I Am Evolving (Part Four)

I would like to tell you the story of how HREvolution 2010 started with my discontent over my choice of socks and shoes on Saturday morning. It’s a dumb story about how my wardrobe choice caused  discerning thoughts of how I should conform to the pressure of fashion. 

But HREvolution 2010 did not start there; Not by a long shot. It started Friday morning when I ran into a known stranger by the name of Bill Boorman.  I had just walked off the CTA and before I even checked-in we were off to get coffee and chat for almost an hour. That was 10:30 am on Friday and I don’t think I shut up until 1 am Saturday morning.

Saturday was still a chatty day. But there was more opportunity to just listen.

And so goes what is the long story of HREvolution 2010. But you’re not here to read a book, you’re here to read a blog. So let me cut to the chase, write my chapter, put my two cents in, etc. and say, this was the most interesting thing I have done for my HR career. After all was said and done, it came down to three things: the people, the group-think and the network.

The People

There is nothing more powerful than people and their need to gather and to share information.  It could be what we do best as a civilization for this planet. Beside need, the want to do so by the attendees was in full swing. We came to take the ethereal relationships and turn them into corporeal relationships. Some of this time together will be the basis for lifetime friendships, some of it will be knowing who’s supporting you, some of it will be putting the genuine face to the name. Either way when I look at the following list, I find it amazing that I met this many folks and that very few people on this list were just simple introductions. The memory I have of meeting each of you is strong. Which proves to me how important each of you are…important to me, important to the work we did this past weekend, and important to the work we are going to do in the future. It’s a mighty list and I hope I got everyone: Alan Robinson, Amanda Hite, April Dowling, Ben Eubanks, Ben Madden, Benjamin McCall, Bill Boorman, Bill Kutik, Bryan Abranowitz, Bryan Wempen, Carol Harnett, Charlie Judy, Chris Frede, Craig Fisher, Crystal Peterson, Dave Carhart, Dee Honner, Frank Zupan, Franny Oxford, Geoff Webb, Jason Lauritsen, Jason Seiden, Jessica Merrell, John Jorgensen, John Nykolaiszyn, Jonathan Krass, Keelie Fallon, Kevin Grossman, Krista Francis, Leanna Pelham, Lisa Watson, Lois Melbourne, Maren Hogan, Margo Rose, Mark Stelzner, Mary Schaefer, Matt Stollack, Mervyn Dinnen, Mike Frazure, Mike Krupa, Paul Herbert, Penina Sachs, Rebecca Slosberg, Rich DeMatteo, Robin Schooling, Ruth Estwick, Sarah White, Steve Boese, Steve Harrison, Sue Marks, Suzanne Rumsey, Tammy Colson, Teresa Morris, Tim Sackett, Trish McFarlane, Victorio Milian, Yasha Stelzner

It was also the opportunity to spend time with some folks that have already bridged the connection to the corporeal and to spend some time catching up on our personal lives, to buddy up our knowledge of each other or to share some more laughs. Eric Winegardner, Jennifer McClure, Joan Ginsberg, Lance Haun, Laurie Ruettimann, Mary Ellen Slayter, Mike VanDervort, Shennee Rutt and Shauna Moerke.

I don’t need to say much about these lists of people. If you know them, you know collectively their reach is as wide as it is deep. If you don’t, spend some time clicking the links attached to their names. The collective body speaks for itself.

The only issue that I had with the HREvolution attendees was there was not enough time to meet each of you. So if I didn’t meet you, and you see me somewhere out and about, and you recognize me from Twitter or HREvolution, I invite you to say to me, “I know you.” Because that’s how this whole thing gets started.


The Group-Think

Much to-do was made about this in my earlier post, I Am Evolving (Part Two) and the question was presented to me, how much of it occurred? For me, very little.

Though I did notice some intensity among a couple of attendees that seemed bound and determined to force consensus to their beliefs. But to the credit of the other attendees, I think most of us were thinking of how individually we can make improvements and share those ideas.

Because the reality is most of us are going back to our workplace and live within the constraints of our current situations. Not one opinion expressed can be applied to every attendees work-life and nor did I hear that "you have to do this".  The closest we got to group-think was the general acknowledgment that we wish to make the workplace, a better place. And that bad workplaces are just a bad way to live life. This brings me to my final point:  

The Network

HREvolution is a collective body of individuals bringing together their rhymes, their reasons and talking about how to make sense of it all.  It's a daunting task. The workplace is extremely complex: politically, economically, and socially. Our role as HR professionals is to strive for process improvements.  It does not matter if you're a director, a specialist or a generalist. Our roles as HR professionals are intertwined and interdependent and we face the same basic challenges. But collectively we are stronger than standing alone. And to me, ultimately that was what this past weekend was really about: forming our individual networks with like-minded HR professionals.  We may have to operate in silos at work, but we don't need to operate within silos amongst ourselves.

'Nuff Said

First of all, I know I'm not saying much that you don't already know. In fact, many blog posts are dedicated to this subject this week.  As much as I hope to get to them all, I hope you do too. Because by reading everyone's experience perhaps you can get a sense of what it was like to experience being there.

Secondly, I want to thank Mike VanDervort and Franny Oxford for being my co-facilitators at the Diversity session. And to the committee for asking me to be part of that part of the program.

Lastly, the committee deserves a big congratulations on putting this all together. It was apparent the amount of time and effort that went into preparing this. It's to your credit that I believe it was a success.

I'm looking forward to doing this all over again.