Even the seemingly benign HR industry isn’t immune from these concerns with the settlement between Halogen and SuccessFactors reading like a SP(HR)y novel – creation of a bogus company, the duping of unsuspecting sales reps, the disclosure of proprietary information, and so on.

And although shadowy characters will always attempt to invade the halls or http’s of their competitive foes, there are two relatively obvious and quite simple means of gathering G2 without breaking a single law:

Intel Option #1: Job Postings

Curious about the location of your competitor’s new operational center? Wondering what the underlying code is for their yet-to-be-unveiled SaaS offering? Sleepless thinking about your relative pace of growth when compared to those in your domain? This is so obvious I’m almost remiss in mentioning it – simply check out your arch enemy’s career site and job postings.

We have reached a level of requisitioning maturity whereby extremely detailed job codes and underlying descriptions are almost a prerequisite for securing both internal approval and a highly targeted and talented candidate pool. Because of this move toward clarity of purpose, you can gleam an incredible amount of highly valuable information in no time flat. With a simple export and sort you can assess trending information, deconstruct growth plans, find out what tools and technologies your foe is codependent on and ascertain exactly where they might go next. It’s really quite simple.

Intel Option #2: Public Sector

Although this may not be true of very small or emerging organizations, most companies of any significant size or scale eventually dabble in the public sector. And with the public sector come four words that are often music to your competitive ears – Freedom of Information Act. FOIA is a post-Watergate provision effectively allowing any citizen to request that information be released to the public by government entities. Although exceptions do exist covering confidential business information, you’d be amazed what is disclosed under the act (visit GWU’s National Security Archive for more details).

If you aren’t willing to wait months (or sometimes years) for FOIA fulfillment, you can always try searching GSA’s Advantage site to find existing government contracts, pricing lists, and the like. Think of GSA as the procurement department of the Federal government, and since many states also purchase off of GSA schedules, this is a great means to find either direct relationships or indirect distributors that carry your competitor’s wares. You can also perform complex searches on State, County or Local sites to gather publicly available information on a wide variety of topics and issues. This one is also painfully easy.

Seriously, That’s It?

Yep, that’s it. I could offer more complex means to an end but this is not spy school and I’m not a lawyer. And trust me – I would guess that 99% of organizations hadn’t thought of how this information could be gathered so cheaply and easily. How do I know that? Because I’m always surprised by the raised eyebrows and “huh”s (followed by frantic note taking) when I describe these two techniques.

What Should I Do Next?

You should ignore this advice completely. Instead you should focus less on your competitors and more on your customers. Any good offering will always stand up to competitive threats and those who spend more effort on understanding others should redouble their efforts on understanding their clients (and themselves). I’m not suggesting that you should be cavalier or myopic in your competitive marketplace. Instead I’ve found that – more often than not – we look elsewhere for answers when they are standing right in front of us.

A Closing Thought

As former CIA counterintelligence officer (and now convicted spy) Aldrich Ames once said:

“Espionage, for the most part, involves finding a person who knows something or has something that you can induce them secretly to give to you. That almost always involves a betrayal of trust.“

Most organizations I know can rationalize their way in and out of any morally ambiguous ground. Maybe by writing this post I’ve contributed to the problem, but what if you think of it instead as a test — now that you know how to do this, should you?

When the dust settles and time passes, it’s up to you to decide if you’re in the business of the betrayal of trust. Like all real life situations, the answer is never as simple as it seems.

In her own words:

“After checking into [my] hotel, I proceeded to the wrong bank of elevators and rode it for awhile before realizing my mistake and getting off. Waiting with me for the next car down was a young guy – early 20s at most – with one arm covered in tattoos, and the other arm gone. Beside him was a canvas tote bag with a large prosthetic arm sticking out.

He was not in uniform; rather, he wore a plain t-shirt, jeans and a baseball cap. I wanted to acknowledge him but hesitated, thinking, “This has to be a war injury. But…what if it isn’t? No, it has to be – why else would a 20-something have such an injury?” Before opening my mouth to ask him about it, he asked me a question. “Ma’am, do you know if you have to turn in your room key?” I said I wasn’t sure but didn’t think so. I asked him if he had served and, when he said yes, I thanked him. He replied, “Oh, thank you, ma’am. It was my pleasure and I served with a smile.”

He took his room key out of his pocket and said, “I hate walking through the lobby with this prosthetic arm, getting stared at.” I said, “Let me do it. It’s the least I can do.” He seemed relieved. I felt humbled.

As I walked to the front desk with his key, I thought to myself, “This is what it is going to mean for us.” “Us,” meaning us Americans. Civilians. Going about our daily lives, we may encounter someone with a visible war injury. My friends who work in the DoD’s Wounded Warrior program have said that wounded veterans don’t want pity from civilian employers and co-workers, but a little patience is helpful. “Soldiers are used to being active and they want to be active again, even if they are injured. They will be active again.”” ~ Emily King

Emily is someone you need to know. She’s the founder of MyMilitaryTransition.com, is a nationally recognized expert on military-to-civilian transitions, spent over a decade with Booz Allen Hamilton in HR strategy and holds a MS in OD and applied behavior science. In short, she’s smart, she understands the problem and has developed a wonderful sense of how to address this systemic issue facing America’s veteran workforce.

Emily recently presented as part of SHRM’s wonderful two-day program, Military Veterans: Transitioning Skills to the New Economy. I applaud SHRM for their work in this area, and as their research shows below, we have a long way to go in educating employers on the benefits that our veterans can bring to their organizations.

But beyond hiring, retention becomes the next key issue, and this is the where Emily’s work really shines. Based on her deep understanding of the differences between military and civilian work culture, she translates civilian culture, expectations and behavioral norms for transitioning military personnel so they experience early and lasting success in the private sector. That’s right – early and lasting success, and this helps bolster the dialogue and understanding between both groups so that veterans succeed as civilians. In turn, organizations accelerate productivity and increase retention among this invaluable segment of the workforce. You really couldn’t ask for anything more.

I’ll leave you with a final thought from Emily King. It was one of the most important lessons she shared and I’d encourage you to truly ponder the meaning of her words. After that, please share your thoughts, comments and stories below. We need to speak more openly about our returning veterans and the challenges associated with their transition into sustainable employment post-service. In my opinion, silence and inaction are simply not an option.

“For those of us civilians who have only experienced war through the media…where we might want to look away, we need to look ahead. Where we want to be silent we need to say thank you. It is only our own discomfort that stands in the way. My encounter today with the young serviceman who had lost his arm showed me a bit about what the war meant for him. Bearing witness to it as we welcome soldiers home is what it means for us.“

This is the longest time between posts in the history of our little blog. If you’re thinking, “This is an outrage!”, I agree completely. So who is to blame for this travesty, this lapse in judgment, this abandonment of an HR community whose path is asunder without the wisdom and guidance of our Zen-like posts? I want names!!

Victims of the empty RSS feed, I present you with the cause of our radio silence – JobAngels.

What is this JobAngels thing and how did it begin?

Rumor has it that my crackling cornflakes whispered an idea to me on the morning of January 29th. It was apparently hard to decipher over their milk-drowned voices, but eventually I could make out their message – “help people find jobs”. Their whole-grained wisdom spread to the world and all were saved. (End scene) Wow. So inspirational!

The real story is this. I was eating breakfast and thinking about the economy. We were in the throws of a debilitating week of job loss announcements and things looked to be worsening in all sectors. I had been spending a bit of time on Twitter and had accumulated about 700 followers, a large percentage of whom are experts and professionals in the HR sector. So I wondered, what if each of those followers helped just one person find a job? Could we actually make a difference? Here’s the original Tweet:

“Was thinking that if each of us helped just 1 person find a job, we could start making a dent in unemployment. You game?”

Where did the name come from?

The response was immediate and overwhelmingly positive. Within several minutes, the discussion evolved to the use of a hashtag to help those in need locate those willing to help on Twitter. But what to call it? A few ideas floated around and then I sent this message on a whim:

“Wish we could come up with a site/plan to link all this positive energy to. How’s #jobangels sound? ”

And thus JobAngels was born. It was literally that simple. This was not rocket science and there was no divine intervention. It was one simple idea that somehow tapped into people’s desire to stop being victims to a seemingly endless stream of angst, depression and relentless negativity. When faced with hundreds of thousands of job losses, it’s easy to feel overwhelmed and helpless. But if the idea is for you to simply aid one person – a friend, a family member, a colleague or a complete stranger – that somehow not only seems possible, it seems probable.

How have people responded?

It has been four months since that original message, and in that time, a movement has begun. In this short period, over 18,000 JobAngels have already assembled across Twitter, LinkedIn and Facebook. Over 500,000 JobAngel messages have been sent across a myriad of online platforms. Angels have donated their time, their networks, their expertise and their hearts to this grassroots initiative (and we are just getting started).

Let me be clear about one thing. JobAngels is not my movement, but it has changed my life. I am blown away by everyday people deciding to step up and aid those in need of employment. This is a chance to truly impact someone’s life and it is amazing to watch the goodwill grow at a time when it’s tempting to thrust your head in the sand.

Please join us if you haven’t already. I’m humbled to be part of this initiative and look forward to hearing your stories of success in the weeks and months to come. Thanks to those of you who have joined thus far and remember, just one Angel can make a world of difference.

NOTE: Five “Guardian Angels” have gone well beyond the call of duty in helping JobAngels become a reality. A warm and heartfelt thanks to Mark Cummuta, Chris Connolly, Deirdre Honner, Charee Klimek and Chris Bailey. Our current and future success would not be possible without their generosity and commitment to this cause. I’d also like to thank Greg Grigoriou of VanPaul Design for creating the JobAngels logo on such short notice.  Coming soon - JobAngels.org.

“The reason for this change is due to the Department’s appropriations act for fiscal year 2009, which prohibits spending funds to operate our new DHS human resources management system.” 

Tim Kaufman of the Federal Times offered a fuller explanation in his article yesterday:

“The final nail in the coffin came Tuesday, when President Bush signed into law a 2009 spending bill for federal agencies that prohibits the department from spending money on the new system. Homeland Security had sought $5 million in fiscal 2009 to fund its performance management system and had hoped to extend the system to 70,000 employees, virtually its entire nonbargaining work force, in the coming year.”

No one denies that competition for key talent and retention of high-performing personnel have been significant obstacles for Federal agencies over the past several years.  With the death of this initiative, the disparity between the antiquated system of Federal pay and modern commercial best practices will grow.  I predict that DHS will continue to lose the people they desperately need, keep the low performers they don’t, and further alienate those who could offer tremendous value to their government and country.  

It’s a simple question of motivation and market parity.  As a result of this action, the public/private divide continues.  In a time calling for increased personal and professional accountability, taking another step backward should not be an option.  Let’s see if the next administration can overhaul the system and keep the conversation going.

Some of the challenges EquaTerra cites are common to most HR departments, both public and private, including:

• Inadequate resources and lack of executive management attention and support that hamper process improvement efforts; 
• An inability to adequately focus on more strategic activities because of competing demands and insufficient resources;
• Ongoing attrition of skilled/affordable employees needed to address these challenges and an overall aging workforce. (pg. 4)

But others are truly public sector centric, such as:

• Competition from the private sector for employees; 
• Diminishing appeal of the public sector “brand” as a means to attract and retain skilled employees;
• More responsibilities than their counterparts of yesteryear as a result of mandates from the Federal Government and public calls for additional services, including homeland security.  (pg. 4)

If you’re still reading and haven’t fully given up hope just yet, you’re probably interested in hearing what the answer is – the big punch-line, the silver bullet shot forth from the blogosphere that offers that dreamy “ah-ha!” moment of infinite clarity and obvious action.  This blog may not have the ultimate answer, but here is some food for thought.  Perhaps the answer lies in the persistence of public sector HR to not take no for an answer.

We asked Glenn Davidson, Managing Director of EquaTerra Public Sector, to comment on how public entities can stretch tight dollars for key initiatives and transformation:

“Be creative; work smarter.  For instance, a marketing/branding strategy for recruitment, retention and driving behavior doesn’t have to be costly.  Look for alternative ways to get access to technology and services, thereby freeing up resources to do other work.”

Neil Reichenberg, Executive Director of IPMA-HR concluded that:

“This study demonstrates the challenges that public sector HR faces in becoming more strategic, especially in a time of diminishing resources. While the study results indicate that progress is being made, the journey is far from over. The HR department needs to develop innovative strategies and tools that will enable them to become leaders in total talent management within their organizations.” (pg. 19)

The underlying implication is that this is not happening.  But in fact, it is…. slowly.  Those who have a vested and external interest in public sector HR are going to continue to saber rattle and cry from the highest rooftops.  Why?  Because there are billions of dollars in services, licensing, consulting, competitive sourcing and the like to be gained if the internal HR functions could simply “get out of their own way”.  

The problem is that this type of change cannot truly exist without those who feel the pain each and every day electing to stop, take stock of their situation and say enough!  This is hard, and scary, and risky, and sometimes career limiting.  But if you don’t try, you frankly have nothing to complain about.  So take action now and let’s keep the conversation going. 

Thanks to James Heintze of American University for his extensive research on the topic. Enjoy your day today everyone and let’s keep the fireworks going! Take it away James:

The act of Congress establishing Fourth of July as a holiday, but without pay, for federal employees and the District of Columbia occurred in 1870. Senator Hannibal Hamlin (Dem. Maine, and previously vice president under Abraham Lincoln) introduced a Senate Bill (referred HR no. 2224), issued through the Committee on the District of Columbia, Forty-first Congress, Session II, on 24 June 1870, and titled “Legal Holidays in the District.” Hamlin presented his rationale for the bill: “There are no legal holidays here, and this bill merely provides for what I think are the legal holidays in every state of the Union.” Apparently there was no opposition to the bill which “was reported to the Senate without amendment; ordered to a third reading, read the third time, and passed.” It was reported in the Congressional Globe, Friday, June 28, 1870, and was printed as Chapter 167:

Be it enacted by the Senate and House of representatives of the United States of America in Congress assembled, that the following days, to wit: the first day of January, commonly called New Year’s day, the fourth day of July, the twenty-fifth day of December, commonly called Christmas day, and any day appointed or recommended by the President of the United States as a day of public fast or thanksgiving, shall be holidays within the District of Columbia, and shall, for all purposes of presenting for payment or acceptance for the maturity and protest, and giving notice of the dishonor of b ills of exchange, bank checks and promissory notes or other negotiable or commercial paper, be treated and considered as is the first day of the week, commonly called Sunday, and all notes, drafts, checks, or other commercial or negotiable paper falling due or maturing on either of said holidays shall be deemed as having matured on the day previous. Approved, June 28, 1870.

On June 29, 1938, by joint resolution of Congress (HJ resolution No. 551; pub. res. no. 127), the Fourth of July was legislated as a Federal holiday with pay for its employees:

Resolved by the Senate and House of representatives of the United States of America in Congress assembled, that hereafter whenever regular employees of the Federal Government whose compensation is fixed at a rate per day, per hour, or on a piece-work basis are relieved or prevented from working solely because of the occurrence of a holiday such as New Year’s Day, Washington’s Birthday, Memorial Day, Fourth of July, Labor Day, Thanksgiving Day, Christmas Day, or any other day declared a holiday by Federal statute or Executive order, or any day on which the departments and establishments of the Government are closed by Executive order, they shall receive the same pay for such days as for other days on which an ordinary day’s work is performed. Section 2. The joint resolution of January 6, 1885 (U.S.C., title 5, sec. 86), and all other laws inconsistent or ion conflict with the provision of this Act are hereby repealed to the extent of such inconsistency or conflict. Approved, June 29, 1938.

On January 14, 1941, it was brought to the attention of Congress by Robert Ramspeck, Chairman, Committee on the Civil Service of the House of Representatives (see 77th Congress, House of Representatives Report No. 532), that the 1938 Federal holiday law failed to specify that employees of the Government of the District of Columbia also have the Fourth of July designated as a holiday with pay. Harry B. Mitchell, president of the United States Civil Service Commission responded back on April 7 that his office, as well as the Bureau of the Budget, had no objection to amending the 1938 law to include District of Columbia employees. On May 13, 1941, a “Holiday Leave for Per Diem Employees of the District of Columbia” amendment was enacted with the following change made to the 1938 law:

In compliance with paragraph 2a of the Rule XIII, of the Rules of the House of Representatives, changes in existing law are shown as follows (present law is in roman and new matter is in italics): (Act of June 29, 1938, 52 Stat. 1246) “That hereafter whenever regular employees of the Federal Government or of the district of Columbia whose compensation is fixed at a rate per day, per hour, or on a piece-work basis are relieved or prevented from working solely because of the occurrence of a holiday, such as New Year’s Day, Washington’s Birthday, Memorial Day, Fourth of July, Labor Day, Armistice Day, Thanksgiving Day, Christmas Day, or any other day declar4ed a holiday by Federal statute or Executive order, or any day on which the departments and establishments of the Government or of the District of Columbia are closed by Executive order, they shall receive the same pay for such days as for other days on which an ordinary day’s work is performed.”

On September 22, 1959, an act was passed by Congress (H.R. 5752, Public Law 86-362) that if the Fourth of July and any other established holiday occurs on a Saturday, “the day immediately preceding such Saturday shall be held and considered to be a legal public holiday, in lieu of such day which so occurs on such Saturday, (A) for such officers and employees whose basic workweek is Monday through Friday, and (B) for the purposes of section 205 (d) of the Annual and Sick Leave Act of 1951 (65 Stat. 681), as amended (5 U.S.C. 2064 (d)). The act also provided for a day of release for employees “whose basic workweek is other than Monday through Friday.”  (James Heintze, American University)

Inflexion would ask that you take 5 minutes to complete our short poll of views.  We will apply the findings from this survey to our broader research initiative comprising profiles and comparisons of over twenty-five leading HRPOs.  Your voice is critical to the success of this groundbreaking study and we thank you in advance for your participation. 

Should any questions or comments arise, please email us at research@inflexionadvisors.com.  Let’s keep the conversation (and industry innovation) going.

“OPM issued a stop work order for the implementation of the calculation engine, one of the three components of the modernization project known as RetireEZ.  In addition to the stop work order, OPM issued a show cause notice to Hewitt giving them 10 calendar days to respond to the performance issues OPM raised.” (OPM)

Commenting on the stop work order, a former OPM employee stated:

“I know that testing of RetireEZ has been going badly.  What Hewitt was trying to do was take an off-the-shelf program and squeeze the government computations out of that.” (GovExec)

A Hewitt spokesperson responded by stating:

“We successfully delivered on our first live date with OPM on Feb. 25, 2008 and as of the date of the stop work order, we were on track to deliver on successive dates as required by our contract.” (GovExec)

Director Linda Springer announced Wave 1 of RetireEZ on her desk page, and on February 25th, approximately 26,000 active employees from the GSA, OPM, National Archives and other agencies went live with the system.  All federal employees were to have been transferred to the system by February of 2009.  It is unclear how the stop work order will effect this timeline, with OPM conveying that the data conversion and change management portions of the project are continuing unabated.  RetireEZ’s home page states that the site is currently down for maintenance.

Let’s keep the conversation going.

Today’s guest post is authored by Chris Connolly, Director of Client Services for Convergys Employee Care.  Chris is a long-time advocate of alternative work schedules (and an extremely bright guy).  If you have questions or comments, Chris can be reached directly at chris.connolly@convergys.com.  Take it away Chris!

Filling my tank near the Kennedy Center in Washington, DC this past weekend, I waited nervously as the $4.25/gallon offering approached a $100 total.  I never thought I would worry about the credit limit on my Exxon Card, and I swear that just last week I could count “one-Mississippi” while the digits on the meter clicked off $1 increments…I fear those days are gone.

Having a little time to contemplate this situation, I began wondering when gas stations might start offering a fourth payment option at the pump: Cash, Debit, Credit or Hedge (i.e, pre-purchase X gallons of premium for $3.25 a gallon and draw down from this purchase over the next year).  Thinking I might have stumbled onto a million dollar idea, I  went home and performed the obligatory Google search only to find out that others had beaten me to the concept:  

• Chrysler is offering a program called “Refuel America” which locks in the price of unleaded at $2.99 for three years if you purchase a “qualifying (read slow-moving-gas-guzzler) vehicle”.   
• Also check out the Gasoline Price Protection Program (G3P) concept at the WTLTrading blog.

But back to the issue you raised Mark.  I am hopeful that employees and employers can discover opportunity in the energy and economic challenges that we face today.   The impact of fuel prices on the average commuter may help produce the momentum to bust through the paradigm that we’ve been stuck in for over 40 years.  Rather than waiting for the oil companies to discover new supplies, build more refining capacity, or offer “incentives” to pre-purchase their highly profitable commodity, employees might start asking their employers for the option of an alternative work environment (aka work-at-home and/or telecommuting).  If you want to begin developing a business case for reducing your commuting expenses,  check out the calculators at the following sites:

• Arlington County VA’s “Car-Free Diet” calculator
• Commute Solution’s “True Cost of Driving” calculator

Both tools demonstrate how an average commuter can save several thousand dollars per year by working at home just one day per week.  Many states (Virginia being one) offer significant incentives to businesses for developing and deploying telework/alternative work site solutions.  The reduced demand on highways and other municipal infrastructure helps subsidize these government incentives.  The benefits to employees, taxpayers, employers and the environment could be significant if we begin to approach our daily commute less as a requirement and more as a choice.  Let’s explore the alternatives.  

Welcome to May of 2008.  The average price of gas is $3.75 per gallon.  Oil is $126 a barrel.  And consumer confidence?  According to Director Lynn Franco of the Conference Board’s Consumer Research Center, April’s Consumer Confidence Index was anything but groovy:

“This month’s decline in Consumer Confidence was the result of yet another sharp decline in the Present Situation Index. This continued weakening suggests that not only has the feeble level of growth in the first quarter spilled over into the second quarter, but that economic conditions may have slowed even further. And, not only are lackluster business and job conditions eroding confidence, but rising gasoline prices are undoubtedly heightening concerns… Looking ahead, consumers’ outlook for the economy, the job market and their income prospects remains quite pessimistic and little changed from last month. Or, in other words, the glass remains half empty.”

So now you’re saying to yourself, “Thanks Mark!  Great start to my Monday morning.  Real uplifting stuff.”  Sorry about that.  But here’s the good news – many employers have been heeding the cry for relief by deploying alternative work schedules (AWS).  

• Saving Energy: Marion County (Florida) just approved a 4-day work week measure, which by their estimates will save about $250,000 in electricity through the remainder of 2008.  
• Saving Oil: Calculations by energy site The Oil Drum estimate that taking one commute day off the books would save about 8.3 million barrels of oil.  
• Saving Employees: If you want to take this idea to the fullest, embrace the work of CultureRx and their Results-Only Work Environment (ROWE), which declined voluntary turnover rates by 90%.

All good stuff, but what do the academics have to say about AWS?  According to the Sloan Work and Family Research Network (Boston College):

• Fifty percent of employees who have high access to flexible work arrangements on the job report high levels of life satisfaction (Bond, Thompson, Galinsky, & Prottas, 2002, p. 39).
• According to the National Study of the Changing Workforce, “employees who have more access to flexible work arrangements report fewer mental health problems” (BTG&P, p. 39).
• 32% of wage and salaried workers with high availability of flexible work arrangements report no interference of job and family life (BTG&P, p. 38).
• 34% of wage and salaried employees who have high access to flexible work arrangement report “low levels of negative spillover from job to home” (BTG&P, p. 39).

So If you have AWS policies, it may be time to dust them off and begin to promote their utilization.  If you don’t, look to a variety of sources (including the Office of Personnel Management) for assistance.  At a time when employees need to look to their employers for solutions, taking this proactive and empathetic step can make all the difference.

Let’s keep the conversation going.