Amplify Digest: Hire Within (February 9, 2022)
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Welcome to the Amplify Digest. Every week, I break down five articles in five minutes; discussing the top people news, stories, and resources that are worth your time. Scroll down for links to the articles covered in the video (and more), a helpful thread from the Amplify Accelerator Community, and curated jobs from the Amplify Job Board.
This week’s digest explores the 100-year history of HR, the pandemic’s silver lining on internal mobility, Greenhouse’s 2022 Candidate Experience Report, Coda’s Layoff List template, and much more.
Sponsor
The Amplify Digest is sponsored by Greenhouse. As modern HR leaders and professionals, you know that your company’s ability to hire great talent is as important as ever. Whether you need to scale your team quickly, or improve your hiring process, Greenhouse gives you the right technology, know-how, and support to take on what’s next.
Articles discussed in this week's Digest (and more)
The 100 Year History of the Human Resources Department (Visier)
How the Pandemic Has Propelled HR Chiefs Into the Boardroom (Time)
Sponsored Post, by Greenhouse
NEW: ✨ Amplify Community Wisdom ✨
The Amplify Accelerator Community was specifically designed to help modern people operators expand their networks, thinking, and connections. Each week, I'll spotlight a helpful thread from the community to help Amplify Digest subscribers learn from the discussions.
[Question] Hi there! We are re-looking at our PTO policies and having more flexibility in work (i.e do we move to unlimited PTO? Should we roll out half-day Fridays? Do we have hours each week that have no internal meetings?). The purpose is to provide more balance in the week, champion wellbeing, and be market competitive. Would love to hear what you've seen as success!
A1: We have unlimited PTO and it's worked great. The one thing to consider is that without the guidance of a set number of days, we found (as a lot of research has) that people ended up taking less - almost like they were unsure what was appropriate and lacked that permission. We did a lot of communication about the need to take time off and we have seen it increase.The other thing we did for the first time last year was close the office for a week in summer 'wellness week'. We communicated with our clients to manage expectations etc... and it was received very well.
A2: In the companies I have launched, we do unlimited PTO and we frame this as we want people to feel like we treat them like adults, they are accountable for taking the time they need. Agreed with above, many folks do not always take the time, so we have implemented 'forced" days off especially in peaks of covid, or added bonus days off around holidays ie Memorial day weekend, extending Labor day weekend etc. We also do a shut down at end of year from 12/25-1/1. Folks always appreciate this shutdown. Lastly, we did "rejuvenation time" when I was at my old company - 2 weeks in the summer where it was meeting-free across our division - folks loved this and it was a result of the question you asked- how can we offer more flexibility and adapt our time off policies. We almost moved to a model of unlimited PTO but instead we found that employees wanted more time that was designated meeting-free vs changing the PTO model.
A3: We have an unlimited PTO model and what we did was require a minimum of time for folks to take for their vacation which combats that lack of direction with an unlimited PTO policy. My team also pulls a report at the end of every quarter and highlight to managers anyone on their team who hasn't taken any time off yet to start pushing the conversation more in their one-on-ones. We also implemented meeting free Wednesdays
A4: We also have Flexible Time Off (unlimited) but have a guide that encourages a minimum. You had a lot of good answers here but LMK if anything more I can do to help.
A5: We just rolled out “Focus Fridays” as no-meeting days, and have a flexible PTO policy currently set at 40 days/year with a 3-week recommended minimum. We’re still working out all of the logistics, because requirements and compliance vary so widely country to country, but our intention is to be as flexible as possible.
You can learn more about the Amplify Accelerator Community in this post or by clicking the button below.
Jobs
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