What are your strengths? Do you know? What would you say if someone asked you “what are your strengths”? Why are they important to you? Do you use your strengths everyday at home? at work?

According to Marcus Buckingham, in Trombone Player Wanted videos, less than 2 out of 10 people play to strengths at work every day. He also says it’s not our organizations that hold us back, but rather we hold ourselves back by holding onto to thoughts that keep us from playing to those strengths. Buckingham, who worked for over 20 years for the Gallup Organization, says the data tells us we have three myths we believe that hold us back.

Myth #1 – We change as we grow older. We don’t really change at all – we may make adjustments to our environment, but we don’t really change. If you loved music as a child, you probably still love music. If you had a keen sense of order when you were younger, you probably crave organization in both your home and work environment. We don’t change all that much. So the strengths you demonstrated as a child are most likely still your strengths!

Myth #2 – We need to give our weaknesses the most attention! We need to improve ourselves in areas that we aren’t as capable. You certainly shouldn’t ignore those areas, but you will gain more traction if you put the same amount of effort and time into taking your strengths to the next level and you’ll enjoy doing it more!

Myth #3 – We need to do whatever our team needs us to do! Although it is likely that some part of our workday will be filled by necessary tasks that might not utilize our strengths, we must take individual responsibility to find additional work that does play to our strengths. According to Buckingham, we need to step forward and volunteer our strengths for our team, for the benefit of the team and the organization! It’s only when everyone volunteers their strengths do we have a team functioning in the “performing” mode and making a significant contribution to the organization.

If you are interested in learning more about your personal strengths you can take a Strengths Finder assessment either through the book Strengthsfinders 2.0 by Tom Rath or Now Play to Your Strengths by Marcus Buckingham.

Thanks to Karla Barry, one of our Corporate Learning and Development Specialists for sharing some of what she teaches our employees through her classes on Strength Finders!

Pinnacol had a unique visitor...

This morning Pinnacol's employees were greeted by a unique visitor as they arrived at work.  On a 4th floor ledge of our building was perched a red tailed hawk basking in the morning sun.  It generated a lot of excitement from those lucky enough to see it and I got some great insights from one of our resident birders, Mike, who in his day job is one of our staff attorneys.  Apparently the bird was a fledgling from a local nest. Red tailed hawks are birds of prey, and are sometimes referred to as "chicken hawks".  Females are usually larger than males by as much as 25%.  Denver has a lot of urban wildlife, from coyotes, to deer, and the occasional bear, but it was still a special treat to see this amazing bird up close.

A conversation with two of our Decision Support Analysts

If you've been out on our Current Opportunities page you've seen that we are looking for a Decision Support Analyst:

Pinnacol is seeking a Sr. Decision Support Analyst to create and maintain business intelligence tools. The ideal candidate will be a great communicator with the technical expertise to support projects that require heavy analysis and problem solving. Position works independently and as part of a team to design and construct BI solutions. Effectively communicates findings to management and helps devise business intelligence strategies. Must have expertise with reporting tools (Brio, Hyperion, Microstrategy, or the like), expert level problem-solving ability and 3-5 years experience with databases. Bachelor’s degree or equivalent experience required. Project management skills and insurance experience a plus.

We thought you might want to hear about the position directly from some of the folks already in the role. In the following video you'll hear from two of our Decision Support Analysts, Lalita and Quincy. You'll hear Quincy refer to himself as the Manager of the "Athena" project. Athena is how we refer in-house to the primary tool they are using: Microstrategy. Why Athena? Well, as our CIO was quick to point out, Athena is the Greek God of information, and as you'll see, thats what our Decision Support team is all about!

Making Volunteering Fun!

Pinnacol employees do a tremendous amount of volunteering in the community. Recently we were asking for volunteers for two efforts, the Westword Music Showcase which helps raise funds for Volunteers of America, and the annual distribution of fans to families that need them to beat the heat this summer. To add a little excitement we gave employees the chance to demonstrate their guitar chops via Guitar Hero. Highlighted in the following video is Farron, one of our employees who showed off their rock star side.

The Westword Music Showcase 2010 will be held on June 19, 2010 at the Golden Triangle District. This year's headliners include Ghostland Observatory, Superchunk, Dirty Projectors, Neon Indian, Tickle Me Pink, Jonathan Tyler and the Northern Lights, Single File, Oh My Stars, and BoomBox. Plus, you'll be able to listen to over 90 local acts on 15 stages.

For more info check out: Westword Music Showcase 2010.

Manpower Survey hints at improving Denver job market

Manpower Inc., one of the nation's largest staffing firms has surveyed U.S. employers for 47 years to gauge the outlook for hiring. More than 18,000 employers across the country are surveyed on a quarterly basis. A brand new change to the survey is sharing state-level results, rather than just national data. I was curious to see what the survey was forecasting for Colorado, and specifically for the Denver area.

The forecast for the 3rd quarter shows employers anticipating more hiring than in the last several quarters although its still not a rosy picture:

For the Denver area 19% of employers indicate they will likely increase staffing in the 3rd quarter, 8% will be decreasing, and 68% will be maintaining their current staffing levels. On a national level the survey shows 18% increasing, 8% decreasing, and 70% not changing from their current staffing levels. So Denver is slightly better, but not by much. What is certainly encouraging is the change from prior quarters over the last two years.

For Colorado statewide, the survey results show 20% of employers will be increasing their hiring, 9% decreasing, and 65% maintaining current staffing.

People inside and outside of Pinnacol are always asking me when Pinnacol's hiring activities will return to more normal levels. As a workers' compensation insurance company our revenues and workloads are tied directly to the staffing levels of our insured policyholders. As the Colorado businesses we insure start adding employees to their payrolls we get busier and in turn start to add staff. When I see data such as that reflected in Manpower's and other surveys I'm encouraged and cautiously optimistic. We're not out of the woods yet - when only 1 in 5 employers is looking to add staff that's not a very robust economic situation - but the outlook does appear to be improving. If you'd like to see the full Manpower report its available at Manpower Survey.

Job Announcement for Junior Achievement

I don't normally broadcast job announcements for other organizations, but thought I'd share this one for Junior Achievement. Pinnacol has a long history of volunteering with and supporting JA. I  had a chance to help out in the classroom this spring (see May 7 blog "Congratulations to this year's graduates") and our CEO Ken Ross has served on their Board of Directors as well. They are looking for a Volunteer Manager so if someone out there is interested thought I'd share the link JA Job Announcement. Heck, if I didn't already have my dream job I'd be applying!

A little bit of Pinnacol trivia... life as a state agency

Unless you've been hiding, or lucky enough to be on vacation, its been hard to ignore that Pinnacol has been in the news quite a bit lately. I'm not going to comment on the coverage; we have an outstanding Communications team to handle that! What's apparent in a lot of the coverage is an underlying debate about whether Pinnacol would be better off as a regular state agency. Today we are not a state agency, but rather a quasi-public authority, meaning that we operate like a domestic mutual insurance company for the benefit of our policyholders and their employees. I was looking through our history and found this interesting tidbit about what life was like for our employees when we were an actual state agency (from 1915-1987):

The “State-Way”

The most difficult aspect of being a state employee, according to many former and long-time employees was complying with state budgetary requirements and whims of elected officials. Just a few examples:

The oil crisis in the 1970’s meant employees did without much heat in the winter or air conditioning in the summer. Employees who worked at the Fund’s offices at 1313 Sherman (referred to by some as the White Elephant) worked with coats and gloves on in the winter and suffered through extreme stuffiness and heat in the summer because the windows were sealed shut for energy conservation reasons.


The Fund was under the state budgetary system and had to follow the lead set by the Joint Budget Committee, even though taxpayer dollars were never used to support the agency. So if the Governor called for a 10 percent cut of all agencies, the Fund was required to follow.

Felt tip pens were absolutely forbidden (they were a luxury according to Governor Lamm) and pencils were hard to get. New pencils were not given to workers unless the workers could produce a pencil stub which had to be so small it wasn’t of use anymore. Only auditors were allowed mechanical pencils and even they had to justify their use. Calculators were another luxury. Four adjusters often shared one calculator. Calculator tape was also a tight commodity; both sides had to be used before new tape was given.


Not only was it difficult to obtain supplies under the state system, it was also difficult to increase staff to meet increasing workloads. Staffing did not significantly increase for the Fund until 1987 when the Fund became an Authority and was no longer under the state budgetary controls.


Fund employees in the 1960’s, 1970’s, and early 1980’s were used to doing a job complicated by a cumbersome state budgetary system. But it was a job they did with a lot of pride. In the 1970’s the Fund was used to set up a workers’ compensation bureau for the government of Thailand, who’s own compensation system was reported to be a disaster. A Fund employee helped create the Thai workers’ comp bureau and a Fund underwriting manager later traveled to Thailand to follow up on the program.

(source: 1995 Annual Report for the Colorado Compensation Insurance Authority - the predecessor to Pinnacol Assurance)

I don't know many people who would like to work under the conditions described above. We take a lot of pride in those former employees. We recognize that the company we are today was built on the foundation and hard work of those who came before us. We've come a long way from those state days. Today we have all of the resources we need to do our jobs and serve our customers. As the media is quick to point out, we're far from perfect, but I think most our our employees would prefer to move forward into a future geared towards continuous improvement rather than to return to the past. I'd hazard a guess that most of our customers might also agree.

The price of gadgets...

A recent article in the New York Times did a nice job of illustrating some of the pros, and some of the cons, of being hooked on technology and the price to be paid when the obsession goes too far. When I interview candidates for positions with Pinnacol I sometimes tell them, only somewhat jokingly, that we live and die by our little black boxes (our computers). I suspect that like other companies this is becoming truer with each day, and its not just our desk top computers. Our company culture used to frown on attendees at meetings using their electronic devices; today one can't sit through a meeting in our building without some (sometimes most!) of the participants looking down at their I-Phones and Blackberries, fingers a-blur. Is this good or bad? I don't know the answer, but increasingly there are studies indicating there is a price to be paid for this obsession with technology.

The article points out that people's brains actually change to adapt to the constant flow of information and stimulus provided through all these devices. The stimulation actually causes a dopamine squirt that researchers say can be addictive. Users often claim they need the technology to multitask. The scientific evidence actually points to the opposite - people overly immersed actually have more trouble focusing and ignoring irrelevant information. What I found intriguing is that scientists are finding that even after multitasking ends, fractured thinking and lack of focus persist. As the article points out, its not that this is just your brain on computers, its your brain off computers as well. Its not all bad news however - imaging studies find Internet users become more efficient at finding information and video game players do develop better visual acuity.

Its a fact of life that people today are innundated with information, nearly three times as much as folks were consuming in the '60's. Recent studies found that computer users check e-mail or other programs nearly 37 times an hour and visit an average of 40 web sites a day. On average we are now consuming 12 hours of media a day, compared with 5 hours in the 1960's.

Some people apparently can easily juggle all these information streams. But according to the University of Utah, these "supertaskers" represent less than 3% of the population. For the rest of us its a challenge that can impact every aspect of our life, from work, to home, to school, to relationships with other people. I'm as guilty as anyone; I occasionally catch myself e-mailing folks in the cubicles next to mine rather than simply getting out of my chair and actually talking to them. We are still in the infancy of all this - the hardware and software we are using today will look like child's toys in a decade or two. Pinnacol, as will be the case with all American companies, will be going along for the ride and will have to adapt. It should make for an interesting journey for both our company and our employees!