Nearly 35 years ago in the satirical movie Network, television newsman Howard Beale exhorted his viewers to open their windows and yell the now-famous line: “I’m as mad as hell, and I’m not going to take this anymore.” Today, I’m sure many workers would love to bellow those same words to their bosses. Trouble is, they’re too afraid to speak up in this still shaky job market.
Overworked and overstressed, many employees are frustrated and frightened. They feel they have little control over their work lives and, even worse, little hope that things will get better anytime soon. Moreover, they worry about reprisals and job loss should they vent their feelings. Certainly, the employee-employer bond has been fraying for many years, but it seems more tenuous than ever.
The opening two feature stories in this month’s magazine illustrate the plight of fatigued, disgruntled employees and the risks of spouting off about workplace grievances, even on personal social networking sites. It’s noteworthy that two employees quoted in the stories requested anonymity to avoid any flak from supervisors.
In a widely watched National Labor Relations Board case about an employee who was fired for bad-mouthing her boss on her Facebook page, an administrative law judge should soon clarify how far workers can go in letting off steam. But no matter what the decision, companies understandably don’t want employees trashing them—especially in public. Research has shown that employees can be extremely influential in shaping the public perception and reputation of the companies where they work. One way to discourage negative word-of-mouth is to assure employees that they can speak frankly to managers about their workload and other stressors without negative consequences.
Clearly, there are plenty of workplace stressors these days. Many of the employee surveys that cross my desk repeat the increasingly familiar themes of feeling overworked, unappreciated or underappreciated, disengaged, depressed and restless. In two surveys earlier this year by Manpower Inc.’s Right Management talent development business and LinkedIn, 79 percent of employees reported heavier workloads because of layoffs, and three-quarters said they almost always put in more than 40 hours a week. The rank and file aren’t the only ones with bigger burdens: In surveying supervisors, Robert Half International Inc.’s OfficeTeam staffing division found that nearly one-third of them are not taking extra time off between Thanksgiving and New Year’s Day.
How long will restive workers put up with the fatigue and fear? It’s unlikely that many will bolt soon because, as this month’s Data Bank feature shows, landing a new job today often means accepting lower wages. But as the economy strengthens, companies will likely see some of their top talent depart. In its Global Workforce Study this year, the consulting firm Towers Watson & Co. found that half of the workers didn’t see any career advancement opportunities in their current jobs, and 43 percent said they believe that they must change employers to move to a higher-level position. Even so, 81 percent said they weren’t actively seeking a new job—at least not now.
To prevent a talent drain, farsighted managers will no doubt figure out ways to relieve the stress and motivate their best performers to stay put. Some employers are trying to prevent burnout by limiting the number of work hours and even requiring that lunchtime be spent outside the office. Others are helping employees set reasonable goals and priorities to avoid feeling overwhelmed. Perhaps the most valuable strategy is to make employees feel valued and help them see opportunities ahead.
In choosing the winners of this year’s Workforce Management Optimas Awards, I noted that several entries demonstrated the powerful impact of employee engagement efforts on morale and retention. IBM Corp., for example, won the award for Global Outlook because of its worldwide Blue Opportunities initiative that enables employees to explore new roles in different parts of the company. Before instituting the program, IBM had been disturbed to learn that workers were leaving because of a perceived lack of career growth options.
The much smaller Planned Cos. received the Optimas Award for Vision in recognition of its online School of Professional Development that has helped reduce turnover among its employees in janitorial, concierge and building security services. President and CEO Robert Francis says that the school sends the message to workers that, “We value you. We’re proud of you.” That’s exactly the sort of sentiment that could comfort tired, tense workers at many companies right now.
Workforce Management, December 2010, p. 42 — Subscribe Now!
The Yawning of a New Era
America’s workforce is weary. Employees of all ages report feeling fatigued, stressed, burned out or depressed, brought down by a heavier workload, layoffs and an assortment of other adverse conditions workers feel they have little or no power to control.
In a recent study, 81 percent of human resources managers agreed that employee fatigue is a bigger problem than in years past. According to a Workforce Management and WorkForce Software survey of 820 U.S. companies, the major culprits are reduced head count, lack of boundaries between home life and work, second jobs and a culture of “wanting to do it all.”
It’s a perfect storm of employers cutting their workforces as far as they can and workers being stretched as far as they can, says Marc Moschetto, WorkForce Software’s vice president of marketing. “Doing more with less is a pretty unsustainable model.”
In a separate survey of U.S. and Canadian workers, more than half of the 794 people polled reported feeling fatigued at the end of the work day, and at least 40 percent of all age groups said their jobs made them depressed. Yet because of the weak job market, employees are afraid to talk about how tired they are, says Mario Canseco, a vice president at Vision Critical, the Vancouver, British Columbia-based pollster that conducted the survey. “You don’t want to be perceived as someone who’s not doing more than you should, even without a raise, because you don’t want to lose your job.”
Indeed, a secretary at a Sacramento, California, agency—who requested anonymity in this article for fear of being retaliated against for discussing conditions at her workplace—says a state-imposed furlough ordered because of the recession effectively cut 15 percent from her salary. Further, budget cuts reduced her agency’s staff to a skeleton crew, leaving more work for those left behind. “I can’t remember the last time I went out for lunch. I bring my lunch and eat at my desk,” she says.
The secretary says her agency wanted to promote her, but a statewide promotions freeze means she has assumed the new position while remaining in her previous job classification and pay grade. She can’t even go home and pour her troubles out to her husband because he’s in the same boat, she says, working 10-hour days “and coming home late and exhausted.”
The animosity directed at California government workers during a protracted and often ugly state budget process only added to civil servants’ stress levels, the secretary says.
“The constant uncertainty, fights in the court, our employer vilifying us, it’s been awful. It’s that more than the monetary losses that are getting us down.”
Some companies have figured out ways to keep employees’ spirits and energy up during down times. For example, Xonex Relocation, a New Castle, Delaware, relocation services company, says it realizes its employees are under added stress with many people making work-related moves. “Every day we’re dealing with people at their very worst, and the last two years it’s gotten worse,” says Bill Humphrey, the company’s senior vice president and managing director.
As a result, Xonex bars employees from working through their lunch hour or even eating lunch at their desks.
The company has mandated other stress reducers, including the “sunset rule.” Every day before quitting time, the company’s customer-service agents must phone clients with a move update, so there’s no unfinished business hanging over employees’ heads when they go home. The company sells the end-of-day check-in as a special feature for clients, but it’s really about giving employees’ peace of mind, Humphrey says. “I don’t want them going home and picking their kids up from soccer and thinking of the calls they didn’t make. It’s a very beloved thing here. Everyone commits to making those calls.”
Workplace fatigue isn’t new, of course, but it’s receiving more attention as employers keep their overburdened staffs lean. It’s also in the spotlight because of high-profile accidents in recent years caused by sleep-deprived workers as well as federal and industry regulations meant to reduce employee fatigue.
One of those accidents happened in February 2009, when a Colgan Air Inc. crew flying for Continental Airlines crashed outside Buffalo, New York, killing 50 people. Federal aviation investigators blamed the accident on pilot error but said that fatigue hurt performance, too.
Fatigue also has been cited in several high-profile trucking accidents in recent years, including a 2009 accident in which a 76-year-old driver hit several vehicles and killed 10 people on an Oklahoma highway. In its investigation, the National Transportation Safety Board said acute sleep loss, shift work and mild sleep apnea contributed to driver fatigue that caused the crash.
In October, the transportation safety board recommended that trucking companies adopt fatigue management programs, which could include such things as screening and treating sleep disorders, scheduling with safety concerns in mind, and installing video and data recorders to collect information in the event of an accident.
Similarly, last year the Nuclear Regulatory Commission required nuclear power plants to minimize fatigue, including creating policies such as giving employees the right to say they’re too tired to safely perform their work and strictly monitoring hours worked. Facilities that fail to comply risk being shut down by the nuclear agency. “It’s not like turning off your light switch; it’s millions of dollars to go through the power-up and power-down cycle,” says WorkForce Software’s Moschetto, whose company sells software that power plants use for shift scheduling purposes.
Speaking at a national safety convention in October, Occupational Safety and Health Administration assistant secretary of labor David Michaels told reporters that he had no plans to create a standard for employee fatigue but expects companies to address it as part of their injury and illness prevention programs.
In the health care field, there has been a movement afoot to modify the back-to-back shifts that residents, nurses and other medical providers often work.
In recent years, a handful of states have passed laws banning mandatory double shifts for nurses, nurses’ aides and other medical-care providers. Pennsylvania passed such a law in July 2009, five years after a University of Pennsylvania study showed that the risk of medical error was as much as three times higher when a nurse worked a shift of 12½ hours or longer. A separate Pennsylvania Health Department study showed that 13.6 percent of the state’s registered nurses had worked mandatory overtime within two weeks of taking the survey.
Pittsburgh’s Allegheny General Hospital got a head start on the state regulation. When the 661-bed facility negotiated a union contract in 2003, it banned mandatory double shifts for its approximately 1,200 nurses. A few years before, Allegheny General had gone through bankruptcy reorganization in the middle of a national nursing shortage. Staffing was down, and RNs were routinely asked to work overtime. “It was a huge issue people were upset about,” says John Ziegler, an RN who has been with Allegheny
General 20 years and was previously president of a union that represents its nurses. “It’s totally disruptive. It doesn’t matter if you know six hours ahead of time. If you have child care issues or standing plans, you have to scramble to arrange around it.”
Banning mandatory overtime and limiting the number of patients monitored at any one time made nurses happier and improved the hospital’s bottom line, says Judy Zedreck, Allegheny General’s vice president of nursing. The year before the 2003 union contract took effect, the hospital had paid temp nursing agencies for 140,000 hours of labor. At least part of that total was to cover for staff nurses dealing with fatigue and burnout. By 2009, the number of temp nurse hours dropped to 34,000, and will total only about 10,000 this year, Zedreck says.
Today, mandatory overtime isn’t even on Allegheny General nurses’ radar, says Zach Zobrist, vice president of SEIU Healthcare Pennsylvania, the nurses union at Allegheny and 19 other western Pennsylvania hospitals. That’s still not the case at other state hospitals, some of which have called Allegheny for advice on meeting the state regulations banning mandatory double shifts. “Even with the law, they haven’t worked it out yet,” Zobrist says.
Workforce Management, December 2010, p. 3-4 — Subscribe Now!
Some Companies Are Playing to the ‘Crowd’
When the economic downturn forced Dassault Systèmes SolidWorks Corp., a Concord, Massachusetts-based software company, to reduce its budget in 2009, Jeff Ray, the CEO, made it a group decision.
He tried an online version of “crowd sourcing”—an approach to group decision-making that taps the collective intelligence of the staff rather than just the executive team. Using custom software, employees responded online with budget suggestions and commented on co-workers’ ideas.
The staff had two weeks to make cost-cutting suggestions, which were vetted by Dave Stott, the chief financial officer, who had final say on implementation. To participate, staff members had to select a screen name, but most people used their actual name, Stott says. Employees could choose to respond anonymously if they preferred; participation was voluntary.
About 300 of the 800 domestic and international employees proposed 100 cutbacks that included eliminating summer outings and holiday parties, cutting back on Web conferences and reducing business travel. The company saved $30 million, including $8 million by slashing business travel, and didn’t lay off a single employee. Not every staff idea was implemented, of course. For example, the company rejected a job-sharing suggestion.
Why use crowd sourcing? Stott says the executive team wanted the staff’s “ideas and buy-in and wanted to give them ownership of the problem.” Previously, the company had used crowd sourcing effectively to elicit customer feedback on new products. It created a dynamic atmosphere throughout the company where everyone “started thinking twice about spending and finding better ways to do things,” Stott says.
Crowd sourcing can boost productivity and raise morale because staff members feel involved in problem-solving, rather than passive recipients of executive decisions. “We involved everyone in the process because we’re all going through it,” Stott says. “It also reinforced our culture of transparency.”
Crowd sourcing can also prove to be efficient and speedy. The entire staff has long contributed projects at USAA, the San Antonio-based insurance and financial services company targeted at military personnel, but, in the past, collaboration took considerable time. With crowd sourcing, ideas can percolate within a day or two after a project or problem is posted online.
It took only five months this year for USAA to implement 44 ideas triggered by crowd sourcing, according to Mick Simonelli, who is assistant vice president at USAA. For example, one idea led to streamlining the mortgage process, reducing paperwork and increasing productivity.
USAA provides four criteria for crowd sourcing suggestions including increasing revenue, reducing costs, improving member benefits and making processes more efficient. Simonelli says crowd sourcing works best when the challenge presented is clearly defined and includes detailed direction.
What’s more, if management asks employees for problem-solving ideas, it needs to report back on them and act on some. “Anyone who does a good job at crowd sourcing responds to each and every suggestion,” says Stephen Shapiro, author of The Little Book of Big Innovation Ideas.
He also warns that employers should be alert to the risk that employees will submit inappropriate or confidential responses. At DS SolidWorks, for example, some staff conveyed confidential information, Stott says. In the future, he adds, the company will urge staff to be more discreet.
Workforce Management, November 2010, p. 6 — Subscribe Now!
Holiday Events Stage a Comeback as Dark Mood Eases
Hey, Scrooge, it’s time to have a little fun. With growing signs of an economic recovery, Chicago employers are again warming up to holiday parties.
After two years of cutbacks, layoffs, bailouts and outright bankruptcies, the return of this annual ritual signals that corporate managers are more confident about business prospects and feel a need to invest again in morale, reward and recognition.
“As a firm, we’ve reinstated holiday parties,” said a spokesman for PricewaterhouseCoopers, Chicago’s No. 3 accounting partnership. The 1,700-employee Chicago office is among the New York-based firm’s 76 branches that will offer the chance to mix and mingle again after a merriment moratorium in 2009. “It shows a lot of optimism where it didn’t exist 24 to 12 months ago.”
The comeback of company-sponsored get-togethers is providing a year-end boost for the city’s hospitality industry, which was slammed by the recession. Corporate bookings are up significantly from last year at many hotels, restaurants and other venues.
Nationally, 76 percent of employers will hold some type of year-end celebration, according to the Bureau of National Affairs Inc., an Arlington, Virginia-based firm that tracks business practices. That’s up from the decade low of 67 percent last year, though below the peak of 83 percent in 2005. “It really does present a very good idea of where the country is economically at any given point in time,” said Matt Sottong, the bureau’s research director.
At Chicago’s Adler Planetarium and Astronomy Museum, “business has tripled over last year,” said Michelle Eastham, director of catering for Food For Thought, the facility’s on-site caterer. While numbers are 15 percent under the 2007 peak, “budget is coming back,” she says.
Across Lettuce Entertain You Enterprises Inc.‘s 39 restaurant brands, event reservations are up 5 percent to 15 percent, while smaller, intimate parties have risen 10 percent to 15 percent, after a two-year drought, said Kevin Brown, CEO of the Chicago-based company.
The Hyatt Regency Chicago has booked a half-dozen big holiday parties this year, twice as many as last year, said Kirk Howard, director of catering and convention services at the downtown hotel. With more companies now making reservations only a few weeks in advance, he said, that number could increase.
“The hangover of the recession is beginning to wear off,” said John Challenger, CEO of Chicago outplacement advisers Challenger Gray & Christmas Inc. He sees more companies playing a defensive game: offering perks such as holiday parties to retain employees who might high-tail it as the job market improves. “They are concerned about their top performers beginning to vote with their feet,” he said.
Two years ago, DLA Piper’s Chicago office canceled its lavish holiday affair and instead hosted a potluck at the office of 450 employees. After another bring-your-own event last year, business is improving and the law firm is headed to a yet-to-be-determined local restaurant for this year’s party, said Bill Rudnick, managing partner of DLA Piper.
“We’re dipping our toe back in that water,” he said, noting that the party will be low-key compared with the excesses of the mid-2000s. “We have a sense that the economy is returning to normal and that we can do some of the things that we used to do, like a nice holiday party for ourselves and our colleagues.”
Some firms are ramping up this year’s event. Executive recruiting firm LaSalle Network is spending 15 percent more on its holiday bash for employees and clients. “We’ve done well and we’re happy about it,” CEO Tom Gimbel said. “We want people to know that we appreciate their business.”
But many parties are less extravagant than they used to be. Denis Frankenfield, director of events and catering at the John G. Shedd Aquarium, said companies are trimming the trimmings by offering wine and beer instead of a full bar, or dishing up chicken rather than beef. “Most of our events aren’t doing décor, like flowers,” he said. Still, the Shedd is already 75 percent booked.
“I like the fact that we’re seeing some corporate business, which is what we really lost over the last couple of years,” added Tony Camarillo, senior director of sales and events at Navy Pier, a Chicago tourist attraction on the lakefront. “It’s a good sign, but I wouldn’t hang my hat on it yet.”
Filed by Kate MacArthur of Crain’s Chicago Business, a sister publication of Workforce Management. To comment, e-mail editors@workforce.com.
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Body of Work
Public relations executive Joe Chernov knows how to dress for success. He favors the crisp architectural lines of Dries Van Noten suits and shops at Barneys New York for the latest menswear.
But his most dramatic fashion statement lies hidden beneath his designer clothes. Chernov’s arms are inked from wrists to biceps with Asian-themed tattoos. Lotus flowers and a bird in flight encircle his lower left arm, and a kimono-clad geisha and fluttering butterflies cover his right. Like many professionals with a fondness for body art, Chernov keeps his tattoos under wraps at work, exposing them only when he feels it’s appropriate.
“I’m going to be on a panel with a lot of chief marketing officers at a fairly buttoned-up event, and I’m already thinking about what I’m going to wear that will cover my tattoos,” says Chernov, the 40-year-old director of content for Eloqua Corp., a marketing automation firm based in Vienna, Virginia. “In certain settings, like a client meeting or being on stage speaking, I’m concerned about how I’m being perceived.” When he interviewed last year for a highly sought-after job at a conservative company, he chose a shirt with extra long cuffs that covered the flowers and breaking waves on his wrists. “It’s my ‘In case of emergency break glass shirt,’ ’’ he says. “I don’t wear it often, but I did that day.” Nevertheless, he didn’t get that position, but did eventually land the job at Eloqua.
Although the tattoos don’t seem to have limited his job opportunities, Chernov isn’t so sure. “Has it affected my career? Maybe,” he says. “I don’t know if I’d be in a different position if I didn’t have them.”
Figuring out how much ink and body metal, if any, are acceptable to display at work is not only a challenge for the growing number of tattooed and pierced professionals, but also for their employers. Establishing guidelines for body art in the workplace will be increasingly important as the millennial generation floods into the workplace.
By 2014, millennials are expected to account for about 36 percent of the U.S. workforce, according to government projections. And they clearly like to express their individuality through body art. According to a 2010 Pew Research Center study, 12 percent of the 18- to 29-year-olds surveyed have at least one tattoo and 26 percent sport two or more. About 7 percent have six or more tattoos. Generation X is fond of body ink, too. About one-third of those between 30 and 45 said they have at least one tattoo. Only 15 percent of baby boomers between 46 and 64 have one.
When it comes to body piercings, however, the generation gap widens considerably. Nearly one-fourth of millennials surveyed have piercings other than on their earlobes compared with just 9 percent of Gen-Xers and 1 percent of baby boomers. Maria Hicks, who is 28 years old, sports an array of body bling. The Albuquerque, New Mexico-based copywriter has her septum and lower lip pierced, and she wears three little diamond studs on her upper chest. Her earlobes are stretched with large metal plugs known as “gauges,” and her upper ear is skewered with a small metal bar.
Tattoos cover her left arm and upper back. She sees her body art as a professional asset. “I’m in a creative field, and this is an expression of my creativity,” she says. Hicks recently left a bartending career to break into advertising and was nervous about the transition. She says her mother, who works in public health, worried that her daughter would never find a job—that is, until she started noticing the number of physicians and nurses with tattoos.
“My mom realized that there’s a whole culture around body art, and it’s not the stigma it used to be,” Hicks says. “I think more employers are seeing that, too.” Still, when interviewing at the agency she now works for, Hicks covered up for the initial meeting.
When she got the second interview she dressed conservatively but decided to expose her arms. “I didn’t want to represent myself in a false light,” she says. “This is who I am.” Acceptance in the workplace is what Justin Johnson, owner of an artistic management firm in Phoenix hopes his newly formed Alliance of Tattooed or Pierced Professionals, or ATOPP, will help bring about. The group assists the pierced and tattooed find employment at “compassionate companies that support this freedom of individuality and don’t judge their employees based on their tattoos, piercings or hair but on the quality of experience and skill you can bring to their team,” according to its website. Johnson, 24 years old, got the idea for ATOPP after working as a Web designer for a company where he was asked to remove his piercings and cover up his tattoos. “It really seemed to take away from the importance of being myself and expressing who I am,” he says, “especially since I never had to deal with customers.”
Individuality
Chicago psychologist Daniela Schreier says body art has evolved from stigma to fashion statement and that younger employees see tattoos and piercings as modes of self-expression rather than rebellion. “Modern body art came out of the prisons and from the gang world,” says Schreier, who teaches at the Chicago School of Professional Psychology and specializes in workplace issues. “Corporate leaders most likely didn’t grow up seeing body art that didn’t have a negative connotation. But young people want to express their individuality, and this is how they choose to do that.”
Despite the growing number of employees with body art, many companies do not have specific policies addressing the issue and many simply leave it to the discretion of supervisors and employees. An exception is the global accounting firm KPMG. The company has clear guidelines on what’s appropriate and advises employees with piercings other than in their ears to “please leave the metal at home,” according to an article in its college recruiting magazine.
Other forms of body art aren’t addressed, but KPMG gives a detailed description of suitable blouses, shirts, skirts, shoes and accessories. Like many companies contacted, KPMG declined to discuss in detail its dress code and the issue of body art, as did American Express Co. Representatives for Bank of America Corp. and Boeing Co. said they don’t have policies addressing body art, but declined further comment. And several other companies, including Hewlett-Packard Co., Starbucks Corp. and Wal-Mart Stores Inc., didn’t respond to telephone calls and e-mails.
Sally Davenport, a spokeswoman for FedEx Corp., says in most cases, “tattoos must be covered if you are in a customer-facing position, but there’s no hard and fast rule.” Company policy states: “Visible tattoos and body piercings, except for an earring in one or both ears, are usually prohibited in customer contact positions when wearing an appropriate company-issued uniform. However, management has discretion to allow visible tattoos when they’re not offensive, vulgar, sexual, have gang-related content or are disruptive, distracting or otherwise inappropriate.” In the end, Davenport says, “Basically, we trust our managers’ judgment.”
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“Corporate leaders most likely didn’t grow up seeing body art that didn’t have a negative connotation. But young people want to express their individuality, and this is how they choose to do that.” |
Ford Motor Co. has a dress code policy but it doesn’t include body art, according to spokeswoman Kimberly Harry. The company leaves the choice up to employees and their supervisors. “It does provide that dress must be suitable to the circumstances of the work assignment and requires employees to utilize good judgment in determining what is appropriate and respectful,” she says in a written statement. Similarly, online retailer Zappos.com leaves the issue up to employees. “We just have a general rule of ‘use good judgment’ that is expected of everyone, and that applies to hair, clothes, tattoos, piercings—pretty much anything,” says Zappos human resource director Rebecca Henry. “We trust our employees to make good decisions and that’s always been the case for us.”
Myrna Armstrong, professor emeritus at the School of Nursing at Texas Tech University Health Sciences Center, based in Lubbock, has studied body art for nearly two decades. She finds “a loosening of attitudes in the corporate world,” as evidenced by the growing number of tattooed and pierced workers she observes in the workplace. “I’m seeing more waiters and waitresses, salespeople, bank tellers, people dealing with customers every day who have tattoos and piercings.” She says that rather than prohibit body art, employers should develop HR policies “that talk about tastefulness, nonoffensiveness, neatness. After all, I’d rather have someone look neat and clean and have a tattoo and piercings than have an employee who looks cruddy but doesn’t have any.”
Debbie Salerno, chief financial officer and human resources director for Peppercom Inc., says the public relations agency in New York City hasn’t adopted an official policy and would decide cases of questionable tattoos or piercings on an individual basis. Several of Peppercom’s 70 employees have tattoos, but most keep them hidden, including Salerno whose small tattoo is placed discreetly on her left breast. “I don’t know how I’d react if someone came in with a ton of piercings on their face,” she says. “It’s hard to see past that.” It’s like selling a house: You “don’t want too much of your personal style showing.”
At some retailers, almost anything goes as long as it’s not deemed offensive. At Borders Group Inc. bookstores, where pink-haired and tattooed sales associates abound, employees are allowed to display body art “as long as they’re not in excess” and their clothing and manner are professional, says spokeswoman Mary Davis. “Our associates like to be able to express themselves but in a way that customers don’t find offensive.”
Some public employers, especially fire and police departments, have become more restrictive than companies in recent years. The Los Angeles Fire Department, which issued a controversial “no show” policy in 2008, requires firefighters to cover up all visible tattoos while on duty. There also are restrictions in the military, where the tattooing craze arguably began when sailors started collecting tattoos as souvenirs from various ports of call. Last year, however, the U.S. Air Force lifted a ban on tattoos on the saluting arms of recruits after only a week because of intense backlash. In 2005, after failing to meet its recruiting quota, the Army loosened its restrictions on tattoos allowing them on soldiers’ hands and neck as long as they are not offensive. But the head and face must remain tattoo-free.
Employment lawyer Kevin Troutman, a partner at Fisher & Phillips in Houston, has seen a surge in the number of companies seeking his guidance on body art in the workplace in the past five years. “It’s a question that will continue to face employers again and again,” he says. “If a guy has a tattoo on his arm or a woman has one on her back and it doesn’t show or affect their job performance, does the employer have any right to tell them you can’t have one? The answer is ‘no.’ But if it’s visible and violates dress codes and policies and if the employer can show an anti-discriminatory reason for prohibiting it, then the employer should be fine.”
Stephen Hirschfeld, CEO of the Employment Law Alliance, a global network of employment and labor law specialists, says companies generally can avoid legal problems if they tie body art restrictions to business impact, such as the potentially damaging effect of tattoos and piercings on the corporate image. Even so, he advises employers to take a common-sense approach. “It’s an issue of supply and demand,” he says. “As you have more people coming into the workplace with piercings and tattoos, companies will have to start making compromises. I honestly don’t think you need to have a policy to address this. It’s a balancing act that should be decided on a case-by-case basis.” Consistency is critical, he adds, so HR departments must be the clearinghouse for such cases.
New York City attorney and tattoo enthusiast Marisa Kakoulas is working on a book called Tattoo Law, about legal issues affecting the tattooing world. She cautions that companies that ban body art must be careful that their policies don’t discriminate based on race, color, religion, sex or national origin, which is a violation of Title VII of the U.S Civil Rights Act of 1964. She points to two highly publicized 2005 cases involving a Costco Wholesale Corp. cashier with an eyebrow piercing and a Red Robin Gourmet Burgers Inc. waiter with religious tattoos on his wrists.
In the first case, the cashier was asked to remove her piercing after Costco banned all facial jewelry except earrings. She claimed religious discrimination, arguing that as a member of the Church of Body Modification, a group that promotes spiritual growth through tattooing and piercing, her jewelry must be visible at all times. Costco won the case in large part because it offered a reasonable accommodation—wearing a clear plastic stud, which the cashier refused to do. In the Red Robin case, the company paid $150,000, according to the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission, to settle the lawsuit with the waiter who was fired when he refused to cover his tattoos and claimed that doing so would be a sin based on his religion. Costco declined to comment and Red Robin didn’t respond to phone calls.
Although body art is more commonplace and some companies try to accommodate it, many people are still leery of flaunting a tattoo or piercing. A 2007 survey of 468 employees in various industries by Vault.com, a career management website, found that 85 percent thought body piercings and tattoos could be an impediment to getting a job. Indeed, Chicagoan Erin Colley, who had several piercings at the time and still sports an ankle tattoo, remembers landing a temporary receptionist’s job a few years ago that she hoped to parlay into full-time work. On her first day, the HR director told her to remove her piercings or look for another job. “I had a choice,” she says. “I could sit at home and play Scrabble and have a nose ring, or I could take it out and pay my bills. I took mine out. I understood that I was the first person clients saw. I got it. And I ended up getting the job.”
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“If a guy has a tattoo on his arm or a woman has one on her back and it doesn’t show or affect their job performance, does the employer have any right to tell them you can’t have one?” |
Kakoulas, whose arms and back are heavily tattooed, says many professionals are afraid of being seen as rebellious or anti-establishment. The best way to combat potential prejudices, she says, is to be willing to cover up. Early in her career when she was hired at a corporate law firm in Brussels, she used bandages and stage makeup to conceal her tattoos. After she had been on the job a few months, one of the firm’s partners asked her how she had injured her hand. She hesitated before telling him that she had tattoos. When she finally unwrapped her hand, the partner told her the tattoos looked much better than bandages and she kept them off.
“But would I have even gotten the job if I had showed up that way to the interview? Probably not,” she says. “But once I proved myself and was making a lot of money for the firm, it wasn’t an issue. So I tell young people to cover up because it should be about you and your accomplishments, not your tattoo.”
Career advisers at universities alert students to the possible risks of letting recruiters see their body art. Stacey Rudnick, director of MBA career services at the McCombs School of Business at the University of Texas in Austin, advises students to be aware of how their choices are perceived by recruiters, whether they involve body art, hair style or religious and political affiliations. “It’s not my job to tell a student what to do, just to advise them on what to expect,” she says. Recruiters may judge applicants on their “body art or a goatee or long hair. My best advice is: Be who you are—once you get the job.” The Internet may provide job seekers with some guidance. Marcus Cota, a 31-year-old body piercer at Tailor Made Tattoo and Body Modification in Madison, Wisconsin, recently launched YoungModifiedProfessionals.com to survey pierced employees about their experiences in the workplace. He hopes to establish a database of companies that are accommodating to body art. Cota notes that most of his clientele is professional. “We rarely get a bum or a junkie.”
(David Ores, a heavily tattooed New York City physician, isn’t surprised by the mix of clients. “Tattoos are expensive and doctors have money,” says Ores who offers free tattoo removal services to former gang members and convicts. He has removed tattoos from professionals but says most are getting rid of smaller tattoos to make room for bigger ones.
“Doctors have to conform with a lot of rules—state, corporate, ethical rules on what to wear, what you can and can’t say,” he notes. “It’s a pressure cooker of obedience. Tattoos can be your sneaky way of rebelling.” In addition to his extensive body art, Ores rides a Harley-Davidson, adding to his rebellious image and alarming the occasional hospital security guard. He is frequently stopped and asked for identification. “If you have tattoos, they make an instant impression,” he says, “but once you start a conversation with someone and you’re civil and polite, the alarm quickly goes down to DEFCON 1.”
For Chernov, the PR executive, body art can sometimes be an asset. “It offsets the misconceptions about being older,” he says. When he interviewed with startup companies where employees tend to be much younger, his tattoos upped his cool quotient considerably. My tattoos showed that “I can play the old guy if I need to and I can hang with the kids,” he says.
While having tattoos can be an issue in some business circles, Chernov likes to point to the growing numbers of respected professionals who are getting them: “My tattoo artist says his two biggest clients are doctors at number one and then lawyers. Of course he didn’t count the unemployed.”
So far, Chernov has not joined those ranks, but as the artist’s promotional T-shirt points out, the inked and pierced employee can never be sure. It reads: “ArtFreek Tattoo: Creating Tomorrow’s Unemployed Today.”
Workforce Management, November 2010, p. 21-22, 24, 26, 28 — Subscribe Now!
Tattoos in the Workplace Drawing Big Online Response
The growing popularity of tattoos and piercings has made the issue of body art in the workplace a hot topic on the Internet. Several websites, blogs and social networks cater to inked and pierced professionals. Here are a few:
• Tattoo Acceptence (sic) in the Workplace—A Facebook group with nearly 710,000 members. Its goal “is to take away the stigma attached to people who have tattoos in the workplace.” Members post queries on which companies have the most restrictive policies, share experiences about being turned down for jobs, and vent about unsupportive bosses and colleagues. Most posts echo the sentiment of one member who writes: “I’m not going to change who I am for a job. I want a job that fits me, not the other way around.”
• Atopp.org—The Alliance of Tattooed or Pierced Professionals helps the inked and pierced find jobs at “compassionate companies that support this freedom of individuality.” Co-founder Justin Johnson, 24, was inspired to create the site after working as a Web designer for a conservative company that asked him to remove his piercings and cover up his tattoos. The group lists companies that are body art friendly, including Home Depot Inc., Target Corp., Trader Joe’s Co., Verizon Wireless and Wal-Mart Stores Inc.
• YoungModifiedProfessionals.com—Marcus Cota, a 31-year-old body piercer in Madison, Wisconsin, hopes to establish a database of companies that are accommodating to pierced professionals on his recently launched website. He is conducting a survey of workplace experiences among participants, asking questions about the number and types of piercings they have and how their careers have been affected.
• NeedlesandSins.com—New York City lawyer and tattoo enthusiast Marisa Kakoulas has been blogging about tattoos and legal and workplace issues since 2005, but started her website just last year. She offers advice to employees, tattoo artists and others who have legal questions about body art. Regarding job discrimination, she writes: “Even if you claim your tattoos are protected for reasons such as religion or national origin, that doesn’t mean you can wear a swastika on your neck and serve customers with abandon.” She is currently working on a book titled Tattoo Law.
Workforce Management Online, October 2010 — Register Now!
From Conflict to ‘Cohorts’ When Young and Older Workers Mix
The organization was in decline with older members seizing control and the younger generation feeling frustrated. As young members left, the organization became “top heavy with old people.” Succession was a struggle, and the organization lost status within the community.
Managing generations in the workplace may be especially daunting today as the millennials butt heads with Generation X and the baby boomers. But generational conflict has been a challenge, well, for generations. The above example comes not from a 2010 corporate office environment, but rather from a 1957 study of the Woman’s Christian Temperance Union by Joseph Gusfield, a University of Illinois researcher. Gusfield concluded that two or more generations in an organization lead to factional conflict.
More than half a century later, researchers at the University of Illinois see similar tensions in a new study: The gray-haired guy in accounting is a baby boomer so he has probably never even tweeted; the young millennial generation receptionist needs constant praise and would fall to pieces if anyone yelled at her, which is unlike the 35-year-old tech guy who’s a cynical Gen Xer. While there’s validity to such generational differences, the researchers say they believe managers can encourage more open-minded, flexible thinking and build “intergenerational cohorts” to help produce harmony and productivity.
The 2010 study, Unpacking Generational Identities in Organizations, which was conducted by three professors and a graduate student and appeared in the Academy of Management Review, analyzed generational research dating back to the 1920s. The researchers also reviewed decades of sociological and psychological identity literature and interviewed employees at various organizations. “The main issue is: How do we create intergenerational relationships that allow for exchange of information?” says Aparna Joshi, the study’s lead researcher and an associate professor in the school of labor and employment relations at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign.
Establishing such relationships requires employers to understand the differences between age-based and cohort-based identities. Most people share a set of attitudes with those who had similar “coming of age” experiences. “When you enter adulthood, certain collective memories impact you,” Joshi says, citing the assassination of President John F. Kennedy and September 11, 2001, as examples of collective experiences.
A cohort-based identity, in contrast, develops from a shared set of organizational experiences. Managers can try several strategies to cultivate cohort-based identities. For example, they can organize orientations or new employee meetings so workers connect based on starting at the company together. “It’s about entering the organization and being socialized into the organization,” Joshi says. New workers go through the same socialization and meet the same contacts.
Negative developments also can produce intergenerational cohorts. In the 2010 study, researchers interviewed management from a large manufacturing company bracing for layoffs. The older employees had experienced economic downturns and counseled the younger employees on what to expect. This type of bonding laid the foundation for a shared, intergenerational experience after the furloughed employees were reinstated.
Succession planning also can develop cohorts as senior employees serve as mentors to up-and-coming leaders. Employees come to an organization socialized to understand hierarchies and succession of power because they have a family tree where generations move up the branches into new roles such as parenthood or grandparenthood, according to the study. Joshi says the concept of the family tree socializes younger workers to expect eventual succession while still acknowledging the contributions of senior employees.
Employers, however, need to identify this succession instead of assuming workers innately understand their evolving roles. Information exchanges and mentorship programs are opportunities for senior employees to pass on information about the company. IBM Corp., for example, developed Mentor Me, which enables employees to use the company’s intranet to request a mentor. Workers can seek mentors in a variety of areas, such as career, technical and organizational, and the system will find suitable matches from a pool of volunteers, according to spokeswoman Laurie Friedman. IBM also offers a reverse mentor program for senior executives, who can learn from recent college graduates how technology is being used by consumers.These exchanges help ease senior employees’ fear of passing on power, Joshi says, while readying the next generation to lead.
Workforce Management, October 2010, p. 12 — Subscribe Now!
The Last Word All Work and No Play ..
Playforce Management. That would be our magazine’s title in the kind of world that people like Josh Linkner envision.
“ ‘Work’ is such a negative-sounding word,” Linkner said at a presentation I attended last month about innovation. The founder and CEO of the promotions company ePrize, Linkner also writes a blog about creativity on his website, www.thecreativitygeneration.com. “As kids, we go out to ‘play.’ Later in life, we ‘play’ sports or ‘play’ music,” he writes in one posting. “But then in sharp contrast, we leave our homes each day and go to ‘work.’ The term implies doing uninspired, often boring and generally yucky things.”
Linkner thinks it would be much nicer to say you are “running off to play” and to hear your spouse respond: “Have a nice day at the playground.” Consider “playing” out a conflict, he suggests, or “playing” through your next tough business challenge.
His message certainly would resonate with members of the millennial generation, some of whom expect the freedom to shop online, listen to iPods and even take naps at the office. But it also makes me wonder whether all generations might appreciate mixing some play and relaxation into the workday. Indeed, for many people, “work” is the antithesis of the fun, freedom and creativity they experienced as children. So why don’t we try to make work feel more like play?
The notion of play in the workplace may sound zany, but it’s really just one perspective in the long-standing debate over how to achieve balance in our lives. While some people think of balance as flexibility in managing both their personal and career demands, advocates of mixing work and play want something more holistic. They don’t want to segregate their personal and professional worlds; they hope to meld those worlds so they don’t have to leave part of themselves behind when they walk through the office door. What they seek is a blended life.
Companies ranging from online retailer Zappos.com (“create fun and a little weirdness”) to Southwest Airlines Co. (“fun-luving attitude”) have made playfulness part of their corporate cultures. But Google Inc. is perhaps the paradigm for blending work and play. It has received abundant attention for letting employees at its Mountain View, California-based headquarters get a massage, take yoga or dance classes, and play a tune on the piano or a game of pingpong. Employees also can take care of personal chores such as getting oil changes for their cars or dropping off their dry cleaning at the Googleplex. That environment has helped make Google the dream employer for many college students. Understandably so. I must say that it was fun dining on gourmet goodies and taking a spin on a scooter when I made a presentation last year at Google’s New York City office.
While Google may have taken fun in the workplace to greater lengths than other companies, it actually followed the lead of earlier pioneering efforts. For example, the software company SAS Institute Inc. has long offered personal perks at its North Carolina campus. In profiling the company in this month’s issue, Janet Wiscombe describes the company’s on-site child-care center, medical-care facility and beauty salon. Employees can play water polo at the fitness center and natatorium, take time to view the extensive SAS art collection or meander along the 1.8-mile “bluebird trail” with its 25 birdhouses. Such leisure activities have helped foster enduring loyalty and very low turnover at SAS.
It’s critical that corporate play be spontaneous, not forced fun. I’m not sure forming “happiness committees” to plan social events and team-building activities is the right strategy. Employees don’t want to feel pressured to wear silly hats or form a conga line and dance through a maze of cubicles. What many would relish is the freedom to take a break when they need to recharge and enjoy their employer’s recreational amenities.
There’s certainly plenty of talk these days about employee engagement in an era of frozen salaries, furloughs and frenzied workloads. Play may be the most engaging approach of all in this stressful period of job insecurity and burnout. If companies would lighten up a bit, everyone might just be happier and more productive. Play isn’t meant to distract from job responsibilities, but rather to rejuvenate. After all, if we’re more playful and laugh a little more, isn’t it likely we’ll be more creative and innovative as well?
Workforce Management, October 2010, p. 50 — Subscribe Now!
Multiskilled Employees Sought as Versatility Becomes a Workplace Virtue
As companies slashed their workforces during the recession, employee specialists became an endangered species. Firms needed generalists who could adapt quickly, think on their feet and competently perform duties often beyond their job description.
Those jack-of-all-trade workers remain crucial to companies for their ability to handle multiple assignments. And versatility has emerged as a key quality that recruiters say they consider when filling vacancies these days.
A study released this year by consulting firm Accenture PLC asked U.S. employers why they added employees during the downturn. While 46 percent of the executives reported that they launched new products or entered a new market, 45 percent also said they needed workers with more or different skills for future business.
“Who are the people who can work under pressure, work harder and earn less, who can take on new tasks, who can be OK out of their comfort zones?” says David Lewis, founder and president of OperationsInc., an HR outsourcing and consulting firm in Stamford, Connecticut. “Companies need people like this now.”
Cynthia Good, founder and CEO of Pink, a publication targeting young female executives, retained the people who could handle multiple assignments when the magazine cut staff and went online-only in late 2009.
“I used to have one copy editor, one rewrite editor, two event managers, a designer and several writers and salespeople,” Good says, adding that publishing online only (although she says Pink still provides some custom publishing) was based on reaching readers who are more tech-savvy and like to receive the publication’s content on mobile devices.
“Now I have a half-dozen people working for me. My designer is also my media and video person, my line/copy editor also writes, my events person is now doing sales and is good at it. One person can wear a lot of hats in this economy where you must do more with less.”
Herndon, Virginia-based DLT Solutions Inc., a reseller of software to federal, state and local governments for companies such as Autodesk Inc. and Oracle Corp., also needs employees to wear several hats.
Since the passage of the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act, DLT Solutions’ salespeople have had to take over what would normally be considered order-fulfillment tasks because of changes in requirements for federal documentation, says Chris Laggini, DLT Solutions’ vice president of human resources.
The new requirements—especially the mandate for transparency in government—meant additional customer information had to be collected for order fulfillment to do its job. However, because the information had to be obtained from the customer, with whom order fulfillment has no contact, the sales staff was asked to collect it.
“The salespeople don’t like that, but the customer is happy, and it’s more efficient for the company,” Laggini says. With that approach, “new pieces of business mean you don’t have to hire new people or create new divisions.”
With the new value placed on adaptable employees, hiring managers appear to be seeking workers who are willing to take on different tasks, even if employees grumble about the extra work.
“We define [adaptability] on two levels,” says Nels Wroe, partner and product director for Princeton, New Jersey-based SHL USA, a division of U.K.-based SHL Global, which provides talent assessment and HR solutions such as succession planning and recruitment for companies such as American Express Co. and Barclays PLC in 30 languages across 50 countries.
“Adaptability is thinking on your feet. It’s a tactical, short-term characteristic,” Wroe says. “Embracing change is not tactical. It’s at the root of someone’s work behavior. It’s more about being thrown curveballs and instead of just reacting, you look at the potential, see it and deal with it. It’s adapting to how the world is changing.”
Wroe says conventional recruiting tools such as résumés, background checks and interviews won’t reveal if job candidates possess such traits.
“For the last 15 or 20 years, most people have been pretty successful” at managing their careers, he says. “But these tools show recent success, an upward trajectory. It’s a little difficult to see if someone embraces change, because only recently have we” experienced economic difficulty.
Wroe is among those advocating the use of personality and talent assessment tests for recruiting and hiring.
“When most companies do interviews, they are as unscientific and unanalytic as possible,” OperationsInc.’s Lewis says. “The days of going from a gut feeling in hiring are over. The interview has become a chess game, and the candidates have become masters. Companies need a more strategic and scientific process. There is a lot of value in personality testing. I started off being a skeptic. Now I’m a convert.”
Lewis adds that tests can validate what occurred in the interview.
“Tests don’t tell you yes or no to hire,” Lewis says. “They tell you the characteristics of the individual and the environment where they’ll do well.”
Adaptive Marketing LLC, a Norwalk, Connecticut-based firm that creates online consumer membership programs and partners with businesses to reach their target audiences, looks for specific adaptability traits during interviews. For executive-level positions, that involves a three-person panel.
“Candidates who deal well with pressure talk about the excitement of change in their work,” says Marcella Barry, Adaptivemarketing’s vice president of HR. “Someone leaving when there was a lot of turbulence indicates they may not adapt well to change.
“In this age of turbulence, it’s good to know you have a person who can operate under pressure. Regardless of the level of the person, it’s helpful to the organization.”
Workforce Management Online, September 2010 — Register Now!
New York Home to Many Mom-Friendly Firms
Of the companies that made Working Mother’s 2010 100 Best Companies list, a commanding 24 of them are headquartered in New York. That number leads the list by far—New Jersey has the second-largest number of companies, with only nine.
Since many companies are headquartered in New York, the large number of local firms making the list isn’t unheard of. According to Jennifer Owens, Working Mother’s senior director of editorial research and initiative, the Northeast is often strongly represented on the list. The five northeastern states combined account for 42 of the top 100 companies.
The companies that make the top 100 aren’t ranked except to highlight the top 10. To decide who makes the list, Working Mother uses an algorithm to score application questions and essays sent in by companies.
“We ask 610 quantitative questions and then there is the qualitative side where they tell their story,” Owens said.
Those 610 questions are put into eight main areas: workforce profile; benefits; women’s issues and advancement; child care; flexible work; paid time off and leave; company culture; and work/life programs. Meanwhile the essays let Working Mother staffers see upcoming trends; for instance, if a majority of significant numbers of companies are focusing on health and wellness issues.
One trend among this year’s featured companies is an increase in backup child care. The percentage of companies on the list offering backup childcare services has “skyrocketed” up to 87 percent, according to Owens.
“It’s becoming the norm,” she said. “I bet at some point backup child care will be at 100 percent; it’s that fast moving. It’s becoming something that companies think they have to do.”
Working Mother also compares practices at companies on their list to nationwide standards. For instance, while all of the companies on the top 100 offer telecommuting, only 44 percent of companies nationwide do. Another unfortunate difference is a decline in the amount of flextime offered.
“Our numbers hadn’t changed, but for the rest of the country they dropped,” Owens said. “And it worries me.”
Filed by Laura Mortkowitz of Crain’s New York Business, a sister publication of Workforce Management. To comment, e-mail editors@workforce.com.
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