Archive for November, 2008

HR, Training & Recruitment Survey

Friday, November 28th, 2008

SHL Ireland completed a survey with organisations in Ireland and there were some interesting findings. I have outlined the key points below. As expected there is an air of consolidation and getting more out of existing staff resources through up-skilling and redeployment initiatives.

59pc of companies surveyed indicated that redefining how staff will need to operate was ‘critical’ to 2009 HR strategy.

47.6pc indicated that redeployment of staff as an important strategy to implement in the current economic climate.

67.9pc of companies surveyed indicated that succession planning would be key in identifying who within their organisation would be retrained in 2009.

57.9pc reported cut back of 25pc or less in recruitment, training and development budgets.

16.2pc identified an immediate requirement to cut staff through voluntary or forced redundancy. Is this your organisation? Outplacement Services can support.

44.7pc of organisations surveyed revealing they have no immediate plans to reduce the intake on their graduate/management development programmes.

Outplacement Services by Recruitment Agencies

Monday, November 17th, 2008

I offered some free advertising on this site for Recruiters or HR Service providers. One thing I didn’t clarify was that direct competition would not get a look in. As we offer Outplacement Services those seeking to advertise similar services need not apply.

Anyway I received little response BUT was surprised that the small response was all from Recruitment Agencies who were seeking to advertise outplacement and career services. Sign of the times I guess.

Now I am not anti-agency providing these services as many commentators are. I am actually from an agency background some moons ago and I realise that there are many skilled professionals in the recruitment sector with qualifications and experience to support organisations and employees through redundancy. I know of many professionals who have moved from recruitment into outplacement and career services very successfully (again including this writer). BUT there is a distinct difference between those professionals in that they chose and were not forced to.

The questions I ask are:

“How committed are recruitment agencies to Outplacement & Career services?”

Possessing the ability and capability is one thing but the commitment is another. Having discussed this with some agencies they have no more interest in Outplacement or Careers and this is purely for income generation during a tough recruitment market. Once the market picks up the interest will subside. One particular agency left a post on this site advertising Outplacement services. When I visited their website there was no mention of these services. One other agency I read about “had been thinking of this for some time” – really!!

“Can you be a recruiter and give impartial Career & Outplacement advice?”

This is a 50 million dollar question. If a sales professional affected by redundancy is telling the recruitment consultant offering outplacement support that the want a career change. What will the recruiter do/ how will they respond when they have an open vacancy for sales which this sales professional would fill in a heartbeat. Tough one!!

Anyway – any views on this please post.

HR Research – HR Managers & Professionals – Products & Services

Wednesday, November 12th, 2008

Recent survey trends have just been released which make interesting reading for organisations offering products and services to HR professionals. Survey data was collected in August 2008 and is based on responses from HR related professionals.

Key trends highlighted include the following

64% of HR buyers use the Internet as their first stop when searching for HR related services or products that they are interested acquiring. Interesting they go online even before getting a recommendation from a peer.

In excess of 50% of HR buyers that were surveyed indicated that they use an Internet search engines at least once a week to search for human resources related information. Not surprisingly Google was the most popular search engine.

Research found that the most popular “business” social networking service for HR buyers was LinkedIn.

To me there are no surprises with this research. The internet is now the key marketing medium to target potential customers and Google of the search engine of choice. What is of surprise though is the lack of uptake by product and service providers. Many are making half hearted attempts to embrace online marketing.

For example we gave an opportunity a few weeks back for free advertising on this site in the form of a free post. Did anyone take it up? NO!! Why because they would have to write a short post themselves with fresh content.

You see this site has about 300 visitors a day and you can see from the URL that it has 2 very relevant words “HR” and “RECRUITMENT” so you can bet the traffic includes HR Professionals. The site ranks well for many important key word searches. It’s not rocket science really ……..

Anyway anyone still interested in free advertising and PR I will ask you to visit HR & Recruitment Services

Interview Ireland