It's Still Personal

Okay, I admit it, I am a bit of a "machineophile" or maybe in the current era and vernacular a "gadget geek."  I love the apps, the widgets, and the QR stuff.  I have no idea what most of it does, worry to death about which ones come preloaded with a virus and then end up deleting the vast majority about every 6 months to make sure I still have disk space on my PC and cell phone.

Well, yesterday when I needed something to take my mind off of how badly I had done in this week's office football pool I decided it was deletion time again, and it was during that process that I came across a reference to an app that if you believed what they were saying, was supposed to be the job seeker's answer to automated responses and messages that come from many job board postings, which, loosely translated, stop just short of "Dear Occupant."

Apparently, after this certain piece of software is up and running, the applicant can send out an automatic message to any posting on any site it searches for the keywords one sets as the criteria. If true, this would make my list of finalists for the ultimate recruiter's nightmare and the job changer's time-waster of the year award.

I recall when the Internet first showed up on most of our radar screens, many of the industry pundits were forecasting the early demise of the whole executive search industry, and what we could expect before too long was all job openings would be filled as we slept. Okay, a bit of an overstatement to make a point, but that is what it was starting to sound like. Here we are a couple of decades or so later, and for sure the death of the industry was, as Mark Twain said, "greatly exaggerated."

Admittedly, at ExecuNet be it career issues or business issues, we are focused on only one segment of the market (i.e. C-level executives and their direct reports) but by observing and interacting with that segment (as well as the executive search community) on a daily basis, we continue to see more of an emphasis on human judgment and less on robotic matching, and for all its impact on the speed of research and communications, the search community keeps telling us that the time to fill the assignments really hasn't changed all that much, the Internet notwithstanding.

Indeed, in our 19 year old annual survey (Executive Job Market Intelligence Report) we have always asked search consultants about the time it takes to fill positions. With the exception of the height of the '08/'09 recession, when they say it took on average a month longer, the answer has always been between 3 to 4 months.

As I think about this issue, and keep reading about the latest and greatest technological enablers that often literally "pop up" it just keeps reminding me of three things:

1. There is no substitute for quality, and

2. There is no substitute for making qualitative judgments, and

3. As a consumer, no matter what the economic conditions, I am always willing to pay a premium for quality, and so, by the way when it comes to talent, are companies - in any market.

Work Life Balance: The Oxymoron of the 21st Century?

A number of people, both on our staff and off, who have stopped by my office over the years have often remarked about the fact that I seem to have an awful lot of pictures for such a small office. Indeed, they say I have a lot of them even for a big office! I guess I never noticed or thought that it seemed like picture overkill, although now that I look around I guess I see what they mean. I just counted them and there are 25. That's practically enough for a one man show for Pete's sake.

I guess the behavior gurus would say that all the pictures (wife, kids, vacation spots, grandchilden, etc. are supposed to give off vibes as to my "warm and fuzzy" MBTS profile. What they would say about the one with me dressed up in a court jester costume I have no idea. (We dress up at the office on Halloween, but that's another story) I guess they would just think to themselves "I hope he has outpatient psychiatric coverage" and move on.

In any case, when I look at these pictures now, as much as anything else, they serve to remind me that I undoubtedly spend and have spent, far too much of my life in my office focused on the care and feeding of "my job" than physically being with and caring enough about the people and places those pictures represent.

They remind me too of a profile of ExecuNet that was in the NY Times some years ago. One of the labels they pinned on me in that article was "workaholic". Not exactly my proudest moment.

As the old saying goes, you have never seen a tombstone that says "I wish I had spent more time at the office." However, I am of The Organization Man generation but on reflection, even that feels more like an excuse than a chronological factoid. I’ve learned that work and time with family are not mutually exclusive, but the tipping point is difficult to find, and it is different for everyone. 

What many find encouraging is that over the years, our annual Executive Job Market Intelligence Report survey has revealed that more senior level executives are moving toward simplifying their lives. While certainly 9/11 had much to do with this trend starting, it has not gone away either.

While salary remains the biggest motivator, many respondents also report that relocation, personal growth potential, improved work/life balance, and corporate culture were key factors in job acceptance.

It is going to be interesting indeed to see how these trends develop, particularly as technology continues to make it easier for us to work outside our physical office space.

If this combination really flies, there are a lot of us type A's who will probably think they had found the universal solvent. Or will they?

Are you a teleworker, and if so, what are you finding from the experience that you like and/or don't like?

Where's Our Boy Donny Q. When We Need Him?

I need some help! Probably not the best way to start this post as it begs the question of "so tell me something I don't know."

Anyone who knows me would probably say this isn't a question of Dave needing help, we have known him long enough to know that he is well beyond that at this stage!

As true as I know that is, at least at this point, that’s not the kind of help I had in mind.

My need comes from something that has been bothering me for a long time, indeed it was something I had thought about even well before ExecuNet's founding some 23 years ago, but for now, I'll just stick to recent history.

If you follow ExecuNet at all, then you might be aware that around this time every year for the past 19 we have published the results of a survey we do called The Executive Job Market Intelligence Report (EJMIR). 

This year's report is, as they say, coming off the presses as we speak, and if there is any "perk" that comes with being the founder of something it is that you get a "sneak peek" at stuff before it goes public.

So I had my "sneak peek" and there is some really interesting stuff as there always is, and given that we are coming out of a very tough couple of years, the data for 2011 will be gone over with a fine tooth comb for sure, so stay tuned.

I am under penalty of being cut off from my latte lite for a month if I reveal anything before our members get their copies next week, but when I read the report, I felt I could raise this issue since it is something that has been part of EJMIR every year and has bugged me for so long.

So, here's the deal: One of the questions that the survey has posed every year to both the recruiting as well as the HR communities is for them to rank what they feel are the most sought-after executive characteristics.

Each year three things have always topped the list: industry specific experience; functional expertise, and leadership skills, and while there were a number of other things on the list, these three were always way ahead of everything else.

So, when you have 19 straight years of the same result it is kind of hard to argue with the notion that obviously companies think these are pretty important, and if the employers thought these important, then it’s no surprise that the recruiters followed suit. It all seemed to make reasonable sense.

If I was going to hire someone for sure I would want them to be competent in their functional area, understand the industry segment and to have "leadership skills."

But here's what bothers me and where I need someone, as Rachel Maddow says, to "talk me down."

Functional expertise I get, and leadership skills are a whole other ballgame.

My hang up is on industry specific experience. If it is so damn important then why do we keep trying to back fill openings that become vacant because the last incumbent was carried out on his shield with another person who "must have" industry specific experience?

Point being, if this characteristic was so critical to success, then one would think that we should not experience the turnover that we do.

All of which leads me to the feeling that while the survey data show the three characteristics I have mentioned here as being so closely aligned that there is no statistical difference between them - in other words they are essentially equally important in the eyes of the more than 3,100+ who responded - that the real "make or break" characteristic is leadership skills or as many respondents put it this year "...the ability to build and lead high performance teams."

So my convoluted logic says I really don't think that functional expertise or industry specific experience are the "show stoppers" - sure they play a role, but they don't hold the proverbial candle to leadership skills, and I just don't understand how the three can be seen as equally important.

So, if the real deal is around leadership skills, then through the wonders of modern technology we’ve got it made. All we have to do is ID "leadership skills" and we’re golden on the hiring front, right?

With that in mind and as a public service to my fellow travellers on the leadership quest, you’ll be relieved to know the answer lies somewhere in the 37,500,000 hits I got on Bing when I asked for "leadership skills" or to make it less time intensive since we all have other things to do as well, the same ask on Google narrowed things down to only 17,200,000.

Now that we have that "solved" we can move on to the next problem - once we have found the leaders, how do we keep 'em because as this year's EJMIR will show, if this an issue that you think has gone away, there’s a bridge in Brooklyn that's on sale and that you are going to have a hard time passing up!

Houston: My Net Isn't Working

Aside from the frustration experienced by job seekers from what feels like the "black hole" in responding to postings on job boards (and there is enough on that subject to provide fodder for posts for the next year!) the next major pain point often seems to be around the dreaded word for anyone in transition: networking.

Yes, they have read the stats be they from our own Executive Job Market Intelligence Report or a zillion other sources all of which report that at the executive level somewhere between 50% and 80% of the time, networking is what made it happen. Our own experience has been consistently at the 70% level which is one of the reasons we invest so much time and energy to provide our members with the ways and means to expand their personal and professional networks both on and offline.

[And BTW, ExecuNet networking meetings around the country and in Canada are open to anyone, be they a member of ExecuNet or not].

In any case, armed with all this overwhelming data, why is it that I continually hear from people who say to me, "Well, this networking stuff may work for someone else, but it sure as heck isn't working for me."

After talking with such a person for a while, it usually becomes pretty clear pretty fast that they are still on a learning curve when it comes to really understanding what networking is. They are still at the stage where they think that networking is a noun.

In their mind networking is a "thing." They haven't quite gotten the message that really effective networking isn't a program ~ it's a process. Said another way, networking isn't a formula that you plug in and a job falls out at the other end. What is it? Short version: It's a process of building a relationship.

As you might guess when I say that, heads nod in agreement, but when we talk further it becomes clear that the "agreement" is really more about "understanding" the concept on an intellectual level not on a "personal/emotional" level, to which I usually says something like: "This just in, real relationships are personal and are based and built on trust not concepts."

After that, not a lot of time passes before I hear something like: "Okay Einstein, and I do this how"? To which I usually respond by asking some questions like: "How have you built relationships in the past"? "Were these relationships where you weren't worried about getting something"? "Did the relationship start with you trying to help this person"? "Where was your focus - on them or yourself?"

So what I am trying to do here is actually stumble to a point: behavior is driven by attitude.

If you enter a relationship where "getting" comes before "giving" people will sense it and if that is the attitude they continue to see, what you will have, best case, is an acquaintance and probably not one whose face will light up at the mention of your name.

I know this sounds horribly naive, but I can't help it; for good or for ill it seems to be in my DNA. To over simplify, at a macro level, I think there are two types of people running around the planet: givers and takers.

Now for sure, the "takers" get more ink (think too big to fail?) and I don't have stats to prove it, but my life experience suggests that at least when it comes to making a career move, the "givers" make changes a lot faster than the "takers."

Signs of Spring?

For those who read this blog from time to time and are wondering what the heck the "good hands" are doing with a springlike sprout of who knows what growing up through the what's left of my 401(k), the answer is that this is the cover of ExecuNet's 17th annual Executive Job Market Intelligence Report, a copy of which went out to all our members last week.

For those who may not be familiar with how the data is gathered, each year the survey goes to all our CareerSmart members (i.e. executives) as well as our RecruitSmart members (i.e. company HR executives as well as search firms). In addtion, this year we also partnered with several organizations as well: Financial Executives International, Forbes Media, Goldjobs.com, MENG (Marketing Executives Networking Group) and Dillitone Systems Search Consult.

The result was a wealth of data (e.g. more than 4,500 executive responses and 450+ search firm and corporate HR responses)that after more than two months of analysis translated into this year's eighteen page report.

Given the digital shorthand nature of the today's world I suppose one could argue that from an attention span perspective it is 17.5 pages too long, but I sure didn't think so.

Am I proud of it? For sure. Am I biased? Of course, but based on what we have heard from members thus far, they feel it has a lot to say in a time when most of us are anxious to listen.

If you don't happen to be a member of ExecuNet, but would like to check out an Executive Summary, we have one available which you can get by clicking here.