For most attendees at the recent #CAHR17 HR Conference in Long Beach, it was a real commitment to attend and, as always, an objective to extract practical wisdom to apply back at the office. It helps that the Long Beach conference venue is a beautiful beachy coastline. Even so, we — in HR — are serious people and we are at the conference to be inspired, get updated and meet-and-mingle with our peers. The breadth of interests, services and vendors can be overwhelming, although, an excellent mobile conference App made scheduling presentations and finding exhibitors much easier.
The General Session speakers did not disappoint. “Lifting People Up; Going Higher Together” was a general session theme that resonated with the capacity audience on Day Two. Corporate leading edge managers Dean Carter @deanecarter, Director of HR (and Lots More) at @patagonia, Hollie Delaney Head of People Operations @Zappos, and Keith Ferrazzi @ferrazzi, Founder of Ferrazzi Greenlight, spoke about how to turn managers into coaches, craft new ways to achieve performance feedback, and encourage employees to bring their “whole” selves to work. There was talk of “speed mentoring,” “committing to career growth” and “connecting business mission and vision to employee core values.” Lofty ideals which, no doubt, got some in the audience thinking about what building blocks they might acquire at the conference to help them with their own organizations. Pamela Green @PamelaJGreen, an inspirational Coach to Leadership and HR Teams taught about how an ability to analyze trends will be one of the best tools in our new economy toolkit. Scott Hamilton, of Executive Next Practices Institute (ENP Forums) spoke at a power session about how HR can influence, “words actually matter.” He is demonstrating the power of “focus” over “mindfulness,” “blind spots” over “bias” and “risk level” over “compliance,” to name a few.
Josh Wright, Chief Economist at ICiMS, who presented of the session “Hire Smarter,” was surely the most “suited-up” speaker at the conference. He came prepared with more than sharp attire though by rolling out macro-economic novel indicators that, not only make sense of dynamics playing out every day in US businesses, but point to significant trends that are with us to stay. Three areas Josh says we should pay attention to:
- Slow wage growth and productivity affecting living wages and annual salaries
- Underemployment of broad segments of the US population is the new normal
- Increase of free agents, casual earners and the “gig” jobs in the “sharing” economy
“At HR Conferences. you get out of it what you put into it,” says Belinda Morris, President at Peoplescape. “We listen closely, with an open and enquiring ear and engage thought leaders by asking them and each other the tough questions our clients are all wondering. We make it our business to discuss the ‘hot topics’ that are shaping the ongoing conversation in the business community.”
Join us at #HRTECHCONF. We invite you to join the conversation at the #PeoplescapeHUB #Booth3621 #PeoplescapeHC #whatsHotinHRT #HRTechnology. We look forward to seeing you there – HR Tech in Las Vegas on October 11th – Come and Win a Prize draw for #Peoplescape’s #CasinoSpree