The HR Hub – Details, episodes & analysis

Mindset is harder than rocket science according to NASA scientists. So all you HR people out there? Give yourselves a pat on the back! The people stuff is hard! In this episode, I spoke with Mitch Warner, managing partner at the Arbinger Institute, which is responsible for the book "Outward Mindset". Mitch helped with the latest edition and shares his insight into mindset generally. He focuses particularly on the value of having an outward (rather than inward) mindset. He's worked with clients like NASA and this is how he knows what the rocket scientists think! An "outward mindset" has all employees (including HR) focusing on others' needs and objectives alongside one's own. This approach, he argues, is key to fostering a productive, connected, and innovative workplace culture. Key insights from our conversation: • There are many mindsets (growth, safety, positive, scarcity etc) but many of them would have us focus on ourselves rather than others around us. • Changing mindset has been shown to be far more effective in creating change than simply prescribing new behaviours. • We can use an outward mindset to help our employees redefine what it means to have a job in terms of impact on others including our customers and coworkers. • He gave examples of how an outward mindset can revolutionize areas like workplace safety and debt collection. HR is often instrumental in creating the kinds of organizations we need. An outward mindset has a so much potential. Forget silos, remember our customers, ditch bickering... This is an idea I am thinking about a lot! Mitch's insights offer a fresh perspective on organizational culture and leadership, challenging HR professionals to rethink their approach to employee engagement and performance. Whether you're looking to boost productivity, enhance teamwork, or drive innovation, this episode provides strategies for leveraging the power of mindset in your organization. Find Mitch and the Arbinger Institute at https://arbinger.com/ You can find their books (The Outward Mindset and Leadership and Self-Deception) anywhere you buy your books but also via their website: https://arbinger.com/store/

Find me, Andrea Adams, at https://thehrhub.ca/

"We (need to) talk to people not about people." Talking about people (unless you're venting with a trusted friend), greatly harms trust.

Building trust within teams is critical for high performance, but it's often an overlooked aspect of team dynamics. It came up recently for me in relation to consulting so I sat down with trust expert Ila Edgar to dive deep into the key behaviours and mindsets needed to foster trust on teams.

Ila is a coach, former recruiter, and co-host of the "Trust on Purpose" podcast. We did a couple episodes year before this one and they were some of the episodes I refer to most often at work. She shares her invaluable wisdom on:

💥 Why distrust can actually be a good thing and how to manage it productively

💥 The 4 key domains of trust (competence, sincerity, reliability, care) and how to cultivate each on your team

💥 The vital role leaders play in modeling trust-building behaviors

💥 Dangerous trust-breaking behaviors to avoid at all costs

Whether you lead a team or are part of one, this episode is packed with practical insights to create an environment of psychological safety where people can do their best work. Don't miss Ila's perspectives on this crucial but often overlooked team dynamic.

Find Ila at https://www.bigchangeinc.com/

This is her podcast: https://trustonpurpose.buzzsprout.com/

Andrea is an HR consultant in Western Canada. Find her at https://thehrhub.ca

"HR professionals have the hardest and the most critical role. It's to really understand the people dynamics and how it's going to help a company grow."

This week we were talking about scaling organizations. It's always a hot topic in HR consulting. Tish Squillaro, a dynamic consultant with over 20 years of experience working with clients like Salesforce and IBM, was my guest. She understands complicated things and shared some of her knowledge with us.

Her particular expertise is helping venture-backed companies scale effectively. She emphasizes five priorities for helping an organization scale and says HR plays the most important role. The first of which is having the right people in the right seats.

So we talk about:

👥 The importance of 'right people, right seats' in scaling an organization

🎯 The role of focus in achieving organizational goals

💼 How leadership style impacts decision-making and overall organizational success

🧪 The significance of team chemistry in fostering a positive work environment.

Tish's insights are not only fascinating but also insightful. You can find her via the following:

https://candor-consulting.com/
https://www.linkedin.com/in/tishsquillaro/

And you can find me at https://thehrhub.ca

I was reading something on the Linkedin a while back about an HR  professional from Afghanistan who was driving a taxi.  Usually we hear  this about doctors and engineers, but HR?    

So what does it take to succeed in HR in Canada? While we talk about  Canada this would apply to other countries as well!  This episode is for immigrants.  Bina Kamath is an immigrant and founder of Orion's Reach and has  established a successful HR career - she also started out in accounting  so that is a double-feat!  

Find Bina at https://www.orionsreach.com  

Find Andrea at https://www.linkedin.com/in/andrea-adams1/

HEADS UP! This episode will be better on YouTube.  There is a lot of visuals in this episode and the experience will likely be better on YouTube.  Find it at https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCsIQh_VRedo7JcDLNZkklSQ

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Job evaluation: bored yet?    

We in HR have to get over our fear of the monotony because it's that important and foundational to paying people equitably. On the bright  side this was definitely the LEAST boring take on grading jobs I can imagine.    

Robert Mosley is an HR thought leader and could do stand-up HR comedy.  That probably sounds like an oxymoron but it's true.  You'll have to  wait 'till a little later in the episode to see this in action.  In the meantime, I daresay you'll learn a shocking amount from this  episode.

Psychometric testing, performed by trained psychologists, is the BEST  predictor of job success of any recruitment or selection tool.  It's a  science and teaches you:  😄 Extraversion is not the same as social skill.  It also isn't going to  predict success in a job.  👯 Personality tests (think Myers Briggs) are a typology.  They might  help you understand people on your team but the results aren't  correlated with job success.   ⁉️ Interviews are, to some degree, a measure of intelligence.   Intelligence IS correlated with job success.   

There were so many facts in this interview with Marina Kolesnikova of  Stefan, Fraser and Associates.  It provided a lot of insight into which  recruitment and selection tools are likely to get you a good candidate  and which are not.   It also dispelled many myths of the recruitment process and other things  you just weren't sure about.

Find Marina at https://stefanfraser.com/  

Find Andrea at https://www.linkedin.com/in/andrea-adams1/

Let's get a bit real.  Chances are if you are white in the workplace you  think you are an ally e.g. ~75% of white employees think they are  allies to women of colour.  But (BIG but)... when did you DO something  in support of someone with a marginalized identity?   

Allies take action and this was a key point in this interview with Emily  Williams of Forward Ever Global. Emily is a DEI expert and coach to  women of colour so they might address microaggressions and other common  workplace challenges.    

Acts of allyship might make you uncomfortable like when you call out  bias. Or maybe you name a microaggression in a high stakes setting. Or  maybe you reduce your own opportunity in favour of someone who  overlooked because of their identity.  These are the actions, however,  of a true ally.    

There is so much overlooked talent because someone doesn't come in the  desired package.  True allies are going to help by giving that talent a  chance to be seen for their strength and perform. It's also the right  thing to do and HR can play a role through individual action and DEI  programs.

Find Emily at [email protected] or https://forwardeverglobal.com/  

Find Andrea on LinkedIn at https://www.linkedin.com/in/andrea-adams1/

HEADS UP! This episode is better on YouTube.  Robert has illustrations to help you better understand the content.  Check it out here: https://youtu.be/ewO6QCBws0Q

Compensation is possibly the most important thing HR has to get right.   Underpay people and they'll be unhappy or leave.  It's also wrong.   Overpay people and EVERYONE is going to want a raise to match and your  compensation costs are going to rise.   

Job evaluation is how we make sure employees are paid fairly and  equitably based on some rational means of comparing.  It's not about how  the wind is blowing today.  And it's foundational to HR.  

Robert Mosley, worked for Hay (the leading job evaluation methodology)  and walks us through how we size a job.  Here's a sample of what you'll  learn in this episode:  

🟰 Job evaluation and sizing are the same thing.   

#️⃣ 'Sizing' is assigning points to jobs and 'grading' is lumping ranges  of points together for an manageable compensation system.  

4️⃣  There's four common job sizing methodologies.  Pick one and use it.   It might seem expensive up front, but it manages the risk of getting  comp wrong.

Find Robert at [email protected]  

Find Andrea at https://www.linkedin.com/in/andrea-adams1/

When was the last time your organization went through a re-org? Have you seen a department designed for an individual and been baffled?

Frequent re-orgs or designing for a person may or may not be a good idea. It depends on whether or not it’s aligned with good organization design principles. These basic questions and principles of organization design was the subject of this episode.

This amazing episode with Len Nanjad was *full* of interesting insights. I know – you might not think so but honestly:

🔺 Hierarchy is natural

➕ ➕ ➕ Bureaucracy is hierarchy plus many rules

🤔The levels in an organization will be determined by complexity

😡 Too many levels might result in micromanaging

🥵 There is a limit on the number of positions a person can meaningfully supervise

⛑ Good organization design can save lives! And on and on.

Find Len on LinkedIn at https://www.linkedin.com/in/lennanjad/ or https://www.mnp.ca/en/personnel/len-nanjad  

Find Andrea at https://www.linkedin.com/in/andrea-adams1/

How long does it take you to bounce back after some failure?  Do you  stay sad and ruminate for a long time or dust yourself off, incorporate  some lessons and keep going?  The latter is resilience and it's pretty  obvious that it would be helpful.

I was also curious about the origins of resilience. Is it something we  develop in childhood or is it something we can learn as adults?  And,  for HR, how can we help our workforces become more resilient so, that  when individuals or teams fail, they learn and keep going?  This is what  this episode was about.

Roxanne Derhodge is a psychotherapist, mental health and wellness expert, keynote speaker, podcast host and more. Find her at https://roxannederhodge.com/  

Find me (Andrea) for HR consulting support in western Canada at https://www.linkedin.com/in/andrea-adams1/