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HR Pros Sound Off On Job Satisfaction, Work-Life Balance Edges Up

Glassdoor Team — Fri, 24 Jun 2011 20:43:47 +0000

As we get ready to head to the annual Society for Human Resource Management (SHRM) conference (Booth #1267), we wanted to take a moment and get a closer look at what it has been like to work in HR over the past few years as the folks in Human Resources have been on the front lines and have had to make some hard calls as companies looked to weather the economic downtown. As an HR professional, your job revolves around how company strategies and policies effect individuals in the workplace from entry-level employees to senior executives. While HR professionals maintain a focus on the company and the workforce instead of their personal happiness, we were curious to see if there had been a shift in the “on-the-job satisfaction” for employees in this industry since the recession hit.

Glassdoor turned to the hundreds of reviews left by HR professionals to get an insiders perspective on the industry. The report shows that there have definitely been some discouraging moments, however, things seem to be picking up: people in the HR industry are reporting greater job satisfaction lately – is this a trend we’ll continue to see? Only time will tell.

HR Industry Report Highlights

HR professionals’ job satisfaction declined as recession took hold. When comparing company reviews and ratings during June 2009 through May 2010 (Year 2) and June 2008 through May 2009 (Year 1), job satisfaction was down for HR industry professionals across the board. During Year 1, HR employees said their employers were ‘OK’ (3.3) places to work; 12 months later (Year 2) overall average ratings fell to 2.8. (Ratings are based on a 5-point scale). Employee morale took the biggest hit between Year 1 and Year 2. Ratings started at 3.3 and dropped one year later to 2.7. Satisfaction with career opportunities, compensation & benefits, and fairness & respect in the workplace all fell by .4.
Past year shows improvement in HR professionals’ job satisfaction. Between June 2010 through May 2011 (Year 3), HR professionals have become more satisfied with their companies and jobs than in Year 2. Overall company ratings from HR professionals had a .3 bump – bringing the average company rating that year to 3.1. Employee morale also crept back up in the last year to a 3.2 rating, .5 higher than the year before. In addition, work-life balance ratings improved as they came in at a 3.4 rating, .4 higher than the year before.
Work-life balance continues to improve. Work-life balance ratings are the only workplace category to see improvement in Year 3 over both Year 1 and 2.

We’ve also looked deeper into company reviews posted by HR professionals to get a better feel for the recent job and work environment…

Feedback on working in HR

“[PROS] The atmosphere is changed constantly and you were always stretched to learn a different way of handling HR related tasks… [CONS] Work-life balance was always addressed but never resolved.” – Accenture Human Resources Consultant/Specialist (location n/a)

“[PROS] Smart people. Real business challenges. Good pay. PepsiCo’s reputation is very positive and solid and the benefits of being a PepsiCo alumni last beyond your time at the company… [CONS] Long hours. Too much internal competition and politics.” – PepsiCo Human Resources (Chicago, IL)

“[PROS] Chase has made many improvements since converting from Washington Mutual including benefits, work life balance, fairness in hiring, promoting, etc…CONS] Chase is a really large bank and has the same issues WaMu had in communicating with employees. It’s frustrating to hear about company changes in the news instead of through management channels.” – JPMorgan Chase Human Resources Manager (Seattle, WA)

“[PROS] Wal-Mart was a great place for me to work- there is ample room for growth….if you have the initiative and drive, you can get promoted and achieve success!…[CONS] Long hours- when you have your blackberry, you are expected to be available 24/7.” – Wal-Mart Human Resources (location n/a)

“[PROS] Opportunities for growth and development, including tuition reimbursement. Very competitive pay, after a few years…[CONS] The P&C industry is going through major changes, which may impact future employment.” – State Farm Human Resources Generalist (location n/a)

“[PROS] One of the leadership principles is to have a backbone. You are expected to speak up if you disagree with something. You don’t see this in a lot of corporate environment. You’re not just a worker bee… [CONS] Things change so quickly at Amazon that it can be difficult to keep up with the latest initiative.” – Amazon.com Human Resources (location n/a)

“[PROS] The “get fit / stay fit, change the rules, change the game” strategy was an excellent beacon during very difficult times…[CONS] Leadership change usually means regime change. It is not what you know, but who you know.” – Dow Chemical Human Resources Leader (Midland, MI)

“[PROS] Cutting edge HR planning and techniques, ability to learn and take on as much as desired…[CONS] High HR to manager ratio, good support to hi-level managers by HR but little support available to supervisors and lower level people managers.”- Hewlett-Packard Human Resources Business Partner (location n/a)

Do you work in HR? Share a company review on Glassdoor and give an update on what’s working well and what needs to be improved.

Headed to SHRM11? Stop by our booth #1267 and connect with us on Twitter (@glassdoordotcom), Facebook and LinkedIn.

HR Pros Sound Off On Job Satisfaction, Work-Life Balance Edges Up is a post from: Glassdoor Blog

Glassdoor’s Heading To SHRM 2011; Come Stop By Booth #1267

Glassdoor Team — Mon, 20 Jun 2011 21:35:47 +0000

Attending SHRM 2011 this year? We are and we know how hectic the event can be – racing from big name speaker sessions (like Virgin mogul Sir Richard Branson and Huffington Post’s fearless leader Arianna Huffington) to useful informational speaking tracks covering everything from talent management to International HR. As you move from one session to the next, stop by Glassdoor’s booth #1267 – a preview of just some of the things we’ll be discussing are highlighted below.

Plus if you feel the luck is on your side in Las Vegas this year, try placing your bet on how many poker chips are in Glassdoor’s “world’s largest tower of poker chips” – the person with the closest guess will win an iPad 2.

Visit the Glassdoor Booth #1267 to learn about…

Job Search & Career Advancement Resources: New to Glassdoor? Employers, HR and other career industry professionals will have an opportunity to learn what employees and job candidates are saying. Glassdoor is a rapidly growing community with more than one million members, which offers ratings and reviews on more than 120,000 companies, along with salary and interview process insights, all provided by those who know best: employees and job candidates. Come see what your staff and prospects are saying.
Employer Branding & Retention Tools: Want to know how to get in on the conversation? Glassdoor will be showcasing Enhanced Employer Profiles (EEP), which allows employers to offer their perspective on what makes their company a ‘Best Place to Work.’ In today’s online world, job seekers are hungry for information and go beyond a company’s careers page, blog or other informational site. Find out how you can bring all your career and job opportunity insights together on Glassdoor.
New Ways to Hire: How do you attract and retain the job candidates that matter most? Your job candidates and employees are turning to Glassdoor to learn about the latest job openings and to find out what it’s like to work at your company or your competitors. With Glassdoor JobAds, you can proactively engage with both passive and active candidates throughout Glassdoor; strategically target difficult to fill positions via industry, geographic, job title, and keyword targeting; learn from advanced analytics that track impressions and click through traffic; and benchmark results against your industry competitors.

We’re looking forward to this year’s event and to seeing you soon!

If you’re not able to attend this year’s conference, follow us on Twitter @glassdoordotcom to stay in the loop on the hot topics at SHRM.

Glassdoor’s Heading To SHRM 2011; Come Stop By Booth #1267 is a post from: Glassdoor Blog

Seven Signs Of Spring; Growth In Hiring, Possibilities

Vickie Elmer — Fri, 04 Mar 2011 15:11:57 +0000

Like purple crocuses amid patches of snow and first faint buds on trees, early signs of growth in the job market and sprouting across the U.S. economy.

The tulips popped up with today’s Bureau of Labor Statistics report of 192,000 jobs created in February. Spring in the air as the jobless rate declined to 8.9 percent, down a half percentage point in the first two months of the year.

Yet the economy also has bloomed in other fields the last two weeks from Society of Human Resource Executives and the Federal Reserve and more.

Here then are our seven signs of spring in various employment reports:

Staffing firms are reporting growth in openings in seven of the 12 Federal Reserve regions, and several report increased conversation of temp to permanent hires, according to the Federal Reserves’ Beige Book report this week. Every region of the country experienced “some degree of improvement” in job markets, the Fed report noted.
College hiring climbed in February, the National Association of Colleges and Employers reported. Its index rose in February and is at the highest level since it was launched in October 2009. On-campus hiring for graduates and interns this spring is likely to be brisk this spring, NACE predicted.
Sectors hiring in February were numerous, according to the BLS, and ranged from restaurants to specialty trades contractors, management consulting firms to trucking companies to nursing care facilities. Plus, the number of long-term unemployed fell for the second month, which means some people are landing jobs even after six months or a year of joblessness. The February statistics, the Washington Post says, represent “perhaps the best all around jobs report in three years.”
Starting pay is rising. For five months running, employers have offered higher initial compensation, with a 5 percentage point gain, according to the Society of Human Resource Executives monthly line data. Towers Watson’s new report on merit increases this year also has encouraging gains for top performers.
The number of job openings aggregated by SimplyHired.com climbed 49.7 percent in February compared to a year ago. Seventeen of the 18 industries showed increases in its monthly report – and a few employers doubled their number of job postings in the last year, SimplyHired.com said. Among them: Home Depot, HCA, Dell, UnitedHealth Group and CitiGroup. (((Yes, for each job these companies posted last year they had two or two and a half jobs posted this year, a 110 percent increase compared to a year ago, according to SimplyHired.))
Small businesses have been hiring for 12 straight months, according to the ADP National Employment Report. In many of those months, small businesses with fewer than 50 workers added far more jobs than did mid-size or large companies of 500 or more workers.
The start of labor scarcity is already being spotted. Human resources managers expect a global shortage of skilled workers. That and the large number of boomers leaving the workforce at the same time are the top trends in a new Society of Human Resources Management report.

Whether they bloom into a full-blown employment crop remains to be seen. High oil prices and economic and political instability in other countries could bring another chill to U.S. hiring, Another currency crisis like the ones last year in Greece and elsewhere also would hinder employment recovery. Certainly for the 6 million job seekers who have been looking for six months or longer, the spring air still feels cold and infertile.

Yet economists and others are saying this time the job growth could take root and flower. We need the 192,000 jobs added in February to multiply and grow to a bumper crop of new jobs every month this year.

Seven Signs Of Spring; Growth In Hiring, Possibilities is a post from: Glassdoor Blog

#SHRM2010 – A Whirlwind Of A Success

Glassdoor Team — Wed, 30 Jun 2010 21:49:54 +0000

We’ve just returned from the Society of Human Resources Management (SHRM) annual conference which had all-star speakers like former Vice President Al Gore, media magnate Steve Forbes, and New York Times best-selling author Michael Buckingham.

The SHRM conference was a great opportunity to get out there and many meet HR professionals, company representatives and other professionals from the career space. According to CollegeRecruiter.com, this year’s conference had about 11,000 to 12,000 attendees – nearly twice the amount that attended the year before. This could be a great sign for hiring, company growth and of course the economy.

Thanks to all those who stopped by the Glassdoor booth to take a guess at the number of jelly beans in the tower for a chance to win an iPad – we’ll be announcing the winner next week! Also we had a great time having a chance to introduce more people to Glassdoor and showcasing the resources available for employees, job seekers and employers on our site.

If you attended SHRM and didn’t have a chance to stop by and learn more about Glassdoor but have questions, send us an email at info@glassdoor.com or leave a comment here. Or if you are interested in staying up to date with Glassdoor, follow us on Twitter @glassdoordotcom.

Congrats to the whole SHRM team for putting on such a great event – Looking forward to SHRM 2011 in Las Vegas!

#SHRM2010 – A Whirlwind Of A Success is a post from: Glassdoor Blog

SHRM Annual Conference Evaluates HR in Changing Economy

Glassdoor Team — Tue, 30 Jun 2009 16:52:54 +0000

The Society for Human Resource Management (SHRM) kicked off their 61^st Annual Conference this week amidst the 80-90 degree heat in New Orleans. The SHRM Annual Conference & Exposition is a chance for HR professionals, academics and businesses to gather and learn new strategies and techniques for improving the workplace. The conference this year focuses on HR leadership for the economy.

Speaking topics range from “Innovate or Perish! 10 Tips to Improve Your HR Processes” to “The Future of Online Recruiting: Why Job Boards and Facebook Are Only Gateways to What Is Ahead.” Are you at SHRM 2009? Tell us how it’s going and what some of the important takeaways are for HR professionals in these next few months and years.

If you’re not at SHRM’s annual conference this year, here are some highlights from Twitter that show what’s catching the interest of conference attendees:

@recruiterdude says “complacency is the exact opposite of urgency” quoting this morning’s Keynote speaker John Kotter, a Harvard Business School Professor widely regarded as the world’s foremost authority on leadership and change.

A tweet from loismelbourne also comments on Kotter’s keynote: “#SHRM09 Kotter – bad times do not create urgency.”

Lisalotzer reiterates Kotter’s list of priorities HR should focus on “1-increase urgency, 2-build team, 3-get vision right, 4-communicate for buy-in”

Knessing writes: “Be bold, be brave, etc. say presenters. Agreed! But most companies won’t hire HR people with new ideas. They prefer sheep. #SHRM09″

Want to hear more about what’s happening at SHRM this year? Follow the conference on Twitter #shrm09.

SHRM Annual Conference Evaluates HR in Changing Economy is a post from: Glassdoor Blog