Archives December 2006

Recruiting Older Workers for Competitive Advantage

Report outlines how tapping the older worker talent pool can fill skills gap

LONDON ¨C November 30th, 2006 ¨C Taleo, the leading provider of on demand talent management solutions and The Age and Employment Network (TAEN) are calling on companies to change their approach to recruitment to capitalise on the ageing workforce in the UK. ¡°Tapping into the older worker talent pool¡± is a joint white paper that highlights the opportunity for companies to address the looming skills crisis by recruiting older workers, and provides step by step advice on how companies can execute this strategy.

¡°Tapping into the older worker talent pool¡± explains the demographic trends in the UK with an ageing workforce that is causing a general shortage of skills. Despite these trends and the recent UK Age Regulations, many organisations retain significant biases and misconceptions about recruiting older workers. Practical recruitment strategies that take advantage of the growing talent pool of older workers will therefore be increasingly critical in creating a competitive workforce in the UK. Central to these strategies are the philosophy of skills based recruiting and the use of e-recruitment technology to promote wide access to job roles, and implement a compliant, skills based recruiting process.

Specific advice from TAEN and Taleo Research includes:

¡¤ Consider where you are advertising your job opportunities
¡¤ Word your job opportunities carefully
¡¤ Capture candidate data on compliant, electronic application forms
¡¤ Drive the selection process based on skills
¡¤ Consider re-skilling or up-skilling new or existing employees

According to Taleo Research Vice President, Alice Snell, ¡°The message is loud and clear for organisations that are looking ahead and developing their recruitment strategies. Retaining the traditional preference for recruiting only from younger age groups will lead to a weaker workforce than competitors who tap into the older worker talent pool. Organisations can gain a significant advantage from adopting a skills-based approach to recruiting that creates a level playing field for older workers. E-Recruitment technology is a powerful tool in implementing this approach because solutions such as Taleo¡¯s have compliant skills-based matching of candidates to roles as a fundamental design principle. ¡±

Patrick Grattan, chief executive of TAEN adds ¡°The recruitment profession has the opportunity to play a crucial role in response to an ageing work force. At present too much of the focus is on age. It should be on skills and experience regardless of age. Internet-based recruitment can spotlight competencies required for the job, whereas a classic CV, with its chronological recital of past job history, encourages assumptions about age and working life. ¡®Tapping into the older worker talent pool’ is a valuable guide for businesses looking to change their recruitment practices to welcome older workers. ¡±

Germany sees more job hires

GERMAN unemployment fell more than expected in November to the lowest in four years as increased optimism in the economy prompted companies to hire and the warmest fall on record buoyed the construction industry, a government agency said yesterday.

The number of people out of work, adjusted for seasonal swings, fell 86,000 to 4.24 million, the lowest since November 2002, the Nuremberg-based Federal Labor Agency said.

Economists expected a decline of 30,000, according to the median of 34 forecasts in a Bloomberg News survey. The adjusted jobless rate fell to 10.2 percent, a rate last recorded in December 2002.

Dressing for Success Really Matters

Carolyn, an HR professional with a Honda subsidiary in Marysville, OH shared with me that she once had
a job candidate show up dressed very casually and wearing a baseball cap. When the interview started, the candidate leaned back in the chair and put his feet up on her desk!

All I can say to this is, ¡°Boy, were you born in the wild and raised by a pack of wolves?¡± I¡¯m pretty sure you weren¡¯t or we would have heard about you on the evening news. What were you thinking?

When you¡¯re lucky enough to be called for an interview, it means something made a good impression¡ªeither your application or your r¨¦sum¨¦, depending on the job. Here¡¯s a gentle reminder: being called for an interview is not the same as being guaranteed the job. In the first interview (and possibly the second, third and even fourth), you¡¯re still selling yourself to the hiring company. So, how should you dress?

The best advice is to always dress professionally. However, not only is professional dress subjective, in some cases it¡¯s also more than you need. To help you determine what you should wear to your interview(s), read on.

• If you¡¯re a guy, you probably have your own House of Fashion brewing just under the surface of your life. Do you have a wife, girlfriend, sister, mother or female friend? Among all of these, you¡¯ll find at least one (probably more) person who can offer sound, reasonable advice on appropriate dressing for various occasions. I would recommend checking with your wife, girlfriend or mother (in that order) before moving to the other options.

• If you¡¯re a woman, you have the same options. You also have multiple reality shows and magazines that obsess over these various subjects. Get together with a group of your friends, a bottle (or two) of wine and a stack of magazines and team up to define your look. Take bits and pieces from each magazine and then have a ¡°What Not to Wear¡± shopping and modeling weekend. If you walk away with a couple of professional outfits, you¡¯re further ahead.
• Check with your local department store. Oftentimes they retain one or two associates dedicated to personal shopping and styling. If you¡¯re in central Ohio, both Macys and Nordstrom offer this service. Nordstrom has two personal shoppers on staff¡ªone male and one female. Some personal shoppers allow you to bring in wardrobe pieces you already own (and adore) and help you build from there.
• Call the hiring manager at the company where you¡¯re getting ready to interview. HR professionals will gladly help you decipher the dressing dilemma. After all, they have a little bit invested in you at this point (they selected your resume for review by others, thereby putting their initial stamp of approval on you (at least on the paper representation of you).
• Drive by the company (OK, stalk it a little) and observe how the employees are dressed and then plan on dressing one step better (unless you¡¯re going for a management position, then wear a suit).

All of this to say that no matter how much we¡¯ve become business casual in the workplace, the interview is not the time to embrace the concept. First impressions still matter and still weigh heavily in the start of any relationship.

From Inertia to Momentum: Why Coaches are Good Investments

I introduced a client to my business coach at a networking event last week. My client was surprised that I¡ªalready a business owner and coach myself¡ªwas working with a business coach. I told her, ¡°Doctors need doctors, attorneys need attorneys, and coaches benefit from coaches.¡±

Later, I started thinking about why I decided to work with a coach. I still stand by my rather witty (if I do say so myself) response, but I also realized I actually started down this path over a year ago¡ªlong before I actually hired an coach.

Last year I started taking a hard look at my business and what I wanted to be doing. I convened an ¡°advisory board¡± of trusted friends and colleagues to help me make the shift. I was losing passion for what I had been doing and I needed people to help me be objective. Again, if I do say so myself, this was one of the smartest moves I have ever made. This group of advisors began helping me more clearly define my business direction and my strengths. It became a source of inspiration, feedback, encouragement, and a million ideas.

As a matter of fact, the million ideas were overwhelming me to the point of inertia. It seemed natural that my next step would be working with a business coach. I was at a point where I knew it was time to make the shift in my business, yet the million ideas had me paralyzed. I started working with Gail from NuGrowth Coaching to help me move from inertia to momentum. This proved to be another great decision and wise investment.

Here¡¯s how working with a coach has helped me:

• A coach holds us accountable. Let¡¯s face it; we can all talk ourselves out of doing something we know we need to do because the only people we might disappoint are ourselves.
• A coach asks the hard questions, expects honest answers, gives direct feedback, but never judges.
• A coach focuses 100% on the client. With friends, conversations tend to be about commiserating or sharing the focus. Coaching allows us to be selfish.
• A coach is an excellent source of information and ideas, helping us get past our ¡°D¡¯oh!¡± moments and getting to our great moments.
• A coach is well-versed in the general area of need. In my case, I needed business assistance and my coach has significant experience in business, sales and marketing.
• A coach never tells you what to do. Through very direct questioning, though, a coach will help you reach your own solutions.

Think about your own needs. Are you stuck in your job and just can¡¯t figure out how to move on? Do you love your current employer, but really want to move up the feeding chain? The benefits of career coaching are tremendous and the investment is one you can¡¯t afford NOT to make. To find out if you¡¯re a candidate for career coaching, and for more information on career coaching, go to www.permanent-ink.com and click on Career Coaching. If you have questions or comments you¡¯d like to see addressed in a future blog, e-mail me at permanentink@insight.rr.com.

Maximum cap for pay rises in state firms cut

CHINA has cut the maximum allowed margin of wage rises in state-owned companies for this year to keep pay growth, especially in monopolistic sectors.

State enterprises which paid employees twice as much as the average level of local urban wages in 2005 can increase total pay not more than 0.6 percent for each percentage of profit growth this year, according to a circular on the Website of the Ministry of Labor and Social Security late on Wednesday. The original cap was 0.75 percent.

The ministry said the government will stringently inspect the linkage between corporate profits and wage payments in state-owned companies where wages are too high and increasing too fast.

“Such a link-up mechanism is of great importance to help create a healthy relationship between growth in wages and profits,” the circular said.

The adjustment came amid a backdrop of intense public calls, starting in the second half of this year, for a wage reform in state firms where employees are considered outrageously overpaid than the average worker, widening the gap between the rich and poor segments of society.

“The latest move is a step forward to increase state control in reining in wage growth,” said Hou Ning, a columnist for several business newspapers. “But I think there is still a long way to go.”

Workers in state companies, typically in highly regulated industries such as telecommunications, energy and tobacco, usually earn much more than they deserve based on the profit they produce.

The monopolistic nature generates complacency resulting in these state firms operating at lower efficiency than global counterparts, thanks to competition. State firms are accused of contributing lower profit while holding a huge amount of state assets and reserves.

Several reports and surveys have indicated average wage for employees in monopolistic industries is up to three times the national average. The gap could be widened to as much as 10 fold if non-wage income like bonuses and pensions are included.