A by gone era of style, etiquette, and interesting HR

How you just blew your phone interview!

The phone screen interview determines whether or not you are going to move onto the next round, the in person interview.  You may have done your research and have prepared some great answers, but in the same way a lot of…

At HRTech we were really impressed with a simple technology introduced by Founder Greg Moran which works on every desk in the recruiting landscape:  Reference checks.  Lets admit it, reference checking is a joke.  

Probably the only analog part of the process in the digital world.  The process is still in the stone ages, until now.  Chequed.com…

The digital age is wonderful.  You have information at your fingertips in the matter of seconds.  With the internet, texting, smart phones, tablets and personal computers, who needs to talk on the phone anymore?  Who needs to handwrite anything anymore? 

I am the first one to admit, rather than picking up the phone, often times I will shoot over…

Tech talent is hard to find. Whenever you have a strong demand in a certain industry, new sites will launch to try and help employers find that talent. We are now witnessing a new crop of techie job sites that have a fresh approach on recruiting tech talent. As a recruiter would you try these? Here’s a look at three that caught my eye.

1. Headhuntable

http://www.headhuntable.com/

This is a free job board that…

Increasingly I keep getting the feeling that organizations feel they are being held captive by the existing systems and technologies that they are using for recruiting.  Whether it’s silence that follows whenever a presenter asks if conference goers “like their ATS” or the increased questions we get from organizations on the technology they should be using, I feel like many organizations are not all together thrilled with their existing…

I was reading a trade industry article online and came across a question from another recruiter, I thought the question would spark a robust yet healthy dialogue. I would love to get your thoughts, read on….



Dear Staffing: Dude Dressed Like A Lady, Now What?!

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“I never, I repeat, NEVER thought that I would come across this issue in all my years of staffing but here I am and I haven’t the slightest what to do about it. I always told myself that it would not…

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Scott’s new video book,…

There has been a lot of talk about skills shortages in certain industries. This is especially true in the engineering consulting specialties, and it's causing many companies to take a more serious look at utilizing contractors, according to Bulldog Recrutiers Vice-President Chuck Szajkovics, who places candidates in those positions.

“The niches we work are key industries for the…

Hi everyone, 

I am in agency recruiting and am contemplating grad school. I was thinking of getting a Master's in Human Resource Management. Do you think it's worth the investment? I know since I am an "agency recruiter" I am not considered "HR" but I think learning about employment laws/benefits/etc. may benefit. Thoughts?

Job Hoppers = no hire…Really

Yup I said it, and this is going to be one of my most controversial posts to date. First let me start by saying this is mostly for corporate staffing. We all know that Hiring Managers (HM), HR, and a lot of Staffing Professionals(SP) have a bias against anyone who has had too many different jobs…

…and not a damn thing has changed.

Same president, roughly the same breakdown in House and Senate, not a lot of local changes that I can tell. Oh, except the pot thing. My state is apparently legalizing marijuana so we can all just get high and forget about 8% unemployment. I told my good friend Michelle that I personally had been disappointed with the government since voting for Ross Perot 20 years ago (I was SO NAIVE) and she assured me Obamacare would cover my…

Gather round, everyone. Uncle Charlie is going to tell you the story of the little meme and how it swam all over cyberspace because people loved it so.

Now, first I have to explain what a “meme” is. A meme is defined by Wikipedia as “an idea, behavior or style that spreads from person to person within the culture.” This was a concept put forth by British evolutionary biologist Richard Dawkins back in 1976 when he described those…

Employees in remote locations and branch offices can often feel as though they are like red-headed stepchildren with coke-bottle glasses and one leg shorter than the other. Scott shares the five M’s for creating a culture of inclusion and accountability for all team members, including those located far and wide.…

Earlier this week I read an article in my favourite online magazine which shocked me… A quick caveat though would be to say I fully endorse social media in all its greatness, it’s my day job (so best I do) but I realised maybe I/we need to remember the appropriateness of our actions.

Here are some of the extracts that shocked me, more because I can relate to them so closely:

“A survey conducted by Curry's and PC World found that 53 per cent of respondents admitting to…

With the polls for this year’s Presidential Election open and closing today, we should know tomorrow who our next President will be for the next four years.  As a nation we’ve had four years to evaluate the current president and now have a big decision to make.  Do we believe in the status quo and what the incumbent will be able to do off his experience or do we believe that the upstart will be able to accomplish more with his new perspective?  This is a decision every voter will make today…

This one's a real world scenario for a friend of mine who owns a recruiting business.  My advice was to return to basics and do a ratios/metrics "where are we now" to identify what's missing.  Good time of year to have a next year planning session too.

Steve Finkel has some invaluable advice on using metrics to diagnose your desk. 

But first I recommended that they check in to see what's going on personally for that person that might be at play.  

Any other thoughts?

Having spoken to many candidates and clients over the last 12 months the one thing that really excites me is a start-up story. Both living in Cambridge and watching  “Silicon roundabout” grow it is incredible just how many there are. It was suggested earlier this year by Charles Armstrong  that there are, up to 5,000 technology-focused companies located in east…

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Scott’s new video book,…