Posts Tagged ‘retention’

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Do You Want To Work With An IT Trophy Kid?

Thursday, March 5th, 2009
Are You Ready To Have The Millennial Generation In Your IT Department?

Are You Ready To Have The Millennial Generation In Your IT Department?

Even though the world currently looks like it is upside down, there is a much larger change going on that will have a much longer impact than this temporary financial crisis: the arrival of the millennial generation into the IT workplace. Are you ready?

Just to make sure that we’re all talking about the same thing here, the millennial generation were born between 1980 and 2001. With the baby boomer generation getting ready to walk off into the sunset, the millennials are the new kids in town and they are getting ready to shake things up.

Ron Alsop who writes for the Wall Street Journal has taken some time to study what this arrival means for all of us and he’s written a book with his answers in it called The Trophy Kids Grow Up: How the Millennial Generation is Shaking Up the Workplace. He’s discovered some eye-opening things that all IT Leaders need to be aware of.

If we had to describe the millennial generation’s view of work, the word that everyone seems to use is “entitled” – they want it all and they want it now. What are they asking for? How about: higher pay, flexible hours, promotions within a year, and more vacation/personal time. Why do they think that they’ll get it? Studies show that nearly half of the millennials have a “…moderate to high superiority beliefs about themselves.”

What’s up with these guys / gals? Where did all of this come from? Blame it on the parents (and teachers and coaches). This is the generation that was constantly told that they were the best, the ones that got trophies even when they didn’t win, and were rarly criticized in order to not damage their self-esteem. Now they are in your IT department…!

But hold on. Remember that the millennials have a solid grasp of cutting edge technology – it is a part of their life outside of work. They tend to work very well in teams and they get along well with baby boomers because they remind them so much of their own parents.

These are hard workers who will get the job done as long as an IT Leader points them in the right direction. How best to do that will be covered in another post…

Do you have millennials in your IT workplace (are you one of them)? How is is it going so far – smooth running or choppy waters? Do you feel that their (your) expectations are in line with what the company can offer? When the economy improves, do you think that they’ll stick around or will they leave? Leave me a comment and let me know what you are thinking.

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So IT Leader, Are You Thinking About Getting An Executive MBA…?

Thursday, February 19th, 2009

Does An IT Leader Need An Executive MBA?

Does An IT Leader Need An Executive MBA?

As the world’s economy continues to shudder, everyone in IT is scrambling to find ways to make themselves more valuable to both their current employer as well as to their next employer (if needed). For a long time, getting an MBA has been an option that many IT Leaders have considered. The big drawback has always been the amount of time that this degree requires – on top of all of your other responsibilities. It turns out that there is another option: the executive MBA.

I guess a good question to start off with is how does an executive MBA differ from a “regular” MBA? An executive MBA generally meets every other weekend for two full days – Friday and Saturday. Students generally travel to campus to participate in classes. While not in class, remotely located students collaborate to complete class assignments.

There’s also the issue of time: an executive MBA generally takes two years from start to finish. If you are working and choose to participate in a regular MBA, there’s a good chance that it will end up taking you longer to complete your degree as you take one or two classes a semester.

Where to go is the big question if you choose to pursue an executive MBA. There are a lot of executive MBA programs out there and because they are such a profit center for universities, they are all marketed heavily. Thankfully the folks over at the Wall Street Journal have taken the time to conduct a survey and they’ve found the best places for an IT Leader to go.

Just how do you go about ranking executive MBA programs? Well over at the WSJ they decided to go about doing it based on multiple criteria. The most important factor that they chose was how corporations viewed the programs – I mean you’re really getting the degree to boost your marketability, right? Next came how students in the program actually felt about the program. Finally, the value of what they were being taught was factored in.

So who won? Here’s the ranking of the top 10 executive MBA programs as computed by the Wall Street Journal:

  1. Northwestern University (Kellogg)
  2. University of Pennsylvania (Wharton)
  3. Thunderbird School of Global Management
  4. University of Southern California (Marshall)
  5. University of North Carolina (Kenan-Flagler)
  6. University of Michigan (Ross)
  7. Cornell University (Johnson)
  8. Columbia University (NY Program)
  9. University of Chicago
  10. Duke University (Fuqua)

So what do YOU need to consider if you are thinking about enrolling in an executive MBA program above and beyond which program ranks the highest? One interesting point is just how much this is going to cost.

The executive MBA programs that were reviewed by the Wall Street Journal cost between $65,000 and $160,000 just in tuition (books, travel, etc. would all be extra). Since lots of students work for firms that pay all/part of the cost of the program, the median out-of-pocket cost turned out to be something like $45,000. Of course then there’s the issue of travel…

In the survey, 64% of the executive MBA students traveled less than 50 miles to go to school which means most of them are local to the school. However 7% traveled up to 200 miles and 9% traveled more than 1,000 miles.

In the end, the big question is if this is all worth it? Once again we can go back to the survey to find out. 24% of those students surveyed said that they had been given a both a raise and a promotion since they started executive MBA classes. Another 30% said that they expect both in the next year.

So what do you think: is an executive MBA the way to go or is a regular MBA better? Do you think that getting an MBA would be worth $45,000+? Could you stay at your current company or would you have to leave once you got your degree? Leave me a comment and let me know what you are thinking.

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Posted in MBA | 3 Comments »

Are IT Managers Afraid Of Commitment? Employees Speak Up.

Friday, February 6th, 2009
If IT Leaders Want To Retain Staff, Then They Need To Make A Commitment

If IT Leaders Want To Retain Staff, Then They Need To Make A Commitment

An IT department does not consist of just a bunch of servers and some cabling. It’s really made up of bright, talented people who know a lot about how servers, networks, and applications can be used to propel a business forward. However, not every company and not every IT manager treats their staff the same way – do you think that that matters?

The real question here is how committed to their staff are companies and IT Leaders. Are the members of your team actual people or are they just resources that can be downsized or replaced at any time. In fact, does it really matter which way you choose to look at them?

The good folks over at CIO Insite did a survey of IT Executives awhile back and they uncovered some interesting discoveries.

Quite obviously, not all IT departments are created equal. It turns out that in the foreseeable future most of the hiring is going to be done by small and midsized companies. Given the current economic climate, that’s good news. The other side of the coin is reflected by the larger IT shops which indicated that they will be reducing their IT staff (this includes IBM, Microsoft, and Yahoo).

Where things get interesting is when you take a closer look at who the firms that will be hiring are looking for. They want business analysts, systems integrators, networking staff, and web designers. These appear to be the place to be in IT!

But back to our original topic – what does it take for an IT Leader to get the people that he/she hires to stick around? The CIO Insight survey revealed that just paying more is not enough. It turns out that what you have to do is to place organizational development up at the center of your IT recruiting and retention strategy.

In simple words, what this means is that in order to get your IT workers to stay, you’ve got to offer them things that they want like job security or  work/life balance. Now an important point here is that when I say “job security”, I don’t mean offering a job for life (unless you are at Toyota). Instead, what I’m talking about is having the company invest in the employee and having them develop skills that will serve them well in this job or in their next one.

In order to find out how to keep IT employees, you first have to understand why they leave. The IT Executives surveyed said that staff left for the following reasons:

  • better pay / benefits
  • opportunity to learn new skills
  • reduced commute time
  • to work at home or set own work hours

Knowing this, then what can an IT Leader do to get employees to stay? Focusing on improving every employee’s work / life balance is a good place for a company and a leader to start. Keep in mind that the benefits that do the most to boost employee retention are the ones that provide long-term financial and career security.

What have you found keeps you and your staff working at the same company? Why do people seem to leave your company? Why do new employees join your company? What changes do you think should be made to get more people to stay? Leave me a comment and let me know what you are thinking.

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Mirrror, Mirror On The Wall, Who’s The Best IT Manager Of All?

Friday, January 2nd, 2009
It Turns Out That An IT Leader's Emotions Are Often Reflected By Your Staff

It Turns Out That An IT Leader's Emotions Are Often Reflected By Your Staff

Those boys who get locked up and do work on behavior neuroscience continue to come up with new and interesting discoveries all the time.  This time around they’ve made a stunning discovery that will have a long lasting impact on how IT managers do their job. Do I have your interest yet?

Daniel Goleman and Richard Boyatzis have written an article in the Harvard Business Review in which they describe what’s been going on in the world of neuroscience. Neuroscientists have discovered something called “mirror neurons” that are spread out all over our brains. Our brains have lots and lots of neurons. This newly discovered type appear to mimic (or “mirror”) what someone else is doing.

These neurons were discovered by Italian neuroscientists who were studying one particular type of cell in a monkey’s brain. This cell only fired when the monkey raised its arm. One day an assistant in the lab raised some food to his mouth and the cell in the monkey fired.

What this all means is that when we detect someone’s (consciously or unconsciously) emotions by observing their actions, these newly discovered mirror neurons reproduce the emotions that we believe that they are feeling. Taken all together, these neurons allow us to create a virtually instant sense of having a shared experience.

Why do we care about all of this brain stuff? It’s the key to being a great IT leader. It turns out that your emotions and your actions are what your department / team are going to be mirroring. If you can activate the mirror neurons in those who are following you, then you will have tapped into a very powerful force.

Additional studies that have been done on groups to measure the effects of activating these neurons has revealed even more. It turns out that when you are addressing your department / team, HOW you communicate is much more important than WHAT you communicate.

This means that if you want to get the best performance out of your team, you need to be demanding (of course) but do in in such a way that creates a happy positive mood in you team. This is all based on the simple fact that when your people feel better, then you’ll get better performance out of them.

Which now brings us to the subject of laughter. I’m not talking about having your team laugh at you (they may already be doing this). Instead, I’m talking about how often you get your team to laugh with you. Studies have shown that the best IT leaders got their employees to laugh on average three times as often as did midperforming IT leaders.

When you are in a good mood, this helps the people who work with and for you to both take in the information that you are providing as well as react quicker and with more creativity.

How often do you make your team members laugh? Have you found that your emotions cause your team to feel the same way that you do? Do you often find yourself feeling the same way that your boss is feeling? Leave me a comment and let me know what you are thinking.

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IT Leaders Have Two Of These But Do They Use Them?

Wednesday, October 1st, 2008
You Should Be Listening Twice As Much As You Talk!

You Should Be Listening Twice As Much As You Talk!

About a year ago I had a chance to sit down with a member of an IT team that was working for me in order to have a heart-to-heart with him. We’ll call him Tim. Tim was a project manager on one of my teams and so far he had been a steady performer. I’d say that he was strong on the analytical side and soft on the interpersonal side; however, he was doing a good job and I had really had no complaints on his performance. Recently, things had changed with Tim. His whole demeanor had been transformed as a deep depression seemed to both surround him and flow off of him and onto anyone that he interacted with. It had gotten so bad that nobody really wanted to have anything to do with him. Clearly this was having an impact on his ability to do his job. It was time for me to step in and see what I could do.

I took Tim with me down to the cafeteria in order to get him into a neutral location. I started my conversation with him by explaining that I had been pleased with his work up until recently. I told him that it sure seemed like something had changed and I needed to find out what it was because things couldn’t continue like they were. Tim initially said exactly what you’d expect a guy to say: “Nothing’s wrong.” I thought about opening up on him with both barrels – look, he was doing a lousy job and he was going to be out the door if he didn’t shape up. However, I knew better and so I kept gently probing. Finally, Tim got around to saying “I hate my Director.” Once again, my gut reaction was to tell him “Too bad, he’s not leaving so you had better make some changes.” However, somehow I was able to hold my tongue and instead said the three most important words that an IT Leader can say “Tell Me More…”

Tim started telling me the standard things that everyone says about their boss behind their backs “He doesn’t give clear instructions, he changes his mind too often, he’s never around when I need to talk to him, etc.” This is regular stuff – not enough to cause such a change in personality. So I went on and said “What else has happened lately?” This finally got Tim to confess everything. In a staff meeting, his boss had found some errors in some slides that Tim had prepared showing the status of the project and had called him out on it in front of the rest of the department. Given Tim’s personality, this was just about the worst thing that anyone could do to him. He was wounded and still sulking several weeks after the event. Bingo! We had our smoking gun.

This was a problem that I could (and did) fix rather easily. That’s not the point of this posting. Rather, my first reactions as Tim’s story unfolded would have been the wrong ones to act on and if I had, then I would have ended up doing a great deal of damage and not fixing the problem. I guess that’s why we all have two ears and just one mouth.

David Benzel is an author and a speaker and he points out that as IT Leaders we all have four main responsibilities when it comes to communicating with our IT teams:

  1. To listen
  2. To get the facts
  3. To determine the problem
  4. To help resolve the situation

As hard as it is to do, listening is both an art and a science that all of us IT Leaders need to get better at doing. Listening is hard to do because it requires you to focus your attention and use your full brain to process what is being said – no multi-tasking allowed! By keeping your mouth shut and your ears open, you allow your staff to do the talking and when they do that, you will learn amazing things.

Have you ever been in a situation in which you spoke too soon without doing enough listening? What happened when you did this? Have you ever seen someone who was a good listener at work? How did people respond to them? Were they more or less effective at their jobs than their peers? Leave a comment and let me know what you are thinking.

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Posted in IT manager, soft skills | 3 Comments »

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