US Economy Sucks, Now what?

With the economy in the US being at an all time low and now with companies laying off more than ever where does that put us the Recruiters?

What are we doing to overcome this terrible time?

I have actually been debating moving out of the US for much $greener$ pastures abroad.

Thoughts?

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Permalink Reply by Philise Conein on July 15, 2008 at 6:31pm

Read 'UK Recruiter job losses - depressing reading or motivator?' in Recruiting Rants in the forums. Europe is always ahead of the U.S. in trends.....this does not bode well. Greener pastures may not be so $green$ after all.

http://www.recruitingblogs.com/forum/topic/show?id=502551%3ATopic%3...

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Permalink Reply by Mark Nelson on July 15, 2008 at 9:39pm

Michael,

I run a new job board designed for mobile phones - JobMob.mobi. All of the listings are based in the U.S., however, we get a fair amount of mobile web traffic from abroad. Maybe you can move your recruiting focus to greener pastures without physically moving. If you have international jobs to fill, contact me and I will add new locations to the site.

Good Luck!

-Mark
http://jobmob.mobi

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Permalink Reply by Paul DeBettignies on July 15, 2008 at 11:48pm

Michael,

Having done this for a little over ten years I do not share all of the negativity you have. Absolutely things are slower. And of course it depends even more on where one recruits, what industry, and how much brand awareness one has.

I maybe made a mistake, it was at the time for sure, to not shift from local IT to med/biotech after the dot com bubble burst and 9/11. I stuck it out and it was very painful.

On a suck scale of 1-10 those days were a 9. Today maybe 5. Bu that is for me in MPLS in IT and surely your area can be worse.

From expereince I suggest evaluating what type of service you offer, kind of talent you find, and location. And see if you can transition into another type of candidate, add a service, market some more.

Leaving the U.S. seems really drastic to me.

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Permalink Reply by Michael Fortin on July 16, 2008 at 12:47am

After being out of the recruiting industry for roughly 1 year it's been tough to come back in such a terrible economy. I have recently assumed a new position as VP with a new company and we have the ability to basically focus anywhere that we wish in terms of getting business but we have had a tough time focusing on which industry to target.

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Permalink Reply by pam claughton on July 17, 2008 at 7:07pm

Michael,

What area do you focus on, both geographical and industry? I am really busy, haven't seen it this crazy since the internet days. Knock on wood, we are not feeling a slowdown at all.

~Pam

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Permalink Reply by Art Pitcher on July 17, 2008 at 7:27pm

"With the economy in the US being at an all time low "

Dude - don't panic ;) Those who lived through the depression would STRONGLY disagree with you.

How much is the economy really a factor in what you do? Your ability to succeed or fail right now rests solely with you. It's LITERALLY all in your head. 15 years in this business have taught me that everything is a cycle - a recession is simply a season of the economy. There's plenty of hiring going on out there.

-Art Pitcher

http://www.TheArtOfRecruiting.net