The evolution of jobs and positions within companies is directly impacted by the economic changes over time.  The impact is felt across all industries at a global level.  This evolution has affected organizational positions from non-exempt to the executive level.  In essence it has affected the labor market in its entirety.  Given the current economic climate, companies are struggling with reorganizations, cost containment, headcount, and other efforts to stay in business  

We are in the midst of a unique transitional economic time and will be facing what is known as a “Jobless Economic Recovery.â€�  We have suffered from the elimination of over 10.1 million jobs since late 2007.   The effects of these eliminations are felt by the employee and those seeking employment in many different ways. 

Fundamental shifts in operations are based on a combination of cyclical and structural organizational changes.  Cyclical or temporary planned layoffs were a common business practice in many different industries of the industrial age.  This practice is correlated to a company’s production cycle.  These types of cyclical changes are always a percentage of recessional economic recoveries. 

Temporary operational models are being utilized through cycles of higher productivity.   The practice of outsourcing small units of work as opposed to developing permanent staff is not uncommon within this model.  This business practice once seen primarily in the manufacturing and production industries can now be adapted to many different industries.  It is a simple way to manage costs relating to the recruitment of regular full time staff.  Temporary staff typically allows organizations to support a surge in a company’s headcount demand relative to production.  This practice allows companies to better manage recruiting costs as well as permanent expenses and headcount. 

On the other hand, structural organizational changes permanently affect the relationship between the employer and employee.  These structural changes are due to two primary factors: process/resources efficiencies and automation.  More recent economic conditions have forced companies to review their current resource allocation and headcount than ever before. 

The media is painting a scary picture otherwise known as the labor market.  Last month’s unemployment numbers are another brushstroke. Over the past 18 months, 3.3 million workers have become jobless.  There are currently 10.1 million unemployed workers in this country since late 07. 

The unemployment rate is at 6.5% and the under employment rate, which measures the number of people only working part-time, but looking for fulltime work, is at an all time high of over 11.1%,

The majority of downsizing in the first three quarters of 2008 occurred in the construction, real estate, and mortgage finance industries, while healthcare, IT, energy and green sectors grew.

But don’t let the numbers deceive you… remember that the labor market is continuing to experience talent shortages at the top of the pyramid.  The 10-million baby-boomer’s retiring over the next eight years is hiding behind the current unemployment rate.  Organizations are continuing to struggle and loose experienced talent at all levels.    

Despite the unemployment rates the numbers continue to reflect we are in the midst of a talent shortage.  Recruitment functions of any kind are continuously facing challenges of creatively exploring and identify the correct mix of right sizing, building, outsourcing and/or some combination to continue to be competitive and effective. 

Remember that the talent shortage is a long term challenge compared to the current economy.  Companies that do not have initiatives to identify and retain top talent are probably not focusing on the overall picture and will continue to struggle with talent shortages in both the short and long term of this economy.   

As you may already know, the unemployment rate jumped to 6.1% last month.  Making it the highest unemployment rate since September 2003 and we continued to shed 84,000 more jobs. 

Looking back, payrolls are down by 605,000 since November 2007.  We have experienced the eighth month in row of consecutive declines.  Since March of 2007, over 2 million people have become jobless. 

In addition, the unemployment rate increased among new college grads.  Their jobless rate rose from 2.4% to 2.7% last month.  It’s the highest college unemployment rate since August 2004. 

I also pay close attention to the underemployment rate, which is now 10.7%.  Underemployment includes part-timers who would prefer full-time jobs.  There are 5.7 million workers in this category. 

Overall, despite the negative trending numbers and the struggling economy, there are pockets of industries reflecting a strong need for talent and continue to show signs of growth.  So who’s hiring? 

Labor Day, the first Monday in September, not only does it mark the end of the summer and the back-to-school blues, it’s a creation of the labor movement and is dedicated to the social and economic achievements of American workers. We celebrate a yearly national tribute to the contributions workers have made to the strength, prosperity, and well-being of our country.

The first Labor Day holiday was celebrated on Tuesday, September 5, 1882, in New York City in accordance with the plans of the Central Labor Union. The Central Labor Union held its second Labor Day holiday just a year later, on September 5, 1883.

In 1884 the first Monday in September was selected as the holiday and the Central Labor Union urged similar organizations in other cities to follow the example of New York and celebrate a "workingmen's holiday" on that date. The idea spread with the growth of labor organizations, and in 1885 Labor Day was celebrated in many industrial centers of the country.   Then, in 1894, Congress passed an act making the first Monday in September of each year a legal holiday. 

Some records show that Peter J. McGuire, general secretary of the Brotherhood of Carpenters and Joiners and a cofounder of the American Federation of Labor, was first in suggesting a day to honor the American worker.  Other records show that Matthew Maguire, a machinist, not Peter McGuire, founded the holiday.

More recent research seems to support the contention that Matthew Maguire, later the secretary of Local 344 of the International Association of Machinists in Paterson, N.J., proposed the holiday in 1882 while serving as secretary of the Central Labor Union in New York.

For more than 100 years the Labor Day celebration remains a tribute to much of the nation's strengths, freedoms, and leadership — the American worker.

Happy Labor Day!!

Search engines are an important resource when looking for resumes, whether you’re searching on general search engines like Yahoo or Google or on resume specific job boards like HotJobs or Monster. To really make your search effective you need to remember Boolean Language. Boolean tools will help you create more effective and focused searches, producing resumes that more closely meet your requirements and also reducing the number of resumes you need to search through that miss the mark.

What is Boolean Logic?

Boolean logic is named after George Boole (1815-1864), an obscure nineteenth century English mathematician. Boole invented a new form of algebra in which values are either true or false. His binary logic is the foundation of digital circuit design and a part of the language of internet search engines.  Don’t worry - you don’t have to remember high school algebra to make Boolean logic work.

The Boolean Operators

Boolean Operator # 1:  AND

This term links two or more terms together in a search string. (Def. search string: A series of words linked and/or modified by Boolean logic used to create a search command for a search engine.)  - will only return pages in your search that have both terms.

Example: pharmaceutical AND chemist

Boolean Operator # 2:  OR

Returns all pages in your search string that include either term.

Example: pharmaceutical OR biotechnology

Boolean Operator # 3:  NOT (sometimes AND NOT)

Returns pages in your search string that have the term that precedes it but not the term that follows it.

Example: chemist NOT biologist or chemist AND NOT biologist

Boolean Operator # 4:  NEAR

Returns pages in your search string with both terms within close proximity to each other on the page. Usually within ten words or less.

Example: research NEAR chemist

An important tip to remember is that Boolean operators must always be CAPITALIZED. Search engines read lower case letters as both upper and lower case, but the reverse is not true.

Example: pharmaceutical AND research or development (Error. Boolean operator “OR� is typed in lower case. Because it is lower case the search engine reads the word “OR� not as a Boolean operator, but as a search term like pharmaceutical, research and development. This will produce incorrect search results and will also increase the amount of the time it takes for the search engine to complete the search.)

The Boolean Modifiers

Boolean Modifier # 1: “ “quotation marks

Returns pages in your search string with an exact phrase.

Example: “sr. research chemist�

Boolean Modifier # 2: (  ) parentheses

Helps define a subset of a search, making it more accurate. Example: chemist AND (new jersey OR nj)

Boolean Modifier # 3: *  wild card symbol

Wildcard symbols retrieve pages with keywords with the same root word.

Example: chem* (would retrieve pages with the words chemical, chemist, chemistry etc.)

From my experience over the years I would say only about 50% - 60% of recruiters are aware of Boolean Logic and use it when conducting searches. Boolean Logic can increase your edge in terms of speed and efficiency of sourcing resumes online. Use it and your already putting yourself ahead of half your recruiting competition.

The unemployment rate dipped slightly from 5.1 in March to 5.0 in April and we experienced more job cuts as well as core working hours are being cut more and more. 

Some positive gains were tracked in healthcare services last month, reflecting 37,000 new jobs as well as professional services (office jobs), which was up 39,000.

The interesting thing is that the underemployment rate has jumped dramatically to 5.2 million workers who are currently involuntarily employed on a part time basis or their hours have been reduced – but they are all looking for full time work.  Involuntary part-time work is the highest it has been since November 2005 and has jumped from 4.4 million a year ago.

It’s also taking more time to find a new job.  The typical unemployment spell increased by over a week from March (at 8.1 weeks) to April (at 9.2 weeks). This is typical in recessions, as jobless workers are unable to find work.

The real question from April’s numbers is whether the less-than-expected losses are indicating a new positive trend or was April just a blip on the radar and we are still continuing from the negative trend?  All in all it still doesn’t look good for employment conditions nationwide. 

As companies lay off workers, their recruitment functions tend to slow down.  In this market it is safe to assume that the most talented employee is still employed.  It is also safe to assume that this top talent is open to explore new opportunities.  This is the time for recruitment to become even more active and develop relationships.  Research shows that more and more of the employed individuals are stretched and are open to exploring new opportunities. 

How are you taping into this talent?  In a down market it provides us the opportunity to move from a transactional recruiting model which only sees a snapshot of who is available at any given time to a more proactive recruitment model.  This is an opportunity for companies to combine all of their recruitment efforts and resources to proactively build and reinforce their talent database.  A proactive approach in a slow market will provide the opportunity to build relationships across multiple disciplines and build a database to pull from and act quickly when you have the open opportunity.  The worst thing we can do is nothing and just wait for open positions to start recruiting. 

We are all familiar with Blue and White collar job sectors, but now a third sector is emerging and is growing by leaps and bounds - The Green Collar Job Sector.

Green collar jobs have been defined as work force opportunities created by firms and organizations whose mission is to improve environmental quality and involve products and services that are environmentally friendly.  The new job sector includes opportunities that involve the design, manufacture, installation, operation, and/or maintenance of renewable energy and energy efficiency technologies.

Moving away from environmentally unfriendly work and towards environmentally friendly work will bring significant changes and benefits to workers, communities, and society as a whole.  If more cities and organizations begin to incorporate environmental concerns into their mission and goals, the potential for green collar jobs over the next decade should be significant. 

It is currently the fifth largest market sector in the US with about 8.5 million U.S. jobs in renewable-energy and energy-efficiency industries.  This could grow to as much as 40 million by 2030, according to a November 2007 report commissioned by the American Solar Energy Society.

Also if the federal government succeeds in combining the benefits of renewable energy efforts with the national employment sector, we could see green collar jobs exploding into a billion-dollar industry.   Initiatives are being pushed by presidential candidates Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama, who are proposing millions of dollars in competitive grants to states that exhibit labor exchange and training programs in the green sector.

Green collar jobs are also becoming more and more attractive to applicants who see the opportunity to bringing about positive change in the world.  The satisfaction of making a positive difference in the world is in many cases enough of a bonus for this environmentally conscious group.

Here’s a site sites to check out that focus on Green Job opportunities, I’m sure there will be more to follow.

www.EcoEmploy.com

The job market numbers were released by the BLS last week and it’s not looking good.  The report paints a picture of what it looked like in the last official recession in 2001. 

Payrolls fell by 63,000 and the unemployment rate dropped slightly, from 4.9% to 4.8%.   You could argue that the unemployment rate should be higher, but it is largely due to the numbers in the labor force leaving the market.  Overall it’s been the largest loss in about 5 years and a strong indicator that the troubled economy has reached the job market.

A few highlights from the report:

• Payroll employment has now dropped two months in a row and three consecutive months in the private sector.
• December and January payroll counts were revised down by 46,000.
• The population in the workforce fell from 66.1% to 65.9%; the share of the population employed is down 0.5 percentage points compared to one year ago.
• Had the 450,000 people who left the labor force last month been counted among the unemployed, the jobless rate would have been 5.1% instead of 4.8%.
• Most industries shed jobs last month; a measure of industry hiring activity is at its lowest level in almost five years.
• Employment fell in core service industries, including retail sales and offices.
• Employers are downsizing temporary workers: employment in the sector was down 28,000, the largest loss in five years.
• The number of part-time workers who would prefer full-time jobs—a measure of underemployment—is up over 600,000 over the past year.
• Both employment and total hours worked in the economy are shrinking in traditional recessionary patterns.

Personality assessments are being used more and more with employees and building strong teams/work groups.  Some of the more commonly used tools for assessing personality and psychological characteristics include: Myers-Briggs Type Indicator Instrument, Kolbe System, and DISC Personal Profile System

1.      Share the team's common goals and purposes.

2.      Clarify each person's role in achieving the common purpose.

3.      Share the needs of the team's external or internal customers or clients.

4.      Work out effective ways to resolve conflicts based on the needs of the specific team.

5.      Make sure you are still the manager by holding employees responsible for meeting goals or helping to solve problems.

6.      Make sure team meetings aren't a forum for your team.  This allows for the development of team synergy.

7.      Allow team members to provide input into their jobs by encouraging them to make suggestions.

8.      Make sure there is room for minority or unpopular views.

Understanding your own work style and the styles of your team members; not only helps you to work better together, it can also help you leverage the teams’ knowledge and insights as a whole. 

"Super Tuesday" marks two important events. It will be the biggest step so far in selecting the next President, but it will also be the first coast-to-coast election since the nation's economic troubles became front page news.

Of the 24 "Super Tuesday" states, 20 have seen their unemployment rates rise over the last six months.  Signs of economic trouble are a rising unemployment and under-employment rate.  When the job market weakens it hurts not just those who are out of work, but also suppresses pay levels for working people from the lowest-paid through middle-income families. Pay raises are fewer and farther apart when unemployment is high.

Employer-provided health insurance coverage declined in 18 states, leaving a growing share of the population uninsured in 19 states.  In 22 of the 24 states, private-sector employer-provided pension coverage declined.

This will, no doubt, be on the minds of voters as they cast their votes today and can also provide insights into voters’ economic worries, hopes, and priorities.