As a Recruitment professional, I contact at least 15-20 Hiring managers & HR Managers (in a new-business capacity) on a daily basis.

Here’s a scenario you may have seen when a new manager got promoted at your company. See if you can identify the key mistakes this new manager made:

Sue just got promoted in an organization where hitting deadlines is a core value. The CEO believes deadlines are the key to excellence and that people who miss deadlines are lazy and disorganized. Right or wrong, that’s the culture, and Sue thrived in it. She never missed a deadline in her life.

Now, barely settled into her new office, she gets a visit from Don, a direct report with whom she shared a cubicle before her promotion. He says that a vendor let him down. A part will arrive a week late and he’s going to miss his deadline for a new product design.

And Sue says, “That same vendor did that to me once, too. I’d like you to call them and find out if you can get the part any faster. Otherwise, the big boss is going to throw a fit.”

What went

Would you be acting more swiftly and diligently if instead of HIPAA HITECH the pending law was called PITPA – Personal Identity Theft Protection Act?

PITPA – Personal Identity Theft Protection Act – wow, that gets right to the heart of it. Who can disagree with this?

Protecting your identity is as  All American as apple pie and Chevrolet! I can hear the politicians and talking heads now going crazy over the importance of personal protection, their rights etc….

What do you think that HITECH is all about? Its about protecting not only your personal identity, but also information relating to your family’s information and further information related to

Every leader must also follow.

Those who show no accountability to others--in business, non-profits, or government--may hold a position of leadership but won't hold on to it without some version of brute and/or "political" force, overt or covert. (If that kind of leadership appeals to you, you may want to check Craigslist for the "Dictators Wanted" ads).

The Hartford Ended Last Year With 900 Fewer Local Workers Hartford Courant ... Inc. has its headquarters in Asylum Hill in the capital city and major local offices in Windsor and Simsbury, where its Hartford Life unit is based. ... and more »

First lady Michelle Obama launched a nationwide campaign Tuesday to fight childhood obesity, part of her effort to teach America's children about better nutrition and exercise.

Quick - Who watched "Undercover Boss" after the Superbowl?  Who thought it was entertaining?  Who thought it was lame?More importantly, who thought it was real?  Or that meaningful improvement could be had from this approach?  Could "The Situation" from the Jersey Shore have actually assisted with the intellectual honesty of this series?Let's imagine you're in the guts of an American business that has a workforce of 40K+ that's been built primarily through acquisition.  If you know anything about business, you know there are going to be plenty of things messed up operationally.  You don't build a business that size via M&A and not have some dysfunction across the board.More dysfunction than can be solved in the finale of a pop culture reality show, where the outcome has to fit into a 20 minute wrap-up.  Walter Kirn of Business Week understands this:"The sudden loss of lofty status that Undercover Boss relies on for its corny appeal is a perennially potent ...

From Nationally known law firm McDermott Will and Emory: HITECH is the number 5 item on their top 10 list of Health Law issues for 2010:

The HITECH Act also expanded the reach of HIPAA, extending it to business associates effectiveFebruary 17, 2010, and imposing nationwide notification requirements for breach of unsecured protected health information (PHI).  Business associates will also now be directly obligated to comply with the security rule of HIPAA and implement security policies to

Any business insurance broker worth his salt will insist that a budding entrepreneur cover him or herself adequately for a debt crisis that could arise from elements beyond their control. It was the failure of the banking behemoths of ...

Aon Reports 4Q Profit After '08 Loss National Underwriter Property And Casualty Insurance News - 2 minutes ago By MARK E. RUQUET Insurance broker Aon Corp. reported fourth-quarter net income rose $204 million despite the challenges from the continuing soft market and economic recession. The Chicago-based ...

I'll be honest. When I wrote about last month's summit conference that brought together federal government officials and executives from technology-savvy firms like Southwest Airlines, I wondered if anything would come of it. The idea was for the

That’s the map of the US based on Pete Warden’s analysis of Facebook profiles. So I live in Socialistan – of well, I grew up in a Communist country, if this is Socialism, I can handle it

But what about the Rest of the World? I thought it was a good time to dust off the good old World Map – admittedly not based on scientcific research

Learn first-hand how   leading technology providers are developing midmarket technologies to solve key   business and strategic challenges.   It's been about two years since I wrote about Gartner's prediction that software-as-a-service could be

I just flew back from Miami, and boy, are my arms tired. But seriously. I loved the Super Bowl. The weather was great. The food was terrific. The mood was extraordinary, mostly due to the joyous, friendly, tipsy presence of the Who Dat Nation. At times it seemed like there were 100 Saints fans for every Colts fan.  Maybe it was the proximity of Miami to the Big Easy. Maybe it was just the overwhelming feeling that it was time for New Orleans to have some good news. But even people from Indianapolis were saying “Who Dat?” to each other.

A word about “Who Dat?” For those who have been living in a cave in Waziristan, this is the greeting that

"Fitting in" is a big deal, and in many organizations it's seen as the way to career longevity.

That's a problem.

People are influenced by those they see as being "ahead of them." If you simply match the rest of the workforce and blend in, your influence is diminished. Eventually, you become invisible.

If you want to lead, be willing to raise your

I’ve noticed a very important shift in market research. Leading-edge firms are relying less on traditional statistical analysis and more on what I’m calling “Contextual insight“ which I’ve defined as

Observations drawn from data that resonates with an understanding of the business

Scientists have found specific genetic variants which may explain why some people age earlier than others and say their findings have important implications for understanding cancer and age-related diseases.

Did Bush Leave Us Bankrupt, Corrupt, Ungovernable? Huffington Post (blog) Yet, a year later, he can't win passage of his top legislative priority: health care. "Our two-party political system is broken just when everything needs ...

This question came in an email yesterday from Mozilla's Asa Dotzler, who is renowned for his skill as an open-source marketer, especially in spreading the Firefox browser.  The engine that propels any open source community is having a wide range of smart and hardworking people who generate and refine solutions, and are eager to step in and fix them when things go wrong.  So maintaining norms that encourage people to participate in generating solutions and making decisions-- rather than those who don't pitch in or help make decisions but always complain bitterly about the outcome  -- is crucial to any open source community. 

I would add that the same goes for life inside organizations: Some people refuse to speak-up or pitch-in when ideas are being developed, are unable or unwilling to go to key meetings, and generally don't have

All too often when HR professionals are looking to conduct background checks on applicants, they first delve into the issue of price and then, maybe but not likely, delve into the issue of competence, integrity and accuracy.  An interesting post over at fellow Lexbloggers and friends at Bond Schoeneck & King's New York Employment Law Report demonstrates the concerns associated with complying with  both the Federal and the New York Fair Credit Reporting Acts.  Author, Kristin Smith,  who notwithstanding her youthful appearance in her corporate mug

George Visger is one of several ex-NFL athletes struggling with memory loss, depression and sudden, frightening bouts of rage. Experts believe the reason for the brain damage is concussion.

We've all had great bosses in the workplace, and most of us have faced terrible ones, as well. It's often a complicated issue in the IT world, where managers are skilled computer experts but sometimes fail miserably at managing employees and helping them achieve their career goals.

What are you supposed to do when you have the bad luck of getting a boss who cannot help you do the best job you can or get to the next level on your career path? Believe it or not, you are not at a dead end. It is possible to get ahead even when your boss is unwilling or unable to support your ambitions.

Here's some advice from the experts, according to a CIO.com article:

• Take matters into your own hands. Start working on auxiliary issues within your team.
• Do your own networking. Reach out to other teams to find out what they are up to and how you could be part of their project.
• Be

The U.S. spent $2.472 trillion on health care last year, according to a paper out today in the journal Health Affairs. That’s $282 million an hour.

Health spending as a percent of GDP — a key metric that shows how much of all U.S. spending goes to health care — rose from 16.2% in 2008 to 17.3% in 2009, far higher than any other industrialized country. That’s the largest one-year increase since 1960, when the feds started closely tracking national health expenditures.

The figure went up so much because health spending continued to rise, even as the overall economy shrank. The aging population accounted for a small part of this rise, but two other factors were more important: rising

Dental health poll: Tooth Fairy has deeper pockets DentalPlans.com Delta Dental of Minnesota, a non-profit dental health services organization, recently came out with their annual Tooth Fairy Poll and found that the average ... The Tooth Fairy Predicts Economic Growth Momlogic.com all 4 news articles »

Private-sector job losses of the last two years have sped up the shift to government payment. Last year, the number of people who received their insurance through the private market declined by 1.2 percent, despite generous federal subsidies in the stimulus bill to help laid off workers continue their employer-based coverage.

McAfee: Big Business Under Constant Cyber Attack
01.29.10

At the World Economic Forum Annual Meeting in Switzerland, McAfee announced the results of a survey of

Cigna, the health insurer, swung to a fourth-quarter profit of $330 million, or $1.19 a share, from a year-earlier loss and reaffirmed its earnings outlook for 2010. At TheStreet.com

... At Thomson Reuters

Is discipline perceived as punishment in your organization? Are managers forced to wield your progressive discipline policy like a hammer?

There’s another way. A few years ago author Dick Grote (who wrote the book “Forced Ranking: Making Performance Management Work”) penned an article called “Discipline Without Punishment.” The most interesting idea in it was what he calls a “paid disciplinary suspension.”

This method was

Aetna Health Inc. paid a $750,000 fine as part of a settlement with the New York Insurance Department related to the company administering an affordable healthcare plan for the state. Aetna is the administrator for the state-subsidized program Healthy NY, which assists small business owners in providing affordable health insurance to their employees. Aetna's violations included failing to provide a required 30-day notice of rate increases to about 946 members in 2007, failing to provide notice to 1,406 terminated workers of their rights to convert to another policy, failing to report enrollment data from May 2007 through August 2008, and failing to respond to Insurance Department requests for data in March 2008, the Hartford Courant reports.

Aetna Says 2010 Earnings Will Drop to $2.55-$2.65 BusinessWeek The two largest health insurers are UnitedHealth Group Inc., based in Minnetonka, Minnesota, and Indianapolis- based WellPoint Inc. Both beat analysts' ... altro »

Aon Posts 4Q Profit After 2008 Charges; Results Top Views >AON Wall Street Journal - 31 minutes ago Aon Corp. (AON) reversed a prior-year loss caused by divestitures and other impacts as the insurance broker saw its commissions and fee revenue rise in the latest quarter, with results beating ...

Insurers, Consumers Battle Over Public Disclosure The Lund Report In fact, the five other large insurers in Oregon oppose disclosure – Regence BlueCross BlueShield, HealthNet, LifeWise Health Plan, Kaiser Permanente and ...

Insurers Ready Another Round of Double-Digit Hikes The Lund Report February 4, 2010 -- Regence BlueCross BlueShield is asking the Insurance Division to approve a 25.3 percent average premium increase on more than 73000 ...

I have argued in the past that there are a lot of evidence-based disadvantages to working in an open office, as there are many more interruptions, distractions, and other stressors --- and of course less privacy.  And there are quite a few studies that show when people move from closed to open office designs, they don't like it all and their productivity sometimes drops.  I had an experience a few weeks back, however, that has me questioning the limits of this research -- and believing that if an organization has the right norms, leadership, and especially collective trust  (and have the right people and right skills to truly do cooperative work), that open offices can be a splendid thing. 

This all struck me a few weeks back when I went to visit  David Kelley at IDEO to chat about some ideas we were hatching for the Stanford d.school (which David, a Stanford professor,

'Software as a service is getting big' TMC Net The operational budget, which has largely been BPO , could also increase from 2-3 percent to 15 percent over next 3-5 years. Beyond back-office work, ...