.
Employee groups have also helped the global company consider different types of diversity per region or country, Jourdan said. For example, there are three major tribes in Nigeria, and people may be marginalized if they are not a part of one of these tribes, he said. Chevron’s diversity efforts there could partly be geared toward this group.
Making Diversity a Business Imperative
At executive search firm Koya, which mostly recruits for leadership positions at nonprofits, clients increasingly are expecting and requiring a diverse pool of talent, Brennan said. Their focus on making diversity a priority has seen promising results. Forty percent of its placed candidates are people of color, she said.
This number is much higher than the general leadership population. Brennan believes this is because they purposely and consciously set out to make this number high. It’s both what the client and the search firm want.
Aspirational diversity goals help Chevron continually create a more even playing field, Jourdan said. Rather than having specific diversity targets for individuals of underrepresented groups, he believes that aspirational numbers, whether or not they are reached in a given year, help the organization take on certain behaviors and move in a positive direction.
One place to look for these aspirational numbers is the demographics of individuals graduating from business school, Jourdan said.
“We believe that [diversity targets] drive the wrong behavior. We’re vocal about the fact that we don’t do those,” Jourdan said. Rather, he said that Chevron holds leaders accountable to move toward improving numbers to achieve the aspirational goals.
Most importantly, it takes leadership and intention for diversity to work, author Newkirk said.
She stressed something that Columbia University President Lee Bollinger said in an interview for her book. There must be a sense of justice, especially given the history of slavery and discrimination in the U.S.
“This is also an issue of justice. Without that mindset many diversity initiatives won’t really work,” Newkirk said.
The Partnership award recognizes organizations that have developed or implemented a program in partnership with another constituency, either within the organization or outside of it. Here are the winners for 2019:
Gold: Columbus Zoo and Aquarium
The Columbus Zoo and Aquarium is a nonprofit conservation organization based in Columbus, Ohio. It aims to lead and inspire in connecting people and wildlife.
Its facilities include a zoo, water park, safari park and golf course, employing about 2,000 people each year. Its Edge Program initiative partners with the Ohio Department of Education and the governor’s office to recruit high school students to work at the Columbus Zoo and Aquarium.
“The Columbus Zoo and Aquarium is very proud of the partnership with the Ohio Board of Education and being one of the pioneer employers to assist with this very important initiative. We are delighted to offer Ohio high school students an opportunity to develop job readiness skills,” said Carman Wirtz, senior vice president of human resources.
The Columbus Zoo and Aquarium does this by specifically filling a mentorship requirement in the Readiness Seal, a formal designation that high school students can earn on their diploma by demonstrating the professional skills that are required for success in the workplace. The Edge Program sets up supervisors with students that work together every day, and are responsible for providing feedback on a variety of readiness skills.
Throughout their employment with the Columbus Zoo and Aquarium, students in the Edge Program will receive feedback and at the completion of 300 hours of work, have official forms signed and submitted to their high school. The Columbus Zoo and Aquarium seeks to be not only a partner in fulfilling requirements for the Readiness Seal, but active partners in developing the skills and eventually the careers of young people in the state of Ohio. For its partnership with the Ohio Board of Education and commitment to educational and community development, the Columbus Zoo and Aquarium is the 2019 Optimas Award Gold winner for Partnership.
“The Columbus zoo and Aquarium is very proud of the of the partnership with the Ohio Board of Education.”
~Carman Wirtz, senior vice president of human resources
Silver: DPI Specialty Foods
DPI Specialty Foods is a specialty food distributor, supplying perishable and non-perishable food products across five continents in varying temperature ranges. DPI also provides sales and other services to food providers, retailers and independent operators across the United States.
Through its partnership with Ceridian’s Dayforce human capital management system, DPI was able to achieve higher levels of consistency, transparency and reliability from recruitment through onboarding and retention. This partnership has streamlined numerous DPI Specialty Foods’ processes, particularly onboarding, as well as collecting data-driven insights and providing more visibility to employees to create a more connected, engaged and satisfied workforce.
For this partnership, DPI Specialty Foods is the 2019 Optimas Award Silver winner for Partnership.
Have you ever encountered a performance review in which a manager criticizes a behavior that’s tied to an employee’s cultural norms rather than to performance issues?
As more multicultural employees join the workforce, organizations are challenged to identify, interpret and assess potentially biased evaluation input on these workers. According to a recent Harvard Business Review article, “while biases can affect any of an organization’s talent decisions, they can be especially harmful when it comes to diversity and inclusion efforts.” And there is perhaps no setting that shapes careers, salaries and lives like annual performance evaluations.
When it comes to developing and advancing multicultural employees, performance reviews can be a double-edged sword. Too often, reviews are either underutilized, resulting in missed opportunities to intervene, or administered with a lack of cultural awareness. This can leave multicultural employees feeling isolated and unable to make reasonable advancements, ultimately deeming them a retention risk.
After seeing more than one multicultural employee depart after a disappointing performance review, I’ve wondered if a different review experience could have prevented that outcome.
Common Review Pitfalls and How to Avoid Them
From coaching many multicultural clients over the years, I’ve compiled some best practices that may be useful for HR and learning and development practitioners, as well as managers faced with these performance review challenges.
No Surprises! Give Feedback Early and Often
When concerns over his clarity of speech were expressed for the first time, one multicultural coaching client said, “I had no idea they felt that way. It’s good to know now, but I had never heard that from them before.”
Negative or constructive feedback coming late in the cycle can unintentionally put multicultural employees at a disadvantage. Addressing language and communications development needs (presentations and writing skills, interpersonal communications or dimensions of emotional intelligence) requires extra time. These “higher order” skills are progressively learned and attained, so infrequent feedback, or feedback that relies too much on human memory, can limit multicultural employees’ progress.
Don’t Let Comments Get ‘Lost in Translation’
Performance review comments are not always written in a way that is clear or actionable. Or they are overly nuanced, reflecting the commenter’s lack of comfort with direct, straightforward language.
For example, a consulting firm employee of Asian background was given the vague advice to “get verbal presence training,”instead of being told that he might explore speech coaching to help improve his speech clarity and articulation. Another multicultural coaching client noted, “It is always disappointing to get my work back with so many corrections — and no explanation of why it is wrong.”
A better way: Focus on clear, actionable steps, as in these recommendations excerpted from a multicultural employee’s review:
Speak louder — both in person and on calls.
Inject energy — vary tone and place emphasis on key words.
Be direct — clearly tell listeners what you have to say and recap if necessary.
Provide coherent structure — organize your points clearly so your key messages are not disjointed or confusing.
Read between the Lines
Some managers are (understandably) reluctant to be too direct in their critiques for fear of giving offense or being politically incorrect. Others may display unintended bias or lack understanding of how cultural differences play into behaviors.
During a manager review feedback conversation, one Springboards coach was told: “My employee is an incredibly strong technical contributor, but accent gets in the way — wait, are we allowed to say that?”
When a senior level employee is either receiving or providing performance feedback, the process is especially delicate. It could benefit from having a neutral third party like a specialized coach who can assess communication, language and culture needs and present recommendations. A well-designed peer review tool really helps managers to articulate potentially sensitive development needs in a way that’s impartial and actionable. This tool also provides a clear roadmap for coaching follow-up.
Managers can zero in on specific employee competencies, for example:
Based on an effectiveness rating scale from 1 to 5, to what extent does the employee:
Speak English with clear pronunciation, appropriate word choice and proficient grammar?
Deliver the appropriate, essential message to the audience: high level or in-depth summary to colleagues/team as necessary?
Guide her audience through complex material with appropriate storytelling, leading them to a strong conclusion and clear takeaways?
Present analysis effectively to a range of audiences?
Speak clearly and at the right pace, pausing appropriately, allowing audience to absorb, interject, and engage naturally and comfortably; display a confident cadence and vocal style?
Mind the Gap
In coaching engagements, we’ve often seen three to five month gaps between the review and the onset of follow-up training. By that point, the next talent review cycle is already well underway. Ideally, employees should immediately have a clear set of recommendations and goals and the appropriate resources to get there, like internal mentoring, coaching or skills training.
Given the extra time multicultural employees often need to address feedback recommendations and make training progress, for some, the writing may already be on the wall.
Unintended Consequences: ‘There’s nowhere to go here’
Consider how frustrating it must be for an individual who has been given constructive feedback but has not been pointed in the right direction for immediate upskilling. “I feel embarrassed that people don’t understand me,” a multicultural coaching client recently shared. “Sometimes I think they are pretending to understand me so as not to hurt my feelings, but it is awkward either way.”
Thoughtful messaging can eliminate any stigma or suggestion that the employee needs to be “fixed.” If coaching is perceived by multicultural employees as remedial or as a last-ditch effort, their next step may well be to contemplate opportunities elsewhere. But when managers frame their feedback and subsequent recommendations to be both constructive and inclusive, performance reviews can be a positive force in advancing career development and opportunity for all employees.
When you hear the word “burnout” in the context of the workforce, a specific image comes to mind. You might picture a lawyer or consultant logging 80 hours a week and managing high-intensity clients, pushed over the edge by a messy court case or a business trip gone wrong.
You’re probably less likely to picture the service worker giving you your burger and fries or health care provider caring for your aging parents at home, overcome by prolonged periods of mild stress. However, shift workers are equally, or perhaps even more, prone to burnout than corporate professionals.
As technology and automation advance to simplify the lives of skilled laborers, the needs of low-wage hourly workers are forgotten. Corporations feel pressured to increase productivity, which creates a chronically stressful environment for workers who are on the frontlines dealing with customers every day.
The Wave of Burnout in Hourly Workforces
Burned out employees are now commonplace in industries requiring an hourly workforce. White-collar workers may take certain job elements for granted, such as predictable hours and flexibility over where they work for the day. But these perks rarely exist for hourly shift workers. Shift managers receive pressure from higher-ups to build schedules that maximize profits and minimize the number of employees needed on a shift, meaning schedules promote high stress and often differ from week to week.
This has led hourly workers to form different relationships with their work. For once, low-skilled workers have leverage in the job market and may be inclined to find new workplaces if their own current conditions are not optimal. In July, 3.6 million people quit their jobs – the highest number ever in a single month.
Employers should be feeling more heat than ever to improve work conditions and worker satisfaction. Doing so needs to start with empowering your workforce through better management practices that give employees control and recognition. Using a digital workplace is a powerful, cost-effective way to ensure your workers don’t burn out.
Leveraging Digital Workplace Tools to Prevent Burnout
Promoting worker engagement can be the difference between burned out workers on the verge of quitting and satisfied employees. Digital workplace tools enable managers to spend more time engaging with customers and employees and give back some of the power frontline workers lack. By optimizing these areas with new technology, you can set up your workforce and customers for lasting success.
Keep communication fluid. Just as it’s important for workers to receive clear communication from higher-ups, it is crucial for managers to accept feedback from those working the frontline. An internal communications platform simplifies the process for getting in touch with employees and opens up opportunities for your workforce to connect, share and receive important information. These tools can also boost retention by ensuring that employees receive the recognition they need to stay satisfied through measures like badges, gamified leaderboards and mobile communication.
Allow agency in scheduling. Burnout among hourly workers is often attributed to stress over scheduling, particularly in industries where employees may not know their hours for the week until the day before. This is exacerbated by paper schedules that hinder last-minute changes. A digital workplace allows employees to request time off and swap shifts with coworkers directly, giving them a healthier work-life balance and a more predictable schedule.
Create opportunities for upskilling. Providing ongoing training to build new skills is an excellent way to ensure employees feel satisfied at work. Unfortunately, it’s often neglected because it can be time-consuming to build and deliver, and therefore costly. Digital tools enable employers to deploy low-cost, personalized training across your company to boost engagement and productivity.
Though retention and workplace management seem trickier than ever, employers are not powerless against the labor shortage, nor the wave of burnout. Instead, use this as an opportunity to stand out as an excellent employer by taking your management processes to the next level. Doing so positions you as the upstanding employer that workers will turn to when another has driven them to burn out.
The workplace has changed a lot since 1922. That year The Journal of Personnel Research debuted, rebranded later as Personnel Journal and finally Workforce. Now in our 97th year, we take a look back at what was on the minds of past generations of people managers.
A Woman’s Place in the Workforce, December 1958
As the 1950s came to a close, government economist Agnes W. Mitchell looked forward to the 1960s and women’s place in the workforce. “To remove women from the business world would result in the collapse of the entire structure, “ wrote Mitchell in “Women Working — in the 1960s.”
In 1958, 33 percent of the workforce was comprised of women, and Mitchell suggested that out of the 10 million workers expected to join the workforce by 1965, half would be women. She also noted that the trend of more women working was happening at the same time that women were getting married earlier than before. Half of women were married by 21 and 93 percent by age 35. It was becoming acceptable, at least for middle- and upper-class women, to enter the labor market because it was what they wanted rather than out of economic necessity.
Mitchell added that automation brought uncertainty to the future of working women. “Employers have traditionally dismissed women rather than men during reductions in force. Will automation cause any significant unemployment for women?”
The article also contained “facts” that would sound silly or sexist now. “A majority of women are believed to have had job experience at some point during their lives.” She also explained how women tend not to have supervisory positions because “male supervisors are frequently preferred by both men and women.”
— Andie Burjek
Beware! Baby Boomers Ahead, September 1980
Look no further than the September 1980 of Personnel Journal to see how entrenched personnel managers viewed the generational onslaught of … baby boomers!
We’re talking about those whippersnappers born in the mid- to late 1950s. The established personnel leaders of course came from the Silent Generation who were anything but silent in a panel discussion about the changing workforce. Said Douglas Marr, AVP of an insurance firm: “It was different 20 years ago. You paid your dues and worked your way up the corporate ladder.” Personnel administrator Jason B. Strode stated: “We have young people adjusting to work life … and the conflicts between their expectations and older employees and their values … impact the organization.” Marr also noted: “We have a whole populace of generally conservative people who are facing a new group of workers who expect freedom of choice, to have a say in the organization and manage their own careers.”
It’s clear that personnel managers in 1980 were as obsessed with managing a new generation as today’s HR pros. Marsha Sinetar’s piece “Management in the New Age: An Exploration of Changing Work Values” leads with “The management practices of the ’60s and ’70s will not do for the 1980s.” Concluding the “some things don’t change” refrain, Phillip J. Decker covered “Homosexuality and Employment: A Case Law Review.” We may call it LGBTQ rights today, but yeah. The case for workplace equality continues.
Little seems to have changed in the past year for the staffing industry. There is still more demand for talent than there is supply, the gap continues to widen, and there is no end to both complex issue in sight.
“If anything, the skills shortage is having a dampening effect on the industry, because it’s even more extreme,” said Barry Asin, president of Staffing Industry Analysts headquartered in Mountain View, California. Clients are seeking out their services more than ever but they just can’t fill the roles fast enough.
Yet there is a subtle difference from last year as staffing agencies make some innovative changes to adapt to the new normal. The biggest investments are around agency-hosted reskilling programs to fill a variety of talent needs. At the high end, agencies like Adecco are creating or acquiring coding bootcamps to train promising candidates for hard-to-fill STEM roles — in 2018 Adecco acquired digital retraining firm General Assembly for $412 million.
Other agencies are more focused on training for lower level labor jobs that come with specific skill requirements, said Steve Bercham, chief operating officer of the American Staffing Association in Alexandria, Virginia. For example, last year staffing firm Hamilton-Ryker launched TalentGro, which uses virtual reality to train forklift operators. The technology has led to a 40 percent increase in successful placement of forklift drivers. “These skills can be learned quickly, which helps agencies fill these roles,” Bercham said.
Digital Transformation: Reality or Hype?
Virtual reality is one of many innovative technologies that staffing agencies are adopting to meet client needs. Many others are focused on streamlining sourcing, said Vinda Souza, vice president of global communications for cloud computing company Bullhorn in Boston. “Sourcing is their top priority,” she said. Bullhorn’s 2019 “Recruitment Trends” report found 57 percent of agencies plan to spend more in tech this year, with 31 percent focused on digital transformation efforts to achieve these goals.
While most believe that artificial intelligence and automation solutions will help the staffing industry in the long run, almost half question their ability to deploy and use these tools effectively. “Only 5 out of 10 staffing processionals understand what artificial intelligence and machine learning are,” Souza said.
This suggests that these digital transformation efforts will take a lot of time and will likely begin with simple automation tools that eliminate manual tasks but don’t optimize decision-making. Early movers are already using tools like catboats to engage with candidate, automated résumé screening tools, and job board posting tools like Jobiak’s AI-based recruitment marketing platform that links job boards to the Google for Jobs ecosystem.
Staffing agencies are also hiring their own AI experts to drive innovation in this space. Bullhorn recently added its first head of artificial intelligence to support development of Cleo, its AI platform. “It is on us as an industry to get to the next level of AI so that we can do predictive sourcing and improve the candidate experience,” Souza said. Bullhorn hopes that adding senior AI talent to its team will help them get there first.
Money Matters
No matter how good the sourcing and recruiting technology is, the lack of available talent means companies need to be practical about who they are looking for and what they can offer. “For roles that are always in demand, wages need to go up,” Souza said. Bullhorn’s survey shows 78 percent of staffing professionals believe employers must increase pay if they want to compete for qualified candidates.
Employers should also be open to exploring new talent pools, including candidates with a criminal record, Bercham added. The American Staffing Association is participating in the Getting Talent Back to Work pledge, an effort led by the Society for Human Resource Management to provide employment opportunities to qualified people with criminal backgrounds. “So many companies avoid these candidates for fear of liability,” he said. A big part of the initiative is to educate companies about how the court system and policies makers ensure these criminal histories can be set aside.
“Now is the time to quash the stigma of incarceration,” said Richard Wahlquist, ASA president and chief executive officer. “Employers need to embrace greater inclusivity when recruiting and hiring and give qualified individuals a second chance at success in life — particularly when the U.S. labor market is the tightest in history.”
It’s one of many ways employers and staffing agencies are opening their minds to new talent pools, and where candidates can come from.
“There is qualified talent out there that employers don’t give the time of day,” Souza said. The challenge for staffing agencies is figuring out how to convince employers that these are the right people for the job.
Barbara Fisher recalled a time one of her remote workers traveled to Hawaii yet called in to four meetings over two days.
“I asked, ‘How are you recharging? Why did you even take your computer?’ As a remote worker, it’s an extension of what she does,” said Fisher, chief operating and people officer for digital health company Aduro Inc. who previously was a vice president for Intel Corp. working in human relations and talent management.
“The reality is that weighs on you. You’re never able to refuel.”
Remote work has become the new normal for companies responding to workers’ desire for flexibility. In its “State of the American Workplace” report, Gallup polling found 43 percent of employees worked remotely in 2016 compared to 39 percent in 2012.
In its 2019 “Employee Benefits” report on leave and flexible working released in June, the Society for Human Resource Management noted that remote work continues to rise in popularity as a benefit. Telecommuting of all types is increasing as a result. Part-time telecommuting — now offered by more than 40 percent of organizations — is up 5 percent from 2018 and demonstrated the greatest increase.
Ad-hoc telecommuting is offered by 69 percent of organizations while full-time telecommuting is offered by more than one-quarter of organizations, SHRM reports.
“From a remote worker’s perspective, some of the positive aspects are flexible job schedules, work-life balance and the freedom to work from almost anywhere,” said Tina Garrell, director of the annual HR Florida Conference for the HR Florida State Council, a SHRM affiliate.
For companies, it means extending a footprint beyond its headquarters, saving on office space costs and keeping employees happy.
Tina Garrell
“But employers are sometimes faced with different challenges arising with their remote workforce, such as the health and well-being of those employees who do not come to the office every day,” said Garrell.
Studies show remote workers struggle with loneliness, isolation, an inability to unplug and ongoing distractions.
“Global Work Connectivity,” a recent study commissioned by Virgin Pulse and HR advisory and research firm Future Workplace, concludes many remote workers feel isolated.
“While remote workers gain freedom and flexibility, the study found they are disengaged and less likely to want a long-term career with their company because of their lack of human contact,” said Dan Schawbel, a partner with Future Workplace.
The survey of more than 2,000 managers and employees in 10 countries found almost half of an employee’s day is spent using technology to communicate. Slightly more than half always or very often feel lonely as a result.
Men, introverts and younger generations indicated a greater need for work companionship. Leaders can support employee relationships by encouraging connection in person over online, researchers said.
“Remote workers in some organizations are among the most stressed, which can seem counterintuitive. The perception is they have more time and are free from office politics, getting dressed up and commuting,” said Mary Marzec, senior health strategy scientist for Virgin Pulse, a part of Richard Branson’s Virgin Group that designs technology cultivating positive employee lifestyle habits.
Mary Marzec
With most employees’ waking hours spent on work, the work culture has a significant influence on adopting and sustaining healthy habits, Marzec said. While technology has paved the way for more employees to work remotely, it also has contributed to that sense of isolation, leading to mental and physical health challenges.
“Technology has created the illusion that workers are connected when in reality they feel isolated, lonely, disengaged and less committed to their organizations when overusing or misusing it,” said Schawbel, who also authored “Back to Human: How Great Leaders Create Connection in the Age of Isolation.”
“Most remote workers have the flexibility to work in different areas — a coffee shop or the beach — and they still choose to work at home,” said Fisher. “The convergence of work and home into one space underlies the struggle to unplug.
“You have to be able to recharge. Not doing it definitely weighs on an individual’s health and how they show up.”
Remote workers can feel left out of key decisions, leading to stress, frustration and unhappiness, said Fisher.
Distractions are another challenge.
Barbara Fisher
One of Fisher’s employees who asked to work remotely later expressed frustration that home tasks were distracting her from work.
“When you are a remote worker, it actually is more work because you have to think about how you balance your time to get things done and make sure you’re still connected,” said Fisher.
That necessitates discipline in meeting work milestones and personal goals, she added.
Air in the at-Home Schedule?
The perception that remote workers have more time at home to take care of family responsibilities essentially is false, said Marzec.
“Drawing boundaries can be very difficult,” she added. “If somebody sends you an email, there is internal pressure to answer that right away to show you’re working. Somebody in the office can be in a meeting for two hours, go to lunch, and even stop at the bank on the way back. A remote worker doesn’t feel that freedom.”
Lack of face time with team members is another challenge.
“You can’t just stop over to somebody’s desk or bump into someone in the hall and ask them if they’ve followed up,” Marzec said. “Emails and communications have to be constructed much more clearly because you’re not there to back it up in person. Communication can start a downstream spiral of lack of productivity.”
Remote workers don’t have the feeling of support one gets by standing around the office water cooler and soliciting ideas on how to deal with professional and personal struggles, Marzec added.
Feelings of isolation and lack of social support are linked to anxiety and depression, she added.
“Even though you think remote workers are not working longer hours, often that sense of being present at work is on their mind and can contribute to depression and anxiety,” she added.
Remote workers also don’t feel they have the freedom to work out or take a walk, said Marzec.
“When you work remotely, you’re not getting in the extra energy like walking from a parking lot to work,” said Marzec. “Someone who works remotely could have as few as 1,500 steps in a day. Whereas in normal workday walking, you’re going to put in 5,000 to 6,000 steps. It isn’t the 10,000 recommended steps, but it’s a lot more than 1,500.”
Health implications depend one’s go-to for dealing with stress when working alone and not able to walk over to peers to get advice on how to move a project forward, said Fisher.
“Whatever your vice is to manage stress is where you’re going to go. That’s just human nature. When you’re alone, going to that vice is likely easier than when you’re in an office where you can reach out quickly to the person sitting in the cube next to you, tell them you’re having a rough day and try to figure the problem out.”
Companies have a responsibility to take care of the workforce and remote workers have to put themselves out on the radar more, said Fisher. That entails remote worker access to wellness initiatives.
“Part of that responsibility if you decide to have a blended workforce is figuring out how what you offer at your headquarters is also what you offer to your extension sites as well as to your remote workers,” Fisher said.
While remote workers may not be able to access the gym at company headquarters or enjoy a healthy lunch at the in-house cafeteria, inclusive team challenges such as walking or drinking enough water “are a lot of fun and help everybody feel included no matter where they work,” said Marzec.
Technology makes implementing wellness programs for remote workers easier, said Garrell.
“These programs offer a variety of options both remote employees and employees who physically come to the office can participate in,” she said. “An example of a program that would work well for a remote workforce is providing partial or full reimbursement for various fitness activities in which they choose to participate.”
That can include sports leagues, gym memberships, yoga classes and other activities available in the remote worker’s area that keeps the employee active and engaged. By allowing them to choose activities in which they are interested, it helps ensure higher participation rates and long-term engagement, said Garrell.
Brian Rhonemus, CEO of Sanford Rose Associates — Rhonemus Group, said he encourages everyone on the recruiting firm’s remote team to manage distractions by being as disciplined in their work hours as they would if they physically drove to an office with a more structured schedule.
Brian Rhonemus
Rhonemus also said some of his company’s remote workers use stand-up treadmill desks to address the struggle with scheduling fitness time.
“We also schedule blocks of time out of the office to meet people face-to-face to fulfill the need for social interaction,” he said. “We encourage participation in coaching and other outside activities and allow time for that away from the office. We share our personal and professional success in our weekly update call.”
Joey Frasier, CEO of Shortlist, a San Francisco-based freelancer-management platform, suggested that hosting events in remote locations can ensure remote workers feel connected to the office community.
“We constantly remain in contact with our remote staff to make sure they are happy and have all of the support they need,” he said.
Frasier said his company helps its customers manage about 70,000 workers, nearly all of whom are remote.
“Remote workers are encouraged to participate in wellness programs in their areas or online using apps like Calm or MoveWith. HR managers also can provide access to places like One Medical, which provides wellness and mindfulness services.”
Management support is critical. A manager can discuss with a remote employee how to set up their work schedule in such a way they can block off time to engage in physical exercise, said Marzec.
“It relieves that pressure that if I take a walk and don’t answer that email within an hour, I’m not going to be punished for it,” she added.
Virtual Teamwork
Garrell said she ensures that the three remote workers in her business are included in as many office activities as possible through daily sales team conference calls, video conferencing training programs and a group messaging chat program to communicate with management throughout the day.
“This helps make them feel like they are truly a part of our organization as well as having a positive impact on their mental health, productivity and overall wellness,” she said.
Fostering a strong work culture that helps remote workers feel supported can be done through team-building activities, social events and workstations where workers can get to know each other on a personal level, said Schawbel.
An investment in the remote workforce yields positive returns.
“When you give greater autonomy, flexibility, responsibility but also greater support for employees, they feel it,” said Fisher. “We talk a lot about ‘I want to have a loyal employee who doesn’t want to leave.’ It’s a balance. The company needs to show how invested they are in the person and the person shows how invested they are into the company based on that relationship between the two of them.
“There is so much research that employees are looking to be heard and valued. When an employee feels that, they’re able to reach full potential because they’re being challenged and rewarded in ways that inspire and motivate them. The impact to productivity and the bottom line starts to improve.”
When a company addresses physical and mental health challenges faced by its remote workers, those workers stay committed, Marzec said.
“The manager doesn’t have to replace that talent,” she added. “Many times, companies focus on health care costs when it comes to health and well-being and overlook the important factor of employee satisfaction and intention to leave the company.
“Once somebody leaves, that impacts other people on that team who now need to work more to fill the gap of the person who left. The manager needs to put in time to hire somebody else. The training may take up to a year before a new person is really folded into the organization. In some cases, knowledge is lost when somebody leaves and we have a very knowledge-based economy. There can be client loss. Protecting against unwanted turnover is an important goal of health and wellness programs.”
Listen this clip from Ear Hustle (a podcast about “the daily realities of life inside prison shared by those living it, and stories from the outside, post-incarceration”), and then let’s chat about “ban the box.”
That injunction is significant for many reasons, not the least of which in that the EEOC’s guidance opined that employment applications that ask whether an applicant has ever been convicted of a felony violate Title VII on their face. Why? Because African-Americans and Hispanics are incarcerated at a rate significantly higher than whites.
The movement against employers asking this question on job applications is called “ban the box” — cleverly labeled after the “box” applicants are asked to check if they’ve been convicted of a felony. Nationwide, 35 states and over 150 cities have adopted these laws.
So what’s wrong with laws that are intended to give those with felony convictions in their background a chance at getting past the application stage of their employment search? The laws don’t work.
As illustrated in the Ear Hustle clip above, all that “ban the box” accomplishes is moving the criminal background check from the application stage to the formal background check stage. Employers that are pre-disposed not to hire felons are not going to hire felons. They will just ding them later in the hiring process — after the expense of a formal criminal background check. These laws aren’t changing employers’ minds or attitudes; they are just giving felons false hope.
Moreover, according to two recent studies, ban the box laws are causing more racial discrimination by improving the hiring prospects for Caucasians, while making them worse for African-Americans and Hispanics.
Thus, if ban the box laws either create a more damaging reliance on unconscious racial biases (as these studies suggest) or push the consideration of criminal backgrounds to later in the hiring process, where employers will still use them to disqualify candidates (albeit with higher transaction costs in the hiring process), why do we have them?
If ban the box laws aren’t working toward their intended results of opening job opportunities for ex-cons, then what should we do to achieve this laudable goal? I suggest a three-pronged approach:
Job training within the prison system to provide the incarcerated with transferable real-world job skills and a certification they can provide to a prospective employers upon their release.
Tax credits to incentivize businesses to hire these felons.
A privilege from negligent hiring and other liabilities for employers that hire certain felons for certain positions (i.e., we still don’t want sex offenders working in schools, but they might able to work in a manufacturing facility if they are otherwise qualified and sufficiently rehabilitated).
We need something to break the cycle of crime, and that something is jobs. Stable employment and steady income will help stem recidivism and keep people from returning to crime as a means of support. If ban the box isn’t working toward this goal, then local, state and federal governments need to abandon ban the box and look for other solutions to this problem.
The number of age-related discrimination charges filed with employers and the EEOC by workers aged 65-plus doubled from 1990 to 2017.
44 percent of employees report that they or someone they know experienced age discrimination in the workplace.
21 percent report they faced age discrimination themselves.
36 percent feel their age has prevented them from getting a job since turning 40.
26 percent feel there is some risk they could lose their current job because of age.
Only 40 percent who experienced age discrimination filed a charge or complaint.
Employers paid $810.4 million to settle age discrimination charges filed with the EEOC between 2010 and 2018 (excluding litigation).
These numbers are only going to get worse. By 2024, workers age 55 and older will represent 25 percent of the nation’s workforce, with the fastest annual growth rates among those aged 65 and older. Indeed, according to the Hiscox survey, 67 percent of surveyed workers age 40-65 plan to continue to work after they turn 66.
This trend is not without its cost to employers. Age discrimination hurts employers, and I’m not just talking about the $810 million paid in settlement costs.
It demotivates employees, which can hurt productivity, customer service, and product quality.
It causes a loss of talent and institutional knowledge, due to experienced workers leaving from a stalled career or hostile environment.
It causes employers to miss the opportunity of hiring and retaining workers who possess knowledge, experience, good judgment, and commitment to the job.
So, how can an employer help prevent age discrimination from permeating its workplace? The EEOC, in its State of Age Discrimination Report, published last year to commemorate the 50th anniversary of the ADEA, offers the following five suggestions.
1. Leadership needs to create and foster a workplace culture that is committed to a multi-generational workplace where all workers can grow and thrive, which extols ability and reject discriminatory stereotypes and words.
2. Employers and employees must recognize and reject stereotypes, assumptions, and remarks about age and older workers, and treat them no differently than stereotypes, assumptions, and remarks about sex, race, disability, national origin, religion, or other protected classes.
3. Companies should work to increase the age diversity of the workforce by hiring, retaining and engaging employees of all generations,
4. Businesses should implement recruitment and hiring strategies that avoid age bias by seeking workers of all ages and not limiting qualifications based on age or years of experience. These strategies should include training recruiters and interviewers to avoid ageist assumptions and common perceptions about older workers, assessing interviewing strategies to avoid age bias, and having an age-diverse interview panel for prospective employees.
5. Employers should develop retention strategies to keep older workers. I’ve written about this point before, which you’ll find here.
Its facilities include a zoo, water park, safari park and golf course, employing about 2,000 people each year. Its Edge Program initiative partners with the Ohio Department of Education and the governor’s office to recruit high school students to work at the Columbus Zoo and Aquarium. 
Through its partnership with Ceridian’s Dayforce human capital management system, DPI was able to achieve higher levels of consistency, transparency and reliability from recruitment through onboarding and retention. This partnership has streamlined numerous DPI Specialty Foods’ processes, particularly onboarding, as well as collecting data-driven insights and providing more visibility to employees to create a more connected, engaged and satisfied workforce.
