Know Your HR History

Years ago, there weren’t any HR influencers.

Nobody was out on social media talking about inclusion, change management, compensation, or even AI. Then, one day, everybody was there. You had Brené Brown, Adam Grant, Josh Bersin, and even Corporate Natalie.

But how did we get here?

It started with a small group of HR people who built the digital and social infrastructure for the virtual hallway conversations you have online all day long.

Who are these people? Well, mostly dorks. They blogged. They threw after-parties at conferences. Built friendships all over the world. Created the early version of digital side gigs. And they built a speaker circuit that isn’t perfect but looks more like you than ever before.

None of this was here before. Can you imagine that?

These pioneers are a quirky group of HR and HR-adjacent people started blogging at each other from 2004 to 2009 and it changed everything.

How weird was it back then? These nerds wrote on their lunch breaks. They commented on each other’s posts. People flew to meet up at conferences with no sponsorships and no expense accounts. There was no money for anything. The audiences they built got monetized later.

Many of these content creators (which is a weird thing to write) are still doing the work. A few are gone, and most never got rich off it. But many of them wrote books, and I’m giving a whole bundle away.

The giveaway is running on my LinkedIn page. Drop a comment there to enter. The list of books, with the stories behind each one, is below.

A Note On Who’s Missing

I need to say something important. Early influencers have the burden of going early and taking risks. They can do it because they have privilege, whether they recognize it or not.

Of the early adopters who wrote books, most are white. But people like Victorio Milian, Sarah Morgan, Ms. Tiffany Toussaint, and Chris Fields of blessed memory belong in any honest version of this story. So does the entire #BlackBlogsMatter movement and many others from the Latino, LGBTQIA+ and AAPI communities. Read them, follow them, hire them, remember them. Their work shaped what HR looks like online whether the publishing industry caught up or not.

The Early Disruptors

Here are the books.

Carmen Hudson, “The Corporate Recruiter’s Playbook”
Carmen has led TA teams at Yahoo, Microsoft, Starbucks, and Capital One. She can find a talented executive for any major company. She can also find your missing uncle. Her book is a field manual for corporate recruiters and the leaders who manage them. Sourcing geeks, hiring manager whisperers, and TA leaders building real functions will find something useful here.

Alexandra Levit, “They Don’t Teach Corporate in College”
Alexandra is my soul sister. The first edition of her famous book came out in 2004. It taught a generation of new graduates how to navigate their first office jobs. The updated edition addresses what corporate America didn’t bother to tell young workers about getting ahead. It’s aged well.

Lindsey Pollak, “Recalculating”
The first time I met Lindsey Pollak in real life was in a bathroom at a conference. She asked me how I always looked so nice at events. I told her, “I pay people to help me.” Lindsey’s been writing about generations at work for over twenty years. This book is her playbook for career transitions in the post-pandemic workplace. It’s especially useful for anyone whose path got rerouted by the last five years.

Marcus Buckingham, “Love and Work”
Marcus once told me, while standing on the Las Vegas strip, that he loved my blog. I think someone told him to say that. I’m still swooning. He came up through Gallup and spent years on speaking circuits. Many were HR conferences, where he sharpened the work that became StrengthsFinder. This book is about the “red threads” inside your work. Those are the specific activities you love. Marcus teaches you how to build more of them into your week.

Kris Dunn, “Best Boss Ever”
KD found me in 2006 and convinced me to coin the phrase “Punk Rock HR.” He’s the founder of HR Capitalist and Fistful of Talent. Those are two of the most consequential HR blogs of the last twenty years. He’s now the CHRO of Marriott. His book is a manager’s handbook with cheat sheets for the hardest people conversations. Pop culture references and humor are folded in. I can hear his voice in my head when I read his books.

Tim Sackett, “The Talent Fix Volume 2”
Tim has been in my life for so long that I forgot how I met him. Probably at a bar. He runs HRU Technical Resources and advises the world’s largest companies on hiring strategies. Volume 2 is a leader’s guide to recruiting great talent. The advice is unvarnished. That’s what you’d expect from someone who’s been hiring for thirty years and writing about it for fifteen.

Robin Schooling, “Real HR”
Robin is punk rock to the core and has my love and attention forever. She brought me down to Louisiana to speak at a state SHRM conference. That’s where I discovered drive-thru daiquiris. She co-hosts DriveThruHR, which has been running since 2010 and isn’t slowing down. This is her first book and a clear-eyed take on the function. What HR is, what it could be, and how to close the gap.

Scott Stratten, “UNLeadership”
Scott is an award-winning keynote speaker known for his energy, passion, knowledge, humor, and man-bun. (Those are his words.) He worked in human resources for many years, became viral on Twitter before you even knew it was a thing, and launched a successful global speaking business rooted in treating customers and employees with respect and integrity. He and his partner, Allison, are co-authors of 6 best-selling business books and co-hosts of The UnPodcast. I butt-dialed Alison the other day and need to call her back!

More From the Early Wave

Steve Browne, “HR on Purpose!!”
Steve is the longtime HR leader at LaRosa’s pizza chain in Cincinnati. He’s a SHRM board member and one of the most generous voices in the field for twenty years. The book is a collection of short essays on deliberate people passion in HR. Steve’s story-driven style has made him a go-to mentor for a generation of practitioners.

Jodi Glickman, “Great on the Job”
Jodi has a pedigreed background and was so early to social media that early adopters look like laggards. She is one of the most professional people I know. She wrote a practical guide to one of the most underrated skills at work. How to talk to people. Asking for things. Answering well. The art of the follow up. It’s fifteen years old and still gets quoted by leaders I trust.

Alison Green, “Ask a Manager”
Alison was a leader in the non-profit space and started the Ask a Manager blog in 2007. She’s been answering reader workplace questions ever since. I love Alison because she can help you manage the thorniest situations while remembering that people are human. Her book is a curated guide to the messiest situations at work. Lunch-stealing bosses, passive-aggressive coworkers, and all the rest. Her voice is calm, specific, and free of corporate jargon.

Jason Seiden, “Super Staying Power”
Jason and I once hosted a party in Chicago at a bar. We invited people up to tell stories of failure. You know who else was doing that at the time? Nobody. You know who took that idea and ran with it? Every local marketing event planner you’ve ever met. Failure parties are everywhere. Jason was also one of the first to write about personal branding in a way that wasn’t cringe. The book is about becoming someone organizations want to keep. That’s a different and more honest question than becoming someone organizations want to hire.

Susan Strayer LaMotte, “The Right Job, Right Now”
Susan is who I want to be when I grow up. She wrote this book in 2006 and went on to build exaqueo. It was one of the most respected employer branding firms in the industry. Then it was acquired because she is so dang awesome. (She publishes as Susan LaMotte now.) The book is a toolkit for finding a career that fits. It’s still relevant for anyone in the middle of figuring out their next move.

Joe Gerstandt and Jason Lauritsen, “Social Gravity”
Jason once asked me if he should start a podcast. I said, “Do you like wasting time and throwing money out the window?” He penned this book with his colleague, Joe Gerstandt. Joe and Jason were two of the loudest voices on culture and connection at work. They wrote at a time when most HR conferences were still arguing about whether social media was a fad. The book covers the natural laws of relationships and how to build a network with depth.

Honorable Mentions

Minda Harts, “Talk to Me Nice”
Minda wasn’t early-early, but she was early enough. Her book “The Memo” was a New York Times bestseller. The new one is organized around seven trust languages for the workplace. It’s on its way to becoming required reading for leaders who want to rebuild trust with the people they manage. You need it. I’m including my copy.

Ashley Herd, “The Manager Method”
Ashley is one of the most credible management voices on LinkedIn. The book is the system she’s been teaching for years, now in long form. She’s not new to HR. I’m including her here because her work comes directly out of what this community built early. Plus her book is awesome. If you’ve sent a new people manager to a training that didn’t stick, try this instead.

My own book, “Betting on You,” came out in 2021. It’s part of the giveaway because I have a copy on my desk. It’s yours if you win. The Punk Rock HR Podcast, my newsletter, and this post all draw from the same well. The book is the long-form version of the same shit.

How to Win the Bundle

I stuck these books, and others, in the bundle. I paid for almost all of these books* because, as Jennifer McClure says, friends don’t ask friends for free copies.

Head over to my LinkedIn post and leave a comment telling me which book you’re most excited about or which early HR voice shaped your career. I’ll pick one winner on Sunday, May 24. I’ll ship the full bundle to one US address. Shipping books overseas isn’t something I can manage this round. But the list above is yours to read and share.

At some point, I’ll take on the responsibility of naming the rest of the community that influenced me from 2004 to today. That’s a big job, but I’m up for the challenge.

---

Some links in this post are Amazon affiliate links. I may earn a small commission if you buy through them. The books in the giveaway are paid for out of my own pocket.

Two books are from people I don’t know personally but are advanced reader copies.