Where Are You on The “Balance” Seesaw?
On any given day as you walk down the streets of Manhattan — or any streets for that matter — you will probably see people engaging in conversations or texting on their cell phones, checking and responding to e-mail on their PDAs, etc. Even during what should be a breather for lunch to escape the work day, you see the same behavior. Think about it.
Posted Mon Jun 15, 2009
Breaking Through the Glass Ceiling — It is Possible, Right?
I read an article this week about a recent report revealing that women face gender discrimination from the beginning of their careers — not necessarily when they reach the executive level. So, the thought of even reaching the C suite or breaking through the glass ceiling is still a huge challenge.
Posted Fri May 22, 2009
Do We Have a Responsibility to Education?
There are many people across the U.S. — the world even — who are committed to improving education. I’m talking about teachers, parents, legislators, community activists and in many instances, students themselves.
Posted Fri May 15, 2009
What Would You Do With 40 Hours of “Giving Time”?
Extra time? Who has free time anymore, right? Between working, spending time with family and garnering a little “me” time, where does the time go from day to day, week to week, and year to year?
Well, my company gives employees up to 40 hours of paid time off a year. What do we expect them to do with that time? We expect them to volunteer in their communities with their favorite charities.
Posted Fri Apr 24, 2009
Promoting Your Brand in a Crisis — Yes You Can!
Most would agree that throughout this economic crisis no industry sector has taken a bigger reputational hit than financial services-related names — the whole group from banks to brokerages and insurance companies. On the inside, it feels like the epicenter of the current global economic predicament.
Posted Fri Apr 17, 2009
Lace up Your Running Shoes and Train for Your Career Did you know that running is one of the fastest growing participatory sports in the United States? My company sponsors distance running events across the country, bringing runners, spectators, employees and the community together in a positive and memorable way.
Posted Sat Mar 28, 2009
How S-M-A-R-T Are You?
It’s that time of year when we ask employees to create their performance objectives. I wish I could say that our employees eagerly anticipate this exercise, like they might their favorite author’s next book hitting the bookstores. But the reality is it’s an important process that we must all endure. However, I feel that we have a system in place that at least makes it easier for our employees. How is it easier? It’s called ePerformance.
Posted Mon Mar 16, 2009
Can Random Thoughts Help To Make Sense of Our Current Environment?
Why would anyone want to hear someone’s random thoughts you ask? Well, perhaps it can offer some method to the madness that some feel we are living in today. Let me explain.
Posted Fri Feb 27, 2009
How Did You Find Out Your Job Was Being Eliminated? The reality is this question is being asked a lot these days. Some companies are superb or really “show their stuff” when it comes to communicating internally to employees during these challenging times. Others may not be doing such a great job. Trust me, I’ve heard some horror stories. I actually heard a story this past week that one company told everyone who was invited to a conference call that if they were on the line — they were fired.
Posted Fri Feb 6, 2009
Three-Dimensional Chess Job cuts deepen across the USA. Retail outlook expected to worsen. We can’t seem to escape these headlines. And this week we’ve read about and heard our share of news about the economy that, for the most part, is pretty grim. Sigh. Huge corporations, including mine, are taking measures to reduce their risk and costs.
Posted Mon Feb 2, 2009
What is Your Personal Brand? Every day we’re exposed to company brands. Maybe it’s that place where you pick up your favorite coffee or home improvement supplies or that suit or running shoes you love to wear. What are the characteristics of a successful brand? Well, it must be recognizable, solid, long-enduring and evolving. You can probably think of a slew of brands that meet these criteria.
Posted Fri Jan 23, 2009
Orange People and the Value of Employee Resource Groups We have a lot of orange people at ING. What do I mean? I equate orange employees with those who are most engaged. I consider members of our Employee Resource Groups (ERGs) to represent some of the most orange folks I’ve encountered at ING. We have five ERGs: African American, Asian American, Gay and Lesbian, Latino and Women. Each ERG has local chapter leadership as well as national leadership positions.
Posted Sat Jan 17, 2009
They Didn’t Hate it Enough to Kill It When one of my daughters learned that I was a blogger for Fast Company, she thought it was very cool. But then she asked me, “Dad, did you even know what a blog was, did they have to explain it to you?” Of course, she was just joking. After all, she knows how hip and cool her Dad is, right. Ok. Who’s joking now?
Posted Fri Jan 9, 2009
What Women Want We’re in a recession. That’s the phrase many of us have been hearing and reading over the last few weeks. Yep, it’s official. However, this news didn’t really come as a surprise to many Americans. As an HR professional for a global financial services company, this official statement did make me pause. Why? I knew those four words would resonate with our employees.
Posted Sat Dec 27, 2008
What Makes a Good Leader? When you’ve been in HR for as long as I have, you can imagine how often this question has been asked of me. To be honest, I don’t think that I’ve been able to give the same answer each time. Why is that? Well, for starters, leadership does involve continuing education, and I’m always reading about this subject. Think about it.
Posted Fri Dec 19, 2008
How Does Orange Go Green? An article the other day caught my attention. It was about the U.S. Army releasing its first annual sustainability report. We’re reading and hearing a lot more these days about green — from private sector to public sector and the government. It seems as if green is everywhere. I’m actually looking forward to news about climate change issues in 2009 — it will be a big year.
Posted Fri Dec 12, 2008
Online Dating: A Model for a Mentoring Program So what does online dating have to do with a mentoring program? Well, we adopted some of the concepts of online dating and applied them to our mentoring program, ING Mentoring Advantage. The mentoring program is voluntary—for both mentors and mentees.
Posted Fri Dec 5, 2008
What Are You Giving These Days? I must admit that I was a little nervous when we launched our annual employee giving campaign in October – on the heels of the economic turmoil across the globe. With the uncertainty that people were feeling about the volatile stock market, I thought: how do we communicate to employees that now is the time for them to dig deep into their pockets and donate money to their favorite charities?
Posted Fri Nov 21, 2008
The Inclusive Diversity Approach: An Example Diversity is as much a corporate value these days as ethics, business integrity and quality. And like those titans of business management, diversity has built its own cottage industry of books, consultants, success stories, awards, and other public, measurable reflections of companies that do it well.
Posted Fri Nov 14, 2008
Brand and Employee Engagement Brand management at corporations is usually handled by the marketing department. Most of the energy in defining and building a brand is to communicate the values of your company, its services and products, to potential customers, clients and other stakeholders. So I’m used to getting puzzled looks when people find out that I’m responsible for both brand and human resources at ING Americas.
Posted Fri Nov 7, 2008
