Recruiting: Five Questions for CEOs

Posted on May 6, 2013 by John G. Self

“At most companies, people spend 2 percent of their time recruiting and 75 percent managing their recruiting mistakes.” – Richard Fairbank, CEO at Capital One, Forbes Magazine, April 2013.

Over the next five to seven years, as the healthcare industry faces a tsunami of change/transformation, an organization’s success or failure will turn on the quality of their employees and flawless execution.

CEOs who get caught up with big picture strategy options – Accountable Care Organizations, patient-centered medical homes, mergers, and acquisitions – at the expense of talent acquisition, development and retention do so at their own peril. In fact, you could make the case that an organization that fails to find, train and retain the best available talent – the “A” candidates – runs the risk of significant losses and, ultimately, business failure.

Here are five critical questions CEOs should consider to avoid career destroying mistakes:

Own the recruiting process – The great CEOs in modern business history will say that a big part of their success is driven by their focus on people – finding, recruiting, developing and retaining the best employees. How much time do you spend on recruiting/talent acquisition and training – 50 to 70 percent of your time?
Know your recruiting brand – Healthcare providers cannot attract and retain the best talent if their reputational brand stinks. How do potential employees see you in the market? Are the top candidates lining up to work for your business? What is your turnover rate? How many EEOC complaints are pending? Do your recruiters treat candidates with respect? Do they communicate effectively? Do you tolerate bad behavior from key executives and clinical leaders because of their perceived importance? What are you doing to ensure your brand says and means “employer of choice”?
How does your internal recruiting team perform? – Did you terminate your relationship with external recruiters because you wanted to improve the quality of the candidates, or to cut costs? Most CEOs will say “yes” to both questions. The fact is that many get stuck focusing on costs, as evidenced by onerous performance metrics that penalize recruiters who take too long to find the best talent. Metrics are important, but the real measure of successful recruiting is in the number of “A” candidates you interview and hire. Are your recruiters “A” quality or are they nice people content with filling job orders?
Do you have a best-of-breed management succession plan at the manager/director level as well as the C-suite? – While there is enormous reluctance among many healthcare executives to engage in succession planning in the executive office, one of the other threats is management turnover at the Department Director or Manager level. This is where success or failure is achieved – managing the day-to-day operations. Executives who fail to acknowledge this immutable truth will be career limited sooner than later. Are you really prepared for management and executive turnover with an up to date plan?
Do you have a sense of urgency? – Change is coming. When the full effects of reform hit, will you have the best people in place? If you wait, it will be too late. Finding the top talent requires a sense of urgency and a highly competitive spirit. If your competitors are smart, they are already sizing up your top performers. When you are recruiting an “A” candidate, you must instill a sense of urgency with the recruiting team. Do you allow endless meetings and scheduling conflicts to delay your recruiting process? What is more important, finding top talent or attending another unrelated meeting at which nothing is decided?

Abandoned But Still Relevant

Posted on March 22, 2013 by John G. Self

I just had a senior moment. Not the kind associated with old age with an ever so slight hint at forgetfulness or, worse, the earliest stages of dementia, but a real honest to goodness meet up with the inescapable fact that I am now a “gentleman of a certain age.”

It happened as I was thumbing through the Brooks Brothers spring catalog that arrived in the mail. The cover notwithstanding, at page two I dropped the magazine in shock — none of the models looked like me. They were thin with a hint of European ancestry, one with a rangy beard and flowing locks could have been a Russian Oligarch. He was pictured with an exotic looking woman. None were wearing clothes that remotely resemble the Brooks Brothers fashion I have worn for years. Gone were the familiar older models, people like me, displaying an elegant sport coat or pinstripe suit. No, this catalog was filled mostly with hip, extra slim fashions that, in years past, would have drawn disapproving stares in the elite so-called white shoe, very conservative law firms, banks or search firms of New York where Brooks Brothers earned its reputation as the clothier to the business elite.

Over the last five years I have noticed that the inventory at my Brooks Brothers store in Dallas was changing, featuring more and more of the stylish slim cut shirts, and sleek trim slacks, sans pleats, all at the expense of the more traditional fitting attire that men of my age require. I was being forced to buy more and more on-line instead of seeing my old friends at the store. And now this spring catalog! I feel as though the abandonment is now complete.

My senior moment led me to realize that not only is Brooks Brothers changing but so are all the rules of career and personal brand management, providing mature executives across America with their own senior moments as I learned at the annual American College of Healthcare Executives Congress last week.

More than a few senior executives privately say they are facing doubts about their own relevance in a rapidly changing environment – shaped by the Affordable Care Act, the future negative impact of deficit reduction, a constant onslaught of new technology and cutting edge connectivity tools, and the approaching tidal wave of bright, well-educated executives eager to move to the C-suite. Many have hinted, or expressed specific concerns, that the speed of change is causing them to question whether they can keep up the pace.

OK, so I am no longer an exclusive Brooks Brothers customer. It is not the end of the world. The tailors at the Neiman Marcus flagship store in Dallas, many who look like me, seem to understand my angst and they have assured me that all is really OK.

Amid the flurry of senior moments, I would encourage current and future senior executives to keep these points in mind:

Be Kind, Be Gracious – There is nothing more attractive than a successful executive who takes the high ground, one of the best, most rewarding places to be. Talented, competent leaders with a solid track record who are also nice and gracious leaders are absolutely golden. They are the type of leaders that recruiters covet.
Don’t Feel or Act Threatened – The only leaders who should feel threatened by technology, their age, level of energy or the competition for the best jobs, are those who have not embraced change. For those who think they can coast into retirement, a bad surprise is probably right around the corner. In my own case, I have learned more in the last five years than the previous 15. I am fascinated and excited by the technology and the possibilities created by our ever-increasing connectivity. I have a social media consultant and I have embraced the various social networking platforms. Meanwhile, I have come to admire many of today’s popular musicians even if I cannot wear the slim fit suits and straight legged jeans of their younger fans. Many of my contemporaries roll their eyes in wonder, amazement or skepticism when they ask about the music mix I am listening to, but it works for me and it helps me keep connected with a new generation of clients. (I recently had my first search with a panel comprised of under-35 candidates and I was reminded, repeatedly, that texting is the new voicemail).
Embrace Change and Technology, If Not Jay Z – Unless you are in the most secure of positions, with an attractive guaranteed severance plan that will allow you to flow into retirement without skipping a financial beat, brand and career management remain a strategic imperative. Technology and the connectivity offered by the social networking platforms as well as YouTube, provide competent executives with exciting and empowering tools to manage their brand and overcome the traditional market filters of web-based employment portals, job boards and, yes, search firms. Smart companies hire people who can deliver results – value. Most avoid candidates – regardless of age – who by their appearance, presence and resume appear out of date and out of sync.

Moral of the story: Your age should not be an issue unless you allow it to become one. I am having more fun, with greater intellectual reward than at any time in my career.

The younger guys will have to run a little faster if they want to catch me, but that might be kind of difficult in those body-clinging new suits.

OK, I apologize. That was not so gracious.

If Only I Had Known

Posted on January 25, 2013 by John G. Self

One summer, my life changed.

At the time it seemed only like a change in plans, but I was wrong.

I remember the events that altered my life and social position as if it were yesterday. The month was May. The year, 1965. President Johnson was in office, Vietnam was raging and student unrest was rising. The place was Tyler, Texas, a sleepy beautiful little city about 120 miles east of Dallas where my dad operated a very successful retail bakery. Our only exposure to the turmoil and protest that was brewing in Asia and on college campuses was when we watched Walter Cronkite report the evening news. Most of Tyler’s residents were still in shock that Sen. Goldwater had lost to Mr. Johnson.

It was a beautiful spring and I was looking forward to a summer of rest and relaxation before making the big step to high school.

Tyler was — it is — a very social little city. In the 1960s, your dad’s profession, the country club and dinner club to which your parents belonged, even where you went to church, defined your level of coolness and popularity, in contrast with the rest of us, the unwashed masses. They were the insiders, and we were, in effect, outside, looking in. This East Texas caste system defined who you dated and on Friday nights it dictated what you did and who you did it with.

Suddenly my sense of order was thrown into chaos. Some of the cool kids asked me if I wanted to join them at a friend’s lake house (read: lake swankienda) for swimming, boating, skiing and, I had been told confidentially, access to beer. Even better, I was assured that one of the cool girls, with whom I was smitten, would be in the group.

Wow. I had arrived. My life hereafter, I reasoned, would be perfect because I had been invited into the coolness club.

Two days before the school term ended, two days before boating, skiing, female companionship and, yes, the possibility of beer, my father entered the picture. “What do you have planned for the summer,” he asked nonchalantly. Well, I could hardly contain myself. The cool kids, I explained, had included me; they had invited me to join them for fun times at Lake Tyler. I did explain that this girl I really liked would be there but I conveniently left out the part about the beer.

“Well, we have an issue,” he began. What? An issue? My future life of perfection—social elevation—flashed before my eyes. “The porter quit today and I am going to need you to fill in until I can find a replacement.” This was a hot job; pots and pans had to be washed, floors scrubbed and work benches and equipment to be cleaned. No smart kid would take this kind of job in the summer. He knew it and I knew it.

My goose was cooked, my life changed. My summer of relaxation and trying to learn about membership in the cool group was now a train wreck.

That night, as I lay in bed feeling more than a little sorry for myself, I had another crushing realization. There would be no future summers of rest and relaxation. I would spend the rest of my life working during the summers, earning money for college and, after college; I would spend summers making a living to provide for a family.

It hit me like a ton of bricks, crushing my already bruised sense of importance, that the previous summer, a couple of months of lying around reading, playing baseball and goofing off, was the last truly free time I would have in my life.

If I had only known that, I thought, I would have not taken it for granted. I would have savored it every day.