Vizualize.me – Hey, someone finally got the “let’s kill all the resumes” thing right

For at least 15 years, I’ve not taken seriously the idea that a resume could be replaced. Why? Not because I didn’t think it could be done, but because every time someone set me up for a “resume killer” conversation, what they came back with was… well, it was lame. (And look, I take my share of the blame for ugliness of resumes in the early days of the Internet, we could have done better.)

Vizualize.me  - you guys did a great job. Combine the data quality of LinkedIn with a decent attempt at improving the user interface, and you come out with a really nice looking visualization. I assume they are not stopping with LinkedIn – reskinning data through interfaces and treating the UI seriously has lots of legs.

Here’s my test 

Games posing as human capital enablers: FoldIt and Superbetter

Every once in a while onthemedia.org comes out with amazing stories of human capital measurement without knowing it.  This week, they featured two pieces on mass collaboration. The first is  a game called fold.it , that makes a game out of folding real proteins. It’s a collaborative game (see my screen shot below of the protein my kids and I revolved this morning with a chat window).  You get points for resolving conflicts in the protein. Recently a gaming community figured out a protein that has stymied researchers for a decade.  Listen to the piece on the radio show, you will become addicted. This is Kaggle.com meets protein folding and education. Awesome.

The second site is in beta testing and is designed to help people recovering from trauma. Basically,  a “team up” approach to getting through a hard time.  Powerful potential – imaging if we used this to manage work too? Talk about engagement and collaboration.

Superbetter – can’t wait to see the beta.

Repost: How Willy Wonka’s Case Study in Succession Planning

(This is a repost from 2 years ago, after recently finishing Charlie and the Chocolate Factory yet again for the girls (I think we’re on 16 now)- this time the twins understood it.)

The Situation

Mr. Willy Wonka is a first generation business leader who has recognized the lack of a succession plan for his CEO/Chief Inventor position.  The business specializes in specialty and novelty confections and currently retains a market leading position through innovation in chocolates and candy, with some miraculous results (examples include chocolate ice cream that will not melt, chewing gum that does not lose its taste,  and Everlasting Gobstoppers).

Mr. Wonka enjoys an excellent labor position in a non-union factory, and has (inexplicably) been exempted from all UK labor laws and health inspections.  Costs for labor are limited to cocoa beans given to his staff in unlimited quantities (this author suspects Google’s free food policy was derived from Wonka’s, but with better stock options).  The company has come under constant questioning as to the legality of detaining an entire population of Oompa Loompas to execute on corporate strategy; Mr. Wonka has thus far avoided governmental scrutiny in this regard.

While each major competitor in the confection space has offered to acquire the company, Mr. Wonka has remained steadfast in his desire to keep his company independent and to work towards a focused mission within the candy world. Espionage had been a problem until recently, when severe visitation restrictions were imposed.

Succession Plan Considerations

At first, Mr. Wonka considered an external experienced hire. Being that he is the sole human working at the company, this was a logical first step.  After evaluating the available external talent pool, Mr. Wonka ruled out an external experienced hire. Mr Wonka said,

“there are thousands of clever men who would give anything for the chance to come in and take over from me, but  I won’t want that sort of person… [The external hire] won’t listen to me; he won’t learn. He[ or she ] will try to do things his own way, not mine.” (p151)

While Mr. Wonka seriously considered hiring from within, the height restrictions alone with existing staff would not allow for full use of the Great Glass Elevator during the normal course of business.

When looking for his successor, Mr. Wonka’s primary concern was to sustain its competitive advantage through innovation. This could not be an in-the-box thinker. He needed someone who could not only think outside of the box, but to dream of a way to make that box taste yummy, and eat it whole. In meeting with his internal team, it was clear that a novel succession planning solution was needed.

Selection Methodology

After examining existing methodologies for the selection, interviewing, and naming his successor, Mr. Wonka decided on a somewhat irregular approach, however, one that fit within his employment brand. He decided to find a set of High Potential candidates through a competitive selection process including, “Golden Tickets”. Being somewhat of a showman, Mr. Wonka turned this phase of the selection into a concurrent marketing campaign that sold an incremental 100 million Whipple-Scrumptious Fudgemallow Delight Chocolate bars.  (This technique was then used by other companies.)

After a set of high potential recruits was selected. Mr. Wonka assessed each individual through a series of physical and personality assessments in which Mr. Wonka hoped to determine if the hi-po had the ability to think magically, and the sense to not be sucked up into giant pneumatic tubes of chocolate within the first ten minutes of entering the manufacturing floor.

Results

By process of elimination, remarkably, a candidate was chosen with the intellectual abilities required, and the moral fiber Mr. Wonka was looking for. Charles Bucket Esq. was nominated as the successor to the factory, and awarded such honor within the Great Glass Elevator. While the mentorship program is expected to last over 10 years, feedback from Mr. Wonka (in his sequel book) seems to have positively reinforced his succession choice.

How long will your project take if I add 2 people?

Scott Adams’ point of view on staffing

Why Medians May Not be the Message – for Talent Data

I was reading a piece in the Journal this morning on a scientific debate regarding an Alzheimer’s study. The debate centers around the use of the median as a descriptive summary statistic. The article brought me to my own recollection of Nassim Taleb’s own objections to some types of quantitative analysis in The Black Swan, and then to an article Stephen Jay Gould wrote in the 80′s that I had never read, and felt ashamed I hadn’t since I was a huge fan of his.

The article was called, “The Median Isn’t the Message”, a nod to Marshall McLuhan, and is a personal story of his own diagnosis with a deadly cancer. The median survival rate of the cancer was 8 months… but being an evolutionary biologist, he knew to dig into the research properly to understand what was really going on. One quote:

But all evolutionary biologists know that variation itself is nature’s only irreducible essence. Variation is the hard reality, not a set of imperfect measures for a central tendency. Means and
medians are the abstractions. Therefore, I looked at the mesothelioma statistics quite differently – and not only because I am an optimist who tends to see the doughnut instead of the hole, but primarily because I know that variation itself is the reality. I had to place myself amidst the variation.

It’s that variation I worry about as we think about talent analytics. The essence of innovation, high performers, and more are not from a central tendency – they lie in the extremes.  I’m still forming my own outlook on this topic, and welcome everyone’s thoughts.

Here’s Stephen’s article in full : http://people.umass.edu/biep540w/pdf/Stephen%20Jay%20Gould.pdf

SHRM/ANSI Cost Per Hire standard – second public comment period announced

Thanks to everyone who commented on the February Cost Per Hire document – they are holding a 2 week open comment period on the revised document (many of the changes came from this group btw…)

Here’s the press release and link to the site

Interview with Kaggle.com posted on iianalytics.com

One in an occasional series of articles I write for the Institute for Advanced Analytics… this is an interview with the CEO of Kaggle.

http://iianalytics.com/2011/04/interview-with-kaggle-com/

Cost of Hire Metric Standard With Lee Webster, Jeremy Shapiro, and Gerry Crispin

A nice interview on the public review of the Cost Per Hire standard we’re working on…

 

http://www.totalpicture.com/shows/leadership/podcast-what-is-the-cost-of-hire.html

Analytical Candidates You May Not Have Considered

Tom Davenport has an institute just for us analytics types, and I write a bit for them… here’s a latest post on sourcing for analytical talent (I’m kind of combining analytics and recruiting for fun…)

http://iianalytics.com/2011/02/uncovering-talent-gems-analytical-candidates-you-may-not-have-considered/

The Cost Per Hire Metric – soon to become an American National Standard – speak now before it’s ratified!

Some of you may recall that SHRM is now a certifying body for American National Standards (ANSI). 16 months ago, SHRM and Gerry Crispin asked me to chair the first HR metric taskforce, Cost-Per-Hire, and the fruit of that labor (across over 50 professionals writing) is now available for public comment.

And now we need your help.

Part of the ANSI process is a public review of the metric.  Would you please take a moment, and read through the document, and comment on the site if you find something that you think needs to be commented upon?  Here is the link.

http://hrstandardsworkspace.shrm.org/apps/group_public/document.php?document_id=3055&wg_abbrev=shrm-staff

The public comment period will continue until March 18th.

Thanks in advance!

-jeremy