Working Thoughts

Awards, when they are genuine and sincere, they are highly motivating

2010-03-13T21:35:00Z

Last weekend was the Academy Awards and I don't normally watch them, but little else was on so I flipped around and found myself taking it in. The Oscars are probably the most popular awards on the planet. There are others like the Nobel prize that are also well known, but Hollywood's reach is stronger than nuclear physics.

The stage welcomed one show biz magician after another and each was humble and overjoyed. There is nothing like earnest gratitude. And that's the thing with awards, when they are genuine and sincere, they are highly motivating. Recognition by ones peers is rewarding a powerful reward. We are social beings after all.

Awards are often overlooked as a source of motivation. Dan Pink calls them out in his book Drive and I ran across a paper written by Bruno S. Frey and Susanne Neckermann called Awards: A Disregarded Source of Motivation which talks about different aspects of Awards. One note I jotted down was that people value status independently of any monetary consequence. Why this is important is because in a rational - yet fictional - world rewards can be viewed as amounting to future compensention, but the statement argues against that. The authors did a review of the International Who's Who to see how they stack up in terms of awards. They chose an international list because awards are not unique to any particular culture. Their findings are that awards are central to business, academia, and the military, and not solely the province of monarchies. Perhaps that goes without saying, but it moves the dial toward understanding the major task of more closely analyzing the incentive properties of awards and to compare them to monetary payments.

Side note: Calem R. Hoffman, a gentleman from my high school, was recognized for his dissertation describing the investigation of neutron-rich isotopes at the dripline, and, in particular, for the identification of a systematic reduction in the effective p-sd shell gap, indicating a weakening of the gap as neutrons are added.

Working Thoughts 3/13/09
A Review of The Fearless Fish Out of Water: How to Succeed When You're the Only One Like You

Working Thoughts 3/13/08
Interpersonal Skills and the Brain - a study

Positive Sentiments: Is Hiring Poised to Make a Run?

2010-03-10T03:58:00Z

Manpower, Inc is an employment company that helps Human Resource departments prepare for personnel changes, whether it is hiring or anticipating lay offs. They produce surveys periodically that get the pulse of the work environment. My last post was the jobs report which is a look back in time. The Manpower, Inc survey is future looking. Here are the numbers with some commentary from me:

>18,000 employers surveyed:
73% expect to keep staff levels stable (Considering this number is tying an all time high, I'd say that it is very good news because very few people are going to predict hiring)
16% anticipate an increase in staff levels during the 2nd Quarter of 2010
8% expect a decrease in payrolls (a positive flow of 8% - seasonally adjusted to 5%)

12 of 13 industries are expected to expand hiring in the 2nd quarter of 2010. Those are:
Leisure & Hospitality (+17%) - Summer months
Professional & Business Services (+15%) - In line with the Jobs Report
Mining (+11%)
Nondurable Goods Manufacturing (+9%)
Financial Activities (+9%)
Durable Goods Manufacturing (+8%)
Information (+8%) - This was called out in the Jobs Report as well
Transportation & Utilities (+8%)
Wholesale & Retail Trade (+7%)
Construction (+4%) - This is surprising considering Construction has lagged all other positive news
Other Services (+4%)
Education & Health Services (+3%) - Health Care has been a consistent winner for two plus years
Government (-1%) - The federal level is hiring, but states and local governments are slashing workers because income is severally depressed and balanced budget laws prevent taking too much debt on at this level

Geographical Trends:
Northeast (+8%)
South (+6%)
West (+6%)
Midwest (+4%)

Working Thoughts 3/9/08
The Different Classes in the US
2006 median household earned $48,201
1999 median household earned $49,244

February 2010 Jobs Report and Wages

2010-03-06T04:38:00Z

Here are the job market and compensation numbers for February 2010 (based on the job report):

Net loss of 36,000 jobs in the month

Analysts expected a loss of 68,000

Predictions were all over the place since a winter storm affected the Northeast, possibly impacting survey results

One year ago the US lost 726,000 jobs

December was revised to a loss of 109,000 after reading a loss of 150,000 and originally a loss of 85,000

January was revised to a loss of 26,000 from an original reading of a loss of 20,000

6.1 million people have been jobless for more than 6 months

The first decrease in this number in 14 months

Temporary work, which usually precedes full time employment gains, added 48,000 jobs in February. This is after adding 46,500 jobs in December and 51,000 in January

Last month it appeared that layoffs were flattening out, but now actual hiring is happening

Challenger, Gray & Christmas, an outplacement firm, said that only 42,900 firings were announced in February - best number since 2006

Unemployment rate held at 9.7%

Analysts predicted it would rise to 9.8%

As employment picks up, the labor pool will grow again and the unemployment rate should go up

The unemployment population held at 58.5% - meaning people were not dropping out of the population

The U-6 report, which is a broader group, increased to 16.8%

GDP,which earned its status as an economic indicator for growth in the 1950s, showed a revised annualized gain of 5.9% in the 4th quarter of 2009

PMI, a measure of manufacturing pace, showed a reading of 56.5% (58.4%last month). Anything above 50% means the machines are running

Specific Segment Job numbers:

Manufacturing added 1,000 jobs

Construction lost 64,000 jobs

Retailers lost 400 jobs

Leisure and Hospitality Services grew by 7,000 jobs

Government sector lost 18,000, Federal gains were 7,000

Education and Health Services grew by 32,000 jobs

Health Care and Social Assistance grew by 20,400

Professional and Business Services grew by 51,000

Temporary work added 48,000 jobs in Feb

Wage (can be revised):

The average weekly paycheck (seasonally adjusted) is $626.58, from $629.37

The average hourly earning (seasonally adjusted) is $18.93 - up 3 cents

The average hourly work week rose to 33.1, a drop from 33.3

The snow probably figured into these numbers

Bureau of Labor Statistics

Job Report Stats Summary

In a Service Economy, Make the Experience Good, but the Memory Even Better

2010-03-05T04:32:00Z

The Technology, Entertainment, and Design (TED) conference was last month and I'm reaping the rewards of what appears to be a terrific line up of talks. There are several that grabbed my attention.

Daniel Kahneman is considered the father of behavior psychology - the field Dan Pink recently wrote about in Drive - and he did a great overview of experience versus memory. It's a subtle distinction, but makes perfect sense. Dr. Kahneman describes situations about music and colonoscopies, but the perfect example for me is the movie The Departed. I'm just like anyone else, when I watch a movie I want to be entertained. The Departed was well acted and had a good plot. I clenched my stomach the entire time. But I don't like the movie because of the way it ended. I barely remember 130 of the 151 minutes of it.

My memory of the movie and my experience of the movie are two distinct things. As a businessman, I need to take that to heart. My customers need to have positive memories of the service I provide. It's why so many people push to be 100% perfect in the delivery, because they know a flaw, any flaw, can be remembererd mightily over all the good parts.

A few weeks ago I wrote about understanding your customers in context - 3 minutes before and 3 minutes after they engage with you. It's a good idea to meld the 3 minutes after with a positive memory.

Business, Federal Government, and Exports Carries GDP to 5.9% Growth

2010-02-27T04:18:00Z

Today the Bureau of Economic Analysis (BEA) published a revision to the 2009 4th Quarter Gross Domestic Product (GDP) reading. It was originally estimated to be 5.7% annualized growth, but now reads a surprising 5.9%. This number further cements the recession ended during the summer of 2009 (the third quarter GDP growth grew at a rate of 2.2%).

5.9% growth is a big number for the US, no matter what the year or the circumstances are. But I'm curious as to what is driving it. According to the BEA the major contributors to it are government expenditures, business spending, and exports. Private Consumption, which comprises about 70% of the calculation of GDP (GDP = private consumption + gross investment + government spending + (exports − imports)) accounted for none of the growth though. People are still sitting on the sidelines getting their wallets in order. Business investment shot up as inventories were depleted. This is a good sign.

What strikes me though is how little media attention this got today. I suppose its because a GDP increase without a comparable jobs increase is seen as phantom good news. But jobs always lag GDP. But maybe there is more to it. Many smart people believe measuring this way isn't a real reflection of how the US is doing economically or otherwise. A term called Gross National Product (GNP) was more heavily used at one time and it focused not on geography like GDP does, but on what US owned entities produced, whether it is India, China, or in the US. This measure has somewhat died out because of the rise of foreign outsourcing. I mention it because I ran across this speech by Bobby Kennedy to University of Kansas on March 18th, 1968:

And this is one of the great tasks of leadership for us, as individuals and citizens this year. But even if we act to erase material poverty, there is another greater task, it is to confront the poverty of satisfaction - purpose and dignity - that afflicts us all. Too much and for too long, we seemed to have surrendered personal excellence and community values in the mere accumulation of material things. Our Gross National Product, now, is over $800 billion dollars a year, but that Gross National Product - if we judge the United States of America by that - that Gross National Product counts air pollution and cigarette advertising, and ambulances to clear our highways of carnage. It counts special locks for our doors and the jails for the people who break them. It counts the destruction of the redwood and the loss of our natural wonder in chaotic sprawl. It counts napalm and counts nuclear warheads and armored cars for the police to fight the riots in our cities. It counts Whitman's rifle and Speck's knife, and the television programs which glorify violence in order to sell toys to our children. Yet the gross national product does not allow for the health of our children, the quality of their education or the joy of their play. It does not include the beauty of our poetry or the strength of our marriages, the intelligence of our public debate or the integrity of our public officials. It measures neither our wit nor our courage, neither our wisdom nor our learning, neither our compassion nor our devotion to our country, it measures everything in short, except that which makes life worthwhile. And it can tell us everything about America except why we are proud that we are Americans.

One measurement that could catch on is the Human Development Index. It looks at life expectancy, education, and standards of living as its man components. I wouldn't argue with increases in each of these areas.

Working Thoughts 02/26/09
Sizing Up the New Guy

Unemployment Is Not Distributed Evening Across Income Levels - No One Thought It Was

2010-02-24T03:11:00Z

Ten or so days ago I ran across several citings of a report issued that revealed that those at the lower income levels are economically suffering at a disproportionate level than those at the higher income levels. I pulled up the report titled Labor Underutilization Problem of US Workers Across Household Income Groups at the End of the Great Recession: A Truly Great Depression Among the Nation's Low Income Workers Amidst Full Employment Among the Most Affluent and noticed that it is written by the same group of people that did the analysis I used for a couple of wealth distribution entries I wrote in April of 2009. I respect their research and many of the their findings.

However, this paper seems to be a little high on dramatics. For instance, the research shows that those with an income level of $12,499 or less has an unemployment rate of 30.8% and an underemployment rate of 20.7% (over 50% of this population pool is not employed at a full level). Those with an income level between $12,500 and $20,000 have numbers of 19.1% and 17.2% respectively. The point of the paper is to show that as income levels increase unemployment and underemployment levels drop to practically full employment levels (those with an income of $150,000 or more have numbers of 3.2% and 1.6%). These are WOW numbers.

But I'm left with several questions. The first is what are the relative numbers during good or normal times anyway, meaning, are those at the bottom always unemployed at a factor of 10 (30.8% to 3.2%)? If not, at what rate is that factor increasing/decreasing? Also, what are the upper and lower normal limits to these numbers historically? I suspect that those at the lower income levels have fluctuations that spike as business cycles come and go. Finally, are these numbers a forecast for what it means to be a knowledge economy? It looks like we are moving to a resort town of society - those that own the hotels and those that clean the rooms. The middle class are the tourists, except in this case they are Chinese?

Working Thoughts 02/23/09
Trade Up to the Future

"EL GRANDE BIGOTE" Victory

2010-02-18T04:05:00Z

It has been too long since I've mentioned one of my favorite charity organizations - Donorschoose.org. I'm sure giving is down with the economic conditions - I know I'm guilty - but Donorschoose has such a great business model and their people are so creative. Below is an email from a friend of mine: Mike “EL GRANDE BIGOTE” Szarowicz. As you can tell he has a lot of fun with the drive and students benefit. I especially love the mustache logo.

Here's how I like to think about it though - $50 is not memorable, but I won't forget Mike's costume and I know that kids, who have a trailer as a classroom, just got four bean bag chairs to read in.

------------------------------------------

To my loyal mustache aficionados:

Another tremendously successful Mustaches for Kids campaign is in the books! Our Charlotte Chapter raised over $58,000 and impacted the lives of over 26,000 students. Thank you, thank you, thank you for all of your support. Every year I’m amazed by the generosity of my friends and colleagues (and by the power of the MUSTACHE)!

All of your help also allowed me to retain my “Top Fundraiser” crown with $5,516 raised. Here’s the series of pictures we all hoped to see:

Three-peat!!!

And if you’re of sane mind you’re likely asking yourself – “what the heck is that outfit on the right?!?!” Well, that’s my 2010 Mustache Persona – “El Grande Bigote”. He was inspired by a Hispanic wrestling show I saw in LA about 11 months ago.

Here are some close-ups:

The second picture there is now my facebook profile. And that’s right - that’s a customized “E.G.B” cape and “El Grange Bigote” logo. I owe credit on the cape to my lovely and talented wife Katie. The logo I made myself. I promised I’d top the prior two year’s costumes and in my mind I delivered. I’m very concerned about 2011.

Alas, I did not win best costume, as the police officer below took home the big prize:

Those are the five “best costume” finalists. I’ll let you decide if the judges made the right decision. [Note my boots!]

Oh well, it was another great year. I hope you’ve enjoyed my crazy pictures. I know our local schoolteachers and students are extremely grateful for everything we’ve done in this campaign.

Until next year…..

Michael
[a.k.a. “EL GRANDE BIGOTE”]

Take a Moment and Ask "What Story Would I Tell about Myself?"

2010-02-14T15:31:00Z

It's Sunday morning and there is snow on the ground. These are the type of mornings when you relax with a cup of coffee and read the news and just kind of veg out. I have my browser open and plenty of good stories ahead of me. But there is one thing I forgot to mention, my plan for a low key morning is not going to happen. My youngest just excitedly decided to dump out her crayon container and put it on her head as a hat. With her messed up blonde hair and three bottom teeth, she deviously smiles at me. But I'm not amused.

In between these occurrences of Sunday morning distraction I take in a blog post by Peter Bregman on HBR.com called A Story About Motivation. It's about an elderly man who needed help into his "person's with disabilities" van. It was raining and the walk was difficult to maneuver. Five good samaritans helped load the man into his ride while the driver curiously sat idle in the driver seat. Bregman didn't get the sense that the driver was being malicious or even soulless. It just seemed like this was an everyday, every stop event. The driver wasn't motivated to continually help in these situations. From his point of view it doesn't change what he needs to do. One way or another, his riders are going to get into the van, he is going to driver them, and they are going to get out. He will do it again the next day and the day after that. So why get wet in the rain?

Bregman at this point hits on the theme of Drive by Dan Pink, a book about motivation. People put themselves into a story. Their role in the story is how they identify themselves. How that is defined is by how the question is framed. Here is an excerpt from the blog entry that helps clarify:

People tend to think of themselves as stories. When you interact with someone, you're playing a role in her story. And whatever you do, or whatever she does, or whatever you want her to do, needs to fit into that story in some satisfying way.
When you want something from someone, ask yourself what story that person is trying to tell about himself, and then make sure that your role and actions are enhancing that story in the right way.
We can stoke another person's internal motivation not with more money, but by understanding, and supporting, his story. "Hey," the driver's boss could say, "I know you don't have to get out of the van to help people, but the fact that you do — and in the rain — that's a great thing. And it tells me something about you. And I appreciate it and I know that man with the walker does too." Which reinforces the driver's self-concept — his story — that he's the kind of guy who gets out, in the rain, to help a passenger in need.

And this snaps me out of my frustrated mood. Remember, I wanted to read the news and drink my coffee. My daughter wanted to wear a hat. I asked myself a personal question about being a father.

The Last Mile is a Land of Opportunity

2010-02-12T03:58:00Z

It's practically cliche to say these day, but we live in an knowledge economy. Other parts of the economy are commoditized. This places a premium on smart ways to look at business problems and most often the toughest nut to crack is the human element of it. We all approach problems from different points of view and that makes it hard for us to accept the reality of others. To us, the answer is always obvious.The TED talk below, is about the last mile. We can have the system, the supply chain to the technology, completely figured out but that doesn't mean the consumer is going to understand it, see value in it, and buy it. There are people out there that overcome these situations. They seem to get the people side. They seem to know when and how to nudge.

Ask Yourself "What if..."

2010-02-09T04:14:00Z

There are signs out there that the US economy is healing. The Jobs Report looks relatively OK, GDP is going gang busters, and the PMI is showing a rebounding manufacturing sector. Plus home sales are coming off lows. There is certainly weakness too - foreclosures are still on the rise.

What if we are at the precipice of a turn around? What if the economy is about to change for the better? How does that change your view of 2010?

Are you as mad at the government?
Do you buy a new car?
Will you take a up a new "you never know" hobby?
Is there a trip to Disneyland instead of camping?
Will you move to a different city?
Are you financially scarred by this?
Do you look back at 2007, before we went off the economic cliff, with a suspicious eye?
Do you wish it was still 2007?

We've spent the last two years healing our wallets, paying debts, getting the house in order and biding our time. It feels like there is an enormous amount of pent up demand for the things like clean energy, demonstrating ethics, and new forms of education. So many people have sacrificed and tested their mental will power - they are changed, but it doesn't mean they don't enjoy a bucket of beer, a beach, and a sunset.

What if...

Job Report Statistics

2010-02-06T16:20:00Z

January 2010 Jobs Report and Wages

2010-02-06T03:50:00Z

Here are the job market and compensation numbers for January 2010 (based on the job report):

Net loss of 20,000 jobs in the month

Analysts expected a gain of 13,000

A benchmark adjustment was made to the unemployment numbers for the last 18 months

The job losses of 2009 were actually under reported by a sum of 617,000

One year ago the US lost 779,000 jobs - still jaw dropping

October was revised to a loss of 224,000 from an original reading of 190,000 and revised reading of 111,000

November was revised to a gain of 64,000 jobs, up from an original gain of 4,000

The first gain in 23 months

December was revised to a loss of 150,000 from an original loss of 85,000

14.8 million of people are unemployed, it was 15.3 million in December 2009

9.3 million are unemployed due to job loss, down from 9.7 million last month

6.3 million people have been jobless for more than 6 months

Temporary work, which usually precedes full time employment gains, added 52,000 jobs in January. This is after adding 46,500 jobs in December

Major federal government hiring is underway for the census - 9,000 jobs were added (part of an overall increase of 33,000)

Layoffs are flattening out, but hiring isn't happening

Unemployment rate fell at 9.7%

Analysts predicted it would stay at 10.0% or possibly go up

The Unemployment rate hit 10.8 in 1982

As employment picks up, the labor pool will grow again and the unemployment rate should go up

The U-6 report, which is a broader group, dropped to 16.5%. It reached 17.3% last month

GDP, which earned its status as an economic indicator for growth in the 1950s, showed an annualized gain of 5.7% in the 4th quarter of 2009

PMI, a measure of manufacturing pace, showed a reading of 58.4%. Anything above 50% means the machines are running.

Specific Segment Job numbers:

Manufacturing added 11,000 jobs

Construction lost 75,000 jobs

Retailers gained 42,100

Leisure and Hospitality Services lost 14,000 jobs

Government sector lost 8,000, Federal gains were 33,000

Education and Health Services grew by 16,000 jobs

Health Care and Social Assistance grew by 17,100

Professional and Business Services grew by 44,000

Temporary work added 52,000 jobs in December

Wage (can be revised):

The average weekly paycheck (seasonally adjusted) is $629.04

The average hourly earning (seasonally adjusted) is $18.89 - up 5 cents

The average hourly work week rose to 33.3

Bureau of Labor Statistics

Job Report Stats Summary

Understanding Your Customers in Context

2010-02-04T03:31:00Z

Perhaps this goes without saying, but many business owners don't consider their product or service in context. They take the long way around to it, but Anthony Tjan over to HBR.org cuts the chase in his blog entry titled The Three-Minute Rule. He comments about the traditional ways to gather data via surveys and focus groups, but he feels to better understand the customer, ask them what they did three minutes before they used your product or service and three minutes after. This type of understanding can help uncover feedback that people didn't realize was important. My favorite part of the his entry is excerpted below. It's my favorite because as a father of two young children I go to the store a lot and inevitably...

One final retail example is described beautifully by my friend Paco Underhill, a shopping-pattern guru. In his book, Why We Buy, he describes how shoppers who do not have a shopping basket or shopping cart go quickly to the checkout when their arms get full. Okay...so what? A casual observer says that is obvious. A savvier approach might be to interview people in a checkout line with an armful of goods to ask where they were three minutes earlier and if they would have considered buying anything else if it hadn't been so difficult to carry so many items. Underhill concludes that more establishments should consider putting shopping baskets in the middle of the store to keep customers in shopping mode longer (since research showed that few would go back to the front of the store to get a cart once engaged with shopping).

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Unsurprising Job Survey Results Show a Ready to Jump Workforce

2010-01-29T04:23:00Z

CareerBuilder.com often produces worthwhile studies and reports and a couple of weeks ago they published their findings from a survey conducted in November, 2009. The report is titled Despite Competitive Labor Market, One-in-Five Workers Plan to Change Jobs in 2010, New CareerBuilder Survey Reveals and it has some great numbers in it. Here are some:

Pay:

57% of workers didn't get a raise last year
- it was 35% in 2008
Those that did get a raise, 28% got an increase of 3% or less
71% of workers didn't get a bonus

Switching Industries:

20% of workers plan to switch careers/fields in the next two years. The reasons:
- 67% say they are seeking more interesting work
- 54% say they want higher pay
- 41% say they want career advancement
- 36% say they want stability

Leadership Ratings:

23% of workers judge their corporate leaders as poor or very poor. Reasons:
- 35% say it's the inability to address employee morale
- 30% say there is a lack of transparency
- 28% say major changes are made without warning

There are other great numbers that I skipped over as well.

The Conference Board also echoed similar sentiment in a report titled I can't Get No... Job Satisfaction, That is

Almost 25% say they don't expect to be at their current job within a year
45% of Americans say they are satisfied with their job
- It was 61% in 1987 and it isn't a cyclical occurrence

Working Thoughts 1/28/09
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Simple Questions can Reveal A Lot

2010-01-27T03:06:00Z

Yesterday, in my Political Science entry, I commented on the difference between training and education. It is something I write about quite often on this blog. One aspect of education is learning to ask questions that lead to insight. This is called the Socratic Method.

I don't really believe in genius. Some people have an aptitude to memorize facts or to do math very quickly. These abilities provide a tremendous advantage to do what is actually meaningful - problem solving. But I have never seen an emergency that was averted because someone could name Pi to the 83rd decimal. So it just depends on the situation.

Those with the skill of critical thinking, quickly and seamlessly, apply the Socratic Method to get to the root of the problem. They ask questions looking for clarification, vetting assumptions, inspecting evidence, understanding perspective, and possible outcomes. In a society with pressures for quick answers, going through this method is not a universal occurrence. It's a lost art.

Next time we think about teaching and the statistics of other nations, consider philosophy and the recent statistics about it.

When Louisiana’s regents voted to eliminate the philosophy major last spring, they agreed with faculty members that the subject is “a traditional core program of a broad-based liberal arts and science institution.” But they noted that, on average, 3.4 students had graduated as philosophy majors in the previous five years; in 2008,there were none. “One cannot help but recognize that philosophy as an essential undergraduate program has lost some credence among students,”the board concluded.

Working Thoughts 01/26/09
Happy Chinese New Year and Era