Review of the book "Lead Well and Prosper"

I was recently contacted by Nick McCormick, author of the book Lead Well and Prosper, and was asked to review his book on my blog. I love to read business related books, especially ones that are focused on the topic of leadership, so I was pleased to accept the request.

Lead Well and Prosper is a quick read. It is the kind of business book that you keep on your bookshelf and reference to remind yourself of the core basic fundamentals that leaders need to follow in order to be effective managers. The book also provides helpful tools in the back of the book as good suggestions in how to better maximize effectiveness.

The subjects that are covered in the book are coveted longstanding principals that Mr. McCormick points out as being critical if you are to achieve the status of a "good" manager. He also points out that being a "good" manager will separate you from your peers by virtue of "good" managers being few and far between.

There is a management practice or principal covered in the book that will speak to each individual. One such topic that I personally am completely on the same page as Mr. McCormick and feel that in today's business world more leaders need to follow is in Chapter 5, which is titled “Listen.” In today's business world, all too often the art of listening and paying attention has been pushed aside for the "art" of multitasking. Have we as leaders forgotten that as much as 70% of all communication is in fact listening? Mr. McCormick reminds us in his book that we should be giving our team members our undivided attention and that bringing a laptop to a meeting or answering your phone when you have a team member in your office are both leadership errors. In Mr. McCormick's words, these types of actions will lead to members of your team shutting down and not coming back to you when they have quality ideas that they would like to pitch to you, which include the ones to which you could add greater value. I could not agree more! Again, this is just one example of the "15 successful strategies for becoming a good manager" that Mr. McCormick covers in his book.

Pick this book up once a quarter and take it to lunch in order to get a good refresher and to ensure that you are executing the basics well. It is an investment of your time that will be well worth the effort.

Thanks again to Nick McCormick for the offer to read and write about my experience with his book titled Lead Well and Prosper. I wish him all the best in his future writing endeavors!

Boomer... Wiser Worker

There has been a lot written over the last year about the emerging need among employers to tap into older workers as a resource to fill positions that require skilled labor. You do not have to look beyond the Boomer generation to understand this phenomenon. The Boomers, who represent the largest generation, are beginning to exit the workforce. Boomers are folks that were born between 1946 and 1964. They represent the most populous generation in the United State's history. When they begin leaving the workforce in masses, they are going to leave a big void in the workforce, and we are all going to feel it. Even in the face of a recession, it would be wise for employers who have or anticipate having a need for skilled labor to start figuring out how to tap into the Boomer generation. The Boomer generation has greatly influenced our culture and will end up being the generation that redefines what retirement means in America.

Okay, so we know this need is coming. So how can employers begin to tap into this valuable, skilled labor force. First of all you have to know what is important to the folks you are trying to recruit. For Boomers this is increasingly not monetary. Priorities for many of these folks are based on flexible work schedules, quality of life, being able to maintain benefits, etc. Many of these individuals will only want to work part-time. That being said, you can also expect that they will only be working in jobs or fields that they enjoy.

How would you define an older worker? Is it someone 40 or older? Does someone become an older worker at 50? One third of the workforce in America will be 50 or older by 2010. How about 55? Share your feedback with me via a comment. I have read that 50 is the new 40 and that 40 is the new 30. The Age Discrimination in Employment Act of 1967 (ADEA) protects individuals 40 years of age or older from age discrimination. If the Fed recognizes that age discrimination begins at the age of 40, is that the age by which companies should gauge their older worker recruitment strategies? If 50 is the new 40, maybe Uncle Sam needs to update this bit of legislation.

We at The Employment Guide invite you to check out our newest job board designed for the "Boomer" or "Wiser Worker." Despite the fact that this demographic represents the fastest growing segment of online users, there are only a few other job boards out there as of today that target this valuable audience. We invite you to check out our latest offering http://www.wiserworker.com/ which is live for indexing purposes but has yet to officially launch to the masses (that is coming shortly). Be sure to let us know what you think. Thanks!

Webformation

Can you trust the internet for accurate information? Is the news, blog posts, site statistics, etc., that you access via the internet really accurate? As more and more people turn to the internet as a source of information, I think it is wise as a business to make sure that the information reported in directories or sites reporting analytics are accurate. Decision makers, current customers and your prospects are increasingly leaning on the internet and these kinds of resources to find out more about your business in order to make a decision if they want to do business with you or not. Using our business, here are some good examples of what I would consider the "misinformation" of the "webformation" (I think I just created a new word) aspect of the internet.

Let me give you my definition of my new word: Webformation (somebody call Webster's) is information that is aggregated or posted on websites from resources or from users about a person, organization, object, event, etc., that has no responsibility for the item being reported on and through the process of how it is compiled will always be understood to have a percentage of incorrect or misguiding information. Let's call it 90% accurate. Based on my experience that seems about right.

1. One of our newest products HealthCareerWeb.com is reported on Compete.com as being owned by a health care company in Albany, New York.

2. Here is a good example of information that is wrong about the Employment Guide and EmploymentGuide.com piece of our business on AboutUs.com.

3. There is even outdated information about our organization listed on Alexa.com.

So whose responsibility is it to make sure this information is accurate and up to date? Does that responsibility fall on the shoulders of those who are monetizing the information or on the business on which they are reporting? In my opinion it makes great sense for you (if you have the time and the resources) to keep an eye on this kind of information about your business so you can keep it updated. Unfortunately for smaller businesses this might not be the case so you might have to look to outside resources to make sure your "webformation" is accurate. This can even be hard for a large organization to keep track of, obviously, given that we need to stay on top of this (falling on my own sword here) and we have internal resources.

So back to my earlier question, whose responsibility is it to make sure this information is accurate? In my opinion, I say follow the money and whoever is monetizing the information on the site is responsible for making sure that the content is up-to-date and accurate. What do you think?

Now, I must end this blog so I can go back to work directing our efforts in updating our organization's "webformation." What a great use of my time!