I’ve written about this phenomenon in the past and I continually encounter it in many sales areas – the allure of experience.  In fact, I just talked to a recruiter from a different part of the country who focuses on sales hiring.  We talked a bit of strategy and I was just dumbfounded.

This gentleman focuses solely on finding someone with as much industry experience as possible.  His primary motivation – find candidates who can bring accounts with them.  No discussion about skills, no behavioral-based questions, no attempt at learning their style and motivation…just simple experience.

I am not even sure if he asks if it was successful experience.

My attempt to move the discussion to skills, talent and motivations was summarily dismissed by him and we ended up having a rather short phone conversation.

This conventional wisdom for sales hiring is persistent today.  My thought is this – what happens when the candidate pool decreases dramatically?  Highly-specific industry experience will not be prevalent.  What then?

Perhaps that is the day I am waiting for.

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This is a new trend, I think:

As unemployment numbers hit historic highs, “pink slip” parties are popping up in big cities around the country. Hundreds of axed employees are going to happy hour meet-and-greets, where one can enjoy a drink and discuss career prospects with eager recruiters.

People are finding creative ways to stand out above the pack. In order to get a job in this economy, people have to get out there. And while there are no guarantees of gaining anything more than good conversations and a few contacts, some pink slip attendees have had success in finding new employment. Pink slip parties offer those on the prowl for jobs a chance to share information among themselves.

“If you take your network and compare it to the network of a total group, you get access to more people – if you can help each other, it’s a win for everyone,” said John Challenger, CEO of outplacement firm Challenger, Gray & Christmas. Pink slip parties are just one extension of social networking.

That is from the Career News newsletter.  Quite the creative idea as long as the parties include the “eager recruiters.”

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CNNMoney.com provides this article regarding 2009 hiring.  As you may expect, hiring is down and it appears more cuts are coming soon:

Of the 31,800 employers surveyed, only 15% anticipate hiring more employees during the second quarter, down from 16% in the first quarter and 26% in the same period last year.

About 14% expect a decrease in their payrolls, up from 13% last quarter and just 9% one year ago. Another 4% said they were undecided about their hiring intentions.

The net employment outlook, or difference between employers who plan to add jobs and those who expect to cut them, was 1%, down from 3% in the previous quarter and 17% in the year-ago period. That’s the lowest net employment outlook since the recession of 1982.

But what of those 15% who anticipate hiring more employees?

Alternatively, employers in construction and leisure and hospitality anticipate increased hiring as compared to the first quarter, Manpower said.

Only employers in transportation and utilities said they plan to keep hiring levels relatively stable for the second quarter, according to the survey.

Those industries would be a good place for jobseekers to look right now.

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You never quite know what you are going to receive from the Herman Trend Alert which makes it one of the more highly-anticipated newsletters in my inbox.  This week the topic is how many job postings there are presently – over 1.8 million.  Granted, there is far more to hiring than just the quantitative aspect, but the number surprised me.

Here is their intro (sorry, no link):

While job postings between January 2008 and January 2009 have declined in all industries, there are still almost 1.88 million jobs that require skilled workers. According to a release by Indeed.com last week, the industries that experienced the least contraction were Education and Healthcare. Job postings in these industries declined by nine and eight percent respectively.

And the bad:

Looking at job seeker trends in 12 major industries, Indeed.com’s assessment reflects major losses in the numbers of postings in most of the major industries. Not surprisingly, the greatest losses were in Real Estate (58 percent) with Accounting second at 53 percent. The numbers of postings in the other major industries Construction, Banking and Finance, Hospitality, Information Technology, Manufacturing, Media and Newspapers, Retail, and Transportation all dropped by between 43 and 48 percent.

The last point they make is indicative of the change towards information-based positions in this country:

The other side of this picture, often overlooked except by employers in need, is the demand for skilled workers. In fact the numbers of postings in this report totals to over 1.87 million. The recently unemployed will fill some of those jobs. However, others will continue to be vacant because we simply do not have the trained workers to fill them— even with a national unemployment rate of 7.6. Employers would do well to take this opportunity to reinforce their pipelines, through the schools or colleges.

That is sound advice.  I find it difficult to believe that in this economy there are still positions that will go unfilled due to a lack of qualified candidates.  If you are looking for a new opportunity, these vacancies would be a good place to start analyzing your skill set to their need.

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There is a common marketing approach used in recruiting that states some form of “we locate the candidates who aren’t looking.”  I suppose the hook is that we can find amazing candidates that you can’t find.  It’s a hook, I guess.  Anyway, here is one I received in an unsolicited email:

What we do is go after the best candidates & the elite that are not currently looking for a job as they already have one. We personally present and sell your specific company’s opportunity to their individual needs. Our clients find that these hidden candidates are more stable, more qualified and haven’t been interviewing all over town.

Stable?  More qualified?  How does one do this?  He talks about presenting and selling your opportunity, but not about qualifying candidates who can succeed in the position.  This fact is an important distinction.

I would be wary of any recruiter who attempts to sell a salesperson on an opportunity.  Have a discussion, look for fit, determine their abilities…the onus is on the sales candidate to sell you.  I would avoid any self-proclaimed sales recruiter who takes the aforementioned approach.

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Recently Cheezhead mentioned that online job ads are down again in November.  According to the Conference Board Help-Wanted Online Data Series online job postings declined 70,200 to 4,369,200 in November.  Job postings for the September to November period were down 264,000.

The data they collected shows declines in the Northeast, the South and the West.  In the Northeast Pennsylvania lead with a decline of 19,900 postings and in the south Texas lead with a decline of 37,800.  Our state, Minnesota, had the largest decline in the midwest – down 12,600 postings.

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Recruiting Trends provides a summary of CareerBuilder and USA Today’s Q4 Job Forecast and there are some interesting trends.  First, according to the survey workers are postponing active job searches but are open to a change if the right one comes along.  Of the 6,100 workers surveyed, 38% are planning to sit tight for the next year and wait for the economy to swing back while 41% plan on staying until retirement.

This “squatting” will create some tension in that 23% of employers plan to add full-time, permanent employees in the next three months and 34% say they are having a hard time finding qualified candidates, especially in highly-skilled areas.  Not surprising, is it?

Finding the right candidate will be difficult over the next 3 months.  The holidays are a difficult time, in general, to fill positions.  This holiday season will be even more of a challenge.  Posting ads through the big job boards or local newspapers will probably not produce the results you are looking for.  I would suggest making a strong push through your network as your primary sourcing channel.  This approach will provide the best chance at finding, and hiring, the right candidate.

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Last week Craig’s List job postings started costing $25 in Atlanta, Austin, Dallas, Denver, Houston, Miami (South Florida), Philadelphia, and Phoenix.  These cities joined the following cities that already charge a fee for job postings – Boston, Chicago, Los Angeles, NYC, Orange County, Portland, Sacramento, Seattle, San Diego, San Francisco Bay Area, Washington DC and NYC.  I supposed it is not surprising with all the “get rich now” ads that are all over the sites.

We are fans of Craig’s List and have had some decent success using their job board.  Unfortunately, it does require some patience by the candidates since there is much garbage to sift through on the site.  Still, it is a valuable resource and an effective piece of a full sourcing program.

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Seems like LinkedIn is benefiting from the recent financial industries crisis.  According to a post at Cheezhead they have had significant increases in registrations and in recommendations:

The site has reported a 17 percent increase in registrations in the last two weeks. They are now claiming to reach 28 million users, up one million from last quarter.

Reports show that memberships from people representing the financial sector have also doubled after thousands of people have been laid off or threatened with termination as closures and mergers usurp industry leaders and rattle the core of the sector.

The site also claims to have seen a 14 percent increase in recommendations, most likely a result of users scrambling to attach praise to their resume in order to find stable jobs in a worsening economy.

I’m sure that other sites are seeing an increase in activity from the financial sector as well (i.e. Monster, CareerBuilder, Plaxo, Facebook, etc.)  Understatement—-I have a feeling you can find many financial industry candidates on these boards/sites right now.

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You have probably read many “how to” articles that provide tips for jobseekers.  One tip that almost always makes the list is to have a professional email address.  Unfortunately, I was looking through resumes today and found one person who may not have read any of those articles.

His email address:  rednecktrucker@domain.com

Next.

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