So where’s the danger in that?  You set yourself up for a huge emotional crash if you expect an organization to make decisions and act like a person.  Your family should love you unconditionally; but don’t expect your employer to do so, no matter how many raises or awards or accolades you’ve achieved. Just ask Tiger Woods, Mike Leach or Conan O’Brien. When the time comes, your employer will make a cold, dispassionate business decision.  If you expect that from your employer it won’t lessen the surprise or ease the pain when it happens to you; but sometime in the days ahead you’ll realize it wasn’t personal, it was just business. And then you can better pick yourself up and get on with the rest of your life.  So no matter how great your current job is, do not love your employer!

1. Hubris born of success
2. Undisciplined pursuit of more
3. Denial of risk and peril
4. Grasping for a silver bullet
5. Capitulation to irrelevance or death

It also interesting because Collins claims that if you find your organization at a stage above stage 5, you may be able to reverse the process.  But what’s most interesting to me is that the stages are BEHAVIORS of leaders.  Think about it.  According to Collins, organizations do not fail because of the wrong ERP, old technology or issues related to capital or markets or finance. No, Collins says that organizations fail due to the inappropriate behaviors of their leaders. Sounds like a talent management issue to me.  What do you think?

• Can’t wait for answers
• Care less about science than outcome
• Hate ambiguity
• Want relevant research
• Want understandable results

On the other hand, academics want practitioners to:

• Understand and value research, including its limits
• Apply research principles appropriately
• Be flexible enough to try research they don’t like

Grossman offers a couple of suggestions about bridging the disconnect.  Okay he lists three but I think the last two are really the same and that’s the one I want to emphasize:  reach out to a local HR professor.  (Disclaimer:  I’ve been an adjunct faculty member.)  Here’s what I think you’ll find: Most (the article says 60%) will be happy to engage you in a conversation about what’s important to you in HR.

Offer to meet them on campus for a cup of coffee.  Explain what you’re working on and then listen to their reaction.  Find out if they’ve conducted research in any areas of interest to you.  Those common areas can be the basis for some great collaboration.  The professor may invite you to be a guest speaker in one or more of their HR classes.  If so, you should accept. (Hint:  Don’t give a lecture, engage the class in a conversation.  They’ll have lots of questions.)  Invite the professor to serve on an external advisory committee, or to speak to your team at a lunch and learn, or to speak at your local SHRM chapter meeting (talk to the program chair first).  The point is to start a relationship.  Most professors could use more connections to the “real” world they teach about, and most practitioners can use more face time with academics. It’s a win-win proposition.

What do I really believe?  HR is not dying, but it is changing. The forces driving the change are complex and because of their complexity the results of the change may be misunderstood. Let’s look at some of the forces driving the change in our profession:

1. Society is changing.  The 500 year period that more or less started with the enlightenment in the western world, and that is referred to as modernity (at least from our perspective) seems to be drawing to an end.  This is a natural, organic shift in thinking and seeing the world, not a cataclysmic end worthy of a blockbuster movie.  Some examples of this shift include the growing number of people who think that “Might does not make right” or “Bigger is not better” or “Science doesn’t have all the answers”…  The point here is not whether you agree with this line of thinking, but rather that a significant (and probably growing) number of  people are thinking in post-modern ways.  HR is recruiting, training and helping managers manage these post-modern employees, and they do not have the same value system as those who are still firmly rooted in modernity.  Society’s changes force HR to change, and I believe these changes are having a profound effect on HR.  However, if we are busy putting out fires, we may be missing the big picture.

2. Our profession is maturing. Beyond HR by Boudreau and Ramstad may be the best summary of this maturation process I’ve seen so far.  Just like accounting matured into the decision science we call finance and sales matured into the decision science we call marketing, HR is maturing into a decision science that these authors call Talentship.  We still have accountants and sales professionals, and we will probably still have professionals working on the issues common to today’s HR.  But we are starting to see a new decision science emerge that has the promise of making tomorrow’s Talentship (or whatever name emerges) a key strategic partner in the post-modern organization.  This is exciting and it’s frightening.  Exciting for those ready to mature with the profession, frightening for those who fear change.

3. At a more personal level we’re finding that changes in technology and the economy are creating fear and resistance to more change. Some of us are just getting comfortable with Windows XP, we’re scared of Vista and now here comes Windows 7.  For such late adapters, talk of integrating Social Media into HR can be paralyzing.  Some of these folk were blissfully ignoring the need to change until the recession forced them to rethink retirement plans.  Now it looks like they will have to adapt to changing technology just to be able to hang on until their personal finances recover.

4. Finally, we face change as a part of everyday business.  Whether its H1N1 or GINA or employee relations issues, change is the normal state for both our employers and our roles as HR pros.   At this level, some of us are better equipped to deal with change than others. Sharlyn Lauby, says that HR has both Rock Stars and dead wood, just like every other profession.  If you’re saddled with a “D” team, then any change looks like a really big deal to you.  On the other hand, if you have an  “A” team of professionals , you can handle change without much fuss. Most of us fall somewhere in the middle.  Want some more proof?  Lance Haun says there are at least three critical functions that a changed HR can best serve: workplace process and productivity improvement, internal ombuds, and employee life cycle manager.  Whatever happened to employment, training and benefits?  Consider Deirdre Honner‘s recent list of HR Rock Star blog posts.  The medium and the content are different than what we could have seen just two years ago.  The point is that change is now part of every day life more than at any time in our careers.

In the face of such radical discontinuous change, what should we do?

I like Charlie Judy’s approach, the first thing we need to do is simplify our approach to life and to our profession.  Like the Curly Washburn character in City Slickers, the secret is “one.”  Here’s my one (at least for today):  People are your organization’s only unique sustainable competitive advantage.  Your competitors can replicate your processes, markets and other advantages, but not your people.  HR is the business function that holds the key to making this unique, sustainable competitive advantage work effectively in a world of radical discontinuous change.  So stop trying to focus on everything and simplify your life.  Right now commit to trying Charlie’s Next Gen HR.  It won’t be easy, but it will be freeing; and that’s a good thing.

1. Most of the Fortune 500 members still have HR departments.  Not all of these are great companies, but most have had some success in the past or they wouldn’t be on the list.  Most of the best have vibrant HR divisions.

2. Most of the “best places to work” winners have HR departments.  I’ve noticed this is true of national, state and local lists of best places to work.  Is there a correlation?  I think there is a strong relationship.

3. Last time I checked, you could still buy recently published HR books. B&N listed 824 items and Amazon listed 51,914 items (all departments) in response to the query “human resource management”  In contrast, B&N lists 6 items for “buggy whips.”  (11/15/2009)

4.  I googled “accounting” and there were about 23,900,000 hits.  I don’t hear anyone arguing that accounting is dead.  I googled “human resources” and got 84,500,000 hits.  By this “metric” HR is almost 4X more alive than accounting (1. We always knew that!  2. For any accountants reading this, item 4 is a lame attempt at humor.)

5. We are having this discussion.  When was the last time you had a passionate discussion about canvas sail makers (or fill in the name of any obsolete profession.)

I could go on, but you get the point. So if HR is not dead, what is going on in the profession?  I’ll give you my opinion in the next post.

1.  Death by obsolescence may be the result of technological change.  It is hard to find a buggy-whip maker today, largely due to the success of Ford’s model-T.  I can remember as a child when you could go to People’s Drug Store to test the vacuum tubes from your black and white TV.  Those tubes and the testing machine are gone, along with the jobs required to create them. At the pace of technological change today, almost everyone can think of an example of a technology shift that changed an industry and killed a profession.

2. Obsolescence may occur due to shifts in market demand.  As tastes change and the demand for products change, the professions that create/grow/manufacture those products will change as well.  Before 7-11, the milkman delivered to our front porch. Another childhood memory is our neighbor who built a two story air conditioned garage to house his chinchilla ranch.  Fortunately, he kept his day job.

3. Obsolescence can result from outsourcing.  I’ve seen examples of this in the timber and defense industries as well as in HR.  Depending on the location of the outsourcing, some of the displaced employees may find jobs with the new provider of the services, and a very small number may be able to become consultants.

4. Obsolescence can occur due to off-shoring.  We’ve seen this in the shoe, steel and textile industries.  When these jobs move off-shore almost everyone affected has to find a new profession.

5. Most often, obsolescence occurs due to some combination of the first four changes.  The layoffs facing the print and network news organizations seem to be in part due to technology and in part due to shifts in markets.  Technology has created new web-based media, and we like it!

So what about the forensic evidence surrounding HR’s body on the floor in the office?

As we look for clues, we see that HR has been subject to a lot of technological change. Many manual transactions in payroll and benefits have been replaced by automated functions.  Employee and manager self-service has also contributed to the demise of HR, as the need for a local office has been reduced.  Over there we see some evidence of market demand shift, right beside what looks like some pretty heavy outsourcing.  It’s hard to tell which came first, so we’ll have to take this evidence back to the lab to re-create the time-line. Over here we see some traces of off-shoring; but that will have to be confirmed back at the lab.

Our preliminary conclusion?  At this point it certainly looks like HR is dead, a victim of obsolescence.  With fingers tightly gripped around manual processes, HR tripped over a huge pile of policy binders.  His cries for help would not be heard by those co-workers who were no longer in the office.  They’d been set free by technology and were out serving customers or working from home.  He even tried to send an email, but they were on Facebook and Twitter.  Too little change, too late in the game.  Now that you’ve seen the clues, what do you think?

After quickly replaying the meeting for my team, and answering their questions as best as I could, I thought about what I’d just experienced:

• In contrast to what I’d heard I could expect from him, I was the recipient of open and honest communication.
• He dealt with a sensitive topic by admitting that a merger was an option and by suggesting a plan that would be in the team’s best interests.
• I’d repeated his behavior with my team, with pretty good results.

As I sat in my office thinking about this experience, it hit me:  honesty really is the best policy.  Of course I should’ve known that, my Mom and Dad drilled that into me at a very early age.  But here I had just seen it demonstrated in a very tangible, if somewhat surprising way.

Since then, I’ve seen this scenario replayed many times with predictable results.  Open, honest, transparent communication, even about bad news, works better than any alternative.  Try to dodge the issue or hide the truth and in the end, you’ll lose the confidence and respect of your team.   Or worse, as the latest headlines seem to repeat with too much frequency, you’ll end up on the wrong side of an ethics investigation and lose more than your job.

Incidentally, it turned out that we were not merged with the corporate office after all, and our ability to stay focused on what really mattered helped the team maintain its reputation for quality work. Do you agree that honesty is the best policy?  Let me hear from you.

In the late 1980′s Zogby and his wife conducted a local poll on hunger and were surprised to find some high income respondents who reported that they were going 24 hours without food.  Further research indicated that most of these were people who had lost very high paying jobs and were maintaining their former lifestyle on a lower, but still high, income by skipping meals.

This discovery led Zogby to research under-employment and the lost “American Dream.” And in turn, that study led to a second surprise by the late 1990′s when he discovered what he calls “Secular Spiritualists.”  Secular Spiritualists define the American Dream as “I can lead a meaningful life.”  Zogby’s polls now suggest that Secular Spiritualists comprise about 43% of the U.S. population, while only about 25% of Americans believe in the traditional American Dream.

The third surprise is that these Secular Spiritualists are comprised in large part by Baby Boomers.  Zogby explained this by suggesting that Secular Spiritualists are:  A) Happy working for lower salaries  B) Content with what they have, or less than what they have  C) Boomers who are learning to be less self-indulgent, and D) Boomers who are recognizing they have a legacy and are willing to sacrifice to make that a meaningful legacy.  One of Zogby’s conclusions was that the new Secular Spiritualist Boomers are more interested in flex time and the opportunity to volunteer for meaningful community projects than climbing the organizational ladder.

This is similar to the profile of Generation Y employees provided earlier in conference by Nadira Hira, see my earlier post “Thinking about Gen Y”.  So if  we design programs to engage Gen Y, might the same programs serve to engage this new cohort of emerging Boomers?  It’s worth thinking about.