March 27, 2025 • 41 mins
In episode 193, Coffey talks with Terri Swain about recent HR news items including return-to-office mandates, “illegal DEI”, and whether it is Alt+Ctrl+Delete or Ctrl+Alt+Delete.
They discuss SHRM's report showing significantly higher workplace incivility in companies with return-to-office mandates; challenges with remote work including leadership development and communication skills; the "over-employment" phenomenon where remote workers secretly hold multiple full-time jobs; the Trump administration's position on DEI programs and the EEOC's new guidance; how political affiliation affects hiring decisions; the importance of rebranding DEI efforts while maintaining their core purpose.
Links to stuff they talked about are on our website at https://goodmorninghr.com/EP193 and include the following topics:
- SHRM: How Return-to-Office Mandates Are Affecting Workplace Civility
- Business Insider: Secretly Working 2 Remote Jobs, RTO Could Hurt Overemployment - Business Insider
- HR Dive: EEOC Outlines How DEI Might Be ‘Unlawful’
- HR Morning ‘Illegal DEI’ Explained: 12 Warnings in New EEOC Guidance
- EEOC: What To Do If You Experience Discrimination Related to DEI at Work
- EEOC: What You Should Know About DEI-Related Discrimination at Work
- Reddit: [OR] Not Hiring Trump Supporters
Good Morning, HR is brought to you by Imperative—Bulletproof Background Checks. For more information about our commitment to quality and excellent customer service, visit us at https://imperativeinfo.com.
If you are an HRCI or SHRM-certified professional, this episode of Good Morning, HR has been pre-approved for .75 recertification credits. To obtain the recertification information for this episode, visit https://goodmorninghr.com.
About our Guest:
Terri is the founder and Chief Truth Seeker with DecipHR a Fort Worth based, human resources consulting firm specializing in Equal Employment Opportunity investigations, employee relations and interim HR leadership. The company was founded in 2022 after the sale of her 24 year old company, The HR Consultant in 2021.
DecipHR has a nationwide and diverse client base, specializing in solving complex employee relations issues and providing interim HR leadership to growing companies. Prior to her consulting role, she had Fortune 200 human resource leadership experience in the areas of employee relations, human resource planning, and training and development.
Terri began her career in human resources via government compliance as an investigator for the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC). In her spare time, she enjoys a good book, a brisk walk, loud live music and travel to new places.
Terri Swain can be reached at
https://www.linkedin.com/in/terriswain
About Mike Coffey:
Mike Coffey is an entrepreneur, licensed private investigator, business strategist, HR consultant, and registered yoga teacher.
In 1999, he founded Imperative, a background investigations and due diligence firm helping risk-averse clients make well-informed decisions about the people they involve in their business.
Imperative delivers in-depth employment background investigations, know-your-customer and anti-money laundering compliance, and due diligence investigations to more than 300 risk-averse corporate clients across the US, and, through its PFC Caregiver & Household Screening brand, many more private estates, family offices, and personal service agencies.
Imperative has been named a Best Places to Work, the Texas Association of Business’ small business of the year, and is accredited by the Professional Background Screening Association.
Mike shares his insight f
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Episode Transcript
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Terri Swain (00:00):
I think we've got to be really careful about
changing the verbiage becausenow what we're doing is we're
kind of vilifying everybody whomight have been the product of
DEI. Like, oh, you're therebecause you didn't earn it. And
so words do matter, but, youknow, the words that we've even
the words that Sherm came upwith, I'm like, seriously? I
(00:23):
mean, we're HR people. Can we doa little better than this?
Mike Coffey (00:33):
Good morning, HR. I'm Mike Coffey, president of
Imperative, bulletproofbackground checks with fast and
friendly service. And this isthe podcast where I talk to
business leaders about bringingpeople together to create value
for shareholders, customers, andthe community. Well, it's hard
to believe it, but we're at theend of the first quarter of
(00:53):
twenty twenty five. And for hertrif ecta appearance on Good
Morning HR, I'm joined by myfriend Terri Swain to discuss a
few notable news items from thepast month.
Terri is the founder and chieftruth seeker with Decipher,
cleverly spelled d e c I p h r.A Fort Worth based human
(01:15):
resources consulting firmspecializing in equal employment
opportunity investigations. Canwe say that word anymore?
Employee relations, and interimHR leadership. Teri has over a
quarter century of HR consultingexperience under her belt.
In fact, I think she and I wereboth talking to clients in 1999
about y two k, and we allsurvived it. Prior to her
(01:38):
consulting role, she paid herdues in the corporate world
including a leadership stintwith a fortune 200 company.
Terri began her career in HR onthe other side of the desk as an
investigator for the EEOC.Welcome back to good morning HR,
Terri.
Terri Swain (01:53):
Thanks, Mike.
Mike Coffey (01:55):
So it's been a month. It's been a quarter. It's
been a year. Seems like threeyears. So but last year, really,
in in full full mode, employersstarted reeling employees back
to the office.
This whole RTO thing, it gotreally serious and I've got a
(02:17):
lot of reasons why it, you know,in my head about why it didn't
work for some employers where itseems to have worked fine for
others. But SHRM, one of theirbig focuses in the last year has
been incivility in theworkplace. It was an election
year and they've continued tofocus on some of these
incivility issues. And they dida survey and said that employees
(02:38):
at companies, who have an RTOmandate reported 63% more acts
of workplace incivility comparedto those without an RTO mandate.
I think this is like a nobrainer.
Right? If you're if people gotused to working at home and they
don't wanna work and they don'twanna go into the office, either
they're gonna be cranky and beincivil or maybe they would just
(03:00):
it would have been the samelevel of incivility if these
people have been workingtogether and brushing up against
each other all day long everyday anyway. Because some people
are just, you know, it's easierjust to get along when you can
just, you know, put theirpicture up on on the Zoom screen
and you don't have to actuallybe in the same room with them.
But what was your take on on onthe Sherm?
Terri Swain (03:19):
Well, I think a few things. I think one, I mean,
think about this, like mydaughter works in Houston. She
lives in The Woodlands. Her herbusiness moved from downtown to
further south because it wascheaper. Right?
We don't have people back at theoffice. Now they're bringing her
back to work. Now she has a twoand a half hour commute Oh. And
back. Oh.
(03:39):
In it yeah. Each way. Each way.
Mike Coffey (03:41):
Two and a half. She's driving for five hours a
day.
Terri Swain (03:43):
She's driving yes. So think about that. I mean,
when you Fort
Mike Coffey (03:47):
Worth down to Rockwall or It down there North
of Austin.
Terri Swain (03:52):
Sherman. Yeah. Yeah. That's nuts. So I think,
you know, you you have to addthat.
Like, commuting is to me,commuting is like the most
unproductive, first of all. Soyou're sitting in traffic, and
then you're unproductive. Youcould be at home at your
computer, so you're you'regrouchy when you get to work.
Right? And I think the otherthing, though, is and I think it
(04:13):
was Chipotle did a study, whichis really interesting that
during the pandemic when you hada whole year when people weren't
in restaurants, people lost ayear of leadership skills.
And think about that. So I thinkthat, you know, when we're at
home, we jump on here. I can bepolite, put my nice clothes on.
I get off the phone call. I putmy comfy clothes back on.
(04:34):
I write my report. I'mproductive, but I don't have to
deal with people. So I thinkwe're losing we're losing really
good communication skills, youknow, when you bring everybody
back to work. And I'm not aproponent for bringing everybody
back to work because I don't Ithink it's not a one size fits
all. You kinda gotta look atyour business, look at your
customers, look at yourstakeholders, and see what you
(04:54):
need.
But I see that incivility, thatuptick, because I think and
we're not, you know, some of thenewer generations don't know how
to speak to each other face toface as well as they do. They're
better at
Mike Coffey (05:10):
Right.
Terri Swain (05:10):
Text and email, and I'm not saying that's good or
bad, but it's different. Right?When you're back in the office,
you might have to do some moreface to face.
Mike Coffey (05:18):
So be the younger generation. It may be that
collision between, like, us GenXers and the younger ones and
even our predecessors in theboomer generation who
communicated very differently.And so when they were, you know,
a lot of those folks, ourgeneration and and the and the
boomers who are still in theworkforce, a lot of them kept
(05:39):
coming into the office becausethat was their routine for
thirty years before, you know,the COVID epidemic pandemic. But
now you've got these youngerpeople coming in the office.
It's one thing when you're justtrading emails and you once you,
you know, once you look up whatWTF means and look up what LOL
means, you can kind ofcommunicate with them in text.
(05:59):
But when you're and I justsounded like such a boomer when
I said that. I know my my I'mglad my kids don't listen to
this. But but rubbing up againstsomebody and realizing that, oh,
you you know, you gotta make eyecontact with people. You know,
you can't talk overly casuallywith with people. Or, hey, these
(06:20):
people did this generation doesspeak more casually or they
speak their mind more, you know,they don't have a sense of, you
know, what's politically correctin an office politics kind of
sense about what you do anddon't say to a supervisor to
appear and they're having tofigure that stuff out.
I know that my son who's, 25 wasat UT during in mechanical
(06:43):
engineering at, during thepandemic. And he was insistent
when he got out of school after,you know, a year of of doing all
of his school remote. He wantedto be in a workplace and he
needed that mentoring. Herecognized that. He when he was
with a big aerospace contractorhere in Fort Worth, he'll go
(07:04):
unnamed.
And then he's now he's with aNASA contractor in Houston and
doing really cool work, but he'sworking in both places, he
worked with somebody who was alot older and who he learned a
lot from. But he also hadparents who had that same
background and he grew up andhaving, know, sawing seeing us
run a company and and had anidea of what a business office
would, you know, what aworkplace is like. I think a lot
(07:27):
of kids coming out of schooldon't have that and they're
learning some of it the hardway.
Terri Swain (07:32):
Right. And the flip side of that, people who are
holding on to traditional valueslike we have to be in the work
because we're a manufacturingorganization and we make widgets
and everybody has to be here.Well, the truth is, you know, if
you're writing reports or you'redoing IT, you can be remote.
Mhmm. And so I think there'sthat clash too, but it doesn't
(07:54):
surprise
Mike Coffey (07:54):
me. And I've heard it called an equity issue in
manufacturing sense that I'veI've even heard HR people say,
well, it seems like it's anequity issue if if some people
can work have to come to officecome to to the workplace to, you
know, attach, you know, tab a toslot, you know, slot a and do,
you know, something physical. Itseems unfair that HR gets to
(08:15):
work hybrid or the IT people oraccounting or whoever get to
work hybrid or fully remote. AndI don't I don't see that as an
equity issue. That's just somejobs require you to be there and
some places some jobs don't.
Terri Swain (08:29):
Well, and that's why I think we always have to
step back as business owners andbusiness leaders to say, what
makes sense for our business?Because owning less real estate
may make sense. Having yoursalespeople nearer to their
customers than nearer to thepeople they're working with
almost always makes sense.Right? So what makes sense?
(08:49):
And I think sometimes we justtry to fit this. Okay. RTO, you
know, everybody's coming back tothe office, so everybody's
coming back to the officewithout thinking about, well,
what makes sense? Because we'reworried sometimes about fairness
and equity and I don't know. Tome, it's it's a pretty big
business issue.
You and I have probably workedfrom home most of our, you know,
(09:11):
or hybrid.
Mike Coffey (09:12):
Well, yeah. Well, you know, I was going into the I
I need people. And so I until wewent remote, I was in the office
every day with my employees. Inever dreamed we'd go remote.
And then I knew they they wereall so much more productive.
And like you mentioned thecommute, I mean, I had an
employee driving forty fiveminutes each way. And it was,
(09:33):
you know, I'm thirty five, whichis not a great drive. And so I
was like, this is working forus. But when and I think one of
the big problems the companies Isee doing RTO are often either
the really large organizationswhere knowledge transfer is
really key, where thatmentoring, you know, the
accounting firms, the the bigconsulting firms. JPMorgan
(09:54):
though, you know, Jamie Dimon'sgotten a lot of grief, right, in
the last few you know, he's beenreally frank and blunt about it,
but he's seen behavior that hedoesn't think is what JPMorgan
needs to be about.
And he went on that rant thatand I'll leave a a link to it in
the show notes, but he went on arant that was caught on video
(10:15):
complaining about people on Zoomtalking about their coworkers
negatively on the Zoom chat andthen, you know, of course,
whatever. We all we've all seenthose happen where it gets put
out to the whole everybody onthe call sees the the chat And,
you know, but I think it's a lotof it's mentoring and stuff. But
there's also the other sidethough where, and I said this in
(10:36):
2020, the employers who havegood management performance, who
have good leadership, who havemetrics for their employees'
productivity and quality, andhave a guide for here's what
we're gonna get done this month,this week, you know, today to
hit our goals. And everybody'sand everybody's at close to full
utilization, they're not gonnahave a problem with remote work
(10:59):
like those companies that manageby walking around, you know,
hurry up, look busy, the boss iscoming, that kind of thing.
They're the ones who are gonnahave a big struggle.
And that's what I saw duringCOVID and I think it's
continues. When I hear somebodywho's just saying my people
aren't as productive, but theycan't they're not saying it's
it's a culture thing and they'renot getting work done as far as,
(11:22):
you know, their, you know,mentorship and and make in
developing talent, which is Ithink is key. It's just they
don't have good managers. Youknow, they don't have a they
haven't trained, you know, theyhaven't trained their managers.
So, I think that's the the flipside of it.
But then, that's this has alsospawned this whole thing of
overemployment and I I did awebinar last week called alt
(11:44):
control this do you say altcontrol delete or do you say
control alt delete? Which one doyou say?
Terri Swain (11:50):
Alt control delete.
Mike Coffey (11:51):
You say alt control. See, think that's
generational because the youngs,including my one of my sons
said, you're saying that wrong.It's control alt delete. And
they say the control first andit doesn't even sound right on
my. So, put in the listeners,put in the notes.
Do you say alt control delete?We'll see and put your age and
we'll we'll we'll see if there'sa correlation between alt
(12:13):
control delete and control altdelete. But anyway, anyway, I
did a webinar last week. That'swhat we were talking about.
About, remote worker fraud andone of the things that's
happening a lot are, especiallyin tech in tech roles, but even
administrative clerical roleswhere people can work remote,
they're doing taking two orthree jobs at the same time
concurrently.
And there's a whole subredditcalled, you know, slash
(12:37):
unemployment, overemployment Imean, and it's all about people
doing that and how to get awaywith it, how to hide one job
from the other jobs and all ofthat. And the only way that's
possible is poor leadership. Youknow, supervisors not paying
attention to how how utilized isthis employee. And I disagree.
Well, go ahead and say what youwere gonna say.
Terri Swain (12:56):
Well, I was gonna ask you though, and this was a
question that I had. At abackground check, can you figure
out if somebody is pulling fromthey're paying Social Security
to multiple places?
Mike Coffey (13:08):
No. You can't see that as an employer, but what
you might see is Equifax hasthis product called the work
number and a lot of employers,especially larger employers,
don't want all those phone callsfor employment verifications
coming into Uh-huh. You know.And so they they give they they
set up APIs generally directlyto Equifax and dump all their
(13:32):
real time employment history andall their history and all their
real time data, as far as who'shired, what the hire date, term
date and all that was. And oftenyou call those employers, you
call out General Motors orLockheed or somebody and you
want to verify employment,they're not gonna do it.
They're gonna send you to a worknumber or or a similar
verification company. And thenyou get in there and you can see
(13:54):
all of somebody's employmenthistory. It just comes up when
you run it. And so that's oneway to do it. But even there,
they're a consumer reportingagency just like my background
screening company.
And so in order to hide that,they can that consumer, that
individual can come to toEquifax and say freeze my report
just like you can freeze yourcredit report. Oh. And so an
employer can't get it. Now, anemployer can go to them and say,
(14:17):
hey, your your employmenthistory is locked. We need you
to unlock it.
And the employee can refuse orthey they can kind of
apparently, according to whatI'm reading is a lot of
employers just say, oh well,okay, and they move on. And they
don't, they hire the person.They don't insist that they open
that up. Because you know, theperson say, oh, is that a victim
(14:37):
of identity fraud and thatdoesn't really matter for the
work number, but they they theythey just basically BS the
employers. But it goes back tojust poor management, right?
If, again, if I'm payingattention, if now there are
people who say, well, if I'mgetting the job done that
they're asking me to do in fortyand I'm getting it done in six
(14:57):
hours instead of forty, thenthen what's the problem? And I'm
like, no. Even if you're exempt,you're paid to be utilized fully
by the company, not just to getthis, you know, well, I'm
exempt, so I'll I'll only haveto work enough to get the job
done. Well, that's not how thatworks. And it's not what the
FLSA says, you know.
You know, you have to pay themregardless if they get a job
(15:17):
done in four hours. And so, Ithink that just goes back to
making, you know, employerspaying attention, having metrics
for their employees performanceand that's the only way you
would be able to do that. Ican't I can't imagine somebody
working none of my team, I mean,you know, and and we we count on
about 80% utilization in all ourbudgeting. I want I want my
(15:39):
employees not to killthemselves. But you couldn't do
a full time job at the same timeyou're working for me.
Don't think you could pull itoff.
Terri Swain (15:47):
Alright. But I think a lot of jobs you could
because for your right, peoplearen't paying attention. You get
the report done on time oryou're fast. I mean, like when I
was an EEOC investigator, I wasprobably I could probably run
circles around a lot of people.My was twice size.
Mike Coffey (16:03):
EOC investigators. You're probably the smartest one
I've ever had. But
Terri Swain (16:07):
you know what I'm saying, like Right. I could
probably do two to three timesthe production that was
expected. Sure. So I think aboutthat. If I'm at home, I'm gonna
produce like all my otherpeople.
I'm gonna have this side gigover here.
Mike Coffey (16:20):
Yeah. And that's what's basically happening. And
I mean, we've always hademployees and I did it when I
was in the corporate world. Idid consulting on the outside
part time. I never did it duringthe day.
If I, you know, I even, youknow, took vacation and traveled
some for, you know, to to helpwith some client stuff. But
never would I even think about,you know Of course, I was in an
(16:44):
office all day too. And so, youknow, but Mhmm. And I I'm double
employed now. I own this companyand I work here and I teach yoga
four or five times a week andsometimes I teach at 04:30 in
the afternoon.
So I guess it happens
Terri Swain (16:56):
studio know you're doing this.
Mike Coffey (16:58):
Yeah. Know. They're gonna yeah. Believe me. The fact
that I'm not starving to death,they know that I'm not that I'm
doing something besides teachingyoga.
And let's take a quick break.Good morning HR is brought to
you by Imperative, bulletproofbackground checks with fast and
friendly service. As we've saidlast week, I held a webinar
(17:19):
called Alt, Control, protectingyourself from remote employee
fraud. We discussed the waysemployers who haven't fully
returned to office have been thevictims of fraud by foreign
governments, identity thieves,and intentionally underutilized
employees. You can catch therecording of the webinar and get
recertification credit forwatching it by clicking on the
(17:42):
education tab atimperativeinfo.com.
If you're an HRCI or SHRMcertified professional, this
episode of good morning HR hasbeen preapproved for three
quarters of an hour ofrecertification credit. To
obtain the recertificationinformation visit
goodmorninghr.com and click onresearch credits. Then select
(18:03):
episode 193 and enter thekeyword decipher. That's d e c I
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And now back to my conversationwith Terry Swain. So we were
(18:24):
talking about the EEOC. Sopresident Trump and day one of
his, administration issued abunch of executive orders and
there's a lot of talk aboutillegal DEI. And a lot of people
have switched that includingsometimes his own spokespeople
to say DEI is illegal. But isDEI illegal, Terry?
(18:47):
No.
Terri Swain (18:48):
No. No. No. Now doing it wrong Yeah. Could be.
Exactly. I mean, doing it wrongcould be, but DEI is not illegal
and it's just getting such asuch a bad rap when you look at
the three words, diversity,equity, inclusion. Who can be
against that? Right?
Mike Coffey (19:08):
Yes. But the flip side of that is some companies
did do it really dumb and andcompletely illegally. And the
worst, you know, anytime theworst example is going to, you
know, result in anovercorrection. Overcorrection.
(19:28):
And there were a lot of badexamples.
You know, things like, you know,some of the training that went
on.
Terri Swain (19:36):
I don't know if there was a lot, but there was
the
Mike Coffey (19:39):
ones that were There was enough I know people
who went who sat through thosesessions. Yes. It wasn't just
something something crazyhappened in New York City. I
mean, here in Fort Worth, therewas and I don't think it was the
company's bad intent. I don'tthink it was anybody's bad
intent.
But, I think a lot of people whowere I must say this in a way
(20:00):
that is trying to be diplomaticand it's not my strong suit, who
were really enamored by thesocial justice justice aspect of
DEI and didn't make a strongbusiness case for the the the
DEI programs they werepromoting. I
Terri Swain (20:15):
think that the reason is that there has been
such a misunderstanding aboutdiversity, equity, and
inclusion, affirmative action,and, you know, compliance.
Cause, for example, people wouldcall me all the time and say,
hey, do you do DEI training? No.I've I mean, I could, but it's
never been my lane. My lane'scompliance.
(20:36):
So the fact that you think,because I do compliance, I do
DEI, or the fact that you thinkI can't do DEI because I do
compliance, when they're allinterwoven, always I always push
back and I'm like, have you everdone basic creating respectful
work environment training? Youknow, no. Then you are not at
DEI. Right. DEI is Frito, Pepsi,AT and T.
(21:00):
They're so far down the pike ofunderstanding. So I think when
you say people get enamored withthe social justice, I think
because they don't know. Theydon't take the time. They read
an article and they just say, Ineed to go get me some of those.
And I've seen that with CEO.
Hey, call. We need a DEItrainer. And that's how I get
the calls and I'm like, yeah,well, here's who I would go. And
(21:22):
then there's a million of themout there. Mhmm.
So how do you know who's good?
Mike Coffey (21:26):
Yeah. And that's the downside is there there are
some wacky and I've I've I'llsay it. I've had I've had at
least one on the podcast who Ithought was just wackadoodle as
far as the approach of what theDEI training was supposed to
accomplish. And if there's not abusiness case tied to it and
(21:47):
it's not a compliance issue
Terri Swain (21:49):
Right.
Mike Coffey (21:49):
Then you're doing it wrong.
Terri Swain (21:52):
And training should be the last thing you do.
Because you look at your systemsand processes and your business
case and are we trying to reachour consumers? Are we trying to
reach our employees? Are wetrying to reach our vendors?
Yes.
All of the above. How are wegonna integrate this? Do we have
good data? And that's the thing,like, I had a client once, very
(22:13):
well meaning, European owned,that said, our goal this year is
gonna be to hire 50% females.Hire and promote 50% females.
They were an engineeringcompany. I'm like, there's no
way you can meet this goal. Andthat would be illegally
discriminated against becausewhen you looked at the type of
(22:33):
engineering they had, theavailability for females was
11%. So 90% of the companies areengineering. So marketing is
gonna be a % female.
HR is gonna be a % female. Salesis gonna be a % female because
how are you get, like you can'tthat's illegal DEI. Right? That
is you don't you have a goodidea. Right?
(22:55):
Because half the world's women.Right? Shouldn't half our
company be women? No. Because wedidn't sit back and think about
who so so I think sometimes it'swell intentioned, but it's not
thought about holistically.
It's not thought about, youknow, how it all fits in your
business.
Mike Coffey (23:14):
But from a compliance standpoint, even if
50% of the available workforcewas women in in that field,
let's say it was 50% of theengineers available for women,
which is probably the directionwe're going if you look at the
enrollment and graduation ratesright now.
Terri Swain (23:34):
Yay.
Mike Coffey (23:34):
It it to set yeah. Yeah. Go girl. But the idea that
you're gonna set a quota, thatour workforce is gonna have a
hard number and we're gonnamanage managers to that number,
that's illegal too. Right?
Terri Swain (23:50):
Well, right. Well
Mike Coffey (23:51):
If it's affecting who gets selected for interviews
and hiring.
Terri Swain (23:54):
Okay. Yes and no. 50% would never be a quota. It
would be a goal. Yeah.
Because you would know that thatis your now if you made it a
quota and said, we're gonna do50%, then it's a problem. But it
should always be a goal becauseyou should always always I mean,
and I've been doing this for,you know, eons. Always hire the
(24:16):
most qualified person. Now, ifyou have two equally qualified
people and you have a goal, youshould go with your goal thing,
but you should never hire a lessqualified person.
Mike Coffey (24:29):
Are there ever two people who are a % equally
qualified? No. And so
Terri Swain (24:32):
They're not.
Mike Coffey (24:33):
So I I think if gender ever comes into it,
you've you've you've got abigger issue. But even before
all of this started going crazy,I I did a I had a presentation
and I've got the webinarrecorded on the website called
mitigating risk in theemployment selection process and
it talked about all the sciencethat said most of the DEI
training doesn't work. Andhere's what you gotta do. The
(24:53):
whole point of diversity equityas inclusion is drawing from the
deepest applicant poolavailable. So making sure you're
mitigating any biases in yourrecruiting process and how
you're advertising jobs.
Getting as many qualifiedcandidates regardless of
whatever demographics do nothave anything to do with the job
and getting those candidates in,mitigating your manager's own
(25:15):
bias, which we all have. Right?I mean, we've all got some and,
mitigating that in the selectionprocess and then making people
feel included when they're inthe workplace. Make this a place
that this person wants to workregardless if they're a a
conservative Southern Baptistwhite minister or a transgender,
(25:39):
you know, young millennial makethis a place where people want
to work, where we we we're civilto each other, where we respect
people's differences and we getthe damn job done. That's the
reason we come to work everyday.
That's what DEI that's what themessage of DEI should have been
and I think we got away fromthat after George Floyd was
(26:00):
murdered. And I think a lot alot of real anger about a lot of
injustices came on, but askingemployers to fix those
injustices proactively ratherthan just saying we're going to
fix our own systems and how weselect people, maybe and
mitigate the biases was amistake. Let me have it.
Terri Swain (26:20):
You know, I feel all kinds of ways about this
because I think there's a lot ofwhen you talk about I mean, I'm
a believer in systems andprocesses and what you said, all
about that. But I think if leftto no diversity component, no
thought about it, you're gonnaget more of the same. So I
Mike Coffey (26:40):
think Or measuring it's important. Yeah. And Yeah.
And and asking what what in oursystem is allowing this thing to
happen? Think that's a fairquestion.
Terri Swain (26:49):
And and I think the other what concerns me right now
in our current climate is thatwhat seems to be under fire also
are mentoring programs,internships that they have to be
Open to Open
Mike Coffey (27:05):
to everyone. That's interesting. So you think that
would be okay?
Terri Swain (27:10):
Well, because on its face, it sounds okay. Right?
But I'm gonna give you a fewexamples. So I have a client who
has a machinist. They hire a lotof machinists.
Who are machinists? I mean,especially back in the nineties.
Who are machinists?
Mike Coffey (27:23):
Dudes.
Terri Swain (27:24):
They're all male.
Mike Coffey (27:25):
Yeah.
Terri Swain (27:25):
Right. So they set up a program. They were in
Houston. They set up a programwith the Houston's public
schools, and they said, we aregoing to set up an
apprenticeship to teachmachinists. So when they come
out of high school, they can bemachinists.
And they specifically wantedthat half of that class to be
female. Okay? So that they couldstart changing the statistics
(27:50):
because if you don't dosomething to change the
pipeline, you know, so that wastheir goal. It wasn't like, oh,
50% have to be female, but inthat case, that really changed
who was becoming a machinist.
Mike Coffey (28:04):
Mhmm.
Terri Swain (28:04):
And it helped them pipeline people. And again, when
it came time for these kids tofinish their apprenticeship,
we're if Teri's a suckymachinist, like, don't well, we
don't want that girl. She can'tdo the job. But here, we're two
people out of high school, andwe're both pretty good. Like, I
wanna bring Terri in because Iwanna give her that opportunity.
(28:26):
So I'm I have a little bit ofangst about that whole thing
because I think there's beenprograms like that so that we
can change the statistics. Whyare women 50% in engineering and
graduating? It's becausesomewhere, they we changed the
narrative. Right? And a lot ofit start with corporate.
I mean, people going on campusesand getting people interested
(28:49):
and then giving them theinternship. Hey, come and work
for General Motors and see whatwe're all about or Toyota. And
then you've had the internship,so you have the leg up. So I
feel, you know, I've got thatkind of feeling.
Mike Coffey (29:05):
Well, and I think and and I'm I'm chair of the
talent committee for the FortWorth chamber, and one of the
things that we're actively doingis looking to get people back
into the trades. You know,college isn't right for every
student and all. And I thinkthat's really important. And I
think making sure you'recommunicating to female students
that, hey, this internship'savailable, and even making sure
(29:27):
you've got hopefully, you canfind your version, the 02/2025
version of Rosie the Riveter toput out there on, you know, as
your as one of your visuals ofwhat people really, you know,
the kind of people are doingthat. And there's this idea that
the trades are all dirty and allof that and now a lot of them
aren't.
They're in clean shops Yeah. Andeverything else. And and so, I
(29:48):
think that's great. And I thinkwhat you you click you you know,
you're saying, yeah, we want a50% women, but but that's kind
of an aspirational thing. We'renot going to limit it down, but
we want to make sure we'remarketing enough to to and it
may be it may just be because ofother social differences and how
(30:08):
how girls are raised by theirparents and social expectations.
You may never get to 50% in atrade in in that kind of
organization. But saying wewould love to we want to make
sure that every every kid whohas opportunity regardless of
their gender has an opportunityto do this program and it would,
you know, in a we feel like in aperfect world it would reflect
(30:30):
what the community looks likeregardless if it's gender or
race or whatever. That's a greataspiration. And and keep going
back and asking yourself whyaren't we getting those numbers?
What is what in our system?
And it may not be our systemthough because Right. Again,
could be all this other stuffout there that's not us. And
this was all to start thediscussion about the EEOC put
(30:52):
out two guidances about whatmight constitute illegal DEI or
how DEI might be unlawful. Andit didn't say anything new. No.
It was just No. Oh, there'stitle seven out there. And and
No. And so it's I've never seenI mean, I've been reading EEOC
guidances because, I mean, I'veworked on the employment side
(31:13):
and the employee selection sidemy most of my career. And I've
never seen guidances that saidso that said nothing new.
They're usually somegroundbreaking, you know, new
interpretation that I disagreewith often, but but here it's
just like, you've title Don'tyou
Terri Swain (31:33):
think that's adding fuel to the DEI fire where now
people are afraid of it? Yeah.So we're going like a flip side.
So now I have this internshipthat I'm trying to get female
machinists in and I'm like, oh,I don't wanna do that because
I'm gonna get, you know, I'mgonna I'm gonna get this thing
because now that's what we'relooking at. And, you know, one
(31:53):
of the first things the EEOCinterim commissioner did was
sent 20 letters to 20 highpowered DC law firms saying, we
think you have illegal DEI goingon, so send us so that's to me
the chilling effect ofeverything that's happening with
this lingo.
The law is the law. DEI is DEI.If you don't understand it,
(32:15):
you're not gonna understand itwith all the
Mike Coffey (32:17):
Well, yeah. All the stuff in the press. Yeah.
Terri Swain (32:20):
The press. You're not gonna understand it, but I
do think people are gettingafraid of it. Like, oh, that's
something like you said, can wesay EEO? Can we say DEI? Can we,
you know, and and and so it'syeah.
Mike Coffey (32:33):
But I think we need to I think it's time we have to
rebrand it and because but wellbefore president Trump was
elected and it became such a hotbutton hot topic button, I do
think it was the term wasappropriated by by folks who
(32:55):
weren't doing the kind of DEIthat we're talking about. Who
were promoting more of a socialjustice aspect of it. And I
think it's just tainted now. Itwas tainted before and that's
how it became a lightning rodissue. And I think now we've got
to get and we've got to talkabout it.
Not like, you know, the way Ialways try to talk about is
mitigating their biases in inyour employee selection, making
sure everybody has anopportunity to get in and that
(33:16):
you find a way to make themsuccessful in the organization.
Those kind of things. I thinkwe're gonna have to do that just
because I don't think DEI meansso many different things to so
many different people and if youask five different, you know,
practitioners of DEI, you'regonna get five different
answers.
Terri Swain (33:32):
Yeah. I mean, I agree with that, but what I hate
is hearing this wholemeritocracy. We're gonna get
back to meritocracy because whatthat sounds like to anybody who
is a black employee Or femalepilot. Hispanic. Yeah.
Or a female pilot or somethingis like, oh, you didn't you
(33:53):
know, I've heard this DEI. Youdidn't earn it. You didn't earn
it. Where we know that thepeople nobody puts American
Airlines does not my mysister-in-law is a a a captain
with American Airlines. Nobodyputs a pilot in the air
Mike Coffey (34:08):
Right.
Terri Swain (34:08):
Who doesn't know what they're doing. I mean, so I
think we've got to be reallycareful about changing the
verbiage because now what we'redoing is we're kind of vilifying
everybody who might have beenthe product of DEI. Like, oh,
you're there because you didn'tearn it. And so words do matter,
but, know, the words that we'veeven the words that Sherm came
(34:31):
up with. Mhmm.
I'm like, seriously? I mean,we're HR people. Can we do a
little better than this?
Mike Coffey (34:38):
Yeah. Well, and maybe because it's become a
political hot hot button. That'sanother reason to rebrand it.
And and and stake out clearlyright upfront exactly what we're
talking about. And so if you'rea company, you're gonna write
the equivalent of your DEIstatement now.
(35:00):
You know, be explicit about whatit really means that, you know,
like I said, you know, it's notjust, you know, rainbows and
unicorns because that doesn'ttell anybody anything. But we're
gonna become the best company todo whatever it is we do serving
the customers we serve becausewe're gonna draw from the
deepest pool of talentavailable. We're gonna select
(35:21):
from that the very best peoplewe can find who will work for
what we're willing to pay andwho, you know, and we're gonna
make them we're gonna try andkeep them employees fully
engaged, fully productive aslong as we can by making this a
place that they wanna work andthey feel accepted and and
appreciated. So I think that'sgonna be the route we go. But
let's talk about the newadministration a little bit
(35:44):
deeper.
My my one of my my dirty vicesis Reddit and which is a
dumpster fire for a very, youknow, just a collection,
especially the employmentrelated Reddits are about, you
know, unemployed, unhappy peoplewho think that the the man is
(36:07):
keeping them down, keeping hisfoot on their neck all the time.
But there was a post called notfrom from a redditor in Oregon,
not hiring Trump supporters. Andthe guy says that basically,
he's not gonna hire anybodywho's a Trump supporter anymore.
And he says, can't catch themall, but people are getting
(36:28):
pretty cavalier about praisinghim on LinkedIn, so that'll be
my guide I guess. The work myteam does requires a level of
critical thinking that makesgullibility an incredibly bad
trait to have.
Additionally, I just don't wantpeople on my team who hate a
country that has given meeverything. And he goes on, And
then he said, I I think it's notprotected by federal state law,
(36:49):
but I'm not a % certain. Am Iright? And as you can imagine,
that blew up quickly and theyquickly locked that one down
from comments. What's your takeon not hiring somebody based on
their political affiliation?
Terri Swain (37:02):
Okay. So I talk about this in training all the
time. There's no federal I mean,if you're a private employer,
there's political affiliation isnot a protected category. Now if
you're with school district oryou're with the city or with
your some kind of government,they're sometimes protected what
you can and can't do. I don'tthink you could ever not hire
(37:24):
somebody because of theirpolitical affiliation.
You know? And I always cautionpeople, you have to be careful
even in the EEO realm of, youknow, assuming, you know, that
every Trump supporter is an oldwhite male over the age 40 or
whatever. Like, even thoughthat's not what the statistics
(37:44):
are showing in the exit But but,you have to be careful because
during our you know, startingwith god. Probably starting with
Obama, maybe before that, theissues of race and gender and
religion have come into thepolitical sphere, and people are
(38:07):
starting to see you know, toequate, You're a Trump
supporter. You're a racist.
You're a liberal. You're afeminist. You're a blah blah
blah. So you've got issues ofrace and gender that come in
there, but no, you cannot youknow, you wouldn't wanna do
that. That just makes no nosense.
Mike Coffey (38:25):
And and even if it's a you know, even if you're
doing it legally, it goes backto what I was saying earlier.
Why would you carve out roughlyhalf of the population from your
employee base and make it thatmuch more hard to recruit
competent people who canactually get the job done? And
(38:48):
and but you gotta go back towhat Sharma's been talking about
about civility training too,right? We've gotta teach people
how to be, if not sweet andlovable, not, you know, not
uncivil to each other in theworkplace, how to respect
differences and say, you knowwhat, we're here to get this job
done and I don't need to knowwhat about your what you did
this weekend. I don't need toknow about what what your church
(39:10):
social taught you or what yourpreacher said Sunday morning and
I don't need to know, you know,about which parade you went to
this weekend.
Let's, you know, to the extentthat we can share that stuff
and, you know, and beemotionally intelligent enough
to know where, you know, we'reat the wrong audience for this,
they don't care, so let me justmove on and not get my feels all
(39:31):
up in it and not be offended ornot think that they're you know
discounting my faith or whateverit is. You know, so it goes it's
on both sides. Let's just teachpeople to do that and move on.
And then if you've got aperformance issue and somebody's
this it's disrupting theworkplace, then you address
those performance issues and howthose people are relating to one
another and but to say I'm notgonna I'm gonna, you know, not
(39:54):
hire half the people becausethey made the a choice I didn't
make, then it's like a goodbusiness decision, which is what
all this is supposed to beabout, is running a business
that makes, you know,accomplishes a mission, whether
it's a nonprofit or or forprofit.
Terri Swain (40:08):
Right. And let's face it, people change political
ideals. Right?
Mike Coffey (40:12):
Yeah.
Terri Swain (40:13):
And, yeah. I saw my dad do that a time or two. Was
like, what?
Mike Coffey (40:18):
Yeah. Yeah. I mean and and I'm always angry. I'd
never be able to hire anybodybecause, know, you know, I'm,
you know, I'm the crazy small llibertarian who votes
independent and looks foranybody but but an r or a d to
vote for. And so if I did that,I'd I'd have an a company of two
and we'd be arguing.
(40:39):
Well that's all the time wehave. Thanks for joining me
again Terry.
Terri Swain (40:42):
Oh thanks. Good to see you. Bye.
Mike Coffey (40:45):
And thank you for listening. If you enjoyed this
episode please write us a reviewon Apple Podcasts, Spotify,
YouTube, or wherever you'relistening and share this episode
on your favorite socialplatform. It helps us reach more
listeners. And we'd love to hearyour thoughts including whether
it is alt control delete orcontrol alt delete at
goodmorninghr.com. Rob Upchurchis our technical producer and
(41:09):
thank you to him andImperative's marketing
coordinator Mary Ann Hernandezwho keeps the trains running on
time.
And I'm Mike Coffey as always.Don't hesitate to reach out if I
can be of service to youpersonally or professionally.
I'll see you next week and untilthen, be well, do good, and keep
your chin up.
I think we've got to be really careful about
changing the verbiage becausenow what we're doing is we're
kind of vilifying everybody whomight have been the product of
DEI. Like, oh, you're therebecause you didn't earn it. And
so words do matter, but, youknow, the words that we've even
the words that Sherm came upwith, I'm like, seriously? I
(00:23):
mean, we're HR people. Can we doa little better than this?
Mike Coffey (00:33):
Good morning, HR. I'm Mike Coffey, president of
Imperative, bulletproofbackground checks with fast and
friendly service. And this isthe podcast where I talk to
business leaders about bringingpeople together to create value
for shareholders, customers, andthe community. Well, it's hard
to believe it, but we're at theend of the first quarter of
(00:53):
twenty twenty five. And for hertrif ecta appearance on Good
Morning HR, I'm joined by myfriend Terri Swain to discuss a
few notable news items from thepast month.
Terri is the founder and chieftruth seeker with Decipher,
cleverly spelled d e c I p h r.A Fort Worth based human
(01:15):
resources consulting firmspecializing in equal employment
opportunity investigations. Canwe say that word anymore?
Employee relations, and interimHR leadership. Teri has over a
quarter century of HR consultingexperience under her belt.
In fact, I think she and I wereboth talking to clients in 1999
about y two k, and we allsurvived it. Prior to her
(01:38):
consulting role, she paid herdues in the corporate world
including a leadership stintwith a fortune 200 company.
Terri began her career in HR onthe other side of the desk as an
investigator for the EEOC.Welcome back to good morning HR,
Terri.
Terri Swain (01:53):
Thanks, Mike.
Mike Coffey (01:55):
So it's been a month. It's been a quarter. It's
been a year. Seems like threeyears. So but last year, really,
in in full full mode, employersstarted reeling employees back
to the office.
This whole RTO thing, it gotreally serious and I've got a
(02:17):
lot of reasons why it, you know,in my head about why it didn't
work for some employers where itseems to have worked fine for
others. But SHRM, one of theirbig focuses in the last year has
been incivility in theworkplace. It was an election
year and they've continued tofocus on some of these
incivility issues. And they dida survey and said that employees
(02:38):
at companies, who have an RTOmandate reported 63% more acts
of workplace incivility comparedto those without an RTO mandate.
I think this is like a nobrainer.
Right? If you're if people gotused to working at home and they
don't wanna work and they don'twanna go into the office, either
they're gonna be cranky and beincivil or maybe they would just
(03:00):
it would have been the samelevel of incivility if these
people have been workingtogether and brushing up against
each other all day long everyday anyway. Because some people
are just, you know, it's easierjust to get along when you can
just, you know, put theirpicture up on on the Zoom screen
and you don't have to actuallybe in the same room with them.
But what was your take on on onthe Sherm?
Terri Swain (03:19):
Well, I think a few things. I think one, I mean,
think about this, like mydaughter works in Houston. She
lives in The Woodlands. Her herbusiness moved from downtown to
further south because it wascheaper. Right?
We don't have people back at theoffice. Now they're bringing her
back to work. Now she has a twoand a half hour commute Oh. And
back. Oh.
(03:39):
In it yeah. Each way. Each way.
Mike Coffey (03:41):
Two and a half. She's driving for five hours a
day.
Terri Swain (03:43):
She's driving yes. So think about that. I mean,
when you Fort
Mike Coffey (03:47):
Worth down to Rockwall or It down there North
of Austin.
Terri Swain (03:52):
Sherman. Yeah. Yeah. That's nuts. So I think,
you know, you you have to addthat.
Like, commuting is to me,commuting is like the most
unproductive, first of all. Soyou're sitting in traffic, and
then you're unproductive. Youcould be at home at your
computer, so you're you'regrouchy when you get to work.
Right? And I think the otherthing, though, is and I think it
(04:13):
was Chipotle did a study, whichis really interesting that
during the pandemic when you hada whole year when people weren't
in restaurants, people lost ayear of leadership skills.
And think about that. So I thinkthat, you know, when we're at
home, we jump on here. I can bepolite, put my nice clothes on.
I get off the phone call. I putmy comfy clothes back on.
(04:34):
I write my report. I'mproductive, but I don't have to
deal with people. So I thinkwe're losing we're losing really
good communication skills, youknow, when you bring everybody
back to work. And I'm not aproponent for bringing everybody
back to work because I don't Ithink it's not a one size fits
all. You kinda gotta look atyour business, look at your
customers, look at yourstakeholders, and see what you
(04:54):
need.
But I see that incivility, thatuptick, because I think and
we're not, you know, some of thenewer generations don't know how
to speak to each other face toface as well as they do. They're
better at
Mike Coffey (05:10):
Right.
Terri Swain (05:10):
Text and email, and I'm not saying that's good or
bad, but it's different. Right?When you're back in the office,
you might have to do some moreface to face.
Mike Coffey (05:18):
So be the younger generation. It may be that
collision between, like, us GenXers and the younger ones and
even our predecessors in theboomer generation who
communicated very differently.And so when they were, you know,
a lot of those folks, ourgeneration and and the and the
boomers who are still in theworkforce, a lot of them kept
(05:39):
coming into the office becausethat was their routine for
thirty years before, you know,the COVID epidemic pandemic. But
now you've got these youngerpeople coming in the office.
It's one thing when you're justtrading emails and you once you,
you know, once you look up whatWTF means and look up what LOL
means, you can kind ofcommunicate with them in text.
(05:59):
But when you're and I justsounded like such a boomer when
I said that. I know my my I'mglad my kids don't listen to
this. But but rubbing up againstsomebody and realizing that, oh,
you you know, you gotta make eyecontact with people. You know,
you can't talk overly casuallywith with people. Or, hey, these
(06:20):
people did this generation doesspeak more casually or they
speak their mind more, you know,they don't have a sense of, you
know, what's politically correctin an office politics kind of
sense about what you do anddon't say to a supervisor to
appear and they're having tofigure that stuff out.
I know that my son who's, 25 wasat UT during in mechanical
(06:43):
engineering at, during thepandemic. And he was insistent
when he got out of school after,you know, a year of of doing all
of his school remote. He wantedto be in a workplace and he
needed that mentoring. Herecognized that. He when he was
with a big aerospace contractorhere in Fort Worth, he'll go
(07:04):
unnamed.
And then he's now he's with aNASA contractor in Houston and
doing really cool work, but he'sworking in both places, he
worked with somebody who was alot older and who he learned a
lot from. But he also hadparents who had that same
background and he grew up andhaving, know, sawing seeing us
run a company and and had anidea of what a business office
would, you know, what aworkplace is like. I think a lot
(07:27):
of kids coming out of schooldon't have that and they're
learning some of it the hardway.
Terri Swain (07:32):
Right. And the flip side of that, people who are
holding on to traditional valueslike we have to be in the work
because we're a manufacturingorganization and we make widgets
and everybody has to be here.Well, the truth is, you know, if
you're writing reports or you'redoing IT, you can be remote.
Mhmm. And so I think there'sthat clash too, but it doesn't
(07:54):
surprise
Mike Coffey (07:54):
me. And I've heard it called an equity issue in
manufacturing sense that I'veI've even heard HR people say,
well, it seems like it's anequity issue if if some people
can work have to come to officecome to to the workplace to, you
know, attach, you know, tab a toslot, you know, slot a and do,
you know, something physical. Itseems unfair that HR gets to
(08:15):
work hybrid or the IT people oraccounting or whoever get to
work hybrid or fully remote. AndI don't I don't see that as an
equity issue. That's just somejobs require you to be there and
some places some jobs don't.
Terri Swain (08:29):
Well, and that's why I think we always have to
step back as business owners andbusiness leaders to say, what
makes sense for our business?Because owning less real estate
may make sense. Having yoursalespeople nearer to their
customers than nearer to thepeople they're working with
almost always makes sense.Right? So what makes sense?
(08:49):
And I think sometimes we justtry to fit this. Okay. RTO, you
know, everybody's coming back tothe office, so everybody's
coming back to the officewithout thinking about, well,
what makes sense? Because we'reworried sometimes about fairness
and equity and I don't know. Tome, it's it's a pretty big
business issue.
You and I have probably workedfrom home most of our, you know,
(09:11):
or hybrid.
Mike Coffey (09:12):
Well, yeah. Well, you know, I was going into the I
I need people. And so I until wewent remote, I was in the office
every day with my employees. Inever dreamed we'd go remote.
And then I knew they they wereall so much more productive.
And like you mentioned thecommute, I mean, I had an
employee driving forty fiveminutes each way. And it was,
(09:33):
you know, I'm thirty five, whichis not a great drive. And so I
was like, this is working forus. But when and I think one of
the big problems the companies Isee doing RTO are often either
the really large organizationswhere knowledge transfer is
really key, where thatmentoring, you know, the
accounting firms, the the bigconsulting firms. JPMorgan
(09:54):
though, you know, Jamie Dimon'sgotten a lot of grief, right, in
the last few you know, he's beenreally frank and blunt about it,
but he's seen behavior that hedoesn't think is what JPMorgan
needs to be about.
And he went on that rant thatand I'll leave a a link to it in
the show notes, but he went on arant that was caught on video
(10:15):
complaining about people on Zoomtalking about their coworkers
negatively on the Zoom chat andthen, you know, of course,
whatever. We all we've all seenthose happen where it gets put
out to the whole everybody onthe call sees the the chat And,
you know, but I think it's a lotof it's mentoring and stuff. But
there's also the other sidethough where, and I said this in
(10:36):
2020, the employers who havegood management performance, who
have good leadership, who havemetrics for their employees'
productivity and quality, andhave a guide for here's what
we're gonna get done this month,this week, you know, today to
hit our goals. And everybody'sand everybody's at close to full
utilization, they're not gonnahave a problem with remote work
(10:59):
like those companies that manageby walking around, you know,
hurry up, look busy, the boss iscoming, that kind of thing.
They're the ones who are gonnahave a big struggle.
And that's what I saw duringCOVID and I think it's
continues. When I hear somebodywho's just saying my people
aren't as productive, but theycan't they're not saying it's
it's a culture thing and they'renot getting work done as far as,
(11:22):
you know, their, you know,mentorship and and make in
developing talent, which is Ithink is key. It's just they
don't have good managers. Youknow, they don't have a they
haven't trained, you know, theyhaven't trained their managers.
So, I think that's the the flipside of it.
But then, that's this has alsospawned this whole thing of
overemployment and I I did awebinar last week called alt
(11:44):
control this do you say altcontrol delete or do you say
control alt delete? Which one doyou say?
Terri Swain (11:50):
Alt control delete.
Mike Coffey (11:51):
You say alt control. See, think that's
generational because the youngs,including my one of my sons
said, you're saying that wrong.It's control alt delete. And
they say the control first andit doesn't even sound right on
my. So, put in the listeners,put in the notes.
Do you say alt control delete?We'll see and put your age and
we'll we'll we'll see if there'sa correlation between alt
(12:13):
control delete and control altdelete. But anyway, anyway, I
did a webinar last week. That'swhat we were talking about.
About, remote worker fraud andone of the things that's
happening a lot are, especiallyin tech in tech roles, but even
administrative clerical roleswhere people can work remote,
they're doing taking two orthree jobs at the same time
concurrently.
And there's a whole subredditcalled, you know, slash
(12:37):
unemployment, overemployment Imean, and it's all about people
doing that and how to get awaywith it, how to hide one job
from the other jobs and all ofthat. And the only way that's
possible is poor leadership. Youknow, supervisors not paying
attention to how how utilized isthis employee. And I disagree.
Well, go ahead and say what youwere gonna say.
Terri Swain (12:56):
Well, I was gonna ask you though, and this was a
question that I had. At abackground check, can you figure
out if somebody is pulling fromthey're paying Social Security
to multiple places?
Mike Coffey (13:08):
No. You can't see that as an employer, but what
you might see is Equifax hasthis product called the work
number and a lot of employers,especially larger employers,
don't want all those phone callsfor employment verifications
coming into Uh-huh. You know.And so they they give they they
set up APIs generally directlyto Equifax and dump all their
(13:32):
real time employment history andall their history and all their
real time data, as far as who'shired, what the hire date, term
date and all that was. And oftenyou call those employers, you
call out General Motors orLockheed or somebody and you
want to verify employment,they're not gonna do it.
They're gonna send you to a worknumber or or a similar
verification company. And thenyou get in there and you can see
(13:54):
all of somebody's employmenthistory. It just comes up when
you run it. And so that's oneway to do it. But even there,
they're a consumer reportingagency just like my background
screening company.
And so in order to hide that,they can that consumer, that
individual can come to toEquifax and say freeze my report
just like you can freeze yourcredit report. Oh. And so an
employer can't get it. Now, anemployer can go to them and say,
(14:17):
hey, your your employmenthistory is locked. We need you
to unlock it.
And the employee can refuse orthey they can kind of
apparently, according to whatI'm reading is a lot of
employers just say, oh well,okay, and they move on. And they
don't, they hire the person.They don't insist that they open
that up. Because you know, theperson say, oh, is that a victim
(14:37):
of identity fraud and thatdoesn't really matter for the
work number, but they they theythey just basically BS the
employers. But it goes back tojust poor management, right?
If, again, if I'm payingattention, if now there are
people who say, well, if I'mgetting the job done that
they're asking me to do in fortyand I'm getting it done in six
(14:57):
hours instead of forty, thenthen what's the problem? And I'm
like, no. Even if you're exempt,you're paid to be utilized fully
by the company, not just to getthis, you know, well, I'm
exempt, so I'll I'll only haveto work enough to get the job
done. Well, that's not how thatworks. And it's not what the
FLSA says, you know.
You know, you have to pay themregardless if they get a job
(15:17):
done in four hours. And so, Ithink that just goes back to
making, you know, employerspaying attention, having metrics
for their employees performanceand that's the only way you
would be able to do that. Ican't I can't imagine somebody
working none of my team, I mean,you know, and and we we count on
about 80% utilization in all ourbudgeting. I want I want my
(15:39):
employees not to killthemselves. But you couldn't do
a full time job at the same timeyou're working for me.
Don't think you could pull itoff.
Terri Swain (15:47):
Alright. But I think a lot of jobs you could
because for your right, peoplearen't paying attention. You get
the report done on time oryou're fast. I mean, like when I
was an EEOC investigator, I wasprobably I could probably run
circles around a lot of people.My was twice size.
Mike Coffey (16:03):
EOC investigators. You're probably the smartest one
I've ever had. But
Terri Swain (16:07):
you know what I'm saying, like Right. I could
probably do two to three timesthe production that was
expected. Sure. So I think aboutthat. If I'm at home, I'm gonna
produce like all my otherpeople.
I'm gonna have this side gigover here.
Mike Coffey (16:20):
Yeah. And that's what's basically happening. And
I mean, we've always hademployees and I did it when I
was in the corporate world. Idid consulting on the outside
part time. I never did it duringthe day.
If I, you know, I even, youknow, took vacation and traveled
some for, you know, to to helpwith some client stuff. But
never would I even think about,you know Of course, I was in an
(16:44):
office all day too. And so, youknow, but Mhmm. And I I'm double
employed now. I own this companyand I work here and I teach yoga
four or five times a week andsometimes I teach at 04:30 in
the afternoon.
So I guess it happens
Terri Swain (16:56):
studio know you're doing this.
Mike Coffey (16:58):
Yeah. Know. They're gonna yeah. Believe me. The fact
that I'm not starving to death,they know that I'm not that I'm
doing something besides teachingyoga.
And let's take a quick break.Good morning HR is brought to
you by Imperative, bulletproofbackground checks with fast and
friendly service. As we've saidlast week, I held a webinar
(17:19):
called Alt, Control, protectingyourself from remote employee
fraud. We discussed the waysemployers who haven't fully
returned to office have been thevictims of fraud by foreign
governments, identity thieves,and intentionally underutilized
employees. You can catch therecording of the webinar and get
recertification credit forwatching it by clicking on the
(17:42):
education tab atimperativeinfo.com.
If you're an HRCI or SHRMcertified professional, this
episode of good morning HR hasbeen preapproved for three
quarters of an hour ofrecertification credit. To
obtain the recertificationinformation visit
goodmorninghr.com and click onresearch credits. Then select
(18:03):
episode 193 and enter thekeyword decipher. That's d e c I
p h r. And if you're looking foreven more recertification
credit, check out the webinarspage at imperativeinfo.com.
And now back to my conversationwith Terry Swain. So we were
(18:24):
talking about the EEOC. Sopresident Trump and day one of
his, administration issued abunch of executive orders and
there's a lot of talk aboutillegal DEI. And a lot of people
have switched that includingsometimes his own spokespeople
to say DEI is illegal. But isDEI illegal, Terry?
(18:47):
No.
Terri Swain (18:48):
No. No. No. Now doing it wrong Yeah. Could be.
Exactly. I mean, doing it wrongcould be, but DEI is not illegal
and it's just getting such asuch a bad rap when you look at
the three words, diversity,equity, inclusion. Who can be
against that? Right?
Mike Coffey (19:08):
Yes. But the flip side of that is some companies
did do it really dumb and andcompletely illegally. And the
worst, you know, anytime theworst example is going to, you
know, result in anovercorrection. Overcorrection.
(19:28):
And there were a lot of badexamples.
You know, things like, you know,some of the training that went
on.
Terri Swain (19:36):
I don't know if there was a lot, but there was
the
Mike Coffey (19:39):
ones that were There was enough I know people
who went who sat through thosesessions. Yes. It wasn't just
something something crazyhappened in New York City. I
mean, here in Fort Worth, therewas and I don't think it was the
company's bad intent. I don'tthink it was anybody's bad
intent.
But, I think a lot of people whowere I must say this in a way
(20:00):
that is trying to be diplomaticand it's not my strong suit, who
were really enamored by thesocial justice justice aspect of
DEI and didn't make a strongbusiness case for the the the
DEI programs they werepromoting. I
Terri Swain (20:15):
think that the reason is that there has been
such a misunderstanding aboutdiversity, equity, and
inclusion, affirmative action,and, you know, compliance.
Cause, for example, people wouldcall me all the time and say,
hey, do you do DEI training? No.I've I mean, I could, but it's
never been my lane. My lane'scompliance.
(20:36):
So the fact that you think,because I do compliance, I do
DEI, or the fact that you thinkI can't do DEI because I do
compliance, when they're allinterwoven, always I always push
back and I'm like, have you everdone basic creating respectful
work environment training? Youknow, no. Then you are not at
DEI. Right. DEI is Frito, Pepsi,AT and T.
(21:00):
They're so far down the pike ofunderstanding. So I think when
you say people get enamored withthe social justice, I think
because they don't know. Theydon't take the time. They read
an article and they just say, Ineed to go get me some of those.
And I've seen that with CEO.
Hey, call. We need a DEItrainer. And that's how I get
the calls and I'm like, yeah,well, here's who I would go. And
(21:22):
then there's a million of themout there. Mhmm.
So how do you know who's good?
Mike Coffey (21:26):
Yeah. And that's the downside is there there are
some wacky and I've I've I'llsay it. I've had I've had at
least one on the podcast who Ithought was just wackadoodle as
far as the approach of what theDEI training was supposed to
accomplish. And if there's not abusiness case tied to it and
(21:47):
it's not a compliance issue
Terri Swain (21:49):
Right.
Mike Coffey (21:49):
Then you're doing it wrong.
Terri Swain (21:52):
And training should be the last thing you do.
Because you look at your systemsand processes and your business
case and are we trying to reachour consumers? Are we trying to
reach our employees? Are wetrying to reach our vendors?
Yes.
All of the above. How are wegonna integrate this? Do we have
good data? And that's the thing,like, I had a client once, very
(22:13):
well meaning, European owned,that said, our goal this year is
gonna be to hire 50% females.Hire and promote 50% females.
They were an engineeringcompany. I'm like, there's no
way you can meet this goal. Andthat would be illegally
discriminated against becausewhen you looked at the type of
(22:33):
engineering they had, theavailability for females was
11%. So 90% of the companies areengineering. So marketing is
gonna be a % female.
HR is gonna be a % female. Salesis gonna be a % female because
how are you get, like you can'tthat's illegal DEI. Right? That
is you don't you have a goodidea. Right?
(22:55):
Because half the world's women.Right? Shouldn't half our
company be women? No. Because wedidn't sit back and think about
who so so I think sometimes it'swell intentioned, but it's not
thought about holistically.
It's not thought about, youknow, how it all fits in your
business.
Mike Coffey (23:14):
But from a compliance standpoint, even if
50% of the available workforcewas women in in that field,
let's say it was 50% of theengineers available for women,
which is probably the directionwe're going if you look at the
enrollment and graduation ratesright now.
Terri Swain (23:34):
Yay.
Mike Coffey (23:34):
It it to set yeah. Yeah. Go girl. But the idea that
you're gonna set a quota, thatour workforce is gonna have a
hard number and we're gonnamanage managers to that number,
that's illegal too. Right?
Terri Swain (23:50):
Well, right. Well
Mike Coffey (23:51):
If it's affecting who gets selected for interviews
and hiring.
Terri Swain (23:54):
Okay. Yes and no. 50% would never be a quota. It
would be a goal. Yeah.
Because you would know that thatis your now if you made it a
quota and said, we're gonna do50%, then it's a problem. But it
should always be a goal becauseyou should always always I mean,
and I've been doing this for,you know, eons. Always hire the
(24:16):
most qualified person. Now, ifyou have two equally qualified
people and you have a goal, youshould go with your goal thing,
but you should never hire a lessqualified person.
Mike Coffey (24:29):
Are there ever two people who are a % equally
qualified? No. And so
Terri Swain (24:32):
They're not.
Mike Coffey (24:33):
So I I think if gender ever comes into it,
you've you've you've got abigger issue. But even before
all of this started going crazy,I I did a I had a presentation
and I've got the webinarrecorded on the website called
mitigating risk in theemployment selection process and
it talked about all the sciencethat said most of the DEI
training doesn't work. Andhere's what you gotta do. The
(24:53):
whole point of diversity equityas inclusion is drawing from the
deepest applicant poolavailable. So making sure you're
mitigating any biases in yourrecruiting process and how
you're advertising jobs.
Getting as many qualifiedcandidates regardless of
whatever demographics do nothave anything to do with the job
and getting those candidates in,mitigating your manager's own
(25:15):
bias, which we all have. Right?I mean, we've all got some and,
mitigating that in the selectionprocess and then making people
feel included when they're inthe workplace. Make this a place
that this person wants to workregardless if they're a a
conservative Southern Baptistwhite minister or a transgender,
(25:39):
you know, young millennial makethis a place where people want
to work, where we we we're civilto each other, where we respect
people's differences and we getthe damn job done. That's the
reason we come to work everyday.
That's what DEI that's what themessage of DEI should have been
and I think we got away fromthat after George Floyd was
(26:00):
murdered. And I think a lot alot of real anger about a lot of
injustices came on, but askingemployers to fix those
injustices proactively ratherthan just saying we're going to
fix our own systems and how weselect people, maybe and
mitigate the biases was amistake. Let me have it.
Terri Swain (26:20):
You know, I feel all kinds of ways about this
because I think there's a lot ofwhen you talk about I mean, I'm
a believer in systems andprocesses and what you said, all
about that. But I think if leftto no diversity component, no
thought about it, you're gonnaget more of the same. So I
Mike Coffey (26:40):
think Or measuring it's important. Yeah. And Yeah.
And and asking what what in oursystem is allowing this thing to
happen? Think that's a fairquestion.
Terri Swain (26:49):
And and I think the other what concerns me right now
in our current climate is thatwhat seems to be under fire also
are mentoring programs,internships that they have to be
Open to Open
Mike Coffey (27:05):
to everyone. That's interesting. So you think that
would be okay?
Terri Swain (27:10):
Well, because on its face, it sounds okay. Right?
But I'm gonna give you a fewexamples. So I have a client who
has a machinist. They hire a lotof machinists.
Who are machinists? I mean,especially back in the nineties.
Who are machinists?
Mike Coffey (27:23):
Dudes.
Terri Swain (27:24):
They're all male.
Mike Coffey (27:25):
Yeah.
Terri Swain (27:25):
Right. So they set up a program. They were in
Houston. They set up a programwith the Houston's public
schools, and they said, we aregoing to set up an
apprenticeship to teachmachinists. So when they come
out of high school, they can bemachinists.
And they specifically wantedthat half of that class to be
female. Okay? So that they couldstart changing the statistics
(27:50):
because if you don't dosomething to change the
pipeline, you know, so that wastheir goal. It wasn't like, oh,
50% have to be female, but inthat case, that really changed
who was becoming a machinist.
Mike Coffey (28:04):
Mhmm.
Terri Swain (28:04):
And it helped them pipeline people. And again, when
it came time for these kids tofinish their apprenticeship,
we're if Teri's a suckymachinist, like, don't well, we
don't want that girl. She can'tdo the job. But here, we're two
people out of high school, andwe're both pretty good. Like, I
wanna bring Terri in because Iwanna give her that opportunity.
(28:26):
So I'm I have a little bit ofangst about that whole thing
because I think there's beenprograms like that so that we
can change the statistics. Whyare women 50% in engineering and
graduating? It's becausesomewhere, they we changed the
narrative. Right? And a lot ofit start with corporate.
I mean, people going on campusesand getting people interested
(28:49):
and then giving them theinternship. Hey, come and work
for General Motors and see whatwe're all about or Toyota. And
then you've had the internship,so you have the leg up. So I
feel, you know, I've got thatkind of feeling.
Mike Coffey (29:05):
Well, and I think and and I'm I'm chair of the
talent committee for the FortWorth chamber, and one of the
things that we're actively doingis looking to get people back
into the trades. You know,college isn't right for every
student and all. And I thinkthat's really important. And I
think making sure you'recommunicating to female students
that, hey, this internship'savailable, and even making sure
(29:27):
you've got hopefully, you canfind your version, the 02/2025
version of Rosie the Riveter toput out there on, you know, as
your as one of your visuals ofwhat people really, you know,
the kind of people are doingthat. And there's this idea that
the trades are all dirty and allof that and now a lot of them
aren't.
They're in clean shops Yeah. Andeverything else. And and so, I
(29:48):
think that's great. And I thinkwhat you you click you you know,
you're saying, yeah, we want a50% women, but but that's kind
of an aspirational thing. We'renot going to limit it down, but
we want to make sure we'remarketing enough to to and it
may be it may just be because ofother social differences and how
(30:08):
how girls are raised by theirparents and social expectations.
You may never get to 50% in atrade in in that kind of
organization. But saying wewould love to we want to make
sure that every every kid whohas opportunity regardless of
their gender has an opportunityto do this program and it would,
you know, in a we feel like in aperfect world it would reflect
(30:30):
what the community looks likeregardless if it's gender or
race or whatever. That's a greataspiration. And and keep going
back and asking yourself whyaren't we getting those numbers?
What is what in our system?
And it may not be our systemthough because Right. Again,
could be all this other stuffout there that's not us. And
this was all to start thediscussion about the EEOC put
(30:52):
out two guidances about whatmight constitute illegal DEI or
how DEI might be unlawful. Andit didn't say anything new. No.
It was just No. Oh, there'stitle seven out there. And and
No. And so it's I've never seenI mean, I've been reading EEOC
guidances because, I mean, I'veworked on the employment side
(31:13):
and the employee selection sidemy most of my career. And I've
never seen guidances that saidso that said nothing new.
They're usually somegroundbreaking, you know, new
interpretation that I disagreewith often, but but here it's
just like, you've title Don'tyou
Terri Swain (31:33):
think that's adding fuel to the DEI fire where now
people are afraid of it? Yeah.So we're going like a flip side.
So now I have this internshipthat I'm trying to get female
machinists in and I'm like, oh,I don't wanna do that because
I'm gonna get, you know, I'mgonna I'm gonna get this thing
because now that's what we'relooking at. And, you know, one
(31:53):
of the first things the EEOCinterim commissioner did was
sent 20 letters to 20 highpowered DC law firms saying, we
think you have illegal DEI goingon, so send us so that's to me
the chilling effect ofeverything that's happening with
this lingo.
The law is the law. DEI is DEI.If you don't understand it,
(32:15):
you're not gonna understand itwith all the
Mike Coffey (32:17):
Well, yeah. All the stuff in the press. Yeah.
Terri Swain (32:20):
The press. You're not gonna understand it, but I
do think people are gettingafraid of it. Like, oh, that's
something like you said, can wesay EEO? Can we say DEI? Can we,
you know, and and and so it'syeah.
Mike Coffey (32:33):
But I think we need to I think it's time we have to
rebrand it and because but wellbefore president Trump was
elected and it became such a hotbutton hot topic button, I do
think it was the term wasappropriated by by folks who
(32:55):
weren't doing the kind of DEIthat we're talking about. Who
were promoting more of a socialjustice aspect of it. And I
think it's just tainted now. Itwas tainted before and that's
how it became a lightning rodissue. And I think now we've got
to get and we've got to talkabout it.
Not like, you know, the way Ialways try to talk about is
mitigating their biases in inyour employee selection, making
sure everybody has anopportunity to get in and that
(33:16):
you find a way to make themsuccessful in the organization.
Those kind of things. I thinkwe're gonna have to do that just
because I don't think DEI meansso many different things to so
many different people and if youask five different, you know,
practitioners of DEI, you'regonna get five different
answers.
Terri Swain (33:32):
Yeah. I mean, I agree with that, but what I hate
is hearing this wholemeritocracy. We're gonna get
back to meritocracy because whatthat sounds like to anybody who
is a black employee Or femalepilot. Hispanic. Yeah.
Or a female pilot or somethingis like, oh, you didn't you
(33:53):
know, I've heard this DEI. Youdidn't earn it. You didn't earn
it. Where we know that thepeople nobody puts American
Airlines does not my mysister-in-law is a a a captain
with American Airlines. Nobodyputs a pilot in the air
Mike Coffey (34:08):
Right.
Terri Swain (34:08):
Who doesn't know what they're doing. I mean, so I
think we've got to be reallycareful about changing the
verbiage because now what we'redoing is we're kind of vilifying
everybody who might have beenthe product of DEI. Like, oh,
you're there because you didn'tearn it. And so words do matter,
but, know, the words that we'veeven the words that Sherm came
(34:31):
up with. Mhmm.
I'm like, seriously? I mean,we're HR people. Can we do a
little better than this?
Mike Coffey (34:38):
Yeah. Well, and maybe because it's become a
political hot hot button. That'sanother reason to rebrand it.
And and and stake out clearlyright upfront exactly what we're
talking about. And so if you'rea company, you're gonna write
the equivalent of your DEIstatement now.
(35:00):
You know, be explicit about whatit really means that, you know,
like I said, you know, it's notjust, you know, rainbows and
unicorns because that doesn'ttell anybody anything. But we're
gonna become the best company todo whatever it is we do serving
the customers we serve becausewe're gonna draw from the
deepest pool of talentavailable. We're gonna select
(35:21):
from that the very best peoplewe can find who will work for
what we're willing to pay andwho, you know, and we're gonna
make them we're gonna try andkeep them employees fully
engaged, fully productive aslong as we can by making this a
place that they wanna work andthey feel accepted and and
appreciated. So I think that'sgonna be the route we go. But
let's talk about the newadministration a little bit
(35:44):
deeper.
My my one of my my dirty vicesis Reddit and which is a
dumpster fire for a very, youknow, just a collection,
especially the employmentrelated Reddits are about, you
know, unemployed, unhappy peoplewho think that the the man is
(36:07):
keeping them down, keeping hisfoot on their neck all the time.
But there was a post called notfrom from a redditor in Oregon,
not hiring Trump supporters. Andthe guy says that basically,
he's not gonna hire anybodywho's a Trump supporter anymore.
And he says, can't catch themall, but people are getting
(36:28):
pretty cavalier about praisinghim on LinkedIn, so that'll be
my guide I guess. The work myteam does requires a level of
critical thinking that makesgullibility an incredibly bad
trait to have.
Additionally, I just don't wantpeople on my team who hate a
country that has given meeverything. And he goes on, And
then he said, I I think it's notprotected by federal state law,
(36:49):
but I'm not a % certain. Am Iright? And as you can imagine,
that blew up quickly and theyquickly locked that one down
from comments. What's your takeon not hiring somebody based on
their political affiliation?
Terri Swain (37:02):
Okay. So I talk about this in training all the
time. There's no federal I mean,if you're a private employer,
there's political affiliation isnot a protected category. Now if
you're with school district oryou're with the city or with
your some kind of government,they're sometimes protected what
you can and can't do. I don'tthink you could ever not hire
(37:24):
somebody because of theirpolitical affiliation.
You know? And I always cautionpeople, you have to be careful
even in the EEO realm of, youknow, assuming, you know, that
every Trump supporter is an oldwhite male over the age 40 or
whatever. Like, even thoughthat's not what the statistics
(37:44):
are showing in the exit But but,you have to be careful because
during our you know, startingwith god. Probably starting with
Obama, maybe before that, theissues of race and gender and
religion have come into thepolitical sphere, and people are
(38:07):
starting to see you know, toequate, You're a Trump
supporter. You're a racist.
You're a liberal. You're afeminist. You're a blah blah
blah. So you've got issues ofrace and gender that come in
there, but no, you cannot youknow, you wouldn't wanna do
that. That just makes no nosense.
Mike Coffey (38:25):
And and even if it's a you know, even if you're
doing it legally, it goes backto what I was saying earlier.
Why would you carve out roughlyhalf of the population from your
employee base and make it thatmuch more hard to recruit
competent people who canactually get the job done? And
(38:48):
and but you gotta go back towhat Sharma's been talking about
about civility training too,right? We've gotta teach people
how to be, if not sweet andlovable, not, you know, not
uncivil to each other in theworkplace, how to respect
differences and say, you knowwhat, we're here to get this job
done and I don't need to knowwhat about your what you did
this weekend. I don't need toknow about what what your church
(39:10):
social taught you or what yourpreacher said Sunday morning and
I don't need to know, you know,about which parade you went to
this weekend.
Let's, you know, to the extentthat we can share that stuff
and, you know, and beemotionally intelligent enough
to know where, you know, we'reat the wrong audience for this,
they don't care, so let me justmove on and not get my feels all
(39:31):
up in it and not be offended ornot think that they're you know
discounting my faith or whateverit is. You know, so it goes it's
on both sides. Let's just teachpeople to do that and move on.
And then if you've got aperformance issue and somebody's
this it's disrupting theworkplace, then you address
those performance issues and howthose people are relating to one
another and but to say I'm notgonna I'm gonna, you know, not
(39:54):
hire half the people becausethey made the a choice I didn't
make, then it's like a goodbusiness decision, which is what
all this is supposed to beabout, is running a business
that makes, you know,accomplishes a mission, whether
it's a nonprofit or or forprofit.
Terri Swain (40:08):
Right. And let's face it, people change political
ideals. Right?
Mike Coffey (40:12):
Yeah.
Terri Swain (40:13):
And, yeah. I saw my dad do that a time or two. Was
like, what?
Mike Coffey (40:18):
Yeah. Yeah. I mean and and I'm always angry. I'd
never be able to hire anybodybecause, know, you know, I'm,
you know, I'm the crazy small llibertarian who votes
independent and looks foranybody but but an r or a d to
vote for. And so if I did that,I'd I'd have an a company of two
and we'd be arguing.
(40:39):
Well that's all the time wehave. Thanks for joining me
again Terry.
Terri Swain (40:42):
Oh thanks. Good to see you. Bye.
Mike Coffey (40:45):
And thank you for listening. If you enjoyed this
episode please write us a reviewon Apple Podcasts, Spotify,
YouTube, or wherever you'relistening and share this episode
on your favorite socialplatform. It helps us reach more
listeners. And we'd love to hearyour thoughts including whether
it is alt control delete orcontrol alt delete at
goodmorninghr.com. Rob Upchurchis our technical producer and
(41:09):
thank you to him andImperative's marketing
coordinator Mary Ann Hernandezwho keeps the trains running on
time.
And I'm Mike Coffey as always.Don't hesitate to reach out if I
can be of service to youpersonally or professionally.
I'll see you next week and untilthen, be well, do good, and keep
your chin up.
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