Atlanta, Georgia, the home turf of HR Opt-In,  is also the home of the secret formula or "blend" behind the Coca Cola soft drink of global renown.  A recent article in the Atlanta Business Chronicle (8.31.07) evoked that metaphor for me with the headline: "Blending Staffing offers Options to Top-Tier Talent."

As the article began, "Blended staffing is a hiring strategy that enables companies to expand their workforce as needed by maintaining a core group of permanent employees complemented by senior-level interim professionals possessing specific skills. Many workers seeking blended staffing are women."

I had the chance to blend my remarks with the story and speak with the article's author, reporter Tonya Layman, when she interviewed me about HR Opt-In.  Tonya did a magnificent job of research as the piece attests.

"A recent Harvard Business Review article said nearly four in 10 highly qualified women have left work voluntarily at some point in their careers. More than 30 million workers, nearly a fourth of the American workforce, are "free agents," according to Daniel Pink, author of "Free Agent Nation." Veritude Workforce Insights reports there will be a shortfall of 10 million skilled/trained workers by 2010, as baby boomers retire, Gen Y rejects corporate constraints and Gen X makes a mass exodus from corporate America."

I spoke with Tonya about my own personal inspiration for HR Opt-In.  When I founded Incite Strategies in 1999 to do human resources consulting work, I started to receive a great many calls for consulting services that my team didn't provide. That began the assembly of a network of HR professionals culminating in the opening of HR Opt-In to marshall the talents of top HR professionals nationwide.

I also shared my innermost inspiration for HR Opt-In -- my own history and personal  need to balance family and career, work and life. When my father passed away, I felt a profound need to be there for my Mom, while at the very same time, I had a small child to care for.  It was at this point that I, like others facing similar circumstances, felt compelled to leave a full-time position (GE in my case) and open my own independent consulting practice.

Blending one's lifestyle and workstyle requires a good deal of flexibility.  Creating that blend can be a powerful elixir for advancing the skills and the goals of human resource specialists like us. It is a blend, like Coca Cola, that is a winning formula!