ERE.net

Jun 19, 2008, 6:52 pm ET

Higher gas prices, of course, mean winners and losers in the job market. The winners are likely to include some oil company employers, alternative-energy employers, Houston recruiters, and telecommuters. It’ll be interesting to see whether the increased demand for public transportation will eventually mean more hiring at public transportation agencies.

Here in sprawling Los Angeles, though the Bel Air/Beverly Hills elite continues to incorrectly claim that “no one in LA takes public transportation,” the MTA says that “Metro Rail ridership in May shot up 6 percent over May 2007, one of the highest one-month spikes on record.”

In May, more than 7.6 million passengers boarded the MTA’s two Los Angeles subway lines and three light-rail surface lines. The organization employs about 10,000 people, and is hiring engineers, Oracle programmers, and others.

The Disney Look, and More Mid-week Chatter

Jun 17, 2008, 6:44 pm ET

–In Illinois, a home healthcare company settles a case regarding an employee allegedly not hired for being black.

–Meanwhile, Disney is sued for allegedly not hiring someone who didn’t have the “Disney look.”

–Who says the newspaper is dead? Well, I do, often. But Brian Hauswirth of the Missouri Department of Corrections tells me the paper’s the main reason why his career fair just surpassed all expectations. “When we ask people, ‘where did you hear about the career fair?’ the no. 1 reason is the newspaper,” he says. About 165 people attended the fair, he says, and about 103 applied for Corrections Officer 1 positions at a new prison. They still need to pass background checks, but Hauswirth says the results are “very promising.” Those with military experience make up about a quarter of corrections officers.

–Cellular South has completed a redesign of its careers site. It’s no EY site, but the company does use video to try to get applicants who fit its culture: fast-paced, challenging, competitive. It had Bernard Hodes (profile; site) help out (after realizing that consumer marketing and employment branding are cousins, not siblings, so Cell South can’t just use its in-house marketing folks), but still uses Sonic (profile; site) to track applicants.

Barb Miller, VP of human resources for the 1,000-employee company, one of the largest privately held wireless companies in the U.S., says the employees you see on the site are indeed employees, not actors, though Hodes and Miller’s team did discuss the idea of using actors (some Cellular South employees underperformed on camera, resulting in an SVP filling in at the end). Cellular South will measure results of the site through the “capture rate” (who leaves the site?); quality of hire (performance reviews, retention); traffic; and productivity (how many customers they can get with a certain number of employees). I asked Miller about the company’s snooze-inducing job descriptions. “You hit on something good,” she says. “That will be the next phase of what we do.”

Dream Big and Rock

May 29, 2008, 9:58 am ET

Three new recruiting campaigns I thought I’d mention today … Microsoft, which we recently said is kicking off a campaign to showcase (and increase) its diversity, has launched a new site at youatmicrosoft.com. Despite the lame cliches and generalities (”diversity is critical,” “the best thing about Microsoft is the people,” etc.), the design is great, and who doesn’t love baby pictures? … Speaking of new sites, Spirit’s new careers page features the tagline “Dream Big, Make it Fly” — check it out with your sound on for full “whooshing-sound” effect. Spirit’s being helped out by its new RPO vendor The RightThing … Lastly, General Dynamics is touting its “Jobs That Rock” and is hiring engineers, particularly because of a big contract it got from the military to work on the Warfighter’s Information Network.

Hot Cooke

May 16, 2008, 8:46 am ET

Word on the recruiting street has it that Austin Cooke, the VP of recruiting for VistaPrint, is getting promoted to VP of HR for all of North America.

Here’s a mini-clip from Cooke, talking at ERE’s Spring Expo about paying non-employees for referrals.

Down on the Biopharma

May 15, 2008, 2:10 pm ET

Four hours of driving to and fro last night’s HR Strategy Forum was worth it, because the HRPS affiliate serves you up a higher-level audience than the annual swag-a-thon. The Forum’s audience is a lot like the Journal audience, but not as recruiting-centric.

One attendee is Debbie Rocco of Amylin, a fast-growing bio-pharma that’s hiring for many of the positions you’d expect as well as for an Ohio manufacturing facility. Interestingly, and fairly unsually, it also has a link to recruiter information on its website.

Amylin is a lot like a startup, and is just starting to do such things as “capacity planning.” It’s finding, for example, that in the past it hired a lot of specialists and needs to either hire more generalists or do more training to give people a broader background needed to start a new project when their last one ends.

The FDA’s Healthy Hiring

May 1, 2008, 11:36 am ET

If you know any good foodies or druggies, today is their lucky day.

The U.S. Food and Drug Administration announced on Thursday that it has plans to hire more than 1,300 people.

The FDA needs to fill openings for medical officers, consumer safety officers, chemists, nurse consultants, biologists, microbiologists, health/regulatory/general health scientists, mathematical statisticians, epidemiologists, pharmacologists, pharmacists, and veterinary medical officers.

Jobs Near the Northern Shore

Apr 6, 2008, 6:42 pm ET

If someone’s looking for a job right now, they’d probably not want to be looking in Michigan, a state infamous for its high unemployment. Nor would they want to target the mortgage and related industries.

So a mortgage company in Michigan seems like a double negative.

Then again, maybe not.

One Company, All Your Careers

Apr 1, 2008, 11:31 am ET

The U.S. Labor Department says people will have up to eight separate careers in their lifetimes.

“Why not have all of them at FedEx?” asks FedEx’s John Leech, speaking at the ERE Expo right now in San Diego. Leech says an employee can do everything from IT to metereology to security to sports marketing (because of the company’s sponsorships) and more, all without quitting.

Indeed, the FedEx careers website (though not perfect … searching for the terms “CEO of large company marketing experience master’s degree” in the resume box at left apparently didn’t produce any results, and a few postings are on the drier side) sells you on the company, not just the job. Some postings play up a potpourri of good company benefits. Many other postings play up the ability to get a promotion.

Starbucks Cuts 600

Feb 21, 2008, 12:29 pm ET

Reigniting the “emotional attachment” with customers or brewing resentment among loyal employees?

This is something Starbucks CEO Howard Schultz has had to grapple with, and he stated his opinions publicly on Thursday. He sent a letter to all employees, a note he called his “most difficult communication to date” but necessary in order to improve the current state of the company and reinvigorate sales.

The gist of his open letter is that Starbucks is cutting about 600 positions, a move that is not surprising in some circles. This includes the elimination of existing positions and open headcount, as well as the reduction of its current workforce. Within this context, Schultz notes that approximately 220 partners have separated from the company, and that nearly all were U.S. partners serving in non-retail support roles.

Caterpillar Grows in Weak Times

Feb 19, 2008, 1:08 pm ET

Despite a painful slowdown across multiple sectors in the building and construction industries, Caterpillar is inching along.

The Peoria, Illinois-based manufacturer of iconic yellow tractors may hire hundreds of engineers and designers to work in a planned 100-acre research and development facility and manufacturing plant in Raleigh, North Carolina. The new facility would develop prototype products for the Caterpillar line of machines and engines.

The company may also boost its 700-strong North Carolina workforce by hiring at the Cary, Clayton, and Sanford locations.

How Sweet It Isn’t: Russell Stover Feels Ripple Effect from Hershey

Feb 13, 2008, 6:46 am ET

Few are likely to give pause before biting into a giant chocolate bar on Valentine’s Day. Instead, most will carelessly toss the foil wrapper and not realize that what they are holding is a piece of history, a previous day’s work for a factory employee, and a job that no longer exists.

Take the workers at perennial boxed-chocolate favorite Russell Stover Candies. The company has announced plans to eliminate the second shift and lay off about 150 workers at a production facility that staffs 480 people in Montrose, Colorado, effective April 1. These workers include maintenance staff, packaging staff, and supervisors. Russell Stover’s three other U.S. manufacturing plants will also see layoffs, according to the company.

Although its biggest competitor, Hershey provides some raw materials to Russell Stover. With Hershey’s plan to move some production to a plant in Monterrey, Mexico, along with inflation and increasing dairy costs, Russell Stover says these cuts – albeit “temporary” according to executives – are necessary to stay afloat.

Losing Their Shirts: Retail Giants Plan Layoffs, Store Closures

Feb 6, 2008, 3:22 pm ET

February is shaping up to be a bad month for shopping fans but an interesting one for retail recruiters, as a rash of layoffs and store closings point to weaker-than-expected January retail sales and a pessimistic outlook for the future.

William Dreher, a Deutsche Bank research analyst, wrote in a report last week that as the economy begins to improve in the second half of 2008, “we expect several of our department store shares could do very well, including Kohl’s and Macy’s, though we are not pounding the table here yet.” In fact, the report upgraded the department store and mass merchant sector to neutral from cautious.

But on Wednesday, Macy’s Inc. announced its plans to slash 2,300 management jobs across three regional divisions to reduce costs and boost sales while adding 250 in-store positions to enhance product offerings in specific regions. The company will cut approximately 950 positions at the Macy’s North headquarters offices in Minneapolis, 850 positions at the Macy’s Midwest headquarters offices in St. Louis, and 750 positions at the Macy’s Northwest headquarters offices in Seattle. It is also consolidating several divisions, though all current store locations will remain in place. The company’s Miami-based Macy’s Florida and New-York based Bloomingdale’s divisions are not affected. The Cincinnati-based retailer said the consolidation will be complete in the second quarter of 2008.

Chatter: San Diego Dreamin

Nov 20, 2007, 10:54 am ET

“America’s Finest City” — as former Mayor Pete Wilson called San Diego– is where job candidates most want to live, according to the Human Capital Institute and Monster. This comes despite still-jaw-dropping housing costs that recruiters frequently cite as a major impediment to convincing people to relocate to San Diego. In the survey of 806 employees, San Diego was the place candidates would be most willing to relocate to, followed by San Francisco, New York, Atlanta, Boston, Austin, Denver, Los Angeles, Seattle, and Portland, Oregon. The least desired: New York, Detroit, Los Angeles, and New Orleans.
We don’t have a specific link to any news item, but we hear Sykes will be picking up its hiring in the coming months.

Chatter: More Sales Hiring

Nov 13, 2007, 10:05 am ET

It’s not apparent on its careers page, but Alpharma is aggressively hiring salespeople.
In Canada, the CMA says it’s on a “hiring spree.”

Biogen Workers Seek Career Options

Nov 6, 2007, 9:12 am ET

Anticipating potential layoffs if the company is sold, Biogen staff are reportedly looking for offers in all the right places.

According to the Boston Business Journal, biotechnology recruiters have noticed an increase in calls from non-executive staff planning for the worst.

Pearl Freier, an executive search consultant, told the Journal that the callers are “anxious” and hoping to avoid becoming one of the thousands who Biogen may fire.

Chrysler’s Cuts, By the Numbers

Nov 1, 2007, 2:26 pm ET

First, real estate foreclosures were up 30%. Then the stock market fell over 360 points. And the news on Thursday didn’t improve much as Chrysler made drastic cuts to its workforce — announcing plans to cut 12,000 workers to help combat sluggish sales expected through 2008.

How the news shakes out at Chrysler, by the numbers:

Bear Stearns Credit Crisis Hits Another 300 Workers

Oct 30, 2007, 7:45 am ET

Bear Stearns has laid off 300 workers across various business units, including its equity trading business. The latest cuts affect about 2% of its 15,500 employees and are blamed on the ongoing credit crisis that has loomed on Wall Street and throughout the country’s housing market.

James Cayne, chief executive of Bear Stearns, wrote in a company memo that the goal is to “deploy our resources in today’s challenging environment where growth opportunities are greatest and to reduce costs in areas that can no longer justify their current level of infrastructure.”

The investment bank has not specified which exact units are affected, and says in the memo that it will continue to add jobs as needed.