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The CareerXroads Annex

staffing, recruiting, employment, retention, HR


  • N'awlins: Settling in

    by on June 28, 2009

    Saturday, June 27  #SHRM09-BoB

    7:30AM
    Cafe Du Monde. Hot coffee w chicory and Beignets. It's a ritual. Unfortunately,  by 8:00AM it appears to be the place every one wants to be this mornig and it is hot enough that I may be the only person drinking coffe hot.

    Joined by LV and afterward we amble over to the Marriott for 8 hours of panel discussions surrounding the Society's assessment/re-assessment of its strategy, technology issues, legislative challenges, etc., etc. Finished up with 5 of us prioritizing technology trends impacting the profession. Most, but not all, were ...

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  • N'awlins: You can feel the difference.

    by on June 27, 2009

    Friday, June 26  #SHRM09-BoB

    8:00AM
    Headed down to N'awlins this morning. First time in nearly a year. This has been the longest time between trips to my favorite city since 2004, a year before Katrina.

    10:45AM
    The plane included a few HR consultants (MJ Sinclair among them) and Academics (Mark Hueslid) whose company I enjoy. All of us have full agendas at the conference but in totally different spaces. In between the special expertise panels, vendor meetings, and presenting on candidate experience at a concurrent session Tuesday there's  food, drink and the sheer pleasure of N ...

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  • 2nd National Standards Task Force Launched: Performance Management

    by on June 24, 2009

    This week SHRM launched the second National Standards Development Task Force (Performance Management) since being named a Standards Development Organization (SDO) in February by the American National Standards Institute (the ISO member for the US).

    In May, the first Standards Task force, Staffing and Workforce Planning, was launched to initially address three standards in the area of metrics, job description and WP as a way of jump starting its longer term of work. 170 professionals within the staffing community- academics, research and consulting professionals, suppliers and vendors, etc. responded to the call for interest by the closing date of June ...

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    hr standards performance management
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  • Is Turnabout Fair Play? SEM for the Job Seeker

    by on June 19, 2009

    This blog (PRSquared) is an eye-opener.

    The writer is a Principal in a PR firm, SHIFT. He was "targeted" on his Facebook page with an ad that said "SHIFT should hire me" and then went on to explain how the ad's author could help the firm.

    Several other members of the firm also saw the ad on their Facebook pages.

    You gotta love it. I'm adding it to my list of "disruptive" suggestions for job seekers.

    This interesting note was passed on to me by Joe Shaker, Jr. Thanks Joe.

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  • A Standing Ovation: Are You Ready for an MBA OATH!?

    by on June 17, 2009

    "As a manager my purpose is to serve the greater good by.... I will seek a course that enhances the value my enterprise can create for society over the long term...therefore , I promise..."

    The idea of a Hippocratic Oath for the Business Grad is going to be ignored by many, scoffed at by nearly every GenXer and, perhaps even made the butt of a few jokes in the National Review but, most Boomers will not only get it, we'll applaud. (Personally, anyone who signs on to this and attempts to walk the talk in the next few years ...

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  • Collusive Restraint: I'm betting someone is going to jail.

    by on June 6, 2009

    Cecilia Kang, writing in the Washington Post this past Wednesday, June 3, announced a Federal Antitrust Probe that is targeting Google, Apple, Yahoo, Genentech and more. Much more.

    It might by you.

    Remember how proud you were when you snagged that top performer from your company's biggest competitor? (And this was the third top pro your team won over from them this year.) They obviously were having retention problems as their new product pipeline emptied out.

    Remember how worried your boss was? She kept asking if you were sure there were no legal non-compete contracts signed by the candidate ...

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  • National Task Force for Staffing Standards: Final Interest- June 5

    by on June 2, 2009

    June 5 [Friday] ends the initial call for volunteers interested in participating in the development of Staffing Standards that I wrote about a few weeks ago.

    100+ professionals from nearly every segment of Staffing indicated an interest so far. Still, we are a bit short of academics among the category termed "developers" (not surprising) and few are "customers" i.e. hiring managers, job seekers etc.

    If you know someone interested, the invitation that needs to be completed with RSVP form can be found here. 

     

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  • The Last Bastion of the Digital Divide May Have Fallen

    by on May 31, 2009

    He has accounts on Facebook, Myspace and Twitter. He runs an Internet Forum on Yahoo and keeps in touch with the rest of his friends via email.

    He is 37 and homeless. He lives under a bridge in NY City.

    "Mr Pitts may lack a mailing address" according to a May 30/31 Wall Street Journal feature by Phred Dvorak but you can certainly find him virtually.

    Roughly half of some 200 shelters in the city (run by various non-profits and the city itself) offer online access.

    When was the last time you required a mailing address to make a ...

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  • National Standards Task Force for Staffing and Workforce Planning Launched: I'm In

    by on May 4, 2009

    If you are interested as an observer or as a "Stakeholder" in the development of Standards for Staffing and Workforce Planning, send an email simply stating your interest (individually or representing a group, vendor, association, company) to Lee Webster HRSTDS@SHRM.ORG before the end of MAY

    Last week a well-worded but routine press release was issued by SHRM without any accompanying fanfare outside of a member magazine mention- despite the fact that a SHRM Staffing Management Conference attended by more than 700 HR and employment professionals was taking place in Las Vegas at the same time.

    The SHRM Press ...

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    staffing standards
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  • Implications for Recruiting With Restricted Travel

    by on May 1, 2009

    Several years ago after the SARS epidemic in China and amidst the hype over the potential for Avian flu reaching our shores, I wrote out a case-style scenario that assumed we were hit with Avian flu and that travel was curtailed indefinitely.

    I presented the scenario to a group of 30 staffing leaders (at a meeting hosted coincidentally by Disney) and asked them to develop a contingency plan for recruiting and onboarding new employees w/o travel by recruiters, hiring managers or job seekers. I gave them an hour to deliver a map of the "new" hiring process starting with ...

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  • Better Tools For Job Seekers May Be At Hand

    by on April 25, 2009

    The article below from our monthly CareerXroads update speculates on new tools for job seekers and offers advice (some controversial) that we support.

    ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

    How to Find A Job (Fortune Magazine, 4/13) could have been a bit meatier but it is well written and includes some key stats - estimating for example that as many as eight people are available for every new job posted.

    There were a few anecdotes we enjoyed in the article. One story was about an engineer who seriously studied the software of a firm with which he was about to interview. He managed to uncover three ...

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  • Shopping for a Career Coach? What Are Your Criteria?

    by on April 15, 2009
    I know quite a few really good Career Coaches- people that I refer on a regular basis, people who I've sent my family members to (and that is a big deal).
     
    I also know a lot of good people who really need good career coaches. There are many more in need than there are good coaches.
     
    The good news is that young people are in search of career coaches and mentors in larger numbers than ever before.
     
    The bad news is that anyone and everyone can hang out a shingle...and they are.
     
    I'm looking for a list ...

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  • Mobile Recruiting: One small step for recruiters, One giant leap left for Jobseekers

    by on April 8, 2009
    John Zappe's excellent ERE article about an iPhone app allowing recruiters and hiring managers mobile access to ATS functionality is getting picked up in quite a few places.
     
    Let me know when a jobseeker can search and apply for a job using their mobile phone.
     
    Actually the giant leap left for jobseekers is to hear back from the firms they apply to, but that is anbother story.
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  • Do you Know Where Your Company's Staffing Site Conversion #s Are?

    by on April 7, 2009
    A few years ago we collected data from about 50 large companies that went something like this:
     
    About 720,000 visitors touched their website each month for all the right and wrong reasons
     
    About 68,000 visitors reached the staffing pages driven from all manner of sources...directly and indirectly.
     
    About 18,000 of the the visitors completed an application for a specific job in a given month.
     
    About 6,000 of the completed applications were qualified applicants for the jobs they applied for
     
    About 2000 of the 6,000 became finalists, and
     
    500 positions were filled.
     
    We're updating ...

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  • Bullets on #EREEXPO

    by on April 2, 2009
    Collecting thoughts while waiting out the delay in San Diego.
     
    - The Twitterati were out in force at ERE's conference (sounds better than twits). And as folks learn the "#" trick to setting up their tweets to be searched, more interested parties than ever before used twitter search to monitor the conference in real time.
     
    - ERE is the only conference with the sense/vision to use live streaming video to engage the "community" that can't attend with a tantalizing window into the main circus tent.
     
    - Smaller conference (1/2 the people in 2X the space)but more discussions and more ...

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  • JobSerf: Concierge services for the job seeker

    by on March 22, 2009
    How much would a job seeker be willing to pay for a high-end concierge service that tracks down highly customized job leads by the bushell AND applies to each of them individually...representing you -the job seeker?
     
    No, I'm not talking about the automated " email blast"scams from a few years ago that purported to ship your resume to thousands of waiting recruiters. I'm also not talking about the Haldane-like services that send out broadcast letters after counseling for thousands of dollars either. This is different.
     
    Again, imagine a concierge service- an intelligent discussion with real people toward ...

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  • Memo to Bernanke: Pay the Bonus

    by on March 16, 2009
    Dear Ben
    Let's pay the folks who've been whinning for their "contracted" bonus- skimming their piece of the stimulus off the top. Pay them all. AIG, Merrill, Lehman, whatever.
     
    Just make sure they all profile themselves on Linkedin and Facebook.
     
    I want to NOT connect with each and every one.
    Yup, I want them all to be my NOT friends
     
    That way I can see if they give their bonus to former friends and colleagues who have lost their jobs or homes. Maybe not.
     
    If not. If they keep it, they'll certainly want more sooner or later ...

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  • myhusbandneedsajob.com

    by on March 13, 2009
    How far would you go to help your significant other get a job?
     
    Jason Dolier, a top notch MBA from Georgetown who graduated in 2007 and participated in an ERE panel in DC that I moderated sent me a link to the website of a friend of his, Mike Stearns.
     
    Mike also graduated with his MBA from Georgetown. He was president of the University's Consulting Club and moved to San Fran with his wife Robin.
     
    Apparently unable to find a job, Robin and Mike put up a site called MY HUSBAND NEEDS A JOB
     
    Ya gotta love it.
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  • ISO 9001 for HR?

    by on March 12, 2009
    A recent Press Release from SHRM announced that the Society was designated a "Standards Developing Organization (SDO)" by the American National Standards Institute (ANSI). (ANSI is the American representative to the International Standards Organization.)
     
    This year long effort to gain approval was led by Lee Webster, a SHRM staffer with considerable standards expertise, and it has the potential of touching off a decade long sea change in how the profession of Human Resources will be viewed in the future.
     
    The protocols for building HR standards are rigorous and require input from ALL stakeholders in the process as well as a ...

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  • Sources of Hire 2008 & What It Means for 2009

    by on Feb. 25, 2009
    We've analyzed how 309,600 openings were filled from 45 large firms during 2008 and published a whitepaper today detailing the findings.
    The point of this annual exercise (since 2001) is primarily to examine the challenges in data collection methods and source of hire definitions but the findings themselves resonate with so many folks that we feel it is important to share them.
    We've done several webinars alreasy and have another planned privately next week for the 45 firms who contributed the data as well as one in late March with ERE if you want to get behind ...

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