By Peter G. Spanberger at Directors and Boards.

When companies become an “employer of choice” they are in an enviable position of much more easily attracting the best and the brightest. Boards can work in the same direction to become a “board of choice” and reap the benefits of more easily attracting outstanding board candidates. What steps can a board take to accomplish this?

If a candidate is outstanding he or she will have done a thorough analysis of the caliber of the board under consideration. A board needs to have already done such an analysis and understand what makes it a board of choice. This self-knowledge forms the basis for selling an outstanding candidate on the desirability of the board.

Boards often underestimate their positive attributes and find self-analysis difficult to do. Once done, however, this self-analysis can provide each current board member with a deeper understanding of the board’s strengths and positive attributes. This has obvious benefits for the current board members and makes it easier for a candidate to discover these attributes. It also gives the board ammunition with which to “sell” outstanding candidates. The analysis will also reveal shortcomings that can then be addressed.

When boards do such an analysis they typically find that the positive attributes run the gamut from obvious to more subtle. Some of the obvious board attributes involve compensation and reasonable time demands. An analysis can reveal the degree to which the board makes it easy for members to do their jobs. Are board members provided with the needed information in a timely manner? Another obvious component involves the right amount of support in terms of travel, accommodations, etc. These are necessary, but not sufficient, attributes for attracting outstanding candidates.

More sophisticated boards take their analysis to a deeper level and focus on some of the more subtle components that would make a board attractive. They recognize that outstanding candidates will assume that the obvious components are present. Outstanding candidates will focus on some of the more subtle dimensions. Strong candidates will consider the prestige and competency
of the current board members. They will ask themselves how much pride they will have in being a member of this particular board.

Are the other board members people from whom this outstanding candidate can learn? Is the process of the board characterized by acrimony rather than harmonious and constructive discussion? Does diplomacy and respect permeate the boardroom? Is the board a place where challenging issues and intellectual stimulation occur? These are some of the more subtle attributes that outstanding candidates require and “boards of choice” must manifest.

Such a self-analysis can be enriched by understanding the reasons why strong candidates are or are not interested in the board. It is essential that the recruiter or a nominating committee member go deeper in their discussions with candidates. Going deeper means not allowing the individual just to give it an obvious reason for turning down the opportunity but to get to some of these more subtle factors that influence their decision. Fundamentally the individual has to read between the lines of what the candidate is saying. This additional step can provide significant insights about perceptions of board functioning.

Similarly, if board members leave or when board members’ tenure expires some type of exit interview can be revealing about the presence or absence of these subtle factors. It might also be revealing to interview board members who have been off the board for a few years in order to gain further understanding of the presence or absence of these factors that would be attractive to particularly strong board candidates.

Sophisticated boards take these types of steps in order to be a compelling board opportunity for outstanding candidates.

Just as companies work diligently to become an employer of choice, boards can do the same. For a board to become a board of choice it is necessary to engage in self-analysis and what makes it a compelling board opportunity. This analysis will deepen the understanding of current board members as well as be a selling point to prospective board members. When completed, the board will have positioned itself so that it can attract candidates of the caliber necessary in today’s complex business environment.

You’ve gotten pretty far in a job discussion. You like them. They like you. And it’s getting down to the nitty gritty.

by Marci Alboher at Yahoo.

Then your prospective employer pops the question you’ve been dreading: “So what are you making now?” (or some variation like, “What were you making in your last position?”) You freeze. You know that answering the question can only hurt you. It might peg you at a salary you feel you’ve outgrown or that you improperly negotiated. And you know that you’re always supposed to let the other person name a price first in any negotiation.

So what do you do?

Avoid revealing your salary. Never reveal your prior salary, says Ramit Sethi, creator of the blog, IWillTeachYouToBeRich, and author of the recently published book of the same title. He is clear and unequivocal. “It’s just none of their business,” he told me. “You’re focusing on a new job and if you reveal what you made previously, two things happen. First, you’ve laid out all your cards. Second, you’re admitting that you are inexperienced in interviewing and negotiating.” (That last bit was particularly painful for me to hear since I’ve made the mistake of revealing a prior salary and I’m in the business of advising people about how to manage their careers.)

Focus on your value. If the employer persists, Sethi suggests steering the conversation to the value you’ll be bringing to the position. If you can focus, say, on the hundreds of thousands of dollars in revenue you’ll help the company generate, it becomes harder for them to focus on the thousands or even tens of thousands of dollars you might be haggling over. If your position doesn’t have a clear connection to the bottom line, Sethi says to emphasize how your job will allow your manager to do his or her job more effectively. In the end, it’s all about how you’re going to help the organization achieve its goals.

Discuss salary ranges. If you get the prior salary question, steer the negotation to why you should be at a certain number or range, says Carol Frohlinger, managing director of Negotiating Women and author of the book, “Her Place at the Table.”

One instance where it’s fine to reveal your salary is when you feel like your current salary is in a reasonable range and you are only seeking a slight bump–say around 10 percent–according to Susan Cain, president of The Negotiation Company.  “If you’re not there, which is often the case, then you’ll want to deflect at least until they love you and don’t want to lose you,” says Cain. “At that point, you can say that you don’t think your current employer would be comfortable with your disclosing what you earn.” If you ultimately feel you have to disclose, Cain says you should just explain, in a non-defensive way, why you think it’s low and why you should be in a higher range. She recommends saying something like: “I’ve had various training and experience and am now looking for a position that will reflect my acquired expertise.”

Know your worth. When you do sit down to talk numbers, make sure that you do your homework so that you know what the range should be for the position. “It’s not just what the job pays, but what does it pay in your geographic area, in a company of the size of the one you’re looking at, in the same industry,” says Frohlinger. “And also think about what there is other than salary, what other things people have gotten for a total compensation package.”

Do your homework. In order to build a picture of what a job is worth, canvas your entire network, looking especially for people who have left a company you’re talking to. In addition, check out sites that offer comparative salary details, like Vault, PayScale, Salary.com and Glassdoor. If you work as an independent contractor or freelancer, ask your peers what they charge. “Talk to at least five people,” says Sethi, “since not everyone charges properly for their work and you might get a range of anywhere from $30-$200 an hour.”

What if you reveal too much? So what if you’ve messed up and revealed more than you wanted to? The best way to recover, says Sethi, is to start collecting evidence of your success on the job and immediately plan for an opportunity to sit down with your manager about how you’re doing. You’ll have to let some time pass–Sethi suggests about six months–but it’s important to let your manager know far in advance that you are preparing for a conversation that will include revisiting your compensation as part of it. In fact, Sethi says that by the time you have that conversation, your manager should fully know that you’re seeking a raise since you will have been laying the groundwork and showing off your accomplishments along the way.

Most people don’t realize the power of personal connection on the job.

I have many clients today that have lost their jobs and are looking for new employment. Unfortunately, they have worked at their respective companies for a very long time and they find themselves unable to get back that one specific position.

Even though I do coach them to ‘reach for the stars’, there is a law of diminishing returns. After a certain amount of time (let’s say 4-6 months), one needs to be realistic about their search. If you are busting your butt getting interviews and not getting that position, it may be time to click your search down a notch and focus on easier pickings. This happens frequently with C-Level clients that NEED to have another C-Level position. Honestly — they’re not many C-Level (or others of that ilk) spots out in business-land today.

My suggestion — instead of beating your head against a wall — take a lower position that will be easier to attract/lock-in. When you get into the invite-only party, show them you’re able to do much more than you’ve been hired to do. Most likely, they will see your capabilities over time and offer you increased responsibility or a better position (with increased pay).

But this scenario only comes with a successful and clear set of personal connections in the new job (I will talk about building personal connections later this week). And you will only get those if you are On The Job.

So don’t be so picky and go get that position. Good things sometimes don’t come to those who wait.

I hear it all the time from my clients when hiring — “I can’t find someone that is “just right” for the position.” Or “They don’t meet all the qualifications for the job.” Well – they’re wrong.

It’s a big mistake to expect that the possible candidates have to own ALL the qualifications for the said position. Why?

1. It’s unrealistic. Even in times like these, where there are a lot of people on the street, the system of finding the right person with the perfect qualifications is slim to none, and slims out of town. What happens is that the recruiter or HR associate puts unrealistic demands on every candidate at the start and rarely lets anyone with real potential in. They focus on capabilities and not on personality.

2. It’s not long-range thinking. Think about hiring for a bank manager. If you hire a previous bank manager with all the qualifications for the position, they’re going to be pretty bored within six months doing the same thing that they did at their last location. Once you learn how the company ‘works’ and all the people’s personalities – the job gets pretty basic after awhile. Then they get bored, sloppy, or start bothering you for a promotion.

You need to STRETCH your new people. The basic rule is to hire at least one grade below the stated position to ensure that you are challenging that person. What will happen? For at least the first year while they step out of their comfort zone they will push themselves and build new potential. In addition, when you stretch your pick, you might find that they do things differently from the previous manager — who might find innovative ways to attack their position and motivate their troops.

For those that are in the market looking for that position, use this info as a retort to the interviewer’s response that you might not have the requisite experience for the position (by the way – a frequent excuse used ALL the time). Tell them that it’s better to hire someone where it is a stretch – they will have more content employees that are consistently challenging themselves and doing things differently.

I’d love to hear your thoughts on this – feel free to leave your feedback in the comments section below. Thanks!

Robert is the KING of Twitter, Facebook, All software, and social marketing in general. This article hits so many personal points I discuss with clients that I just had to post it. So let’s all lift our glasses – here’s to Robert!

I’m getting a LOT of chats from people who have been laid off. Most of the time I find that they just aren’t presenting a good face to me for me to help them find a new job.

If you are laid off, here’s what you need to do:

1. Your blog is your resume. You need one and it needs to have 100 posts on it about what you want to be known for.
2. Remove all friends from your facebook and twitter accounts that will embarrass you. We do look. If we see photos of people getting drunk with you that is a bad sign. Get rid of them. They will NOT help you get a job.
3. Demonstrate you are “clued in.” This means removing ANYTHING that says you are a “social media expert” from your Twitter account. There is no such thing and even if there were there’s no job in it for you. Chris Brogan already has that job and he’s not giving it up.
4. Demonstrate you have kids and hobbies, but they should be 1% of your public persona, not 99%. Look at my blog here. You’ll see my son’s photo on Flickr once in a while. But mostly I talk about the tech industry, cause that’s the job I want to have: talking to geeks and innovators.
5. Put what job you want into your blog’s header. Visit Joel Spolsky’s blog. He’s “on software.” That’s a major hint that if he were looking for a job that he is totally, 100%, thinking about software. If you want a job as a chef, you better have a blog that looks like you love cooking.
   
6. Get rid of any ‘smart’ name/acronym like “LOLCats”. Do not argue me on Twitter about this. Google finds Twitters. Do you want your future potential boss noticing that you post LOLCats all day long? Believe me, you do not. It will NOT help you.
7. Post something that teaches me something about what you want to do every day. If you want to drive a cab, you better go out and take pictures of cabs. Think about cabs. Put suggestions for cabbies up. Interview cabbies. You better have a blog that is nothing but cabs. Cabs. Cabs. Cabs all the time.
8. Do not beg for links. If you did the above, you can Twitter me and say “check out my great software blog” though. Include @scobleizer in the tweet so I’ll see it. I’m an egotistical person so I read all Twitter replies that include my @scobleizer name in them. Hint: I haven’t met a blogger yet who is not an egotistical person. Take advantage of it. But no begging.
9. If you want to be a plumber, look for other plumbers to add to Twitter, friendfeed, Facebook, and LinkedIn. Remove all others. Be 100% focused on what you want to do.
10. On Twitter you can tell me what you had for lunch, but only after you posted 20 great items about what you want to do. Look at Tim O’Reilly’s tweet stream. Very little noise. Just great stuff that will make you think (he wants a job as a thinker, so do you get it yet?)
11. IMPORTANT: Invite influentials out to lunch. Getting a job is now your profession. If you were a salesperson, how would you get sales? You would take people out to lunch who can either buy what you’re selling, or influence others who can buy. That means take other bloggers (but only if they cover what you want to do) out to lunch. That means taking lots of industry executives out to lunch.
12. Send out resumes. Make sure yours is up to date and top notch on LinkedIn and other sites where employers look for employees. Craig’s List. Monster. Etc.
13. Go to industry events. I have a list of tech industry events up on Upcoming.org. If you want to be a plumber, go to where contractors go. Etc. Etc. Make sure you have clear business cards. Include your photo. Include your Twitter and LinkedIn addresses. Your cell phone. Your blog address. And the same line that’s at the top of your blog. Joel’s should say “on software.” Yours should say what you love to do. Hand them out, ask for theirs. Make notes on theirs. Email them later with your LinkedIn and blog URLs and say “you’ll find lots of good stuff about xxxxxxxx industry on my blog.”
14. When you meet someone who can hire and who you want to work for – Follow them on Twitter. Facebook. LinkedIn. Their blog. Stalk them without being “creepy.” Learn everything you can about them. Build a friendfeed room with all their stuff. That way when they say on Twitter “I have a job opening” you can be the first one to Tweet back.
15. Tell others where the jobs are. One thing I learned in college is by helping other people get jobs you’ll get remembered. So, retweet jobs messages (if they are relevant to your professional friends and to you). Blog about job openings. Help people get jobs. Hold lunches for people who are jobless. Some of them will get jobs and they’ll remember you and invite you along.
16. Do what you want to do. Let’s assume you’ll be laid off for a year. Are you going to lay around on the couch waiting for a call? No. You will do exactly what you want to do. Want to be an engineer at a great startup? Go and volunteer to work there for free. Make sure you do a blog post about every day you do what you’re doing for free. Say “I could do this for you, call…”
17. Do some work on SEO. Make it possible for people to find you. THINK about how people would search for someone with your expertise and skills. Here’s how, Visit the Google AdWords Keyword Tool. Do a search on a word that you think represents best what you want to do. I just did one for “Electrical Engineering” and it brought up a ton of great info about what people are searching for. Include those terms in your blog. And, even better, blog about those things!
18. Remove any hint that you hated your old job from all your online things.

Good luck. It sucks. I know that. I was laid off last time and, who knows, might be laid off again, but if you’re doing all this stuff and you aren’t finding a job, let me know. You know where to find me.

Interviews have morphed into very weird experiences for my clients. I’ve heard some of the most stupid questions, tests & assessments come out of highly respected organizations.

My opinion? I think they’re lazy.

Bottom line — you want a good candidate for that position? You’ll have to work for it. Ask very specific questions and see HOW they answer.

Here are some of my favorite questions I would ask executives interviewing for a position under me (I found it in an old file from my days in corporate):

1. RESULTS – Tell me about the results you have achieved at your last two positions. How did you achieve them? What was the effect to the business?

2. KNOWLEDGE – Give me an example of how you understand my business (broad). Where do you think the growth areas are? Where do you think we can do better with customer experience? Give me an example.

3. RISK – When was the last time you took a risk? What did you learn from it? (Cause & Effect – learn from mistakes; learn from successes).

4. COMMITMENT - Show me how you are committed to your customers, associates, peers?

5. COMMUNICATION - Tell me about a time when you communicated effectively (up-down-across — effective, clear, convincing).

6. SPEAKING UP – Give me an example when you pushed back, made some noise, offered constructive dissent.

7. STYLE – From where do you manage (Desk, email, phone, floor, in-person)? When do you make your BEST decisions?

8. PEOPLE – What are you currently working on (personally)? What are your people working on? How do you grow them?

9. EXECUTION – What actions do you take to deliver on time? How do you connect yourself to priorities?

10. ROLE PLAY – Show me how you solve problems (I give them a typical scenario they would face in that position).

You can easily modify these questions for yourself – whether you are promoting internally or hiring externally. You can even develop powerful PARs (call me, I can explain – 203-500-2421) for YOUR interview and talk to these points. You will come off looking like a true professional.

This interview of John Donahoe, president and chief executive of eBay since March 2008.

By Adam Bryant at the NY Times.

Q. What is the most important lesson you’ve learned about leadership through the years?

A. You can’t change people. As a leader, there’s a real temptation to try to change people or help people get to where you want them to go. And I learned, actually through experience, that you can’t change someone. All you can do is help them help themselves.

And so I spend a lot less time than I used to trying to make people do something that either they can’t do, or don’t want to do, and spend more time illuminating what needs to get done. And if they make the choice to do it, great. If not, get them into a role where they can do what they’re good at.

Q. How has your management style evolved?

A. I was blessed with being part of a really professional service firm, a talent firm, at Bain & Company, for years. I got rigorous performance reviews every six months or so, and in those learned what I needed to develop and work on to go to the next level.

Interestingly, when I became C.E.O. of Bain, I used to get a performance review where my assessment committee would interview 40 partners in half-hour interviews, and I’d get a performance review that was 20 pages thick. Everything I could possibly do better was included in that.

In many ways it was liberating, because I realized feedback’s a gift and I wasn’t afraid of the feedback. I’d look at it — and a third of it, I said: “You know, that’s exactly right. This is going to be a long-term area I’m going to have to get better and better at, and I want to make progress next year, and it will still be an issue that year.”

It’s kind of a lifelong journey. About a third of it was: “Oh, wow, I didn’t realize I was doing that and need to stop doing it, or someone wanted me to be doing something else that I agreed with.” And then a third of it, I said: “You know what? Thanks for the feedback. I’m going to ignore it. I’m going to keep doing what I want to do.”

I try to do the same for the people around me, and give them open, objective feedback offered in a constructive way. Then each person says, “Here’s what I’m good at, here’s where my development priorities are and where I want to get better.” And then, as I said earlier, the choice of whether they want to get better is actually their choice. I can’t make them do that. And I waste a lot less time than I used to trying to make someone do something they won’t choose to do.

Q. Any other ways you’ve evolved as a manager?

A. Sure. Be more direct in communication. Don’t sugarcoat tough news, bad news. Second, there are certain really important decisions to take thoughtful time on, because once you make them, you can’t unwind them. There are a lot of other decisions that you’re better off making quickly, even if the decision is not the perfect one, and then adjusting down the road, rather than taking too much time.

Q. What questions do you ask of job candidates?

A. A good question is always: ”When have you failed and what did you learn from it?” A second question I always ask is, “If I were to talk to your boss, your work colleagues, people who work for you, what would they say about you?”’ And the quicker I can get them to give adjectives, the more I get to know them. And then I’d say, “If I were to ask those same people what are your priorities? Where do you need to learn, grow, develop?”

Q. How do you make sure you know what people at all levels of the company are thinking?

A. I try to reach into the company and talk to different people at different levels. It’s interesting how much companies don’t like that. The people who I contact like it, but their bosses or their bosses’ bosses don’t.

One of the things I’ve also found really useful over time is any time a senior person leaves, or sometimes a midlevel person, I’ll often reach out and say, “Hey, would you either send me an e-mail, or I’d love to get together and I’d love to hear what are the three things that you think I should know about what’s going on in the organization that you think I might not be aware of.” And then, secondly, “If you were me, what would you do differently from what we’re doing?”

And I find that when people are leaving, they’re often in a very reflective state and, because they’ve often made a very difficult decision, they’re also just stunningly direct, because it’s like they have nothing to lose. In fact, if they care about the company they’ll be more direct. And I find I get some very good insights, and they’re often quite actionable.

Q. Can you share a couple of specifics insights you’ve gleaned from the exercise?

A. A common theme would be, in recent years at eBay, just how hard it is to get decisions made when you’re in the middle of the organization — how it feels like, if you’re in the middle of the organization, there are 10 people who can kill a decision but no one person can make the decision.

And so we’re now moving to dedicated cross-functional teams in our product development process. It’s called agile development, where we’re trying to sharpen clarity about who can make the decision and who needs to be involved in the decision.

Q. You want eBay to … ( fill in the blank).

A. To compete for each customer’s business and loyalty each and every day, and understand that when you’re in the middle of a competition, rarely do you get a whole lot of positive feedback. Rarely is there a lot of glory in it.

I use analogies of the N.B.A. finals or the World Cup. The World Cup final a couple years ago was a really ugly game. Remember it? It was 0-0, and at the end of the day, an ill-timed head-butt, because someone lost his temper, was the difference between winning the World Cup and not winning the World Cup.

Similarly, in the N.B.A. finals, often one team comes out of the gate and wins the first game or second, but then the other team comes back. When you get up to that level, I mean you get up to world class, it’s often a dogfight. Who’s got a little more endurance? Who’s a little tougher? Who has a little more resilience? Who makes one less mistake? And that’s the same thing about competing and winning in business.

Another really valuable piece of advice early in my career was from a guy named Kent Thiry, who was another of my early bosses and is now C.E.O. at DaVita.

I didn’t know it at the time, but I was suffering from a real fear of failure. Kent said, “You know, John, your challenge is you’re trying to bat .900.” And he said: “When you were in college, you got a lot of A’s. You could get 90, 95 percent right. When you took your first job as an analyst, you were really successful and felt like you were batting .900.”

But he said, and this is probably five years into my career: “Now you’ve moved from the minor leagues. You’re playing in the major leagues, and if you expect to bat .900, what happens is, either you come up at bat and you freeze because you’re so afraid of swinging and missing, or you’re a little afraid to step into the batter’s box.”

He said, “Best I can tell, the best hitters in Major League Baseball, world class, they can strike out 6 times out of 10 and still be the greatest hitter of all time.”

And he said, “That’s my philosophy — the key is to get up in that batter’s box and take a swing. And all you have to do is hit one single, a couple of doubles, and an occasional home run out of every 10 at-bats, and you’re going to be the best hitter or the best business leader around.” You can’t play in the major leagues without having a lot of failures.

Q. Let’s talk about time management. Do you do anything unusual?

A. I take days away. This is the only phone call I’m taking today, because it’s a thinking day. It’s a day to just get away and step back and reflect. And I find that very hard to do in the office or in a familiar environment.

I find that if I don’t schedule a little bit of structured time away, where there’s no interruption, that it’s very hard to get the kind of thinking time and reflection time that I think is so important.

Q. How often do you schedule them?

A. Not often enough. I’d say probably every two months, and I think I should do it every month. Long airplane flights can sometimes accomplish that — that 10- or 12-hour flight, where there’s no e-mail, there’s no cellphone.

Q. Are you a gadget person?

A. I couldn’t do without my cellphone. I would love to do without my BlackBerry. On the one hand the BlackBerry’s a productivity tool. On the other hand, it can be a very fragmenting thing. If I’m spending all day checking my BlackBerry, by definition I’m reactive.

And so I try to only do e-mail first thing in the morning or in the evening, because I find if I check e-mail during the day, I go from being proactive about what I want to get accomplished that day to being reactive, and that’s a bit of a trap. Being reactive is a lot easier than being proactive, and e-mail and the BlackBerry are natural tools to facilitate that.

Q. Is there an important list you keep?

A. Well, I keep a copy of a paragraph from a John Gardner speech. He was, I think, one of the wisest observers of society, man, leadership. I keep a laminated copy in my wallet. And once you read it you’ll see it’s consistent with a lot of what I talked about. It’s about how you build purpose and meaning into your life. And to me it also talks about how you win in the right way.

Here is the paragraph:

“Meaning is not something you stumble across, like the answer to a riddle or the prize in a treasure hunt. Meaning is something you build into your life. You build it out of your own past, out of your affections and loyalties, out of the experience of humankind as it is passed on to you, out of your own talent and understanding, out of the things you believe in, out of the things and people you love, out of the values for which you are willing to sacrifice something. The ingredients are there. You are the only one who can put them together into that unique pattern that will be your life. Let it be a life that has dignity and meaning for you. If it does, then the particular balance of success or failure is of less account.”

— From a speech John W. Gardner delivered to the Hawaii Executive Conference in Kona, Hawaii, in April 1993 and published in Stanford, an independent publication of the Stanford Alumni Association, March 1994.

By Adam Bryant at the NY Times.

“Take an interest in the interviewer. Show you care by figuring out what gets the interviewer’s mojo working, then strike up a short conversation about it – or, better yet, incorporate it into that thank you note. If the interviewer is into, say, fishing, include a tip about an unknown fisherman’s paradise your note,” suggests executive coach Rich Gee.

“You’re looking for a connection,” he says.

Figuring out what that connection might be is part of the trick. “You need to be like Sherlock Holmes. You have to decipher certain things that drive them,” says Gee, who notes: “People’s offices are a reflection of themselves, so you can always find something.”

Yea! Thanks Brian!  Here’s the link.