How was your week? Are you starting to feel the cheery holiday atmosphere? That nice blanket of snow I found Friday morning sure did jumpstart that magical feeling for me! Christmas lights and snow always bring an enchanted mood to Zurich, and after a week away at our RockMeRetreat, I feel even more present than usual and less anxious about the daily tasks. Don’t get me wrong, I’m still concerned about the state of the world, the health of my loved ones, and all the fatigue I hear from clients and colleagues. However, in this state of presence, with renewed energy and this joyous state of mind, it is a lot easier to focus my energy on what is really important.
Presence is important as we are constantly pulled in so many directions, and “energy flows where our attention goes” (Robbins, T n.d., para. 2).
I would like to share with you a small confession: Before I launched my business and when I started to blog I had a tendency to spend a lot of time on social media. There was a time when my family was concerned that I was getting addicted to Facebook or Twitter. Luckily, I got over this by developing healthy ways of interacting with social media. However, last week during our RockMeRetreat I enjoyed not engaging for a few days and now I feel ready for the online world again.
If you are like me you can hardly survive a day without your smartphones anymore, let alone access your bank account, google account, or any account for that matter.
When we are offline or have low batteries, it creates feelings of anxiety. I have an ongoing experiment where I am trying to increase my productivity and get more done by using less and fewer resources (money, paper, time, people). I would like to summarize the learning for you and you might want to follow me in this experiment. In my Mastermind Group, we are all considering getting a paper planner again because we feel that our digital tools are just not doing all the tricks. I also feel that often paper gives me a higher sense of security than an app. Obviously, I am trying to reduce paper where it is not needed but there are areas where paper just beats digital tools.
1 – Start with an Inbox List
To write this I started an inbox list I am regularly checking. The list became very long. I am not even sure I finished it yet. I’m not surprised that I am occasionally concerned about inbox anxiety. Once you have completed your inbox list, review my simplification principles and check which ones apply to you. Once you have completed your list review my simplification principles and check which ones apply to you.
2 – Develop Your Simplification Principles
Here are examples of your simplification principles.
- People over Robots! Any personal message is better than an automated response.
- Move from DIGITAL to ANALOGUE on purpose. Use paper strategically.
- Delete unused apps from your smartphone.
- Turn your phone off from 9 PM to 6 AM. Give it a space for the night outside of the bedroom. (You will still hear the alarm!)
- Use Post-it for visualizing what is important to you. The idea is One thought, one post-it.
- Say “No, thank you…” or “yes, if…” to any proposal for meetings, work, and tasks right away. Commit fast and decline fast. Don’t ponder on decisions forever.
- When asked for meetings give two time-slot options only.
- Always set a deadline by when another person should come back to you.
- Wear black most of the time. On Wednesdays add a color. Stop ironing during a pandemic.
- If you don’t know what to wear because you don’t know if the occasion is formal or not, wear a black suit.
- Choose your social media channels wisely. You probably have more than necessary.
3 – Write your 2021 Accomplishment List
Go through the RockMeApp archive and review all that you have accomplished in 2021. For those who are not on our RockMeApp, go through your daily planner or your journal: I’m sure you have accomplished more than you realize in your professional, as well as in your personal life. Check if there are open items that you wish to close within the next two workweeks.
4 – Participate in our Online Workshops
I bet you’re wondering how participating in our online workshop is going to simplify your life? HireMeExpress is not just a course, it’s a group of people wanting to evolve on the Swiss job market. Global People Transitions is a community of people with connections always willing to give a helping hand.
There are many advantages to joining our online workshops: this group offers the opportunity to meet others who are in a similar situation, looking for a job. Together, you will acquire and exchange knowledge, practice networking techniques, give each other feedback. The shared journey offers you peer support, fresh points of view, encouragement through collaborative work. Personal and professional development is not always easy, but these online workshops will help you grow confident, are motivating, make the journey less lonely, and give you the keys to make it easier. Who knows! you might even meet people who can introduce you to someone who knows someone… You might even make long-term friendships!
To simplify your life in 2022, start right away with a few simple changes like getting rid of the apps you are not using (or shouldn’t use), go back to analog, where it’s relevant, think of your achievements and reflect on what you want to achieve in the upcoming year, and think of the HireMeExpress program if one of your goals for next year is looking for a new job in Switzerland! You won’t regret it!
Please join us and celebrate your accomplishments and let’s practice what we preach. Let’s build even more personal connections this December, make friends, work on our fame and improve our finances. I look forward to seeing you on 1 December in our first free workshop.
Workshop 1: Partnering Masters – Building Effective Relationships (FRIENDS)
Wednesday, 1 December from 17:00 PM CET till 18:00 PM CET
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Workshop 2: Powerful Missions – Having a Voice in a Sea of Noise (FAME)
Thursday, 9 December from 17:00 PM CET till 18:00 PM CET
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Workshop 3: Persisting Mindsets – Designing Work to Support a Global Lifestyle (& Gluehweinparty)(FINANCES)
Wednesday, 15 December from 17:00 PM CET till 18:30 PM CET
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All dates and updates will be shared if you sign up on our #HireMeExpress list. Please sign up here by SATURDAY to get further updates and our 19 FRESH RESUME CHECKPOINTS.
“Biases and prejudices are burdens that confuse the past, threaten the future and render the present inaccessible” ~ Maya Angelou.
Although international organizations have Diversity and Inclusion objectives, in the vague sense of it as it were, yet according to a report by KPMG, 2018, many are falling short due to failure to understand how Diversity and Inclusion impact Global Mobility programs.
Another survey by KPMG highlighted that the majority of Global Mobility Programs do not have specific Diversity and Inclusion objectives as part of their department’s strategy. 70% of the companies that do have diversity and inclusion practices in place stated that this was due to a strong business case for diversity across all areas of the business.
At this juncture, it is important that we define “Female and Minority Talent”. While what you consider as a minority will depend largely on your home base country, where your headquarters is based, I recommend that you consider all of these groups:
- BIPOC: The acronym BIPOC refers to black, indigenous, and other people of color and aims to emphasize the historic oppression of black and indigenous people.
- LGBTQ+: LGBTQ+ stands for Lesbian, Gay, Transgender, Queer, and other sexual identities and genders.
- Religious and cultural minorities in your home and host countries.
We previously discussed the obstacles women face in Global Mobility. We also raised the why question. This is about the how.
As rightly posited by Tom Paton, diversity is slower to gain reception in areas where prejudice or centuries of deep-rooted behavior may persist. Unconscious bias is when a Sponsoring Manager is preparing to send only white men abroad to fill a business gap.
What you will see is often unconscious bias against female talent because the Sponsoring Manager assumes that a woman has a house to keep and children to raise. Sometimes the prejudice is just as simple as “women don’t do this kind of job or can’t work in this country”. There is a strong stereotype that women with children don’t want to work abroad.
Meanwhile, data shows that 88% of women feel that they need to go on an international assignment to advance their careers (PWC, 2016). The study shows that 73% of women in Financial Services wish more transparency on opportunities overseas. The lack of transparency in overseas opportunities leads minority groups and women to be underrepresented as they are not aware of the opportunities.
Consequently, companies have smaller talent pools as the communication of overseas opportunities is often rather ambiguous. The outcome of the survey by KPMG brings a little hope in this aspect, as nearly half of the companies surveyed indicated that the review of their Global Mobility processes will result in broadening communication to employees about opportunities.
We all want to maximize the potentials of our pool of resources.
There is enough evidence that companies having both gender diversity and ethnic and cultural diversity are more likely than ever to outperform their less diverse peers.
McKinsey’s most recent report ‘’Diversity Wins’’ outlines that companies in the top quartile for gender-diverse executive teams are 25% more likely to have above-average profitability than companies in the fourth-up quartile. The outcome for ethnic and cultural diversity is equally appealing. Therefore, the business case for diversity and inclusion is clear, it is time for us to take matters into our own hands.
Here are our top six tactics to give female and minority talent a seat at the Global Mobility table.
1 – Identify Strong Candidates: This boils down to eliminating all forms of prejudices, stereotypes, and biases. Regardless of being male or female, it is important to create a system of identifying those who are qualifying for international work and projects. The key points to consider for an ideal selection are performance, potential, and if needed proficiency with the relevant languages. Use your performance and potential data and don’t just rely on “gut” feeling about candidates. Make sure that you have “hard skills” added to your HR System so you can search talent by language or IT skills.
2 – Select Candidates Based on Intercultural Sensitivity Tests: Every candidate that meets the requirement for being sent on an assignment should go through an intercultural sensitivity test. We must stop making the assumption that women with children are unwilling to take up an international assignment. Not only can women be willing to receive an assignment, but they are just as capable of accomplishing great things and succeeding as their male colleagues. On another note, the potentially stressful or dangerous context in the host location might be a deterrent for some employees, but before assuming, have a conversation with your potential assignee. You have to ensure that your selection process is based on data and facts, rather than sentiments. Work with a professional to assess their intercultural competence. At GPT, we use assessment tools such as the Intercultural Development Inventory or Individual Cultural Blueprint Indicator.
3 – Provide Global Guidelines for Recruiters: This sounds simple yet very profound. We have witnessed the surge of different “expatriates” such as Cross-Border Commuters, Virtual Assignees, Global Nomads, International Business Travelers, and Commuters. In Global Mobility, if we want to be inclusive, we need to offer support to all of these people, their families, and their needs have to matter to us. Here are my ideas for your global recruiting guidelines.
4 – Enhance Intercultural Intelligence Across all Levels: “Intercultural intelligence means suspending judgment until enough information about the other person becomes available; paying attention to the situation; cross-cultural training that increases isomorphic attributions, appropriate affect, and appropriate behaviors; matching personal and organizationally attributes; increasing the probability of appropriate organizational practices” Now is the time to promote intercultural intelligence within your workforce population. Offer “Unconscious Bias” training for your senior managers and ensure your senior managers lead a diverse workforce. Expose them to other cultural styles.
5 – Offer an open Job Platform: Most companies work like Twitter. You have fans and followers and people who watch what you are doing closely. Instead of organizing talent programs, you can make your global job market transparent. All talents want to be given a fair chance at success and you need to find ways to motivate more introverted busy bees as well. Part-timers often need more recognition and sponsors who help them be seen for opportunities.
You might want to rewrite all your job postings to be more inclusive and reduce the white male-dominated language. You also need to reduce the profiles so they match real professionals. As I mentioned in “The Global Career Workbook” most job profiles I’m reading have been written for Superman and Wonderwoman. According to a study by Hewlett-Packard, women only apply for jobs when they meet 100% of the requirements while men already do so if they meet 60% of them. This finding is often quoted in articles to prove that women lack confidence. It is never wrong to boost up your confidence, but the reason behind the figures seems to be something else.
According to an article by Tara Sophia Mohr, the reason why women apply less quickly is because of the bias that women need to meet more qualifications than their counterparts. Secondly, from a young age girls are being taught to follow the rules and are being rewarded for doing so. This often leads to a rule-following habit that makes women believe that if they don’t meet all the requirements, that they shouldn’t waste their or the HR Manager’s time and energy. So, don’t post vacancies that only heroes can fulfill as you will miss out on many potential candidates.
6 – Target Your External Job Ads to Female and Minority Talent: When you post a job profile on LinkedIn, you can pay for as much or as little exposure as you want and target it to a very specific audience. Indeed, if you manage your campaign effectively by targeting Female and Minority Talent you not only show your support, you also help your brand. Mention that you wish to hire women and minorities explicitly. Posting jobs online is like getting applicants in real-time. Online announcements can help you either increase your efforts to attract more candidates or even prevent candidates from applying if you’ve already found the right person for the job. If you are looking for younger recruits in particular, then e-recruitment is probably the single most effective and efficient strategy possible; in the US, for instance, 98% of the 18–29 age group are active internet users. It can help if you build a fan base through a specific topic and use this fan base for building your female and minority talent pipeline.
We’re offering a series of free workshops in advance of our upcoming #HireMeExpress fall group program.
Workshop 1: Partnering Masters – Building Effective Relationships
with Angie Weinberger
Thursday, 24 June 21
from 4 PM to 5 PM CET
Workshop 2: Powerful Missions – Having a Voice in a Sea of Noise
with Angie Weinberger
Thursday, 1 July 21
from 4 PM CET to 5 PM CET
Workshop 3: Planning Money – Bringing Financial Security to your Life
with Keren-Jo Thomas
Thursday, 8 July 21
from 4 PM to 5 PM CET.
We promise friends, fame, and finances.
#hiremeexpress #humantouch #globalmobility #expats #digitalnomads #networking #minorities #diversityinclusion #financialplanning #retirement #friends #fame #jobalert #jobs
Please sign up here to receive all updates on our workshops, the 19 POINT FRESH RESUME CHECKLIST, and our special offers: http://eepurl.com/hitraT.
RELATED POSTS:
Why only 25 percent of international assignees are women
https://www.sundaebean.com/2019/04/29/121-why-only-25-percent-of-international-assignees-are-women/
The Ultimate Holiday Reading List for Minority Expats to Reinvent Themselves
Why we Need to Push for More Minority and Female Expats in Global Mobility
Every Expat and Spouse Should have the Best Experience – Why we Need to Transform Global Mobility
https://www.globesmart.com/blog/four-ways-organizations-can-support-their-lgbtq-employees/
References:
KPMG. (2018a). Inclusion and Diversity: How Global Mobility can help move the Needle. KPMG. Retrieved May 13, 2020, from https://assets.kpmg//content/dam/kpmg/xx/pdf/2018/06/global-mobility-inclusion-and-diversity-how-gms-can-help-move-the-needle-FINAL.pdf
Kramer, S. (2018). How Inclusion and Diversity Impact Global Mobility Programs [Report]. Retrieved 15 June 2021, from https://fowmedia.com/how-inclusion-and-diversity-impact-global-mobility/
McKinsey & Company. (2020). Diversity Wins: How inclusion matters [Report].
https://www.mckinsey.com/~/media/mckinsey/featured%20insights/diversity%20and%20inclusion/diversity%20wins%20how%20inclusion%20matters/diversity-wins-how-inclusion-matters-vf.pdf
Paton, T. (2021). DiversityBusiness.com | News. Retrieved 15 June 2021, from http://www.diversitybusiness.com/news/diversity.magazine/99200881.asp
PwC. (2016). Women of the world: Aligning gender diversity and international mobility in financial services. Pwc. https://www.pwc.com/gx/en/industries/financial-services/assets/women-of-the-world.pdf
Why Women Don’t Apply for Jobs Unless They’re 100% Qualified. (2014). Retrieved 15 June 2021, from https://hbr.org/2014/08/why-women-dont-apply-for-jobs-unless-theyre-100-qualified
