jessica lee writes.

Hey Boyfriend? Can You Help Me Find A New Job?

i received a call and then an email from this guy yesterday. the email read:

Good Afternoon Mrs. Lee,

First off let me start off by saying, I'm by no means a recruiter/HR firm/HR agency. I'm only here to help out my friend with finding a strong and reliable firm and your company is one to be highly recommended.

So on that note, I'm proud to say that <<name removed to protect her from shame, lol>> is not only a perfect candidate but also an asset to you. I've seen her grow strongly with her efforts at <<school name removed to protect them from shame>> and strived to grasp all aspects in the PR industry...

the email went on.

a little confused, i compared his company name against her resume as he sent the email from a work account and referenced who he worked for in his voice mail too... but no clarity on what his relationship was with the gal whose resume he sent. so i did the most logical thing - i emailed him back and simply asked why he was contacting me instead of her contacting me directly. his response? it was his girlfriend whose resume was attached. her email was down, and he was contacting me on her behalf. is this weird to anyone else?

i know times are tough, but for job seekers out there, you have to be your own advocate. i won't accept calls from your mother, brother, father, uncle or significant other. you're an adult and you've got to do this on your own. we all have advisers we seek out and turn to for advice - but they can't do the dirty work for you. what this simple act translated to is me thinking that the job seeker isn't able to act independently and that she lacked resourcefulness. if her internet was down, she should have gone to the library or Kinkos or a friend's house if she wanted to get her resume to me that badly. and sadly, it reinforced negative stereotypes about millennials and their reliance on helicopter parents (or pseudo replacements like a boyfriend.)

the little act of job seeking pity hearkened me back to a piece ran that in the New York Times a few weeks ago on the family that job hunts together. i had to appreciate the story providing a glimpse into what the realities are of the job market - at every generation level... but what it highlighted is that families can commiserate together. they can share strategies - but we didn't see in the article family members becoming each others spokesperson or henchman. mommy or your boyfriend can't come with you to your interview, right? at a certain point, you've gotta do this on your own.

now what i do want to learn from this candidate? how she got her boyfriend to do this for her because how awesome would it be if i could get a guy to pick up my dry cleaning, take out the trash and schedule an appointment for my next haircut, pick up a present for my niece's birthday, schedule and book travel for my next trip, fix my leaking bathroom sink.. i've got a honey-do list sitting around here somewhere...

Could Social Media Save Ford... and Detroit? Maybe...

okay. so i know i write about some random things at times. sometimes it's HR and recruiting heavy. other times it's politics. or family. or my love life... it's all over the place. but that's the beauty of it being my blog. i'm accountable to no one! but what would you think if i started writing about cars? especially when i don't even own a vehicle! i mostly walk, cab or use public transportation!

interestingly, i was reached out to recently to see if i'd be interested in test driving a Ford Fiesta or Escape Hybrid for a few days. i thought it was a joke, or a mistake. but they fully acknowledged in their pitch that they knew i typically write about HR, recruiting and social media topics though... it's just that they are looking for some fresh perspectives and feedback. and in their words, "something a little more engaging and authentic." now those are some buzzwords that actually do resonate with me.

i finally started putting some pieces together on why i was tapped thanks to the blogger Brett Hummel who blogged about Ford trying to court the millennial set. oh, how we love the whole dissection of our millennial/gen y set that we're part of... but here's some more scoop on this initiative from the Wall Street Journal:

"Ford Motor Co... has picked 100 young, Web-savvy drivers to get behind the wheel of its new Ford Fiesta subcompact for six months and post their impressions on sites such as YouTube, Flickr and Twitter... To build a new generation of Ford car buyers, the "Fiesta Movement" marketing effort is enticing its 100 test drivers with a free car for six months, auto insurance and gas. In return, they agree to upload their adventures online... Ford is hoping the participants will serve as "opinion leaders" and generate a grass-roots following. "It was our goal to build a collective of digital storytellers," said Budd Caddell of Undercurrent, a New York-based social media consulting firm working on the Fiesta project."

there's also more on Ford's initiatve via this Wired article. and it looks like another piece of the "Fiesta Movement" is additional outreach to others active in the social media sphere, including random folks like me. and for the sheer marketing innovation i think Ford is employing here... i'm totally game. because as cheesy as this might sound,  given Detroit's woes and how much i fear unions have been a huge part of its decline, Ford doing something as cool and fresh as this? it gives me some hope for the auto-industry in the U.S. yep, i'm willing to go there on this simple little issue. it's smart. totally smart. and as Brett so smartly points out:

"I believe an interesting parallel can be drawn between companies ceding control to consumers in their marketing messages, and employers doing the same with their employees...  What if companies started to relinquish control and empower their workers just as Ford and Toyota are leveraging their customers to increase their brand’s message? There is a chance that it will not work, but can we afford to stick with such a broken and dysfunctional system?"

i'll share something on the blog here once i take one of their cars out for a test drive!

Onboarding Presentation Done. Debriefing + Lessons Learned.

what a sigh of relief. finally... my onboarding presentation at IQPC has come and gone. whew.

here's the thing - i dislike public speaking. i'm good at it. but it's not my thing. and i've never presented or taught for the industry, in front of a group of my peers who do not work in my org or on my team, or for folks senior to me outside of my organization. this was a first for me. and i was nervous because i was in pretty good company - in the line up were some of the senior-most HR folks from companies including Whirlpool, Bank of America, Starbucks, IBM - and then little 'ole me? besides Fistful of Talent (which is how they found me!), i think i have little brand recognition, a modest title... my firm isn't widely known unless you're in PR or you're in DC. i'm working on all of this... but honestly, i was not sure if i would be able to hold my own. yet i did. and i'm pleased.

debriefing and lessons learned:

• i joked that perhaps i would rather teach via a webinar where it's a one way street where i don't have to face the audience. but in reflecting about today, it turns out, i actually do need that immediate feedback. they laughed at my jokes. we laughed at each other. i saw the heads nodding, the smiles on their faces, their furrowed brows. i could see what points hit home with them as i watched them scribble notes. i had them engaged and it built confidence seeing the immediate reaction.
• i spoke from my heart where it made sense. that sound so... cheesy, but i was able to do so since i was speaking about gen y - which i'm technically part of. i used a personal story to kick things off and in starting there, i became comfortable immediately and i think so did the group. it broke down any question of authenticity. i poked fun at myself and it helped to humanize me, and later picking on them helped humanize them too which was perfect - because we were there both learning from one another really.
• i had probably a dozen questions asked of me - and truly, i don't have all the answers. the topic struck a chord with so many in my little audience and i was fortunate to have a handful of gen y folks in the room who piped up quickly and answered questions for me. it turned my presentation into a meaningful dialog at the end. i used the wisdom of the crowds. 35 minutes in, i was no longer the only one speaking and we were having an interactive discussion. we went over by about five minutes because the dialog was so good and it didn't feel right end it just yet.
• interestingly, gen y and millennials still generates a lot of interest among folks. i was surprised (yet not surprised since i chose to spoke on the topic in the first place) to have so many attend my breakout session... but still, generational differences continue to be a mystery for HR pros and managers both. it was great to have some boomers in the crowd though who spoke to what it was like when all the hype was around them entering the workforce - they helped to illustrate that there will always be hype about every new generation... the issue of how to manage a new, large, different workforce isn't completely new.
• in watching others present, too many folks still rely on their presentations + bullet lists. you read to me what i could easily read off the screen. and i ask you - please stop. pretty please. i had a revelation the other night thanks to a slidecast i listened to on McArthur's Rant on the science of presentations and following that... i went through my presentation and stripped down a whole heck of a lot of stuff, consolidated, and below is the final deck. can you follow everything that i discussed? probably not. and of course, that was the point. i wanted you to listen to me ,and i wanted to have a conversation with you. the deck was just back drop.

View more presentations or upload your own.

Why My Expectations Are So High: Helicopter Parents.

presenting is half (or completely) story telling, right? for the onboarding presentation in a few weeks, i'm focusing on strategies with gen y in mind. i have a few stories about situations i've encountered as an HR pro that are about classic gen y's... but i wanted to find a way to get personal. and i think i've nailed it. let me share and test it out with you... and here's the slide for the story:

pictured above, that would be me, circa 3rd grade. i was the featured solo act in this all-school, end of the year assembly. and that honor, well, it was a big deal. a BFD.

look in the background of the picture though and you'll see a girl whose head is cocked to the side. that would be Angela. and if you look closely, she actually looks pissed off, rightfully so because i was singing what was supposed to be her solo. (for what it's worth, it was Bette Midler's The Wind Beneath My Wings... nice, right?)

let me back track and explain. for this assembly, the choir director had us audition for the solo opportunity. one by one, we sang it out, just like on American Idol. Angela was a really good singer - probably the best singer in the choir. and me, i'm an okay singer. Angela was selected for the solo, which she earned, but i still went home crying about it because i had wanted that solo, and frankly, i thought i had sung my heart out at the audition.

before we move forward in the story, let me ask you this: if your child comes home in tears, how do you react? you probably want to kick the ass of whoever made your kid cry, right? so as you can guess, my mother was furious that i hadn't been selected and that i was so upset. after all, she thought i was a great singer with a lot of potential to make it big. like Britney Spears big. so she called the school and she proceeded to yell and scream that i deserved the solo. she ranted and raved that i was a far superior singer, better than any other kid, and that i deserved the solo act. eventually, after a series of phone calls with the choir director, my teacher, the vice principal and finally the principal... the gig was mine.

this is how i grew i up - with a helicopter parent. and this is how many other gen y or millenials grew up. if we wanted something, we would tell our parents and somehow, they would always find a way to make it happen. even if we didn't deserve it, even if we didn't earn it - what we wanted, was ours. end of story. we were handed things, we were told we were the greatest, and the best, and the brightest, and the most talented. (luckily, in my case, my mother was right. see how i turned out?) we were rewarded just for participating, just for showing up. and as you can imagine, as a result of growing up this way, my expectations are high. sky high. and now, years and years later, i'm in your workplace where you have to deal with me, and my expectations which remain high. and when i don't get what i want, i'm going to call my mother, who mother might call you and make you give it to me.

so how do you deal with someone like me, who grew up being handed things that i didn't necessarily earn or deserve but now has high expectations for what i should be given in the workplace? okay, so not every gen y or millennial is like this and i exaggerate a bit about what it was like growing up although this story is 100% true. however this theme of sky-high expectations is definitely real, and one of the most challenging aspects of gen y in the workplace. 

i struggle writing or even presenting on generational differences - truthfully, i'm generationed out. i get sick of all the "experts" on the gen y/millennial set, and i think there is a lot of exaggeration about us... but, when i have managers who continue to struggle managing the expectations of their young staff, and some young staff who are frustrated because they aren't receiving what they need, it's hard to ignore the issue. stay tuned for the next piece of this story, the practical stuff, later this week or next. in the meantime, read this good piece in the economist about managing gen y in this downturn and a take on gen Y and generational differences by Gerry Crispin.

I Hate Presentations. I Hate Training. And I Hate Public Speaking.

i hate giving presentations. i hate training. i hate public speaking. i'm decent at it though. actually, i'm told i'm pretty darn good at it all. i get nervous though. and i panic. and so i prepare and prepare... yet i also know i do best when i'm improvising and under pressure.

this week, i'm working on developing a presentation to give at the IQPC seminar on onboarding. it's not rocket science, the topic... i recognize this... but certainly there are best practices to share and lessons to be learned about how we could be doin' it better. and given the downturn economy, i think now is an excellent time for recruiting and HR pros to re-evaluate their current practices and programs - onboarding is an excellent one to tackle. 

specifically, i thought i'd go the trendy route and talk about onboarding strategies for gen Y. yeah, yeah... a lot of folks are getting generationed-out. there's an awful lot of talk about it. but despite all the talk, i'm not sure everyone is connecting the dots. we all know gen Y is different, but what specifically do you do about it? there's a lot of griping, but i'm not sure there's a lot of translation of the griping on a practical level. i'll share the deck post-conference... but for now, i loved this little presentation by Sacha Chua that i came across when doing research. she pulled together a sketch presentation on web 2.0 at work and it has some good tidbits on using technology in your onboarding. enjoy! i know i did.