Hiring real people, not slick resumés.
Karl Edwards
Author: Karl Edwards
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Listen In -> Bold Resolutions for the New Year #3: Build a Team, Not Fill a Job
One of the great self-defeating strategies of team building is the practice of culling resumes with numeric and search engine based criteria.
Thousands of talented, appropriate and possibly “best fit” candidates are never met, because their resumes were thrown in the trash based on missing “key words”, arbitrary experience requirements, and other impersonal and unhuman criteria.
In this week’s show, Claudia discuss the need to build teams rather than fill job openings.
The annual “All-Star” games in many team sports made up of the best players from all the teams, do not result in the two best teams.
The order is important. We need thriving teams in order to function at the level necessary to create a way out of our economic doldrums.
A job opening is merely the existing set of tasks that the former employee did. It does not consider what might be possible given what the new hire brings to the table.
The question is, will you ever know? You may have just thrown the most promising resume in the trash because it showed six years of experience instead of seven.
Listen in.
Just now joining the conversation? Catch up on the entire series here.
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Race For “Most Insubstantial Napkin”
There seems to be a new race afoot. A new competition. A new business strategy by which great careers will be made and lost.It is the race to offer the most insubstantial napkin.
Only a few months ago it seemed the napkin dispenser norm was a semi-absorbent sheet of paper folded once in half in one direction and then again in thirds in the other.
The first feature to get left behind was absorbency. In fact, absorbency is but a distant memory, isn’t it?! But that loss was easy to cover up under the guise of protecting the environment. That it now takes five napkins to wipe up what one used to suffice for is conveniently not mentioned.
Next to go was the full sheet folded in half. Clearly we had been over-cleaning ourselves after our burger and fries. Some executive most certainly gave themself a big salary increase for finding such a clever way to cut their paper costs in half.
More recently it seems the tri-fold is increasingly being ditched in favor of a single fold. (And a fold that isn’t even a full half fold at that.)
It’s amazing how little paper these executives feel is more than adequate to deal with grease, coffee, ketchup, or whatever else one might want to wipe off one’s hands.
Who do you feel is winning the race to offer the most insubstantial napkin? Leave a comment with your example. Let’s compare notes.Â
More significantly, where are your cost-cutting efforts inadvertently resulting in something like the need to use five insubstantial napkins instead of just one nice absorbent one?
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Quote to Consider: The Habit of Excellence
“Excellence is not an act but a habit. The things you do the most are the things you will do the best.”Marva Collins
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Karl Shares Six Words… #59
Puzzled why mandating positive morale failed.
Karl Edwards
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Listen In -> Bold Resolutions for the New Year #2: Think Outside the Box
Far too many of us are waiting for the economy improve before we make important decisions and commitments of our own.I suggest this is the case because most of us are waiting until we know it is safe to go back to doing things the way we did before our economy’s near collapse and this extended recession.
I am almost certain that the only viable way forward will not be found in going backwards. In fact, business may never be successfully done again the way it was before 2008.To move forward aggressively and responsibly, though, we need to get our thinking out of the rigid box that limits us to the values, methods and means of the past.
We need new perspectives, new frames of reference, and new approaches.
In this week’s show, Claudia and I discuss making one of our “Bold Resolutions” for the new year to think outside the box.
Not crazy, impulsive, rash thinking. But creative, non-linear, and proactive thinking.
Listen in.
Just now joining the conversation? Catch up on the entire series here.
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Business Book Awards from 800-CEO-Read
My reading list just gets longer and longer.
800-CEO-Read announced their 2011 awards for best business books.
You can read the entire book summaries on their blog post here.
The winners are:
General Business
 Leadership
 Marketing and Sales
Entrepreneurship
 Personal Development
 Finance & Economics
Innovation & Creativity
 Management
Head over to 800-CEO-Read’s website and check out the many resources they make available.
Enjoy!
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Quote to Consider: Seeing Needs, Meeting Needs
“He who sees a need and waits to be asked for help is as unkind as if he had refused it.”Dante Alighieri
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Karl Shares Six Words… #58
Feigning decisiveness she dodges the question.
Karl Edwards
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Listen In -> Bold Resolutions for the New Year #1: Too Much Fear, Caution and Passivity
Doesn’t it seem like everyone is waiting? Waiting for the economy to improve before making important decisions.The problem with everyone waiting is that leaves no one taking actions that might stimulate the economy.
No one wants to take the first step, which, while understandable, leaves open the possibility (which is currently being realized) that no first steps are being taken.This week Claudia and I begin a new series entitled Bold Resolutions for the New Year.
Let’s use the tool of setting New Year’s resolutions as a means for taking the initiative, making some decisions, and taking concrete action… even if it seems like we’re the only ones.
How can we be bold without being rash or impulsive?
We certainly don’t want to repeat the mistakes that landed us in the economic mess of the past several years!
Are there ways to be both bold and responsible?
Bold Resolutions for the New Year
Week #1: Too Much Fear, Caution, and Passivity
Week #2: Think Outside the Box
Week #3: Build a Team, Not Fill a Job
Week #4: Create Your Own Opportunities
Week #5: Rethink FailureListen in.