#6Things: NINJAS, Blind Auditions and Silicon Valley

Welcome back to #6things, your FAVORITE place to get all the random links that collect in my brain weekly. Some exciting things are happening in talent acquisition, HR, and recruiting. Firstly, people are moving and shaking right out of several well-known companies and on the looky-loo for new and exciting careers. Way more than normal. Less funding announcement these days though…anyway, let’s DO this:

DON’T HATE THE A-PLAYER, HATE THE GAME

Jeff Hunter, Trevor Hunter and Bud Bhattacharyya tackle the myth of the A-player in this LONG but detailed and useful article. A key focus is “context”, using several examples of former stars crashing and burning at new companies, the authors show that messing with the context piece of the formula (DUH) changes its outcome. “(Steve) Jobs brought his “A-player” message to Apple long before he sold Pixar to Disney, yet he was wise enough to recognize that how you define “A-players” depends completely on the context of the organization.” (Talentism)

MASS EXODUS

Do you lose good people all the time? Do you find yourself wishing you could figure out retention? You might like this piece. Ever since I became a boss, I find myself bristling at pieces like this because they never seem to understand MY pain, but it’s probably because I do some of these things. Check out all the stupid ways you can lose great people. The good news is that these are super avoidable. Although written by a vendor, these are still very real issues in the workforce. Check it. (Quartz)

BUT I DON’T PLAY THE CELLO!

You know that symphony tryout study people always cite when we chat about diverse hiring or “blind auditions”? Well, someone is doing something about it. Why? Because it kind of pisses the MIT and Stanford grad that she was told she “wasn’t technical for a role”, although she was a full stack web dev at 15. Her new app Blendoor aims to make hiring blind. Blendoor lets job seekers upload resumes, then hides their name and photo from employers. The idea, says Lampkin, is to circumvent unconscious bias by removing gender and ethnicity from the equation. (Forbes)

IN A SAD CASE OF ART IMITATING LIFE IMITATING A WHITE GUY

Silicon Valley, (the show not the overpriced foggy area in California) has faced criticism for being very homogenous (for lack of a better term). But the Alec Berg, producer, says it’s not HIS fault. In fact, one of the scenes that was the most criticized was taken at TechCrunch Disrupt, like the ACTUAL one. The reason there are no women on the show is…well…“Tech is 87% male. VC at the partner level is 96% white and male,” Berg said. “The world that we’re depicting is very much off kilter.” He said this at SXSW at the Silicon Valley SXSW panel…which was all white men. (Jezebel)

YOU DIDN’T EVEN SEE THIS COMING!

You can be a ninja. I just thought you should know. I was gonna do it but it’s full time and I really need space to work on my music, you know? (AtlasObscura)

THIS ENTIRE PIECE GOT DELETED FIVE TIMES

This is not for the faint of heart. In fact, I would bet that of all the writers I know, only Matt Charney is brave enough to try this. The freaky app totally deletes everything you’ve typed if you stop for more than 5 SECONDS! It’s the most dangerous writing app in the world and if you are on deadline or writing a stream of consciousness book, it might be for you. As for me, I don’t like to be bossed. (Wired)

Maren Hogan

Maren Hogan is CEO of Red Branch and general Bad@$$

Maren Hogan is a seasoned marketer and community builder in the HR and Recruiting industry. Maren started Red Branch Media and, before she hired all the smiling faces you see below, she ran it on her own. In marketing for over 15 years, she has deep experience in strategic campaigns and a long-term, results-based operational approach.