Have you considered revamping your performance review process? The traditional approach to performance management has failed managers, employees, and organizations. Most of today’s performance management approaches, no matter what they are called, are often complex, emotionally burdensome, and time consuming, resulting in the most dreaded task managers have to do at work. For example, performance management is intended to measure employee performance and provide a feedback mechanism to drive more performance. Although both outcomes have to do with employees, they are distinctly different things. Measuring employee performance provides data to help inform talent decisions. What’s measured does not get done; what’s measured gets measured. Think about taking your temperature. Does taking your temperature reduce a fever? Of course not. And the act of measuring employee performance does not increase performance. Two separate outcomes deserve two separate approaches. If organizations want to measure employee performance (which they should), then they ought to have a process dedicated to that and that alone. Increasing performance happens in many ways, but most powerfully by creating a practice of high attention between team leaders and team members. Separating performance measurement from performance acceleration allows organizations to design processes and programs to achieve the intended outcome.  It is recommended to keep it simple.  Source:  Fast Company 5/30/22

How unions impact pay:  Apple is boosting pay for workers amid rising inflation, a tight labor market, and unionization pushes among hourly store employees.  The iPhone maker on Wednesday told employees in an email that the company is increasing its overall compensation budget. Starting pay for hourly workers in the U.S. will rise to $22 an hour, or higher based upon the market, a 45% increase from 2018. Starting salaries in the U.S. are also expected to increase. In recent months, Apple has been facing unusual labor unrest. That discontent has spanned from front-line store retail workers agitating for unionization to salaried engineers unhappy with the company’s plans to return to the office. Some workers, including those hourly employees in its stores and AppleCare, were told their annual reviews would be moved up three months and that their pay increases would take effect in early July.  Improving compensation and the compensation process is what Apple hopes to stop union activity.  Source:  The Wall Street Journal 5/25/22

Didn’t meet hiring plans last year? Most didn’t:  Companies fell short of their hiring plans in 2021, with 50% of HR pros surveyed saying their hiring goals weren’t met last year, according to a survey by GoodTime.  The hiring process has also lengthened. 60% of HR pros surveyed said time-to-hire has increased in the past 12 months. Hiring managers are struggling to keep up with backfill hires amid the Great Resignation, the survey noted. Retention remains a top challenge for HR pros, but especially so for those with remote work, the survey said. Notably, while 34% of mostly or fully remote companies surveyed said they struggled with a lack of qualified candidates, only 22% of fully or mostly in-office companies said the same, pointing to the downsides of a widened talent pool, GoodTime said.  Source:  HR Dive 5/19/22

Do you have miscarriage leave? While as many as half of pregnancies end in miscarriage, according to health site WedMD, there's no federal employment statute explicitly dealing with miscarriages or requiring employers to accommodate workers who have one. Most employers don't have policies specifically addressing the loss of a pregnancy, but experts say employers are increasingly wising up to the advantages of having thoughtful leave policies that encompass the full spectrum of family planning, including miscarriages, as well as a failed surrogacy, adoption, or infertility treatment. The Pregnancy Discrimination Act, which sits under Title VII, bars an employer from treating workers unfavorably because they're pregnant or have a pregnancy-related condition, which the U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission has interpreted to include miscarriage.  Miscarriage could potentially qualify as a disability under the Americans with Disabilities Act — a federal law that requires working with disabled employees on accommodations that put them on equal footing with their peers — though it's rare that courts find a pregnancy loss meets the law's definition of a disability.  Therefore, it may be a DEI effort to incorporate a miscarriage leave in the sick leave policies.  Source:  Law360 5/27/22

Unable to sleep, so is just about everyone else: Nine out of ten people struggle to fall asleep each night, according to research from Harmony Healthcare, a healthcare consultancy. 40% blame mindless thoughts for their poor sleep, while 8% spend their night hours thinking about finances. 4% spend their night hours focused on current events. Poor sleep patterns can have long-term negative results, says Dr. Grandner, a sleep advisor at Casper and director of the sleep and health research program at the University of Arizona, from diabetes to depression to more.  The Harmony Healthcare survey found that 35% have pulled an all-nighter in order to do more work. During the pandemic, work hours have become much blurrier for many. Employees are taking advantage of work from home to fit in some cat naps, the survey found. Nearly 75% of workers take a nap at home at least once a week, and 11% squeeze in a snooze every day. These naps are typically less than an hour — 33% spend 30-40 minutes napping, while 25% nap for less than 25 minutes. The impact on workers goes beyond the bedroom, too: the survey listed a lack of focus and work productivity as the most impacted areas. Source:  EBN 5/25/22

Free college and childcare in New Mexico:  This year New Mexico became the first U.S. state to offer free college to its residents and free childcare to most families, all on the back of soaring revenue from royalties and taxes on oil and gas production, which are booming on its patch of the Permian Basin. The state now ranks behind only Texas in energy production. With support from local legislators, Governor Michelle Lujan Grisham, a Democrat, is parlaying the record receipts into programs that could lift incomes for many of New Mexico’s 2.1 million residents and ultimately reshape its economy. Almost 17% of New Mexico’s population lives in poverty—the third-highest proportion in the US. The state’s high school graduation rate, at 75%, is the lowest in the nation. Unemployment was 5.3% in April, compared with 3.6% for the country as a whole.  Source:  Bloomberg 5/25/22