Welcome to the August 15, 2007 issue of The Total View

Published by Success Performance Solutions, Written by Ira S. Wolfe

Visit our Human Resources Blog and Perfect Labor Storm Blog where we can post daily (and more often) human resource updates, news, and Perfect Labor Storm facts. 

What's Inside:

1. Six Steps to Successfully Managing Performance  

An effective performance management process sets the foundation for rewarding excellence. Performance management is the link between strategic planning and execution. Establishing a clear line of site between a company's operating objectives and individual employee's goals is critical.

What follows are six steps to managing performance: 

1. Link individual employee work efforts with the organization's mission and objectives. Every employee must understand how his/her job contributes to the organization's success.
2. Focus attention on setting clear performance expectations (results + actions & behaviors). Help every employee know what needs to be done to be successful on the job. 
3. Focus effort through the use of objectives, standards, performance dimensions, and other measures. This helps every department get done what needs to be done and provides a solid rationale for eliminating work that is no longer useful.
4. Define job-mastery and career development goals as part of the process. Make it very clear how the current position supports employee growth and opens up additional opportunities the employee needs to explore. 
5. Promote flexibility through regular check-in discussions, which include status updates, coaching, and feedback, allowing you and the employee to identify problems early and change the course of a project or work assignment.
6. Emphasize that an annual appraisal should simply be a summary of the conversations held between you and the employee during the entire cycle. Shift the focus away from performance as an "annual event" to performance as an on-going process.

An effective performance management process, while requiring time to plan and implement, can save you and the employee time and energy. Most importantly, it can be a very effective motivator, since it can help you and the employee achieve the best possible performance.  

Learn more about Strategic Success Modeling and read more about KeyneLink below.

2. Perfect Labor Storm Indicators

Jobs are changing.

     Workforce growth is slowing.

           Educational attainment levels are lagging.

                Skill gaps are rising. 

The Perfect Labor Storm is imminent.

Where Have All Your Workers Gone?  Learn more about The Perfect Labor Storm: why skilled worker shortages, aging populations, education and skills gaps will change the way all people do business.  

Watch these brief Perfect Labor Storm videos now:  

Where Have All The Workers Gone? Skills Gaps  (6:33)
Where Have All The Workers Gone? Skilled Worker Crisis  (5:19)
Then please forward these links to co-workers, colleagues, bosses, reports, and customers.  Thanks.  

The videos are also available on The Perfect Labor Storm website.  

Comments? Please leave comments on the YouTube.com site or email: comments@perfectlaborstorm.com

3. Employees Beware: Second Life Gets Dress Code  

If you have ever wondered from what planet many employees came when you observe how they dress for work, you'll want to read this!  

You are not alone. Many businesses are wrestling with getting employees to show up for work dressed appropriately - whatever that means these days. Heck, many employers just hope their workers show up at all and put up with droopy drawers, bare midriffs, see-through tops, flip-flops not to mention multiple body piercings and countless tattoos.  

Now IBM, once known for its starched white shirts and wing-tip shoes, has decided appropriate dress has its place - in this world and the next!  Several weeks ago I wrote about Second Life, an online 'world' that is virtually animated to look and act like reality.  In Second Life, the only person you control is an avatar (that people create) through daily interactions with other people from around the world in an online community.  Businesses like IBM have opened shop in Second Life. And yes, you guessed it - avatars representing businesses like IBM have been seen in inappropriate and unprofessional dress.  

In late July IBM issued "etiquette" guidelines for employees visiting Second Life and other online worlds. 

"Avatars," the images that represent Second Life users online, should also have an appropriate appearance for doing business, the guidelines suggest.  

In case you're wondering: Second Life now has over 6 million residents and hundreds of business.  My column in May discussed the first career fair held in Second Life and attended by the likes of Sodhexo, eBay, HP, Microsoft, T-Mobile, and Verizon.

4.  Order your advanced copies of Perfect Labor Storm 2.0 (soft and hard cover versions)- release set for September 2007. 

Read what one reader has said:  

Perfect Labor Storm 2.0  will be one of the most quoted books over the next decades. Ira did his homework on this one. Anyone who depends on having a strong workforce for the next twenty years better heed his warnings and prepare accordingly.

Bobby Foster
The Organizer Plus Co., LLC

Save 25% off retail by ordering now.

Hard Cover: $29.99         Soft Cover: $19.99  

Read the pre-publication reviews:  

Below you will find just a sampling of the trends, stats, and facts that will change the way you do business.

If you took every single job in the U.S. today and shipped it to China . . .       

                                                                                                       .......China would still have a labor surplus.  

China's Generation Y accounts for nearly one-sixth of the Chinese population, equivalent to two-thirds of the entire U.S. population.   

By 2025 more than 75% of the workforce in India will be from Generation Y and younger generations.  

In the United States, Gen Y and younger will make up just less than 60%.

Trends and stats like this are just an inkling of the information you'll find in the revised, updated and expanded Perfect Labor Storm 2.0, including several chapters about managing generational clashes.  

Keep reading future issues of this newsletter for more announcements about the book release and updated Perfect Storm Indicators.  

Perfect Labor Storm e-book published earlier this year is still available.

You can order a download copy of PLS, a great value at $9.95. 

5. A Solution to "I hate performance reviews":

Introducing KeyneLinktm Performance Management System

KeyneLink is a revolutionary performance management system that links your organization's vision, values and operating objectives with the daily activities of your people.   

KeyneLink is part process, part software, part roadmap, and all about successful performance.  

KeyneLink motivates your employees to align with your organization's operating objectives, achieving results and heading off performance problems before they become problems or distractions.  

For more information visit KeyneLink Performance Management System or call 800.803.4303 to schedule a web meeting demo.

6. CriteriaOne Certification Workshop: October 31-November 2, 2007

Learn to build a competency-based selection and performance management system to align employees with the right skills to meet the competitive demands of your business.

"Light years ahead of the competition" says one CriteriaOne participant.

"A must for anyone interested in lowering turnover and improving productivity," says another.

Don't miss the only certification workshop in 2007.

More about CriteriaOne Certification, the whole person approach to selecting and managing employees

7. Quotes from Hire Authorities

"For the past 25 years, we have optimized our organizations for efficiency and quality.  Over the next quarter century, we must optimize our entire society for innovation."

National Innovation Initiative, Council on Competitiveness, Final Report, Executive Summary (December 2004).

Permission is granted to consultants, managers, business owners and HR professionals to reproduce content from this newsletter for your internal publications, or to distribute copies to your workforce, on the condition that you reproduce the credits and contact information as follows: "Reprinted with permission from Ira S Wolfe and Success Performance Solutions. Copyright 2007 Ira S Wolfe." We also hope you will forward the newsletter in its entirety and recommend to others that they subscribe.

Ira S. Wolfe Copyright 2007 - All Rights Reserved. Reprints and other distribution by permission