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5 Myths About Women and Work

In 1989, after a new leadership team took over the Toronto-based Bank of Montreal, managers identified that female talent was underutilized. A 1991 survey of the 32,000 employees uncovered five myths that stood in the way of women having full representation in senior positions:


Myth 1 was that women were either too young or too old to compete with men for promotions. Reality showed the men and women were, on average, the same age.


Myth 2 was that women had babies and quit; there was a perception that they were less committed to their careers. The reality was that although they did take time off for childbirth, they had longer service records to the bank at every level except senior management.


Myth 3 was that women needed more education. It turned out that the women in feeder positions to upper-level jobs had more degrees than the men in those positions.


Myth 4 was that they didn’t have the “right stuff,” which wasn’t clearly defined, but the results indicated that women averaged higher performance ratings overall.


Myth 5 was that women would soon catch up. They did projections and found it was going to take far too long for this to occur.


After uncovering these myths and misperceptions, the bank’s team of HR professionals and managers went to work to effect major changes for the advancement of women in the organization.



Workforce, May 1998, Vol. 77, No. 5, p. 80.


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How Secure is Your Data

In today’s ultracompetitive work environment, few company secrets are as important as what workers earn. And last February, Pixar Animation Studios of Richmond, California, found out just how easily the information can be compromised. With the click of a mouse, someone within the organization—nobody is sure exactly who—sent an e-mail that accurately listed the salaries for each of the firm’s 400 employees. Not only did the public release of the data serve as a huge embarrassment and potentially compromised the firm’s ability to attract top talent, the e-mail raised serious legal concerns centering on the violation of privacy.


On a list of crises for a human resources professional, it ranked right at the top. And, unfortunately, it wasn’t an isolated incident. According to The Computer Security Institute of San Francisco, 75 percent of companies have suffered financial losses, such as financial fraud, theft of proprietary information and sabotage, from computer security breaches. The institute found that the biggest security threat typically comes from inside an organization. “There are plenty of people—hackers and others—looking to steal information or do something malicious,” states Darren Donovan, a senior managing director at Pinkerton Investigation Services, a security and investigations firm in New York City.


Welcome to HR’s newest battleground. As more and more data goes electronic, the risks and threats to the modern organization grow. An unencrypted e-mail sent over an intranet or the Internet can allow crucial information to fall into the wrong hands. A PC without the proper password protection can easily become a fountain of illicit knowledge. And a network without the proper safeguards, including a firewall and audit capabilities, can become a high-tech sieve that lets crooks steal or destroy sensitive data. These days, there’s even cyberterrorism —orchestrated attacks on organizations for political or economic purposes.


Yet, despite the need for sophisticated hardware and software protection, data security has far more to do with policy than product. Notes Chip Mesec, director of product management at Santa Clara, California-based Network Associates, a provider of network security products: “Having the right systems in place is crucial. But unless employees understand the consequences of their actions or inactions, unless they’re educated to follow procedures and abide by rules, all the solutions in the world won’t work.”


For human resources, the implications are clear: In today’s business environment, it’s essential to understand enough about the technology to ensure breaches don’t take place. It’s also crucial to know that employees are using electronic security properly and that HR policies are in place to deal with training, education and compliance. “A tremendous amount of thought and planning is required,” states Kevin Wheeler, vice president of staffing and employee development at Charles Schwab and Co. in San Francisco. Yet, juggling corporate politics, procedures, staffing issues, and educational concerns to secure a workplace can seem overwhelming. Today, it requires a team-oriented approach that involves HR, security, legal and information technology (IT). As Mesec puts it, “Electronic security cuts across departments and divisions, but it always gets back to human resources issues.”

Pay attention to the growing risk.
A quarter-century ago, a typical company conducted the vast majority of its business on paper. Important files and documents were kept under lock and key, and when something was sent to someone across the office or in another part of the country, a set of security precautions was almost always used. In most instances, a document was sealed and sent by courier or registered mail with a signature required at the other end. Paper shredders helped ensure that sensitive documents didn’t wind up in front of the wrong pair of eyeballs.


But today, the move from paper-based systems to electronic data management has turned security upside down. Although breaches have always been part of the corporate landscape—a dishonest or inattentive employee presents a serious concern in any environment—digital data is far easier to duplicate and disseminate “In the past, a fairly limited number of people had access to key data. With the opening of systems to the entire workforce, particularly HR records, people can access and even change information and records. There’s a greater risk of employees accessing information that’s not theirs, and once a problem occurs, people lose confidence,” explains Bill Davies, director of technology at PDS, an HRMS systems vendor with headquarters in Blue Belle, Pennsylvania.


Violators now include a long list of individuals: workers who are disgruntled or have been laid off; contractors; consultants; even good employees who inadvertently destroy, alter or expose crucial data. Moreover, curiosity, gossip and the indiscriminate sharing of data can also lead to crime and a litany of other nightmares.


One thing is clear: today’s crooks are opportunistic—and elusive. A computer left unattended for a moment—and without proper password protection—can serve as an access point for a data bandit. It’s then possible to intercept data from the network using specialized software, tap into confidential files on a PC or a server, and undelete previously erased data from a hard drive, including e-mail. Unless the person storing data has encrypted the information or used a “wipe” delete function to get rid of it, the information isn’t secure.


And all this is just the beginning. Dial-up remote access—an increasingly common tool for telecommuters and traveling employees—is designed to provide entry into a network. Once there, it’s possible to gain access to unauthorized files unless firewalls and other protections are in place. Internet access poses yet another threat. And, as the Pixar case points out, an e-mail message can instantly transport company secrets to someone outside the organization. As Donovan puts it, “The risks are everywhere.”


The Pentagon found out how true that statement is in February. Despite an elaborate effort to protect its vast data bank, computer hackers broke into an unclassified section of its network and conducted “the most organized and systematic attack” ever, according to Deputy Defense Secretary John Hamre. The individuals who conducted the attack examined and possibly altered confidential payroll and personnel data. The assault was one of 250,000 attempts to crack the Pentagon’s security code each year.


But, more often than not, the biggest threat exists within an organization. For example, at Omega Engineering Inc. of Bridgeport, New Jersey, an engineer who doubled as his firm’s network administrator allegedly launched a logic bomb (a hidden malicious program) that deleted every application and file on every hard drive at the company. That resulted in more than $10 million in damage. Three weeks after the network administrator was fired, the program deleted every file on the network. “Employees came to work but couldn’t boot their computers,” Omega’s Director of Human Resources Al DiFrancesco later remarked in ComputerWorld magazine.


Although the man has been indicted by a grand jury and currently is awaiting trial—he faces a maximum five-year sentence and a possible $20 million fine—Omega learned its lesson the hard way. Even sophisticated back-up, recovery and audit software alone can’t prevent an incident. It’s the human side of the equation, well-designed policies and procedures, that make or break an organization.

Take a byte out of crime.
Firewalls, encryption, digital signatures, public keys, security tokens—products like these might make you feel as though you’ve been transported to the far reaches of the IT galaxy. Yet, it’s how people use the tools that largely determines whether key data remain a firm’s bread and butter or become toast. Ask yourself: Who has access to information? What files can specific employees access? What do people do with data? How do they share data? “Human resources should play a central role in determining who has access rights to certain data as well as educating employees how to use security tools correctly,” says Jude O’Reilley, a research analyst at the Gartner Group, a Stamford, Connecticut, market research and consulting firm.


At brokerage firm Charles Schwab and Co., data security has become a religion. With service representatives accessing highly confidential customer account records and servers storing mission-critical data, there’s no margin for error or problems, says Wheeler. As a result, the company conducts extensive background checks on all employees, offers a security briefing during orientation, and then provides booklets, brochures and intranet links that constantly remind employees what they should and shouldn’t be doing. In addition, any employee who works with the public must take a refresher course and exam once a year to ensure that he or she understands company policies and procedures related to data security—including the use of passwords and e-mail.


But the company also goes to great lengths to ensure that human policies mesh with physical security. For example, all service centers and branch offices are equipped with PCs that lack floppy drives and modems—and employees aren’t allowed to bring in any type of foreign media. Only data that have been approved and certified are available through a secure network connection. That makes it extremely difficult to remove or corrupt data, and ensures that viruses won’t wind up in the system. Although such a design can make some tasks, such as training, more difficult because local offices can’t load an updated CD or floppy disk into the PC, “Everyone understands how important it is to make sure that there’s no risk of compromised data,” says Wheeler. Schwab backs all this security with regular spot checks and sophisticated network monitoring that can detect illicit files.


Of course, Schwab’s detailed policies didn’t just happen. They were the result of meticulous planning. A senior vice president of human resources interacts with various other department representatives—including IT, legal and compliance—to put procedures and rules into place and regularly update them through a formal review process. In addition, human resources works with the security department to determine what actions and punishment should occur if an infraction takes place. “Decisions are made on a case-by-case basis, though the company generally has a very low bandwidth of tolerance,” says Wheeler.


In fact, Pinkerton found that 80 percent of a company’s vulnerability to cybercrime is related to inconsistent information security practices, including the use of passwords and standardized log-off procedures. “Passwords, codes, access levels and other tools are crucial, but security is just as much about culture and corporate attitudes as anything else,” says Donovan. And that begins with making clear which data are proprietary and valuable and which are cleared for public release. Many companies don’t adequately inform employees on such issues, he points out. Even worse, far too many organizations don’t bother to ask workers—as well as consultants and outside contractors (who frequently pose an even greater risk)—to sign a confidentiality agreement. The result? Ignorance about how to handle important data and questionable legal liability, if the case ever reaches a courtroom.


“One of the problems is that employees and employers tend to become lax and, over a period of time, pay less attention to policies,” says Burke Stinson, a spokesperson for AT&T of Basking Ridge, New Jersey. In fact, infractions take place despite AT&T handing employees information at orientation and providing them with bulletins and notices that remind them to change passwords, switch off computers at lunch or after work, and use encryption for highly sensitive e-mail.


Consequently, AT&T’s security department conducts regular audits and spot checks to find violations and then sends out notices to employees who haven’t complied with policy. What’s more, temporary employees—particularly in the IT department—aren’t allowed into the system. Ultimately, “It’s the tone you set within an organization. If you have slipshod management and a relaxed attitude, you’re setting yourself up for problems. If you take the risk seriously and use proven methods to make sure workers comply, you greatly reduce the odds of anything catastrophic happening,” he explains.

Build a better strategy through teamwork.
O’Reilley believes that a workable solution always comes down to three key issues: 1) Determining which data are private, 2) who has authorized or unauthorized access to data, and 3) potential ways people can access network-based information. Although it’s IT and security departments that typically put computer security systems in place, HR must communicate the human side of the equation—particularly when data originates and resides within the HR department, he argues.


Among other things, that means mapping out processes and work patterns—often using a team-based approach or a task force that cuts across departments. O’Reilley believes it’s necessary to create a continuum, ranking information from “public” to “business critical” and then putting work models in place that allow appropriate individuals to view appropriate data. In the case of HR data, for example, employees would be allowed to view their own records. A manager who directly oversees a group of workers might have data privileges as well. But the same manager wouldn’t be allowed to view data for other workers, other managers or executives. That becomes the centerpiece of designing security systems and policies. In fact, once rights and privileges have been mapped out within the organization, it’s possible to create secure work teams or departments unrelated to geography. It’s also possible to determine who is violating established policies.


If individuals outside the organization pose a threat, then it’s probably an issue best left to security and IT. However, when the threat is internal, human resources can play a key role in identifying potential violators within the company. In some cases, HR might be aware of previous violations and infractions that could tip off future problems. Routine background checks conducted during the pre-employment process might also provide important clues. In fact, experts say that thorough background checks should be mandatory for network administrators, who are entrusted with enormous power and can wreak havoc if they abuse it.


Dealing with employees who are leaving the organization is just as important. According to Donovan, many security breaches occur when a disgruntled employee—usually somebody who has been fired—is allowed access to his or her PC. Although managers would never dream of letting the person rifle through filing cabinets, they often don’t consider the consequences of allowing that person to log onto his or her computer. “A strict termination policy must be in place, and one that deals with passcodes. A person should immediately be locked out of the system,” he says.


New technology is making it easier to nab crooks and maintain solid security. Biometrics—once the stuff of James Bond films—is beginning to filter into the workplace. Using thumbprint, retina or facial recognition, biometrical devices allow only authorized personnel access to the network, without the hassle of passwords. What’s more, a person is able to log on from any location, and, in the case of facial recognition, the computer monitor can automatically go blank when the individual walks away. In addition, far more sophisticated intranet-based firewalls are cordoning off departments, while encryption is becoming increasingly transparent. In many cases, e-mail is encrypted and decrypted automatically by software running on the PC.


Yet no amount of technology will ever eliminate all cybercrime. As Mesec puts it, “As long as there are people, there will be incidents.” Ultimately, it’s up to human resources—partnering with security and IT—to help employees understand the risks and responsibilities of using computers. Indeed, a byte of prevention goes a long way.

Workforce, May 1998, Vol. 77, No. 5, pp. 53-60.

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Will HR IGo-I IFree-lance-I By 2008

Futurist David Pearce Snyder, the life styles editor for The Futurist magazine, has been in the forecasting business for more than 30 years and is known to viewers of “Nightline,” the “Today Show,” CNN and MSNBC. He and his partner, Dr. Gregg Edwards, are the authors of “Future Forces” (1984) and “America in the 1990s” (1992), both published by the Washington, D.C.-based American Society of Association Executives. He believes there’s a major change coming to the world of human resources that wasn’t surfaced by the “HR 2008” study.


“The reality is that the job is going away,” says Snyder. “The list of fixed skills and responsibilities we call a job will be a thing of the past in the age of the unbundled enterprise. Jobs are going away because the large bureaucracies that require them are going away.”


Snyder believes downsizing and outsourcing are more than just management fashions. “Over the next five to 10 years,” he says, “large organizations will see a reduction in the ranks of permanent, career employees of about two-thirds. In the 21st-century enterprise, 35 percent of the workforce will be a core career cadre of permanent employees, 25 percent will be outsourced suppliers of components and support services, 25 percent will be contingent workers and 15 percent will be contract specialists.”


Snyder believes the outsourcing, downsizing and focusing on core competencies he predicts for American business will have profound implications for human resources professionals. “We’re going to see the growth of a free-standing human resources industry,” he says.


Because the job as we know it will no longer exist, the new HR industry may not serve organizations as much as it serves workers. “In a world without jobs, career management is complicated, to say the least,” says Snyder. “Everybody will need professional help in navigating the workplace.” Snyder insists that in the near future, it won’t just be actors and star athletes who have agents. He likes to quote consultant Charles Handy, “From now on, we’re all going to need an agent.” Those agents, says Snyder, will be members of the human resources industry.


In the future, Snyder insists, nobody will have a job, but everybody will have a career. It’s the human resources industry, the massively outsourced HR function, that will help us all manage our careers.


Workforce, January 1998, Vol. 77, No. 1, p. 56.


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Covert Union Organizing-Beware the Trojan Horse

Just as Spartacus went undercover to enter and attack his enemy’s castle, labor organizations today use a guise to enter and then organize businesses. This practice, called salting, is thriving across the country and costing employers millions of dollars each year in legal fees and back wages. It begins with a normal job advertisement and ends with the hiring of the best-qualified worker. It’s only later you discover the person you hired is employed full time by a labor union as an undercover union organizer.


Union salting has been on the rise since it was made legal by the 1995 U.S. Supreme Court case, NLRB v. Town and Country Electric. Michael Van Gordon, the chief organizer with Indiana’s Local 20 of the Sheet Metal Workers Union in Indianapolis knows the practice well. Van Gordon is using sheet-metal worker apprentices with the AFL-CIO’s youth-to-youth program in salting operations. He said the last apprenticeship class completed 1,780 job applications at 279 nonunion companies. Thirty-five union organizers salted in.


So what’s the harm? Beyond the obvious possible outcome of a unsuspecting company falling prey to unionization, salting can result in costly lawsuits. Discriminating against union officials by not considering them for employment is one legal land mine. Disciplining them—especially with termination—when they solicit participation is another. The good news is that the HR solution isn’t as complicated as many employers believe. HR can avoid liabilities by using guidelines when hiring, disciplining and firing labor organizers.


What’s union salting?
Many employers don’t know what salting is until it hits them. The term comes from the mining industry and refers to how promoters scattered precious metals around the mine to make it appear more valuable to investors. A policy manual of the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers (IBEW), describes the salting process as “artificially enriching” the nonunion contractor with union organizers. Although salting is a strategy primarily used by blue-collar labor unions within the construction and building industry, it’s a strategy labor unions are also using in other sectors, such as hotel and restaurant industries.


Associate Professor Paul Baktari from the State University of New York at Potsdam explains: “Salting is akin to the Trojan horse. The covert practice involves full-time union organizers applying to Help Wanted classified ads placed by nonunion businesses. Often the union organizers misrepresent their employment backgrounds on the employment application by failing to disclose they’re full-time union organizers.” If an employer doesn’t run reference checks, the organizer quite possibly will be hired. Once infiltrating the employer and becoming entrenched in the workforce, the union operative initiates a union-organizing campaign. The practice is on the rise and being supported by AFL-CIO President John Sweeney. “We will be training at least a thousand organizers a year, pouring $20 million into organizing programs—and organizing from the Sunbelt to the Rust Belt and from the health-care industry to the high-tech field,” said Sweeney during a speech before the National Press Club in 1995, a month after the U.S. Supreme Court ruled salting legal.


Screen out salters early.
To avoid such practices at your company, you must be proactive, says Brent Ballow from the Nashville, Tennessee-based law firm of King and Ballow. Ballow is one of the country’s experts in union salting campaigns. Ensuring that all job candidates complete an employment application and provide past job references is the first step in protecting the employer.


Checking those references is the second. During salting activities, unions rely on employers not conducting background or reference checks. Many labor organizers try to infiltrate the workforce by intentionally falsifying their employment application and omitting their current employment status as an organizer with a labor union. This is the standard practice taught to union salters because, as Van Gordon emphasizes, this type of covert salting proves more effective than the overt method—when the organizer admits he or she is seeking employment for the purpose of organizing the employer. Van Gordon says that out of approximately 7,000 employment applications organizers filled out over the last eight years using the overt method, only two were hired. Using the covert method, considerably more were hired, although he declined to say how many.


Therefore, implementing a system to ensure all finalists for a position undergo a reference check is important. This process will reveal whether a job candidate has been less than truthful on his or her job application. Bob Baughn, human resources director for JESCO Inc., a Tupelo, Mississippi-based construction firm, says that conducting effective reference checks is essential, as is creating and enforcing a policy of declining to hire applicants who provide false information on their employment applications. Baughn recommends other HR strategies, such as checking for gaps in employment that may be indicative of employment with a labor union.


But, Ballow warns, “The reference-check process [and policy enforcement] should be implemented for all finalist job applicants—not just those an employer may suspect are union salters.” Targeting salters is clearly in violation of the National Labor Relations Act.


Professor Baktari agrees. He explains that the National Labor Relations Act (NLRA), supported by the 1995 U.S. Supreme Court decision in the Town and Country Electric case, prohibits discrimination against salters. “Keep good notes during the recruiting and interview process,” says Baktari. “If during the interview the job candidate engages in overt salting and admits he or she is a union organizer, keep in mind you can’t decline to hire this person based on his or her union affiliation. However, hiring a different candidate based on the perception and fact that he or she is the better qualified candidate is defensible.”


Carl Cannon, vice president of construction with Pan American Electric Inc. in Nashville, Tennessee, says overt salting has occurred at his company. “In a lot of cases, union organizers will say on their applications that they’re union members with the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers. But we don’t take that into consideration when making hiring decisions, and we don’t ask them if they’re paid union organizers. We hire the best-qualified applicant.”


Another union strategy that employers should be on the look out for during the interview process is surreptitious tape recordings made during a union operative’s meeting with HR department staff. Rufus F. Palmer, vice president of JESCO, says this has happened to his company on a number of occasions. “You don’t find out what your company personnel say to an applicant/union organizer until the tape recording is introduced at the NLRB [National Labor Relations Board] hearing. Then it’s too late.” For example, if the HR manager reveals the company is planning to fill 15 positions, and 15 union organizers apply but less than 15 are hired, then there’s no doubt the union will file charges with the NLRB. JESCO was salted six times between 1995 and 1997 and currently is appealing a massive NLRB award of a half-million dollars to the 5th Circuit Court of Appeals.


Apply appropriate disciplinary measures.
Even with the use of reference checking, some labor organizers may make it through the hiring process. Therefore, it’s important to have defensible and proactive disciplinary policies in place as well, such as no-solicitation and no-moonlighting policies. Explaining these policies to new employees and requiring them to sign a statement that they understand and will adhere to these and all other company policies will support an employer’s desire to remain union-free. “Any violation of these or other policies by any employee, including union salters, can be dealt with through the employer’s disciplinary procedure,” explains JESCO’s Baughn. As long as the employer doesn’t selectively enforce these policies on union salters, but rather ensures these policies are applied impartially throughout the organization, salting activity would become more difficult for unions to engage in.


For example, if a salter is hired and caught soliciting employees to sign union interest cards, the union organizer could face disciplinary action for violating the no-solicitation policy. However, an employee soliciting employees for any other reason, such as posting a notice that his or her car is for sale, would also have to face the same discipline. “A no-solicitation policy, just as all other hiring and employment policies, must be applied equally, or the employer is left open to a union’s unfair labor charges,” says attorney Ballow.


“[A no-solicitation policy] worked for us,” says Cannon. Pan American Electric’s job sites span across the United States as do its 500 blue-collar employees, averaging about 25 at any one job site. “Several years ago we decided to train our employees about the National Labor Relations Act and what we need to do to comply with that law. In our training, we tell our people not to do anything that would break the law. In our company policies, we don’t allow any solicitation during work time—that’s just not union organizing, but any solicitation of any type,” he says.


The same practice holds true for no-moonlighting policies. If it’s learned that an employee moonlights for a labor union, then that employee could face discipline. But so could another employee who works evenings at the local burger joint. Ballow says employers have the ability to control the work environment in this regard, and they should seriously consider using their authority.


Consistently and impartially implementing and applying these restrictive policies would on the one hand curb salting, but on the other hand, may impact employee morale. So, think twice before proceeding via policy making.


Make sure terminations are legal.
Union organizers who get into your company know what they’re doing. In fact, they participate in an organizing training program called COMET or Construction Organizing Membership Education Training. During the first stage, COMET One training, new organizers are presented the reasons why the building trades must organize, and in COMET Two training, they learn how to organize. Says Van Gordon: “We teach them how to get a job and to be the hardest workers, most productive, and most skilled so other employees look up to them. They then announce their affiliation with the union and respond to questions about the union. At that time, the organizing campaign begins.”


What the employer does and how the employer reacts to a union’s salting campaign will determine whether it will face substantial penalties. Often the first reaction is to dismiss the union organizer. According to attorney Ballow, this would be the worst possible action an employer can take.


Ballow admits that “an employer can’t completely protect itself from all salting activity because federal labor laws give unions an unfair advantage.” Nevertheless, instituting some strong policies and disciplinary measures, up to and including termination, will protect the employer, just as long as discipline and dismissals are dispensed in a nondiscriminating way. JESCO’s Palmer and Baughn both suggest employers keep a detailed record of employee dismissals and disciplinary actions for all policy violations, which can be presented at an NLRB hearing if the union claims its organizers were dismissed unfairly and for reasons other employees hadn’t been dismissed. “You’ve got to have your ducks in a row when the NLRB hearing comes up. Otherwise, without substantial documentation to prove your case, you could face serious penalties and legal fees,” explains Palmer.


Look what happened to JESCO During 1995 and 1997 when union organizers made a half-dozen salting attempts at JESCO, the company fired one union salter for violating company policy by defacing a hard hat that belonged to the company. The salter had placed a union sticker on the hard hat. The union, IBEW, charged JESCO with violating the NLRA as it relates to discriminating against union members engaged in a protected concerted activity—union organizing. In addition to the hard-hat charge, the union filed another five against JESCO for unfair labor practices in firing 18 job applicants who were union organizers. Subsequently, the NLRB merged the six charges into three and heard the cases in February 1997, awarding the IBEW union organizers nearly a half-million dollars in back wages. The NLRB ruled in favor of the union because JESCO allegedly failed or refused to hire the 18 organizers. “We’ll continue to fight those charges, and we’ve upgraded our HR function and training of our staff, and haven’t had another salting attempt for nearly a year,” says Palmer.


Fighting the charges.
Despite an employer’s best efforts, some suits do get filed, as JESCO executives have learned. If, in fact, you find yourself pondering the possibility of defending a salting case before the NLRB, you can invest in salting insurance. According to officials with the Associated Builders and Contractors (ABC), contractors who have joined the ABC can take advantage of a salting insurance program that would pay legal fees and up to 90 percent of back-pay awards issued by the NLRB. That program was initiated in July 1997 and can be supplemented by a general employment practices liability insurance (EPLI) policy that would cover other employment and labor claims. Insurance of this type may be a good investment. Unions file tens of thousands of unfair labor practice charges each year, costing employers millions of dollars and sometimes their businesses. In 1996 and 1997, more than 33,000 unfair labor charges were filed. There’s no doubt the employer with insurance will best weather the storm of defending itself against union charges in the future. Unless the bills being considered by Congress eventually pass, employers will have to continue fending for themselves.


 

Workforce, May 1998, Vol. 77, No. 5, pp. 45-51.

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Rethink Tuition Policies

If your company spends money on employee tuition reimbursement, outdated policies may increase your costs. Typical policies are based on the traditional higher education system and fail to consider changes in technology that make nontraditional learning options both more available and more acceptable. It may be time to re-evaluate, if the following look familiar:


Employees select schools and programs with no guidance. While this policy allows maximum freedom to employees, few have the knowledge or the time to sift through the enormous variety of learning options currently available—telecourses, Internet, videotapes, credit for on-the-job training, testing programs, and so on. Many employees automatically will select the highest cost college in the area, mistakenly thinking that higher expense equals higher quality in education. Many courses are mis-selected or end up not being transferable. Providing guidance in house will result in cost and time savings as employees select coursework that’s appropriate for them and for the company.


Don’t assume that all necessary advising will be supplied by the college. College recruiters are knowledgeable about their campus and its programs and requirements, but can’t supply impartial advising that relates to all other local colleges or national programs.


Tuition reimbursement is limited to a few large, well-known traditional universities and colleges. The intense development of new options in learning over the past 20 years has happened largely outside the mainstream institutions, which continue to offer education designed specifically for the younger student, not for working adults. Because of innovative programming, many private universities cost less for the entire degree than state-aided campuses or even community colleges. Having greater variety to choose from means more people will be able to find a learning option that fits into their already busy lives, resulting in more committed and qualified workers.


Reimburse for tuition only, not fees. The lower tuition state-supported campuses usually charge additional fees, while the higher tuition private schools charge a single rate. Employees will pick the college with the single rate because, even though it may be the higher priced choice, it means less money out of their pockets.


Reimburse for traditional, classroom courses only. An increasing number of legitimate and regionally accredited colleges and universities offer courses through the Internet, computer and television, and grant credit for tests, corporate training, military training and other prior learning experiences. These options may cost considerably less than traditional coursework and may save an adult learner years in classroom study to complete a degree.


Provide no ongoing support for employees’ learning efforts. Studies show that companies realize a $10 return in productivity for every $1 invested in employee education. Yet, few companies provide continuing support or encourage those employees who seek higher education. Recognition through mention in the company newsletter or other nonmonetary incentives motivates employees with little cost.


The increasing pace of change in the world today indicates that employee education will continue to be an important function of business and industry. College tuition increases 11 percent to 14 percent annually, and sometimes semiannually. Adult learners represent 50 percent of the national college population. Increased use and increased expense mean corporations must pay attention to tuition-assistance plans. Companies must make sure they use all the resources available in higher education appropriately to ensure that the dollars spent on employee education bring a maximum return on their investment.


Source: Scottsdale, Arizona-based Educational Advisory Services Inc., the nation’s only educational brokering firm. Written by Dixie Darr, freelance writer and education consultant.


Workforce, May 1998, Vol. 77, No. 5, p. 104.


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Being the Conscience and a Businessperson

Laying off your most important assets: Greg is the senior vice president of HR for a very large organization. He has spent a lot of time promoting the fact that employees are his firm’s most important asset. The company has done well for several years, but is now experiencing a major downturn. He has to decide whether to do the “easy” thing and institute a companywide downsizing, which shows the company does not, in fact, see employees as the most important asset (because it’s getting rid of people). Or Greg must help the senior management team figure out other courses of action — such as cutting senior managers’ pay — which shows that employees are the most important asset. What’s Greg’s best course?

Response from Frank Navran, a management and ethics consultant: Greg has fallen into a common trap. He has wrongly defined the problem, equating downsizing with not seeing employees as the most important asset, thus narrowing his choice of options. The problem isn’t whether or not to downsize. The problem is how to survive a (possibly short-term) downturn. This is a question of finding a balance among a trio of concerns: employees, customers and the bottom line. These three concerns are like the legs on a milking stool: They need to be nearly equal if the stool is to be stable. Employees, customers and the bottom line all need to be satisfied. Greg needs to communicate this redefined problem statement to all of the affected players: senior managers, employees, stockholders, vendors and strategic partners. All of these stakeholders can contribute to surviving a downturn through operational efficiencies, payment deferrals, salary adjustments, accelerated retirements, sabbaticals, leaves of absence or a dozen strategies, including layoffs. This isn’t an either/or proposition. It calls for telling the truth, preserving trust and creatively seeking balance.

Frank J. Navran, a manager, trainer and consultant for more than 25 years, knows about downsizing from three perspectives: survivor, victim and change agent. Now Navran is a senior consultant responsible for the design, management and evaluation of ethics consulting projects for the Ethics Resource Center (ERC) in Washington, D.C. In addition, as the center’s director of training, he spearheads more than 50 training seminars and workshops on organizational and business ethics for the ERC and its clients.

Workforce, May 1998, Vol. 77, No. 5, p. 66.

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Why HR Can’t Win Today

If you’ve been feeling “damned if you do and damned if you don’t” lately, you’re not alone. Human resources professionals everywhere are feeling they can’t win today than ever before. And they’re shouldering more role-related dilemmas as a result. Remember the UPS strike a few months ago? There, the HR leaders tried to temper strategic workforce-planning issues against temporary workers’ needs. And how about the Texaco racial-discrimination case last year involving secret audiotapes and allegations of racism among senior managers? HR had instituted diversity training, but incidents of apparent racism and discrimination happened anyway — and ultimately cost the firm more than $175 million.

As Roseanne Roseannadanna (played by Gilda Radner) humorously used to say on “Saturday Night Live”: “If it’s not one thing, it’s another.” She certainly had a point. Many human resources professionals can relate.

While strikes and discrimination charges are no laughing matter, for HR professionals, dilemmas like them are hitting faster, harder and more profoundly than ever. Consider these real HR issues: Employees are filing more lawsuits than ever. Disgruntled line managers need state-of-the art training — yesterday. CEOs won’t let HR anywhere near the strategic planning table, but in their next breath profess: “Employees are our most important asset.”

It’s time for an HR reality check. As if you didn’t already know it, the damned feeling is real. What you might not have thought about is that much of the frustration stems from dichotomies in the many roles HR plays. It could be that your HR department has so many internal and external customers — the senior management team, CEOs, employees, shareholders and other stakeholders — that you’re having a hard time steadying your eyes on the firm’s business goals and your HR mission in fulfilling those goals.

Of course, there are no simple answers to the complexities of HR’s many dilemmas, or to figuring out which roles the HR department should play in organizational strategy. But understanding where the dilemmas lie and why your current HR role is causing confusion, is a good place to start.

Damned, no matter what.
How often do HR professionals feel damned? “All the time,” says Max Wagoner, HR director for P2S Engineering Inc., which is based in Long Beach, California, and employs 69 workers. “I’ve told people the job is many times like being a high-wire walker. You can’t afford to deviate even marginally from a very straight line without falling off. And, of course, falling off can be very expensive.”

One of these expensive areas where HR often faces the “damned if you do or don’t” scenario is employment law and other legal entanglements. “There have been times I remember thinking that if I did A I’d be breaking one law and if I did B I’d be breaking another, and the only choices were A or B,” laments Wagoner. “So sometimes it meant making a decision as to which of the choices would be the least costly or have the least chance of coming back to bite us.”

But legal entanglements are only one reason why HR people are feeling damned these days, albeit a big reason. HR also has to fight old stereotypes and is still punished, it seems, for past sins. Other times, senior managers simply aren’t willing to allow HR’s emerging role as business partner. “I just left an organization where HR was just damned,” says Nancy Probst, who’s now a manager and organizational development (OD) consultant of management advisory services for Dixon Odom PLLC, a certified public accounting and management advisory firm, based in High Point, North Carolina. At her old firm, a large health-care system for which she was the director of organization development, Probst says she had helped her boss, the chief HR officer, outline a vision of HR as a strategic business partner. Unfortunately, the directors in that organization just couldn’t see the HR leader’s vision and fought it constantly. They truly preferred to preserve the paper-pushing, compliance/police role human resources had played for so many years,” she adds. “As a result, in their eyes, HR had little respect and basically couldn’t do anything right.”

That’s not to say the damned feeling is unique to HR professionals. Other directors of business functions, such as sales, production, accounting and marketing, also experience job frustrations and dilemmas. For example, a production manager has to decide which jobs to push through first on the production line. An accounting director has to figure out how to surface losses in one division, while trying to bury profits in another. These scenarios are certainly real business. But at the core of their functional roles, these other professionals don’t seem to experience the same type of role frustration that HR professionals do.

“I haven’t personally confronted that type of no-win scenario to any extent in the positions I’ve been in,” says Art Karacsony, manager of marketing and communications in Coopers & Lybrand LLP’s Parsippany, New Jersey, office. “In my role, I wear a number of hats: public relations, advertising, strategic planning, business development, corporate communications, management and so on.” But, he says, these hats all fit well within his job of serving his primary customers — the firm’s 1,200 partners.

Interestingly, when functional managers outside of HR do experience dilemmas, the concerns often tend to be employee-related. “In an ideal world, we could serve both of these objectives — being an employee advocate as well as a business manager — successfully,” explains Susan A. Orr, director of catalog marketing for Programmer’s Paradise, based in Shrewsbury, New Jersey. “Of course, we don’t live in an ideal world, so naturally, our dual objectives often conflict.”

However, the frustrations of business people in functional roles other than HR seem to arise with the changing nature of business itself rather than basic role discrepancies. Not so for HR. Much of HR’s struggle and conflict has surfaced in the form of the “damned if you do or don’t” feeling because HR has increasingly taken on the business partner role, while still holding on to other traditional HR roles: being employee advocates and administrators. This leaves HR with a uniquely dichotomous function in the corporate world.

Notes Bob Carter, HR staff consultant for Guilford County government in Greensboro, North Carolina, “Leave it to human nature, culture, life experiences, brain chemistry and [other factors], to make the world of HR one of the most difficult to master in terms of organizational effectiveness.”

Adds Joan Farrell, vice president of HR for Lawson Mardon Wheaton Inc. based in Millville, New Jersey: “I’ve worked in both line and staff roles, and my three years in production management were like a vacation because the possibilities were limited, the choices were clear, and at the end of the day you could look back and measure progress.” HR’s role isn’t so clear-cut. But it wasn’t always that way.

Today’s HR role: various and dichotomous.
Traditionally, the human resources role was fairly straightforward. The personnel function was the administrative force behind employee issues. Personnel managers hired, fired and did employment-related paperwork. Now, human resources is more. Much more. Not only is HR responsible for the administrative tasks and strategic planning issues relating to employees, it has also moved into the business partner roles of being a change expert, an organizational performance specialist, a best-practices consultant, a legal liaison and now, even a risk manager.

According to HR guru Edward E. Lawler III, director of the University of Southern California’s Center for Effective Organizations in Los Angeles, HR’s role is now both:

  • Follower and Leader
  • Reactive and Proactive
  • Administrator and Strategist
  • Controller and Business Partner
  • Conscience and Businessperson
  • Employee Advocate and Manager
  • Doer and Consultant.

The many roles are causing HR to make some tough decisions: Choosing between business reality and social welfare, between current expediency and long-term viability, and between blind regulatory compliance and common sense. The problem is: What’s good for the business isn’t always good for employees, and vice versa.

For example, in the “Reactive and Proactive” scenario, U.S. HR managers are responding to single employees who are demanding that company benefits be more universal and not presuppose that employees have a traditional family. For instance, many companies provide child care, but don’t provide elder care or pet-care assistance. While HR managers have to react to benefit problems at hand, they also have to think proactively about making a benefits package that pleases workers and yields a high return on their company’s investment.

But, perhaps the biggest role conflict for HR has come in trying to be both business partner and employee advocate. This dichotomy has surfaced some big hot buttons for HR people in terms of clashes between employee-relations issues and ethical problems.

To add fuel to the fire, the dichotomies HR professionals face in trying to serve both company and employee interests aren’t always appreciated by other managers. “Unfortunately, operations managers and accountants don’t always understand that employees are the company’s most important resource and where your actions are really an extremely beneficial ‘business partner’ activity, they’re sometimes seen as ‘pro-employee and anti-company,'” says Wagoner.

He admits the employee advocate and business partner dichotomy does lead to some very real “damned if you do or don’t” scenarios. He points out that if a company has a union, for example, the labor relations manager spends his or her time representing the company exclusively. However, in nonunion workplaces, most HR managers have to understand the needs of employees and management. “Does this create a conflict between roles?” Wagoner asks. “It shouldn’t. But, in fact, it does perceptually.”

Says Lawler, “I think the toughest role for HR is the duality issue around conscience and employee advocate.” It’s now common for HR organizations to have centers of excellence that take care of administrative tasks related to worker issues. And HR can have another area that’s strictly concerned with business-partner issues. “What I’m not so sure about is how you balance the traditional role of HR being the employee advocate and conscience of the organization with simultaneously being a business partner,” he ponders. “It’s often in the same meeting that you need to be both.”

He suggests that in the best of all worlds, the conscience and the employee-advocate roles would be shared by everyone in the organization, especially those in other leadership roles. But getting other functional leaders to share the corporate conscience may be a daunting challenge considering that HR people (46 percent) currently tend to feel they’re cleaning up the messes caused by ethics violations in their companies, according to “The Business Ethics Survey Report,” a joint study of 747 HR professionals released in 1997 by The Ethics Resource Center based in Washington, D.C., and the Society for Human Resource Management. Getting other managers to act in sync with ethical standards could be a daunting task, but it’s not impossible.

And on the employee-advocacy front, HR professionals would have to continue pushing responsibility for employee-advocacy issues further out into line managers’ and supervisors’ hands. This has been a constant struggle for workforce managers who have been trying to switch gears and take on more of the business partner’s role over the past few years.

This is exactly what one general manager for HR in a large, nonunion company in Australia has done. “To empower employees, we’ve created and successfully trialed a position of ’employee adviser.’ This position is not in HR,” says this HR professional who recently posted her company’s idea on a popular Internet HR listserve. She adds: “HR staff advise management; the employee adviser supports employees. It also means I have a more independent view on whether management is stepping out of line and whether, and to what level, I may need to intervene.”

Adds USC’s Lawler: “I’m inclined to think that in the short term, if HR people are really going to become business partners, they have to partially abandon that [employee-advocate] role and gain credibility first as a business partner.” Then, once HR professionals have gained credibility as business partners, they can come back to that employee-advocacy role. “Because if you keep that [employee-advocate role] as a central piece of your behavior, it’s very hard to get seen as a business partner,” he says.

This idea represents a radical shift from what most see as the current role for human resources. But face it: HR’s role has become somewhat of a repository of tasks, functions and roles. To HR’s credit, HR professionals have proved in recent years that they can and will take on an organization’s toughest challenges, while still providing world-class, administrative record-keeping services. But, have HR professionals let organizations put them in a no-win situation where they can’t effectively serve two or more masters?

“HR, as a profession and as a function, is in flux,” says Probst, the OD specialist who had left a firm where human resources was just damned. “It’s important for HR professionals to truly decide what their roles will be. They need to take a proactive stand and make this decision based on the best outcomes for the organization. They’ve always been reactive and have waited to be told what they should be. Therefore, they haven’t gained the respect they so desire.” Perhaps it’s time to pick a role, instead of trying to be all things to all people, which can’t be very good to HR departments’ bottom line or the companies they serve.

Don’t get stuck in a no-win spot. Choose your role wisely.
When senior human resources managers clarify their primary roles upfront — whether it’s making the radical shift away from employee advocate to be more of a business partner, being a change agent or being the knowledge worker management guru — the dichotomies will work themselves out. That’s not to say that in the end you won’t have more than one role. Many world-class HR operations do. Yet, to put it simply, it’s not unlike the roles of any given individual who might at the same time be a businessperson or worker, a mother, a wife, a community volunteer, a friend, a daughter, a sister, a civic leader and so on. Everyone plays different roles at different times. However, it’s crucial to be clear about which roles are primary, which are secondary and how best to fulfill the roles your HR department agrees upon as most important with your firm’s other business leaders. And have a clear plan in mind.

The best HR professionals today are starting with their companies’ business mission and defining their human resources mission from there. Those who don’t, flounder. “The business mission is your North Star,” says Lawson Mardon Wheaton’s Farrell. “Without it to focus on, you can wander lost in the seas of uncertainty forever.” The lesson here is: If you take it for granted that you’re there to fulfill the needs and requests of everyone in the organization at all times, you’ll be spending a lot of time on unnecessary and nonvalue-added activities. Think big picture.

For example, Gayle Evans, assistant vice president of HR for Standard Insurance Co. based in Portland, Oregon, originally set her group’s human resources mission four years ago, but reassesses it yearly based on her firm’s business mission. The goal of her company, whose motto is “People, not just policies,” is to provide excellent insurance products and services to its customers. From there, Evans’ HR team extrapolates its mission: “Our HR service strategy is to be perceived by our customers — and we define those as external applicants, employees and managers — as caring, knowledgeable, flexible, responsive, approachable and fair.”

To assess how well the firm achieves its business mission and HR mission, each of the company’s seven divisions has subjected itself to a rigorous quality-improvement process since 1991. The process is based on both the Malcolm Baldrige National Quality Award qualification process and the Oregon Quality Award process. It measures quality in seven categories, including HR development and management, and quantifies the results of those activities. Evans says the clincher for her HR department’s strategy is making Standard Insurance a great place to work for all of its 1,750 employees. “And that’s all linked to our corporate vision, which is driven by the elements of long-term relationships, excellence and a supportive work environment,” she adds.

This is exactly the area that USC’s Lawler says is how human resources can still strategically keep the two HR roles as company advocate and employee advocate: That of making a company an employer of choice. These days, with the shortage of qualified workers, HR can frame the argument for continuing to be an employee advocate by positioning it under the “employer of choice” mantle. “The window has been opened more in the past couple of years as organizations have become concerned about retaining people and attracting high-talent people — particularly technical people,” says Lawler. If HR chooses the employee-advocacy role as its primary mission to make a firm the best place for employees to work and thereby fulfills the corporate mission of having the best workers who can be the firm’s strategic advantage, then HR’s role is clear. And everyone else will be clear on HR’s primary role as well.

When setting your HR vision, pay close attention to the CEO’s leadership signals. The CEO will speak volumes in the way he or she sets the company’s agenda. For example, at Verifone Inc., a wholly-owned subsidiary of Hewlett-Packard that’s a global provider of secure electronic payment solutions based in Santa Clara, California, its 2,700 employees around the world are considered the firm’s number one corporate asset. Therefore, the firm’s former chairman, president and CEO, Hatim Tyabji (who just announced his retirement last month) has considered HR his right arm for the past 12 years. “Most CEOs look upon HR as a backwater function,” says Tyabji. “But I look upon HR as a key element of my overall strategy in moving my company forward. HR people here are front and center in the formulation of the strategy and how to achieve it.”

Adds Tyabji, “We don’t operate in silos here.” He doesn’t separate the HR strategy from the business strategy because Verifone’s human resources strategy often drives the business. For example, to capitalize on top world talent, HR set up development centers globally in countries such as India. Half the firm’s employees work outside the United States. The company’s revenue has grown from $31.2 million in 1986 to $387 million in 1995; HR helped make it happen. “HR at Verifone is not an administrative spectator sport; it involves being part of the business solutions,” says Katherine Beall, vice president of global human resources. “Our HR strategy is to be collaborative business partners who provide value-added HR services.”

And at Cambridge, Massachusetts-based Polaroid Corp., Joseph G. Parham, Jr., corporate vice president of HR and total quality ownership, says he sees his primary role as working with the CEO to help run the company. “In so doing, I believe the interests of the employees, customers and shareholders align nicely with exceeding the customers’ requirements. Satisfied and enthusiastic employees are bound to deliver results which satisfy or delight shareholders.”

That’s HR nirvana, you say, and it’s impossible to achieve that type of human resources business partnership in the real world because most senior managers aren’t that enlightened. Just because it’s difficult to achieve doesn’t mean it’s impossible. Now that HR has begun to shake up the corporate hierarchy by stating its strategic partner value, it’s time to further clarify what it means to add people smarts to your business — and how it plays out in the management ranks.

Take a stand. Clarifying your primary role as a strategic business partner shouldn’t mean putting yourself in a no-win situation by diluting your HR effectiveness with conflicting roles. Experts say it’s well worth the effort. In fact, in this case, you just might be “damned if you don’t.”

Workforce, May 1998, Vol. 77, No. 5, pp. 62-74.

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Being an Employee Advocate and a Manager

Firing the violent employee with mental disabilities: Christine, an HR professional at a large company faces this dilemma. An employee, Don, who has mental disabilities, threatens to commit an act of workplace violence. This isn’t the first such threat Don has made, according to Don’s co-workers, but it’s the first such threat that Christine hears about. If she fires Don, she risks the chance he might sue under the Americans With Disabilities Act. If she doesn’t fire him, she risks the chance he might hurt employees. What’s the best course of action?

Response from Brent Longnecker, an expert witness in HR issues: Depending on the severity of the situation, Christine might not want to fire Don immediately. It would be wise to place him into a performance-appraisal process and into counseling. By giving feedback, the company could show in a court of law that Christine tried to make sure Don was taken care of. To immediately terminate employment can put the HR executive in a bad situation legally.

The problem with this scenario is that this is the first time Christine has heard about the threats, and she’s being told about them by other people. You have to be careful in a courtroom because if the behavior hasn’t been documented, it’s considered hearsay and doesn’t hold weight in a court of law. It might be wise to place Don on a paid leave to seek counseling. Unfortunately, this type of situation occurs frequently. It’s wise to proceed cautiously.

Workforce, May 1998, Vol. 77, No. 5, p. 68.

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Consider Do-it-yourself Certificate Programs

In 1994, Gregory Hardoby, personnel administrator for Union County, New Jersey, was searching not so successfully for a tuition-reimbursement program for county employees. The options weren’t inspiring. The county could go with a policy that covered tuition for any work-related courses-and risk paying for a hodgepodge of classes that might not really develop employees. Or HR could micromanage the reimbursement program, approving or rejecting every course request-time that could be much better spent in other areas. There seemed to be no middle ground.

It’s not an uncommon problem. As business and governmental organizations strive to prepare their workforces of today for the challenges of tomorrow, they collectively spend more than $6 billion on employee tuition-reimbursement programs.

Too often, however, traditional approaches to tuition reimbursement lead to one of two problems. First, employers that pay for any job-related courses often wind up paying too much for coursework that in the end has little relevancy to the organization’s development. And second, in the name of economy, some organizations require extensive and elaborate prejustifications and preapprovals for every single course for each and every employee. While such a process cuts back on program costs, it also sends the message that the organization is more interested in short-term costs rather than long-term development of the employee or the organization.

The solution to this dichotomy is better managing, rather than enlarging or restricting, reimbursement programs. As Union County’s HR staff discovered, a middle ground exists between the “anything goes” approach on one hand, and the “only what we say” approach on the other. The faculty at Kean University in Union, New Jersey, worked with Hardoby and his staff at the county to create a customized certificate program that combines employer guidance with employee flexibility. Other organizations struggling with reaching a balance also may find such a program helpful.

The county creates its own program.
The primary focus when we began working with Hardoby was to define suitable coursework for the county’s management-level employees. We decided the best solution would be the creation of a graduate-level Certificate in Public Management program, in affiliation with Kean University.

The program meets all the county’s needs. It requires employees to successfully complete two employer-chosen foundation courses-the graduate-level Public Bureaucracy: People, Processes and Performance and Policy, Politics and Public Management. These two courses formed the building blocks of a graduate-level course of study and ensure county employees learn the solid basics of public management.

But to allow for individualization, employees also get to choose any two elective courses of their own from Kean’s accredited master’s in public administration (MPA) curriculum. This way they can pursue a line of study that interests them on a personal level.

The certificate program is administered just like other Kean courses of study. The Union County employees take all their classes right alongside other Kean students. Union County covers half the class tuition costs for each employee.

The certificate program has been highly successful for the county. By linking it with the public administration program at the college, the county has assuaged any concerns as to its relevancy and value. At the same time, the certificate program offers a wide enough range of courses to meet a variety of employee and employer needs and desires.

A second benefit of the certificate program is that the credits earned by participants are applicable to employees continuing on with their MPA degrees, should they wish to do so. To date, of the 26 county employees who completed the certificate program, 24 have elected to go on to earn master’s degrees. The county pays 75 percent of tuition for degree units 13 through 30 and 100 percent for units 31 to completion. “It’s the best of both worlds, for us and for our people” says Hardoby.

Janis Lisa, director of the Division of Internal Audits for the county, agrees. “The program … has helped me to develop a good understanding of how the governmental sector works and how to make it work better. This program should be considered a mandatory tool in developing the skills needed to perform productively in government.” The program has proved so beneficial that the county board of Freeholders has just begun a second, undergraduate-level Certificate in Public Administration program with Kean for employees who lack a four-year degree.

Like the graduate program, employees will take a total of four courses, two employer-selected foundation courses and two employee-selected electives, all of which can later be used toward a baccalaureate degree. The county currently has eight employees working on undergraduate certificates.

“With our undergraduate program, we’ll be able to reach out to employees at all levels within the county, not just those in the professional and management ranks,” says Hardoby. “Union County is committed to providing our citizens with the best possible services, a big job for which we require the best-prepared employees.”

What to remember when shopping for a degree program.
Other organizations can copy Union County’s successful experience by keeping a few tips in mind. First, certificate programs should be linked to a college’s existing degree programs. This helps ensure that the courses taken are relevant to the employee’s occupational needs: An employee who wants to continue on a degree path has already completed the basics, and the linkage of credits to specific degrees helps direct employees away from courses that are interesting but not relevant to the employer.

Also, certificate programs may be framed not just as a training opportunity, but as a stepping stone for a return to academics for many adult learners-gently starting off those who are able, and signaling to those who are not quite ready, prior to launching an extensive and costly degree-program effort.

Finally, when establishing a certificate program, an employer should bargain with the school over reduced tuition rates for its participants. If an organization has enough employees enrolled (equivalent to fill a full class, which would be a total of 10 to 12 graduate students or 15 to 20 undergraduate students), the employer should look to negotiate a reduction of between 5 percent and 15 percent.

Using customized certificate programs, employers are able to create high-value educational opportunities. Such programs can be created in any field relevant to the organization and its work needs, from public management in the case of Union County, to more specialized areas such as accounting, engineering, computer programming and more. Certificate programs can be tailored to employees of all levels and backgrounds and start from entry-level courses to up through graduate-level coursework.

Certificate programs also work well with college courses using distance learning and other alternative learning strategies that can accommodate employees who travel or have unique working conditions.

These programs also can be valuable indicators to management when reviewing employees for transfers or promotions.

Creating and maintaining one or more certificate programs puts employers back in the position of managing their education programs, not just administering them. It offers an employee-friendly, but results-oriented system for directing today’s employees toward the long-term growth and development they, and their employers, need to meet the dynamic workplace needs of tomorrow.

Workforce, May 1998, Vol. 77, No. 5, pp.101-104.

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Send Your Expats Prepared for Success

Can you imagine buying something with a $1 million price tag and then leaving it in plain view in your unlocked car while you run in the store for milk and eggs? Anything could happen. Most folks would consider it worthwhile to protect something so valuable.


Yet it’s a fairly common practice to send expatriate families overseas with little or no preparation for the tremendous transition companies expect them to make. And you’ve heard the statistics: Cultural adaptation trouble is the one of the leading causes of failed assignments. Clearly, international assignees would be better prepared for the cultural adjustment if companies were more consistent about offering predeparture culture and language training. Consider it an insurance policy. With a budget of only 1 percent of your $1 million investment in an expat assignment—or $10,000—you can put together a predeparture orientation program that will do the job.


To help you design this program, or to provide you with some benchmarking standards for your existing program, Global Workforce interviewed a dozen service providers. In the next few pages, you’ll find a summary of their collective wisdom.


Train the whole family.
Experts agree that every family member should be involved in predeparture orientation. It’s true that employees face a good deal of stress as they adjust to the new workplace culture, perhaps struggling with a second language in informal business situations and learning to read their local colleagues during meetings and negotiations. But in many ways they’re sheltered from the local culture. The language of business is often English. The employees are surrounded by co-workers who realize they may need assistance. And for eight or more hours a day, employees have someplace to be and something to do.


On the other hand, spouses and partners rarely are permitted to work in the host country. For starters, this means they have all day long to think about how different things are. They’re also typically the ones who keep the household running. They’re forced to interact with the local culture as they struggle to buy groceries, meet with their children’s teachers and communicate with neighbors.


So it’s imperative that partners participate in the orientation program. Tracy Colquhoun, manager of client communications in the Chicago office of Cendant Intercultural, The Bennett Group, says: “It’s important the employees understand the kinds of difficulties their spouses are going to face. It’s also important for the spouses to have a realistic understanding of what the expectations are going to be of the employee.” Too often, spouses leave for assignments with a vacation mindset, thinking they’ll enjoy seeing more of their husbands and wives than they would usually. Well-prepared spouses understand the opposite is more likely to happen.


Patrick Burns, a trainer with Chicago-based International Orientation Resources, shares another advantage of keeping the employee and spouse together during the training: It gives them an opportunity to talk through their concerns about the assignment with each other. “It’s often very hectic before the move and sometimes people don’t have time to just sit down and discuss what’s happening,” he says.


As you’ve probably heard, children make the adjustment extremely well. But that doesn’t mean it’s easy for them. They leave behind friends and relatives—and possibly favorites like french fries. They face new grading systems. And although they may acquire the local language with a flawless accent, they may be embarrassed about their parents who sound like foreigners in front of their classmates.


It’s unlikely an employee is going to be successful on the job with an unhappy family. Worst case, this results in an early return home. Structuring your orientation program to include the partner and children may prevent this.


Conduct the orientation one to two months out.
On average, predeparture cultural orientation programs run one to three days in length, depending on a variety of factors:


  • The family’s level of prior international experience
  • Whether the focus is country-specific or regional
  • The time and money the company is willing to invest.

When asked when is the ideal time to conduct the training, service providers respond unanimously: Don’t wait until the last minute. In the final weeks before the transfer, international assignees are preoccupied with a mound of tasks that absolutely have to happen before the move: selling the house, selling the cars, packing, arranging for elder care and saying good-byes. Sitting quietly in a two-day training session is the last thing they’ll be in the mood for.


So if two weeks out is too late, when is the best time? “As soon as you know they’re headed to another country. You can’t start too soon,” says Chris Roosevelt, director of distance language training for Alta Language Services in Atlanta. Several experts explained that the day the family learns of the transfer, the adjustment phase begins. And any point from that time forward is appropriate because families will be eager to learn more about their destinations.


Karen Hamady, director of client services with Prudential Relocation International in Houston, recommends waiting a bit later. “If it’s too close, they’re harried. If it’s too early, they’ll forget everything.” She adds, “So the ideal time I would say would be anywhere from a month to three weeks before the move.”


But many companies don’t allow enough lead-time to do so. Last-minute decisions result in frantic training schedules, including post-arrival culture programs. Although not ideal, this arrangement is more effective than trying to squeeze in the training during the final days before the transfer.


Language training is an entirely different story. It’s certainly possible to cram in two weeks of immersion training in the month before the transfer, but families would feel better prepared if they had time for a 10- to 12-week program, allowing more opportunity for the material to sink in. Progressive companies recognize this and offer language training to potential expatriates so they can begin preparing far ahead of time.


On the flip side, the shorter immersion schedule can be followed by a continuation program in-country. Service providers offer a range of options for long-distance learning or instruction from local consultants or training centers.


Include key elements during the culture segment.
A family leaving on its first international living experience is going to require more in-depth information than one accepting a second or third assignment. So an important first step is a thorough assessment of the family’s experience. Often conducted via a written survey or a telephone interview, the assessment will help the trainer custom design an appropriate program. Programs usually include key components such as these offered by Boston-based Eaton Consulting Group:


Culture profiles. This element explains the differences and similarities of the home- and host-country cultures.


Cultural adaptation. This section communicates the theory of the culture shock curve, alerting families to the typical time frame during which culture shock hits, describing the symptoms and providing tools to counteract it.


Logistical information. When this piece isn’t already handled by global relocation companies, culture trainers share these types of details: the etiquette of gift giving, whom to call in an emergency and how to write a check.


Application. This section applies the cultural background to the roles employees and partners will assume in the new location. The trainer will pick apart the expat’s job description, for example, identifying the adjustments he or she may need to make to be successful performing a familiar function in the context of the host country.


Joerg Schmitz, director of global management development and training for Princeton, New Jersey-based Training Management Corp., shares an interesting example of the impact of culture on an employee’s job performance. “The U.S. [culture] is extraordinarily task-oriented. Northern Europe is perhaps the closest to the type of task orientation you’ll find in the United States.” He adds, “But about every other country in the world is relationship-oriented.” Clearly it’s important your expats understand this as they struggle to build rapport and gain credibility with business colleagues.


Expect the expat and partner to attend training sessions together. It’s important they experience the same training because they will be each other’s primary support system abroad. Children often attend separate age-appropriate programs focused to their needs.


You’ll see a lot of variety in terms of the backgrounds of those who conduct the training. Generally, a facilitator skilled in training leads the discussion. Then country experts, often natives of the subject country with business backgrounds similar to the expat employee, come in on a consultant basis to contribute their perspectives in a short segment or two. You may also see panels of returned expatriates offering the inside scoop from an American viewpoint. In one case, a vendor even offers a panel of returned children to answer questions from the expat children.


Follow these guidelines for the language segment.
On the language side, you should expect most of the instruction to focus on building conversation skills. There may or may not be some emphasis on grammar, but the service providers agree that in a short time frame, it’s more important to concentrate on speaking.


“Our goal at Berlitz is to train people with enough vocabulary—with the use of about 40 verbs in present, past and future tenses—so they have the basics to be able to ask for a taxi, make their way out of an airport, go shopping, give compliments to their colleagues, and so on,” explains Michael McCallum, national director of business development for Berlitz International Inc. in Princeton, New Jersey. Then families can build on this base in the host country.


One way to get the basics is through an immersion program. If you go this route, keep in mind that experts suggest participants’ ability to absorb the material wanes after four hours of study. Half-day sessions for two or three weeks running works well for most students.


If your employees will begin language training a few months before departure, frequency is still important. Consider sending them in for two or three, two-hour sessions each week.


Ideally, you’ll provide your expat families with 100 to 150 hours of language training. Since it’s unlikely they’ll have enough time to complete this many hours before the transfer, your goal should be to give them a solid start before they relocate. Then you’ll need to make arrangements for ongoing education in-country.


Be prepared for families to opt out of training.
So you’ve designed the perfect orientation program, but families are choosing not to participate. How can this be? A couple of things might be happening. The obvious answer is that families don’t understand the value of the culture information. Maybe they haven’t made the connection between knowing the basics of the host country language and forming relationships with co-workers and customers. So the first thing you need to do is to publicize these benefits. Take a “what’s in it for me?” approach: Market the career-development value of the program to expats and potential expats.


Second, your line managers may not understand the value of the program, and as a result, they may be discouraging assignees from participating in the face of all the work they’re hoping these employees will wrap up before leaving. If you suspect this may be the case, you might want to consider a radical idea: Make the training mandatory. Remove pressure from the expats entirely.


And third, if your organization selects expats and gives them short notice, these employees may feel too rushed to take the time for predeparture training. If this sounds familiar, make yourself aware of the long-distance and in-country training options so you have a back-up plan ready to go.


Make employees aware that language training is always an option, so they can start ahead of the rush when they have “potential expat” status. Pete Simmonds, director of corporate sales for Syracuse Language, based in Syracuse, New York, says: “Several of our clients have asked us: ‘Can you provide us with tools we can use to tell our employees these kinds of language training programs are available?’” In response, Syracuse offers a variety of solutions—e-mails, Web pages and newsletter articles to name a few.


And that’s all there is to it. Your expat families are counting on you to give them the tools and skills they need to adjust successfully. Not only are you saving them from unnecessary frustration and anxiety, but you’re also protecting your company’s $1 million investment. Just think how much better you’ll sleep.


Global Workforce, March 1999, Vol. 4, No. 2, pp. 6-8.