Talent Edge Weekly - Issue #122

Covers sourcing talent in a remote world, psychological safety, people analytics, trends in rural job openings, and questions managers can use in performance management.

Welcome to this week’s issue of Talent Edge Weekly—the weekly newsletter for human resources practitioners, bringing together insights about work, the workplace, and the workforce from various sources.

If you find value in this issue or any of its resources, please share them with your network by using the social media icons at the top of the newsletter.

Have a great week, and I look forward to sharing more ideas in next week’s Edge!

Brian 

Brian Heger is a human resources practitioner with a Fortune 150 organization and has responsibilities for Strategic Talent and Workforce Planning. To connect with Brian on Linkedin, click here.

THIS WEEK'S CONTENT

  • 6 Articles from Gartner's June HR Leaders Monthly | Gartner | A new 50-page issue containing six articles on topics such as sourcing talent in the remote world, redefining quality of hire, recruiting a more diverse workforce, and planning your workforce without the limitations of roles. 

  • Special Summer Report: Working Values: How Purpose, Morals, and Meaning Build Stronger Organizations | MIT Sloan Management Review | A 26-page edition that includes a collection of four articles on driving purpose, DEI, and psychological safety (PS) in organizations. Includes a 6 question index to measure PS.

  • Are People Analytics Dehumanizing Your Employees? | Harvard Business Review | Provides three tactics for how companies can ethically and successfully deploy people analytics and minimize the risk of workers feeling they are “defined in terms of their data."

  • Report: Rural’s Rise: Shifting Trends in Rural and Urban Job Postings | Emsi Burning Glass | A new 16-page report that reveals a rise in rural job postings as a result of a segment of people moving from urban to rural areas.

  • 39 Questions Managers Can Use in Their Mid-Year Check-In Discussion with Direct Reports | INSEAD and AIHR | Includes two previously shared resources (totaling 39 questions) that managers can leverage as they conduct mid-year performance check-in discussions.

THIS WEEK'S EDGE

In this hypercompetitive talent market, HR leaders and their teams must rethink their strategies for sourcing, recruiting, and retaining talent. As HR teams reimagine these areas, this 50-page June 2022 Gartner’s HR Leaders Monthly Magazine issue provides several ideas. It includes six articles on a range of topics: 1) How Recruiting Partnerships Create Competitive Advantage in a Challenging Labor Market. 2) A Roadmap to Sourcing Talent in the Remote World, 3) Why You Must Redefine Quality of Hire (and How), 4) Five Best Practices for Recruiting a More Diverse Workforce, 5) Plan Your Workforce Without the Limitations of Roles, and 6) For Tech Talent, Staying Power Matters More Than Star Power. While each article offers various insights, a few sections to point out are a) Page 17, which includes four questions recruiters can ask hiring managers to address their biases in assessing remote work feasibility of roles. One question is, “What activities require employees to be in person, work specific hours or complete work in a defined manner?” b) Figure 1 on p.30 illustrates how recruiters can expand their talent pools by drawing from overlooked talent segments, such as “self taught” talent. c) Figures 1 and 2, beginning on page 37, illustrate an example of how to determine which roles to break down into tasks that serve as the basis of workforce planning. Other ideas are discussed. 

Many reports indicate workers place increased value on the cultural components of an organization’s employee value proposition (EVP). As leaders create opportunities to enhance and communicate these EVP components—such as shared purpose, psychological safety, and DEI, this special 26-page summer edition of MIT Sloan Management Review includes a collection of four articles containing ideas. The four articles include: 1) Unlock the Power of Purpose, 2) How a Values-Based Approach Advances DEI, 3) Why We Don’t Talk About Meaning at Work, and 4) Fostering Ethical Conduct Through Psychological Safety (PS). Concerning article #4 on PS, the authors, which include Amy C. Edmondson, share on page 23 a modified version of Amy’s original 1999 psychological safety scale. They added a new sixth item to capture the extent to which people hesitate to speak up. The six items are 1) On my team, if you make a mistake, it is often held against you. 2) Members of my team are able to bring up problems and tough issues. 3) People on my team sometimes reject others for having different views. 4) It is safe to take a risk on my team. 5) It is difficult to ask other members of my team for help. 6) I tend to think about how raising a concern will reflect on me before speaking up. Based on statistical analysis, the addition of the sixth question shows strong internal consistency—meaning that all six items are consistent with one another and measure the same underlying construct of PS. Leaders can refer to these questions as they gauge the extent to which PS exist in their organizations.

Employee monitoring and analytics have gained much attention since the pandemic’s start. Employee monitoring is a growing practice in which companies use digital tools to track work, employee performance, assess behavior, and collect proof of hours worked (and even employee ID badge swipes), to name a few. But as noted in this HBR article, “while this approach of employee monitoring aims to increase productivity and efficiency, increased monitoring can also increase stress, reduce trust, and even cause employees to act less ethically.” One recent example of how employee monitoring can create unintended consequences involves JPMorgan—where “employees describe growing ‘paranoia’ as the company tracks their office attendance, calls, calendars and more.” The HBR article provides three tactics for how companies can ethically and successfully deploy people analytics and minimize the risk of workers feeling they are “defined in terms of their data.” One tactic involves transparency about what employee information is tracked and how it is used. Given that research suggests that employee monitoring can signal distrust and lead to employee disengagement, organizations should carefully develop and implement their employee monitoring and analytics strategies to mitigate unintended consequences.  

Since the start of the pandemic, there have been reports on how remote work is one reason people continue to move from cities to less dense, rural areas. One benefit for a segment of those making these moves is that they can move to less expensive housing markets while retaining their higher incomes earned in more expensive labor markets. And according to this new 16-page report by Emsi Burning Glass, job postings are following them. As a point of reference, the researchers define a county’s urban-ness by the percentage of the county population that lives within urbanized (50k or more people) or urban cluster (at least 2,500 people and less than 50k) areas. Rural counties have less than 40% of their population in such areas. For example, Pika County, Kentucky, is 12% urban, while New York City is 100%. Leveraging a database of over 1 billion current and historical job postings, the researchers found that 1) nine of the ten counties with the highest growth in job posting share from 2019 to 2021 are rural. This rural job growth isn’t limited to specific sectors. 2) Since 2019, remote job postings from urban-based employers have grown 102 percent, likely contributing to the population shift away from urban areas. And while many jobs cannot be done remotely regardless of location, leaders can use the data points in this report as one of several sources for informing their talent strategies. As a bonus article, check out the Economic Innovation Group's article, How Remote Work is Shifting Population Growth Across the U.S.

Mid-year is usually one of several times during the year when managers and leaders hold performance check-in discussions with each of their team members. And while one purpose of this check-in is to discuss the employees’ progress on key performance goals and objectives, it is also an opportunity for managers to see how employees are doing and to use the time to re-engage their workers. To help managers and leaders prepare for these conversations, here are two previously shared resources that can be leveraged. 1) An INSEAD article, “Performance Reviews Need a Brand-New P&L,” which includes 18 questions managers can draw from to help identify what workers value in their work, careers, etc. Example questions include: What are your aspirations for career advancement? What are your needs at this life stage? How do your lifestyle needs align with your growth aspirations? Have you been learning in your current position? What would you like to learn next? 2) An AIHR article that includes 21 “stay interview” questions, including: What do you look forward to most when you come to work every day? When was the last time you thought about leaving the company? What would tempt you to leave the company? As your manager, what can I do more or less of? Managers can select a few questions and integrate them into their check-in discussions. The answers can help uncover opportunities for enabling employee performance, development, engagement, and retention.

CHRO APPOINTMENT OF THE WEEK

This past week, 28 Chief Human Resources Officer announcements were posted on CHROs on the Go – a subscription that provides the easiest way to stay informed about CHRO hires, promotions, and resignations. This week's CHRO highlight is:

To learn how to gain access to all 28 detailed Chief Human Resources Officer announcements from this past week and +1600 archived announcements, visit CHROs on the Go .

If you are already a member of CHROs on the Go, you can log in to access all announcements and site functionality.

MOST SHARED RESOURCE FROM LAST WEEK

A new 44-page report that analyzed 15 million jobs to determine the extent to which skills are changing across various occupations.

TWEET OF THE WEEK

BOOK RECOMMENDATIONS

You can see several book recommendations by clicking the image below.

Partial View of Recommendations. Click Image to See All Books

OUR RESOURCE LINEUP

​​brianheger.com provides free access to +1,000 curated articles, research reports, podcasts, etc. that help practitioners drive better business results through strategic human resources and talent management.

CHROS on the Go is a subscription that provides the easiest and most convenient way to stay informed about Chief Human Resources Officer hires, promotions, and resignations in organizations of all sizes and industries.

​Talent Edge Weekly is a free weekly newsletter that brings together the best talent and strategic human resources insights from various sources. It is published every Sunday at 6PM EST.