Tuesday March 31st, 2009
Today is Our Blogging Birthday!

One year ago today the first post of this blog (cross-posted on the Head2Head site) went live. It's been an exciting year from a recruiting perspective, an economic perspective and a talent perspective. There's also been the occassional blogging controversy to comment on.

Blogging those topics has been nothing less than mind blowing.

Figuring out what you like to read from among those topics has been almost impossible!

Looking over the statistics tracked via our Head2Head blogging tool, it's interesting to see how that diversity of topics appeals to bigger and more niche audiences.

Here are a few posts that stuck out for the recruitment community:

Demographics, especially surrounding Generation Y, is of interest to the recruitment community. Generation Y: Full of Youth & Promise? attracted more than 700 readers.

Almost of many of you read about Experimental Philosophy for Recruiters before returning to the Generation Y interest. 432 of you have read about On-Boarding Gen-Y. That makes the people themselves slightly more interesting than their job interviewing clothing choices.

Since our profession is results-oriented's not surprising that more than 600 readers are searching for the gold via Treasure Mapping for Mutual Rewards. 

The wider community outside the recruiting blogosphere gave us some attention too. We're all still obsessed with brands. Especially new-ish brands. 2546 people have read NOTE TO GOOGLE: Your employment brand is weakening your share price.

Our most-read post? It has had 3509 readers so far and is titled Help for Immigrant Job Seekers with a link to CanadianImmigrant.ca.

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Friday March 27th, 2009
The Twitter 'Cisco Fatty' saga: Interesting follow up

If you've been reading this blog, you'll know I'm a big fan of the Feiler Faster Thesis , which (basically) says that in this era of networked communication and 24/7 news cycles, ideas go burbling along quietly in the background, until suddenly some kind of 'event' happens, the media all pick up on it at once, and within 48 hours, the general public goes from "barely aware of this idea" to "everyone's talking about it everywhere".

This week that happened with Twitter.

Oh sure - Twitter has been growing fast (from 2 million subscribers to 6+ million in the past 6 months alone), but it definitely wasn't mainstream.

Then the Big Event happened: the 'Cisco Fatty' incident. Predictably, it was the Twitterverse and blogosphere (heck, we blogged about it, too!) which lit up fast and furious, but it was such a darn good story that it quickly jumped to the mainstream media.

Last Friday, 80% of my co-workers and friends had no idea what Twitter was, less than 2% of them had ever visited the site, and none of them knew or cared what I meant when I said "I'm up to 138 followers!"

Today - just 7 days later - everyone at the office is talking about Twitter, and half of them have started tweeting too!

(Add to that the whole 'Jennifer Aniston broke up with John Mayer because he was tweeting instead of spending time with her' story and you've got one heck of a publicist's dream - if, of course, you're the publicist for Twitter!)

Interestingly, there's a follow up: Connor Riley - the guy who posted the Cisco fatty tweet in the first place - has posted a blog about the whole thing (it's a shame that he doesn't have GoogleAds on the site - he could have made a packet this week!) to explain his side of the story.

(He doesn't excuse himself: he admits it was a stupid thing to do, but with only a handful of followers at the time - less than 50 - he never dreamed that his tweets would ever be seen by anyone outside his group of friends. And heck, if you're just one of 6+ million people tweeting away, it's hard to believe that your little tweets to your little group of friends would ever be noticed amidst all the other noise.)

I think that's what I like best about all this social media stuff: Connor Riley - just a guy and a blog - has the ability to reach millions of people. Sure, the mainstream media probably won't be as quick to report on his side of the story as they were to pick up the debacle in the first place, but he's not entirely powerless against the media juggernaut which rolled over his life this week. And we don't have to rely on apocryphal tales of Whatever Happened To That Cisco Fatty Guy - he's put it out there, in a more or less permanent record.

Anyhow, just something to think about if you were considering signing up to Twitter over the weekend...

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Wednesday March 25th, 2009
In this economy, does RPO even matter? You betcha

At the best of times - i.e. 12 months ago, when we were all obsessed with 'the talent crisis' - RPO (Recruitment Process Outsourcing) has been one of those topics that seems to engender more discussion than actual action: there are hundreds of articles, blog posts, white papers and god knows what else out there about RPO, but actual examples of fully outsourced recruiting solutions were rare.

Now that so many organizations are thinking more about how to trim their workforce than how to hire in large quantities, it seems logical to conclude that RPO will fade into the background again.

But - as your procurement department will tell you - now is probably the best time to think about RPO.

SIDEBAR: Part of the reason that 'RPO' stayed more of a 'buzzword' than 'something everyone is doing' is that the early definition of RPO - outsourcing an organization's entire recruitment function to a third party - was just too darn big. That kind of full-scale RPO really only makes sense for large organizations who are making hundreds or thousands of hires every year, and for whom the potential savings run into 6 or 7 figures. Only in those situations is it worth the huge enterprise-wide changes involved in full RPO.

However, in the past 6-12 months we're seeing a real change in how people are talking about 'RPO'. According to Aberdeen Group, which has just released a comprehensive study, "...73% of organizations viewed RPO as a selective model...." in which they outsource parts of the recruitment lifecycle, not the whole thing.

(At Head2Head, we call this 'RPO Lite': all the benefits of RPO, but without the headache of a stem-to-stern enterprise transition or commitment.)

This 'RPO Lite' model is relevant now for 2 reasons:

1. It delivers against the bottom line. In the Aberdeen Group study, respondents reported an average savings on cost-per-hire of 48%. At Head2Head, we've seen a typical savings of about 35% when organizations outsource key parts of their recruitment function.
   
   
2. When you're hiring fewer people, every one of them has to be a keeper. In a good economy, an organization can carry some 'deadwood' employees; in a bad economy, there's no room for dud employees, and even the A-listers have to try a little harder. So when an organization does make a hire, quality is even more important. RPO solutions tend to involve better metrics around quality of hire, quality of sources, retention rate and other indicators of long-term recruitment success. Which contributes to #1, above.

I know, I know - everyone blathers on about 'outsourcing' but doesn't actually get specific about how it could help you, and help your organization today.

Well, here's something: yesterday I spoke with a client (a mid-sized financial services firm, which is feeling the pinch as much as anyone) who said that outsourcing their research/talent mapping portion of the recruitment lifecycle saved them $14,000 in January - which meant they didn't have to lay off one of their employees.

These small things can make a big difference.

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Monday March 23rd, 2009
Our very own Facebook app - for HotJobs!

Add it to your profile and you'll receive HotJobs as soon as they hit the site!

I'm sure our own Twitter application isn't far behind...

Because we're just that kind of on-the-bleeding-edge kind of recruiting company.

lol

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Sunday March 22nd, 2009
The Twitter Twits Hall of Fame Opens

Last week, I am not actually a geek, reported the following twitter exchange:

"A lucky job applicant tweeted the following:

Cisco just offered me a job! Now I have to weigh the utility of a fatty paycheck against the daily commute to San Jose and hating the work.

"This tweet caught the attention of Tim Levad, a channel partner advocate for Cisco. To which he responded:

Who is the hiring manager. I’m sure they would love to know that you will hate the work. We here at Cisco are versed in the web.

"The person who dissed the Cisco offer quickly took their Twitter account private. But Twitter search retained the record."

The mainstream media has been full of Twitter news lately. Much of it announcing that the doors to the Twittering Twits Hall of Fame are now open!

Many are questioning the wisdom of politicians, including the Canadian Prime Minister, who have recently taken to twitter. "Perhaps bored by the global economic collapse" one columnist wrote. Then again, the same writer, Greg Weston, said that social networking sites "aren't designed for newspaper columnists -- they are for people with friends."

(People like comedian, author and actor Stephen Fry whose inclusion in this post is an act of gratuitous fandom.)

On Sunday, the Toronto Star, published a guide to knowing When a Twitterer Becomes a Twit that features social media expert G. Wayne Clayton called Toronto Mayor David Miller's Tweets "boring and lazy." Clayton advises politicians to keep a week's Tweets "10 per cent humour, 10 per cent humanizing and 80 per cent get-down-to-business." That's probably a formula everyone should follow.

Do twittering twits take the shine off micro blogs? Yesterday, the Guardian reported that technology entrepreneur Jason Calcanis offered Twitter $250,000 to make him a "suggested users". Twitter didn't take the money.

Calcanis' objective? Recruitement. He runs Mahalo.com a site that pays people to answer questions asked by internet users.

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Tuesday March 17th, 2009
The Celtic Tiger Today

In honour of St. Patrick's Day, and just to have the chance to use the image above, today's post is about the state of the economy in Ireland.

Today, is a celebration of the Irish diasphora, the immigrants and their descendants who left the Island in search of food, work and opportunity. In the early 20th century, the lure of the new world was so great that mothers took to hiding their daughters shoes at night to prevent them from running away to become maids in New York, Toronto and Boston.

How the technology boom changed that image! Between 1985 and 2005, the world's understanding of Ireland changed. In the last decade, especially, the Island nation has gone from being a country of emigrants to a nation that welcomes immigrants. The character of the unemployed builder who populated Roddy Doyle stories became exinct. Not only were there no unemployed Irish builders, but more builders had to be imported from Poland and other ports East.

 Has all that changed with one recession?  

Today, the Irish Independent quoted Irish Finance Minister Brian Lenihan saying; "Ireland is facing a very difficult recession, somewhat worse than the rest of the world."

When Ireland adopted the Euro in 2002, it took a competitive advantage over the British pound. The value of the Sterling has always been 42% to 52% more than the EURO, until very recently when the value of the Sterling dropped. It has been trading on par with the EURO for the last two months or so. As a result, exports to the UK from Ireland have dropped. Canada experienced similar difficulties with US exports, and lost many manufacturing jobs, when its dollar rose against the US dollar.

At the same time, there is hope for a swift recovery. Ireland is a member of the European community.

"The advantage of eurozone membership is having the European Central Bank behind us," the minister told the newspaper.   

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Saturday March 14th, 2009
Just because it looks neat: a graphic Tag Cloud

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Friday March 13th, 2009
Social Networking 101 for the 50+ job-seeker

I know most of the people reading the Head2Head blog are well aware of the power of social networking, but in my capacity as Managing Partner of RetiredWorker.ca (an employment website for people who want to return to the workforce after retirement), I am often asked, by people 50+, whether social networking is relevant for them or whether it's 'just for young people'.

And of course I always say: Absolutely it's relevant for older workers! In fact, it's extra relevant for 50+ people, especially if they are no longer working full-time, because it's an excellent way to build and maintain a personal network - which can be harder to do when you aren't going to an office every day and interacting with co-workers.

So I posted an article, 'Social Networking 101: Why it makes sense for you on my Retired Worker blog - you might find it helpful to send to your 50+ candidates (or even your parents!).

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Tuesday March 10th, 2009
The Kitchen Threat

If you saw our post on International Women's Day, you know that Canada's national statisticians have said its highly likely that females in the workforce will out number males if current economic trends continue.

In England, the Fawcett Society, is worried "that new or expectant mothers will be "picked off" as unscrupulous employers look for a reduction in their workforce."

In an op-ed in the Guardian, Katherine Rake of the Fawcett Society warns that, in the UK, pending equality legislation is essential to protecting strides made by women in the workforce.

"This recession must not be used as an excuse to send women back to the kitchen," Rake says.

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Sunday March 8th, 2009
Women Out Number Men in Workforce = No One Cares

Our last poll asked what will happen to society now that women outnumber men in the workforce.

The response? No one cares. All those laid off factory workers are too busy looking for jobs, I suppose.

Click "view results" to display the final tally.

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Tuesday March 3rd, 2009
7 Attributes of Highly Attractive Candidates

Job applicants love to complain about recruiters. They say that their online applications end up in a cyber black hole and are never read, responded to or recorded. While that might be true in some cases, there are candidates who always get a response and this is what they do to help us out as recruiters with limited time to fill specific positions with highly qualified candidates.

1. They save us time. They write their applications to be scanned. Qualifications and experiences are listed up front using the language used in the original posting.

2. They solve our problems. Recruiters, like employers, aren't interested in what a job can do for you. We're interested in what you can do for the company. Good candidates know what the pitfalls are and have thought about how to bridge them.

4. They are excellent at doing researchers. They are up-to-date on major events, performance issues and current trends in their industry.

5. They know how to leverage social media. All of their contacts know they are looking for work, what they want to do and how they intend to get it.

6. They're passionate about their work. A dedication to their careers shines through difficulties. Further education, training and involvement in industry associations are listed on their CVs.

7.They give our clients a reason to feel inspired. Clients can tell when fresh blood is going to bring fresh thinking. When you're a special candidate, it shows in your CV in your cover letter and, most importantly, in how you STATE YOUR GOALS. Ambition, combined with practical steps toward achievement, are the most attractive qualities in any candidate anywhere.

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Monday March 2nd, 2009
Bad CRM making you feel like no one cares? Now you can just call God!

Given what I wrote about bad CRM the other day, I thought this was hilarious:

The next time you're fed up with customer service and feel like no one will listen to you, you can go straight to the top and just call God directly.

Incidentally, this also a good reminder that ultimately there is only one difference between 'bad' CRM and 'fantastic' CRM: giving the person on the receiving end the impression that someone cares about them or their problem.

Actually, now that I think about it, I get asked about this a lot...

As the Director of User Experience at Head2Head, it's my job to ensure that all of our employees and consultants are delivering great experiences at all touchpoints. From client meetings to interviews, phone calls to emails, website to trade shows, we expect all our people to deliver positive and consistent experiences which meet or exceed expectations, 100% of the time. And we make it clear that "It's not my job..." is NOT an acceptable excuse - from the president to the part-time admin person, we're all equally responsible for delivering The Head2Head Experience.

One of the questions I'm frequently asked by 'newbies' is: "But what if I have to call a candidate to tell them they didn't get the job? Isn't that a 'bad experience' that is out of my control?"

"Absolutely not," is my response.

90% of the unpleasantness around not getting a job is just the feeling of rejection. In this case, it's not the recruiter who's doing the rejection (or at least not directly). So when the recruiter takes a few minutes to empathize with the unsuccessful candidate - heck, even just takes the time to leave a friendly voicemail message instead of a one-line "You didn't get it" email - s/he is demonstrating that someone does, in fact, care about them.

How do we know that The Head2Head Experience approach works? Because we have clients, candidates and consultants who've been working exclusively with us for almost 10 years now - which is almost unheard-of loyalty in the recruiting business - and more than 50% of all our clients, candidates and consultants come to us through referrals.

Well - as usual - this turned into a rather longer post than I'd anticipated, but we all know that the whole 'delivering great experiences' subject is Sarah's favourite soapbox...

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About the Authors

Paul Dodd
Co-founder and President
Head2Head Canada

Paul has one simple goal: To help companies hire great people - and get the most out of every recruiting dollar they spend. That's why he's recognized as one of the best recruitment-industry thinkers in Canada.

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