Work is Changing

The nature of work and the ways we think about it are undergoing fundamental changes. Give it a thought - even 10 years ago, would we think of work as:

• alternative
• nontraditional
• market mediated
• vulnerable
• contract
• freelance
• e-lance
• contingent
• disposable
• temporary
• nonstandard
• telecommuting

Since business is changing and the world is becoming more competitive, people become increasingly demanding towards the format they wish to render their services in exchange for some sort of value. Hence, there is more and more research on such topics as market mediation, non-traditional work and even new branches of science, e.g. “nonorganizational work psychology”.

At the same time, only a few countires are ready for such shift. The US and the Western European countries are leading the way, but elsewhere it is a far cry from where the labor markets are now. I am looking at the Russian labor market and I realize that while there are some early signs of drifting away from the "standard" models, outside the capital CEOs are vaguely familiar with such functions as HR or Marketing, so I cherish no hopes that all of a sudden we will shift to "non-standard" progressive modes of work.

Apart from purely traditional, conventional and customary issues hampering this transition, there are obviously practical questions concerning, for instance, legal issues, career management problems, and other aspects, encompassing motivational, organizational, controlling and other spheres of work environment.

Are we as HR ready to embrace these changes? Looks like we won't have a choice if we want to maintain a competitive Employee Value Proposition, but I doubt that it is a one-size-fits-all option. Obviously, this paradygm shift is geared towards knowledge workers, those whose skills are more portable, those who are more valuable and those who can work remotely. There is a great role for us to play in planning and shaping the 21st century work, but still something prompts me that the change will happen quickly, will hit us with the force of an avalanche and will spread faster than a viral infection.

don't get COMMODITIZED

I take my hat off to those who created Voss, sell it and, what is more, to those who buy it.


Really --- my heart filled with awe, I totally, truly and genuinely amazed at professionals who deal with branded commodities or with the art (magic?) of making a purse out of a saw's ear. Well, the metaphor is not 100% correct: there is some degree of transformation involved in the act, but what happens to the water in a Voss bottle we don't know and hope that nothing happens at all and it arrives on our tables in its pristine condition.

The beauty behind branded commodities is that with minimum of effort and cost you are all of a sudden able to charge next-to-premium prices, basically for a bit of wrapping paper and a beautiful story behind it. One of the ways to escape from commodity hell.

When you step out into the labor market, you are nothing else but a product as well. As any product, there is some/much marketing effort needed and most marketing concepts apply. Hence, as any product, you have a price tag and value, which is, to a large extent,a perception of you by your own self and other labor market players. Tweaking the basic concepts just a little bit, we can place ourselves onto the following diagram:

Nobody wants to be priced low. Every ambitious person or at least those who do not have issues with personal self-esteem, want to be positioned in Quadrants 1 and 2, i.e. being a luxury product or a branded commodity. We know that big companies get thousands of solicited applications for a single position, so getting a distinguished personal brand is nowadays synonimous with self-preservation and survival in the long run.

Sometimes I get a feeling that all these talks about personal brandings is merely a fad, created by image experts in a despearte outcry for money, but the reality is that nobody wants to be a commodity, fad or no fad. We comb our hair even if we do not plan to leave home and we do other things just to feel good regardless whether others are going to notice or not. Thus, I guess we are running out of excuses to invest in ourselves and add a couple of zeroes to that price tag we are all wearing.

Leadership Story

Going for an interview, the most difficult question might turn out to be, "How did you get here?" - and it will not be about the mode of tranport you favored that day to get to the venue. It will be about you life map, or what have you done to be at this particular stage of your career. Another difficult question (as well as a famous namesake book) is "Why should anyone be led by you?" Think for yourself, how would you answer those?

We were asked to do someting similar in the Strategic Communication class a few weeks ago. I should say that we were lucky to have a highly entertaining and deeply knowledgeable professors Des Dearlove and Stuart Crainer, authors of Thinkers 50, which is a research on business thought gurus, most likely to influence the development of the business reality as we know it.

The task was to write a personal leadership story in less 250 words, which should be a distilled message to the world of your own persona. I should say it is so much easier talking at length about yourself, but when you are confined to mere 250 words, it is a mission impossible. Next, it brings you back to the same old questions: Why should anyone be led by you?

I am posting here what I wrote and submitted as my final project to the professors. Really keen on feedback!

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Sergey Gorbatov

Personal Story
Strategic Communication
December 7, 2010

My most respected high school teacher told me shortly before I graduated, “Sergey, if you want to achieve something in this life, you need to be the first, the best, or different”. I did not grasp the full value of that advice at the time, but I heeded it nonetheless. Looking back (and most importantly – looking forward), I see with clarity why I am where I am and how I got here: by being the first, the best or different.

There are few things I have been the best at. Well, in relative terms, I did gain a considerable number of awards and on a number of occasions I had to blush in front of an audience receiving an accolade or praise. Being the first gained me the reputation of an innovative first-moving go-getter. However, what truly advanced me in life is being different.

A distinct way of clothing, an atypical career path, a very special circle of friends, and many other uncommon aspects, granted me that edge I could use to stand out. Yet, it has always been a unique way to look at the world, a peculiar manner of thinking and seeing the connections that elude others that have prevented me from blending with the background or getting lost in the crowd.

I bow with utmost respect to that teacher for her invaluable lesson. It is ambitiously pleasing to be the first. It is painstakingly rewarding to be the best. It is ostentatiously crucial to be different.

10 Minutes: Call Center Reality

I am urging you to watch this short movie, it's just 15 minutes and it gets one message across: the way we communicate is changing.



The crude reality of call centers is that an operator is often taken away all latitude of decision-making or a personal impact whatsoever. Strict manuals and procedures truly convert people working there into answering machines (if you are lucky to get one after minutes of listening to options and some cheesy pseudoclassical music).

Have you noticed in the movie that actual communication starts when Nuria keeps silent? Is that the new frontier? At the same time what would be better: lose her job because she violates the prescribed procedures? Talk to the boss and get reprimanded for not dealing with it herself?

One of the aspects I have noticed about call centers is that the atmosphere there is permeated with the feeling of fear. Fear hampers productivity and creativity of the employees. Disempowerement corrupts.

Still, where do we find the balance between the efficiency and personal connection?

Limits of Online Recruitment

Internet is a reality. Blogs are now a part of business. People spend their productive work time in 2.0 applications and are getting money for it. I get it: the world has changed, but how far can we go?

I had a very interesting chat this week with Miguel Mangas, Online Marketing Director for Spain and Portugal at Meetic. Meetic is a dating site. One of those... "join thousands of singles looking for love today". Noble cause and I am sure many people did find someone to spend an evening together, a couple of months or an entire life. However, what Miguel is trying to assess now is opportunities of this web service for recruitment.

The idea is that this tool can work for fresh graduates from universities in the initial steps of their careers. Before you start using the site, you have to complete a 90-question questionnaire, which translates into your psychological profile, which is shared with you free of charge. Unlike the assessments that you go through when entering a company, it is likely that you will be more sincere and honest with yourself answering the questions in hope that this will help you meet your other half. Hence, the validity rates are high. Drawing on other personal information, such as education, areas of interest and maybe current company or at least industry, it is possible to concoct an aggregated job candidate profile, which then can be shared with recruiters.

This has not been launched yet, and my question to Miguel was whether any data privacy laws could be violated. The conversation turned onto a slippery road, and I posed another challenge: how would a person feel if s/he is selected for the job, but then every day the recruiter (whoever that might be) or even the line manager are aware of that person's "romantic profile". The third question I asked was about the company image if it resorts to such search techniques and who actually would be most interested to use this service.

That was a conversation over a glass of gin&tonic and obviously we were just swapping ideas and chatting, but the problems remains on a larger scale: how sure can we be that our personal information is not shared across the web with anyone but those we want it to be shared with? In Germany there is already a law that Facebook information cannot be used in the recruitment process. In the UK a teacher was fired for posting a private comment on Facebook. The borders between private and public are getting blurry. Obviously, it is your personal responsibility to filter what is appearing in the www, but protection from unsanctioned access to your data is an acute problem yet to be resolved.

HR in the Luxury Industry

Yesterday I attended a conference at IE Business School boasting a loud name of "Career Development and Management in Fashion, Cosmetics and Luxury Industries". The timing of the event could not have been worse: right in the middle of my exam week and one day before the most feared Advanced Financial Management exam. Still, as curious as I am, I decided to attend, and my expectations did not tumble short. Apart from an insight into an industry which I had not had much dealings with apart from being a loyal customer, it was a great networking opportunity. Thanks to coffee breaks, workshops, round tables and the cocktail party at the end, we got a chance to rub shoulders with CEOs and HR VPs of such companies as LV, Carrera y Carrera, Loewe, Diageo, Pernod Ricard and the like. Quite a fascinating crowd, really, and refreshing as well. I caught myself musing over the peculiar combination of business savvy with an appreciation for what is beautiful to the extent of being useless from the layman's perspective.

I will just share with you the main points that I took away from the conference, in no order of importance whatsoever:

• You must be passionate about the world of luxury. People there work for the idea and the feeling of belonging to the domain of gods, not the money. Luxury pays poorly, worse than FMCG. Luxury brands compensate with a "psychological salary" of being proud for working for that particular brand.
• Cognitive dissonance: selling goods worth thousands of euros while getting very modest wages: potential entrants need to be well-aware and prepared for this step.
• What they are looking for: creativity, innovation management, strategic capacity, brand management, building shared vision.
• Where will an MBA candidate most likely start? Retail. Fresh business school graduates should not expect doing big growth projects - otherwise current CEOs will be left without jobs.
• What value will you create working in the Luxury industry? A dream. You will give your customers a dream they will be living.

Carlos Delso, General Director of Louis Vuitton for Spain, Portugal and Marocco shared his four rules for success in the industry:

1. Set yourself stretched goals
2. Innovate to achieve them
3. Know yourself a bit better each day
4. Love your neighbor

Those might sound trite and common sense, but they are particularly important in an environment where dreams are "made and used and wasted". Otherwise, how will you be better than the others in dream creation?

Thus, if you are considering to enter the world of glamor, think well about the the first question you are likely to be asked at the interview (any interview, in fact):

Why are you here?

Cost Cutting Your Talent?

There is an article in Cinco Días published today, where John M. Scott, president of KPMG Spain talks about cost cutting and possible implications it might have on the competitive advantage of an organization. "Reducing costs cannot be cutting talent," says Scott and there is little disagreement with him. There are multiple publications about cost reduction in times when bottom lines don´t look particularly rosy, and undoubtedly getting rid of headcount is the easiest way to push the fixed costs down. However, there are many examples when companies were able to stay close to their proclamations of "people are our greatest asset" without actually divesting of that very asset at the first sight of an approaching storm. Southwestern Airlines is one of the best example, I think, and there are many others that would explore a multitude of other opportunities before they say  good-bye to their staff.

Following Scott in his speech, he claims that this "passivity" of not being able to overcome tough economic problems by other means than letting go of people is "losing the opportunity to face the future". In fact, what will the companies do when the markets pick up? Recruit again? Well, as an old Latin proverb goes, Even a healed wound leaves a scar (free translation of vulnus sanatum est, cicatrix manet :)

What will happen if you "divest of your most valuable asset" and your competitors will not? In any business school you will hear that the only true competitive advantage is your people. Cannot agree more - look at the heading of my blog. Still, I guess we have seen too many people lose their jobs this last crisis. Oops, sorry, I am not supposed to say the word "crisis"... financial downturn! or yet better - economic slowdown.

But - there is a worrying thing that Mr Scott is saying, "I have not seen in Europe the willingness, the ambition that is there among the youngsters of India for the past at least ten years". So, the developing world is eagerly looking towards the West, wishing for nothing else but for jobs to be cut, because we all know where those jobs will be migrating. I do not wish to go into the issues of outsourcing here, but the point is clear: by letting your people go, you are letting go of your business, and most likely... it is not coming back.

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Full article: http://www.cincodias.com/articulo/empresas/KPMG-dice-reducir-costes-puede-ser-recortar-talento/20101203cdscdiemp_12/