In This edition

1. From "Professional Business Partner" To "Strategic Talent Leader": "What's Next" for Human Resource Management?
2. The Cry for Competence
3. Making Inclusion A way Of Life
4. Flexibility Key To Retaining Women
5. Across The Board: Official Newsletter Of The SA Board For Personnel Practice
6. Case Law & Legislation Review: Fixed Term Contracts Reasonable Expectation
7. Downloads: Human Capital - A self-Assessment For Agency Heads
8. Book Reviews
9. Web Reviews: Corporateblogging
10. Unsubscribe & Moving Soon

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Jeff Sacht: Publisher-editor

www.equityskillsweb.com
jeffs@worldonline.co.za
'A MUST TO PRINT & READ'
30,000+ AND STILL GROWING!

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Star Human Resources Development Africa 2005

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Visit us at Stand C23. To receive your free access to the show, complete our online Visitor form and stand a chance to win a free copy of our latest product:- Workinfo.com Job Description Compiler. http://www.workinfo.com/software/visitor.htm 

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1. From "Professional Business Partner" To "Strategic Talent Leader": "What's Next" for Human Resource Management?

By John W. Boudreau, Pete M. Ramstad, Working Paper 02 - 10, CAHRS,

Cornell Schoool Of Industial & Labour Reations, 2002

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People, intellectual capital and talent are ever more critical to organizational strategic success. This observation is so common today, that it almost goes without saying. It appears

as the first slide in virtually every conference presentation on strategic HR, and is the first slide in most of the HR strategy documents in organizations. Digitization, labor shortages, growth through acquisitions, simultaneous downsizing and expansion, workforce demographic changes, and globalization are just a few of the trends that have made talent a top priority. A

deluge of articles, consulting products, future vision statements, and HR strategic planning documents attest to this.

Talent's critical role now transcends the HR profession. Our conversations with CEO's CFO's and other senior executives in leadership roles reveal this change vividly. In the past,

they may have patiently tolerated discussions about HR and talent, and offered their opinions about HR programs, but many did not see talent issues as their personal responsibility. While

the importance of people within organizations was at times acknowledged, it was not clear how many leaders really believed that talent had a tangible connection to business performance, share price or shareholder value.

Today, these executives are quick to point out that managing talent well is not only their personal concern, it is perhaps the most difficult issue preventing their organization's maximum success. Recognizing the pivotal role of talent, organization leaders are increasingly frustrated with traditional HR, even when it is executed well, even in the face of measurements that document best-in-class HR programs. One CFO (now the CEO of his organization) put it well, when he said to us, "I value the hard work of HR, but I worry that our organization may not know which talent issues are the important ones, versus which are mostly tactical. I know how toanswer that question in finance, marketing and operations. I'm not sure how to do it for talent. I wish HR had more to offer here."

In our work with business leaders and corporate strategists, key clients for HR, we encourage them to seamlessly connect their talent to their fundamental strategic decisions and goals. As they strive to do that, their frustration with the current state of traditional HR, and their hopes for something more, are reflected in questions like these:

• "Why is there so little logical connection between our core business management processes and talent? We have well-developed strategic planning, marketing, operations and budgeting processes that connect deeply and logically with our understanding of how to create competitive success and shareholder value. Yet, at best these core processes reflect only general talent goals like headcount, labor costs or generic HR programs. At worst, people issues don't even appear except as a headcount budget at the end of the plan."

• "We invest heavily in the latest HR measurement techniques- HR scorecards, HR financial reports, ROI on HR programs, and studies of how HR programs enhance attitudes, skills and abilities. Yet, these HR measures seldom drive key business decisions, such as acquisitions and entry into new markets. Moreover, our investors can't rely on these measures to show them the competitive value of our talent. Can talent measures truly drive business decisions and investments?"

• It's a basic principle of business that all investments have a different impact across divisions, markets, countries, or situations. Marketing would never get away with a strategy to "provide 40 hours of advertising for every product." Yet, our HR programs such as "40 hours of quality training" or "20-70-10 performance assessment" are usually applied to everyone. Shouldn't we be able to deploy our HR investments with greater precision and distinction, to have more effectiveness and less wasted effort?"

"HR spends a lot of time with our top leaders, describing the value of HR initiatives or the value of the HR function. Finance, Marketing and Operations spend very little time on their initiatives or their function. They focus on how strategic success

is accomplished through financial, customer and production resources, and on helping our leaders make better decisions about those resources. Their internal activities and

functional value are judged through their results. Why is HR different?" We also work with HR leaders in these same organizations, as they strive to link talent with strategy. As they strive to make the link, it is interesting to hear their own frustrations and

hopes, expressed in observations such as:

• "The strategic mandates for the organization are clear, and we use the best processes we know to connect to them. Yet, our HR strategy discussions typically focus on: (1) What HR programs will we offer; (2) Should HR be centralized or decentralized; (3) What IT and other infrastructure is needed to make it all work; and (4) Why it is to hard to justify the investment? What is missing in our the connection to the big-picture issues?"

• "HR professionals are personally well-respected, yet as a whole our HR profession lacks the respect, credibility and impact of other core professions like finance, marketing and operations. Why is respect for HR as a whole less than the respect for HR individual contributors?"

• "We always have a few HR professionals that are trusted business contributors - respected and effective in their perspective on how talent connects to strategic success. Yet, finance, marketing, and engineering routinely produce this kind of leader. In HR, they are a precious few, and each has their own unique approach. Why can't we more reliably create this kind of leadership excellence across our entire

group of HR professionals?"

Often a lack of powerful measures is blamed - HR cannot articulate its perspective with as much precision as finance, marketing or engineering. Other management professions have

better "facts and figures." Organizations often address this by building HR measurement systems "that show the value of what we do" or "apply scorecards or six-sigma initiatives to the

HR processes". Yet, a recent survey by the Corporate Leadership Council (2001) suggests that the top two most important goals for HR measurement are to enhance decisions about human

capital and to connect human resources to strategy. The same survey, however, found that these goals are only very rarely met, and that most HR measurement systems are good at

measuring the things that are perceived as least strategically valuable.

HR measurement cannot solve the problem alone, because today's measurement systems typically adapt measures designed for other resources and apply them to HR. For example, six-sigma initiatives often apply accounting-based cost-efficiency or operational measures that may miss the true impact of HR decisions. At best, the result is less costly and quicker HR processes, but not necessarily better talent. At worst, a six-sigma process focused on the wrong measures results in more efficiency (which is measured) and a reduction in the quality of talent (which is often unmeasured). The same pattern emerges if the measurement logic of finance, marketing or operations is applied indiscriminately to HR. Examples include "HR accounting," "HR quality," "HR branding," "HR balanced scorecards," etc. These can be useful systems if applied properly, but they often fail to address the symptoms described above.

To address these issues, many HR functions benchmark themselves against other "best in class" HR functions. We propose that the clues to the future lie much closer to home - within their own organizations. The key lessons can be found by more carefully considering some of the most powerful and respected business disciplines - such as Marketing and Finance. The development and logic of these disciplines provides a blueprint for what's next for HR, because these disciplines evolved from where HR is

today.

Download a copy of the full text of this document at: http://www.ilr.cornell.edu/depts/cahrs/downloads/pdfs/workingpapers/WP02-10.pdf

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IN-COMPANY WORKSHOP: MANAGING CHANGE & TRANSITION IN THE NEW WORLD OF WORK

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An Intensive and Practical 2- DAY WORKSHOP FOR HUMAN RESOURCES AND LINE MANAGERS TO DEVELOP THE CONFIDENCE AND COMPETENCE TO PLAN FOR AND LEAD TEAMS THROUGH CHANGE & TRANSITION. Enhance your ability to plan for and lead a team through the transitions triggered by a continuously changing world of work.

Contact Jeff Sacht to request a workshop flyer and to arrange an in-company workshop customised to your requirements. Facilitation is charged on a realistic daily rate and not a per person cost.

Also available as a web download for self-delivery/in-house use under license agreement. Contact jeffs@worldonline.co.za

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2. The Cry for Competence*

By Ken Keis who can be contacted at http://www.crgleader.com/ 

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Do we really have a crisis in terms of individuals' competence in their various fields of endeavor? Yes, Yes, and Yes!

Competent: Capable, fit, qualified, able

For the book Credibility, Jim Kouzes and Barry Posner researched the character traits of the most credible individuals. After honesty, competence was found to be the second-most-important characteristic an individual needs to have credibility with others.

I write this e-zine about events happening now. The theme of this issue is frustration with incompetence. To write it, I had to calm down.

Have you worked for or beside someone who did not know what he or she was doing? Have you been served by a vendor or supplier who was clueless? How did you feel? What kind of emotions did those situations evoke? Irritation, frustration, even resentment and anger?

My question to you is this: Do you believe that we as a society have created this chronic cond ition called incompetence? I do!

One contributing factor over the past century is that many institutional organizations have been created to protect individuals and groups of people, such as professional associations, unions, and other bodies. They were first formed to protect the rights and limit abuse of individuals from others, including management and other officials. Many of these group have, however, grown to protect and embrace the incompetent.

Before anyone screams foul, I was once a member of the largest union in the country and experienced firsthand the protection of the incompetent.

My wife, a teacher for the past 20 years, has watched in horror as incompetent teachers were protected in their jobs and children's education was being blatantly compromised. But nothing could be done about them unless the incompetent teachers acted in a criminal manner.

We've witnessed many professional associations protecting their own doctors, dentists, police, lawyers, accountants, engineers, managers, professors, bureaucrats, political representatives, religious officials, and many others.

What is the origin of the shallow and false pretense that it is okay to have incompetent individuals on board and that it's okay to protect them?

This stance is not limited to the business world; it is prevalent in non-profit organizations, too. I am a new board member at the private school our children attend. The school has experienced some difficult times for one main reason: incompetent staff members were protected and permitted to continue their poor management of the school. Thus the school suffered from both staff incompetence and incompetent leadership because the leaders did not address the issues.

I know of another non-profit group completely in denial about the competence of their senior leader and they keep supporting him. This organization is slowly eroding and becoming a shadow o f its former self. All because of incompetence.

In the book Good to Great, Jim Collins' team documents the activities of the most successful companies and organizations. One of the top items on the list is that these companies work with only the best (competent) individuals. Not only that, these companies are brutally honest about the abilities of the individuals and the capabilities of their team. They release people who are not competent.

Before you say that is heartless, there is absolutely no value in putting our heads in the sand. In protecting incompetent individuals, companies are doing a disservice-not only to the group or individuals they serve, but to the incompetent individuals themselves.

An incompetent person will ultimately fail. People working with incompetents feel frustration and lowered levels of fulfillment and passion. The productivity of the entire team working around the incompetent will suffer. Never underestimate the impact incompetent individuals have in reducing the efforts of everyone around them. It's time we called a spade a spade and became courageously authentic . . . and stopped protecting individuals and organizations from their own incompetence. We should start expecting more?not only from others but from and for ourselves.

I am sharing my intensity and passion for this cause because I have learned the hard way about the enormous cost of not demanding and expecting competence. Over the past three years, CRG has hired and contracted so-called experts to help us with various projects. And we have been sorely disappointed by their results.

The cost of working with incompetent individuals is far more than the direct investment. Competent team members, frustrated by the incompetent members, will leave you, so you have a double loss. And there is the emotional toll and physical illness brought on by stress.

What about you? What would others say about you? Are you competent or incompetent? Are you competent in the roles and responsib ilities you currently fulfill? If you are not fully competent, what are you doing to ensure that you become competent? What is your level of credibility with yourself and others in this area?

What to do?

First, if you don't expect competence in yourself and in others, you are doing a disservice to all people involved.

Make a personal commitment to move toward competence in your chosen field or interest. No one simply "gets" fully competent. Competence requires a commitment to continual improvement. If you cannot be competent, do everybody a favor and find an area where you can excel. If you want to stay where you are, mentor under someone to increase your competence.

Make no false claims about your ability of level of experience. For example, I am talking about individuals who claim to be marketing experts and have never successfully marketed anything in their lives. And those who feel they have leadership skills, yet their organization cont inues to flounder. And those who constantly fail to achieve success or results, yet think they are doing just fine.

# STOP protecting the incompetent.

# START being courageously authentic.

# There is no redeeming value to your passively permitting someone to fail or have poor credibility with others. If you do, you have shown your own incompetence. That may hurt but I say it because I have been guilty of the sin of omission, too. In the past, when I have not followed the above advice, I have paid dearly.

I simply want you to avoid or decrease those experiences. Don't be mislead into protecting the incompetent by those who would have you be loyal to false pretense and lack of integrity.

Competence has a price and a reward. When you have a competent provider/team member, do whatever you can to keep him or her. Those individuals are rare gems.

When you are working with or being served by someone completely competent, how do you feel? Your reactions could include confidence, calmness, certainty, and feeling productive and positive.

Make it a priority to surround yourself as best you can with competent individuals and organizations. And when you find them, do what you can to stay connected to or served by them.

To help you on this journey of competence and establish your level of le adership competency, complete CRG's Leadership Skills Inventory-Self. If you want to know how others' perceive you, ask a few people who know you well to complete the Leaderships Skills Inventory-Others on you.

It is more challenging to achieve competency if you are not passionate and on purpose with what you are doing. Why? Your motivation will wane. To confirm that you are on purpose, go through the Source Experience Journal.

Competence is a reasonable expectation; incompetence is not. Become competent. Insist on competency from others and, when you find it, embrace and honor it.

ACTION STEPS

1. Commit to being competent in your chosen field or in your responsibilities.

2. Complete the Leadership Skills Inventory-Self and the Source Experience Journal to confirm that your skills and passions are aligned and that you are competent in your life.

3. Ask others to share their perceptions of your competency and credibility levels. If the levels are not high enough or if they could be improved, ask them what you could do to increase your levels.

4. Expect competence in others, both team members and service providers.

5. Be courageously authentic about the competence of the others who are serving you.

6. Stop protecting others and their incompetence. By doing so, you have revealed your own

incompetence as a leader.

7. Never underestimate how much money and time that incompetent individuals/organizations are costing you. The total is way more than most people think.

8. Failure and mistakes are different than incompetence. Competence is about ongoing excellence and the ability to perform well most of the time with most tasks.

9. Make a commitment to surround yourself with competent individuals and organizations.

10. Do what it takes to keep competent players around you. They are in high demand because there is such a shortage.

11. When you are working with competent individuals, pay attention to the emotional release and confidence you feel vs. working with people who are incompetent.

12. When you are acknowledged and seen as competent, enjoy the ride. After all, competence is in demand and that means you!

For information on CRG Assessments, please visit http://www.crgleader.com/ 

* Reprinted by permission of the author

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IN-COMPANY WORKSHOP: MANAGING FOR DIVERSITY

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An Intensive and Practical 2- DAY MANAGEMENT/ SUPERVISOR WORKSHOP to develop insight and self-knowledge about intercultural competence and enhance your capacity to work with a diverse workforce.

Contact Jeff Sacht to request a workshop flyer and to arrange an in-company workshop customised to your requirements. Facilitation is charged on a realistic daily rate and not a per person cost.

Also available as a web download for self-delivery/in-house use under license agreement. Contact jeffs@worldonline.co.za

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3. Making Inclusion A way Of Life*

By Judith H. Katz & Frederick A. Miller who can be contacted at http://www.kjcg.com/ 

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As organizations shift from the industrial revolution model of mass production to the global model of innovation and customization, people's roles are undergoing a revolution as well. No longer unthinking automatons of the assembly line, no longer replaceable cogs, people are today's sole source of tomorrow's most important commodity: intellectual capital. Although many organizations talk about regarding people as assets and the need to tap into their knowledge and expertise, few know how to do it. Even among the most well-intentioned, few organizations create an environment where people feel a sense of belonging and are able to do their best work.

For an organization to be a Top Tier performer, it needs to include all of its people in the work of creating new pathways to operational and financial success. For greater competitiveness and sustainable success, an organization needs every member's skills, ideas, experiences, energy, and best performance.

As the survival and success of organizations becomes more dependent on how well their people work-and work together-one thing has become clear: Leveraging Diversity and Creating a Culture of Inclusion is a critical part of the answer.

The Task: Creating and Sustaining an Inclusive Work Culture

In many organizations, efforts have been made to increase the representation of people of color, women and other groups in the workforce. However, increasing the representation of any population is insufficient for real gains in organizational performance. The issue is not having diversity (of backgrounds, experiences, and perspectives) but creating an environment in which those differences and our similarities are utilized and leveraged to yield higher performance. For most organizations, this requires a major shift in the way they operate and do business.

Diversity exists in virtually every workforce. Differences, however, are rarely regarded or used as an asset. In most organizations, few people feel welcome or able to contribute their full range of skills, experiences, ideas and opinions. They are expected to think, act and express themselves in conformance with a fairly narrow range of behaviors. Few organizations devote much effort to the task of enabling new people to feel included in the life of the organization. Consequentially, few people fully invest their primary or discretionary energy to the organization.

Culture Change as a Business Strategy

Changing an organization's work culture is not something that can be accomplished through a new mission statement, employee handbook, recruitment policy, or mentoring program. It cannot be done overnight, with a one-day workshop or training program.

Creating an inclusive work culture that leverages diversity requires systemic change. It requires a clear organizational imperative and platform for change; a fundamental shift in mindsets and behaviors followed by changes in policies and practices. It must be tied to organizational goals and direction; and establish a new set of competencies and capabilities required of people at all levels, including clear skill sets and behaviors for leaders, managers and front line workers. It requires new ways of defining and measuring success. It requires new ways of thinking about and working with people, both individually and collectively, inside and outside the organization. In short, it requires Total System Change.

Unfortunately, most efforts to leverage diversity and create a culture of inclusion take a programmatic approach with little direct linkage to organizational performance and direction. Often the effort is the responsibility of Human Resources and not owned by line managers and operations.

Unless the people of the organization have a clear understanding of the connection of the culture change to the business of the organization, they have little reason to expend energy in making the culture change work. Culture Change sounds suspiciously like one of those "soft" issues that are not seen as essential to the real business of the organization. Therefore, the need for culture change must be presented in "hard" terms-of dollars and cents, the bottom line, and fulfilling the organization's mission and key business strategies-as the difference between profit or loss, success or failure, survival or extinction.

Starting at the Top

For a change effort to have any chance of success, it must be "owned" by all levels of the organization. However, a crucial area of focus is always the senior-most leaders - and assuring that they truly understand and can articulate how this work is fundamental to organizational performance and success. Senior leaders must be accountable for the successful implementation of culture change. This is not something that can be delegated to middle managers. Senior leaders must play an active role in the change process. To create an inclusive work environment that leverages diversity will take time, energy, resources, and involvement of everyone, and senior leaders must lead the way.

Making Inclusion THE Way of Doing Business

Organizations that embark on efforts to create an inclusive work culture that leverages diversity seem to follow a natural progression in their strategies and activities to get to that point. Since different parts of organizations may be in different places with regard to attitudes, policies and leadership styles, there can often be overlapping or intermingling of the stages we have identified below. To achieve breakthrough performance from creating an inclusive work culture, it is necessary to develop the leadership and management skills to foster inclusion, educate the people of the organization in how to behave inclusively; and create a broad awareness of the business imperative for creating an inclusive work culture. Often, it is necessary to go through the initial stages shown in the diagram below in order to achieve an awareness of the real benefits to be gained from leveraging diversity and creating a culture of inclusion-and the extent of the work required to get there.

Developing Individual Awareness.

Many organizations begin their efforts to address diversity and inclusion by implementing activities that are pre-packaged "one-size-fits-all" training exercises that relate primarily to enhancing understanding and awareness of differences among people. The primary goal of these activities is to help individuals interact better with other individuals. There is usually little focus on changing the organizational systems or business practices, although that may be an unintended outcome from a forward-thinking leader who attends such an event.

Implementing Programs and Activities.

In many organizations, the initial work on raising awareness about diversity leads to an acknowledgement that more work is needed. This often occurs because overall awareness about "diversity issues" has been raised, and people begin noticing and talking about the inequitable experiences of different groups. Organizations may institute a number of different programs such as mentoring, support networks, high-potential career-path development, targeted recruiting, and/or communication skills enhancement to address issues raised.

The programmatic approach is an important but insufficient step; activities and programs are often fragmented. At times, different parts of the organization hold responsibility for different programs without much linkage or coordination (HR, Talent Management, Diversity Councils, Network Groups, Supplier Diversity, etc). Some organizations create their programs and activities based on prepackaged programs from different vendors or from benchmarking studies, each focusing on a specific diversity issue. Even if programs are coordinated through the same department, they remain loosely related at best and rarely linked directly to overall organization strategy and performance.

Many organizations experience a "backlash" at this stage, with some people making charges of "reverse discrimination." Such charges are one of the clearest indicators that the organizations have not effectively positioned the change effort as critical to organizational success and long-term sustainability.

Combining Programs and Activities into an "Initiative." When an organization realizes that leveraging diversity is more than understanding differences and increasing representation, it begins to make a fundamental shift in its approach. Efforts that had previously been fragmented and programmatic, suddenly become important business and organizational priorities. The organization begins to pursue them with a strategic intent. The various parts of the effort are evaluated, and those activities that fit within the strategic intent are knit together into a "Culture Change Initiative."

The investment in this initiative is justified by an understanding that the organization must change as a system on a systemic level. The focus moves from the needs of individuals to the needs of the system, and in identifying new competencies for a new culture and workplace.

Linking and Aligning Initiatives into the Strategic Work of the Organization. For the greatest effectiveness in changing people's mindset, behaviors and enhancing business outcomes, an organization must integrate the culture change effort into the strategic work and goals of the organization. This involves integrating the competencies and practices of building inclusion into the organization's other major strategies and initiatives, e.g., leadership, quality, mergers/acquisitions, strategic alliances, downsizing, re-engineering, and/or becoming a preferred stock.

A Way of Doing Business.

As an organization unleashes the synergy gained from integrating its culture change effort with its business practices and strategic goals, the result is measurable benefits through new or improved processes and outcomes. Institutionalizing the change involves using these and other measurements to hold senior executives, managers, and all members of the organization accountable for acquiring, practicing, and continually improving their performance, and thereby continually enhancing the organization's skill-base, culture, overall performance, and financial and business success.

The Bottom-Line: The Best Reason For Creating a Culture of Inclusion

Organizations that have made long-term commitments to building and sustaining inclusive workplaces and work cultures that leverage diversity have seen substantive, measurable, positive change, such as increased productivity, successful penetration into new markets, improved customer service, reduced employee turnover, and increased market share. They have also reported new levels of engagement, creativity, commitment, and improved job satisfaction from people at all levels of the organization-from line workers to the CEO.

Although a comprehensive change effort requires a major investment in time and resources, there are many actions to create an inclusive environment that do not cost anything. You can start first thing tomorrow morning by greeting every colleague you see, and calling them by name. It all starts with Hello.

*Reprinted by permission of Linkage Inc. Originally published in the May 2005 Issue of Link & Learn.

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4. Flexibility Key To Retaining Women*

By Sylvia Ann Hewlett and Carolyn Buck Luce who can be contacted at

http://hbswk.hbs.edu/ 

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In the workplace, employers need to take into account women who take a temporary "off-ramp" from their careers. Here is how to keep them connected to your company.

Employers can no longer pretend that treating women as "men in skirts" will fix their retention problems. Like it or not, large numbers of highly qualified, committed women need to take time out. The trick is to help them maintain connections that will allow them to come back from that time without being marginalized for the rest of their careers. [...]

Provide flexibility in the day. Some women don't require reduced work hours; they merely need flexibility in when, where, and how they do their work. Even parents who employ nannies or have children in day care, for example, must make time for teacher conferences, medical appointments, volunteering, child-related errands-not to mention the days the nanny calls in sick or the day care center is closed. Someone caring for an invalid or a fragile elderly person may likewise have many hours of potentially productive time in a day yet not be able to stray far from home.

For these and other reasons, almost two-thirds (64 percent) of the women we surveyed cite flexible work arrangements as being either extremely or very important to them. In fact, by a considerable margin, highly qualified women find flexibility more important than compensation; only 42 percent say that "earning a lot of money" is an important motivator. In our focus groups, we heard women use terms like "nirvana" and "the golden ring" to describe employment arrangements that allow them to flex their workdays, their workweeks, and their careers. [...]

Provide flexibility in the arc of a career. Booz Allen Hamilton, the management and technology consulting firm, recognized that it isn't simply a workday, or a workweek, that needs to be made more flexible. It's the entire arc of a career.

Management consulting as a profession loses twice as many women as men in the middle reaches of career ladders. A big part of the problem is that, perhaps more than in any other business sector, it is driven by an up-or-out ethos; client-serving professionals must progress steadily or fall by the wayside. The strongest contenders make partner through a relentless winnowing process. While many firms take care to make the separations as painless as possible (the chaff, after all, tends to land in organizations that might employ their services), there are clear limits to their patience. Typically, if a valued professional is unable to keep pace with the road warrior lifestyle, the best she can hope for is reassignment to a staff job.

Employers can no longer pretend that treating women as "men in skirts" will fix their retention problems. Over the past year, Booz Allen has initiated a "ramp up, ramp down" flexible program to allow professionals to balance work and life and still do the client work they find most interesting. The key to the program is Booz Allen's effort to "unbundle" standard consulting projects and identify chunks that can be done by telecommuting or shorts stints in the office. Participating professionals are either regular employees or alumni that sign standard employment contracts and are activated as needed. For the professional, it's a way to take on a manageable amount of the kind of work they do best. For Booz Allen, it's a way to maintain ties to consultants who have already proved their merit in a challenging profession. Since many of these talented women will eventually return to full-time consulting employment, Booz Allen wants to be their employer of choice-and to keep their skills sharp in the meantime. [...]

Remove the stigma.

Making flexible arrangements succeed over the long term is hard work. It means crafting an imaginative set of policies, but even more important, it means eliminating the stigma that is often attached to such nonstandard work arrangements. As many as 35 percent of the women we surveyed report various aspects of their organizations' cultures that effectively penalize people who take advantage of work-life policies. Telecommuting appears to be most stigmatized, with 39 percent of women reporting some form of tacit resistance to it, followed by job sharing and part-time work. Of flexible work arrangements in general, 21 percent report that "there is an unspoken rule at my workplace that people who use these options will not be promoted." Parental leave policies get more respect-though even here, 19 percent of women report cultural or attitudinal barriers to taking the time off that they are entitled to. In environments where flexible work arrangements are tacitly deemed illegitimate, many women would rather resign than request them.

Interestingly, when it comes to taking advantage of work-life policies, men encounter even more stigma. For example, 48 percent of the men we surveyed perceived job sharing as illegitimate in their workplace culture-even when it's part of official policy.

Transformation of the corporate culture seems to be a prerequisite for success on the work-life front. Those people at or near the top of an organization need to have that "eureka" moment, when they not only understand the business imperative for imaginative work-life policies but are prepared to embrace them, and in so doing remove the stigma. [...]

Stop burning bridges.

One particularly dramatic finding of our survey deserves special mention: Only 5 percent of highly qualified women looking for on-ramps are interested in rejoining the companies they left. In business sectors, that percentage is zero. If ever there was a danger signal for corporations, this is it.

The finding implies that the vast majority of off-ramped women, at the moment they left their careers, felt ill-used-or at least underutilized and unappreciated-by their employers. We can only speculate as to why this was. In some cases, perhaps, the situation ended badly; a woman, attempting impossible juggling feats, started dropping balls. Or an employer, embittered by the loss of too many "star" women, lets this one go much too easily.

It's understandable for managers to assume that women leave mainly for "pull" reasons and that there's no point in trying to keep them. Indeed, when family overload and the traditional division of labor place unmanageable demands on a working woman, it does appear that quitting has much more to do with what's going on at home than what's going on at work. However, it is important to realize that even when pull factors seem to be dominant, push factors are also in play. Most off-ramping decisions are conditioned by policies, practices, and attitudes at work. Recognition, flexibility, and the opportunity to telecommute-especially when endorsed by the corporate culture-can make a huge difference.

The point is, managers will not stay in a departing employee's good graces unless they take the time to explore the reasons for off-ramping and are able and willing to offer options short of total severance. If a company wants future access to this talent, it will need to go beyond the perfunctory exit interview and, at the very least, impart the message that the door is open. Better still, it will maintain a connection with off-ramped employees through a formal alumni program.

Provide outlets for altruism.

Imaginative attachment policies notwithstanding, some women have no interest in returning to their old organizations because their desire to work in their former field has waned. Our data suggest that fully 52 percent of women with MBAs in the business sector cite the fact that they do not find their careers "either satisfying or enjoyable" as an important reason for why they left work. Perhaps not surprisingly, then, a majority (54 percent) of the women looking for on-ramps want to change their profession or field. And in most of those cases, it's a woman who formerly worked in the corporate sphere hoping to move into the not-for-profit sector.

Employers would be well advised to recognize and harness the altruism of these women. Supporting female professionals in their advocacy and public service efforts serves to win their energy and loyalty. Companies may also be able to redirect women's desire to give back to the community by asking them to become involved in mentoring and formal women's networks within the company.

Nurture ambition.

Finally, if women are to sustain their passion for work and their competitive edge-whether or not they take formal time out-they must keep ambition alive. Our findings point to an urgent need to implement mentoring and networking programs that help women expand and sustain their professional aspirations. Companies like American Express, GE, Goldman Sachs, Johnson & Johnson, Lehman Brothers, and Time Warner are developing "old girls networks" that build skills, contacts, and confidence. They link women to inside power brokers and to outside business players and effectively inculcate those precious rainmaking skills.

Networks (with fund-raising and friend-raising functions) can enhance client connections. But they also play another, critical role. They provide the infrastructure within which women can earn recognition, as well as a safe platform from which to blow one's own horn without being perceived as too pushy.

*Reprinted under license agreement with Working Knowledge an online publication of Harvard Business School. Article Originally published in Working Knowledge May 16 2005 edition.

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IN-COMPANY WORKSHOP: EMPLOYMENT EQUITY COMMITTEE TRAINING

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An Intensive 2-Day In-Company programme For ELECTED EMPLOYMENT EQUITY (EE) MEMBERS & CHAIRPERSON To Competently & Confidently Represent Co-Workers.

Contact Jeff Sacht to request a workshop flyer and to arrange an in-company workshop customised to your requirements. Facilitation is charged on a realistic daily rate and not a per person cost.

Also available as a web download for self-delivery/in-house use under license agreement. Contact jeffs@worldonline.co.za

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5. Across The Board: Official Newsletter Of The SA Borad For Personnel Practice

By Huma van Rensburg who can be contacted on sabpp@mweb.co.za 

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# Comments and questions around the proposed HR Bill

The Board has received excellent and constructive inputs from bodies such as the CHE, the Competition Commission, government departments, various academics and also comments from individuals. Some of the main issues emerging are:

>> Compulsory / voluntary registration

The wording in the proposed Bill around the compulsory registration of all HR practitioners and related specialist professions will have to be re-written for the sake of clarity. This compulsory registration will be free of charge and for the purposes of keeping a national Roll of HR people in order to come to grips with the extent of HR practice in the country. Professional registration will remain voluntary and will be regulated by the proposed private Bill or Act. To understand this better, an analogy could be made with the accounting profession - a bookkeeper or an accountant need not register, but in order to be a Chartered Accountant CA(SA), the qualifying criteria must be met for professional registration and a Code of Conduct is enforced (their process also being governed by a private Bill).

>> Specialist HR professions

The related HR specialist professions are currently covered by the proposed Bill as it is not feasible to set up separate Bills for each HR specialist profession (ER, EAP, OD, ETD, HR IT etc). There could be different models of coping with this.

It would be possible for instance for the member body of Employment Relations (IRASA) to set criteria as well as keep current their own criteria (and manage their own board exam if this goes forward) for registration in their specialist field. An augmented code of conduct could address specific issues in addition to the general Code.

Another model could be that the specialist professions with perhaps more than one membership body in that field, set up sub-boards or advisory bodies to take up these functions.

Thus a specialist professional could register with the SABPP based on the criteria of their own body. Taking again the example of employment relations specialist, it would be possible to register as an ER Technician, ER Associate, ER Practitioner, Chartered ER Practitioner and Chartered ER Practitioner (Master level) based on the criteria set by the "National Employment Relations (ER) Advisory Body" (or whatever name they give themselves).

Funds received for registering the various specialist professionals will be used to fund the work of these advisory bodies/organizations and this will be discussed fully with all stakeholders when the time comes.

# A Board examination

The institution of a Board examination as the final hurdle before professional registration, has been suggested and seems to have some support. It will be necessary to investigate current practices in other professions locally and internationally. In Human Resources currently the United States certification body (HRCI) has a 225 multiple-choice, 4 hour examination which is internet based. The Canadian Council of HR Associations has national exams for their CHRP designations (started August 2004). It seems that the CIPD in the UK does not have an examination - research has already started. Anyone willing to assist with this will be welcomed. Please contact Huma at huma@sabpp.co.za 

# SABPP Mentor projects

The RPL project renamed - Professional Placement (not RPL in the classic sense)

Under the leadership of Morag Mentis, a workgroup of some 15 Mentors of the Board has commenced work on the final details of the SABPP project to make placement at the correct registration level freely available for all those who are active in the HR profession, sometimes with many years of experience, but who lack a formal qualification. The purpose of this work is not to issue anyone with a qualification, but to register people at the appropriate levels while keeping the standard of professional registration intact. Much of the work in this process will be outsourced and the client will pay for this service. The committee is currently working on criteria for a portfolio of evidence, criteria to become approved providers (assisting with portfolio or assessing the portfolio), fee guidelines for approved providers, criteria for a panel of three mentors doing the final interview, appropriate fees for that phase etc.

# The CPD project

The project to renew the Board's approach to Continued Professional Development (CPD) is being spearheaded by Jean Grundling. The work of this committee is done by email and about 8 Mentors have made themselves available for this task. The end product will hopefully be a modern and workable product that can be easily kept up to date by registered professionals going directly on-line to their own files. One of the main concerns is coming up with a system to verify the CPD entries and any thoughts you may have in this regard will be most welcome.

# A Disciplinary Code

Twelve experts in this field have put their credentials on the table and offered to assist in drawing up a "Standard of Conduct" or "Disciplinary Code" whichever is the more acceptable title for this work. We are looking at the following:

(a) Disciplinary Offences Checklist

(b) Penalty/Sanction Guideline

(c) Appeal Procedure

(d) Conflict Handling Procedure for SABPP should we be challenged legally for the decision taken concerning a Professional's Conduct and subsequent Professional Membership

# Evaluation of Applications

Due to the greatly increased volume of new applications, we have roped in more Mentors to help with the evaluation and confirmation of levels and categories. We now have nine Mentors who have joined this work with seven more expressing their interest in joining the work. As these Mentors are being intensively exposed to our standards and trained to understand and implement the standard of registration, they will obviously be the ideal panel members in our upcoming RPL plan. Dr Ray Eberlein, who has been in charge of our professional registrations for approximately 20 years and who is thoroughly conversant with our standards, is guiding this group of Mentors and assisting with borderline cases.

# Reviewing the current Code of Conduct

A great deal of work has already been done to investigate the international codes of the medical, legal, engineering and accounting professions. It has brought forward a wealth of elements developed by the other professions and the challenge will be to decide which of these elements are perfectly suited to HR and then to come up with a concise and simple code. A questionnaire containing possible elements of a new Code of Conduct has been drawn up and circulated. The work can then begin on analysing and collating the information. A draft code will be circulated for comment. A number of mentors have offered to assist us with this process.

# Further assistance required:

The Board would like to re-introduce our campaign of writing to all companies who advertise human resource positions, informing them of the advantage of employing registered human resource professionals. By registering professionally these HR people have indicated a strong personal commitment to and interest in practising professional human resources. They have presented themselves to be measured against accepted, NQF aligned levels and criteria by their own professional body and have subjected themselves to a Code of Conduct and thus are willing to be accountable for their actions as professionals. We are requesting that all HR advertisements that do not mention professional registration, be faxed to the SABPP at 011 773-6224, so that a letter can be addressed to companies in this regard.

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6. Case-Law & Legislation Review: Fixed Term Contracts Reasonable Expectation

By Gary Watkins who can be contacted at

www.caselaw.co.za ; www.workinfo.com 

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# King Sabata Dalindyebo Municipality v CCMA & others

Case No: P437/03

Judgment Date: 01 February 2005

Jurisdiction: Labour Court, Port Elizabeth

Judge: Farber AJ

# Subject: Fixed Term Contracts Reasonable Expectation

Issue: A Commissioner of the CCMA issued an arbitration award stating that the non-renewal of the employees' fixed-term contracts constituted an unfair dismissal and the employer was ordered to reinstate some of the employees and to compensate others. The employer's conduct created a reasonable expectation to the employees of renewal of their contracts. Finding held to be justifiable.

Summary of facts: During October 1999 the employer engaged the services of the employees to perform what has been described as "cleaning work" within the Municipality of Umtata. The work entailed the cleaning of gutter drains, the cutting of grass and the removal of litter. The engagements were in each instance for a fixed period, terminating at the end of June 2000. The employees were required to provide the equipment necessary for the work. During June 2000 the employer renewed the engagement of the employees for the period, 1 July 2000-30 June 2001. In May 2001, the employees directed a written request at the employer to be employed on a permanent basis. Despite this, their contracts were renewed for another 12 month period.

The employees once again requested permanent employment during this 12 month period, and their contracts were not renewed at the end of June 2002. The employees then declared a dispute which was eventually settled when they received contracts for the period 01/12/2002 to 30/6/2003. They also received payment for the period 1 July 2002 to 30 November 2002 as well as an 8% increase in wages. During May 2003, the employees were notified that their contracts were not to be renewed. Despite a request from the employees to renew their contracts, it was decided not to do so. The employees referred the matter to the CCMA where they were awarded reinstatement. The employer conceded that there were funds available for the renewal of the contracts, but that it had decided to take unemployed people from the community to work in the employer's Community Cleaning Project on three months rotational basis.

Summary of Judgement: S 186(1)(b) of the LRA provides that a dismissal takes place in circumstances where an employee reasonably expected the employer to renew a fixed term contract of employment on the same or similar terms and the employer offers to renew it on less favourable terms or did not renew it.

The court found that the employer's conduct of rolling renewal of the employees' fixed term contracts every year since 1999 and the fact that work and money to renew the employees' contracts was available, had created a reasonable expectation to the employees of renewal of their contracts. In addition the court found that the employees were not consulted before taking the decision on 3 December 2002 to change the fixed term contracts to 3 months, and that employees should now give other people a chance to be employed in their positions, therefore the decision was not effected in accordance with a fair procedure. The employer's decision that the employees had to give a chance to other unemployed people to be employed in their positions while the employees would be unemployed was unfair. Therefore there was no fair reason for the employees' dismissal on 30 June 2003.

The employer was ordered to reinstate the employees' contracts to 1 May 2005 and pay them compensation for the period in which they had been unemployed. The court further pointed out that there should be no further expectation for renewal of the contracts and that the employees should tender their services to the employer during this period. The employer was ordered to pay costs.

New search options available on www.caselaw.co.za 

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7: Downloads: Human Capital - A self-Assessment For Agency Heads

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The Human Capital self-assessment checklist is intended to be a relatively simple diagnostic tool, meant primarily to capture senior leaders' informed views of their agencies' human capital policies and practices.

Click on www.workinfo.com/free/downloads/180.htm  to download a copy of the assessment.

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8. Book Reviews

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# The HR Value Proposition

By David Ulrich, Dave Ulrich and Wayne Brockbank, Harvard Business School Press, 2005

To purchase this book click on http://www.kalahari.net/e-trader/referral.asp?toolbar=mweb&linkid=5&partnerid=293&sku=28084515 

Written by the international bestselling author of "Human Resource Champions this book argues that HR value creation requires a deep understanding of external business realities and how value is defined by key stakeholders both inside and outside the company. The authors provide practical tools and worksheets for leveraging this knowledge to create HR practices, build organizational capabilities, design HR strategy and marshal resources that create value for customers, investors, executives and employees.

# The Inclusion Breakthrough: Unleashing the Real Power of Diversity

To purchase this book click on http://www.kalahari.net/e-trader/referral.asp?toolbar=mweb&linkid=5&partnerid=293&sku=24743631 

By Frederick A. Miller and Judith H. Katz, Berrett-Koehler Publishers, 2002

The Inclusion Breakthrough shows how today's businesses can boost their success by building workplace cultures that draw on the strengths of a diverse workforce. Grounded in real-world business practices, the book presents a specific, tested, and proven methodology for systemic change that will unleash the nearly boundless creativity and productivity of any firm's greatest resource: its people.

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9. Web Reviews: Corporateblogging

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# Click on http://www.corporateblogging.info/ 

Over the last twelve months, business leaders have grudgingly, warily, come to realize that blogging is a force that must be used-or at least accounted for-in their communications strategies. Companies are increasingly using blogs to communicate to both internal and external audiences. But blogs have also become a thorn in the side of these very same companies-witness the many vitriolic blogs posted by former employees and disgruntled customers.

Clearly, we need to better understand the "blogosphere," and this site, created by Swedish publications professional Fredrik Wackå, provides a good background to what blogs are, who uses them, and how businesses can use them to their advantage. The site offers blogging basics (What is it? Why do it? How to read them? How to publish them?), testimonials from corporate bloggers, and examples of effective blogs, primarily in Europe.

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10. Unsubscribe & Moving Soon

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About the e-Journal/e-Newspaper

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Equity-Skills News & Views is a free bi-monthly newsletter for business owners, Line Managers, and Human Resource Practitioners (who support Line Managers) with the implementation of fair and developmental people management systems and practices.

The style of this e-Newspaper fits between the traditional email newsletters and printed professional trade journals & magazines. Subscribers will be kept up to date with the latest developments in the world of people management, receive handy people management tips, and feedback about labour court rulings that relate to the implementation of the key Labour Acts.

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Opinions expressed by contributors DO NOT NECESSARILY REPRESENT the standpoint of the publisher-editor of Equity-Skills News & Views. Information published here is for general information, and is not intended as legal advice. The authors, editors, and publishers do not accept responsibility for any act, omission, loss, or damage occasioned by any reliance upon the contents hereof.

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