Last month, I hosted Houston’s first ERE Meetup.   After a few tense moments when I thought I’d be left alone at Block Seven Wine Company to read my Angelina-cover Vanity Fair Magazine with a bottle of wine and some truffle popcorn all to myself  (ok – not SO tense,) several interesting and interested HR and recruiting folks from across Houston started popping over to say hello. We had recruiters from the hospital industry, the temp industry, and the refining industry there. We also had a couple of folks without jobs who are staying positive while on the hunt.

The conversation was authentic, lively, and engaging. We had laughs, we told the truth about how things are going, and we engaged far beyond the usual stiff  ”elevator speeches” often found at networking events.

I was thrilled. I’ve been looking for a community of smarty-pants HR pros in Houston, people who want the best for their organizations and aren’t afraid to take risks to make things happen. HRQ occasionally holds evening meetings that are focused on conversation rather than Powerpoint slides, and I’m sure there are other private group meetings as well. But this group just fits me. (Plus, since it was open, I was invited!)

We’re meeting again August 17th. Click here to sign up, or if you’re not from Houston, click through to sign up for the ERE meetup in your town. You won’t be sorry!

My great-grandmother, Francelia Crittenden, was a force of nature.  She lost her husband in the Great War, and raised her two sons on her own by working as a business organizer and community activist. She died, at the age of 103, in an old folks home she helped found. Gran had two sayings that have always stuck with me: “The only sin is not using the talents God gave you to make the world a better place,” and “You are how you spend your time.”  She stayed busy until the very end, walking the halls of the home, “offering suggestions” in her gracious but firm way.  I often fail her model, but she’s always on my mind.

In the last six days at work I’ve:

If you’re attending SHRM 2010, don’t waste your time, or your dime.

Use this opportunity to learn something new, make new connections, land that next gig, get those new clients – whatever is truly on your mind as your Next Big Step. With a conference this big, attracting so many HR Pros and business leaders, you have the perfect opportunity to do what you want. But don’t show up, expect to be spoon-fed training, and leave. That would be a big waste.

I once landed my dream job at a National SHRM conference. I was working in a small town, disconnected from other opportunities, and I knew I wanted a bigger platform to do my thing. So since the SHRM National conference was being held nearby, I set my sights high. I decided I was going to walk out of the conference with at least three funny stories, fifteen new friends, two major job leads, and thirty-five non-vendor-related business cards. I asked a friend, who wasn’t attending, to help me keep score every morning – and I went to work. Here’s how I did it.

• I spent time on the SHRM bulletin boards before the conference, getting to know some people and arranging for a meetup or two.
• I went alone, so no one could bust my momentum or distract me from my goal.
• I came up with a loose elevator speech explaining what I’d done up to that point, what I was looking to do, and my goals for the conference. This was important – it helped get strangers at the conference “on my team” and they introduced me to lots of their friends and invited me to parties.
• I made myself show up. I went to every party, every luncheon, every large class I heard of. I also, frankly, crashed a party or two – sorry SHRM Best Small Companies partygoers, that was me with the lampshade on my head.
• I applied for jobs through the SHRM on-site job board, and asked to meet with company interviewers during the conference. This is actually what did it for me. I was in the computer room and saw that Dream Job had JUST been posted. I quickly shot an email out outlining why I was The One and asking to visit immediately. The recruiter, Shannon Maroney of HR Backbone,  introduced herself, and we talked right there! We immediately clicked, and over the course of the next couple of days, she and I got to know each other much better. I told her about my goals for the SHRM conference and we attended a couple of the same parties. On the last day of the conference, I took her to lunch and to the airport. By the time she introduced me to her client, she was comfortable selling me as the best possible match to Dream Company’s CEO.

I know SHRM National is about more than networking. The seminars are great and you can learn a great deal just by listening. But if you are one of the attendees who goes to every seminar, takes notes, and then watches bad cable in your hotel room all night, you are REALLY missing out.  There’s no reward for being a wallflower.  You don’t need to be me, totally goal-focused and intent, but you do need to stretch yourself.  HR is an isolating and often depressing job. Use this time to make some new friends and have a laugh or two.  If you don’t, you may be wasting your time.

The news of China Gorman’s departure from SHRM cast a bit of a pall on the HREvolution 2010 event a couple of weeks ago.

Someone said they felt hopeless. I myself felt discouraged and let down. I don’t really care much about social media, except as a way to connect with people who practice the kind of progressive, candid, risk-friendly HR I wasn’t seeing at SHRM events.  Speaking plainly, I think local SHRM chapters are often cliquish, conservative, behind the times, useless to those with more than five years of experience, and a little greedy. I think they get the tacit nod toward these behaviors from SHRM National. When China, who went from SHRM COO to interim CEO to Global Outreach Something Or Another,  chose to resign, I took it as a sign that SHRM would never “get it,” and my last hopes regarding the organization’s direction went up in smoke.  I felt that momentum that had been building towards change in SHRM had taken a big step backward.

I was wrong. Not necessarily about SHRM, but about the pedestal I put China on. It’s a little like the difference between the Obama campaign and his administration. We’re learning in lots of different ways that no one person can make things much better on their own. Barack Obama, China Gorman, our CEOs, all need US to create and sustain momentum and leadership. They can’t do it alone. Asking them to do so and then being disappointed when they can’t deliver is a complete cop-out, and creates a dangerous level of apathy.  I think people want to be lead. But we decline responsibility for our own role as leaders at the expense of our families, neighborhoods, workplaces, associations and even country. We have to do the work ourselves.

My friend Victorio Milian asked his readers to put up or shut up, to help create bright spots of positive change within our own spheres of influence.  So, Victorio, here’s what I’m doing about it.

• I’m developing and leading a class on creating efficiencies in a one-person HR shop. The workshop will be held at HRFlorida 2010 and, afterward, I’ll post a series of articles on the subject. (This has recently been approved for three HRCI strategic recertification hours, so come on along!)
• I’m using four vacation days to present at and blog about HRFlorida.
• I’m using another three vacation days to blog about HRSouthwest.
• I contacted HRHouston about helping them get their 2011 Gulf Coast Symposium plugged in to the online world. (I’ve got to comment here – the first thing they wanted me to do was join for $275 to get the pleasure of helping them. I can’t say I’m excited about this particular opportunity.)
• At each regional or local SHRM chapter that I touch, I’m going to host open hours for anyone who wants to learn more about how to connect with the smart and business-savvy HR community that populates twitter, the blogging world, ERE, and the like. I don’t think that everyone has to blog and tweet and involve themselves with social media, but all HR pros need to know how to readily source interesting business ideas and next-level HR thinking.
• I think I’m not going to rejoin SHRM National this year. I don’t really think it matters to them, but I just can’t believe that it’s worth any more investment. I’ve paid into SHRM National for ten years. That’s enough.

China, I’m going to miss you at SHRM National, no way around it. But I do apologize for turning you into a two-dimensional Joan of Arc character, and for not stepping up to the plate earlier.  I’ll help create bright spots within local SHRM chapters and within the HR field.  Thank you for your perseverance and your leadership. And thanks for helping remind us that we’re all capable of leading, if we choose to take it on.

HREvolution posts have come and gone. Now that I’m on vacation, I can finally organize just a few thoughts.
I love seeing people in real life. Context is everything, and when I see people who are kicking ass and taking names in action, it makes me stronger and more committed to my own goals. Some people just exude intentionality, and being around them makes me much more focused. Just a few examples

• All the volunteer leaders of HREvolution, keeping their word, getting down into the details, and making stuff happen in order to pull off an impeccable event. You know who they are. And how awesome they are.

• Sarah White moving from Bright Idea to Execution in the space of ten minutes. During the discussion of HRIS advisory services for small companies, it became clear to Sarah that there was a market opening that she was uniquely qualified to fill. A few pecks on her iphone later, and she owned her new URL. She hosted planning meetings that day. I have no doubt Sarah will take this idea all the way.

• Amanda Hite and her posse move through a room like lions on the hunt. Amanda is literally a self-made woman, and she knows how to work for what she wants. Amanda owned the responsibilities of micro-celebrity, never forgetting to treat each of her “fan-friends” to her full attention. She truly gets that she’s onstage at events like this, and that each interaction matters. I know she must have been exhausted by the time she got home, but her energy never flagged in front of others.

I thought a lot about personal responsibility at this event. The lack of structure of an unconference is a perfect fit for me.  I loved being responsible for getting what I needed out of the conference, rather than just being force-fed slide after slide of data and opinion.  It was great to get to ask people directly about how they’re getting things done, what they’re thinking about at work these days, and what they’d like to create next.  It made the conference much more work, but much more useful, than those meetings where one person does all the talking and the folks with great input sit there taking notes. If you don’t like talking to new people, or you don’t have the discipline to make things happen for yourself, there are always more traditionally structured meetings or conferences to keep you up to date.

Thanks to everyone who participated in HREvolution, at whatever level, and whatever your goals were.  I learned something from each of you, and I hope you got more out of it than you put in, as another attendee observed.

There is nothing more boring than reading about other people’s dreams.

(Isn’t that how blog posts about dreams always start? And then you are treated to twenty paragraphs of prattle?)

I recently received the first of many annual SHRM renewal notices. I pay for my own SHRM membership, and every year I get a little angina and kvetch about the cost before sending the check in. This year, in addition to some heartburn, I had one hell of a dream* about SHRM.

In the dream, we were all at a conference being held at SHRM headquarters, which were once really nice but now had missing windows on the top stories, lick-and-stick granite coming off the facade, and no power. The doors to the stairs were jammed shut. As a result, the convention was being held in and around bleachers in the parking lot.

And it turned out that the convention, y’all, was actually a corporate cheer leading competition. (I know, right?)

There were four types of people in attendance:

• Earnest, hard working, happy types who were folding laundry and picking up trash and peer pressuring all their neighbors to cheer along.
• Good timers who were just there to have fun and didn’t care that they couldn’t hear or see anything. The bleachers fell apart and they brushed themselves off, laughed, and went to get another free drink.
• Vendors who kept everyone well lubricated from the flasks they passed out behind the stands and slipped their cards in all the purses sitting at people’s feet on the bleachers.
• Consultants and commentators who used to occupy those top-floor offices back when they were really posh but don’t care much about them now. Mostly concerned with the media and camera time.

In the background, looking frazzled but chipper, China Gorman was working diligently with a lone home renovation contractor to get the power up and running again.

And basically that was it. This weird little vignette stuck in my brain so vividly, though, I felt I had to share it with you.

I don’t know where SHRM is headed, and I don’t know were the HR profession is headed, but I don’t think it would be a bad thing for us to stay locked out of the building while it undergoes repairs. We could all use the fresh air and some time to think past our personal agendas.  Myself included.  I’ll pay my dues again this year, for China and whoever else is helping her get the power back on at SHRM.  I’ll also do what I can to support in a more hands-on way.

As long as the cheer leaders shut up.

Fortune 500 Go! Go! Go!

*My brother’s 40th was the night before this dream. I ate way too many boudain sausage and bacon-wrapped doves, and drank quite a lot of red wine. We had also watched Bring It On in the previous couple of days. So it wasn’t so crazy that all this came together in my hungover head.

After a ten year hiatus, I’m going back to yoga. Focusing is lot harder this time around, especially since I’m practicing at home, in the middle of my real life.  My child wants a glass of water. My dog licks my face. My wife wants to know where I put the  new towels and did I feed the goldfish? The Blackberry chimes.  I have to remind myself that I’m doing it to make an impact on my health and well being in the long term, and that momentary distractions are an opportunity to refocus.  Just stay on the mat, and get back on the mat again the next day. And the next.

I’m at my best working on long term, high impact HR projects. The thing about being in HR is that interruptions and distractions can eat up your entire day. A typical day in HR: an ex-husbandof an ex-employee gets his back up due to his lack of understanding of COBRA and his role in getting and keeping coverage. Someone else wants to know who’s going to clean up the watermelon on the table in the break room. A new hire didn’t pass his drug test and the manager wants to know if we can just get him tested again in a few weeks. A manager wants to complain about another manager rather than going to someone who can do something about it.   It’s so easy to begin to relate to people as distractions – no one is going to ask about the watermelon or the COBRA ex-husband, but they *are* going to want to know what HR accomplished for the entire company. (And why we can’t just blow off that bad drug test result.)

I dream of a magical day when I won’t have these distractions, but I find even when I do have a relatively interruption-free day, I now get in my own way. I’ve learned too well how to split my concentration. That’s a heavy e-mail day, or I make a lot of phone calls. But I want to get better at reclaiming my thinking, recovering from distractions much more quickly so that I can get back to the more strategic aspects of my work.

Like Amanda Hite over at Talent Revolution says, It’s all about Focus Control. This week that’s exactly what I’m going to do. Control, re-control, bring my focus back to center. Every time. Stay on the mat. And welcome the distractions as opportunities. Will you get back on the mat with me?