A Few Good Creative Men

This movie remake of A Few Good Men into A Few Good Creative Men is making the rounds and really cracked me up. For any of you who have worked with creatives this one’s well worth watching.

[via SwissMiss]

Just Say No to National Boss’s Day

Bad Boss Today is National Boss’s Day in the U.S. I am officially declaring the start of a Just Say No to National Boss’s Day campaign. In fact, I’m declaring that the word “boss” should be tossed out, too. Just stop it. And if you have a Boss’s Day card just move straight to the trash bin. It’ll feel good. Go ahead. Don’t be afraid. Your “boss” won’t know.

Hey, is there a National Oppressed Employee Day? We should get that going.

HR Jargon Threat Advisory

KnowHR’s HR Jargon Advisory is elevated at this time. Employees should be on the lookout for suspicious verbiage and should alert the proper HR authorities if the word “engage” is used to mean anything other than two people signaling their intent to marry or when gears are meshing.

While the HR Jargon Advisory is currently elevated, it will be raised to high if anything gets “run up the flagpole” except for a flag. That goes double for “socializing ideas.” Run for cover if you hear someone say “there’s no ‘I’ in team.”

The most severe level of HR Jargon has been activated a few times in the past year, the most recent example when “balanced scorecard,” “pay-for-performance,” and “all pay decisions are discretionary” were used in the same communication without a shred of irony.

Employees are asked to be vigilant and report any HR Jargon to the proper authorities. If you’re an “Engaged Employee” you already have.

[via Fables of the Reconstruction]

HR Shadow Puppets

GREAT Shadow Puppetry - The funniest home videos are here

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My friend, Bill, used to talk about people using shadow puppets when they weren’t prepared. I’ve sometimes felt like that when I hear weak discussions about “HR needs a place at the table” instead of HR grabbing a place at the table because of their business contribution. It’s shadow puppetry. But not this kind.

If HR is showing shadow puppets, at least do them like this. You’ll get a place at the table. Dazzling people is always the right thing to do.

By the way, one of my favorite all-time blog taglines is for The HR Capitalist: Get to the table — stay at the table.

You Know You’re Old in HR When…

Today is Guy Kawasaki’s birthday, and he did a fascinating post called You Know You’re Getting Old When…. It’s a fun read. I even contributed three to the mix. Go have a look. You’ll get a laugh. In that spirit, here are a few HR-related “you know you’re old when” statements.

You know you’re old in HR when…

You remember when HR was called “personnel.”

You remember that human capital were called people. (Soylent Green was people, too.)

Engagement meant that people were getting married.

You could work your way up, and it wasn’t by climbing a career ladder.

MBOs were in vogue, and you loved them.

Stock option scandals didn’t happen because people didn’t get stock options.

You did what you were told to do because you were part of Generation GET-TO-WORK.

You doled out twice annual double-digit increases in the 1980s.

You lived through the rise of self-directed teams, the end of self-directed teams.

What other things let you know you’re old in HR when…?

UPDATE: Guy Kawasaki reads The Best of You Know You’re Old When. Some of them are really funny. Your truly even rates a mention.