Several new opportunities with Pinnacol...

I just posted two new opportunities with our company. The first is for a Learning & Organizational Development Director. For those who follow this blog you may have seen this position posted before in its prior incarnation at the Manager level. After reviewing our L&OD needs we have concluded that we need someone at the more senior Director level to really help us chart our future L&OD Strategies. The Director will redesign and build our L&OD function from the ground up and will develop L&OD strategy and ensure its alignment with Pinnacol's business strategy and goals. A key aspect of this position will be overseeing the assessment of organizational needs and the design and implementation of trainings, initiatives and interventions that enable the execution of business strategy and goals in the areas of leadership development, change management, training development, performance development, succession management and organizational design. 

The L&OD Director will also build, direct, manage and coach the learning and organizational development team and will be responsible for measuring performance to gauge the success of programs and to drive continuous improvement in organizational development and learning. A Bachelor's Degree in Human Resources, Organizational Development, Organizational Effectiveness, Business, Communications or a related field and 7+ years progressive experience in L&OD strategy development and execution in a professional business setting are required along with strong relationship management skills and the demonstrated ability to effectively partner with all levels of management. Candidates should also have experience with large and small group classroom facilitation and managing and leading a team of L&OD specialists. MBTI, Emergenetics, Social and Emotional Intelligence, PDI certifications are preferred.

The second position (which we have not posted in any former incarnations!) is on our Finance team and will report to our CFO and CEO both. We're looking for a Financial Analyst - Special Projects to be responsible for analyzing and modelling possible future initiatives to provide perspective and to assist in the making of sound investment decisions in light of the Company's strategic and tactical direction and growth objectives. This position conducts quantitative analysis of complex financial data related to strategic projects/investments, mergers and/or acquisitions or business alliances. The Financial

Analyst - Special Projects role performs due diligence, industry research and financial modeling with the main purpose of informing executive-level decision making with data-driven analytics.  Working at the direction of the CEO, CFO and other senior leaders the analyst should expect to work multiple projects spanning various topics simultaneously. A Bachelors Degree (MBA preferred) in Accounting, Finance, Economics or Business required along with a minimum of 3-5 years of related financial analysis or financial modeling and valuation experience in a Corporate Finance/Corporate Strategy.

As with all of our positions we do ask interested candidates to please submit their information via our company website. We look forward to hearing from you!

Potential...

One of our managers, Paul, just sent me the following comic which he had found interesting and thought it applied to what I do in terms of getting great people into our organization.

Strategic Humor from December 2014 Harvard Business Review

I'm always joking with our employees when they occasionally bring their children in that they (the kids) must be my next interview so I  also got a chuckle when he sent it to me. It did get me to thinking, however, of what the work world will look like when this baby reaches the age of entering the job market. When we meet with candidates interested in working at Pinnacol we look not only at can they do the specific job they applied for but whether they have the skills necessary to move into other roles over the next 5-10 years. The average tenure with our organization is about 10 years and I'm the first to admit that I'd hazard only a fuzzy guess on what the world will look like in a decade let alone the 20 or so years it will take today's babies to enter the job market.

In a recent Workplace Matters magazine sent out by the folks at Mountain States Employers Council (which is celebrating its 75th anniversary) one of their research consultants tried to tackle this topic in an article titled "The Future of HR". The author was hypothesizing what the work world might look like some 75 years from now, about the time our comic baby might be looking forward to whatever the future of retirement looks like. Some of their prognostications wouldn't come as much of a surprise: technology - specifically web or cloud-based - will continue to change and influence how we all interact with each other and our perceptions of reality. The good news for all those folks who text while driving is that they'll likely be doing so in self-driving cars which should prove safer for all of us.

The increasing use of robots, Big Data, wearable (and surgically implanted) technology, health care, environmental concerns, and changing corporate cultures  all made the list of things to watch for over the next 70+ years. The article's author of course has no way to know if the world he envisions will become reality. I always get a kick out of watching Stanley Kubrick's film 2001: A Space Odyssey (filmed in 1968 - just a few short 46 years ago...) to compare how much of what they thought the future would look like has actually transpired. One thing that will likely not change is that we cannot lose our focus on the "H" in HR. The ability to interact effectively with those around us will continue to be a critical aspect of life at work. That's my prognostication. While I won't be around 75 years from now to see if this comes true I do know that a world without the Human in human resources
would be a sadder place. So good luck little comic baby and may you reach your full potential!

Looking for a Scrum Master to join our PMO!

Scrum..., there is a term that many may not be familiar with but its been around since the late 80's/early 90's. Wikipedia defines Scrum this way:

Scrum is an iterative and incremental agile software development framework for managing product development. It defines "a flexible, holistic product development strategy where a development team works as a unit to reach a common goal", challenges assumptions of the "traditional, sequential approach" to product development, and enables teams to self-organize by encouraging physical co-location or close online collaboration of all team members, as well as daily face-to-face communication among all team members and disciplines in the project.

If you understand all that you may be interested in our opportunity for an experienced Scrum Master who will be dedicated to multiple Scrum teams as determined by our Manager of Project Services. The Scrum Master will be responsible for enforcing the rules of Scrum, removing productivity impediments for their teams, developing each team's self-organization and self-management skills, and constantly improving Pinnacol's standards of work. 

Candidates  for the Scrum Master should bring an excellent understanding and knowledge of Agile SDLC methodologies, in particular Scrum, and must have extensive knowledge and experience overseeing the design, development and implementation of quality assurance standards and practices for software testing. A Bachelors Degree in computer systems design, computer science or related field and/or 10 years equivalent work experience along with 5+ years experience in Project Management is required. Certified ScrumMaster desirable. 

Scrum Alliance

Scrum.org

Congratulations to our new Governor... Whoever he may be!

As I write this the 2014 Colorado Gubernatorial election has yet to be decided. As I went to bed last night I thought for sure I would wake up today and know who our next Governor would be but apparently we'll have to wait. This election was Colorado's first all mail-in ballot. I'm not sure what that tells us - American culture today turns up its nose at anything to do with snail-mail yet we deem it a step forward when we elect to choose our civic leaders that way.

Akron Weekly Pioneer Press Front Page 

Back in 1914, the year leading up to the legislative session that would create our company, voters didn't have the option of voting by mail. Most Coloradoans didn't even have the option of climbing into their own vehicle and driving to the polls.

Most of us this year were not thrilled with the amount of political advertising on T.V. but my sympathies go out to those voting in November 1914 - they had 45 propositions on the ballot, including whether to make Colorado 'dry' by implementing Prohibition.

The Prohibition proposition passed, although like the current vote for Governor it also was too close to call for several days after the election, and Colorado was scheduled to become completely 'dry' on January 1, 2016. National Prohibition didn't become effective until 1920 so Colorado was ahead of its time. Colorado would also repeal Prohibition and legalize alcohol ahead of the nation in 1933, and of course we led again in November 2012 by being the first state to eliminate marijuana prohibition by making its recreational use legal. This year's election cycle saw Oregon and Washington D.C. pass marijuana initiatives and Alaska's vote on the issue is still being counted.

For those Coloradoan's who could afford a car in 1914 they had a choice of gas or electric; given that any thought of global warming was still decades away the makers of the 1914 Fritchle Electic Car were really, really ahead of their time. Given that November weather in Colorado can be somewhat cool the proud owners of the Fritchle could have sought accommodations at the Denver Albany Hotel (17th & Stout Streets) and waited for the election results to sort themselves out. A room at the  Albany, which was demolished in 1976, would have set you back $1.50 per night.