Jobs Layoffs in USA due to "Economic Downturn"

Month of July, 2008

Northwest Airlines will cut 2,500 jobs or 7% of its workforce due to rising fuel prices. (CNN Money/AP).

German conglomerate Siemens will cut 16,750 jobs worldwide. (Reuters).

United Healthcare will eliminate 4,000 jobs or 5% of its workforce. (AP)

IndyMac Bancorp will exit most of the home lending market and cut 3,800 jobs due to high rates of loan defaults. (LA Times)

Chicago Tribune will eliminate 80 newsroom positions. About 60 workers will lose their jobs and 20 positions are already vacant and won't be filled. (Crain's Chicago Business)

Starbucks will close 600 stores in the U.S. resulting in the loss of 12,000 jobs. The leading coffee chain blames a weak economy and overexpansion. (Seattle Times)

Month of June, 2008

Bank of America will ax 7,500 jobs following its acquisition of Countrywide mortgage company. (LA Times).

Foxwoods will layoff 2% of its workforce or 200 workers as the casino is being hurt by weak spending due to high gas prices. (Newsday/AP).

The Hartford Courant newspaper will cut 60 jobs and reduce the number of news pages by 25 percent as it suffers from an industry-wide downturn in advertising. The paper will reduce its newsroom staff from 232 to about 175. (Hartford Courant)

The Baltimore Sun newspaper will eliminate 100 workers through voluntary buyouts, layoffs and attrition. About 55-60 jobs in the newsroom are expected to be lost. (Baltimore Sun)

Continental Airlines plans to cut 3,000 jobs and ground 67 planes in order to deal with high fuel costs. (Houston Chronicle)

Intuit will cut 575 jobs or 7% of its workforce as it streamlines operations. (Silicon Valley Daily)

Week of April 4, 2008

Freightliner is laying off 1,500 workers at its Rowan County, NC truck plant -- half the plant's work force (Charlotte Observer).

Motorola plans to layoff 2,600 workers. (Chicago Tribune)

Schering-Plough will lay off 10% of its global workforce or 5,500 employees and will also shut plants. (Newark Star-Ledger)

CBS News is cutting 1% of its 1,200 member workforce. Local news stations at CBS have also cut anchors and reporters in NY, Los Angeles, Chicago, Boston, Philadelphia, San Francisco and Sacramento. (Reuters)

Aloha Airlines has laid off over 2,000 workers as it shut down passenger flight operations due to heavy losses and the high cost of fuel. (Honolulu Advertiser)

ATA Airlines filed for bankruptcy and will end flight operations following the loss of a military charter contract. 2,000 employees will lose their jobs including 600 at Indianapolis headquarters. (WTHR - Indianapolis)

People's Bank is eliminating 420 jobs and closing 20 branches in Connecticut, Massachusetts, Vermont and New Hampshire by this summer. (AP)

City of Portland, ME has cut 98 positions and 76 will be layoffs in a reorganization plan (WCSH - Portland).

Pilgrim's Pride is the nation's largest chicken company. It announced it will cut 1,100 jobs and shut down seven U.S. facilities. (Reuters)

Week of March 19, 2008

Delta Airlines is offering buyouts to 30,000 employees as it plans to reduce 2,000 jobs at the airline. (AP)

Supervalu is closing a plant in Livonia, MI resulting in the loss of 366 jobs. (Crain's Detroit Business)

Vaughan Furniture will close its last U.S. plant in North Carolina and cut 275 jobs. (Winston-Salem Journal)

ON Semiconductor is cutting 200 employees and closing a fab plant as it merges with AMI Semiconductor. (EDN)

Lehman Brothers is planning to lay off 1,425 people or 5% of its workforce across all regions of its business. (WSJ)

Week of March 1, 2008

Newsday will cut 120 positions as it deals with lower sales and weak advertising. (Newsday)

BMW plans to eliminate 8,100 jobs due to rising euro affecting profits. Most jobs will be lost in Germany. (NY Times)

Siemens will cut 3,800 jobs in its Enterprise Communications division and sell its telecom unit. Most will be in Germany and some in South America. (PC World)

Zale Corp. will eliminate 225 jobs or 20% of its headquarters workforce. The jewelry retailer also is closing 105 stores. (Bloomberg)

Wabash National is laying off 130 workers after furloughing 150 production workers last month. The company is a manufacturer of trucks. (Journal and Courier)

Week of February 23, 2008

Harrah's has cut about 150 workers at casinos in Las Vegas, Illinois and other parts of the country. (Las Vegas Review-Journal)

Goldman Sachs is ready to fire 1,500 employees as it faces losses in its investing and lending portfolios. (Dow Jones)

Starbucks is cutting 600 jobs nationwide with about one-third at Seattle headquarters. The company also plans to close 100 underperforming stores this year. (Seattle Times)

Wilson's Leather announced it will close 160 of its stores and layoff 1,000 workers. (AP)

Bay Area News Group is offering buyouts to 1,100 employees. The group publishers newspapers in the Bay Area including Oakland Tribune, San Jose Mercury News and Contra-Costa Times. (SF Chronicle)

The NY Times plans to cut 100 newsroom jobs at its flagship paper to deal with lower advertising revenue. The company will offer buyouts and layoffs if necessary. (NY Times)

Week of February 16, 2008

Sears announced it will cut 200 workers at its headquarters. The number represents 4% of 5,000 workers at its headquarters office. (Crain's Chicago Business)

Morgan Stanley is scaling back its mortgage operations and trimming 1,000 jobs. (International Herald Tribune)

Polaroid will no longer make instant film and is closing factories in Massachusetts, Mexico and the Netherlands and cutting 450 jobs. (AP)

General Motors announced a record $38.7 billion loss for 2007 and offered buyouts to all 74,000 union workers at the company. Buyouts can range from $70,000-140,000. (CNN Money)

DHL will cut about 600 jobs in the U.S. due to economic climate and demand. (Reuters)

Tribune Co. plans to layoff 2% or 400-500 employees. The LA Times will lose 100-150 jobs including 40-50 in the newsroom. (LA Times)

Week of February 9, 2008

Russell Stover will layoff 150 workers at its plant in Montrose, CO. (Kansas City Star)

CBS Radio has laid off 400 workers at its radio stations across the country. (Newark Star-Ledger)

Time Warner will cut up to 100 corporate positions and also split its AOL access and advertising businesses. (CNN Money)

Macy's will lay off 2,300 workers and consolidate its regional operating divisions following weak sales for the holidays and January. (Cincinnati Enquirer)

Week of February 1, 2008

Dell is closing call centers in Oklahoma and Edmonton this spring and will layoff 1,200 workers. 900 will lose their jobs in Canada and 300 in Oklahoma. It will also close 140 mall kiosks in the U.S. and focus on selling in retail stores. (Austin Business Journal)

Home Depot will lay off 500 workers or 10% if its headquarters workforce in Atlanta. (Atlanta Journal Constitution)

Ann Taylor to cut 180 positions or 13% of its corporate workforce. The company plans to close 117 underperforming stores over the next two years. (PR Newswire)

Yahoo is laying off 1,000 workers or 7% of its workforce after reporting a drop in profits for the year. (San Jose Mercury News)

Week of January 25, 2008

Morgan Stanley is laying off 1,000 workers or 2% of its total workforce. (WSJ)

Goldman Sachs may lay off 1,500 workers or up to 5% if its workforce due to weed out underperformers. The company paid $20 billion in bonuses last year, equivalent to $661,490 per person. (Bloomberg)

Ford is offering buyouts and early retirement packages for its 54,000 hourly workers. The auto giant lost $2.7 billion in 2007. (Detroit Free-Press)

Tellabs to cut 225 jobs or 6% of its workforce after profits dropped 78% in the fourth quarter. (Chicago Tribune)

Wyeth may cut as many as 5,000 jobs or 10% of its workforce after federal regulators delayed four of its medicines last year. (NY Times)

The Chicago Sun Times cut 36 staffers from its newspaper. (Chicago Tribune)

Week of January 18, 2008

Lawrence Livermore Lab in California could lay off as many as 700 workers this year due to a tighter federal budget. (Modesto Bee)

Sallie Mae is eliminating 350 workers or 3% of its workforce in a bid to cut 20% of its operating expenses. (Bloomberg)

Sprint announced plans to close 125 retail stores and cut 4,000 jobs or 7% of its workforce after reporting heavy subscriber losses for wireless service. (Washington Post)

IndyMac Bancorp will layoff 2,403 workers or 24% due to serious problems in the mortgage and credit industry. (AP)

The American Red Cross could layoff up to 1,000 people as it faces an operating deficit of $200 million. (NY Times)

Lehman Brothers is closing its wholesale mortgage unit due to the housing slump, resulting in the loss of 1,300 jobs. (AP)

Applied Materials is eliminating 1,000 jobs in its Silicon Systems Group via layoffs and attrition. (San Francisco Chronicle)

Source - Google

A Standardized Sales Plan ?

I was reading some articles from internet that’s explains how companies can successfully implement a company-mandated sales plan and be sure that all of the salespeople are following it.

I found the advice given in that article to be deeply disturbing to me, especially since it is new and not from a ten-year-old book from the old school of selling.

The essence of the article is this: Companies that intend to implement a new sales plan must make it mandatory, must hold the salespeople accountable for following it, must let the salespeople know that managers will inspect to make sure the new plan is being followed, and that role plays should be done in training sessions to teach salespeople how to use the new sales plan.

I felt shivers down my spine when I read the part about how managers will hold salespeople accountable, and will inspect to be sure that the plan is being followed. I immediately got the picture of the stereotypical raving lunatic, “little dictator” sales manager who terrorizes his or her salespeople through micro-management and blunt orders.

Is this the kind of organization good salespeople would want to work for? I’m amazed that this kind advice is still being given in this day and age.

I also have a major problem with mandated role playing in training sessions. I hate role plays. I always have and always will. I think they’re stupid and a complete waste of time. They’re absolutely BANNED from my training programs. The biggest problem with role plays is that they’re NEVER realistic. In fact, if you train a salesperson through role plays, he will be completely blind sided and blown out when meeting with real prospects who have real problems and real objections. All of the example sales dialogues I use in my programs have come from REAL sales appointments, those carried out by either myself or other salespeople I know and trust.

I m in sales, I m always count in good performer. The only times I was not a good performer was while working at companies that had a mandated sales process that I was required to follow. It always baffled me as to why companies that forced us to follow their plan would hire experienced sales reps. Why not hire inexperienced people right out of college? They won’t have any pre-conceived notions of how to sell, won’t have any prior experience or training, and therefore will blindly follow the company’s system, no questions asked.

Here are a couple of realities that managers and sales directors must face up to:

1. If you want an experienced sales force with a proven track record, you must understand that they already know how to sell. How else could they possibly have a great track record? Attempting to force them to learn a new system and follow it negates their talent and experience and will immediately destroy their top producer status. Proven salespeople excel and perform at their very best when treated like independent contractors.

2. If you really want to implement and mandate a company sales plan, the only way to do that successfully and with little turnover is to hire people with no experience right out of school. And even then, you’d still be much better off with sticking to option 1.

If you want a successful organization, hire the best and place your trust in them that they know how to sell. They’ve done it before and can do it again for you. Don’t derail their performance and undermine everyone’s success by forcing something on them that is totally unnecessary. Keep your sales training program updated for the current trends you need to provide your sales reps the latest training so they can also keep them self updated and ready for new challenges.

Surviving a Layoff

Surviving a layoff. Losing your job is one of the most stressful life events. You need to have a good plan of action in place to recover and get going in the job market. Use these strategies to help you handle the lay off and compete effectively for a new job.

Don't panic

Panic following a lay off is dangerous. Do not lose sight of these two facts - you are a skilled person and you will work again. Adapt to what has happened and turn your energies to finding a solution.

The way in which you look at the job loss will make all the difference in surviving a layoff. Avoid getting into a spiral of negative thought. Anger and fear are the usual emotions experienced after a job loss. Both these are destructive emotions that prevent you from thinking clearly about your future.

Deal with your anger and fear

You need to deal with these emotions and move on so that you can be relaxed and confident in an interview situation. Here are some practical guidelines for handling the emotional challenges in surviving a layoff.

Acknowledge your feelings - it is absolutely normal to experience fear, anxiety and depression after losing your job. Don't pretend that you are fine, acknowledge what you are going through otherwise you will not be able to deal with it.

Write it all down - put down on paper how you feel. What would you like to have said to the company but didn't? What upset you about the way you were laid off? What thoughts keep going through your head? What would you like to tell your family but feel unable to? Empty all your negative emotions into your writing and get it out of your system. Do it as many times as necessary. You can even write a letter to the company and then burn it. This can have a very cathartic effect.

Make a list of all the positive things you recognize about yourself - this is a good way to build your self-esteem and feel more positive. Ask for letters of recommendation from colleagues and managers. These serve two purposes in surviving a layoff- to boost your confidence and to help you in your job search.

List the positive outcomes of this experience - what good has come from this layoff? What have you learned? Finding value in the experience moves you from been a victim to a survivor. Practice telling yourself and others "It was very hard but I'm glad it happened because ...."

Engage in stress reducing activities - yoga, jogging, walking or whatever is the most relaxing. Key to surviving a layoff is to get involved in activities that help you reduce your anxiety and prepare for renewal.

Take constructive steps to reducing financial anxiety by knowing

Your Layoff Right

One effective approach to dealing with negative emotions and surviving a lay off is to look at it as if you are on a paid sabbatical(through your severance package or unemployment benefits) to take stock and consider your future. This just might be the opportunity of a lifetime. You are off the treadmill for a while and able really to really find out where you are and where you could be and want to be in your professional life.

Reflect and take stock

The layoff gives you time to examine your job and career history, your possible career path and your personal career goals. You now have the time and motivation to consider all this and work out what your next step will be.
Ask yourself:

What are the skills and knowledge I can bring to the marketplace? - Look back on your work experience and select the most valuable and marketable skills you have to offer. Are these the skills you want to use in your next job? Use a free online career aptitude test or see a career counselor to help you decide.

This year we are experiencing the most rapidly changing economy in recent history. The job market today is more competitive than ever. There are many opportunities but they may be in different areas, in different forms and different places. Studies show that a college graduate with a non-professional degree will have an average of ten to twelve different jobs or careers during the working lifetime.

Most workers today will be out of their fields and doing something else within two years. Anyone who does not adjust rapidly to constant change, greater competition, and opportunities of the future, will be rapidly overtaken by those who do. If necessary consider changing the skills and work you are offering to meet the needs of the job market. If there is no real demand for your current skills package you may have to acquire some new skills.

Surviving a layoff may include taking advantage of the time provided by the lay off to learn new and valuable skills. Lifelong learning is critical in today’s job market, you should constantly be updating and upgrading your knowledge and skills. Read books, magazines, trade journals, and newsletters. Listen to business and motivational audio learning programs. What interests do you have that could be transformed into workplace skills?

Consider your values? Where do your career values, interests and skills come together in terms of a job? This is where will you find greatest job satisfaction.

Even consider changing the place where you are offering these skills. You can change your location to be where the demand for your skills is. Many people change their whole lives by moving from an area of low employment to an area of high employment.

What is the salary I really need to earn? - consider your savings, your expenses, your assets. Are you in a position to sell assets that no longer benefit you? Are your monthly expenses all essential? After reassessing your financial situation you may find that your salary requirements have changed giving you more flexibility in job and career choices.

Once you have taken these steps it is time to

1) Update your resume and activate your network.

2) Know your Layoff Rights

3) Lay off Survival Tips

Surviving a layoff depends on putting the right strategies in place.

Practical Survival Tips

Job layoffs have become a simple fact of life in this volatile economy. The Department Of Labor reports that year-to-date totals of layoff events (12,542) and related initial unemployment claims (1,274,765) in 2008 were the highest January-August totals since 2003.

Dealing with the layoff and staying focused on finding a job is tough. Here are some practical steps you can take to lessen the fallout from this traumatic life event.

Acknowledge your emotions

Employees who are laid off feel betrayed by the company and even by colleagues who survived the layoff. Anger, fear and depression are common and natural emotional reactions to job layoffs. If these emotions are not dealt with properly they can become all-consuming and prevent the individual from focusing on taking constructive steps to handle the layoff. They can derail a job search and destroy job interviews.

First step is to be honest about the depth and strength of the emotional fallout. Then begin to process these emotions and regain control. A cathartic activity is to write down your feelings. Put together a letter to the company detailing how you feel about them. Once it is all down on paper burn or shred the letters. Keep doing this till you feel the anger subsiding. Keeping a journal is another way of doing this.

Recovery is always helped along by talking to people who have been in similar situations. Join a support group and use it as both an opportunity to vent your feelings and to brainstorm career solutions.

Update your resume and build a portfolio of accomplishments

Job layoffs can be devastating to one's self esteem. Remind yourself of two things constantly - you have skills and you will find another job. List all the experience and skills you have. Highlight your strengths and accomplishments. Rework your resume to reflect these.

Don't leave your job without collecting references and letters of recommendation from the company. Select relevant work samples that demonstrate your abilities such as proposals and reports. Develop a portfolio that focuses on the value you can bring to a prospective employer.

Take this opportunity to relook at your career goals

Use this time to reflect on your career and reevaluate your career goals. Find answers to questions such as what motivates you, what are your strengths, what do you enjoy doing, and what is meaningful to you.

Re-evalaute and make decisions about moving into something new and better, something in line with your values and motivations. Rewrite your career goals and develop a strategy to get there.

The layoff can present an entire new career opportunity. Read some of the layoff blogs and stories on the web and you will be amazed to discover how many people rebound and find better work after losing their jobs. That may be hard to conceive in the current job market awash with layoffs but for individuals who are willing to change industries, relocate to an area of higher employment or try a new career a layoff can be seen as an opportunity.

Start networking

Be open about your layoff and inform every relevant person that you are currently in the job market. Develop a concise but clear summary of what you are looking for and what skills you have to offer. Have business cards ready to handout at the right moment. Ask for business cards of people you network with to follow up.

Stick to a daily action plan

Develop a structure for your day that involves scheduled activities. Set aside time slots for different activities- networking, job search, researching prospective employers, writing cover letters and sending out resumes. Also include important activities such as exercise, healthy eating and some time spent on hobbies or activities that help you relax. It is important to get out of the house so visit the library to do some job research or simply take a walk through the park.

Struture provides a sense of control over your life. Normally a job provides this structure to your day so it is important to create an interim structure while you are unemployed. Sticking to the schedule gives a sense of accomplishment. Additionally the more job search activities you involve yourself in the greater your chances of finding and securing the job you want.

The Economic Downturn Means That Hiring Freezes Will Soon Decimate Recruiting

Whenever there is a downturn in economic conditions, one of the first knee-jerk reactions that many CFOs and senior managers take is placing a freeze on all hiring, pay raises, budgets, and promotions.

The effect of long-term hiring freezes is particularly damaging to the recruiting function, because “no hiring” generally means that a majority of recruiters will be laid off. Historically, budgets for recruiting have been cut so low that the function is literally decimated, making it rather difficult for companies to resurrect a decent function when the economy swings up.

Many executives think that the decision to institute some sort of resource freeze is one that helps the organization because it contains costs; however, the opposite is more often the case.

Poorly thought-out freezes that impact talent acquisition and other talent-management activities may actually harm the organization by:

• Driving increases or vacancies in revenue producing/impacting roles that decrease revenues beyond any cost savings.
• Driving increases in employee burnout/turnover.
• Missing out on new talent opportunities (i.e., not be able to hire a superstar that becomes available).
• Decreasing an organization’s capability/capacity to innovate.
• Damaging the employer brand making hiring more difficult when the economy returns.

Rather than waiting for the inevitable announcement of a freeze, recruiters need to be proactive and preempt any such silliness long before it occurs by making the business case for leveraging this time to re-architect the talent acquisition function, upgrade its strategic programs, and trade up the talent population while salaries and vendor costs can be negotiated down significantly.

(Incidentally, you can tell when a hiring freeze is imminent because they are almost always preceded by the infamous “paper clip memo” from the CFO, which limits the purchase of office supplies, magazine subscriptions, and travel).

Because every organization is unique, there is no one magic way to structure the business case, but I have put together a list of arguments that you can select from:

A) Negative impacts on revenue and costs
Obviously, not expanding your staff or keeping open positions vacant can save payroll dollars in the short term. However, such savings may actually present a false reality because freezes have many other unintended consequences that CFOs often fail to account for:

1. Lost revenue. Across-the-board hiring freezes mean that critical revenue-generating and revenue-impact positions go unfilled. Obviously, when there is no one in a revenue-generating position, there is a lost opportunity to generate revenue every day that the position remains vacant.
2. Customer impacts. Frozen budgets and understaffing can stretch your employees. This means that other employees must now do double duty because replacements can’t be hired. This may also impact quality and send a message to your customers that your firm is slipping as constrained employees sidestep process elements and cut corners. Both can negatively impact your product brand and future sales.
3. A limit on growth. Within most large firms, even during tough times some businesses units are growing, while others are shrinking. By freezing hiring “across the board,” you negatively impact your rapid growth and top revenue generating divisions. This limits their ability to continue to grow. In global firms, some regions are likely to be growing despite the downturn and an overall freeze will threaten your competitive position.
4. Headcount replacements are expensive. In the end, few hiring freezes actually end up saving money because budgeted headcount employees are often just replaced with consultants, temps, interns, and other “off the book” spending. In some cases, these alternative consultants and workers are actually more expensive than regular employees, leading to a situation where overall “labor costs” don’t go down at all. Facing employee shortages, some managers increase the use of overtime in order to get the work done, but at time and a half, this solution is relatively expensive.

B) Retention impacts

1. Frustrated employee turnover. Freezing resources means stagnation, and when opportunities are limited, they are likely to seek employment elsewhere. Freezing pay, promotions, travel, and/or training can also limit employee growth and learning, which will also increase turnover, if not immediately, at the first sign of opportunity.
2. It encourages your competitors. Hiring freezes are visible to outsiders on your website and the news of their existence spreads rapidly. These freezes send a message to your competitors that you are “weak” and struggling. This may cause them to increase their efforts to recruit away your employees and more often than not, your customers.
3. Freezing deadwood. Unfortunately, not being able to fill vacant positions causes managers to slow down or even cease their efforts to get rid of their deadwood employees. “Carrying” these low performers leads to lower productivity overall, but also weakens your managers by not forcing them to confront low performers. It gives managers an excuse not to make tough people decisions, which may also eventually weaken their decision making in product areas also.
4. Freezes frustrate “idle” recruiters. The best recruiters you are able to keep on your staff will invariably get rusty during hiring freezes. Having idle recruiters is a waste of money but it can also foster turnover among your recruiters who love action.

C) Missing out on talent opportunities

1. Exceptional talent. Across-the-board hiring freezes mean that when a few exceptional individuals like “Tiger Woods” enter the talent market, you will not be able to consider them. As a result, you’ll miss out on exceptional talent who could really make an impact. If your firm doesn’t capture this exceptional talent, other firms will.
2. Off-cycle recruiting. During tough economic times, both the amount and the quality of available talent will greatly exceed the available talent during boom times. Because during lean times, few firms are hiring, there is minimal competition. Together this means that a firm can now successfully attract experienced and college hires that their weak employment brand, pay rates or location wouldn’t normally allow.
3. Weakened recruiting capability. Extended hiring freezes invariably weaken the recruiting function. This loss of recruiting capability can impact the business because the remaining recruiting staff won’t have the ability to successfully recruit and land “in demand” candidates for the few positions that do become open.

D) Reduced innovation and technological capability

1. Reduced innovation. Budget freezes in particular can rob your innovators of the resources that they need to innovate, just as hiring freezes prevent you from recruiting new innovators. As a result, the rate of process and product innovation may decrease significantly during hiring freeze. In addition, freezing promotions and pay increases may limit your innovators motivation and willingness to be creative.
2. Impacts on technology. Because technology is constantly evolving and improving, hiring and budget freezes will directly limit your ability to attract new technologists and the needed new technologies.

E) Additional negative impacts of freezes

1. Employment brand impact. It signals a stoppage in a firm’s growth, which can impact your firm’s employment brand as a great place to work. This can make future recruiting more difficult and expensive.
2. Stock price impact. A freeze sends a message to analysts, customers, suppliers, and employees that your firm is not in a growth mode. Long or frequent “pauses” in recruiting may also send a stronger message that the company is in trouble, which could further hurt the stock price, which is likely lower anyway as a result of the weak economy.
3. Recovery time. Hiring freezes often mean that the recruiting function will be decimated. The function cannot be rebuilt overnight after the freezes are lifted. Many managers wrongfully assume that recruiting is a pure production function, one which you can put money into today and get results out tomorrow. While recruiting truly is a production function, it often requires significant ramp-up time, which many organizations fail to plan for. Refilling the “talent pipeline” with candidates after a freeze might take months, which can end up making the freeze last even longer than intended. In addition, “exploding out of the box” when the economy improves will also be more difficult.
4. Excessive early spending. Anticipating freezes often encourages hiring managers to hire “a bunch” of people early (whether they are needed or not). They do this in order to avoid “losing” the positions later in the year when hiring and budget freezes are generally introduced. In the same light, rumors of possible freezes can make managers and HR paranoid and to do “immediate panic” hiring the moment they hear a rumor about an upcoming freeze. They might also make rush decisions during a current hiring process, in order to complete it prior to the institution of a forthcoming hiring freeze.
5. Lower referral rates. Freezes may cause employees to hesitate before making referrals. They are hesitant partly because budget, promotion and pay freezes make the organization a less desirable place to work but also because a freeze may make their efforts fruitless because it diminishes the chances that their referrals will soon be hired.
6. More time spent on administration. Most across-the-board freezes are really not true freezes. Top managers almost always leave “exceptions” open. As a result, they don’t really “stop” hiring, they just slow requisition approvals and make them more painful to get approved. A large amount of a managers (and HR’s) time is wasted “getting around” these freezes and justifying “exceptions.” It can also give managers a bad taste for hiring of any kind, which may result in managers not devoting much time to the hiring process once the regular hiring process returns.

Action Steps

Rather than instituting across-the-board freezes, educate managers about the different options they have for cutting costs and increasing revenues:

• Focus on budget dollars. When it is important to slow down expenditures, it is often better to do it through budget control (controlling dollars) rather than through a hiring freeze or headcount tracking. In addition, always look at the revenue impacts whenever costs are cut.
• Increase internal movement. Managers need to increase the impact of their current employees by developing plans to transfer people internally from low return areas to those with higher return.
• Use incentives. Managers should consider offering short-term incentives to employees for increasing productivity or for reducing costs. Employees are often better equipped to judge where costs can be cut with minimal impact on productivity.
• Prioritize positions. If a manager decides to use a hiring freeze, they should limit the freeze to pre-identified non-key positions. Otherwise, a vacancy in a critical job can cause a significant loss in revenue and negate the projected cost savings from the hiring freeze.
• Demand metrics. If freezes are used, track metrics to determine whether overall costs are actually reduced by the freeze.
• Performance management. Managers should be encouraged to periodically fire low performing employees first, before seeking replacements.
• Rapid growth divisions. These critical regions or business units should be exempt from across-the-board freezes.
• Continuous churn. The new realities of talent management and business are that the old pattern of resource freezes and then layoffs needs to be broken. In a global economy, where firms need to be fast and agile, the new model is for firms to simultaneously hire and release workers in different areas. Smart managers must learn to continually add workers in areas of growth and innovation, while continually redeploying or releasing workers in areas of low ROI.

Final Thoughts

Any review of history will reveal that the majority of wealth in modern civilizations is more often than not created during times of significant economic crisis.

Opportunities abound for those organizations that are truly strategic, but as we all know, lots of people talk about being strategic but few really are. Now is the time for talent management to step up and proactively re-engineer antiquated practices and programs, and to embed talent management activities throughout core business processes while the organization can accommodate change.

If you wait until things are moving fast once again, you won’t have time to be strategic; you’ll be too busy catching up!

Managing Recruiting During an Economic Downturn: The Top 10 Action Steps to Take

A key question in every recruiting manager’s mind these days is “how will recruiting and talent management be impacted by the economic downturn?”

In fact, it was also be a major topic at ERE Expo in Hollywood Beach, Florida. This article will highlight some issues to anticipate and action steps you can take that will increase the probability of your survival and perhaps even prosperity during these tough economic times.

We all already realize that there are periodic economic downturns. These downturns quite often negatively impact the recruiting function through hiring freezes and dramatic budget cuts in recruiting as organizations seek to “contain costs.”

However, this economic downturn is different. Traditionally, when the economic cycle peaks and starts its cycle downwards, everything related to business and recruiting declines; events are consistent and relatively predictable.

Instead of recruiting heading straight down, it will be volatile. The demand for talent management services will go radically down, then back up again in short spurts, and then down again. This volatility will require more planning than ever before from the recruiting function.

Instead of planning for one consistent, long, downward spiral with associated layoffs and hiring freezes, organizations will need to prepare for spurts of growth and continuous hiring in some areas while layoffs occur in others. Some might call these actions “right-sizing” the workforce, but that would imply that organizations are much better at forecasting and workforce planning than most actually are.

There are several reasons why hiring will continue:

• The volatility in credit markets
• Globalization
• The need by organizations to continually innovate

The first and perhaps most important cause of volatility will be the chaotic availability of credit and capital. The continued uncertainty related to financial markets will cause oscillations or “spurts” during which capital will be easier and then harder to get. This volatility will cause firms to grow and to hire in spurts.

A second cause of volatility is globalization. In a truly global business world, there will almost always be some degree of economic growth in emerging economies scattered around the world. Because many major US companies now book a majority of their revenues abroad, pressure to keep corporate functions fully staffed will continue despite possible layoffs in production and client service groups.

A third reason volatility will plague the recruiting function is relentless consumer demand for new innovative products. Despite the downturn, consumer demand remains high. When negative news erupts, those in Western societies go shopping!

Because the rate of innovation among competitive firms is unlikely to slow down, firms will still need to rapidly innovate in their products and business processes.

13 Trends In Corporate Recruiting for 2009

A significant part of my work involves giving presentations to companies around the world on the recruiting services. It is an aspect of my work that I truly enjoy because it affords me an opportunity to continuously learn about where our profession is headed.

Through speaking, I not only help companies understand the latest recruiting trends, but I also learn from hundreds of professionals about what they see as hot topics, emerging trends, and how they are approaching them. I wanted to take this opportunity to share my thoughts on what recruiting trends will top the agendas of Global 500 recruiting managers in the next 12 to 18 months based on my interaction with more than 300 organizations around the globe this year.

The Latest Trends in Corporate Recruiting

Based on conversations with recruiting leaders, questions asked during seminars, advisory requests, and best-practice research, expect to see an increased emphasis in:

• Upgrading employment branding. Nothing is hotter around the globe in recruiting than employment branding. Firms throughout Asia, in particular, are increasingly adopting employment branding as a wildly important activity for 2009. The success of Google, a firm that has built the world’s strongest employment brand over an amazing five-year period, has led others to focus on this impactful long-term strategy. Key focus areas include increasing media coverage, increasing visibility online, building your “green” brand, and countering your “negative” employment brand. Firms to watch: Facebook, Google, Yum Brands, Tata, E&Y, Enterprise, U.S. Army, and Sodexo.
• Reinvigorating referral programs. Despite the growth of career-related Internet sites, the highest volume and quality candidates still come from well-designed employee referral programs. While heavy adoption was initially hampered by cultural issues around the world, today such programs are proving highly effective everywhere. Key focus areas include proactively approaching key employees for referrals (program targeting), leverage non-employee referrals, making reward systems more comprehensive, immediate, and visible, and last but not least, helping employees leverage social media to restore relationships, make new relationships, and build stronger relationships. Firms to watch: AmTrust Bank, Edward Jones, Whirlpool, and Amazon.com.
• Renewing the focus on quality of hire. As a result of strong research by organizations like staffing.org, recruiting leadership has begun to refocus its efforts on identifying factors that increase the quality or the on-the-job performance of new hires. Key focus areas include improved quality of hire metrics, calculating the performance differential between average and quality hires, and identifying sources that produce high-quality hires. Firms to watch: Aimco and Wipro.
• Reinforcing the business case for recruiting. As budgets tighten and slow economic growth continues, recruiting budgets will face constant constraints. Instead of whining, many leading talent organizations are seizing the opportunity to reposition themselves as non-transactional organizations. When the focus in recruiting is placed on non-transactional, more systemic issues, such organizations can work with the CFO and risk management to demonstrate the importance of supporting recruiting even during times of reduced hiring volume. The key focus areas include predictive modeling, dollarizing recruiting results, and showing the dollar impact of vacancies in revenue generating positions. Firms to watch: Aimco, DFS, Wipro, and Google.

• Utilizing social networks. Although using social networks as a recruiting source has been a well-discussed concept for a while, few firms have found productive ways to truly leverage social media sites. However, as new approaches are developed that more accurately align with the paradigm of social media audiences, recruiting on social networks will become more mainstream. Focus areas include encouraging your employees to be more visible online and using networks to identify innovators. Key networking sites include Facebook (global), MySpace (global), Friendster (global), LinkedIn (global), Twitter (U.S.), Multiply (Asia), Mixi (Japan), Cyworld (Korea), and Xiaonei (China). Firms to watch: E&Y, Zappos, CIA, Yum Brands, Google, and Facebook.
• Utilizing video. While it may be hard for some to fathom, 1:1 and 1:many video has become a very popular communication medium, surpassing all other forms of Internet traffic. Second only to employee referrals, the most impactful tool for effectively demonstrating the excitement and passion at a firm is online video. If a picture is worth a thousand words, then moving pictures demonstrating what it’s like to work at your firm would have to be “priceless.” Focus areas include posting on video-sharing sites such as YouTube (global), Youku.com (China), and sharing employee-generated “unscripted” videos on your corporate site. Firms to watch: Deloitte, Microsoft, and Google.
• Upgrading succession planning. A common practice becomes much more critical as global growth and large-scale retirement loom on the horizon. Focus areas include replacing retirees, improved succession planning metrics, adding external candidates to your plan, and fast-track leadership development. Firms to watch: Intuit, Eli Lilly, Deloitte, and TVA.
• Using employee blogs for recruiting. A practice that is finally beginning to enter the mainstream is employee blogging to support recruiting efforts. The very best firms use blogs not just to spread their message but also to answer questions and to make their company appear more “real” and approachable. Key focus areas include blogs by employees other than recruiters and micro-blogs. Firms to watch: Microsoft, Google, and Sun.
• Using mobile-phone recruiting. As mobile phones with amazing features spread throughout the population, recruiting managers are beginning to realize that they can be a powerful recruiting media. Key focus areas include text messaging, mobile video, and mobile-accessible corporate careers sites. Firms to watch: Google and nearly any firm in Asia!
• Revitalizing corporate jobs page. Recruiting managers are beginning to understand that pitifully dull and dated websites drive away innovators. Focus areas include providing personalized information to the visitor, Flash video integration, blogs, podcasts, and virtual Q&As. Firms to watch: Microsoft, Google, and Deloitte.
• Using a CRM model for hiring. I’ve been touting the values of the CRM (customer relationship management) model for years. More firms are beginning to understand the value of improving the experience at each “touch point” with the candidate. Key focus areas include relationship recruiting, automated applicant profiling, automated event calendaring, and robust lifecycle metrics. Firms to watch: U.S. Army, GlaxoSmithKline, and E&Y.
• Hiring innovators. Rapid product copying and the high visibility of innovative firms like Apple and Google are forcing recruiting managers to modify recruiting processes in order to successfully recruit innovators and game changers. Key focus areas include relationship recruiting, pre-need hiring, and tolerant/inclusive screening and interviewing processes. Firms to watch: IBM and Google.
• Recruiting globally. Recruiting managers are beginning to learn how to differentiate multi-national recruiting from true global recruiting. Key focus areas include global sourcing, globalized websites, and globalized employer referral programs. Firms to watch: Infosys and IBM.

Other Trends to Observe

Although these trends aren’t red-hot, they are emerging areas where a few firms have taken the lead and have produced noticeable results. These are certainly not going to become mainstream for most firms during the next year, but if you are an innovator, keep a close watch:

• Virtual-reality recruiting on SecondLife
• Video games as recruiting tools
• Online assessment tools
• Using contests to identify internal and external prospects
• Simulations for candidate assessment
• Inclusive recruiting (replacing diversity recruiting)
• Remote interviewing
• Remote college recruiting
• A renewed focus on internal redeployment
• Boomerangs (bringing back key ex-employees)
• Recruiting at professional events
• Using credit card/sales leads to find prospects
• Using analytics and modeling to predict future workforce needs
• A new focus on the use of contingent workers in the weak economy
• “Remote” college recruiting
• A focus on contingent hiring
• Improving on-boarding to build the employment brand
• Reality TV shows as a recruiting and branding mechanism

KEY MARKETING TRENDS FOR CANADA MARKET IN 2009

What does one do when you have a bit of free time on your hands after finishing the work? The answer is of course simple: you put together a prediction of key marketing trends for next year (2009)!

I bet that the top three marketing trends that will impact how Canadian marketers do business in 2009 will be:

• Mobilization
• Personalization
• Greenification

With the cell phone technology becoming more advanced, marketers need to dial into a new wave of mobile linked promotions. Apple has been leading the trend in this area, with their iPhone, which is going to be launched in Canada July 2008.

Second version of iPhone is going to be equipped with a new generation of location-aware software created in collaboration with Google Inc. Furthermore, expected to retail at a price of $199 (under a 3 year contract), iPhone is going to be quite affordable compared to other Smartphones on the market today. What does that mean for marketers in Canada? It means that with the increased popularity of the iPhone marketing spending on mobile medium is likely to receive a significant boost; in particular companies are going to start investing more into mobile advertising and building their mobile presence.

There are already services in US that allow promotional coupons to be sent to user’s cell-phone once they are in the vicinity of a particular registered business, maximizing the potential for lead generation and conversion. Combine that with the fact that new generation of Smartphones will likely allow for a far more granular measurement of marketing ROI and there’s a real possibility that mobile marketing dollars are going to be the biggest growth area next year.



As Canadians increase the use of Bluetooth, Wi-Fi and GPS technologies available in majority of new Smartphones, their mobile experience will become more personalized. Prior to these technologies such level of personalization was only available sitting in-front of the computer. With the mobile personalization, depending both on their location and preferences users would be receiving selected promotional information on their mobile phones that could be made much more relevant and appealing to them. This also lessens the traditional gap of time and distance between when a consumer sees an ad and when they can actually buy the product which in turn would increase the effectiveness of promotional activities.

Furthermore, as marketing dollars continue transitioning towards online medium, social networking sites will start to play an even more important role in 2009. Websites like Facebook and MySpace as well as other niche players will increasingly help marketers to deliver their message effectively through the clutter to their target audiences. This will be made possible through the abundance of personal preference data that users willingly share on those sites.


Gas prices have skyrocketed over the last three years. Last year alone the price of gas shot up 31%. As gas prices increase, the topic of energy starts to occupy greater share of consumer’s mind and so does the related topic of environment. Hence, Greenification is becoming another hot topic. As companies continue to attempt differentiating themselves in consumer’s mind being the Greenest is finally starting to pay off real dividends. Therefore metrics measuring how Green is the company perceived by its target segment will provide an additional insight of potential sales driver in 2009.

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Now we'll just have to wait a year to see how close I really was ;)

Historic Win for Obama

Barack Obama claimed the White House on Tuesday night, saying his election as the first African-American president of the US sent a message that “change has come” to a troubled nation.

“If there is anyone out there who still doubts that America is a place where all things are possible, who still wonders if the dream of our founders is alive in our time, who still questions the power of our democracy, tonight is your answer,” Obama, 47, told more than 125,000 cheering supporters in Chicago.

A wave of discontent with Republican rule and the nation’s direction powered the Illinois senator to a sweeping electoral victory over Republican rival John McCain. Obama won at least 349 electoral votes, far more than the 270 needed for a majority and the most for a winner since former President Bill Clinton got 379 electoral votes in 1996.

The results should encourage “those who’ve been told for so long by so many to be cynical and fearful and doubtful about what we can achieve to put their hands on the arc of history and bend it once more toward the hope of a better day,” Obama said.

Americans spilled out on the streets in cities across the country to celebrate. Almost four hours after television networks called the race for Obama, people were still cheering and honking non-stop in Washington as thousands gathered by the White House, shouting Obama’s name and his campaign slogan of “Yes, we can.”

Before speaking to supporters in Chicago’s Grant Park, Obama took congratulatory phone calls from McCain and President George W Bush, who will leave office upon Obama’s inauguration, set for January 20. Arizona senator McCain, 72, conceding the race in Phoenix, told his supporters that Obama “has achieved a great thing for himself and his country.”

But Obama won’t have time to catch his breath. Having won the longest election in US history, the new administration will begin as economic indicators suggest the US may be headed for the deepest recession in a quarter century and the most complicated financial crisis since the Great Depression. Wages are stagnant, credit is squeezed and costs are escalating.

“The crisis crystallised in so many ways what was really at stake,” said Anita Dunn, a senior Obama adviser. “We had been saying it’s a big election about big things.” For many people, the WallStreet crisis and the $700-billion bailout brought “into focus how big the challenges are.”

About three weeks ago, as the crises deepened and financial markets reeled, Obama increased the proposed cost of his “middle-class rescue plan” to $175 billion from $115 billion. Advisers said pushing through that stimulus, which would direct funds to financially strapped states, rebuild infrastructure and give a $1,000 tax rebate to eligible families, will be Obama’s top priority in January if Congress doesn’t pass a comparable plan this month.

But Obama may not wait until Inauguration Day to get started. He’ll get his chance when Congress returns in less than two weeks for a lame-duck session with plans to pass another economic stimulus bill. Such a package would only be a down payment on Obama’s economic recovery programme if the Republican incumbent, George W Bush, supports it. The rest will come when Obama, 47, is in the White House.

The Democratic president-elect has much more on his agenda, amounting to what may be the broadest overhaul of the US economy since Franklin D Roosevelt’s New Deal. Beyond job creation and big investments in public works, Obama intends to shift the tax burden back toward the wealthy, roll back a quarter-century of deregulation, extend health-care coverage to all Americans and reassess the US government’s pursuit of free- trade deals.

Meanwhile, European stocks retreated for the first time in seven days and US index futures dropped after disappointing earnings overshadowed speculation that Obama will boost the economy with a stimulus package.

Time Warner Inc declined 2.2% in Germany as the world’s largest media company lowered its full-year profit forecast. ArcelorMittal, the biggest steelmaker, slumped 15% after saying it will slash production as prices tumbled. The dollar gained against the euro and Treasuries fell on expectations Obama’s victory and Democrat gains in Congress will speed passage of spending plans.

Europe’s Dow Jones Stoxx 600 Index lost 1.5% to 230.07 as of 11.55 am in London. Futures on the S&P 500 decreased 0.7% before a report that may show service industries in the US shrank in October.

“There is still deterioration in the profits outlook,” said Bernd Meyer, head of pan-European equity strategy at Deutsche Bank AG in London. “Earnings estimates from analysts are too high. The fourth quarter will be substantially weaker.”

—Bloomberg...