By Angela Nuñez

Productive, drama-free conversations are important to the long-term success and wellbeing of any organization. Most people begin conversations from a place of advocacy—persuasion in favor of their own needs, desires, and/or beliefs and from their own point of view. Entering a conversation in this way leaves very little room for growth, change, or collaboration. A better attitude with which to approach conversations is one of open-mindedness. You should still value your view, but be open to the fact that you may be missing something. If everyone in a group has this attitude, there is much more room for innovation and growth. In this way, employees can express their view as a possibility but not the only answer while listening with an open mind to alternative views.

This approach is much more likely to lead to problem-solving than if everyone simply argues his or her point of view. You can start having better conversations by adopting this attitude and inviting responses after you’ve expressed your point of view. If you don’t understand where someone else is coming from, ask him for further explanation and be willing to hear his reasoning. A balance between assertiveness and open-mindedness leads to better conversations and more productive, healthier relationships both at the workplace and outside of it.

 

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By Angela Nuñez

With budgets shrinking and demands increasing, agencies—especially those in the public sector—need to have competent, productive teams. This may mean letting go of some employees in order to enable teams to be more productive and in order to make room for new employees. There are several traits that managers need to look out for in their employees, one of which is the tendency to cause drama. Work can be stressful enough without petty drama added to the mix, so if you have a drama queen or king in the office, you may want to consider letting him or her go. Another troubling trait is the tendency to overpromise and underdeliver. The best employees are aware of their abilities and limitations; you don’t want someone with a glaring lack of self-awareness on the team.

A red flag that it’s time to let go of an employee is if he or she acts out with customers and/or clients. Doing so is unprofessional and very bad for an agency’s brand and reputation. Another red flag is if an employee is unreliable and doesn’t do his or her job. Managers need teams they can depend on and that are able, even under pressure. Many employees will learn and grow, of course, but it’s important not to waste time on those who can’t or won’t improve. In some situations, out with the old and in with the new is the way to go.

 

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By Angela Nuñez

Younger workers will be expecting and demanding better benefits than those that currently exist, which, to be blunt, are a joke. New mothers in other countries, from Pakistan to Canada, receive anywhere from 12 to 50 weeks of paid maternity leave. New mothers in the United States receive zero. Smart organizations provide some paid maternity leave even though it isn’t required because they know that benefits such as paid maternity leave instill loyalty in employees and that any investments made in benefits will be well worth it in the long run. But not all new mothers are lucky enough to work for these on-the-ball organizations. Many other developed nations also provide paid paternity leave; unsurprisingly, the U.S. doesn’t provide that either.

Why is the U.S. so behind the times when it comes to employee benefits? This country’s values have been shaped around working hard in order to achieve “success,” and somewhere along the line, “working hard” was equated with having no work/life balance. Other developed countries also provide more vacation time for their workers than the U.S. does because they value health, wellness, and family time. U.S. workers tend to be overworked, stressed out, and lacking in the social life department. But how successful are we if we are giving up time with family and friends and butchering our mental, emotional, and physical wellbeing?

 

A cultural shift must occur if we are to change our lifestyles in order to be healthier and to spend more time with those whom we care about. Younger generations of workers will demand this shift and usher it in themselves if necessary, because we’ve witnessed that sometimes, no matter how hard you work, you still lose it all and for nothing but irretrievable time that could’ve been spent with family and friends. The Internet has connected us to the rest of the world, and we see that there are better ways to live, that the “American way” is not the only nor the best way in every circumstance. Working hard is certainly important, but so is having a life outside of work and putting time and energy into that life. Younger workers know this and will only stick with agencies that embrace these values, as well.

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By Angela Nuñez

Recruiting the best and brightest isn’t easy, but there are things you can do to make sure your organization is doing all it should to attract the right candidates. During the recruiting and hiring process, it’s important to keep in mind the skills your agency needs now and those that will likely be necessary in the future.

One of the most important traits for an organization to have if it is to be successful in the long run is flexibility. Forward-thinking organizations offer benefits such as unlimited paid vacation and the option for women on maternity leave to return to work when they want to on a schedule of their own devising. Strategies like these inspire terrific loyalty and rarely, if ever, backfire. Not to mention that by 2025, Generation Y and its successors will comprise more than half the global population and 75% of the workforce, according to consulting firm A.T. Kearney. Eighty percent of them want to be able to work flexibly, so recruiting candidates from that generation will require agencies to embrace flexibility.

Cooping employees up in offices everyday stifles creativity and innovation. While there is undoubtedly value in bringing people together in the office, it is not the only way to inspire great work and collaboration from employees. If you want loyalty, creativity, and innovation to thrive, make sure your organization is flexible.

 

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By Angela Nuñez

Millennials have been on the receiving end of a lot of criticism lately, with the most recent coming in the form of Time’s feature article claiming that Millennials are lazy, entitled, and narcissistic. I addressed some of these criticisms in a previous post, and it’s important to remember that every generation enters the workforce with varying skills and weaknesses. Millennials have grown up in a very different world than the previous generation; technology dominates life now and work life boundaries are much more blurred than they used to be. 

Because Millennials have grown up in such a drastically different world, they require drastically different training and development. Agencies need to actively identify the strengths Millennial workers bring to the table as well as the areas that need to be improved. New strategies for recruiting, developing, and retaining Millennial talent need to be formed and implemented. Leaders need to focus on Millennials’ positive traits instead of constantly harping on their negative ones. Yes, Millennials are different; no, they’re not work averse, so don’t treat them that way. Concentrate instead on developing them to be the next movers and shakers.

 

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By Angela Nuñez

It happens—even some of the best organizations in the U.S. hire the wrong person from time to time. Research conducted by CareerBuilder reveals that more than half of employers in the world’s ten largest economies report experiencing negative effects from hiring the wrong person. These effects include decreased productivity, lowered morale, and worsened customer relations. Among U.S. employers, 66% report experiencing measurable negative impacts from hiring the wrong person.

Matt Ferguson, CEO of CareerBuilder, said, “Making a wrong decision regarding a hire can have several adverse consequences across an organization. When you add up missed sales opportunities, strained client and employee relations, potential legal issues, and resources to hire and train candidates, the cost can be considerable. Employers are taking longer to extend offers post-recession as they assess whether a candidate really is the best fit for the job and their company culture.” Make sure your agency has a strong assessment strategy in place and also takes into consideration not only what skills are needed now, but also what skills will be needed in the future.

Hiring mistakes are inevitable, so when they happen, agencies should do their best to minimize the negative impacts; don’t burn any bridges and be sure to identify the holes in the hiring strategy.

 

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By Angela Nuñez

A bully in the office can scare away potential candidates, even if the bully treats candidates with respect and kindness at first. Many people can detect incongruence and sense when someone only pretends to be nice. Bullies bring everyone down and eat away at an organization’s culture. Sometimes bullies only behave in an unacceptable manner behind the boss’s back, so how do you combat this kind of bully if he’s fake to your face? Bullies like this need to be confronted and made aware that their behavior is not going unnoticed. If the bully’s attitude doesn’t change, he or she needs to go, as it’s not worth losing great employees.

Some bullies only become bullies when they’re stressed, but being stressed out is no excuse to treat others with disrespect. Stress is part of any job and learning to deal with it is a skill every employee should master. A bully like this should be made aware of his or her behavior and given a chance to change, but if change doesn’t occur, consider letting him or her go. Again, it’s not worth losing great employees over one whose moods are so mercurial. While no one is perfect, everyone deserves to be treated with respect, and if you have an employee who struggles with that, the issue needs to be dealt with swiftly.

 

 

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By  Angela Nuñez

Smaller budgets, hiring and pay freezes, and increasing demands all require federal agencies to be more innovative than ever before. Despite pay freezes, most federal workers still want to innovate and are motivated to do a good job. Federal workers, according to the Partnership for Public Service, feel that they lack the necessary support to be innovative. Managers and agencies as a whole are failing to act as the support system they need to be to enable their employees to be creative and innovative. The Partnership for Public Service revealed that the government-wide innovation score went down 1.7 points from 2011 to 2012, to 61.5 out of 100.

The Partnership’s findings show that most employees (91%) look for ways to perform better, but only 57% of employees say they are encouraged to do so. Only slightly more than one-third of federal employees say that creativity and innovation are rewarded in their agency. The reduction in available resources and increasing demand for government services means that federal leaders and agencies on the whole need to step up and actively support innovation. Employees need to be empowered to implement change faster and more easily. Red tape needs to be cut down. The nation’s problems won’t slow down just because we can’t keep up with them, so it’s time to allow innovation to flourish.

 

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By Angela Nuñez

The best leaders know that there is always room for growth and improvement. Many teams, though, may not feel comfortable voicing opinions about how things could be done better for fear of backlash or the feeling that nothing will change anyway. Leaders must address the issue if a team doesn’t feel like there is truly an open door policy. Use the following tips to make sure that sugarcoating isn’t leading to your demise:

• Ask open-ended questions.
Your questions should generate discussion. Ask your team what it needs in order to succeed. Ask what stands in the way of efficiency and productivity. Ask what’s working and what’s not.

• Learn to be a good listener.
The next step after asking the right questions is listening to the answers. You may feel the urge to interrupt and/or justify, but doing so shows your team that you’re not really ready to hear what needs to be said.

• Act on the advice.
Make sure you act on the feedback your team gives you. If you don’t, you’re less likely to continue to receive useful feedback, as your team will realize there’s no point in telling you how things could improve.

Keep an open door and an open mind so that you can support your team and your team can support you.

 

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By Angela Nuñez

So you found a great candidate who has all the right skills and you’re ready to hire when you realize that he just won’t be comfortable with your agency’s culture. Friday’s blog post gave tips to potential candidates for finding the right job, and those same tips apply to the organization as a whole when it comes to recruiting talent. It’s essential for an agency to represent itself honestly and authentically or much money and time will be wasted recruiting, hiring, and onboarding employees who won’t work out in the long run. Jibing with the company culture is a pretty important part of being happy with a job, so you want to make sure the candidate understands and accepts the culture before she accepts a job offer.

A recent Inc. article suggests that organizations refrain from posting anything political or religious on social networking sites because it will “alienate about 50 percent of your audience.” While this may be true sometimes, if part of your regular company culture involves jokes about one political party or another or discussions around religion or a lack thereof, you want to make sure that a candidate isn’t going to be unbearably uncomfortable with it. Diversity is important, but you want to make sure no one feels excluded because of company culture. If you find that a lot of candidates are put off by your agency’s culture, it may be time to reevaluate that culture and find out what needs to be fixed. Maybe your organization is being too cliquey and exclusive, so try to make sure that doesn’t happen. As long as your agency represents itself authentically, the right candidates should stick around and be able to find success.

 

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