Christopher S. Rugaber, AP Economics Writer, On Friday August 6, 2010, 11:20 am EDT
WASHINGTON (AP) -- Companies showed a lack of confidence about hiring for a third straight month in July, making it likely the economy will grow more slowly the rest of the year. The unemployment rate was unchanged at 9.5 percent.
Private employers added a net total of only 71,000 jobs in July, far below the 200,000 or more jobs needed each month to reduce the unemployment rate.
The modest gains were even weaker when considering a loss of government jobs at the local, state and federal levels in July that weren't temporary census positions. Factoring those in, the net gains were only 12,000 jobs, according to the Labor Department's July report Friday.
Investors reacted by selling stocks and shifting into more conservative Treasury bonds. The yield on the 10-year Treasury note, which helps set rates on mortgages and other consumer loans, fell to 2.85 percent from 2.91 percent late Thursday. Major stock indexes all fell and the Dow Jones industrial average dropped more than 130 points in morning trading.
The department also sharply revised down its jobs figures for June, saying businesses hired fewer workers than previously estimated. June's private-sector job gains were lowered to 31,000 from 83,000. May's were raised slightly to show 51,000 net new jobs, from 33,000.
"There is still a labor market recovery, but it's a very, very weak one," said Nigel Gault, chief U.S. economist at IHS Global Insight.
The slow pace of hiring will weigh on the recovery, he said, with economic growth in the current quarter likely to come in even lower than the April-to-June quarter's already weak 2.4 percent.
Overall, the economy lost a net total of 131,000 jobs last month, mostly because 143,000 temporary census jobs ended.
The "underemployment" rate was the same as in June, at 16.5 percent. That includes those working part time who would prefer full-time work and unemployed workers who've given up on their job hunts.
All told, there were 14.6 million people looking for work in July. That's roughly double the figure in December 2007, when the recession began.
Even if hiring picks up, it will take years to regain all the jobs lost during the recession. The economy lost 8.4 million jobs in 2008 and 2009. This year, private employers have added only 559,000 new hires.
Friday's report is being closely watched by the Federal Reserve as it considers ways to energize the recovery. The report could persuade the Fed to take new steps to boost the economy and keep interest rates at record lows when it meets next week.
Without more jobs, consumers won't see the gains in income needed to encourage them to spend more and support economic activity. Even those with jobs may not feel confident enough to ramp up their spending.
That's important because many of the trends driving economic growth earlier in the recovery are fading. Companies boosted production in the winter and spring to rebuild inventories that were depleted in the recession. But those efforts won't last much longer. And the impact of the federal government's stimulus package is also declining.
The economy grew at 5 percent in the fourth quarter last year and 3.7 percent in the first three months of 2010. But that slowed to 2.4 percent in the April-June period. That's not fast enough to generate many jobs and reduce the unemployment rate.
Many companies appear to be getting more out of their current employees rather than adding new staff. The average work week increased by one-tenth of an hour to 34.2 hours, the department said. That's up from about 33 hours in the depths of the recession.
Average hourly pay also rose 4 cents to $22.59, up 1.8 percent from a year earlier. That, along with the increase in hours worked, could provide some boost to spending.
The number of temporary jobs fell by 5,600, the first drop after nine months of gains.
Employers usually hire temp workers if they need more output but don't want to hire permanent employees. But "firms aren't even adding temporary workers right now," Gault said.
Manufacturers added 36,000 jobs in July, slightly above its monthly average this year. Those gains were aided by General Motor's decision to keep its plants running last month. Usually it closes them and temporarily lays off employees to retool for the new model year.
Construction firms cut jobs for the third straight month, losing 11,000, while financial firms shed 17,000 workers.
But retailers added 6,700 jobs. And the leisure and hospitality industry hired 6,000 additional staffers.
Corporate net income rose sharply in the second quarter, but businesses aren't yet using the proceeds to ramp up hiring. Companies in the S&P 500 index reported a 46 percent increase in net income for the April-to-June period, compared to a year earlier.
But many employers are uncertain about the direction of the economy. Some are concerned sales will slow once government stimulus and other temporary factors fade. Others fear what will happen if federal income taxes are allowed to rise next year as tax cuts enacted by President George W. Bush expire.
"People have a long worry list they're looking at," said Ethan Harris, chief economist at Bank of America Merrill Lynch.
Some companies are adding permanent workers. The hospital chain HCA Inc. has 8,300 open positions, company spokesman Ed Fishbough said. That includes nurses, physicians and information technology professionals needed to build HCA's ability to handle electronic medical records. HCA employs about 190,000 people.
But layoffs are also continuing. FBR Capital Markets, an investment bank based in Arlington, Va., cut its work force by about 15 percent in early July to about 500 employees, saying it needed to reduce costs.
AP Business Writers Stephen Bernard and Tali Arbel in New York contributed to this report.
Thursday, June 10, 2010
Post-Recession Bounce-Back Plan: Recover Your Earning Power
by Sara Eckel, PayScale.com
During the recent economic downturn, many Americans vastly lowered their expectations about earnings. One survey of career-fair attendees, conducted by Next Steps Career Solutions, found that 65 percent of respondents were willing to accept compensation that was up to 30 percent lower than their pay at their previous job. In addition to salary cuts, workers have also reduced their hours or accepted lower-paying jobs than they've previously held.
But now that the economy is beginning to rebound, Laura Browne, a corporate trainer and the author of "Raise Rules for Women: How to Make More Money at Work," says there are new opportunities to bump up pay. "Companies are giving money back to people, but they're being selective about who gets it," she says. Here's how to get on that list:
1. Forget the past
Whether you've suffered a pay cut or a raise freeze, understand that complaining about the hardships you've endured will get you nowhere. Instead, show your managers what you are doing now--and what you'll continue to do in the future. "They want to know, 'Did you make money for the company?' And even more important, what you are doing right now that will continue to make money for the company over the next six months to a year," says Browne.
2. Start the conversation now
Even if the company is still struggling, Brown says it's important to start talking before the good times start rolling in. "By the time you hear that your company is making money, it's going to be too late," she says. Approach your boss at a time you're feeling upbeat--that is, not the day you got a big credit card bill, for instance. Explain that you know times are tough for everyone (not just you) and thank your boss for sticking by you and recognizing your hard work. Once the positive tone set, let him or her know that when things start to pick up again, it's important to you that you are recognized for what you've done--and for what you'll continue to do.
3. Arm your boss with data
Your boss may need to convince upper management that you should get a pay bump. So provide him or her with a results summary--not simply what you did, but the results you got--that can be taken to decision-makers. "You have to help your boss help you," says Browne.
4. Work crazy hours
If you've had to reduce your hours, let your manager know that you can work whenever he or she needs you--Saturdays, holidays, or late at night if you can. "If company revenue and income are on the rise, then they'll need more hours to meet increased demand," says Jeff Cohen, the author of "The Complete Idiot's Guide to Recession-Proof Careers."
5. Make new friends
If you can't get enough hours in your department, get to know the people in other departments and see if there are opportunities to pick up extra hours there. "Tell everyone you know that you're looking for more hours--in a pleasantly persistent way," says Browne.
During the recent economic downturn, many Americans vastly lowered their expectations about earnings. One survey of career-fair attendees, conducted by Next Steps Career Solutions, found that 65 percent of respondents were willing to accept compensation that was up to 30 percent lower than their pay at their previous job. In addition to salary cuts, workers have also reduced their hours or accepted lower-paying jobs than they've previously held.
But now that the economy is beginning to rebound, Laura Browne, a corporate trainer and the author of "Raise Rules for Women: How to Make More Money at Work," says there are new opportunities to bump up pay. "Companies are giving money back to people, but they're being selective about who gets it," she says. Here's how to get on that list:
1. Forget the past
Whether you've suffered a pay cut or a raise freeze, understand that complaining about the hardships you've endured will get you nowhere. Instead, show your managers what you are doing now--and what you'll continue to do in the future. "They want to know, 'Did you make money for the company?' And even more important, what you are doing right now that will continue to make money for the company over the next six months to a year," says Browne.
2. Start the conversation now
Even if the company is still struggling, Brown says it's important to start talking before the good times start rolling in. "By the time you hear that your company is making money, it's going to be too late," she says. Approach your boss at a time you're feeling upbeat--that is, not the day you got a big credit card bill, for instance. Explain that you know times are tough for everyone (not just you) and thank your boss for sticking by you and recognizing your hard work. Once the positive tone set, let him or her know that when things start to pick up again, it's important to you that you are recognized for what you've done--and for what you'll continue to do.
3. Arm your boss with data
Your boss may need to convince upper management that you should get a pay bump. So provide him or her with a results summary--not simply what you did, but the results you got--that can be taken to decision-makers. "You have to help your boss help you," says Browne.
4. Work crazy hours
If you've had to reduce your hours, let your manager know that you can work whenever he or she needs you--Saturdays, holidays, or late at night if you can. "If company revenue and income are on the rise, then they'll need more hours to meet increased demand," says Jeff Cohen, the author of "The Complete Idiot's Guide to Recession-Proof Careers."
5. Make new friends
If you can't get enough hours in your department, get to know the people in other departments and see if there are opportunities to pick up extra hours there. "Tell everyone you know that you're looking for more hours--in a pleasantly persistent way," says Browne.
Saturday, May 1, 2010
How to Ruin Your Work Reputation Slowly
by LIZ WOLGEMUTH
It isn't hard to ruin your reputation online these days—blogging about your boss, Twittering about your customers, posting Facebook pictures that involve copious amounts of alcohol and otherwise inappropriate props. But there's a danger in all of the conversations and lessons about online etiquette: Forgetting that most reputations are made or lost in the office.
While some workers make big, reputation-destroying mistakes (think plagiarism or sexual harassment), the vast majority make a series of choices that can quietly build or ruin their professional image in the workplace. "What I find is that most people undermine their credibility in little ways and they do it because they don't mind their '-ilities,'" says Emily Bennington, coauthor of Effective Immediately: How to Fit In, Stand Out, and Move Up at Your First Real Job. Think punctuality, dependability, humility, accountability. "It's not so much that they make these major mistakes ... What they do is that they slowly chip away at it."
Careful communications: E-mail is a sensitive area. These typed communiques can easily impress groups of colleagues with a worker's communication skills, or lack thereof. "Reputations get destroyed by this so frequently," says Sandy Allgeier, author of The Personal Credibility Factor: How to Get It, Keep It, and Get It Back (If You've Lost It). For one thing, E-mail reveals a worker's sensitivity to the office culture and others' time. If you're frequently cc'd on mail that has no bearing on your work, you may begin to doubt the sender's discernment.
Then there's the ominous "reply all." Everyone knows the accidental office-wide reply can be devastating, but there's plenty of harm in the intentional "reply all." An E-mail reply that's terse, caustic, or cryptic might make sense to a single recipient who knows the writer well, but it rarely translates to a broad audience. Replies that are driven by organizational tensions or are an emotional reaction can be particularly dangerous. E-mail generally seems like a quick way to communicate to a broad group, "but it can become the most inefficient thing in the world," Allgeier says. Large-audience E-mails are rarely wise for dealing with a controversial issue or for being humorous. A regular habit of insensitive, unwise digital communications can leave coworkers with a negative impression that's "almost irreversible," Allgeier says.
In the public eye: Meetings are another danger zone.New hires are often eager to look good among more experienced colleagues, so they're quick to raise a hand when there's an opportunity. Younger workers who are ambitious and want to be seen as contributors can have quick responses that are not helpful, Allgeier says. Better qualities to display: attentiveness and inquisitiveness. "You should really be feeling free to ask more questions," she adds. "This is especially true of people who are trying to make their mark." Young professionals sometimes feel that they will be judged if they've sat through a meeting without saying anything,
Similarly, employees who interrupt their boss or embarrass their boss in a meeting will quickly chip away at their reputations. "Make sure you understand the rules of behavior," says Roy Cohen, an executive coach in
Relationships: It's easy for professionals to get caught up in their relationships with managers. For many, this is the most important factor in whether a job is worth sticking with. The downside of constantly nurturing your relationship with your boss is its effect on your relationships with coworkers. "I've noticed that new professionals coming into the workforce don't appreciate that their success is as dependent upon colleagues as it is upon their boss,"
Relationships are critical to actually establishing a reputation for yourself. Indeed, the only thing worse than a bad reputation is no reputation. Some professionals become generic. "They don't stand for anything in the workforce,"
First and foremost, Cohen notes, people need to know what it takes to keep a reputation intact. "Then you know what could potentially damage it," he says.
Monday, March 15, 2010
50 Worst of the Worst (and Most Common) Job Interview Mistakes
U.S. News and World Report
Karen Burns, Wednesday March 10, 2010
You may have heard the horror stories--job hunters who take phone calls or text during an interview, or bring out a sandwich and start chomping, or brush their hair, or worse. You wouldn't do any of those things, would you? Of course not.
But there are tons of other job interview no-no's you may not have thought of. Or that you've forgotten. The job hunting trail is long and arduous, and a little refresher course can't hurt. So for your edification and enjoyment, here are 50 (yes, 50!) of the worst and most common job interview mistakes:
1. Arriving late.
2. Arriving too early.
3. Lighting up a cigarette, or smelling like a cigarette.
4. Bad-mouthing your last boss.
5. Lying about your skills/experience/knowledge.
6. Wearing the wrong (for this workplace!) clothes.
7. Forgetting the name of the person you're interviewing with.
8. Wearing a ton of perfume or aftershave.
9. Wearing sunglasses.
10. Wearing a Bluetooth earpiece.
11. Failing to research the employer in advance.
12. Failing to demonstrate enthusiasm.
13. Inquiring about benefits too soon.
14. Talking about salary requirements too soon.
15. Being unable to explain how your strengths and abilities apply to the job in question.
16. Failing to make a strong case for why you are the best person for this job.
17. Forgetting to bring a copy of your resume and/or portfolio.
18. Failing to remember what you wrote on your own resume.
19. Asking too many questions.
20. Asking no questions at all.
21. Being unprepared to answer the standard questions.
22. Failing to listen carefully to what the interviewer is saying.
23. Talking more than half the time.
24. Interrupting your interviewer.
25. Neglecting to match the communication style of your interviewer.
26. Yawning.
27. Slouching.
28. Bringing along a friend, or your mother.
29. Chewing gum, tobacco, your pen, your hair.
30. Laughing, giggling, whistling, humming, lip-smacking.
31. Saying "you know," "like," "I guess," and "um."
32. Name-dropping or bragging or sounding like a know-it-all.
33. Asking to use the bathroom.
34. Being falsely or exaggeratedly modest.
35. Shaking hands too weakly, or too firmly.
36. Failing to make eye contact (or making continuous eye contact).
37. Taking a seat before your interviewer does.
38. Becoming angry or defensive.
39. Complaining that you were kept waiting.
40. Complaining about anything!
41. Speaking rudely to the receptionist.
42. Letting your nervousness show.
43. Overexplaining why you lost your last job.
44. Being too familiar and jokey.
45. Sounding desperate.
46. Checking the time.
47. Oversharing.
48. Sounding rehearsed.
49. Leaving your cell phone on.
50. Failing to ask for the job.
Karen Burns, Wednesday March 10, 2010
You may have heard the horror stories--job hunters who take phone calls or text during an interview, or bring out a sandwich and start chomping, or brush their hair, or worse. You wouldn't do any of those things, would you? Of course not.
But there are tons of other job interview no-no's you may not have thought of. Or that you've forgotten. The job hunting trail is long and arduous, and a little refresher course can't hurt. So for your edification and enjoyment, here are 50 (yes, 50!) of the worst and most common job interview mistakes:
1. Arriving late.
2. Arriving too early.
3. Lighting up a cigarette, or smelling like a cigarette.
4. Bad-mouthing your last boss.
5. Lying about your skills/experience/knowledge.
6. Wearing the wrong (for this workplace!) clothes.
7. Forgetting the name of the person you're interviewing with.
8. Wearing a ton of perfume or aftershave.
9. Wearing sunglasses.
10. Wearing a Bluetooth earpiece.
11. Failing to research the employer in advance.
12. Failing to demonstrate enthusiasm.
13. Inquiring about benefits too soon.
14. Talking about salary requirements too soon.
15. Being unable to explain how your strengths and abilities apply to the job in question.
16. Failing to make a strong case for why you are the best person for this job.
17. Forgetting to bring a copy of your resume and/or portfolio.
18. Failing to remember what you wrote on your own resume.
19. Asking too many questions.
20. Asking no questions at all.
21. Being unprepared to answer the standard questions.
22. Failing to listen carefully to what the interviewer is saying.
23. Talking more than half the time.
24. Interrupting your interviewer.
25. Neglecting to match the communication style of your interviewer.
26. Yawning.
27. Slouching.
28. Bringing along a friend, or your mother.
29. Chewing gum, tobacco, your pen, your hair.
30. Laughing, giggling, whistling, humming, lip-smacking.
31. Saying "you know," "like," "I guess," and "um."
32. Name-dropping or bragging or sounding like a know-it-all.
33. Asking to use the bathroom.
34. Being falsely or exaggeratedly modest.
35. Shaking hands too weakly, or too firmly.
36. Failing to make eye contact (or making continuous eye contact).
37. Taking a seat before your interviewer does.
38. Becoming angry or defensive.
39. Complaining that you were kept waiting.
40. Complaining about anything!
41. Speaking rudely to the receptionist.
42. Letting your nervousness show.
43. Overexplaining why you lost your last job.
44. Being too familiar and jokey.
45. Sounding desperate.
46. Checking the time.
47. Oversharing.
48. Sounding rehearsed.
49. Leaving your cell phone on.
50. Failing to ask for the job.
Tuesday, January 5, 2010
Four Lessons We Should Have Learned This Year
by Kevin Wheeler - Dec 9, 2009, 5:07 pm ET
Adversity is a great teacher, and the past year will certainly be one of the most adverse and professionally difficult that we will ever experience.
It has been a year of paradoxes and contradictions: unemployment is soaring, but many organizations cannot find the qualified people they need. Rather than restructure work or rethink how work gets done in order to find people, we continue to seek people to work in traditional ways. More people are looking for part-time, temporary, or contract work, yet only a tiny percentage of companies are looking for these type of people. We know that being discourteous to people creates negative branding and is morally questionable especially when so many are unemployed, but we have perhaps never been as discourteous to applicants are we are now. Energy costs have fluctuated wildly and global warming is a topic on every agenda, yet most organizations and people prefer face-to-face relationships rather than asking people to save energy by working from home.
Here are four lessons we should have learned this year.
Lesson #1: Building and maintaining candidate relationships and generating referrals are keys to survival.
Job descriptions should be dead, but I have no doubt that they will live on for a long time. We should all agree that they are not the best, cheapest, or fastest way to attract good people.
In general, you are not going to find the people you need by posting on job boards. The most successful recruiters use social networks, ask employees (and others) for referrals and focus on building talent communities of potential candidates.
Learn from product and service marketing how to do a better job. Watch how IBM or Deloitte advertise and market their professional services. Go for targeted messaging and quality, not volume. Generate candidates from relationships you form using tools such as LinkedIn, Facebook, and Twitter and by asking for referrals. Make it a rule of thumb that if you are generating hundreds of responses to a job posting, you are doing something terribly wrong.
Lesson #2: Use targeted, bold marketing and branding to appeal to the types of candidates you want.
Don’t try to appeal to everyone. Focus your marketing messages and media on the type of candidate you are most in need of. KPMG and other organizations target college-age candidates with videos and other media designed to appeal to that age group and to the personalities of the type of candidates who usually want to work for them.
They don’t spend any time or money on marketing that is generic or that appeals to older potential candidates.
The best marketing is always targeted to a specific audience and discourages, although subtly, those who don’t fit the target. Partly this is done through words and pictures and partly by placing the information where the people you are targeting are most likely to see it.
For example, Mercedes advertises on television at the times and on programs where their research shows that highly successful and well off people watch. They place print advertisements in magazines that these types of people read. They do not advertise on Super Bowl nor do they advertise in Reader’s Digest. Targeted marketing requires research, focus, carefully thought-out graphics, and tested writing.
Wording is also key; what you say makes all the difference. If you say and imply that you are seeking only those with very specific backgrounds and qualifications, you will reduce the numbers who apply and improve quality. Even your recruiting web site needs to be worded in a way that is attractive to those you are most anxious to have apply. Cisco Systems has a web site that is appealing to technical professionals but less so to others.
Lesson #3: Do not just use, but embrace, emerging technology
Social networks, video, YouTube, candidate relationship management products, Web 3.0 websites, and SecondLife are all tools that can potentially enlarge your candidate pools, screen candidates, and build relationships.
Facebook, Twitter, and YouTube are perhaps the most effective recruiting tools in your arsenal. Video has become king in attracting people, and YouTube is the second-most used search engine after Google itself. If your organization has a recruiting page and/or video, it’s a good start.
Once you start attracting potential candidates, there are many tools to help screen them and communicate with them. CRM tools (Avature is a good example) let you track and communicate with groups of candidates. The most current ATS vendors are also offering this capability and even allow you to link to online profiles in LinkedIn and Facebook. This means candidates do not need a resume.
There are countless email programs, newsletter distribution programs, and other free or inexpensive communication aids that recruiters can use to do a better job letting candidates know where they stand. Even automatic bounce-back responses can be more intelligently written and distributed. A follow-up email could follow the bounce-back and automatically provide the candidate with another touch point.
Lesson #4: Accept change as a way of life
We will not be heading back to the more traditional ways of recruiting, and the contradictions and paradoxes I outlined at the beginning of this article will be with us for a long time. Traditional recruiting skills will be liabilities and will generate little profit.
Everything from face-to-face interviews to onboarding new employees will be more automated and will be done using the Internet. Software applications and mobile technology will dominate the recruiting space. Video interviewing and simulations for selection will become normal within five years.
To be a thriving recruiter you need to focus on building a new mindset that is centered on the acceptance of change as a constant and on taking advantage of technology.
Perhaps the greatest lesson of this year is that we are now at the place where we can use this technology to target our marketing, focus on a smaller number of candidates, allow more direct communication between candidates and hiring managers, and spend more time on raising awareness and marketing key positions using the various technical platforms we have available.
The ability to do this will be seen as strength and will generate returning profit for years to come.
Adversity is a great teacher, and the past year will certainly be one of the most adverse and professionally difficult that we will ever experience.
It has been a year of paradoxes and contradictions: unemployment is soaring, but many organizations cannot find the qualified people they need. Rather than restructure work or rethink how work gets done in order to find people, we continue to seek people to work in traditional ways. More people are looking for part-time, temporary, or contract work, yet only a tiny percentage of companies are looking for these type of people. We know that being discourteous to people creates negative branding and is morally questionable especially when so many are unemployed, but we have perhaps never been as discourteous to applicants are we are now. Energy costs have fluctuated wildly and global warming is a topic on every agenda, yet most organizations and people prefer face-to-face relationships rather than asking people to save energy by working from home.
Here are four lessons we should have learned this year.
Lesson #1: Building and maintaining candidate relationships and generating referrals are keys to survival.
Job descriptions should be dead, but I have no doubt that they will live on for a long time. We should all agree that they are not the best, cheapest, or fastest way to attract good people.
In general, you are not going to find the people you need by posting on job boards. The most successful recruiters use social networks, ask employees (and others) for referrals and focus on building talent communities of potential candidates.
Learn from product and service marketing how to do a better job. Watch how IBM or Deloitte advertise and market their professional services. Go for targeted messaging and quality, not volume. Generate candidates from relationships you form using tools such as LinkedIn, Facebook, and Twitter and by asking for referrals. Make it a rule of thumb that if you are generating hundreds of responses to a job posting, you are doing something terribly wrong.
Lesson #2: Use targeted, bold marketing and branding to appeal to the types of candidates you want.
Don’t try to appeal to everyone. Focus your marketing messages and media on the type of candidate you are most in need of. KPMG and other organizations target college-age candidates with videos and other media designed to appeal to that age group and to the personalities of the type of candidates who usually want to work for them.
They don’t spend any time or money on marketing that is generic or that appeals to older potential candidates.
The best marketing is always targeted to a specific audience and discourages, although subtly, those who don’t fit the target. Partly this is done through words and pictures and partly by placing the information where the people you are targeting are most likely to see it.
For example, Mercedes advertises on television at the times and on programs where their research shows that highly successful and well off people watch. They place print advertisements in magazines that these types of people read. They do not advertise on Super Bowl nor do they advertise in Reader’s Digest. Targeted marketing requires research, focus, carefully thought-out graphics, and tested writing.
Wording is also key; what you say makes all the difference. If you say and imply that you are seeking only those with very specific backgrounds and qualifications, you will reduce the numbers who apply and improve quality. Even your recruiting web site needs to be worded in a way that is attractive to those you are most anxious to have apply. Cisco Systems has a web site that is appealing to technical professionals but less so to others.
Lesson #3: Do not just use, but embrace, emerging technology
Social networks, video, YouTube, candidate relationship management products, Web 3.0 websites, and SecondLife are all tools that can potentially enlarge your candidate pools, screen candidates, and build relationships.
Facebook, Twitter, and YouTube are perhaps the most effective recruiting tools in your arsenal. Video has become king in attracting people, and YouTube is the second-most used search engine after Google itself. If your organization has a recruiting page and/or video, it’s a good start.
Once you start attracting potential candidates, there are many tools to help screen them and communicate with them. CRM tools (Avature is a good example) let you track and communicate with groups of candidates. The most current ATS vendors are also offering this capability and even allow you to link to online profiles in LinkedIn and Facebook. This means candidates do not need a resume.
There are countless email programs, newsletter distribution programs, and other free or inexpensive communication aids that recruiters can use to do a better job letting candidates know where they stand. Even automatic bounce-back responses can be more intelligently written and distributed. A follow-up email could follow the bounce-back and automatically provide the candidate with another touch point.
Lesson #4: Accept change as a way of life
We will not be heading back to the more traditional ways of recruiting, and the contradictions and paradoxes I outlined at the beginning of this article will be with us for a long time. Traditional recruiting skills will be liabilities and will generate little profit.
Everything from face-to-face interviews to onboarding new employees will be more automated and will be done using the Internet. Software applications and mobile technology will dominate the recruiting space. Video interviewing and simulations for selection will become normal within five years.
To be a thriving recruiter you need to focus on building a new mindset that is centered on the acceptance of change as a constant and on taking advantage of technology.
Perhaps the greatest lesson of this year is that we are now at the place where we can use this technology to target our marketing, focus on a smaller number of candidates, allow more direct communication between candidates and hiring managers, and spend more time on raising awareness and marketing key positions using the various technical platforms we have available.
The ability to do this will be seen as strength and will generate returning profit for years to come.
Friday, November 13, 2009
Fired is the New Retired - The idiocy of axing older employees.
By Ellis Cose NEWSWEEK
Published Oct 29, 2009
From the magazine issue dated Nov 9, 2009
This may be the worst time in the last 60 years to be old and looking for work. Some 6.8 percent of workers over 55 are unemployed (not as bad as for younger workers, but still a historic high). You have to go back to 1949 to find employment stats nearly (but not quite) as bleak as they are now. The bad news does not stop there. On average, it takes employees over 55 roughly 33 weeks to find new jobs, nearly seven weeks longer than for younger workers, and nearly 13 weeks longer than it took just two years ago. Bad as things are, the Supreme Court has made them even tougher—at least for those who believe they are victims of age discrimination and are inclined to try to prove it.
The court's 5-4 ruling last June came in response to a suit filed by a demoted employee, Jack Gross, under the Age Discrimination in Employment Act (ADEA) of 1967. It was not sufficient, concluded the majority, to show that age was among the reasons for an employee's bad treatment; age had to be the reason. In his dissent, Justice John Paul Stevens called the decision "unnecessary lawmaking." The majority, he said, misread Congress's intentions. Last month, in introducing legislation to nullify that decision, Senate Judiciary Committee chair Patrick Leahy also accused the court of thwarting congressional intent.
At a Judiciary Committee hearing focused on recent Supreme Court workplace decisions, Jack Gross told his story. (The committee also heard from a former Halliburton employee who says she was raped by coworkers in Iraq but was denied the right to sue because she had unwittingly signed a binding arbitration agreement.) Born in 1948 in a small Iowa town, Gross grew up imbued with the value of hard work. As a schoolboy, he labored at numerous jobs despite the constant pain of ulcerative colitis. As an adult, he found work with Farm Bureau Life, an insurance company, and eventually became a vice president. But in his 50s, he was abruptly replaced by a younger woman. The company, he surmised, was systematically trying to weed out older workers. A jury found in his favor but an appeals court vacated the verdict. The case eventually made its way to the Supremes, whose decision "mortified" him.
The AARP was similarly disturbed—especially in light of statistics showing a 29 percent jump in age-discrimination complaints from 2007 to 2008. Dan Kohrman, senior attorney with AARP, concedes that the numbers don't necessarily prove a commensurate rise in age discrimination, but he insists they show something bad is going on. During hard times, he says, many employers resort to "crude practices" that drive older workers away. They may force supervisors to rank employees on subjective criteria—such as mental "flexibility"—that are essentially a license to discriminate. Or they generate paperwork alleging drops in performance that have no clear explanation.
Linda Barrington, an economist with the Conference Board, agrees that older workers are often stereotyped. Obesity," she observed, "is more of a health-care cost than age for those between 30 and 50." And older workers show every bit as much stamina as younger workers when called upon to put in long hours. Yet in all too many cases, employers see age as a much larger liability than it is.
Earlier this year, after another Supreme Court ruling made it harder for women to fight discrimination in pay, Congress passed the Lilly Ledbetter Fair Pay Act to restore rights many legislators assumed they had already protected. Congress ought to do the same for older workers, who should be given every legal weapon they need to fight discrimination. But even if that happens, age discrimination will not simply go away. Very few workers have the resources to bring a case to court. As Joanna Lahey, an economist with the Rand Corporation, has noted, "the majority of people who sue under the ADEA are white, male middle managers or professionals." And even if more people did have the financial resources to sue, many who are discriminated against don't have the smoking gun that will prove their case. They may just know the job or promotion they wanted went to someone else.
The larger problem, as Barrington points out, is how we tend to view people, the stereotypes we impose on workers of a certain age. It would be great if correcting that were as simple as changing a law. Instead, we face the more daunting task of changing ourselves.
Find this article at http://www.newsweek.com/id/220144 © 2009
Sunday, November 1, 2009
US staffing market primed for recovery
The US staffing market is set for recovery in 2010, according to Ron Mester, managing director of research and analysis firm Staffing Industry Analysts.
In a live satellite link up to California at APSCo’s member sales conference in London, Mester told delegates that the value of the world’s largest staffing market (on a country-by-country basis) has now fallen to $93bn (£58.5bn), from $126bn in 2008.
But total revenue is predicted to grow to $98bn next year and temporary staffing is forecast to grow in all sectors measured by the research firm, including industrial (15%), finance/accounting (8%), IT (8%), marketing/creative (5%), legal (5%), clinical/scientific (4%), engineering/design (4%), office/clerical (4%) and healthcare (1%).
According to Mester, US recruiters have been more agile in the recession, increasing their value-adds of recruitment process outsourcing, HR outsourcing, managed service provider services, vendor managed services and master supplier services, while there were 8% more staffing companies placing professionals over office staff and industrial staff last year than in 2004.
Mester said: “Over the next 10 years, employment services will be one of the biggest growth industries. Increasingly, there are more people that want to work in flexible arrangements. Management teams are looking for more flexible workforces and there are skill shortages in professional skill sets.”
But elsewhere, Palmer Forecast predicts that US temporary worker demand is set to fall by 13.7% in 2009.
The industry consulting firm’s findings indicated a 22.2% decline in temporary help for Q3 2009, which actually came in at a 24.5 % decline more than predicted due to higher than expected unemployment figures.
According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, seasonally adjusted temp jobs fell 23.3% year-over-year in September, up from the 24.5% year-over-year decline in August. Temp jobs, seasonally adjusted, fell slightly, 0.1% sequentially from August.
Palmer says this is an encouraging early sign of rebound and provided a 3.1% boost on a non-seasonally adjusted basis. The 2,000 temp job losses were the lowest rate of loss since October 2007.
The unemployment rate increased to 9.8% in September from 9.7% in August, the highest jobless rate since June 1983.
In a live satellite link up to California at APSCo’s member sales conference in London, Mester told delegates that the value of the world’s largest staffing market (on a country-by-country basis) has now fallen to $93bn (£58.5bn), from $126bn in 2008.
But total revenue is predicted to grow to $98bn next year and temporary staffing is forecast to grow in all sectors measured by the research firm, including industrial (15%), finance/accounting (8%), IT (8%), marketing/creative (5%), legal (5%), clinical/scientific (4%), engineering/design (4%), office/clerical (4%) and healthcare (1%).
According to Mester, US recruiters have been more agile in the recession, increasing their value-adds of recruitment process outsourcing, HR outsourcing, managed service provider services, vendor managed services and master supplier services, while there were 8% more staffing companies placing professionals over office staff and industrial staff last year than in 2004.
Mester said: “Over the next 10 years, employment services will be one of the biggest growth industries. Increasingly, there are more people that want to work in flexible arrangements. Management teams are looking for more flexible workforces and there are skill shortages in professional skill sets.”
But elsewhere, Palmer Forecast predicts that US temporary worker demand is set to fall by 13.7% in 2009.
The industry consulting firm’s findings indicated a 22.2% decline in temporary help for Q3 2009, which actually came in at a 24.5 % decline more than predicted due to higher than expected unemployment figures.
According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, seasonally adjusted temp jobs fell 23.3% year-over-year in September, up from the 24.5% year-over-year decline in August. Temp jobs, seasonally adjusted, fell slightly, 0.1% sequentially from August.
Palmer says this is an encouraging early sign of rebound and provided a 3.1% boost on a non-seasonally adjusted basis. The 2,000 temp job losses were the lowest rate of loss since October 2007.
The unemployment rate increased to 9.8% in September from 9.7% in August, the highest jobless rate since June 1983.
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