HR Technology Archives • SpriggHR

7 Examples of Innovation & Key Takeaways

Emily Barr — Mon, 10 Feb 2020 16:16:59 +0000

7 Examples of Innovation & Key Takeaways

Examples of innovation are all around us…

In today’s market, organizations work tirelessly in generating ideas for unique products and services that will help them beat the competition and be an industry-leading company. This very task hinges upon how innovative an organization is at its core. Examples of innovation are all around us and can fall into several different categories.

Innovation & Business

Innovation plays a central role in productivity gains and the competitiveness of enterprises, influencing a company’s economic growth and social wellbeing. According to statistics, between 2015-2017, the percentage of innovative enterprises in the marketplace increased by 12.5 percentage points. The specific means of innovation vary greatly as well. Organizational innovation – the introduction of new methods in business practices, workspace organization, or external relations with other companies – leads in emerging innovation types at 59.5% in 2015-2017, increasing from 37.9% in 2010-2012. It is followed shortly by marketing innovation – the use of new media or techniques for promotion, new methods of product placement and pricing, or changes to design or packaging – with rates rising 21.2 percentage points over the same period.

Innovation is needed to offer the right value to your organization’s customers. Strong innovation techniques set you apart from your rivals and make you the preferred choice for customers. Ultimately, your efforts to differentiate build and sustain value creation and customer loyalty.

What is innovation, then? It is specifically defined as the process of making an idea or invention into a strong product or service that creates value and/or for which customers will pay. There are many different types of examples of innovation with as many practical takeaways.

In this article, we will look at seven strong examples of innovation that should encourage and inspire you to apply the concept of innovation to your own organization.

Examples of Innovation – Products

Product innovation involves creating new products or improved versions of existing products that increase and improve its use. When an organization embraces product innovation, products can be differentiated from others in the market, thereby making them more attractive to customers. Companies that implement product innovation are bound to experience growth, expansion, and gain a competitive advantage over industry competitors.

Some product innovation examples include:

Apple Inc.

The success of the iPhone series is undeniable. What some organizations fail to recognize, however, is that its success is largely due to its existence as a series itself. Instead of developing and independent products, Apple Inc. regularly improves upon the existing model of the iPhone and releases its improvements in a stylized manner, generating excitement and increasing sales with every new model to be announced.

LG

LG introduced a new type of screen flexible enough to roll like a newspaper. By solving the problem of portability, their brand immediately becomes more attractive to customers in the market for mobile devices.

Radical Examples of Innovation

Radical innovations are innovative business solutions that organizations have undergone that have ultimately transformed the future of the organizations themselves. While these are riskier, it demonstrates the power that strong innovation can have on the success of a company.

Some radical innovation examples include:

Amazon

While Amazon’s success is largely due to its massive product selection, ease of use and convenience, the introduction of their Dash Button feature was an extremely successful service innovation. The Dash Button is a small Wi-Fi connected device that allows customers to reorder household essentials with ease, which worked to improve the efficiency and ease of their purchasing process.

Salesforce

Salesforce’s introduction of their CRM system, a platform that gives every organization’s department a shared view of every customer, is both a radical innovation example and an extremely strong marketing innovation example. By harnessing new technology, its platform in the form of cloud computing supports today’s modern business model.

Examples of Innovation – Process

Many organizations have achieved success in their operations by embracing innovation in the process of producing their goods and services. Process innovation improves a company’s efficiency, reducing the cost of production, increasing the quality of the product, and overall boosting profitability.

One of the strongest process innovation examples is:

Zara

Zara’s decision to not spend any of their budget on advertising may seem abnormal, but ultimately, their reliance upon word of mouth and labeling has allowed for a reallocation of funding towards efficient production patterns. They have developed a process that enables them to respond quickly to market demands, establishing an innovative manufacturing process that optimizes their response time to market demands. Only 15-25% of their clothes are produced before the season, and 50-60% during the beginning of the season. The remainder is produced during the season, responding to customer wishes directly and staying ahead of the curve on the market. This process innovation allows Zara to be market-responsive, solidifying its top position among fashion brands.

Examples of Innovation – Open

Open innovation refers to the alternative to conventional innovation, which tends to limit itself to information that stays within pre-set confines. It is a more distributed, more participatory, more decentralized approach to innovation, based on the observed fact that useful knowledge today is widely distributed, and no company, no matter how capable or how big, could innovate effectively on its own.

Some open innovation examples include:

Samsung

Samsung is a leader in innovation in today’s market, advocating for open innovation and partaking in innovation collaboration with start-ups. Their innovation process divides itself into 4 categories: partnerships, ventures, accelerators, and acquisitions.

Partnerships are collaborations between companies, often start-ups. These usually aim for new features or integrations with Samsung’s existing products.
Ventures are investments into early-stage start-ups. These bring Samsung revenue in case of exits and provide the company with access to new technologies that they can learn and benefit from.
Accelerators provide start-ups with an innovative environment to create new products, offering an initial investment, facilities to work in, and some resources to help along the way. The goal of this effort is that internal start-ups end up becoming a part of Samsung’s product portfolio, serving as learning experiences for the company.
Acquisitions work to bring in start-ups working on innovations that are at the core of Samsung’s strategic areas for the future. These often remain independent from units but can also join the Accelerator program.

Lego

While Samsung demonstrates success in open innovation by systematically collaborating with start-ups, Lego exhibits how engaging with customers directly can also increase productivity.

By activating users through its Create and Share site, it allows community members to share their own product designs and Leo pictures. It also offers customers access to the Lego Ideas site, where new product ideas can be generated.

A specific example of the ways in which this open innovation method has benefited Lego is its mini-Big Bang Theory Lego set, which was a community-based product that originated in Lego ideas. When the number of supporters for an Idea reaches 10,000, Lego evaluates the design, and if it is approved, the design can be released into stores under the Lego Ideas product label. When a product idea is approved, the original community member(s) that ideated the product are provided monetary compensation.

The community provides Lego with thousands of new ideas annually, enabling Lego to have a steady flow of free ideas that they can ensure customers are already eager to purchase for themselves. This innovative approach in their product design phase is a key factor in their success as a brand.

Final Thoughts

Innovation is extremely essential to any organization, especially in today’s hyper-competitive business market. The successful exploitation of new ideas is critical to a business’s ability to improve its processes, bring new and improved products and services to the market, increase its overall efficiency and productivity, and, most importantly, improve its profitability.

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4 Takeaways from the HR Tech Summit – New York City

Tony Kerekes — Fri, 08 Nov 2019 14:14:18 +0000

4 Takeaways from the HR Tech Summit - New York City

Introduction

SpriggHR’s Jilaine Parkes and Tony Kerekes were among many HR and Tech professionals to attend the HR Tech Summit in New York City on November 6th, 2019.

Jilaine gave a talk about how to align & cascade key objectives in a business and also participated in a panel discussion with HR leaders from MetLife and Microsoft about how to best utilize HR data to drive performance.

A CHRO, in her second high-growth tech company, noted, in the last 5 years there has been a large shift from governance and compliance to driving the business (with talent and talent solutions).

1. People Analytics

Attendees to the conference indicated a significant interest, and desire for, increased use of people analytics. Most agree that the benefits of having hard data to support people decisions, identify trends and validate investments in talent are enormous.

The larger organizations are leveraging advanced analytics with teams that support the need for reports, analysis, and data interpretation. Other HR leaders have taken on this challenge and are now looking to learn relevant analytical skills themselves in order to keep up in this ever-advancing field.

Microsoft indicated they are hiring into HR from some MBA programs that teach analytics and HR analytics, over students with a masters in HR or IR. A tool such as Twine Labs can produce insights, but you need to know the questions to ask and how to weave results into a story and recommendations.

There’s no denying that we are seeing an evolution in the desired skillsets of an HR professional; perhaps analytical skills will become an expectation in the future.

Speaking of the future...

2. The Future of HR Competencies

With all of the talk about how new technologies and methods of analysis are changing the landscape of HR, the obvious question on many attendees’ minds was:

How will the role of future HR professionals change?

Although the immense potential of HR data analytics has yet to be realized in most business settings, analytical capabilities are still highly desirable skills that may serve to differentiate HR professionals in the future.

In the past, data analysis may not have played as central a role in an HR professional’s job description, but this may change going forward. As technology advances and more and more innovative tools become available to us, an ability to effectively utilize these tools increases. Future HR professionals will be equipped with more data than ever before, and it is important to know how to leverage such data in order to optimize strategic decision making. HR can use data from their companies enterprise systems, financial systems and HR systems to knit together a business case for HR decisions.

For example, looking at actual business unit results, candidate sourcing and performance management data over time, a better picture can be generated on the best hires, sources, internal training, results, etc. If you have a significant percentage of new hires through employee referrals, you can compare the performance and tenure over two to three years to other hires and glean insights.

It seems quite apparent that future HR professionals will need to be adept in the technology space. Understanding how to leverage technology to create workforce engagement, reducing paper and cycle time on HR processes will be critical when all of us are faced with lower budgets and resources.

3. Managing & Implementing HR Technology

While there’s a nearly unanimous agreement that HR technology and analytics offer a range of benefits, companies are slow to adopt these practices? Many of the attendees spoke of the difficulty associated with the integration of various tools to work together and the adoption across the organization. In some cases, self-service and mobile tools have helped propel adoption.

The complexity, resources, and time required to implement new HR technology was one area that was on most people’s minds. As a panelist noted, technology itself creates stress as there are so many possibilities and functionalities that like a kid in a candy store, its hard to make a choice and to pare back to true needs, making implementation more challenging.
There is always an organizational reluctance to switch from a current, familiar application, even if a superior, more intuitive, lower-cost option becomes available. A large company indicated that having new fields and definitions, also makes historic data analytics more challenging.
AI can be used to source candidates by pointing to an optimal candidate on LinkedIn and having your tool produce a list of best matches on LinkedIn. Then imagine being able to do a comparative analysis two years later using LinkedIn with your number 2 or 3 candidates and the one you hired.

Although it is true that many barriers exist, the same can be said about any game-changing advancement, be it technological or otherwise. The fact of the matter is that benefits outweigh the costs of overcoming these barriers, and that is why we are seeing companies persevere.

4. Leveraging Social Networks for Today’s Workforce

With the technology currently available to us, it is not uncommon for an individual to be able to complete all aspects of their position remotely. For this reason, recognition of a permanent, distributed workforce is a new reality for many companies today. With this change in structure to the conventional workplace comes the need to address the associated decrease in social interactions among employees. Conference attendees had a variety of thoughts and ideas:

What tools, processes, and norms will you create to knit people together so that people are more likely to stay? Leveraging tools like Slack beyond work can help engage employees with each other.
A best practice from one organization – go beyond the usual work topics, create broad communities so that employees can engage and support each other beyond work. Pet channel? Food channel? Things to do this weekend channel?
A tip from one HR leader – connect new employees during onboarding so they can grow their network outside of their immediate team. Remote workforces need to build relationships when they aren’t meeting each other face-to-face.
A global finance organization noted the technology can fostering collaboration and the right behaviours, they switched to Zoom (with pushback) and after a year asked employees for feedback. Most indicated they collaborate better and never use their landlines and would give them up.

Issues such as a decreased sense of community that are associated with distributed workforces are important to address. Face-to-face social networks have existed for a long time, and have been shown to drive retention and engagement. Implementing internal social networks through technology is a potential solution to engaging a distributed or hotelling workforce.

Final Thoughts

We hope that our summary has provided you with some insight and given you some things to think about. Key Media organized a great line-up of interesting speakers.

Ready to learn more about how Sprigg addresses these areas?

We would love to introduce you to Sprigg. Hit the “Request a Demo” button and we'll customize a demo just for you, led by one of our senior HR professionals. We look forward to connecting!

Request a Demo

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Sprigg President on Performance Review Season

Admin — Wed, 21 Jan 2015 17:35:46 +0000

Jilaine Parkes offers advice about how to build a performance review strategy that will work year after year

Its high season for performance reviews. At this time of year companies are busy getting ready to complete reviews for last year and set up powerful development plans for the year ahead.

As more and more SMBs move away from paper-based evaluations and over to Sprigg, we increasingly work with companies implementing the performance and goal products for the first time. They are typically well prepared with their communication strategies, rollout plan and training agendas for the initial launch.

Creating a plan to continue to grow for years to come, however, can be ignored at implementation stage. This causes problems in the future.

The following checklist will help you get through the preparation for the upcoming review process in a manner which will also ensure long-term benefits and an effective strategy which the whole company can get behind year after year!

Having a plan for each part of this process will eliminate some of the stress that is typically associated with the review process during an already busy year-end time frame.

I hope you find this list to be a good starting point for developing your own performance review process. I offered suggestions around what you could coordinate and complete to have a successful performance review cycle.

If you have any questions, or would like some assistance with updating your current talent management processes please get in touch with our team at sales@sprigghr.com

Create Next Year’s Goals

Many people come out of the annual review cycle with ideas for goals. Tools like the Sprigg software gives them a place to record those goals so they don’t lose them: create the next year goal plan and permission them to see it in Sprigg.

Set Your Timeline

Knowing what your timeline looks like keeps your HR team on track. It also helps employees plan the time they need to complete their duties. Be mindful of the natural ebb and flow of your organization.

Pick the “best” time for the majority of people to complete the review. You will never be able to satisfy everyone so that should not be your goal. Satisfy most!

Year-Round Dialogue

Try to avoid the mindset of Performance Appraisals and Development Plans being an annual process.

While many organizations continue to work on an annual performance review cycle, we find that the companies which benefit the most from our collaborative HR software encourage a culture of weekly, if not daily, use of Sprigg’s functions.

Optimize Rating Scales

Review your company’s rating scale and make any adjustments to the wording or number of rating options. While it seems like an easy task to go in and make rating scale changes in Sprigg, the change management it takes to get your employee and management population using the new rating scale effectively can be considerable. Many of my clients have found that it takes several communications, examples and training programs to really get a new rating scale put into place and widely used consistently.

Competencies

Review your competency structure and update any competency names, descriptions, and writing assistant text.

Typically once you have established a competency model, there is not a lot of work that needs to be done year after year but you should continually add to the writing assistants such as the Coaches Corner tool and which competencies they most need it for.

Check Your Data is Up-To-Date

Review your user data to ensure the manager and human resource representatives are correct for each employee and people who are no longer with the company have been inactivated. Lots of Sprigg’s goals and performance software relies on these two relationships for the most of the process to function accurately. Why not ask your managers and HR team to complete a quick check of their reporting relationships before the launch of the next cycles development plans?

Try New Tools and Approaches

So you get the importance of the performance review cycle but have never done a 360 review? You could be missing a big qualitative piece of the pie. Getting feedback from peers and colleagues in a way which can be measurable and add to the overall metrics of the review can be invaluable to ensuring accountability and developing performance.

Check You Have Buy In

Sprigg is so successful because we encourage dialogue and transparency. We believe that there should be no shocks in the evaluation and that development plans should reflect the genuine strengths of the team and individual. Tools like Sprigg gives power to Managers and HR pros to ensure employees and stakeholders feel engaged and recognized year-round. Utilizing these tools means that you Managers and Employees buy into the performance management process!

Want to learn more? Contact Jilaine at jparkes@sprigghr.com

First published in The HR Gazette

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That Radio Interview! Remembering an Awesome CareerBuzz Show with Mark Franklin

Admin — Wed, 05 Nov 2014 14:57:36 +0000

Wow! Its hard to believe that its been over six months since Jilaine Parkes was interviewed on the awesome CareerBuzz radio show with Mark Franklin.

Jilaine had a fab time with host and HR thought leader Mark Franklin talking about how and why, with Bruce Croxon (Co-Founder of Lavalife and a star of CBC’s Dragon’s Den), she launched Sprigg, allowing easier, faster and metric-driven employee reviews

Listen to Jilaine

Last week, Shanna Landolt and Tim Baker were interviewed on the show about their career paths and the upcoming SocialHRCamp event led by Jeff Waldman.

Shanna Landolt, Tim Baker and Jilaine Parkes have all been guests on Mark Franklin’s CareerBuzz radio show

Sadly Jeff was taken ill and so couldn’t make the show so our very own Marketing Manager, Bill Banham, did a cameo to plug this month’s hottest HR ticket.

Not yet booked your ticket to SocialHRCamp? Learn more.

Mark Franklin and his team will be in attendance to meet and interview attendees and speakers.

http://careercycles.com/online-talent-management-plus-a-manifesto-for-reinventing-yourself

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The Importance of Performance Reviews at Micro-Enterprise Levels

Admin — Thu, 25 Sep 2014 15:33:18 +0000

Start-Up or Fed-Up?

Sprigg Talent Management is on a mission to wake people up who think: “Performance Reviews are for Big Companies” or “Performance Reviews Don’t Work” or “Performance Reviews are Broken” or my personal favorite (insert sarcasm): “Get Rid of the Performance Review” Excuse Me? “Get Rid of…?”

I am going to come back to the “Get Rid of…” topic on another day as it will no doubt send me into a “Rick’s-Rant” (reference: The Mercer Report http://www.cbc.ca/player/Shows/Shows/The+Rick+Mercer+Report/Rick’s+Rants/ or the U.S. version: Julia-Sugarbaker-Rant – ref: Designing Women – old TV sit-com). But before I leave this particular topic…don’t do it, don’t get rid of it, simply change how you approach it and in my next article, I’ll tell you how.

Back to our subject at hand, the Sprigg Mission, which is multi-purposeful, yet today I would like to focus on the absurdity of the thinking: “Performance Reviews are for Big Companies.” You wouldn’t believe me if I told you how many times I’ve heard that comment from small business owners. And “small business” by the way is actually defined by Industry Canada as “less than 100 or 1 to 99 employees” There are sub-categories like contractors, self-employed and all on its own are “Micro-Enterprises” with 1 – 4 employees.

I’ve been at this gig for close to 25 years and so, I’ve seen lots of HR trends and HR hot-topics come and go…lots. But a few HR subjects like Compensation Strategies, Recruitment Systems and Performance Reviews have sustained their discussion-worthy status year over year and why is that? Because they’re important, that’s why.

Now, let me offer some perspective on the Performance Review at the small business level (which…you guessed it…translates quite easily as a process to medium and large businesses…it’s just more people. Simple.)

Somewhere along the way small business people adapted the thinking that because they are so small, they shouldn’t do performance reviews. Or…nobody has time to do it because we’re so focused on growth. The single biggest reason is a hangover. That’s right, a hangover from the previous system someone made them do in a previous life…and I do mean, “made them do.” It was complicated, administratively intensive and so fraught with HR jargon it made them crazy. They resisted and even resented it and vowed: “one day…when I have my own company, I will abandon this crap.” And so they did.

Well, I’m here to tell you it’s a mistake and a big one. If you think about the small business landscape where survival is the focus in early days, why wouldn’t you want to offer clarity to who does what and how well they do it? That’s all a Performance Review is by the way…clarity of roles, direction and course-correction when people fall short from delivering on the expectations. It’s really a name change to Performance Accountability and since you own your own business you get to call it what you want. Some people call it a conversation.

It doesn’t need to be difficult; it just needs to be effective. Performance discussions aren’t personal character attacks so why are so many people nervous about them? They’re metric-driven discussions on what’s getting done and what isn’t. They also unload a ton of uncertainty and guesswork for the small-yet-mighty teams of less than four.

Most small business owners think: “we work so closely on the day-to-day, why bother?” Wrong again. Most micro-businesses are a flutter with work-load volume issues and often four people are doing the work of ten or more. You aren’t talking with your employees; you’re giving them short-bursts of your attention. The rest…they make assumptions on what to do next and they’re often off-strategy about it…not their fault. If they had some carved-out time for a performance-related conversation on what you need from them and how they can access you for answers…you will have cracked some light into the eternal question every employee asks themselves: “I wonder how I’m doing?”

I guess in the end, I’m saying it really doesn’t matter what size company you are, I just believe it’s even more important when you’re that micro-industry of 1 – 4 employees. So, at Sprigg (which is an acronym: “Successful People Reviewing and Improving Goals and Growth” AND is symbolic of growth (very cool brand J) we want to say: “Get in touch! We can work with you to help your people achieve and your company grow”.

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Sprigg & SocialHRCamp Partners with Free The Children

Admin — Fri, 12 Sep 2014 01:36:08 +0000

It is with excitement that SocialHRCamp, partner of Sprigg and The HR Gazette, has initiated a philanthropic project with Free The Children, an international charity and educational partner.

The project will directly fund the building of a school in the Amazon region of Ecuador. Working in the communities of Mondaña and Bellavista, both in the Napo province, Free The Children is developing sustainable community partnerships to ensure children have safe and wonderful places to learn and so that communities are empowered to change their circumstances and lift themselves out of poverty.

“Free The Children is deeply appreciative of SocialHRCamp’s initiative to raise funds and awareness in support of building a school in the Amazon region of Ecuador. Their support will be instrumental in providing students with access to an education as well as a safe and wonderful space to learn. Free The Children believes that education is the foundation, which can break the cycle of poverty. With SocialHRCamp’s investment, we will be able to provide instrumental opportunities for elementary school students in these communities, creating a brighter hope for their future.”

Shellbie Wilson — Senior Manager Donor Engagement, Free The Children

60% of upcoming SocialHRCamp ticket revenue in Toronto (November 13, 2014) and Vancouver (tbd) will be donated to the project. SocialHRCamp will also initiate a campaign where the public can donate to the cause. Further, SocialHRCamp will work with crowd-funding platform and SocialHRCamp sponsor Tilt.com to launch and run this initiative. Stay tuned for the launch of these platforms.

Part of SocialHRCamp Founder, Jeff Waldman’s original vision for the Camp was to integrate a philanthropic component. Free The Children was a logical choice for Waldman, a father of 3 young boys living in North Toronto where education is a core value and easily accessible to Canadian children. Philanthropy has long been a major part of the Human Resources community, says Waldman. This project will increase the level of engagement with the broader HR Community, and continue the work to build the skills of Practitioners in social media and emerging HR/Recruitment technology adoption.

For more information about the fantastic work that Free The Children is currently doing in the Amazon click on the image below for up-to-date stories from the communities they work in. Updates are made every 4-6 weeks.

About Free The Children

Free The Children is an international charity and educational partner that believes in a world where all children are free to achieve their fullest potential as agents of change. They work domestically through We Day and We Act to educate, engage and empower youth to become active local and global citizens. Through their holistic and sustainable development model—Adopt a Village—they work to remove barriers to education and to empower communities to break the cycle of poverty. For more information about Free The Children visit them at www.freethechildren.com, and on Facebook, Twitter and YouTube.

– See more at: http://socialhrcamp.com/socialhrcamp-partners-with-free-the-children/#sthash.5tZh66tn.dpuf

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Nicole Bendaly: Tips to Help Recognize Team Performance and Have Fun!

Admin — Mon, 30 Jun 2014 14:28:52 +0000

Recognition comes in many forms. It can be a specific “thank you” for something that has been well done or it can be a leader showing sincere interest in their team members as individuals.

Whatever form the recognition takes, the objective is to ensure that your team members feel good about themselves and the contribution they are making. Only then will there be the energy required for high performance.

4 Tips to Help Recognize your Team Members

Do you give everyone credit for achievements, not forgetting those who may be struggling? The recognition is often the boost those individuals need to get back up to speed.
Develop your own personal people-recognition system to ensure that pats on the back are always at the top of your to-do list. Make sure that the pats are for something substantive. Overdone recognition becomes hollow.
Ask the people you lead how they would like to be recognized. What energizes some means little to others.
Recognition doesn’t have to come only from the leader (although it must also come from the leader). Get your team members committed to looking for opportunities to recognize one another.

Remember to Have Fun!

It is easy for teams to become too serious and lose the lightness that brings both energy and creativity to the job. If your team doesn’t have fun, it is either burning out or fading out.

Fun doesn’t have to be a full-scale production. A picnic, a game of pool or a drink after work can be fun. Celebrating small successes is fun. Surprising your team with a morning break (complete with muffins and coffee of course) can be fun. Working in an environment in which light-heartedness is seen as an energizer as opposed to a distraction, is fun.

Contact Nicole to learn more.

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Study Finds Women are Working Longer but HR Technology Adoption is Still Slow

Admin — Thu, 26 Jun 2014 13:37:14 +0000

A study released today suggests that more women will be working into their 70s, and those in their 60s will be as likely as men to be in paid work in 2020. The Innovation Imperative study, called suggests that better adoption of user friendly, collaborative software would help in bridging perceived generation gaps and could be a powerful way to address social end economic discrimination among employees.

Reasons for Working Longer

Commenting on the findings, Richard Shea, MD EMEA Search at Futurestep suggests:“A number of factors, both social and economic, have led to a prolonged working life for a large part of the population, and as a result the retirement age has become meaningless. But it is disappointing to see that age discrimination is still a problem in the workplace, with a recent survey showing that not only do 54 % of people believe their age negatively impacts their work, but that 42% of over 40s felt they would be passed over for promotion due to their age*.

He continues: “Instead of overlooking ageing talent, employers should be looking to engage these employees, taking advantage of years of invaluable experience and a strong work ethic, so that they become a powerful driving force in the success of their business. The onus here lies with the employer to make sure that they are retaining key, experienced talent whilst also maintaining growth and nurturing talent from within.

Older employees have the same expectations as everybody else

“Older employees have the same expectations as everybody else; to work for an employer that appreciates their value, puts their skills to the best possible use and keeps them engaged with the role. This remains to be something which many employers are struggling with.

The Innovation Imperative study surveyed 4,000 workers globally and revealed that over three quarters of employers expect employers to be innovative in the way they retain and engage staff, yet only 30% of us feel that our current employer has succeeded in being innovative in these fields. More worryingly for employers, two thirds of employees said they would leave a role if they were targeted with a job that offered more innovative benefits, while 55% would leave a role they are happy in if approached in a particularly innovative way.

With this in mind, it is important for employers to make sure they are rewarding loyalty and commitment from long-standing staff members, whilst keeping them motivated to perform through career development programs – which are vital to ensure that all workers are adequately supported to progress and flourish, regardless of age.

Adopting New HR Innovations and Technologies Helps Retain Employees of All Ages

By embracing technology and HR innovation companies can retain staff at all levels and in all age categories, empowering them to take control of their own career. In the case of older employees, implementing these practices will allow the business to develop a mature, talented team, who are able to progress through the company and pass on their knowledge to the next generation.”

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Top Free HR Resources

Admin — Tue, 13 May 2014 13:43:02 +0000

Looking for new places to grow your Human Resources knowledge base? Need to find free resources to help you better understand the modern HR landscape? Want to find professional communities eager to collaborate and share experiences? Don’t want to invest more budget to achieve new goals?

Here’s a handy list of some of our favorite HR resources to help Human Resource professionals and business leaders.

SmartBrief

SmartBrief publishes various B2B newsletters for business owners in specific sectors. Subscriptions are free and they allow you access to a wide variety of content in an easily accessible format. What’s more, you can get lots of help info about partnerships and memberships with NFIB, NAWBO and not-for-profit organisations.

The Department of Labor

Easy to use website covering lots of common questions employers ask. Great resource in understanding roles and responsibilities and keep processes such as employee wages requirements.

Canadian Management Centre

Canadian Management Centre offers a wealth of free online professional development resources, tools and insights to help users grow personal and business strategies. Resources include articles, webcasts, whitepapers, podcasts, templates and self-assessment quizzes. Topics covered include Management, Leadership, Communications, Project Management and HR & Training.

G.Neil

A great HR supply shop for small business and medium businesses. G-Neil are well-known for their 5-in-1 labour law posters as well as a service that will notify you when updates are issued.

Human Resources & Career Information | Entrepreneur.com

A premier business magazine for entrepreneurship since the 1970s, Entrepreneur is a first rate source of analysis and opinion for business leaders and HR. Unique content includes premium and free forms and templates, job descriptions and other human resource management forms.

BenefitsLink.com

BenefitsLink provides employee benefits professionals with latest developments and analysis in plan compliance, administration, policy and design. The website includes active message boards, industry news and an extensive calendar of conferences and webcasts.

Employment Law Information Network

ELIN is a no charge legal resource web site designed for employment lawyers, in-house employment counsel and human resource professionals.A helpful online source of information to allow you to keep pace with the changing landscape of workplace law.

Ask a Manager

This is a superb human resources blogs that offers no-nonsense help and tips. Written by practicing HR pros to help educate and network.

Outsourcing

The Outsourcing magazine is published by Wordlabs Global once in every two months for the niche needs of decision makers in the global services industry. It focuses on bringing quality content to its audience through a global network of highly experienced writers. The magazine reaches out to its audience of over 200,000 globally through comprehensive circulation of hard copies, e-magazine and subsequent digital channels.

Monster.com

Monster.com is considered one of the top job boards out there. Besides being able to post jobs on Monster, companies can save job searches and constantly monitor the site for talent.

This can be very valuable if you have positions you hire for regularly or a job that’s difficult to fill.

Specialized community forums in Sales, Health Care, Marketing, Administrative services will help you can stay on top of industry trends and commentary.

Expatriate Foundation

Established in 2008, the Expatriate Foundation is the first of its kind to reach out to expatriates, scholar practitioners, human resource professionals and internationally minded organizations who share a common bond; one in which education, learning, and the desire for success meet equally for the betterment of all.

Society for Human Resource Management

SHRM is perhaps the most well know professional association for HR in North America. Loads of content – much of it totally free and super helpful.If you don’t mind paying a small fee you can also get articles, white papers, templates, employment legislation, tools and event info.

Your Local Chamber of Commerce

This can be a powerful resource to find meetings and workshops focused on employment challenges and goals.

The post Top Free HR Resources appeared first on SpriggHR.

HR Professionals Believe Video Conferencing Improves Productivity

Admin — Tue, 18 Mar 2014 13:17:30 +0000

Analysis of a recent global survey conducted by Redshift Research on behalf of Polycom, Inc. has found that 98% of HR executives who use video at work today say they will prefer video collaboration over email as their top method of business communication within three years.The findings were released today and concluded that the majority of those respondents (56 per cent) indicated video would be their most preferred method of business communication, surpassing email (49 per cent) and voice conference calls (32 per cent).

Proving that the benefits of video for HR functions are well understood, the survey of business decision makers in 12 countries revealed that almost all (98 per cent) of the HR executives participating in the survey believe video conferencing removes distance barriers and improves productivity between teams in different cities and countries.

The survey also showed that video is becoming more pervasive for Human Resources teams across the globe. When asked to choose their preferred methods of business communication today, HR respondents ranked video conferencing as a top-three tool for communications, placing third (46 per cent) after email (88 per cent) and voice/conference calls (62 per cent). Other methods of business communications these HR executives said they use included Web conferencing, instant messaging and social media.

The views of the HR professionals polled are supported by Aberdeen Group’s 2013 report on video talent acquisition that found 32 per cent of organisations were investing in video interviewing, compared to 21 per cent of organisations in 2012. The top three reasons identified by Aberdeen for this growth in adoption were:

·         To reduce travel costs
·         To shorten the time to hire
·         To reach geographically dispersed candidates

“Advancements in technology and telecommunications are allowing organizations large and small to operate seamlessly from anywhere,” said Mollie Lombardi, Vice President and Principal Analyst, Human Capital Management, Aberdeen Group. “HR leaders require a new understanding of how technology can help them bridge geographical boundaries and rethink their talent strategies to take full advantage of a broader talent pool.”

Voice, video and content collaboration is impacting many facets of the HR function, including retention, engagement, and training. Video conferencing, video recording and video asset management helps organisations overcome diminishing training budgets, minimise scheduling and travel conflicts, and prevent the loss of knowledge through attrition and retirement with easier, more frequent collaboration and on-demand access to training and knowledge. The ability to record live training sessions and playback later for people to view at times when it is more convenient for their work schedule allows for more cost-effective delivery of training content and efficient re-use of training content.

The post HR Professionals Believe Video Conferencing Improves Productivity appeared first on SpriggHR.

HR Technology Archives • SpriggHR

7 Examples of Innovation & Key Takeaways

Independent Contractor or Employee? - Ask a Lawyer!

Upcoming Webinar - April 8, 2:00PM EST / 11:00AM PST

COVID-19 - Coping with Legislative Changes & Working from Home

Upcoming Webinar - March 20, 1:00PM EST / 10:00AM PST

7 Examples of Innovation & Key Takeaways

Examples of innovation are all around us…

Innovation & Business

Examples of Innovation – Products

Apple Inc.

LG

Radical Examples of Innovation

Amazon

Salesforce

Examples of Innovation – Process

Zara

Examples of Innovation – Open

Samsung

Lego

Final Thoughts

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4 Takeaways from the HR Tech Summit – New York City

Independent Contractor or Employee? - Ask a Lawyer!

Upcoming Webinar - April 8, 2:00PM EST / 11:00AM PST

COVID-19 - Coping with Legislative Changes & Working from Home

Upcoming Webinar - March 20, 1:00PM EST / 10:00AM PST

4 Takeaways from the HR Tech Summit - New York City

Introduction

1. People Analytics

2. The Future of HR Competencies

3. Managing & Implementing HR Technology

4. Leveraging Social Networks for Today’s Workforce

Final Thoughts

Ready to learn more about how Sprigg addresses these areas?

Sprigg President on Performance Review Season

Jilaine Parkes offers advice about how to build a performance review strategy that will work year after year

Want to learn more? Contact Jilaine at jparkes@sprigghr.com

That Radio Interview! Remembering an Awesome CareerBuzz Show with Mark Franklin

The Importance of Performance Reviews at Micro-Enterprise Levels

Sprigg & SocialHRCamp Partners with Free The Children

About Free The Children

Nicole Bendaly: Tips to Help Recognize Team Performance and Have Fun!

4 Tips to Help Recognize your Team Members

Remember to Have Fun!

Study Finds Women are Working Longer but HR Technology Adoption is Still Slow

Reasons for Working Longer

Older employees have the same expectations as everybody else

Adopting New HR Innovations and Technologies Helps Retain Employees of All Ages

Top Free HR Resources

HR Professionals Believe Video Conferencing Improves Productivity