5 Principles for Uncertain Times - Indra Nooyi

She came, she spoke and she gave the answers. Well, some anyway. PepsiCo's India-born Chairperson and CEO, Ms Indra Nooyi, had the tough job of speaking last at the three-day long AdAsia2011. But she was not at loss for words in her concluding keynote speech, she provided some solutions to dealing with uncertainty.

Dressed in orange and sporting a black jacket, Ms Nooyi, who flew into New Delhi from the Middle East in a private jet just for the keynote, stuck to the conference theme of dealing with uncertainty.

“We are living in a period of negative uncertainty,” she emphasised, “Creativity has given way to fear and risk has triumphed over ingenuity,” she said, grimly pointing to how companies today were grappling with a crisis of leadership, crisis of governorship and severe crisis of expectations.

“While I don't have all the answers, I do have five thoughts,” she said.

FIVE LESSONS

Her first tip to corporations was: recognise and accept that we are in a new era of uncertainty, and adapt accordingly.

Second, lead for today as well as tomorrow at the same time. “It is companies with a clear long-term mission that will thrive. So, we have to work on two time scales at once,” she said.

Third, make big changes to big things. “Disruption is now our friend, not our enemy, she told the marketers.

“If you don't disrupt yourselves, the competition will,” was her warning.

Fourth, nurture talent. “In the time of volatility and uncertainty, the way we buy, broaden and bond our talent will be the key to whether we atrophy, just survive or thrive.”

And, her final piece of advice to heads of corporations was to be super-visible as a leader. “We need to communicate all the time.”.

FIZZ IN EMERGING MARKETS

Ms Nooyi rued that the $60-billion PepsiCo, which employs 300,000, still had most of its business volumes and revenues coming from the developed world.

“I wish 60 per cent of our business was in emerging markets,” she said, saying she was working on getting to a 50:50 situation in the next five years — “50 per cent in emerging markets and 50 per cent in developed markets.”

“We are all evolving models, the book on this has not been written yet,” she concluded.

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Why Companies Aren't Getting the Employees They Need

By PETER CAPPELLI

Everybody's heard the complaints about recruiting lately.

Even with unemployment hovering around 9%, companies are grousing that they can't find skilled workers, and filling a job can take months of hunting.

Employers are quick to lay blame. Schools aren't giving kids the right kind of training. The government isn't letting in enough high-skill immigrants. The list goes on and on.

But I believe that the real culprits are the employers themselves.

With an abundance of workers to choose from, employers are demanding more of job candidates than ever before. They want prospective workers to be able to fill a role right away, without any training or ramp-up time.

Bad for Companies, Bad for Economy

Andrea Levy

In other words, to get a job, you have to have that job already. It's a Catch-22 situation for workers—and it's hurting companies and the economy.

To get America's job engine revving again, companies need to stop pinning so much of the blame on our nation's education system. They need to drop the idea of finding perfect candidates and look for people who could do the job with a bit of training and practice.

There are plenty of ways to get workers up to speed without investing too much time and money, such as putting new employees on extended probationary periods and relying more on internal hires, who know the ropes better than outsiders would.

It's a fundamental change from business as usual. But the way we're doing things now just isn't working.

The Big Myths

The perceptions about a lack of skilled workers are pervasive. The staffing company ManpowerGroup, for instance, reports that 52% of U.S. employers surveyed say they have difficulty filling positions because of talent shortages.

But the problem is an illusion.

Some of the complaints about skill shortages boil down to the fact that employers can't get candidates to accept jobs at the wages offered. That's an affordability problem, not a skill shortage. A real shortage means not being able to find appropriate candidates at market-clearing wages. We wouldn't say there is a shortage of diamonds when they are incredibly expensive; we can buy all we want at the prevailing prices.

The real problem, then, is more appropriately an inflexibility problem. Finding candidates to fit jobs is not like finding pistons to fit engines, where the requirements are precise and can't be varied. Jobs can be organized in many different ways so that candidates who have very different credentials can do them successfully.

Only about 10% of the people in IT jobs during the Silicon Valley tech boom of the 1990s, for example, had IT-related degrees. While it might be great to have a Ph.D. graduate read your electrical meter, almost anyone with a little training could do the job pretty well.

A Training Shortage

And make no mistake: There are plenty of people out there who could step into jobs with just a bit of training—even recent graduates who don't have much job experience. Despite employers' complaints about the education system, college students are pursuing more vocationally oriented course work than ever before, with degrees in highly specialized fields like pharmaceutical marketing and retail logistics.

Unfortunately, American companies don't seem to do training anymore. Data are hard to come by, but we know that apprenticeship programs have largely disappeared, along with management-training programs. And the amount of training that the average new hire gets in the first year or so could be measured in hours and counted on the fingers of one hand. Much of that includes what vendors do when they bring in new equipment: "Here's how to work this copier."

The shortage of opportunities to learn on the job helps explain the phenomenon of people queueing up for unpaid internships, in some cases even paying to get access to a situation where they can work free to get access to valuable on-the-job experience.

Companies in other countries do things differently. In Europe, for instance, training is often mandated, and apprenticeships and other programs that help provide work experience are part of the infrastructure.

The result: European countries aren't having skill-shortage complaints at the same level as in the U.S., and the nations that have the most established apprenticeship programs—the Scandinavian nations, Germany and Switzerland—have low unemployment.

Employers here at home rightly point to a significant constraint that they face in training workers: They train them and make the investment, but then someone else offers them more money and hires them away.

The Way Forward

That is a real problem. What's the answer?

We aren't going to get European-style apprenticeships in the U.S. They require too much cooperation among employers and bigger investments in infrastructure than any government entity is willing to provide. We're also not going to go back to the lifetime-employment models that made years-long training programs possible.

But I'm also convinced that some of the problem we're up against is simply a failure of imagination. Here are three ways in which employees can get the skills they need without the employer having to invest in a lot of upfront training.

Work with education providers: If job candidates don't have the skills you need, make them go to school before you hire them.

Community colleges in many states, especially North Carolina, have proved to be good partners with employers by tailoring very applied course work to the specific needs of the employer. Candidates qualify to be hired once they complete the courses—which they pay for themselves, at least in part. For instance, a manufacturer might require that prospective job candidates first pass a course on quality control or using certain machine tools.

Going back to school isn't just for new hires, either; it also works for internal candidates. In this setup, the employer pays the tuition costs through tuition reimbursement. But the employees make the bigger investment by spending their own time, almost always off work, learning the material.

Bring back aspects of apprenticeship: In this arrangement, apprentices are paid less while they are mastering their craft—so employers aren't paying for training and a big salary at the same time. Accounting firms, law firms and professional-services firms have long operated this way, and have made lots of money off their young associates.

Of course, a full apprenticeship model—with testing and credentials associated with different stages of experience—wouldn't work in all industries. But a simpler setup would: Companies could give their new workers a longer probationary period—with lower pay—until they get up to speed on the requirements of the job.

Promote from within: Employees have useful knowledge that no outsider could have and should make great candidates for filling jobs higher up. In recent years, however, an incredible two-thirds of all vacancies, even in large companies, have been filled by hiring from the outside, according to data from Taleo Corp., a talent-management company. That figure has dropped somewhat lately because of market conditions. But a generation ago, the number was close to 10%, as internal promotions and transfers were used to fill virtually all positions.

These days, many companies simply don't believe their own workers have the necessary skills to take on new roles. But, once again, many workers could step into those jobs with a bit of training.

And there's one on-the-job education strategy that doesn't cost companies a dime: Organize work so that employees are given projects that help them learn new skills. For example, a marketing manager may not know how to compute the return on marketing programs but might learn that skill while working on a team project with colleagues from the finance department.

Pursuing options like these vastly expands the supply of talent that employers can tap, making it both cheaper and easier to fill jobs. Of course, it's also much better for society. It helps build the supply of human capital in the economy, as well as opening the pathway for more people to get jobs.

It's an important instance where company self-interest and societal interest just happen to coincide.

Dr. Cappelli is the George W. Taylor professor of management at the Wharton School and director of Wharton's Center for Human Resources. He can be reached atreports@wsj.com.

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Organizational Culture Change

Mohit Kishore

The changing culture is a complex problem faced by many organisations. It's a lot like repairing the engine of a moving vehicle. While new firms have the luxury of gradually building the culture that best serves their interest, larger organisations tend to find themselves ‘stuck' with cultures that may be completely at odds with their stated vision or strategy. The big question then is whether it is possible to change culture mid-course. The answer may lie in understanding how culture is created in the first place.

individual & organisational values

The crux of culture is values — in simple terms values expressed in the form of behaviours is what is perceived as culture. Values themselves may be of two kinds — individual and organisational.

The source of organisational values is usually the values of the founders. However, with time, as the firm transitions the values could change. This could be due to a lack of attention paid to the developing culture, particularly when meeting the demands of rapid growth. This takes the form of indiscriminate addition of individuals whose values may be at odds with the founding values. While organisational values may be documented formally, the ‘real' organisational values are informally “stored” in the minds of members of the organisation.

Individual values may be of two kinds — expressed, and suppressed. Expressed values are those that members of an organisation choose to express in their behaviour based on their assessment of what is required in the organisation or ‘what works'. The other values possessed by an individual member may be suppressed, at least in the organisational context. It is this interplay between “stored” organisational values and individual values that develops into “culture” in the manifested form. The metaphor of an iceberg could represent this interplay. What is seen above the surface is culture, but what lies beneath is the cause — the complex, ever-evolving dynamic of organisational and individual values.

The right culture

The next question that arises is — what is the right kind of culture for a particular organisation. The simple answer to this would be — the culture in which there is no conflict between organisational and individual values, and where organisational values themselves are aligned to what the organisation seeks to achieve. It is important to recognise that the culture manifested at any time is indeed already the most appropriate culture for the current interplay between organisational and individual member values.

However, this culture may happen to be completely counter-productive to the organisational goals, owing to degraded organisational values or high conflict between individual and organisational values. Any attempt to transform culture by simply manipulating the manifest dimension of culture will not succeed unless the underlying interplay of values is not addressed.

Thus, culture transformation must address both organisational and individual values. On the organisational values front, one may first need to begin with an assessment of what the organisation's values really are. If the current state of values is a diluted version of the original intent, a fresh rediscovery or redefinition of values may need to take place in order to define an ideal state.

On the individual values front, the first intervention should be at the ‘input' stage, where new members are inducted. If a well-defined organisational identity or value is in place, it is not difficult to identify and add individuals who are in alignment. The bigger challenge is for existing members. Here, the solution is likely to be a more gradual one. It may involve a reassessment of all levels in the hierarchy to determine the “culture” icons best suited for leadership roles in the “new world” as it were. Leadership roles are the key fulcrums upon which culture is reinforced. This is because leadership behaviours typically tend to activate the relevant values in followers (provided the followers subscribe to those values at least partially).

Over time, a culture transformation process would start to work on the organisation's memory, replacing negative versions of the organisation's values that are “stored” in the minds of members with fresh versions, till the new version becomes the new normal.

Setting right a malfunctioning or poorly aligned organisational culture is undoubtedly a complex process and may require an intuitive, right-brained mindset on the part of the designers, as well as multiple iterations to arrive at the right solution.

Finally, culture needs to be an integral component of organisational strategy, as it is the foundational building block upon which the organisation's purpose can be manifested into reality.

(The writer is a management professional. He can be contacted at mohit.kishore@gmail.com)

Source : Businessline

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Communication is Key to Success

So you have an idea for a business—one that you believe has the potential to alter the industry. You have put together a simple, straightforward proposition that potential customers find easy to understand. You have raised the necessary capital, gathered a team and publicized your new venture by every means available. What happens next?

It’s time to deliver on your promises. And the only difference between merely satisfactory delivery and great delivery is attention to detail.

Anyone who aspires to lead a company must develop a habit of taking notes. I carry a notebook everywhere I go. Most of my entries are like this one, from a Virgin Atlantic flight years ago: “Dirty carpets. Fluff. Areas around bow dirty. Equipment: stainless steel, grotty. Choice of menu disappointing—back from Miami, prawns then lobster (as a main course) in Upper Class. Chicken curry very bland. Chicken should be cut in chunks. Rice pretty dry. No Stilton available on cheeseboard.”

What’s most revealing is this final note: “Staff desperate for someone to listen. Make sure flight staff reports are actioned IMMEDIATELY.” I’m pleased to say that they now are. This is the real key to getting all the other items on the list done—employees are better able to report problems and get them fixed before I come along with my notebook.

And as you decide how best to deliver your product or service, keep in mind the company’s core business values, the medium-term strategic considerations and where the industry is headed in the long term. Make your decisions on the microlevel in light of that bigger picture, and your business should be headed in the right direction.

This problem-solving process should not be limited to the launch. Owners and leaders of established companies should sample their business’ products as often as possible. Many bosses regularly speak to staff at all levels, but often they do not follow up on problems they uncover. This means that their employees never learn what importance the chief executive places on getting the details right, or see just how necessary and possible it is to address the everyday problems that come up. If you foster a corporate culture of waiting for someone else to solve problems, the company will suffer the consequences.

Great delivery also depends on great communication, which should start at the top. Be brave: hand out your email address and phone number. Your employees will know not to misuse it or badger you, and by doing so, you will be giving them a terrific psychological boost—they will know that they can contact you anytime a problem comes up that requires your attention.

Instilling attention to detail throughout your new company will prove especially important when the business begins to gain ground. It always tickles me when a spokesman explains to reporters that a company experiencing delays or other problems in delivering a product or service is “a victim of its own success”—as though it had undergone something rare and freakish. Delivery is not just limited to the company’s first day: Employees across the business should be focusing on getting it right all day, every day.

A few years ago, I saw warning signs that we were starting to stumble when I received a letter from a couple who had planned to travel on Virgin Trains in Britain. We had seen a rapid 50% increase in passenger numbers, and suddenly people were finding it difficult to get a seat on the busier routes. The letter writers had not realized that they now had to book seats in advance. When they arrived at the station, they found the staff unhelpful. Given that the husband was disabled and needed assistance, this was pretty terrible of us.

I personally helped them with their problem, and in the process became concerned about the bigger picture for this company. I penned a letter to Ashley Stockwell, the brand and customer service guardian for Virgin Group, asking him to take a look. Thanks to our renewed focus on delivering great service and attention to detail, we got better and soon received plaudits. I’m proud to say that Virgin Trains delivered on its promises—it wasn’t easy.

Finally, if you do start to see success in the form of new and repeat business, remember to keep a cool head. You’re delivering change, and if you are succeeding, other businesses are very probably getting hurt in the rough and tumble. They will try to shut you down.

Be sportsmanlike, play to win, and then befriend your enemies. If you do fall out with a partner, colleague or competitor, call that person a year later and take him out to dinner. It is likely you have a great deal in common. After all, why did you both get into the business in the first place? To deliver change, serve customers, reform an industry—does any of this sound familiar? Now, what can you create together?

by nyt syndicate

©2011/richard branson

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Part Time Jobs - Are you ready ?

Anjali Prayag

Bangalore, Jan. 7

After offering flexi hours and work-from-home option, tech MNCs are now giving their employees a larger work-life balance choice through part-time work, that is., work for half of a week or choose to work for fewer hours during the entire week.

Starting January 1, SAP Labs India rolled out this new initiative for its employees: they could either choose a four-hour per day work week or decide to work full day for just three or four days in a week.

Terming this as ‘another step to provide a meaningful work life balance' for its employees, Mr Bhuvaneswar Naik, Vice-President, HR, SAP India, said that the salary would decrease in proportion to the option chosen.

Reducing workload

Global tech major GE-Jack F Welch Technology Centre too offers its employees the ‘part-time option' where employees can reduce their workload and consequently decrease work days to fewer than the standard work week days, with a corresponding adjustment in compensation and benefits. Compensation and benefits such as leave, provident fund and gratuity will be reduced to reflect the reduced work schedule, says Mr Raj Raghavan, HR Leader at GE-JFWTC.

Accenture has gone one step ahead and has ‘institutionalised' the flexibility in teams and groups where flexible work options were difficult to operationalise. Through Project Santulan, it has identified those specific roles and ‘flexidised' and ‘unbundled' them.

“We looked into every role and identified components of it which could be done flexibly. Interestingly, the roles we identified belong to job families that potentially impact over two thousand people in the organisation,” says Mr Prithvi Shergill, Human Resources Lead, Accenture India.

Honeywell Technology Solutions does offer part-time working option to employees, including women employees immediately after their statutory maternity leave and employees taking care of special short-term situations at home involving families.

They are also allowed to work part-time either to complete higher studies or for health reasons on a case-to-case basis for periods of time as agreed to with their immediate managers, says Mr Uday Tulapurkar, Director and HR Head India, Honeywell Technology Solutions.

Flexi variants

Ms Saundarya Rajesh, Founder-President, Avtar Career Creators, a recruitment firm that helps people find flexi jobs, says that with over a dozen variants of flexi-working in the Indian workplace, which are proven and tested in terms of efficiency and productivity, companies are surely waking up to the fact that it is better to provide legitimised flexibility than manage absenteeism and low performance and in the case of a woman, even a break in career.

“All large cities are magnets of talent but commuting is a challenge with infrastructure not quite keeping pace with development. Today's lifestyle and the double-income family also impose unique demands on time – for both the man and woman and such options are useful,” she says.

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How HR is helping employees to re-wind ?

How HR is helping employees to re-wind ?

If you were told you could put your feet up and take a nap in office, would you think Santa Claus came your way a bit early in the year? In case you think one is spinning a yarn, be assured this is no dream.

Increasingly, Indian companies are opening their doors and minds to unconventional and even fun methods of unwinding that can bring the zing back in their employees. From power nap rooms, culinary workshops to raising your mug for beer, perks are not just about money. This New Year choose the concepts you would like your HR to introduce at your workplace, pronto.

Sleep at work

When Radhika Iyer, an assistant manager at CBay Systems, Mumbai, mentioned the Crash-out Room at her office where employees can take a quick nap, her friends thought she was a master storyteller. CBay Systems is a medical transcription, medical billing and coding services company which has round-the-clock operations. “I was taken aback when I first joined the organization and was told about it,” she recalls. “I had quit my previous software organization due to stress and here I was told, there is a room where I can sleep.”

Work is fun too: (clockwise from top) employees enjoy a game of foosball at the Chill Zone, RPG House, Mumbai; dartboard practice at Chill Zone, RPG House; 10-minute naps at the Crash-out Room refresh employees at CBay Systems, Mumbai; and co-workers learn to make chocolates at Broadridge Financial Solutions, Hyderabad.

The Crash-out Room has 20 bunk beds for employees to take a 10-minute nap when stressed at work or take a quick nap during lunch time (1 hour). But there is a rider: An employee wanting to take a nap has to inform his/her section head. No permission is required to take a nap during lunch hour.

Why it works: Sanjay Shanmugaum, vice-president, human resources, CBay Systems explains, “Employee health is a top most concern for us. With this objective in mind, we have set up Break-out Rooms (with recreational facilities such as table tennis and dart games) and Crash-out Rooms for our employees. They are aimed at relieving physical and mental stress.” The company has found that these rooms have proved to be a “hit” and has resulted in “an increased inter-employee interaction, thus increasing a sense of belonging with the company”. The high point, says Shanmugaum, is that “these rooms have projected a ‘we-care’ attitude for CBay Systems, thus aiding in higher (employee) retention”.

Project robot

When competitiveness at work transcends to play, it sharpens one’s game. And when there’s a cash award thrown in, there’s no reason to complain. Progress Software India (PSI), Hyderabad, holds BotWars (a game in which competitors make robots and then teams compete with each other’s robots) every quarter, called PSI Robocode competition and Age of Empires tournament. These are held not just for fun but also to pose a challenge to employees at computer educational games. Kiran Kumar, software engineer, who took part in the Robocode competition, says, “It is relaxation from work. As one is engrossed during after work hours at something that is intellectually stimulating, it is immensely challenging to be a part of such competitions at the workplace with one’s colleagues and teammates.”

Why it works: Sachin Hejip, director, centre for enterprise in progress division, PSI, explains: “As a product company, we need to find ways to think on our feet and out of the box. We are also very self-driven and expect a lot in terms of communication from our team members. These events, organized by the employees themselves, help to improve soft skills—providing employees excellent opportunities of learning and growth outside of their regular work. We also give cash awards to the winners ranging from Rs10,000-20,000, depending on the event.”

Hobby central

If it is games for some organizations, then it is about developing hobbies for others. Broadridge Financial Solutions (India) Pvt. Ltd, a financial services company, Hyderabad, organizes creative workshops where employees can learn the art of origami and calligraphy and how to make chocolate, pots anddiyas, and puppets. The families of employees can take part too.

After every workshop, employees fill up a feedback form, sharing their experiences and also give recommendations on how to improve these workshops. The company organizes future workshops based on this feedback.

Why it works: These initiatives are conducted on Sundays to ensure employees can come with their families,” says Rajita Kumar, head, human resources, Broadridge Financial Solutions. “The aim is to explore new creative ideas and spend time together.”

Let the beer flow

Most organizations throw parties quarterly, half yearly or annually. But NetApp India, Bangalore, organizes a beer bash every Friday evening with unlimited beer on the tap for its employees. Needless to say, it is the most awaited day of the week. “We look forward to the lively, chilled-out social evenings for a heavy dose of fun, laughter, camaraderie and office chit-chats. It is a great way to de-stress, unwind and connect with the fellas,” says Keith Dias, workplace resources director, NetApp.

Why it works: S.R. Manjunath, senior director, HR, NetApp India, says: “We have social evenings over drinks and snacks where employees can unwind and connect with their colleagues at an informal level, irrespective of their designations. This helps in narrowing the gap between employee and employer. We also have Nintendo Wii, table tennis, and other indoor games. Initiatives like these build camaraderie within the employees and strengthen team-building initiatives.”

Chill Zone

From a mixed bag of games (adventurous ones too for the sporty types) to listening to music to even enjoying a quiet read, the Chill Zone at RPG House (earlier known as Ceat Mahal), Mumbai, has something for everyone. There is a music station, a video games section with an LCD television and recliners, a mini library (books, CDs, DVDs), a pool table, chess and carrom sets, a table-tennis board and a dart board too. Interestingly, the zone also has a punching bag to vent out your anger, when the going gets tough. Employees can use the facilities anytime during work hours and even after work. Vinod Kumar, head marketing, Ceat, who plays games at the zone every day, says, “The range of games available is exciting. I also feel it helps in bonding with team members, as the informal atmosphere here helps in having work-related discussions in a relaxed and open manner.”

Why it works: The Chill Zone is a perfect example of how the organization trusts its employees, says Arvind Agrawal, president and chief executive, corporate development and HR, RPG Enterprises. “While there will be no negotiations on deliverables by allowing employees to use office time for recreation, it re-emphasizes its trust on the fact that employees are responsible human beings who know what is expected from them and are focussed on deadlines. It also provides them with the much needed stress-buster, making RPG a fun place to work for.”

Isn’t it time you send your wish list to your HR?

Author : Sheela Nair

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10 Things Recruiters Won't Tell You

1. “There are better ways to find a job.”

A recruiter or agency is one part of a job search, but it shouldn’t be your primary source – and maybe not your secondary one, either. Referrals – that is, a connection made by someone you know – remain your best bet. CareerXRoads’ annual survey of more than 200 employers shows that the percentage of hires made through referrals has remained remarkably consistent over the last five years. Nearly 27% of respondents said referrals were the biggest factor in external hires in 2009, practically unchanged from its 27.1% figure in 2005. Third-party agencies, meanwhile, accounted for only 2.3% of external hires last year, compared to a 5.2% success rate in 2005.

2. “We don’t work for you.”

Christy Ezelle, a media advertising executive in New York, was in her first job out of college when she got a call from a headhunter working for a major advertising agency. It was a good experience, until she tried to negotiate her salary – the company wouldn’t budge. Why? They had already shelled out for the headhunter that tracked her down – a fee that was eating into the amount they were willing to pay Ezelle.

Recruiters work for the hiring company, and that’s where their allegiance lies – not with the job-seeker. That means headhunters will always be more interested in making their client happy than in finding a candidate the best possible package, says Carolyn Dougherty, an executive search consultant in Villanova, Penn. “There’s a belief that the recruiter is working on the candidate’s behalf and that’s not the case,” she says. “They’re working for the client – that’s where the fee is coming from.” And because most recruiters don’t get paid until the position gets filled, they care more about sealing the deal than about getting you another $10,000.

3. “Until a year ago, I was a car salesman.”

There are no laws or rules that govern what constitutes an “employment agency” or who can call himself a recruiter, and setting up shop is pretty easy: A year’s worth of advertising, office space, travel and communications equipment is just $50,000 for an experienced recruiter like Eleanor Sweet, who runs the Remington Group in Barrington, Ill., an hour outside of Chicago; a rookie could put out a shingle for far less. Anyone can do it, she says, “It’s pretty much like getting a real estate license.”

That means job seekers have to vet a recruiter with the same diligence they’d investigate a potential employer. Ask how long the recruiter’s been in the business, and where they’ve placed candidates in the past – and then call those companies and confirm, experts advise. Also, though a certification isn’t required to be a recruiter, there are a handful of designations a pro can earn. Getting certified as a Temporary Staffing Specialist, a Personnel Consultant, or a Professional in Human Resources don’t require any coursework, but all require previous experience and the passage of an exam – legitimate hoops for a dedicated professional to jump through. One strategy to avoid at all costs: firms that charge for job search services or call themselves “fee-based counselors” raise red flags with experienced recruiters, because “It’s expected that the company pays the fee,” says Dougherty. (see No. 2, above).

4. “The job we advertised may not exist.”

Recruiters often advertise appealing jobs that aren’t vacant, just to build up a stable of candidates, says Nick Corcodilos, who heads the executive search firm North Bridge Group and runs www.asktheheadhunter.com in Lebanon, N.J. From a staffing firm or recruiter’s perspective, this is a practical way to do business, because many assignments offer a bonus for filling a key job fast. But for the job hunter, it’s misleading, raising false hopes at an already anxious time.

That doesn’t mean an applicant’s efforts are useless. Just because there’s no job now doesn’t mean there won’t be one in a few months. Jeremy Dixon, general manager at A-1 Temps in Tampa, says client companies will ask him for 50 people qualified for customer service positions “in a couple of weeks.” If he has a sufficient pool of established applicants, he can place them in a hurry.

For the best odds of success, job-seekers should identify companies and positions they’re specifically interested in and seek out recruiters who work with them. (This is particularly true for anyone seeking an upper management job, for which companies typically rely on an established relationship with a recruiter or recruiting firm.)

5. “We already know quite a bit about you.”

As soon as you sign up with a recruiter or search firm, they check you out – your background, your credit history, even legal records. That’s why they have applicants sign all those disclosures. If you want to work with them, you have to submit. That’s fairly standard in the job market these days, whether or not you work with a recruiter, but unlike a recruiter, a prospective employer usually doesn’t do the background check until after he’s met you. That gives a candidate the opportunity to impress on his merits, and explain anything that might be dodgy in his history. Working through a recruiter, a job seeker might never get that chance.

In that case, all you can do is make sure that the information they have is accurate, says Corcodilos. Almost 80 percent of credit reports contain errors, and 25 percent have what’s considered to be a “serious error” such as false delinquencies or accounts that did not belong to the consumer, according to a 2004 study from U.S. PIRG. To ensure you’ll be judged on your own merits, check your credit report for errors and take steps to fix what you find.

6. “Our jobs aren’t so hot either.”

Because most agencies don’t get paid unless they place candidates at jobs, the weak labor market has taken its toll. In Orange County, Calif., for example, the 20 largest employment firms saw revenue drop almost 20% in 2009, prompting many to lay off employees, according to an Orange County Business Journal survey. A lot of experienced people have left the field, says Darrel Gurney, an independent career consultant who runs the CareerGuy.com web site, leaving “empty desks and brand spanking new people who have never done this before.” That means you often don’t get the best help in your job search, particularly working with smaller firms, he says.

Bigger, national and international firms are doing better. Revenue at Switzerland’s Adecco, the world’s largest staffing company, rose 16% in July and August. Meanwhile, revenues at domestic search firms Manpower (MAN: 55.82, +2.06, +3.83%) and Robert Half International (RHI: 27.54, +0.55, +2.03%) are up 15% and 6% respectively in the last three months, in part a result of an increase in revenue-producing job placements.

7. “You’re at the mercy of a computer, just like online job board users.”

The rise of online job sites like Monster (MWW: 19.37, +0.35, +1.84%) and Careerbuilder has changed the way many staffing professionals work. The sites use computer programs to scan applications for particular keywords – and now, so do recruiters. Even if you submit your resume on fancy stationery, it gets scanned by the recruiter or staffing agency. Especially for entry or mid-level jobs, cover letters don’t get read, Gurney says: It’s this digital process that drives the professional match-making.

To get through the computer gatekeeper, applicants need to make sure the relevant, searchable words are on their resumes. For example, he says, if you want to work in the entertainment industry, listing a past job at Sony Pictures on your resume isn’t enough; the word “entertainment” must be there too. Candidates who aren’t sure what the magic keywords are should look at the description of the job they’re applying for, says Jessica Mazor, an account manager for the accounting and finance business at Kforce Professional Staffing (KFRC: 15.21, +0.47, +3.18%) in New York. The “must have” criteria in the description are particularly important.

8. “The ‘temp-to-perm’ carrot is rotten.”

Many staffing agencies hold out the promise of permanent jobs after success in a temporary position, but that trend isn’t holding in this recovery. Since temporary employment trends hit bottom in September 2009, the U.S. Department of Labor says the service and professional sectors have added 392,000 temporary jobs. But the CareerXroads survey showed that positions explicitly advertised as temp-to-perm accounted for just 1.6% of all hiring in 2009 – and even in better times, that rate was only around 3%. “Temp-to-perm is basically a marketing ploy,” says Corcodilos, who says it’s really more of a fantasy: “It’s what recruiters would like to see happen.”

9. “If you have a job, I could get you fired.”

Not all recruiters are careful, and the last thing you want is to have your resume land on the desk of your current boss. This is a very real risk, says Sweet, president of the Remington Group, so job seekers need to make sure they know exactly what recruiters are doing on their behalf. “Put every recruiter you work with on notice,” she says. “Say, ‘You do not have permission to release my paperwork without my permission.”

And then there are the aggressive recruiters who pull resumes off LinkedIn profiles and job boards and circulate them without getting the candidates permission – or even letting him know. That’s what happened to Michael Segel, an information consultant in Chicago, who was interviewing with several different companies when one prospective employer asked him why he’d received his resume twice. An overzealous recruiter whom Segal had never met had sent it. Now Segal only posts his resume as an un-alterable PDF, and he keeps careful track of where he and any recruiters he’s working with send it. He says it can’t stop the practice of unauthorized circulation, but if he’s contacted by a recruiter he doesn’t know, he can quickly figure out what’s happened. “I usually cut off contact right there,” he says.

10. “If I’m in Virginia, I probably won’t help you find a job in Nebraska.”

If you’re willing to relocate, don’t rely on your contact in your home city to help you find work outside the area — even if you’re working with a national search firm. Recruiters at big firms have little incentive to spread your resume around to other locations; they’ll have to split a commission with the colleague that helps you land a job. Instead, send your resume to the branch offices in the places you would like to go. As soon as that office has you on file, “they take ownership of your search,” says Sweet. Smaller, more local firms agree – and may even refer you to someone else. “We have alliances with other staffing companies,” says Diana Wall, a senior account manager at Accel Financial Staffing in Oklahoma City. “There’s no commission – it’s all friendly referrals.”

Source : SmartMoney.com

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