Archive for the ‘Trends in HR’ Category
Thursday, January 27th, 2011 by Tim Giehll
Standard economic wisdom says that the real estate industry leads the way out of recession. This time, though, I think the healthcare sector might be taking real estate’s place.
Based on recent numbers, staffing analysts are saying that demand for nurses and other health professionals has increased by almost 50 percent over the previous quarter, accelerating a trend that has been going on all year. A recent report from The Conference Board, an international economic think tank, noted that online healthcare job listings posted the largest gain of any other economic sector in October – over 26,000 more jobs, in fact. The report also states that health care vacancies outnumber job seekers 2 to 1.
Wednesday, January 19th, 2011 by Tim Giehll
Since I looked back at 2010 in a recent post, I’ll look ahead in this one. And I’ll admit, reading U.S. News and World Report’s annual “50 Best Careers” list got me thinking about staffing challenges and staffing solutions in the year ahead.
According to the article, just about any healthcare position – especially those involving direct care, including massage therapists and dental hygienists – is a safe career bet in 2011. Not surprisingly, technology-related positions will continue to be “hot careers” – although some may be surprised to see “meteorologist” and “hydrologist” alongside “biomedical engineer” and a handful of computer-related positions on U.S. News’ list. Business professionals like financial analysts and public relations specialists are expected to be in demand, along with a smattering of other workers (including translators, technical writers, and court reporters).
Thursday, January 13th, 2011 by Tim Giehll
Although I could have done a year-end retrospective in December like everyone else, I wanted to wait and see the last unemployment number first. Unfortunately, the number – 9.4% — wasn’t what anyone was hoping to see. Analysts and commentators everywhere, still eager for any small bit of good economic news, seemed to unilaterally pounce on the number as a sign that things are improving slowly. That’s probably true, but it’s not too hard to find analysts who remain pessimistic. And since the country started out 2010 with an unemployment rate of 9.8%, it’s hard not to be pessimistic myself. No matter how you cut it, 9.4% still represent about 14 MILLION unemployed Americans.
Wednesday, January 12th, 2011 by Tim Giehll
I’ve said before that companies should develop good relationships with staffing agencies as part of their human capital management. Imagine, however, outsourcing some or all of a company’s HR functions. Is this a good idea?
According to a Staffing Industry Analysts webinar, more and more executives think it is.
The big question, though, is this: Is outsourcing HR functions a good idea for your company?
Here are some things you should think about when answering that question:
The Pros of Outsourcing HR Functions
Thursday, December 30th, 2010 by Tim Giehll
SaaS is a new field, legally speaking. What are the rights of SaaS users?
Cloud computing is growing rapidly. Experts predict that, by the end of 2010, the Software as a Service (SaaS) market will be 20-30% larger than it was on January 1 – and that’s while the economy as a whole is growing at an annual rate of less than 3%.
With growth comes growing pains, however, mostly in the form of unanswered questions. What happens to material in a cloud when a SaaS provider goes out of business? How liable is a cloud computing company for its mistakes? Should users have to pay for part of the licensing fees for cloud-borne software?
Wednesday, December 22nd, 2010 by Tim Giehll
What is the best way to determine the real salary expectation of a job seeker or current employee? First, do NOT assume anything !!
This is an especially pertinent question in a time of high unemployment. Because of the number of job seekers out there, employers can offer lower-than-usual salaries to prospects. If staffing services don’t help their job seekers have realistic and workable salary expectations, they will find it hard to make placements.
A recent article in HirePlateau, an information hub for recruiters and other staffing professionals, provided some important insights for the staffing professional:
Monday, December 20th, 2010 by Tim Giehll
One of the most important parts of a dynamic workplace is diversity – a number of different views, opinions, lifestyles, and characters working together in harmony. In the current day and age, a workplace issue is starting to arise more and more and that is the place of body modification in the workplace. Body modification is a broad term encompassing all types of piercings and tattoos in a work environment. Here are a few different suggestions of how to handle this growing trend:
Friday, December 17th, 2010 by Tim Giehll
Over 80 million professionals use LinkedIn to exchange employment information, ideas and opportunities.
80 million! That sounds like a great HR database…but only if you know how to easily find what you’re looking for. Searching for individuals and companies is easy enough on LinkedIn, but if you want to be efficient and effective at finding good candidates, there are a few tips and tricks you should know.
1. Create a strong company and career page on LinkedIn. LinkedIn has always had the reputation of the professional or ‘networking network’ and therefore job seekers have used it as another job search engine.
Tuesday, December 14th, 2010 by Tim Giehll
My youngest daughter is currently a college student, studying literature. This focus gives her a different eye on many of the HR topics I usually address in my blogs and that eye is what brings me to the topic of this blog. We were discussing her studies and she brought up a man named Niccolò Machiavelli. He is best known for his book, The Prince. The purpose of the book was to outline the goals of the Medicis, those ruling in Florence Italy, where he was living in the fifteen and sixteenth century, and how he believed they could attain those goals. His name is frequently associated with a very rigid sense of rules and some, when it was first introduced, thought his views were tyrannical – while this could be true at that time, with some creative interpretation, he had some important ideas that could apply to the modern day business world of Human Resources.
Wednesday, December 8th, 2010 by Tim Giehll
A video blog, or “vlog”, is a simple extension of the traditional blog format to include video. The use of video blogging can have many benefits for a business: they can be easier to share than their textual counterparts since the files can be saved on a smart phone to be brought up and viewed with little effort. They also add another informative dimension that can be taken in many directions. Here are the five T’s of video blogging – things you should take into consideration if you’re interested in using video blogs for your own business:
