Free Daily Podcast Summary
The HR Life Podcast: Daily Summaries Delivered
by Tony Benjamin
The HR Life Podcast is a show about the work-life experience of those of us in Human Resources and business leadership. This long-form podcast is a conversation, casual, and not always the corporate line. Hosts and guests touch on everything from serious or even controversial topics to the absurdity of modern American business practices. Your hosts are Tony Benjamin, owner and founder of The Grange Strategic HR Consulting, and Steven J. Smith, Author of The Hiring Tree: Laws of Applicant Attraction and all-around important guy. Guests include the best minds in the HR world. Join the show weekly.
Latest Episodes
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- Yesterday1h 32m
EP 59 An HR Department of One, the Wild Wild West, and Almost Quit with Claire Lizear
Claire Lazaire is back for round two, and this time she's traded corporate HR for something she calls the wild, wild west: running HR solo across fifteen entities and four owners in an industry so new it barely has a rulebook yet. She talks about the year she almost walked away from HR entirely, what changed her mind, and how rewriting an entire employee handbook in her first month (attorneys included) turned into rolling out a full performance management program for a company pushing 300 employees nationwide. What does it actually take to build HR from scratch while the business is already running at full speed, and why did an industry with zero playbook end up giving her more real HR work than a decade in corporate ever did?She also picks a fight worth having: is there any real standard for what makes an HR professional good at their job, or is the whole profession just winging it based on whoever happens to be in the room? Claire, Tony, and Steve dig into what the "people ops" trend really means for who owns strategy inside a company, and why a thirty person business trying to stand up a full DEI program might be one of the more avoidable mistakes in HR this year. Is your HR function actually built for the size of your business, or is it running someone else's playbook?Learn more about Claire Lizear at: https://www.linkedin.com/in/clizear/ Learn more about Fantastic Tony Benjamin at: https://www.thegrangellc.com/Learn more about Steven "Big Deal" Smith at: https://thehiringtreebook.com/Learn more about the Books mentioned on the podcast at: https://thehiringtreebook.com/hr-life-podcastLearn More about the Netflix film Titan at: https://www.netflix.com/title/81712178Learn more about Dyno Outfitters at: https://www.utahviaferrata.com/Learn more about MegastarHR at: https://www.megastarhr.com/Learn more about Pucks for Autism at: https://www.pucksforautism.com/Learn more about Thrive Life Project at: https://www.thrivelifeproject.org/Claire Lizear, SHRM-SCP, is an experienced HR leader with a passion for creating workplaces where people feel seen, supported, and set up to succeed. Known for her thoughtful approach to employee relations and her ability to bring clarity to complex situations, she’s helped leaders and teams grow through change with empathy and accountability. When she’s not in HR mode, Claire gives her time to Pucks for Autism, a volunteer effort that combines her love of hockey with her commitment to community and inclusion.
- 1 weeks ago1h 18m
EP 58 An "Accident" at Work and Gandalf is HR's Best Recruiter with Melissa Yergensen
Melissa Yergensen has done HR at a two-hundred-person county government, an underground mine, a giant hospitality company, and back again, and she has an opinion about which one prepared her best. It is not the one you would guess. She joins Steve and Tony to explain why she thinks corporate HR, the version with the big titles and the bigger silos, might be quietly making the profession worse, and why the HR people who never got a fancy title might actually be better at the job.Along the way, there is a workers' comp claim that starts in a supply closet and ends somewhere nobody expected, a scheduling form with an answer nobody should have written down, and a small town where firing someone on Tuesday means running into them at your kid's basketball game on Wednesday. Steve and Tony also drag Melissa into a Lord of the Rings comparison she never asked for, and somehow it explains exactly why good people stay in bad jobs too long. Is HR having an identity crisis, or did it just get lost trying to sound smart at the executive table? Learn more about Melissa Yergensen at: https://www.linkedin.com/in/melissa-yergensen-mshrm-sphr-ipma-scp-aa7a6711a/Learn more about Fantastic Tony Benjamin at: https://www.thegrangellc.com/Learn more about Steven "Big Deal" Smith at: https://thehiringtreebook.com/Learn more about the Books mentioned on the podcast at: https://thehiringtreebook.com/hr-life-podcastLearn More about the Netflix film Titan at: https://www.netflix.com/title/81712178Learn more about Dyno Outfitters at: https://www.utahviaferrata.com/Learn more about MegastarHR at: https://www.megastarhr.com/Learn more about Pucks for Autism at: https://www.pucksforautism.com/Learn more about Thrive Life Project at: https://www.thrivelifeproject.org/
- 2 weeks ago1h 24m
EP 57 Careless Hiring, Skinwalker Ranch, and Britt Davies' Long Awaited Debut
Britt Davies started her HR career before she graduated High School, and is most recently in the tech industry, which puts her right in the middle of the layoffs and AI anxiety everyone keeps talking about. She joins Tony and Steve for a real conversation this time, after her first appearance got lost to a technical glitch, and she comes with a historian's eye for how we got here. Britt walks through the shift from Peter Drucker's era of management theory to Jack Welch's forced ranking system in the 1980s, and makes the case that every major leap in technology, from the printing press to the steam engine, has followed the same pattern: fear first, then a new frontier nobody saw coming.She also gets personal about why AI matters to her beyond the workplace, and she doesn't hold back on what concerns her either. And what does Gallup's engagement data, now the lowest it has been since the pandemic, actually tell us about the people managing others, not just the people being managed? Britt has answers, and a few surprising ones. Stick around for how her idea of an annual girls trip involves Bigfoot, Skinwalker Ranch, and a paranormal conference most people have never heard of.Learn more about Britt Davies at: https://www.linkedin.com/in/brittdaviespeople/Check out Britt's podcast, The At Will Economy at: https://open.spotify.com/episode/6zE64AwfH8h2UPOY3I8MxA?si=ivkG0G0STHKJSaszZjcO5w&utm_source=copy-link&nd=1&dlsi=ba57a0e82292427cLearn more about Fantastic Tony Benjamin at: https://www.thegrangellc.com/Learn more about Steven "Big Deal" Smith at: https://thehiringtreebook.com/Learn more about the Books mentioned on the podcast at: https://thehiringtreebook.com/hr-life-podcastLearn more about Dyno Outfitters at: https://www.utahviaferrata.com/Learn more about MegastarHR at: https://www.megastarhr.com/Learn more about Pucks for Autism at: https://www.pucksforautism.com/Learn more about Thrive Life Project at: https://www.thrivelifeproject.org/Ring doorbell sound effects provided by Britt.
- 3 weeks ago1h 28m
EP 56 Where's My Ashtray, Hire Right Fire Fast, and the OceanGate Culture Collapse with Bryan McCurdy
What does a foreman burning a coworker with a cigarette have to do with a submarine imploding two and a half miles under the Atlantic? On this episode, Tony and Steve sit down with Bryan McCurdy, HR Director at Hughes General Contractors, to find out. Bryan didn't set out to work in HR (nobody really does, apparently), but nearly twenty years later he's running people operations for a seventy-year-old, third-generation family construction company He explains why he failed a forty five minute personality test at Target during a Christmas hiring push, why the traditional job posting is broken, and why he'd rather hire for what someone is great at than spend forever trying to fix what they're bad at.The conversation gets even more interesting when the guys pull the OceanGate Titan disaster into the mix, using it as a gut punch example of what happens when leadership refuses to listen to the people warning them something is about to break. Learn more about Bryan McCurdy at: https://www.linkedin.com/in/bryan-mccurdy-shrm-cp-ab703630/Recovery Friendly Workplace of Utah: https://rfwutah.org/Learn more about Fantastic Tony Benjamin at: https://www.thegrangellc.com/Learn more about Steven "Big Deal" Smith at: https://thehiringtreebook.com/Learn more about the Books mentioned on the podcast at: https://thehiringtreebook.com/hr-life-podcastLearn More about the Netflix film Titan at: https://www.netflix.com/title/81712178Learn more about Dyno Outfitters at: https://www.utahviaferrata.com/Learn more about MegastarHR at: https://www.megastarhr.com/Learn more about Pucks for Autism at: https://www.pucksforautism.com/Learn more about Thrive Life Project at: https://www.thrivelifeproject.org/
- 4 weeks ago1h 22m
EP 55 Disrupting Benefit Management with Rhonda Nerenberg and Jacob Davis
The guys sit down with Rhonda and Jacob from Weltrio and talk maximizing effective use of benefits. Rhonda and Jacob give the history of Weltrio and how they are helping companies manage their plans. What would happen if you didn't have a group open enrollment meeting this year and instead sat down and had a personal conversation with every employee? Why are HR people so afraid of change or rocking the boat? The discussion also turns to the recent DisruptHR event in Salt Lake City and reviews that said only vendors and consultants were in attendance. Learn more about the team at Weltrio at: https://www.weltrio.com/Find the Behind the Premium podcast at: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC3UMiw6juj5ZWZcuA9gm7eQLearn more about Fantastic Tony Benjamin at: https://www.thegrangellc.com/Learn more about Steven "Big Deal" Smith at: https://thehiringtreebook.com/Learn more about the Books mentioned on the podcast at: https://thehiringtreebook.com/hr-life-podcastLearn more about Dyno Outfitters at: https://www.utahviaferrata.com/Learn more about MegastarHR at: https://www.megastarhr.com/Learn more about Pucks for Autism at: https://www.pucksforautism.com/Tony's "Robot Voice" courtesy of The Internet.
- Jun 23, 20261h 14m
EP 54 HR's Opportunity to Drive the AI Bus with Ryan Kohler and Fragments of Tony's Skull
Ryan Kohler, founder of Applicant Pro, joins the guys and blows Tony's mind in the first minute of the podcast. As Tony picks up pieces of his skull, Ryan unfolds the nature of AI, what it is really capable of, and the opportunity HR has to drive the AI bus in American business. In this episode you'll learn the real impact AI will have on your company, what job searches will look like in the future, the future of purchasing software, and what the dramatic reduction in intelligence costs means for your future. The Hosts of this podcast are not responsible for any minds of listeners that short-circuit or get blown after listening to its content. Listeners are encouraged to consume in moderation. Learn more about Ryan Kohler at: https://www.linkedin.com/in/ai4teams/Get Ryan Kohler's book at: https://www.amazon.com/Bus-Has-Driver-Authority-Organization/dp/1968164340/ref=sr_1_1?crid=10DQ2SZWEJW0Y&dib=eyJ2IjoiMSJ9.HBMjj0_WMtAuITo6NoZubnbSY4PBM_MMAF4FIEieekc.LmaNxcI9u35RwsVMYvL9idcFPkA_bIweMG-ih76EMHI&dib_tag=se&keywords=ryan+kohler+bus&qid=1782224946&sprefix=ryan+kohler+bus%2Caps%2C213&sr=8-1Learn more about Fantastic Tony Benjamin at: https://www.thegrangellc.com/Learn more about Steven "Big Deal" Smith at: https://thehiringtreebook.com/Learn more about the Books mentioned on the podcast at: https://thehiringtreebook.com/hr-life-podcastLearn more about Dyno Outfitters at: https://www.utahviaferrata.com/Learn more about MegastarHR at: https://www.megastarhr.com/Learn more about Pucks for Autism at: https://www.pucksforautism.com/
- Jun 16, 20261h 16m
EP 53 Joe Tate Music, Japan, and the Power of Presentations
Joe Tate got into HR because his handwriting was better than the other guy's. He left one of his biggest roles because he refused to let his HRIS manager take the fall for a company-wide data breach. And somewhere in between, he built Boost HR, mentored hundreds of professionals through his six-week HR essentials course, and took a ski trip to Japan that ended up reshaping the way he thinks about people, culture, and the kind of workplace we all say we want but rarely build. Tony, Steve, and Joe cover a lot of territory in this one: why getting HR a seat at the table with the CFO is still a fight worth having, what promotion from within actually looks like when you celebrate it the way it deserves to be celebrated, and why live training is making a comeback that should have you rethinking your next all-hands. What can a heated bidet seat at 2 a.m. teach you about the employee experience? Listen and find out! Learn more about Joe Tate at: https://boostrecruits.com/ and https://www.linkedin.com/in/joe-tate-a92b02/Learn more about Fantastic Tony Benjamin at: https://www.thegrangellc.com/Learn more about Steven "Big Deal" Smith at: https://thehiringtreebook.com/Learn more about the Books mentioned on the podcast at: https://thehiringtreebook.com/hr-life-podcastLearn more about Dyno Outfitters at: https://www.utahviaferrata.com/Learn more about MegastarHR at: https://www.megastarhr.com/Learn more about Pucks for Autism at: https://www.pucksforautism.com/Voice audio distortion courtesy of The Internet. Joe Tate is a regionally renowned speaker, trainer, and source for HR compliance information. After serving more than 1,000 clients with his company, Boost HR, he knows what he's talking about.
- Jun 9, 20261h 21m
EP 52 Turns Out Smiling Is Free: Aric Bostick on Attachment Theory and Why Your Face Is an HR Problem
Tony and Steve welcome Aric Bostick, keynote speaker, former classroom teacher, professional crowd-energizer, and the man Steve publicly credits for telling him to get on a stage when he was just some guy with a book idea and a lot of enthusiasm. Aric brings the science of attachment theory out of the therapy room and drops it straight into your org chart. You'll learn why people leave companies that pay more to work somewhere they feel seen. Why your resting face is already sending a message to your team (it's probably not the one you want). Why "soft skills" is the wrong name for the hardest thing most managers will never learn. For the record, Tony has never made a mistake. Learn more about Fantastic Tony Benjamin at: https://www.thegrangellc.com/Learn more about Steven "Big Deal" Smith at: https://thehiringtreebook.com/Learn more about the Books mentioned on the podcast at: https://thehiringtreebook.com/hr-life-podcastLearn more about Dyno Outfitters at: https://www.utahviaferrata.com/Learn more about MegastarHR at: https://www.megastarhr.com/Learn more about Pucks for Autism at: https://www.pucksforautism.com/
About The HR Life Podcast
The HR Life Podcast is a show about the work-life experience of those of us in Human Resources and business leadership. This long-form podcast is a conversation, casual, and not always the corporate line. Hosts and guests touch on everything from serious or even controversial topics to the absurdity of modern American business practices. Your hosts are Tony Benjamin, owner and founder of The Grange Strategic HR Consulting, and Steven J. Smith, Author of The Hiring Tree: Laws of Applicant Attraction and all-around important guy. Guests include the best minds in the HR world. Join the show weekly.
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