Archive for June, 2009

SHRM Annual Conference Evaluates HR in Changing Economy

Posted by • June 30th, 2009 • 3 Comments

The Society for Human Resource Management (SHRM) kicked off their 61st Annual Conference this week amidst the 80-90 degree heat in New Orleans.  The SHRM Annual Conference & Exposition is a chance for HR professionals, academics and businesses to gather and learn new strategies and techniques for improving the workplace. The conference this year focuses on HR leadership for the economy.

Speaking topics range from “Innovate or Perish! 10 Tips to Improve Your HR Processes” to “The Future of Online Recruiting: Why Job Boards and Facebook Are Only Gateways to What Is Ahead.” Are you at SHRM 2009? Tell us how it’s going and what some of the important takeaways are for HR professionals in these next few months and years.

If you’re not at SHRM’s annual conference this year, here are some highlights from Twitter that show what’s catching the interest of conference attendees:

@recruiterdude says “complacency is the exact opposite of urgency” quoting this morning’s Keynote speaker John Kotter, a Harvard Business School Professor widely regarded as the world’s foremost authority on leadership and change.

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Climate Bill to Bring New Jobs?

Posted by • June 29th, 2009 • Leave a comment

Last Friday the House approved White House-backed legislation that will help combat global warming and put the U.S. on a new course for cleaner energy.  The legislation still faces an uphill battle, however, as many aspects of the bill are hotly debated.  One of the key issues on the table is if this bill will help, or hurt, U.S. jobs.

The debate includes some who believe that while investing more U.S. resources in new energy will open the door to perspective new careers and needs in this space, the restrictions the bill places on pollution from factories, refineries and power plants could put a damper on some existing jobs that are dependent on these operations.

In addition, many are discussing what financial impact passing the legislation, also known as the Waxman-Markey bill, will have on the American people.  The President was quoted in a recent Reuters article that the bill will cost American households the equivalent of a postage stamp per day, disputing those who argue the the transition will sacrifice U.S. economic growth.

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Consumer Cable Spending Down: Employees Hold Steady

Posted by • June 26th, 2009 • Leave a comment

In a down economy, many of us are thinking of ways to save on the everyday- eating more meals at home, giving up that daily Starbucks run (or at least limiting it to a few mornings a week) and decreasing our monthly cable bill.  Reports state that both Comcast and Time Warner Cable are seeing declines as a result of the economy, although the recently released Global Entertainment and Media Outlook study from PriceWaterhouseCoopers notes that the industry will recover by 2013, when it’s expected that $68.3 billion will be spent on basic TV services, up 33% from 2008.

While it does make some sense that families and individuals would cut back on some of the more expensive cable packages, it also seems logical that people could potentially justify the spend -  more time at home means less spent on going out to the movies.   So what does this mean for employees of these companies- are they worried about their jobs or do they feel confident they’ll make it through successfully to 2013?

In the Glassdoor.com Report below, you’ll see the company ratings for the top cable TV providers are pretty consistent, aside from DISH network, where employees are dissatisfied with their ...

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Citi Salaries Up; Bonuses Down

Posted by • June 25th, 2009 • 1 Comment

Citigroup announced plans Wednesday to restructure their compensation by increasing base pay for employees whose salary would be affected by government bonus restrictions. The final plans are yet to be revealed, but sources note it would not affect overall compensation, but would shift the mix in compensation from bonus to salary to adhere to the mandate for bonus caps.

So what does this mean for Citigroup employees? Some could see their salary rise as much as 50% — purportedly to help keep top-tier talent at the struggling investment bank. We see one Citigroup Senior Fund Accountant report on Glassdoor.com that they are ‘underpaid’ and suggests that the company should “Hire more qualified managers and give pay based on performance.” Given that the company received $45 billion from the government, switching bonus dollars to base salary hardly seems like a good use of taxpayer money.

Citigroup salary reports on Glassdoor vary widely, with Executive Vice Presidents reporting a total compensation package of more than $500K. Anonymous reports for Managing Directors with the company note an average base salary of $210K with bonuses of up to $1 million.

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Nokia/Intel Partnership: Are the Employees in Support?

Posted by • June 24th, 2009 • 1 Comment

Nokia and Intel formally announced a long-term partnership Tuesday morning and without skipping a beat, debate fired up among reporters and analysts about who had the most to gain from this alliance. For example, as InformationWeek points out this was a “big win for Intel,” and adds “Intel has gotten a big boost into a market the chipmaker has been unable to penetrate.” However on the flip side, PC World calls out, “Intel may be taking a big risk with its dive into the mobile wireless device market with Nokia. Intel has to be careful not to upset its current partners (including Apple and Microsoft), yet still work with Nokia to deliver new and impressive devices to consumers.”

To add in another perspective, is this partnership one that employees would have suggested for their respective companies? Was Intel’s entry into the mobile market the creative and innovative direction employees wanted the company to head? And was Nokia’s partnership with Intel the technological step employees thought the company should focus on?  Provided below is snapshot of advice employees at these respective companies have suggested for senior management.

Intel Employees Advice for Senior Management: Within Intel company reviews, employees suggest cutting out bureaucracy and ...

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Recruiter/HR Advice: How to Avoid the Arrogance of Supply

Posted by • June 23rd, 2009 • 1 Comment

“Arrogance of Supply.” This is a phrase I coined back in the early 1990′s when I was leading a staffing team that received thousands of resumes a week, and my team was horrendous at responding and processing those resumes. I told my team that we had an “arrogance of supply” in how we treated our candidate pool.

This was during a time when every resume came in a paper envelope with a cover letter attached and a human being opened each and every one of those letters, read them, and then processed them to the correct recruiter who would then respond either positively or negatively. (Yes, this was when we walked to work both ways in the snow bare foot!) The supply of candidates and resumes back then was so high that my staffing admin, God love her, had back problems from carrying the bags of resumes home each night to open. This was even before bags with wheels.

In a recent San Francisco Chronicle article, HR Managers were complaining about having to sift through the huge amounts of incoming resumes (which are now delivered electronically thank you very much and probably already screened through a keyword search program…no breaking backs there) ...

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The Business Behind Your Health Care Plan: An Insider’s Perspective

Posted by • June 19th, 2009 • 10 Comments

It’s been one interesting week for health care given Obama’s statements on health care reform. As Associated Press reported today, President Barack Obama seems to leave little room for doubt when he promises that his health care plan will let people keep the coverage they have. This is hopefully a good thing for the employees who work at the health care plan companies as they may be nervous that their jobs could be challenged due to Obama’s proposal for a national health care plan.

So what’s it like within the walls of a health care plan company in America today? We selected a UnitedHealth Group company review as the winner of the May review of the month to help give a better idea.  The review provides an overall look into what’s working at UnitedHealth Group and what needs improvement. As of today, UnitedHealth Group receives a 2.7 company rating (neutral) and CEO Steve Hemsley receives a low 20% approval rating and a 43% disapproval rating. This winning review from a Technical Support Analyst in Minneapolis, MN gives a pretty interesting snapshot into the private health care plan industry.

What’s Working:

Job Security

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Obama Extends Benefits for Domestic Partners of Federal Employees. How Does Your Company Rate?

Posted by • June 18th, 2009 • 24 Comments

President Obama signed an order Wednesday afternoon that extends dependant care rights and other benefits to the partners of gay federal employees. That means the federal government has joined the increasing number of employers across the country who provide equal benefits to domestic partners (which are often unmarried opposite sex or same sex partnerships) of their employees.

With this step forward for government jobs, we were curious which private-sector employers offer domestic partner benefits. The Human Rights Campaign (HRC) provides a list of private companies that offer such – more than 8,600 businesses are listed. HRC reports that in 2008, 39% of Fortune 1000 companies and 83% of Fortune 100 companies offer partner benefits. For example, Expedia (Fortune 699; 3.4 Company Rating) offers comprehensive health benefits to: opposite-sex spouses, same-sex partners and opposite-sex partners. To top it off, the benefits package at Expedia is frequently noted as a ‘Pro’ among the company reviews on Glassdoor. In fact, close to 20% of Expedia company reviews favorably comment on the benefits offered by the organization.

While Glassdoor is not on the Fortune 1000 list – yet – we were disappointed there wasn’t a public list to promote our domestic partner benefits and figured there ...

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College Grad New Hires Down; Career Service and Recruiting Professionals Discover Glassdoor

Posted by • June 15th, 2009 • 5 Comments
Tim Besse, Glassdoor co-founder at NACE 2009

An article on MSNBC today referenced the National Association of Colleges and Employers (NACE) 2009 student survey, which projected a 21.6 percent decrease in new hires among college graduates. Of the roughly 1.6 million students who recently graduated from college, this means that a measly 19.7 percent secured jobs upon graduation in May.

“Students don’t see the private sector as being as viable this year,” said Edwin Koc, director of strategic and foundation research for the Pennsylvania-based NACE.

This sentiment added fuel to the fire at this year’s NACE annual convention which wrapped up this past Friday. Event attendees (which included HR representatives, recruiters, college career service professionals and relevant businesses) came highly prepared to share and learn from one another in an effort to help recent college graduates and job seekers get better access to resources that could allow them to make more informed decisions that shape and affect their careers. Glassdoor participated in the conference and noted the enthusiasm by event organizers and other attendees. In fact, AJ, a member of the Glassdoor team, commented on Twitter last week “terrific energy from all NACE09 attendees here in Las Vegas.”

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How new CEOs Can do Better than their Predecessors

Posted by • June 12th, 2009 • 1 Comment

CEOs from two high-profile companies have stepped down from their positions this week to make room for a new wave of leadership.  It was announced Thursday that Palm CEO Ed Colligan would be replaced by Jon Rubinstein, a former Apple executive. And earlier this week, Proctor & Gamble CEO A.J. Lafley announced that he would step down and that Bob McDonald who has been at the company for nearly 30 years would take over.

There is no denying the fact that the recession is taking its toll on companies across the country, and thus organizations are looking to change things up a bit, which for many means new senior management.   In fact, CNN reported today that “CEOs are getting the boot on a regular basis: 115 departures in May alone”. Here is a quick list of some of the big name CEOs, along with their approval and disapproval ratings that have departed office over the past few months: It’s interesting to observe that only three of the CEOs listed below garnered an approval rating over 50% at the time of their departure.

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