The idea for this post started from the impact WordPress plugins have had on my blog and my desire to share those amazing little plugins with you. Originally I was going to call this post my “Plugin Roundup”, but… the more I thought about it, there are other important tools that I am using for my site that are not wordpress plugins. So, long story short, I am not limiting this post to plugins only.

My good buddy Ben over at upstartHR has had a huge impact on logicwriter.org, he has graciously offered advice along with some great tips on getting my blog going. Some of the tools that I am going to talk about here were suggested by Ben to help me get going in the right direction. Well, enough chatting, let get down to the great tools that can help make a difference in you website.

1. WordTwit: WordTwit is a WordPress plugin that automatically sends a tweet from your twitter account with the post title and link. Why is this valuable? Well.. this plugin will help drive traffic to your site assuming you have someone following you on Twitter and if your Twitter followers find your post handy, it is super easy for them to retweet it.

2. All in One SEO Pack: All in One SEO Pack is another great WordPress plugin that allows for you to optimize your website for search engines. This will help search engines determine what is the important content on your site and help direct visitors to your site if it relates to their initial search.

3. Website Grader: I love this website! I am a statistics junkie. Website Grader is basically a SEO tool that will take a look at your current site and will rank your site based on over 50 variables. This tool is helpful for tweeking your site to help your SEO.

4. Google’s Webmaster Tools: This is another web based tool and it requires you to sign up for a free account. Once you sign up for the free account and configure your website properly Google’s Webmaster Tools will help you to more or less see your web site from a search engines eyes. Webmaster Tools will give you helpful stats like telling you what keyword searches you are showing up in, what keywords make up the content of your site (Are you really talking about what you think you are?), managing sitemaps and if there are any errors on your website.

5. Add to Any: Share/Bookmark/Email Button: This is another nifty WordPress plugin that adds a small button to the bottom of your posts, pages or both if you choose. When the visitor to your website hovers their mouse over the Share/Save button, it allow them to save, print, post a link to your article on any number of social media sites and much more. The easier you make it for your visitors to share your content, the more exposure you will gain, at least in theory.

Well, there you have it. Just a handful of tools that I am currently using and enjoying. If you have any blog or website tools that you would like to share, please leave a comment and tell me about them.

How many times have you heard that SHRM is more or less a waste of space, a dinosaur of an organization or just not meeting the needs of the HR community? I have been hearing this more and more lately.

My view of SHRM apparently is different than the growing disdain among my fellow HR Professionals. As I was developing my knowledge of HR at the University of Michigan, I was given a great deal of support by SHRM either directly or indirectly. There in lies the key to why I feel that SHRM is still a relevant organization. While in college, I went on to become the President of the student chapter of SHRM at my University. I’m not saying that to toot my own horn (Trust me, its doesn’t amont to a hill of beans), but because this is a good example of SHRM creating an opportunity that allowed for great personal growth. Without SHRM, there would have not been an affiliate chapter at the University of Michigan nor the opportunity to further my knowledge of HR so easily.

Another example of SHRM’s relevance to me would be the HR certification and the HR Games. Again, while still in college, myself and two other HR majors studied and competed in 2005 HR Games. The information we gained in the preparation for these games was above and beyond what we were learning in our college curriculum. It just seemed to me that SHRM was making it possible to walk away from college with a much more well rounded understanding of Human Resources.

I understand that both of my examples are from the start of my HR career, but that does not mitigate the importance that SHRM had on my growth as a HR professional. I feel that if the only accomplishment SHRM does day in and day out is to bring awareness to the field along with providing students a wealth of information, then they are relevant and important. I dont look to SHRM to solve all of the worlds HR problems.

Ultimately, what I am expressing is that there is and will be a lot of good that SHRM has done for the field of HR and we should pay them just a little respect once in a while.