May 6, 2009

Edited and Written by Ira S. Wolfe

Published by Success Performance Solutions. Major Sponsor,

2008 Best Places to Work In Pennsylvania

What's Inside this issue of The TotalView:

1.  Social Media Links Youth and Young at Heart

2.  Perfect Labor Storm Warnings

3.  Clues for Leadership

4.  The Emotional Intelligence Pocketbook

5.  Quotes from the Hire Authorities

6.  Video: Types of Assessments

1.  Geeks and Geezers: Social Media Links Youth and Young at Heart

The results of the SPS Geeks and Geezer Survey are in and they fire a shot over the bow of management's ship: if an organization is not using social media in its marketing, recruiting, and retention strategies, they might be working more like shotguns than lasers.

Thanks to readers of this newsletter, partner consulting companies, Twitter, Facebook, and LinkedIn, we ended up with 1902 participants.  The purpose of the survey was to determine how different generations use social media and how education levels and gender might affect usage - and the results are both stunning and predictable.

Organizations will need to understand the generational composition of their workforce and customer markets better than ever if they expect their messages to connect with their targeted audience.

President Obama knew exactly what he was doing when he wouldn't give up his Blackberry. "With well over 80 percent of the age group between 18 and 44 years old texting from the phone, keeping in touch with this constituent was easy and quick. Business leaders should learn from this lesson. Instead of banning texting from the workplace, they should consider ways to leverage it.

It seems that texting and Tweeting isn't the only digital technology dividing the generations. Nearly 9 out of every 10 Gen Ys and 67 percent of Gen Xers admitted to having a Facebook account as compared to less than 43 percent of their parents and grandparents.  If your business is targeting customers or recruits in the 40-ish and younger educated cohort, Facebook seems to be the place to be.

The survey also delivers more bad news for the already battered print newspaper. Over 3 out of 4 Millennials read the newspaper electronically. And no less than 55 percent of all groups acknowledged that they too read the newspaper on a computer or mobile device.

Other survey highlights:

• More than 50% of all respondents have opened accounts on LinkedIn, a business social networking site.
• LinkedIn participation seems to be a site frequented more by 4-year college and higher graduates than high school and technical grads; Facebook enjoys a more universal appeal regardless of education.
• Only eighteen percent of respondents 55 years and older have a Twitter account but more than 25 percent of Gen X and Gen Y college graduates have one.
• Downloading music from the Internet seems to be an activity shared by young and old alike: 62 percent of pre-1945 respondents said yes to downloading music, just slightly less than the 68 percent of the 44 year old and younger crowd.
• YouTube by far had the most universal appeal with 76 percent of all respondents watching videos on this multimedia site.

The results of this survey illuminate intriguing and compelling relationships between technology, generations, and education. Different generations are tuning out old forms of communication and media at different rates but the impact is the same:  Web 2.0 and specifically social media are changing the way people will do business.  The results should put many organizations on high alert when developing their marketing and recruiting strategies for customers and employees.

For a free copy of the summary report, click here to download it free of charge.

2.  Perfect Labor Storm Warnings   

Subscribe to the Perfect Labor Storm 2.0 blog and receive skilled worker shortage updates like this:

The American Welding Society predicts that by 2010,

the demand for skilled welders in the United States alone

will be 200,000.   

Learn more about workforce trends. Purchase the NEW Perfect Labor Storm 2.0 books (soft and hard cover versions) at PerfectLaborStorm.com.

New Perfect Labor Storm videos added. Watch now!

3. Clues for Leadership for as little as $20
 

Leadership Clues is typically used by management as a screening tool for potential managers and leaders. It is the perfect tool to use before promoting hourly employees to team leader and supervisory positions. Its low-cost and ease of administration makes it affordable and efficient to screen an entire organization to identify bench strength and potential managerial skill gaps.

The report shows a "Good", "Ok" or "Poor" fit for each of the individual's traits as compared to general leadership traits.

Learn more about Leadership Clues.

4. The Emotional Intelligence Pocketbook

In The Emotional Intelligence Pocketbook author Margaret Chapman, a coaching psychologist and coach-supervisor, demystifies a complex subject that hitherto has only been covered by academic, heavyweight literature. The book takes readers through each of the five steps to attaining EI and describes how organisations can become emotionally intelligent. 

Buy The Emotional Intelligence Pocketbook today (only $12.50) or take a sneek peak at the 89 other Management Pocketbook topics. 

5. Quotes from Hire Authorities

"Inside every CEO there's a human being trying to climb out. If you can create a condition in which you get business leaders away from the public role, away from all the things that they know
they're expected to say, there is the possibility of real
change."

Mark Goyder, Founder Director of Tomorrow's Company.

6. New Video: Types of Assessments

We've added 3 new educational video presentation to our website. This week's Total View issue features a 6-minute video about the different types of assessments: Attitude, Personality, Cognitive Abilities, and Skills.

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Ira S. Wolfe Copyright 2009 - All Rights Reserved. Reprints and other distribution by permission only.