HRevolution: Is It HR Revolution or HR Evolution?
October 21st, 2009 by Lois Melbourne
We win either way!
The first weekend of November, I will be attending an event in Louisville, KY that would never have been possible to create 10 years ago. Forget the fact that there likely were not enough (read as “any”) HR Bloggers around to make a gathering. What I’m talking about is the ability of a group of geographic strangers to meet online and introduce each other to their electronic network of friends who are also passionate about HR. These people are so passionate about recruiting, human resources, workforce planning, succession planning, career development, and all things work/life/people related that they share their wisdom, rants, ideas, and questions via their blogs. Often, these blogs are written on their own time, sometimes they are corporate supported. The point is they communicate.
These friends chat via Twitter. They recommend each other’s blog posts. They find ways to share and communicate in the nonelectronic world, too. Then an amazing thing happened. Trish McFarlane and Ben Eubanks (whom we have not seen nearly enough of on Twitter lately) hatched the idea that this talented network of HR professionals needed to learn from each other in a more concentrated venue. So, they hatched the idea of an HR Bloggers gathering. They named it HRevolution. What I don’t know is, have they realized the true coolness of this event beyond the fact that we are all going to learn to be better bloggers? We are going to become better HR professionals but we’re also experiencing a new way to create brain trusts in a rapid fire, get it organized, light the spark and let it happen way.
I know that the, now four, organizers (see the awesome list of individuals below) have jumped through hoops to pull off what has now become a 50 person gathering. Yet, I challenge all of us to not be fearful and use this concept as a way to bring together previously unmet individuals to solve a problem, inspire development, strategize a plan, et al, by connecting. Gather people in your social network, bring them together, toss out your challenges and watch the great minds move further ahead than you could ever dream of doing on your own. Can you tell I am psyched about HRevolution? I am also excited about exploring whole new ways of building new collaborative teams.
Check out the HRrevoultion site and see the individuals attending. Most of them have blogs or will in the future. Read their stuff, comment on the posts that you enjoy or disagree with, follow them on Twitter. Engage. I promise you will learn.
Huge “thank yous” in advance to
- Trish McFarlane @trishmcfarlane http://hrringleader.wordpress.com/
- Ben Eubanks – @beneubanks http://upstarthr.com
- Crystal Peterson – @crystalpeterson http://crisscrossed.wordpress.com/
- Steve Boese @steveboese http://steveboese.squarespace.com/
I can’t wait to tell you what happens at the event. I’m sure these blog posts will get better because of it.
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Awesome post Lois! I can’t tell you how excited we all are about the event, and to bring so many great folks together in one place. It really should be a fantastic time.
Lois, thank you for the excellent post! I’ve added it to the Press page on the wiki. I think the attractiveness of the idea in the first place was meeting people who are thinkers and doers and sharing ideas among the group. Then it grew into an event with speakers and an actual agenda, because we realized that people really wanted an opportunity to learn something new and useful.
Thanks again!
Ben
Lois- Just THANK YOU! For being you, for blog exchanging with me when I was new to the space and getting started, for promoting this event, for ATTENDING this event, for helping everyone learn and grow.
This was a very touching post to me. I am grateful for your friendship. Whenever people who do not use social media ask me if I’m meeting “real” HR people, I can always point back to you, Ben, Steve, Crystal, and the many others on Twitter. YOU ALL are the real future of HR. YOU ALL are what makes being a part of this larger community so great.
Sincere thanks.
Trish
Boy, I sure wish everyone would stop blogging about HRevolution. I can’t attend despite Trish McFarlane’s heroic attempts to track down flights that would allow me to criss cross the US and but be back in time for some family events. So now I cry myself to sleep every time someone mentions HRevolution. I won’t get to spend time with all the amazing people who are attending and I will be missing out on a fantastic opportunity. Great post Lois and congrats in advance to the organizers. Hopefully you all will talk about me (fondly) during the conference.
Michael we will miss you. But I will learn for you and send you my notes.