The Herman Trend Alert offers up an excellent analysis of the most pressing topic of today – retention. I thought this statement was spot on: The Hodes 2007 Workplace Study holds that two factors are critical to retaining valued employees. The first is choosing quality people, not settling for “warm bodies”. The second is choosing people who have long-term expectations of staying with the organization. We encounter companies that have a hire fast, fire fast mentality. Personally, I think this approach is high risk, low reward and we never condone this approach at Select Metrix. The second point is an important one also. If you are looking at a candidate… Read More
Continue ReadingHiring Is About Margins
This post from the Pondemonium blog at Inc.com explains the rationale behind hiring from a corporate and employee perspective. What is interesting is that the blogger is the decision maker who had to let people go last week. I thought these graphs cut right to the core of employment: I don’t know about other companies, but every time I’ve ever hired someone to work here, it was because I fully believed I’d be able to make more money with them than without them. In other words, if I pay someone $1 to do something, I expect to make $2 from their efforts or services. It’s really that simple! Unfortunately my… Read More
Continue ReadingA Future Shift In Sourcing Candidates
Well, the future is now when it comes to this topic. The social network sites are going to have a dramatic impact on finding strong sales candidates. First, this may be slightly off topic, but MarketingProfs.com offers up this article – Facebook: Changing Advertising Forever: At the November 5 launch of Facebook’s new advertising platform, Mark Zuckerberg, CEO of Facebook, presented his vision for the future of advertising: “Once every hundred years media changes. The last hundred years have been defined by the mass media. The way to advertise was to get into the mass media and push out your content. That was the last hundred years. In the next… Read More
Continue ReadingWhen Experience Matters
We go after experience-only hiring in that it is overly subjective and wrought with pitfalls. But that doesn’t mean experience is irrelevant. There are certain aspects to an applicant’s history that is important for hiring decisions. I’m currently sourcing for a mid-level, B2B sales position in the Twin Cities’ market. Although open to less-experienced sales candidates, our customer still requires a certain level of sales experience for the position. This requirement means that the Best Buy salespeople, car salespeople and other retail-based experience is not a fit. I am certain there are talented salespeople within those groups, but the mitigating factor is that our client’s sales cycle is long (up to 2… Read More
Continue ReadingCandidates Are Negotiating Offers
No surprise here but the Career News is reporting that candidates are negotiating for higher starting salaries in this current market (emphasis mine): Job candidates are more apt to ask for higher starting salaries this coming year, and companies may have to up the ante to attract them. That’s according to an annual study on employment and compensation trends by Robert Half International (RHI) and CareerBuilder.com titled The (EDGE) Report. Fifty-seven percent of hiring managers polled for the project said it was difficult to find qualified candidates 12 months ago; 91 percent said recruiting is equally or more challenging today. More than half (52 percent) of hiring managers who are… Read More
Continue Reading7 Tips For Recruiting Gen Y
From Recruiting.com: 7 Tips for Recruiting Gen-Y Offer generous referral bonuses. Consider different geographies. Keep ‘em moving. Tlk 2 them. Get flexible. Community service. Think beyond the short term. Shelley Solheim, CMP Channel
Continue ReadingTelecommuting – Now More Than A Trend
We’ve been on the telecommuting trend for quite some time this year as it continues to grow. I think it is safe to say it is more than a trend now. As we source for sales positions, it is quite apparent that the younger candidates almost always address this issue early in the process. They want to know what tools are in place and what the office expectations are. We only work in the sales arena so our data may be slightly exaggerated to that end. Nonetheless, telecommuting is a hot article topic as you can see from CareerJournal.com’s Good News for Professionals Who Want to Work at Home: A… Read More
Continue ReadingWhat You Can Ask In An Interview
This article on HR World – 30 Interview Questions You Can’t Ask and 30 Sneaky, Legal Alternatives to Get the Same Info – is making quite a splash on the web today. I think it is an interesting read with some excellent suggestions regarding how to phrase interview questions. To give you a sample: 12. What you can’t ask: Do you have kids? This one is for positions in which the candidate may work with children. The added experience of children at home may be a bonus for you, but it’s not an employer’s place to ask about this. Rather, inquire about the candidate’s experience, and they may volunteer this information to… Read More
Continue ReadingFinancing Via Job Change
I enjoy skewering the mainstream media for “talking down the economy” which is a practice they condemned back in 2000. But all signs point to a slowdown in this red-hot economy which has led the Federal Reserve to target a soft landing. I’m no economist, but I found this article by John Sumser quite interesting. His take on the economy is one I have not heard (emphasis mine): The veterans, burnt by the dot com bust and the post 911 recession will argue that business will contract and layoffs will ensue. That’s the prototypical recession profile. Everywhere you turn, this scenario is forecast or implied. … Or, there may be… Read More
Continue ReadingThe Laid-Off Salesperson Problem
When sourcing and phone screening, we tend to come across salespeople who have been laid off from a previous position. Layoffs are obviously a common occurrence in business, but they are problematic in sales. Most companies do not lay off salespeople who are closing profitable business. Granted, some companies view salespeople as an expense and assume the customer relationship will remain – big mistake. Some smaller companies are family owned and keep the family members employed as the business contracts. There are always exceptions, but they are not the rule. When we encounter a salesperson who has been laid off, we immediately look for logical specifics regarding their shortened tenure. The… Read More
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