Don't Throw Your Employees Into the Deep End

Imagine enrolling your child for swim lessons at a place that promotes the following:

Our standard, one-lesson policy for novice swimmers is to walk them over to the deep end and push them in. Those with the best swimming potential will quickly figure out how to keep their heads above water. Those who can't tread water will sink, confirming they weren't cut out to be swimmers. Advance payment required, no refunds.

Poor instruction and worse parenting? Yes. But it's also the prevailing approach to promote talent into stretch roles. In the deep end you go. If you are truly high potential, you'll figure it out. If not, sorry we put you in the wrong place on the potential/performance grid. No refunds.

What a waste. Just as any responsible swim instructor will provide appropriate instruction to ensure the safety of every student, intelligent organizations will see each stretch promotion as an obligation to instruct and support.

By definition, stretch assignments mean the individual isn't fully ready for the new job. Perhaps the new role requires a higher level of skill or judgment, a leap in job breadth or role complexity. In any case, before you hear a big splash by the deep end of your organizational pool, it would be wise to consider five principles.

1. Look before they leap:

With today's ultra-lean human capital resources, providing substantial support for every promotion isn't practical. But realize the cost of failure due to neglect. Strategically place support resources where the odds of failure are high or the cost of failure to the individual and organization are high. My experience points to first-time moves to general manager roles, global assignments and high-pressure product development or critical customer relationship jobs.

2. Teach transition dog paddling:

Building strength in transitions to challenging work is a fundamental leadership competency. It should be a core part of anyone's personal skills portfolio and a systematic element of any talent development program. Be transparent in coaching and training to communicate the risks of jumping head first into a "deep waters" role. Further, provide development in the three fundamental swim strokes of big transitions: expanding self-awareness of their impact on others early, gaining a lifelong habit of aggressive learning and self-development rather than relying on old skills and acquiring solid start-up practices and stress-reducing resiliency habits.

3. Preview unseen currents and riptides:

Proactive coaching on stretch job challenges will better prepare talent for unknown hazards. One of the big moves in my company is promotion to division president, where plenty of trials await. We've developed a start-up briefing, based on interviews of successful incumbents passing along advice and experiences from the first year on the job.

4. Make it a team swim:

Loneliness in stretch roles is typical and can compound the difficulties of a transition. Similar to a geographic relocation, those newly promoted begin without the circle of familiar faces they left behind. Having a mentor or at least a sympathetic ear can be a lifeline. I've seen organizations assign a trusted external coach for the first six months or a skilled internal mentor who has been there.

5. Keep an eye on them once in the water:

The direct manager should play an active role. The more enlightened bosses will recognize their destiny is tied to new leader success and will provide assistance at start-up. Equally important is to keep checking how the new swimmer is doing throughout the first year. Sometimes signs of new leaders struggling aren't apparent for months. Managers who withhold help throughout the first year are like lifeguards taking a noontime nap. Managers can likewise fail to toss in a life preserver due to a misguided fear of undermining the new leader's confidence or seeing it as disrupting the "sink or swim" trial.

"Sink or swim" isn't a smart policy for swim classes, and it isn't the most effective approach to talent development in times of big job transitions. Providing great transition support is like telling your talent to come on in, the water's fine.


By Kevin D. Wilde | Talent Management

Authentic Leadership Development: Your Past, Present, and Future

There’s been a lot written about the concept of “authentic leadership”, that is, being a leader that is comes across as sincere, genuine, and real. Authentic leaders lead from the heart and are true to their values and principles. Authenticity builds trust, credibility, and inspires – all essential elements of great leadership.

Becoming a leader isn’t just about studying famous leaders or role models and then trying to emulate them. Nor is it just about assessing yourself against a competency model, and attacking your weak spots with a development plan.

While those can both be effective leadership development strategies, they won’t help you to be an authentic leader. 

Becoming an authentic leader involves transformation. It’s not “doing” leadership, it’s figuring out who you are and who you want to be as a leader.

In order to become a truly authentic leader, you can use the same methodology used by Ebenezer Scrooge to discover the true meaning of Christmas: examine your past, present, and future leader.

Your past

In his book True North: Discover Your Authentic Leadership, former Medronic CEO Bill George suggests looking back over your life to identify key moments that helped define who you are today. These key moments could be from early childhood, school, family, work, sports, military experience, religious, or people in your past life that had a significant impact on you. They could be high points or low points in your life. These key events and people taught you lessons – lessons that played a part in shaping your values, principals, and your identity. 

In a recent UNH leadership development program, our instructor, Dr. Carole Barnett, had participants map out their leadership journeys visually on a “Leadership Journey Line” poster. She then had them present their stories in their small groups. It was moving and inspirational! Presenting your Journey Line to others can be a powerful way to learn about yourself and others. 

Your Present

When you examine those critical incidents from your past, you begin to piece together patterns of lessons learned that help define what’s important to you today. These lessons define your values, principles, and motivations – in other words, you become self-aware. 

Your values, principles, and motivations in turn drive your behaviors. They become your compass in life, serving as a conscious or unconscious decision making checklist to guide the choices you make. Behaviors then drive results.

Figuring out who you are and what’s important to you is hard work! In fact, for many, it can become a lifelong journey. In addition to the Journey Line exercise, other ways to facilitate self-awareness include:
- Formal values assessments (I’m certified in Hogan, but there are others)
- Reflection
- Feedback from others (to uncover blind spots) 
- Journaling
- Therapy
- Gazing at your navel

Seriously, there’s no need to go completely off the deep end when it comes to self-awareness. You just need to end up with a handful of guiding values, principles, and motivations that when in doubt, guide your everyday decisions as a person and leader. 

BTW, this list shouldn’t be kept a secret, only to be discovered with a secret values decoder ring by those around you. Great leaders share their defining stories, values, and principles with others. They become “teachable points of views” in explaining their vision, goals, behaviors and decisions. This is where authenticity comes from – through heartfelt self-disclosure.

Your Future

We all know that leaders need to be visionary, to have a compelling vision, are future focused, etc…. This is all true and important. However, great leaders also have a vision of the legacy they want to leave behind.

They don’t wait until their retirement to begin to reflect on their legacy. They start the process early on in their careers, and then live each day in a way that contributes to that legacy. This involves asking yourself what you want your lasting impact to be on your organization and the people you work with. “Starting with the end” will have an amazing impact your daily behaviors. 

Try visualizing your retirement party in a positive way. What would you say in your speech? More importantly, what would you want others to be saying about you? 

Authentic leadership development: look to your past to figure out what’s important to you today. Think about your future legacy and begin leading with that purpose today.




By Hari Das Nair - Vice President & Group Head - HR at JBM Group

How To Spot A Liar At Work

"You can count on my support."

"It wasn't my fault."

"You're next in line for a promotion."

Really?

Wouldn't it be great to know when we're being lied to? If only spotting falsehoods were as easy as it is portrayed on television shows like "Lie to Me" and "The Mentalist." But in real life, deception detection remains an inexact science.

Lying triggers stress

For the vast majority of individuals the act of lying triggers a heightened stress response. These signs of stress and anxietyare obvious, if you know where to look. Basically, research shows that the mind has to work a lot harder to generate a false response. One theory, posed by Daniel Langleben, a psychiatrist at the University of Pennsylvania, is that, in order to tell a lie, the brain first has to stop itself from telling the truth, then create the deception, and then deal with the accompanying emotions of guilt, anxiety, and the fear of being caught.

Spotting deception begins with observing a person's baseline behavior under relaxed or generally stress-free conditions so that you can detect meaningful deviations. One of the strategies that experienced police interrogators use is to ask a series of non-threatening questions while observing how the subject behaves when there is no reason to lie. Then, when the more difficult issues get addressed, the officers watch for changes in nonverbal behavior that indicate deception around key points.

In business dealings, the best way to understand someone's baseline behavior is to observe her over an extended period of time. Note her speech tone, gestures, blinking patterns, etc. Once you've assessed what is "normal" for a co-worker, you will be able to detect shifts, when her body language is "out of character." Just remember (and this is key), that the atypical signals you detect may be signs of lying—or a state of heightened anxiety caused by many other factors.

One of the biggest body language myths about liars is that they avoid eye contact. In fact, many liars, especial the most brazen, may actually overcompensate (to prove that they are not lying) by making too much eye contact and holding it too long.

12 tell-tale signs of lying

My best advice is not to rely on any one signal. You'll be more successful if you look for clusters of behaviors (three or four body language cues that reinforce one another). To increase your chances of spotting a falsehood, watch for a cluster of body language cues that include:

1. A fake smile. It's hard for liars to give a real smile while seeking to deceive. (Real smiles crinkle the corners of the eyes and change the entire face. Faked smiles involve the mouth only.)

2. Unusual response time. When a lie is planned (and rehearsed), deceivers start their answers more quickly than truth-tellers. If taken by surprise, however, the liar takes longer to respond, as the process of inhibiting the truth and creating a lie takes extra time.

3. Verbal cues. When lying, a person's vocal tone rises to a higher pitch. Other verbal cues include rambling, selective wording (in which one avoids answering the question exactly as asked), stammering, and the use of qualifiers ("To the best of my knowledge." "I could be wrong."). It's also been noted that liars use fewer contractions: "I did not have sex with that woman" rather than "I didn't . . . "

4. Under or over production of saliva. Watch for sudden swallowing in gulps or an increased need to drink water or moisten lips.

5. Pupil dilation. One nonverbal signal that is almost impossible to fake is pupil dilation. The larger pupil size that most people experience when telling a lie can be attributed to an increased amount of tension and concentration.

6. Change in blink rate. A person's blink rate slows down as she decides to lie and stays low through the lie. Then it increases rapidly (sometimes up to eight times normal rate) after the lie.

7.  Foot movements. When lying, people will often display nervousness and anxiety through increased foot movements. They will fidget and shuffle their feet and wind one around the other or around the furniture. They will stretch and curl their feet to relieve tension, or even kick out in a miniaturized attempt to run away.

8. Face touching. A person's nose may not grow when he tells a lie, but watch closely and you'll notice that when someone is about to lie or make an outrageous statement, he'll often unconsciously rub his nose. (This is most likely because a rush of adrenaline opens the capillaries and makes his nose itch.) Covering the mouth or eyes are additional common gestures people make when they are being untruthful.

9. Incongruence. When a person believes what she is saying, her gestures and expressions are in alignment with her words. When you see a mismatch—where gestures contradict words—such as a side-to-side head shake while saying "yes" or a person frowning and staring at the ground while telling you she is happy, that's a sign of deceit, or at least an inner conflict between what that person is thinking and saying.

10. Changes in gestures. Often, in an effort to prevent their gestures from "giving away" the lie, deceivers will hold their bodies unnaturally still. At other times, especially after being asked a searching question, they may accelerate pacifying gestures—biting their lips, rubbing their hands together, fidgeting with jewelry, or touching their hair.

11. Micro-expressions. Difficult to catch, but if you ever spot a fleeting expression that contradicts a verbal statement, believe what you see and not what you hear.

12. The quick-check glance. This may follow a less-than-truthful response: liars will immediately look down and away, then quickly glance back at you to see if you bought the falsehood.

A final caveat: If a person really believes the lie, there is no way that you can detect the falsehood. However, unless you are dealing with a pathological liar or a superb actor, you can definitely improve your odds of spotting those who try to deceive you!

By,Carol Kinsey Goman- executive coach, leadership consultant, and international keynote speaker at corporate, government, and association events.

5 Ways To Spot A Bad Boss In An Interview

A boss can literally, make or break your career. Here are five ways to spot the bad ones before they become yours.

A great boss can make you feel engaged and empowered at work, will keep you out of unnecessary office politics, and can identify and grow your strengths. But a bad boss can make the most impressive job on paper (and salary) quickly unbearable. Not only will a bad boss make you dislike at least 80% of your week, your relationships might suffer, too. A recent study conducted at Baylor University found that stress and tension caused by an abusive boss “affects the marital relationship and subsequently, the employee’s entire family.” Supervisor abuse isn’t always as blatant as a screaming temper tantrum; it can include taking personal anger out on you for no reason, dismissing your ideas in a meeting, or simply, being rude and critical of your work, while offering no constructive ways to improve it.  Whatever the exhibition of bad boss behavior, your work and personal life will suffer. Merideth Ferguson, PH.D., co-author of the study and assistant professor of management and entrepreneurship at Baylor explains that “it may be that as supervisor abuse heightens tension in the relationship, the employee is less motivated or able to engage in positive interactions with the partner and other family members.”

There are many ways to try and combat the effects of a bad boss, including confronting him or her directly to work towards a productive solution, suggesting that you report to another supervisor, or soliciting the help of human resources.  But none of those tactics guarantee improvement, and quite often, they’ll lead to more stress. The best solution is to spot a bad boss—before they become yours! Here are five ways to tell whether your interviewer is a future bad boss.

1. Pronoun usage. Performance consultant John Brubaker says that the top verbal tell a boss gives is in pronoun choice and the context it is used. If your interviewer uses the term “you” in communicating negative information ( such as, “you will deal with a lot of ambiguity”), don’t expect the boss to be a mentor.  If the boss chooses the word “I” to describe the department’s success—that’s a red flag.  If the interviewer says “we” in regards to a particular challenge the team or company faced, it may indicate that he or she deflects responsibility and places blame.

2. Concern with your hobbies. There is a fine line between genuine relationship building, and fishing for information, so use your discretion on this one. If you have an overall good impression of the potential boss it may be that he or she is truly interested in the fact that you are heavily involved in charity work, and is simply getting to know you. On the other hand, the interviewer may be trying to determine whether you have too many commitments outside of work. The interviewer can’t legally ask if you are married, or have kids, so digging into your personal life can be a clever way to understand just how available you are.

3. They’re distracted. The era of email, BlackBerrys and smartphones have made it “okay” for people to develop disrespectful communication habits in the name of work. Particularly in a frenzied workplace, reading email while a person is speaking, multi-tasking on conference calls and checking the message behind that blinking BlackBerry mid-conversation has become the norm of business communications. But, regardless of his or her role in the company, the interviewer should be striving to make a good impression—which includes shutting down tech tools to give you undivided attention. If your interviewer is glancing at emails while you’re speaking, taking phone calls, or late to the interview, don’t expect a boss who will make time for you.

4. They can’t give you a straight answer. Caren Goldberg, Ph.D. is an HR professor at the Kogod School of Business at American University. She says a key “tell” is vague answers to your questions. Listen for pauses, awkwardness, or overly-generic responses when you inquire what happened to the person who held the position you are interviewing for, and/or what has created the need to hire. (For example, if you are told the person was a “bad fit,” it may indicate that the workplace doesn’t spend much time on employee-development, and blames them when things don’t work out).

You should also question turnover rates, how long people stay in given roles, and what their career path has been. All of these answers can indicate not only if the boss is one people want to work for, but whether pay is competitive, and employees are given a career growth plan.

5. They’ve got a record. Ask the potential boss how long he or she has been at the company, in the role, and where he or she worked before coming to it to get a feel for his or management style, and whether it’s what you respond to.  For example, bosses making a switch from a large corporation to a small company may lead with formality. On the other hand, entrepreneurs tend to be passionately involved in business, which can be a help or a hindrance, depending on your workstyle.

Goldberg also recommends searching the site eBossWatch, where you read reviews that former employees have given to a boss. If you’re serious about the position, she also suggests reaching to the former employee whose spot you are interviewing for, and asking for their take on the workplace. (LinkedIn makes this task easy to do). The former employee’s recount may not necessarily reflect your potential experience, but it can help you to determine whether his or her description of the job and company “jibes” with what the potential boss said.

By Stephanie Taylor Christensen

The Myth of Potential: 5 Ways to Develop Talent

In high school, I wasn't an amazing athlete, but one of my closest friends sure was. Most people didn't know it, though. He was quiet, even shy, and spent most of his time either practicing or studying. Nothing he did off the court—not the way he acted, how he dressed, or who he talked to—shouted "jock!" But he handled a basketball as if he'd been born with one in each hand. According to our school's coach, one of the best in the region, my friend had "real potential." He even talked about him going pro.

But what is potential? When most people say "potential," what they really mean is "proven success." After all, no one mentioned my friend's potential when he was an awkward third grader learning how to dribble. It wasn't until he already established himself as a local superstar that people started talking about his potential. 

The truth is everyone has potential, and nearly every employee has some talent of great potential value. But developing that talent takes serious work, both from employees and their managers—just like the thousands of hours my friend put in every day after school, along with the encouragement and instruction from his dad and his coach.

Developing talent—that is, helping every employee reach their potential—should be a goal of every leader. In fact, at GE top executives spend as much as 40% of their time identifying and mentoring their replacements. Leaders at other companies would be wise to follow suit. Here's how to start:

1. Give employees time to focus. 

With the frenetic pace of business, it's easy to get lost in a sea of deadlines and shifting priorities. The best leaders encourage employees to spend time absorbed in a single project or area of focus—especially when it's a stretch assignment that will challenge their abilities.

Some of the most innovative companies in the country put a priority on free or flexible time. For example, Google developers and engineers receive "20 percent time"—eight hours a week they can devote solely to projects of their choice. Likewise, Bell Labs—one of the biggest American innovators of all time—gave scientists and engineers the opportunity to spend years researching a single product.

2. Promote the value of learning. 

Leaders should be on a constant lookout for professional development opportunities. Taking time to focus on learning helps employees crystallize their goals and determine what skills and areas of growth are most important to them.

As I mentioned, General Electric is one example of a company that places a premium on promoting the value of professional development and learning. The company has a Chief Learning Officer and spends $1 billion a year in training its employees through the GE Global Learning initiative. That's about $3,500 per year for each of their 290,000 employees. 

3. Ask lots of questions. 

It's no secret that leadership requires clear and effective communication. When it comes to developing talent, leaders should focus on the listening side of the communication equation. Find out what's important to employees, what experience they have, where they see themselves in the future, and what excites them about the company.

Colin Powell nicely sums up the importance of listening and effective communication: "The day soldiers stop bringing you their problems is the day you have stopped leading them." His words are just as true in the corporate world as they are in the military one.

4. Give frequent, specific feedback. 

It's far too easy for managers to only give feedback during performance reviews or to offer vague platitudes. The best mentors provide quality feedback that's timely, genuine, and focused on desired behaviors. It's also important to be positive and forgo any personal judgments.

To reinforce how critical providing quality feedback is, try Googling "leaders and the importance of feedback." The search yields over 18 million results (and lots of good advice). 

5. Treat failure as an opportunity for improvement. 

Nobody likes failure, but everybody enjoys saving face. When employees fail, they're often at their most vulnerable. And that's a good thing. It means they're open to receiving feedback, trying new approaches, and improving areas of weakness. Stay positive as you help your team members take advantage of these opportunities.

Some of the most meaningful learning in my life has been in response to failure. A beloved high school teacher of mine often used the mantras, "Failure is a better teacher than success," and, "The bigger the failure, the bigger the lesson." Obviously, no one wants to encourage failure, but it's important to realize that it will happen—and embrace it for what it is: a learning opportunity. 

Remember: Everyone has potential, but that potential may remain hidden without skilled mentoring and effective leadership. Take time to help employees discover their talents, learn from failures, and build on their successes. It may just save your company some major recruitment dollars.




By, Joel Garfinkle - one of the top 50 leadership coaches in the U.S

5 Minute Management Course

Lesson 1:

A sales rep, an administration clerk, and the manager are walking to lunch when they find an antique oil lamp. 
They rub it and a Genie comes out. 
The Genie says, 'I'll give each of you just one wish.'
'Me first! Me first!' says the admin clerk. 'I want to be in the Bahamas , driving a speedboat, without a care in the world.'
Puff! She's gone.

'Me next! Me next!' says the sales rep... 'I want to be in Hawaii , relaxing on the beach with my personal masseuse, an endless supply of Pina Coladas and the love of my life.'

Puff! He's gone

'OK, you're up,' the Genie says to the manager.
The manager says, 'I want those two back in the office after Lunch.'

Moral of the story:
Always let your boss have the first say.

Lesson 2
An eagle was sitting on a tree resting, doing nothing.

A small rabbit saw the eagle and asked him, 'Can I also sit like you and do nothing?'
The eagle answered: 'Sure, why not.'

So, the rabbit sat on the ground below the eagle and rested. All of a sudden, a fox appeared, jumped on the rabbit and ate it.

Moral of the story:
To be sitting and doing nothing, you must be sitting very, very high up.

Lesson 3

A turkey was chatting with a bull.

'I would love to be able to get to the top of that tree' sighed the turkey, 'but I haven't got the energy.'
'Well, why don't you nibble on some of my droppings?' replied the bull. They're packed with nutrients.'

The turkey pecked at a lump of dung, and found it actually gave him enough strength to reach the lowest branch of the tree.

The next day, after eating some more dung, he reached the second branch.

Finally after a fourth night, the turkey was proudly perched at the top of the tree.

He was promptly spotted by a farmer, who shot him out of the tree

Moral of the story:
Bull Sh!t might get you to the top, but it won't keep you there..

Lesson 4.(AB tells this very nicely in BHTB)

A little bird was flying south for the winter. It was so cold the bird froze and fell to the ground into a large field.

While he was lying there, a cow came by and dropped some dung on him.

As the frozen bird lay there in the pile of cow dung, he began to realize how warm he was.

The dung was actually thawing him out!

He lay there all warm and happy, and soon began to sing for joy.
A passing cat heard the bird singing and came to investigate.

Following the sound, the cat discovered the bird under the pile of cow dung, and promptly dug him out and ate him.

Morals of the story: 
(1) Not everyone who sh!ts on you is your enemy.

(2) Not everyone who gets you out of sh!t is your
friend.

(3) And when you're in deep sh!t, it's best to keep
your mouth shut!

THUS ENDS THE FIVE MINUTE MANAGEMENT COURSE

Six Strategies to Keep You Engaged at Work

Engaged employees have the highest productivity because they show up mentally and physically every day with a high degree of motivation to deliver extraordinary results.



The following six strategies will keep you engaged at work.

1. Build friendships with people at work.



• On a scale of 1 (low)- 10(high), how satisfied are you with the friendships you have at work?



• Love and connection is the most important emotional need that people have to stay motivated.



• We spend roughly 50% more time with our customers, coworkers, and bosses than we do with our friends, significant others, children and other relatives combined.



• Gallup research shows that without a best friend at work, the chances of being engaged in your job are 1 in 12.



• Gallup research shows that employees who have a close friendship with their boss are more than 2.5 times as likely to be satisfied with their job.



Action Item: If you want to be more engaged at work, develop at least three strong friendships at the office, maybe even one with your boss/senior.



2. Develop a learning and growth plan on a quarterly basis.



• On a scale of 1 (low)- 10(high), how satisfied are you with the opportunity you have to learn and grow in your current role?



• Learning and growth is a life-long emotional need that people have to stay motivated.



• You currently have skills, behaviours and experience that enable you to deliver results.



• Action Item: Identify learning and growth objectives and develop a 90-day action plan to improve your skills, behaviours and experience in required areas to help you achieve your full potential.

3. Contribute to the success of the people around you.


• On a scale of 1 (low)- 10(high), how satisfied are you with the contribution you make to the success of both internal and external people?



• Contribution is a life-long emotional need that people have to stay motivated.



• Action Item: Identify three activities that you do that contribute to the success of others. Develop a plan to spend more time doing these activities and/or add new activities within the scope of your role.



4. Step into your significance.



• On a scale of 1 (low)- 10(high), how significant and important is the work that you do?



• Significance is a life-long emotional need that people have to stay motivated.



• When you do activities that you love to do, you feel a sense of purpose and significance.



• Action Item: Identify what you do that makes you feel significant and important. Develop a plan to spend more time doing these activities and/or add new activities within the scope of your role.



5. Embrace variety and challenge.



• On a scale of 1 (low)- 10(high), how satisfied are you with the amount of variety and challenge in your current role?



• Variety and challenge is a life-long emotional need that people have to stay motivated.



• Boredom sets in if you don’t have enough variety and challenge in your role.



• Action Item: Identify what you do that makes you feel a sense of variety and challenge. Develop a plan to spend more time doing these activities and/or add new activities within the scope of your role.



6. Create certainty to achieve career success.



• On a scale of 1 (low)- 10(high), how satisfied are you with the amount of certainty and control you have related to your career success?



• Certainty is a life-long emotional need that people have to stay motivated.



• Fear and pessimism set in if you don’t have enough certainty related to your career success.



• Action Item: Define what career success looks like to you. Reach out to your boss (and other coaches and mentors) to help you create more certainty related to your career success.




By Hari Das Nair - Vice President & Group Head - Human Resources

Why are there so many women in HR?

Does HR attract women because it’s perceived to be a soft and fluffy profession? Johann Tasker (a man) of UK-based Personnel Todaylooks for an answer

The figures speak for themselves. Seventy-two per cent of UK-based Chartered Institute of Personnel and Development (CIPD) members are women. Only 28 per cent of the 124,500 membership are men.

Paul Turner, general manager, people, at West Bromwich Building Society, has an HR team of 25. Only three of them are men. He says the imbalance in his team is because men are not attracted into the profession. But he adds that a more in-depth examination of why that is the case can be controversial. “I hate getting into conversations like this because you are almost forced to generalise and that can be dangerous,” he says.

“HR is generally perceived to be a profession based around people and people skills. Men – and this is too deep a topic to be specific about – tend to be attracted to areas that are more systematic, more structured and more competitive.”

Duncan Brown, assistant director general at the Chartered Institute of Personnel and Development (CIPD), attributes the high levels of women in HR to educational background. “In the UK, HR has been associated with a ‘softer’ social science background which tends to attract women, whereas men tend to prefer the ‘harder’ sciences.”

HR’s image and perception has served to turn men off joining the profession, argues Marianne Huggett, associate director at the Work Foundation.

“As far as many people in the outside world are concerned, [HR] is a soft and fluffy job all about social and welfare issues,” she says. “Anyone who gets close to HR knows it is anything but soft,” says Huggett. “But I think the common misconception is something that has, in the past, acted as a disincentive for men to get involved in the profession.”

But Huggett rejects the popular argument that women are more attracted to HR because they are in some way genetically predisposed to the nature of the job. “Maybe there is a slight element of predisposition, but I would be uncomfortable saying it was anything more than minor,” she says.

Welfare roots

To understand why there are more women in HR we must look at the history of the profession in the UK, says Angela O’Connor, HR director at the Crown Prosecution Service.

“The roots of HR go as far back as the late 19th century, when the role of welfare workers was to take care of women and girls in the workforce,” she says. “These welfare workers were all women, and as more women entered the workplace during the two world wars, the number in welfare work increased and their role expanded to include recruitment and training.”

The development from the welfare role to personnel, and then to HR, took place, therefore, in a predominantly female environment – in much the same way, for example, that engineering developed as a mainly male occupation. And just as small, but increasing, numbers of women have entered engineering over the past few decades, O’Connor believes HR can be seen to be a predominantly female occupation attracting an increasing, but still relatively small, number of men.

No soft option

Unlike Huggett, Turner has more sympathy for the view that women seem to be attracted to caring “people-based” professions such as HR, while men have traditionally preferred professions where success is judged on results.

“In male-dominated professions, such as sales, law or engineering, you can see the number of sales made, or court cases won, or bridges built,” he says. “You can usually see exactly what has been achieved. But in HR, it has not always been easy to measure your achievement.”

Turner also rejects the notion that women prefer HR because it is a soft option. In the difficult areas of HR that managers often shy away from – such as discipline or hard-edged negotiations – he says it is often the women who are prepared to cut to the quick and be decisive.

“HR is a job where the amount of power you have lies in your ability to influence other people, whereas in many other jobs, you have power through position. I think the women who come into HR and do well are particularly good at influencing other people.”

Women also seem to be less precious about positions, says Turner. “I don’t mean that they don’t care about status. I mean that they seem to be more open minded when it comes to moving towards or away from a particular point of argument, whereas men often feel it is a sign of weakness.

“The key HR skills in many areas are the ability to empathise, relate and influence, and use emotional intelligence. I am not suggesting that men don’t have emotional intelligence, but in HR the women who do well have bags and bags of it,” Turner says.

To the casual observer, all of this might make it seem that HR really is a woman’s world. But a closer look at the statistics reveals this is not the case. Women may outnumber men at the lower levels of the profession, but it is a different story at the top.

Glass ceiling

Figures from the UK Chartered Management Institute reveal a significant pay gap between men and women in middle management HR posts. On average, women earn salaries of 41,000, but men earn 49,000. And while there are fewer men in HR, their relative numbers increase with job seniority. Added to this, only 40 per cent of HR directors are women, so when it comes to promotion, the glass ceiling, it seems, is intact.

Susan Anderson, director of HR policy for the Confederation of British Industry, says HR directors are often male because in the past, women didn’t return to work after having a career break to start a family. Those who put their career on hold, returned to the profession lower down the career ladder. But this is changing and there is room for optimism, she adds.

“There are lots of female HR role models who have reached the top,” says Anderson. “Perceptions are changing, but it should not be the case of saying that unless there is a fifty-fifty split we have failed. That would be a mistake,” she adds.

Companies which fail to promote female HR managers to director level are missing a trick, suggests Mary Mercer, principal consultant at the Institute for Employment Studies. But women themselves should do more to promote their cause, she says.

“It’s only recently that HR has begun to be represented at board level in the UK. The views of HR have got to change and many of the women in HR have to think about championing HR and focusing on the impact that it can have on the bottom line.”

Mercer believes good HR practice can have a bigger impact on an organisation’s bottom line than almost anything else. Good people management can account for a 15 per cent positive variation in business performance, whereas something like strategy only accounts for 2 per cent, she explains.

“It has to be thought of in those terms for women in HR to get themselves onto the boards of organisations and start getting people to think about HR when they are thinking of business decisions. The people element has traditionally been thought of last and that attitude has to change.”

Men at the top

When Mercer studied for her Chartered Institute of Personnel & Development qualification, there were no men on her course. All too often, she says, HR departments are staffed by women, but the director is a man – and often one who has come into HR from another role within the business.

“There is a feeling that anyone can ‘do’ HR, that it is something anyone can pick up. This has led to a lack of professionalism within HR and a lack of focus on business outcomes. It is a challenge for women if they want their careers to be taken seriously and if HR is to be put on the map,” says Mercer.

The development of the HR business partner role, for example, requires business experience and qualifications. This role will give HR more clout within business and should help put it on the map, while at the same time moving the profession away from its soft and fluffy image. But will the emphasis on business experience appeal more to men?

Turner doesn’t think more men will take up such roles. Forward-looking companies are increasingly employing people on merit, rather than according to gender, he says.

“I don’t think it’s an HR issue. I think it’s a general issue around the need to recognise that if you have a quality person going on maternity leave then you want them back, and you want to make sure you keep them.”

O’Connor concurs. She doesn’t believe that a move towards more HR business partner roles will see more men rushing to join the profession.

“This assumes two things,” she says. “First, that women are less business-focused and results-orientated than men. And second, that the ‘soft skills’ for which women have traditionally been valued are not compatible with a strong business focus. I think both assumptions are wrong.”

Feedback from the profession

"Women are more attracted to the humanist side of the work. More men would create a better balance, but they need to be excited and have a passion for the work. Having a lot of women in HR is not a bad thing, unless there are barriers for them to make the step to HR director level."

- Craig White, station training and development officer, Royal Air Force

"HR is a job where the amount of power you have lies in your ability to influence other people, whereas in many other jobs, you have power through position. Women who come into HR and do well are particularly good at influencing people."

- Paul Turner, general manager, people, West Bromwich Building Society

"Women are more social animals than men and, therefore, more attracted to the HR profession. It may be self-perpetuating - if there were more women in senior roles, that could fuel the interest of other women."

- David Regester, managing director, Anne Shaw Consultants

"The days of demanding industrial/employee relations roles created macho environments that appealed to men. Now HR is focused on developing, engaging and supporting people, it is more attractive to women."

- Paul Pagliari, senior director, HR, Immigration and Nationality Directorate

"A lot of HR activity is to do with multi-tasking and juggling work - women can be much better at that than men. There does need to be an influx of male candidates into the profession, especially in the more junior roles."

- Liz Thompson, director, Liz Thompson HR

"I think it comes back to the traditional personnel and welfare department. Women are a lot better at working as part of that than men. The level of pay might also be an issue."

- Debbie Handley, HR adviser, Mellon Analytical Solutions

"It may be something about the way that some organisations set themselves up. HR is not perceived as a serious business function. There is no machismo in [the function] and that appeals more to women."

- Mark Harrison, consultant, Kineo

This article first appeared in Personnel Today magazine. www.personneltoday.com