The Top 50 Human Resources Blogs To Watch In 2009

1) Four Hour Work Week  URL: http://www.fourhourworkweek.com/blog Princeton guest lecturer and troublemaker Tim Ferriss blogs about his cutting-edge experiments in lifestyle design: outsourcing life, global travel and mobile lifestyles, anddoubling income while halving hours. 2) Penelope Trunk's Brazen Careerist  URL: http://blog.penelopetrunk.com/ This blog is about career advice. And about Penelope Trunk. Her career never had a straight path, but she is always learning and trying new things, and that's what makes it fun. And sometimes scary. 3) Chief Happiness Officer  URL: http://positivesharing.com/ Happiness at work is a strange idea to many people, who have gotten used to the idea that work is unpleasant, tough and hard. Find out what you can do to make your business the place that inspires workers to do a great job and have fun at the same time with this inspiring blog. 4) Punk Rock Human Resources URL: http://punkrockhr.com/ Laurie Ruettimann is a punk rock, Human Resources professional with extensive Fortune 500 experience. She writes and speaks about business trends, employment, Corporate America, and opting-out of the rat race. 5) JibberJobber Blog URL: http://www.jibberjobber.com/blog The JibberJobber Blog offers updates on job search, career tools, personal branding, career management, networking, social networking, and thoughts on other resources. 6) Fortify Your Oasis  URL: http://fortifyservices.blogspot.com/ Consultant and author Rowan Manahan muses on the world of work, career management and personal development. 7) The Career Encouragement Blog URL: http://careerencouragement.typepad.com/ The Career Encouragement Blog is all about encouraging you to have a rewarding and personally satisfying career. The blog focuses on career development, work and family, working moms, job search strategies, career planning, and decision making. 8) Work Happy Now! URL: http://www.workhappynow.com/ Maximizing your work happiness should be the theme of your working life. Happiness creates success. When you stop putting in the hours and start extracting joy from work, you'll be successful. This blog helps you achieve that goal. 9) Career Hub URL: http://www.careerhubblog.com/main Career Hub helps people take charge of their job search, build confidence and advance their careers by connecting job seekers with the best minds in career counseling, resume writing, personal branding and recruiting.

Worklife 

10) Bob Sutton  URL: http://bobsutton.typepad.com/ This blog is about the workplace. Bob Sutton is a Stanford Professor and Organizational Psychologist who writes about innovation, leadership, evidence-based management, and workplace assholes and how to reform - and if need be - get rid of them. 11) All Things Workplace URL: http://www.allthingsworkplace.com/ Real-life stories, tips, and techniques for creating top notch workplaces, performance, and work life for executives, leaders, employees, and their coaches/consultants from Steve Roesler. 12) Gruntled Employees URL: http://www.gruntledemployees.com/ Managers, executives, in-house counsel, and HR people know all about disgruntled employees and their costs. Gruntled Employees looks at how to keep employees gruntled. Employer advocate and counsel Jay Shepherd leads the discussion. 13) 8 Hours & A Lunch URL: http://debowen.typepad.com/8hours/ 8 Hours & A Lunch is a search for balance and sanity, manging change, layoffs, training, and the recession.

Recruitment, Talent Management & Compensation 

14) Cheezhead URL: http://www.cheezhead.com/ Cheezhead is dedicated to issues pertaining to search engine optimization, Internet recruiting, human resources, employment branding, technology and marketing. 15) The HR Capitalist URL: http://www.hrcapitalist.com/ The HR Capitalist examines the intersection of the HR practice, technology and business results in today’s organizations, with a strong focus on areas like recruiting and performance management, but also with an eye towards the thousand other areas that impact HR Generalists at every level. 16) Your HR Guy URL: http://www.yourhrguy.com/ Lance Haun is a Human Resources Generalist practicing in the field for the past five years. His professional interests include recruitment, team building, training and development, employee relations and restraining himself from beating the crap out of bad managers and employees. 17) The Recruiters Lounge URL: http://www.therecruiterslounge.com/ In March 2008, the HR blog “JimStroud.com” (aka JimStroud 2.0) rebranded itself as The Recruiters Lounge. At this writing, it is written by Jim Stroud (and friends) and explores the wacky world of employment with articles, podcasts, videos, comics and more. 18) The Talent Buzz URL: http://thetalentbuzz.com/ The Talent Buzz is a Staffing, Employment, and Recruiting Blog. It is a leader in providing news, trends, and information for the Human Resources and Recruiting Community. 19) HR to HR 2.0 and HCM URL: http://strategic-hcm.blogspot.com/ This blog focuses on helping businesses that already have sound approaches to people management gain further improvements in the capabilities and engagement of their people, and the effectiveness of their organisations. 20) Workplace Learning Today URL: http://www.brandon-hall.com/workplacelearningtoday This is a daily blog from Brandon Hall Research, which gives a summary of news, events, commentary, and research on workplace learning, including training, performance support, job aids, learning technologies, talent management, organizational learning, and adult education. 21) Compensation Force  URL: http://compforce.typepad.com/compensation_force Compensation Force offers practical news, information, tips and musings about employee performance and compensation. 22) Workers Comp Insider URL: http://www.workerscompinsider.com/ Lynch Ryan's weblog about workers' compensation, risk management, business insurance, workplace health & safety, occupational medicine, injured workers, insurance webtools & technology and related topics.

HR 101 

23) About.com Human Resources URL: http://humanresources.about.com/ This Human Resources site provides articles, free sample policies, and other resources for people who: work in HR; manage or lead people; want to increase their personal or career effectiveness; or want to improve their ability to work with people. 24) Evil HR Lady URL: http://evilhrlady.blogspot.com/ Why is she evil? Well, she's not, but that's the perception of most people in HR. Need to fire someone? Come to HR. Need to explain to someone why, even after working their rear end off all year, that their annual increase is 2.7%? Come to HR. 25) KnowHR Blog URL: http://www.knowhr.com/blog KnowHR Blog serves up straight talk about human resources. They like simplicity in language. They don’t have much patience with HR jargon (unless they ’re making fun of it). 26) HRM Business Practices & Ideas URL: http://www.hrmbusiness.com/ This blog provides practices and notes on Human Resources, Small Business, Finance, and Personal Management. 27) HR Daily Advisor URL: http://hrdailyadvisor.blr.com/ HR Daily Advisor presents just ONE HR tip, piece of HR news, or compliance advisory a day, readable in 5 minutes or less. Check it out every morning and see how easy it is to keep up with changing HR management trends. 28) HR Bartender URL: http://www.hrbartender.com/ HR Bartender is here to provide human resources expertise. They want to be that friendly face that greets you after a long day at work. They ’ll listen to issues and offer up some options to make your work life as smooth as a vodka martini. Cheers! 29) HR Marketer URL: http://hrmarketer.blogspot.com/ HR Marketer is a blog for companies who sell products or services to human resource executives.

Leadership 

30) Great Leadership URL: http://www.greatleadershipbydan.com/ This blog offers opinions and information on leadership and leadership development from a practitioner in the field of leadership development for over 20 years, with a focus on questions about leadership development, leadership issues, crazy bosses, or impossible employees. 31) The Engaging Brand URL: http://theengagingbrand.typepad.com/ This blog offers thoughts on the world of business, leadership, creativity, branding, all aimed at enabling people to be the best that they can be. 32) Slow Leadership URL: http://www.slowleadership.org/blog Slow Leadership offers ways of returning civilization and humanity to organizations. Their aim is to provide interesting and challenging articles to help you think through the issues and find ways to enjoy your life and work to the full. This is a blog about ideas, not quick tips. 33) Three Star Leadership URL: http://blog.threestarleadership.com/ If you are a boss at any level, this blog will give you insight, information, and pointers to resources to do a better job and live a better life. 34) Execupundit URL: http://www.execupundit.com/ Execupundit.com features management consultant Michael Wade’s commentary on leadership, management, ethics and life in an often unconventional and humorous manner that interests people who’d otherwise avoid a workplace-related site. 35) HR Thoughts URL: http://hrmanager.squarespace.com/ If you are a Human Resource professional, developing leader or someone interested in transforming the way we communicate, interact and connect with others, you've come to the right place. HR Thoughts is partly professional, partly personal and 100% authentic. Guaranteed. 36) Six Degrees From Dave URL: http://sixdegreesfromdave.com/ Six Degrees from Dave spotlights HR industry leaders, sourcing gurus, global staffing practices and social networking.

On Organizations 

37) Orgtheory  URL: http://orgtheory.wordpress.com/ Orgtheory.net looks at the essence of the organization, from theory, strategy, management, sociology, design, economics, academia, stakeholders, public policy, human resources, and ethics. In short, all things organizational. 38) White Spaces  URL: http://gauteg.blogspot.com/ White Spaces is Gautam's commentary on business and management with an Indian flavour, focusing on organizations, work, people, strategy, learning, knowledge, innovation and high performance. 39) Flip Chart Fairy Tales URL: http://flipchartfairytales.wordpress.com/ Flip Chart Fairy Tales offers reflections on business, the world of work and the general organisational crap that we all have to put up with in the course of our employment. 40) Authentic Organizations URL: http://authenticorganizations.com/ Striving for authenticity is a powerful way that organizations - and the people in them - can renew, reform or revolutionize what they are about and what they accomplish together. This blog looks at what we can do, as organization members, as managers, leaders, scholars or practitioners, as persons, to help organizations pursue authenticity.

HR Law 

41) Workplace Prof Blog  URL: http://lawprofessors.typepad.com/laborprof_blog Two Labor and Employment Law Professors cover arbitration, employment discrimination, employee benefits, labor law, and employment law in all of its dimensions. 42) George's Employment Blawg URL: http://www.employmentblawg.com/ George created George’s Employment Blawg in May 2003 as an outgrowth of his online reading in the field of employment law. As the blawg grew, he also started reading and posting more about topics of general interest in the employment and HR area.

A Day in the Life 

43) Ask a Manager URL: http://askamanager.blogspot.com/ If you're not sure what your manager is thinking, or how to ask for a raise, or whether you might be in danger of getting fired, or how to act in a second interview, ask this manager and find out. 44) HR Wench URL: http://hrwench.blogspot.com/ HR Wench is one HR Manager's musings about life, work and kicking butts. 45) HR Minion URL: http://hrminion.blogspot.com/ The blogger behind HR Minion would like to tell you, "I may be a minion, but I'm not your mother so take some ownership over your own career and stop bugging me. However, if you have any questions on how to do that, then this is the place for you." 46) Cranky Middle Manager URL: http://cmm.thepodcastnetwork.com/ Being a manager today is enough to make anyone cranky, but you're not alone. Join Wayne Turmel and thousands of listeners around the world as they speak to the brightest minds in the business, management and career development.

HR Technology 

47) Michael Specht  URL: http://specht.com.au/michael/ Michael Specht blogs from Australia looking at technology, enterprise 2.0, management, Human Resources and recruitment. 48) The Human Capitalist URL: http://humancapitalist.com/ The Human Capitalist is a blog by research director and industry analyst Jason Corsello about HR technology, services, and outsourcing trends. 49) Vendorprisey URL: http://theotherthomasotter.wordpress.com/ Vendorprisey is all about HR and ERP technology, Enterprise 2.0, SAP, living in Germany and even expensive bicycle components 50) Systematic HR  URL: http://systematichr.com/ SystematicHR is a human resources blog about the intersection between HR process and HR technology. It is where HR strategies become the practice of service delivery, discussing how HRMS systems, point solutions such as TAS, can be utilized to maximize your employee experience and enhance the strategic capabilities of your organization.

Scientific Speed Reading: How to Read 300% Faster in 20 Minutes

Written by Tim Ferriss

(Photo:  Dustin Diaz)

How much more could you get done if you completed all of your required reading in 1/3 or 1/5 the time?

Increasing reading speed is a process of controlling fine motor movement—period.

This post is a condensed overview of principles I taught to undergraduates at Princeton University in 1998 at a seminar called the “PX Project”. The below was written several years ago, so it’s worded like Ivy-Leaguer pompous-ass prose, but the results are substantial. In fact, while on an airplane in China two weeks ago, I helped Glenn McElhose increase his reading speed 34% in less than 5 minutes.

I have never seen the method fail. Here’s how it works…

The PX Project

The PX Project, a single 3-hour cognitive experiment, produced an average increase in reading speed of 386%.

It was tested with speakers of five languages, and even dyslexics were conditioned to read technical material at more than 3,000 words-per-minute (wpm), or 10 pages per minute. One page every 6 seconds. By comparison, the average reading speed in the US is 200-300 wpm (1/2 to 1 page per minute), with the top 1% of the population reading over 400 wpm…

If you understand several basic principles of the human visual system, you can eliminate inefficiencies and increase speed while improving retention.

To perform the exercises in this post and see the results, you will need: a book of 200+ pages that can lay flat when open, a pen, and a timer (a stop watch with alarm or kitchen timer is ideal). You should complete the 20 minutes of exercises in one session.

First, several definitions and distinctions specific to the reading process:

A) Synopsis: You must minimize the number and duration of fixations per line to increase speed.

You do not read in a straight line, but rather in a sequence of saccadic movements (jumps). Each of these saccades ends with a fixation, or a temporary snapshot of the text within you focus area (approx. the size of a quarter at 8? from reading surface). Each fixation will last ¼ to ½ seconds in the untrained subject. To demonstrate this, close one eye, place a fingertip on top of that eyelid, and then slowly scan a straight horizontal line with your other eye-you will feel distinct and separate movements and periods of fixation.

B) Synopsis: You must eliminate regression and back-skipping to increase speed.

The untrained subject engages in regression (conscious rereading) and back-skipping (subconscious rereading via misplacement of fixation) for up to 30% of total reading time.

C) Synopsis: You must use conditioning drills to increase horizontal peripheral vision span and the number of words registered per fixation.

Untrained subjects use central focus but not horizontal peripheral vision span during reading, foregoing up to 50% of their words per fixation (the number of words that can be perceived and “read” in each fixation).

The Protocol

You will 1) learn technique, 2) learn to apply techniques with speed through conditioning, then 3) learn to test yourself with reading for comprehension.

These are separate, and your adaptation to the sequencing depends on keeping them separate. Do not worry about comprehension if you are learning to apply a motor skill with speed, for example. The adaptive sequence is: technique ‘ technique with speed ‘ comprehensive reading testing.

As a general rule, you will need to practice technique at 3x the speed of your ultimate target reading speed. Thus, if you currently read at 300 wpm and your target reading speed is 900 wpm, you will need to practice technique at 1,800 words-per-minute, or 6 pages per minute (10 seconds per page).

We will cover two main techniques in this introduction:

1) Trackers and Pacers (to address A and B above)
2) Perceptual Expansion (to address C)

First – Determining Baseline

To determine your current reading speed, take your practice book (which should lay flat when open on a table) and count the number of words in 5 lines. Divide this number of words by 5, and you have your average number of words-per-line.

Example: 62 words/5 lines = 12.4, which you round to 12 words-per-line

Next, count the number of text lines on 5 pages and divide by 5 to arrive at the average number of lines per page. Multiply this by average number of words-per-line, and you have your average number of words per page.

Example: 154 lines/5 pages = 30.8, rounded to 31 lines per page x 12 words-per-line = 372 words per page

Mark your first line and read with a timer for 1 minute exactly-do not read faster than normal, and read for comprehension. After exactly one minute, multiply the number of lines by your average words-per-line to determine your current words-per-minute (wpm) rate.

Second – Trackers and Pacers

Regression, back-skipping, and the duration of fixations can be minimized by using a tracker and pacer. To illustrate the importance of a tracker-did you use a pen or finger when counting the number of words or lines in above baseline calculations? If you did, it was for the purpose of tracking-using a visual aid to guide fixation efficiency and accuracy. Nowhere is this more relevant than in conditioning reading speed by eliminating such inefficiencies.

For the purposes of this article, we will use a pen. Holding the pen in your dominant hand, you will underline each line (with the cap on), keeping your eye fixation above the tip of the pen. This will not only serve as a tracker, but it will also serve as a pacer for maintaining consistent speed and decreasing fixation duration. You may hold it as you would when writing, but it is recommended that you hold it under your hand, flat against the page.

1) Technique (2 minutes):

Practice using the pen as a tracker and pacer. Underline each line, focusing above the tip of the pen. DO NOT CONCERN YOURSELF WITH COMPREHENSION. Keep each line to a maximum of 1 second, and increase the speed with each subsequent page. Read, but under no circumstances should you take longer than 1 second per line.

2) Speed (3 minutes):

Repeat the technique, keeping each line to no more than ½ second (2 lines for a single “one-one-thousand”). Some will comprehend nothing, which is to be expected. Maintain speed and technique-you are conditioning your perceptual reflexes, and this is a speed exercise designed to facilitate adaptations in your system. Do not decrease speed. ½ second per line for 3 minutes; focus above the pen and concentrate on technique with speed. Focus on the exercise, and do not daydream.

Third – Perceptual Expansion

If you focus on the center of your computer screen (focus relating to the focal area of the fovea in within the eye), you can still perceive and register the sides of the screen. Training peripheral vision to register more effectively can increase reading speed over 300%. Untrained readers use up to ½ of their peripheral field on margins by moving from 1st word to last, spending 25-50% of their time “reading” margins with no content.

To illustrate, let us take the hypothetical one line: “Once upon a time, students enjoyed reading four hours a day.” If you were able to begin your reading at “time” and finish the line at “four”, you would eliminate 6 of 11 words, more than doubling your reading speed. This concept is easy to implement and combine with the tracking and pacing you’ve already practiced.

1) Technique (1 minute):

Use the pen to track and pace at a consistent speed of one line per second. Begin 1 word in from the first word of each line, and end 1 word in from the last word.

DO NOT CONCERN YOURSELF WITH COMPREHENSION. Keep each line to a maximum of 1 second, and increase the speed with each subsequent page. Read, but under no circumstances should you take longer than 1 second per line.

2) Technique (1 minute):

Use the pen to track and pace at a consistent speed of one line per second. Begin 2 words in from the first word of each line, and end 2 words in from the last word.

3) Speed (3 minutes):

Begin at least 3 words in from the first word of each line, and end 3 words in from the last word. Repeat the technique, keeping each line to no more than ½ second (2 lines for a single “one-one-thousand”).

Some will comprehend nothing, which is to be expected. Maintain speed and technique-you are conditioning your perceptual reflexes, and this is a speed exercise designed to facilitate adaptations in your system. Do not decrease speed. ½ second per line for 3 minutes; focus above the pen and concentrate on technique with speed. Focus on the exercise, and do not daydream.

Fourth – Calculate New WPM Reading Speed

Mark your first line and read with a timer for 1 minute exactly- Read at your fastest comprehension rate. Multiply the number of lines by your previously determined average words-per-line to get determine your new words-per-minute (wpm) rate.

Congratulations on completing your cursory overview of some of the techniques that can be used to accelerate human cognition (defined as the processing and use of information).

Final recommendations: If used for study, it is recommended that you not read 3 assignments in the time it would take you to read one, but rather, read the same assignment 3 times for exposure and recall improvement, depending on relevancy to testing.