The Secrets to Hiring: Recent College Graduates Edition

secrets to hiring recent college graduates

It’s that time of year when the job field is flooded by over-eager college graduates begging to be given a chance by skeptical (perhaps cynical) human resource professionals and business owners. What can someone who spent the last four years pulling all nighters and doing keg stands (possibly on the same night) do for my business? Okay, maybe every employer or HR director isn’t that cynical, but there are certain stereotypes surrounding recent college graduates. Maybe these words come to mind: inexperienced, entitled, inappropriate… Enough with the negativity! As HR professionals with over 50 years of experience, we’ve interviewed every type of person: a recent college graduate, a mom that’s been out of the workforce for the past 15 years, a retired CEO, a middle-aged entrepreneur, an experienced business person looking for a career change…you name it, we’ve … [Read more...]

Could You Go To Jail Over Your Pay Practices?

free compensation seminar

Could You Go To Jail Over Your Pay Practices? The Secrets to Successful Salary & Benefits Practices When is the last time you really thought about the compensation philosophy in your organization? Six months? A year? Two years? YIKES! There are laws that govern how your employees are paid—do you know what they are and whether or not your organization is at risk? For example: If you are misclassifying job functions as exempt when they are non-exempt you could be headed for a world of hurt if your employees figure it out. You could be liable for unpaid overtime for every employee who is misclassified. Ouch! Could you pay those fines? Or could you go to jail over your pay practices? If you even have to think about that for a second, then you need to keep reading. Even if you think you are in the clear, you may be wrong. There are other reasons to look at your … [Read more...]

How Petrino Broke HR Rules of Recruiting—Oh Let Us Count The Ways!

Recruiting

How did Petrino break HR Rules of Recruiting…Oh let us count the ways! When this Bobby Petrino scandal broke last week, a lot of people started asking us: What do you think about that? If you’ve been avoiding all forms of media as some sort of technological detox, first let us say, “Welcome back!” and secondly, here’s the scoop: Bobby Petrino was fired as Arkansas’ head football coach on April 10, shortly after it was discovered that he had an affair with a 25-year-old engaged employee, Jessica Dorrell. Petrino, a married man with four children, attempted to cover up the affair even after he got into an accident during a motorcycle ride with Dorrell on April 1. Oh where to begin with that? Well, it took us a while to gather up enough energy to even care about yet another professional sports scandal. Seriously, hasn’t this story be written before? Once … [Read more...]

Has Yahoo! Gone Yahoo?

yahoo layoffs

Yahoo is making the equivalent of a Hail Mary pass in the final minutes of a bowl game or a final shot right at the buzzer. And we don’t think this is going to end like the glorious IU vs UK game back in December (glorious, if you are an IU fan, of course). Just by glancing at the numbers, it doesn’t look good for Yahoo: six layoffs and three CEOs in four years—not the sign of a healthy company. Maybe new CEO Scott Thompson has something up his sleeve? We hope for the sake of the other 12,000 employees that he is not bluffing. But who are we to say what may be the fate of Yahoo? After all, we are HR professionals, not fortune tellers. What we can say is this: From an HR prospective, Thompson is going about this all wrong. Yes, sometimes business owners and CEOs have to make drastic decisions that others label as crazy (ex: Facebook buying Instagram for $1 … [Read more...]

Attention: ‘This is Your Captain (and HR) Freaking’

this is your captain freaking

It seems like every other week there is a news story that makes our HR professionals cringe. Whether it is about dangerous working conditions at an Apple factory in China or a CEO resigning after a scandal, there is always something to talk about. This week, of course, we have to talk about the pilot. (Side note: we can’t take credit for the catchy headline that one goes to the New York Post.) We’re sure you’ve heard about the JetBlue pilot Clayton Osbon whose erratic behavior mid-flight caused him to be locked out of the cockpit and restrained by passengers. According to his co-pilot, Osbon’s behavior became ominous shortly after takeoff. Then, at 34,000 feet, his rant started. While running down the aisles, he yelled about Jesus, Sept. 11, Iraq, Iran and terrorists. While it’s unknown what exactly caused Osbon’s mental breakdown, some sources are … [Read more...]

Innovative Ideas Don’t Create Jobs. Implementation Does.

Ray Kroc, Founder of McDonald's Corp and a great innovator.

The atmosphere at Tuesday night’s GLI Annual Meeting was quite inspiring. Hundreds of local business leaders gathered in the YUM Center, buzzing with excitement as they networked with fellow business owners and saw visions of obtainable success in 2012. The energy in the room was contagious, almost to a point of delirium. The theme for the 2012 GLI Annual meeting was, “Ideas Create Jobs.” Well, we can’t argue with that slogan. We would, however, like to take it a step further. Innovation and ideas are the first step to creating jobs. But you can’t stop there! You must take action! The next and most critical step is Implementation. As business owners, we all want our companies to be the next Fortune 500 and even on a smaller scale, we want to be named in the next Fast 50 Business celebration. We all have our dream goals, but what are we doing to get there? Let’s take … [Read more...]

Embrace March Madness and Increase Employee Morale

ncaa march madness

Are you ready for some…basketball?!? Wait, or is that for football? Whatever the theme song, the important message is that March Madness just tipped off this week. And this year, we are right in the middle of it! The YUM! Center in Louisville is hosting the second and third rounds of the tournament creating even more hype than usual. (Also creating more traffic. Apparently the traffic will be quite a nightmare from 10 a.m. to 11 p.m. on game days! Of course, these days a little game day traffic seems like nothing compared to the Shermageddon traffic we experienced for five months!) Your office is probably all a-buzz with basketball chatter especially since the area teams are competing this year and actually have a chance of taking the title. So we thought we’d bring you some helpful advice on how to deal with March Madness in your office. This post can help you flip the … [Read more...]

Disaster Relief: Don’t Let Your Good Intentions Turn Sour

Henryville-Indiana highschool

It’s almost been a week since the deadly tornadoes tore through the Midwest leaving communities with broken homes and broken hearts. Towns just 20 miles up the road from our office in Louisville, KY were destroyed. Henryville High School was ripped to shreds with students being released just 45 minutes before the tornado touched down. Stories started pouring in; stories that would make even a Hells Angel biker tear up. One story was about a 15-month-old girl who was found in a field near her family’s home. She was the lone survivor of her five person family. Two days later, she passed away at Kosair Children’s Hospital. There is also the story of Stephanie Decker whose dream home crashed down on top of her and her kids. She used her body to shield her children, breaking seven of her ribs and severing both of her legs. Her children didn’t have a scratch on them. She … [Read more...]

How To Tame Your Out of Control Office Celebrity

image-super-star-employees

Now that this year’s award season is behind us, we can finally move on with our lives! Our Sunday nights are no longer devoted to judging questionable evening gown choices and listening to painfully awkward acceptance speeches. But all this fuss made over awards season and celebrities got us thinking about just how much we let celebrities get away with. In real life, what would you think if someone wore a dress like Angelina Jolie’s at the Oscars? Her right thigh now has its on Twitter account (I can’t make this stuff up). And everyone was talking about whether or not Jennifer Lopez slipped out of her deep plunging neckline dress. (Her now infamous body part also has a Twitter, but does not have nearly as many followers as Jolie’s leg. Sigh).   And what about Sacha Baron Cohen? He is probably banned from the Oscars after he paraded down the red carpet dressed as … [Read more...]

Foxconn Horror Stories Make Our HR Professionals Cringe

foxconn_workers

On a recent episode of CBS’s “Sunday Morning,” Charles Osgood featured a story about the horrible conditions of a factory in China. Back in 2010, 18 Foxconn workers who could no longer face the long hours and ghastly working conditions threw themselves off the factory’s roof resulting in 10 deaths. Back in May 2011, an explosion in the factory resulted in four deaths and 18 injuries. Just a few weeks ago, 150 workers protested the factory’s working conditions by standing on the roof and threatening suicide. (The workers were coaxed down after two days.) That’s just some of the horrific stories about Foxconn. After hearing these stories, we wondered what could make these workers take such drastic measures. What product is worth more than human life? Look down at your phone. Look at your computer. Look around you. Foxconn produces gadgets such as Amazon's Kindle … [Read more...]

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