BlogERP: Jim Holincheck's HCM Software Blog

A Great Talent Management Cartoon

My wife sent me this cartoon from GoComics.  This certainly illustrates what can happen if you focus too much on workforce reductions.

Another Week, Another Conference

It has been quite a busy time with many conferences and lots of notes to wrap up.  I am finally seeing the light at the end of the tunnel so I thought I would take a few minutes and discuss the Workbrain Users Conference.   

I was able to attend a number of customer presentations.  These presentations showed a wide variation from really large customers with very complex workforce management requirements to midsized organizations with faster track implementations.  These customers were at different stages as well.  Best Buy was just starting their implementation.  Limited Brands had piloted the solution in 50 stores and were preparing for a broad rollout in 2007.  United Airlines was live with a very complex implementation.  J.B. Hunt was live with a very fast track implementation.  All of the presentations were very informative about the challenges that those companies were facing and how they leveraging Workbrain to solve those issues.

I presented at a breakout session on Trends in HCM/Workforce Management (and technology).  I have to admit I did put my foot in my mouth.  I started out my presentation with an anecdote about the experiences I had dining at two restaurants (one really good and one not so good) at Epcot in Disney World the previous week.  I knew that Disney was a Workbrain customer, but I did not make the connection.  I should have.  There were seven folks from Disney in the audience.  If you have read some of my previous posts or if you know me, my wife and I are big Disney fans.  Needless to say, I was mortified, but the Disney folks were very gracious.  They even let me join them for the lunch keynote the next day.

Speaking of the keynote, it was very inspirational.  The speaker, Captain Jerry Linenger, talked about his 132 day off planet mission on the Russian Mir space station.  Needless to say, his discussion of the challenges of spending that much time off-planet with two Russian Cosmonauts made some of the the challenges we face on a day-to-day basis pale by comparison.  However, he did a great job of tying those experiences to everyday experiences and how it can impact each person's work and personal lives.

For those going to Oracle OpenWorld (and I know there are a lot of you going), I hope to see you next week.