Author Archives: Tom Foster

About Tom Foster

Tom Foster spends most of his time talking with managers and business owners. The conversations are about business lives and personal lives, goals, objectives and measuring performance. In short, transforming groups of people into teams working together. Sometimes we make great strides understanding this management stuff, other times it’s measured in very short inches. But in all of this conversation, there are things that we learn. This blog is that part of the conversation I can share. Often, the names are changed to protect the guilty, but this is real life inside of real companies.

Interviewing for Attitude

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“We always hire people for their technical skills, but we fire them for who they are.” Russell and I were having a conversation about how to create hiring questions.

“Tell me more. What do you mean you fire them for who they are?” I asked.

“Well, they may have the right experience, know how to handle the technical part of the job, but their attitude is a little out of whack. In the beginning, it doesn’t show up, but after a couple of months, little things appear. After six months, this strange behavior actually begins to flourish and it’s downhill from there.”

“What do mean, strange behavior?” I was getting curious.

“Sometimes, it’s just people skills. They are a little gruff at first, then a couple of people get on their bad side. Pretty soon, they become downright rude. They publicly dress people down in meetings. No one can disagree with them without a huge public confrontation.”

“Do you interview to discover this type of behavior?”

“No, usually the person is pretty well coached by a headhunter on how to handle the interview, so we don’t find out until later.” Russell stopped, his brow furrowed. “You mean you can interview for a bad attitude?”

“Yes, you can. Bring me your job description for that open position. Tomorrow, we will talk about interviewing for both the technical side of things and the soft “people side of things.” -TF

Recruiting Intelligence

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“It’s a matter of business intelligence. It’s a matter of thinking differently about recruiting.” Marcy and I had been talking about sourcing candidates to fill two open positions in her company. “Marcy, how do your salespeople keep up with all the customers and prospective customers in their world?”

“Well, the sales department uses a CRM program. You know, Customer Relationship Management. It’s a database that they can use to keep track of contact information, conversations, likes and dislikes, birthdays, all kinds of stuff.”

“Marcy, have you ever thought about using a low-end off-the-shelf CRM software to keep track of prospective job candidates? Listen, when your sales people go out to meetings, conferences, mixers, do they meet people, collect business cards and find out important information related to customer needs? I just want you to do the same thing. Always be recruiting, always be gathering information, always be collecting business intelligence. You should have the best rolodex in the business, only these days, your rolodex needs to be on steroids, using CRM software. Find out who the players are in your community. Always be sending them information, enticing them toward your company. Invite them to events, send them a card on their birthday. Get aggressive about recruiting.” -TF

The Wanted Poster

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Since Marcy was still listening, I continued to talk about the specific things that need to be done to source more candidates in the recruiting effort. “You started by creating the Wanted Poster, like in the old West. Paint a picture of the person you want and get it on paper.

“This does two things for you. First, it creates a picture in your own mind. Many candidates may slip through your fingers because you don’t know who you are looking for. Did you ever decide to buy a car, a specific car, and once you knew what you wanted, you suddenly noticed how many other people were driving that car. You were able to distinguish this year’s model from last year’s model. And they were everywhere.

“Second, you now have something to talk to other people about. You can firmly place the image of this person in the minds of other people, business associates, friends and family. You need to get a posse together to go find these candidates.

“Marcy, you will never get what you want, you will only get what you focus on.” -TF

Hard to Find Good People

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“I am just not getting quality candidates from the referral agency,” complained Marcy. We were talking about two positions she needed to fill. “I call them and explain what kind of person we need, but they take two weeks to get back to me. And the people they send are just not qualified.”

“Marcy, how do you source other candidates besides the referral agency?” I asked.

“Well, we really don’t have time. We’re just so busy around here. It’s really hard to get good people these days.”

“Marcy, here is my observation. You are not seeing quality candidates because you are not focusing your efforts. If your referral agency is not doing the job, then your company has to take responsibility and source your own candidates. You need to be actively recruiting and networking all the time. You are in the business. You should have a better rolodex than the referral agency. You don’t, because you see recruiting as a distraction. Your expense last year for head hunters was $45,000. And what do you have to show for it. Three positions filled, but two didn’t work out, so you are waiting for the replacement guarantee.”

Marcy didn’t like what she heard, but she was still listening. Is your company having difficulty sourcing candidates? What are you doing about it? What ideas have you used to get more and better people into the interview room? -TF

HR’s Budget

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“How important is the role of HR in a growing company?” Last Friday, I conducted our Hiring Talent workshop, which generated a number of thoughtful questions.

How big is your company’s payroll? In dollars? That’s how important HR is. The HR person is in charge of your company’s acquisition, training, development and human productivity. HR’s budget isn’t your training budget, or the salaries of your HR personnel. HR’s budget is your entire payroll cost.

So, if you have a company of 80 employees and an annual payroll of $2M, then HR’s budget is $2M. I look to your HR person to actively be involved with your managers, constantly asking how this person or that person is performing. This is what I want to hear from your HR person.

Does this person need training? Is that person ready for a new assignment, more responsibility? Does this person need to be replaced? Because I have two candidates in the wings you should take a look at.

That’s how important HR is in a growing company. -TF

Structured Outcomes

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“Let me take Curtis’ point-of-view,” says Barry in a comment to last Friday’s post. We had been talking about Curtis (the Manager) and Roger (the new Supervisor). We were exploring how a Manager turns over increasing responsibility to a new Supervisor. Barry continues,

“While Curtis may BE a micro-manager, I think the BIGGER point is that he’s not yet comfortable in KNOWING that Roger will do the right thing. I would add that Roger should engage Curtis in several conversations – related to, but separate from, any particular assignment – about what Curtis feels IS the right thing. That way, Roger can help show Curtis in non-essential moments that he has a good head on his shoulders and can be trusted more when it comes to doing the ACTUAL work.”

I find a great way to structure these conversations is by using a written document which captures daily outcomes, weekly outcomes and monthly outcomes. This spells out expectations right from the get-go. It also outlines appropriate (expected) moments for follow-up.

These conversations create helpful (rather than meddling) opportunities for coaching. -TF

Focus on Outcomes

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“They told me they wanted me to take on more responsibility, but Curtis, my boss, still micromanages everything I do. Even though I have a new title, I can’t even send a confirmation letter without him changing it before it goes out.” Roger was trying to be a sport about things, but he was frustrated with his new promotion.

“It’s a tough situation,” I said. “Many managers in Strata III love to do Strata II work or even Strata I work. One reason is they like doing that work. It gives them a sense of accomplishment.

“Your question, however, is what do I do? First, sit down with Curtis and work on your job description. Make it crystal clear what you are responsible for and what outcomes have to occur each day, each week and each month. Ask for regular meetings every couple of weeks with an agenda to specifically discuss those outcomes. This exercise will not only refocus you, but refocus your manager. -TF

PS. I’m-OK.org continues to provide a web based messaging system for Katrina evacuees by creating an individual message board tied to their old phone number. Volunteers are now working at aid stations and relief centers to add people to the database. For more information, visit www.im-ok.org.

Finding the Energy

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Jessica was talking about her boss, Matthew. Matthew is one of those special people who, in the midst of a problem always seems to see a solution. In a meeting, where an idea may be shot down, Matthew reverses the energy. He says, “I know it is impossible, but if it weren’t impossible, how would we do it?”

What she finds interesting about Matthew is that when he walks in the room, she feels an uncanny ability to conquer any difficulties in her current project.

Stay away from naysayers, and surround yourself with people who are pathologically positive. In this time of national difficulty, we each have to find the energy to make things happen, to solve the problems around us. Find that person who gives you the uncanny ability to conquer difficulty. -TF

PS. I’m-OK.org continues to grow. On Wednesday around 4:30pm MSNBC.com posted a link on their site and our traffic immediately jumped. Lots of people are still looking for people. If you can help by volunteering some time to register evacuees on the site, all you need is an internet connection, a laptop and a sign that says, “I’m-OK.” We will be posting suggestions on the site that might be helpful. Groups of evacuees are landing in different places all over. Please help. For more on this incredible story, check out Tuesday’s post.

Adherence to the Plan

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I don’t watch much television, but it is difficult to escape the media’s focus on the Gulf Coast. The past few days have been filled with mud slinging about which government leader should have done what. Is there a lesson for us, as Managers, about our role in planning for our own organizations?

I thought about the distinct differences between South Florida’s (where I live) response to hurricanes and what we are seeing in New Orleans. There is no doubt that had Katrina come ashore here as a Category 4, we would have seen similar destruction, but I wonder if we would have seen the ensuing chaos.

When Hurricane Andrew struck South Florida in 1992, we learned a lot. We learned a lot about building codes and we learned a lot about preparedness. Almost every organization I work with has a detailed Hurricane Plan in writing. The path and the storm intensity trigger automatic response to take specific action based on the plan.

The plan takes the emotion out of the decision. So many Managers make their decisions based on emotion rather than strict adherence to a plan. Plans are created in the calm of foresight, to help us take action in the face of circumstances that may be chaotic or difficult to interpret.

Unfortunately, it often takes a bit of hindsight, and sometimes a devastating event to teach us the lessons of planning for the worst. -TF

PS. Please pass along the link to our “I’m-OK” message boards in the search for people displaced in Hurricane Katrina. You can read more about our site in yesterday’s post. The link is www.im-ok.org

Incredible Story “I’m-OK” (long)

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I want to tell you an incredible story.

Last Wednesday night, a close friend of Managementblog, Cathy Muth, CEO of O. R. Colan Associates, watched the stream of video from Hurricane Katrina and recognized the need for a central place where family and friends could locate people displaced from the disaster. Her company manages relocation programs for public agencies and has worked for FEMA in the past. She contacted us with an idea to see if we could help create a web registry called “I’m-OK.”

So, we became a team. OR Colan immediately agreed to fund the site. Our chief programmer Brandon Stone (photoblogs.org) had specific ideas of how this site had to be put together to accomplish its goal.

We thought long and hard about how to handle the data requests, how to make the site quick, accurate and simple. We looked at other boards and noticed that they were jumbled, jammed with messages, ultimately irrelevant to the search for a family member or a friend. In 99% of the searches, it was all noise. With im-ok.org, the user puts in a phone number and immediately finds information about a person.

Or not. On most message boards and other registries, if there is no news about a family member, it might take an hour or more of useless searching to find that out. With im-ok.org, using the person’s phone number, the search takes three seconds. If there is no news, the visitor knows that immediately. The design team did not want to string someone out for an hour searching a database in vain.

We observed other message boards that became overloaded to the point where users experienced significant slowdowns. We knew that if the site proved successful, it would get hit hard. All of this was carefully considered in the architecture of the site before a stitch of programming was done.

The idea was simple, yet overlooked by most people trying to create registry sites. Tell a database programmer that thousands of people are going to input data and watch him cringe. How many different ways can you spell New Orleens, Biluxi and Metaree? Designing a site using a traditional database approach is flawed before it gets out of the gate. The overhead to handle the queries and the variations of queries is of immense proportions, which is fine if you have three or four months and an unlimited budget. Im-ok.org was structured in a few hours and functional within 24. We chose a single piece of meta data (a person’s telephone number) and created message boards around that. The site was up and scalable.

The launch was critical. Friday, September 2, at noon, the site was up, yet, no one knew about. We contacted newspapers, television stations and networks, but quickly understood that traditional media outlets might not be effective or fast enough. Because of our active participation in the blogging community, we knew the success of the launch would depend on the power of the internet and its connected groups of people.

The momentum began to pick up steam with blog postings, email lists and message boards. After two hours, people were posting real messages on the site. Within 24 hours, sampled traffic rates were running 1200 hits per hour. We put a stats stream on the site, so visitors could see, in real time, who was clicking through back- links from other sites all over the world. After 36 hours, we held number one listings on Google, Yahoo and MSN for Katrina I’m OK. MSN search also showed number one for I’m OK. The Alexa rating for the site hit 46,005 on Sunday, just 48 hours after launch.

The success of www.im-ok.org will ultimately be determined by how useful and helpful it is. It was created so other people could assist in its proliferation throughout the internet. It was a simple idea, to create a scalable application, using message boards centered around phone numbers so people could truly help each other in this time of chaos.

Here is where we need your help

You can help by coordinating volunteers at aid stations and relief centers to relay information back to people with computers to input the data. It is quick, just a phone number and a name. Then click a button that says, “I’m OK!” This will take initiative on the part of people to just do this. We are in Florida and cannot physically be there to do that work. We have more information on the site. You can volunteer at this email address: volunteer.im.ok@gmail.com. Please help. -TF