http://sharpobjectconsulting.com/blog Trends and tips for RPO and other Recruitment companies Fri, 20 Mar 2009 01:27:20 +0000 http://backend.userland.com/rss092 en Just a quick note about a cool new product that hit the scene. Check out HarQen (rhymes with "Darth Vader's Colleague the Gran Moff Tarkin) product called VoiceScreener at VoiceScreener.com. I demoed it last week and was nicely impressed. The tool isn't necessarily groundbreaking in it's scope, but the ... http://sharpobjectconsulting.com/blog/?p=60 Pinstripe recently posted an article on their blog arguing that the failure of an RPO program does not mean that RPO will never work within that company and providing five reasons why companies should give RPO another try. While I agree wholeheartedly with their premise, I also know that there are ... http://sharpobjectconsulting.com/blog/?p=53 I've had a few people send me links to cloudrecruiting.net and their video about cell-phone recruiting.  I've reviewed both and am creating a new industry award to bestow upon them. The Hyperbole Award for most beautifully packaged presentation which tells us nothing new but looks like a million bucks - therefore ... http://sharpobjectconsulting.com/blog/?p=47 I saw an interesting article on the "Infection Greed" blog (http://paul.kedrosky.com/archives/2009/03/has_the_us_layo.html) showing a graph that may appear to show that the growing layoff trend is actually trailing off.  The graph shows layoffs peaking in January and dropping in February. I'm not quite as rosy as they are in looking at these ... http://sharpobjectconsulting.com/blog/?p=45 Evidently, making fun of Snuggie is more popular than boring talk about RPO.  I've had quite a response to my snuggie post and wanted to share the following two links which were forwarded by loyal blog followers (blolowers?) 1) Snuggie mentioned on the freakanomics blog at: http://freakonomics.blogs.nytimes.com/2009/02/19/security-blanket-with-sleeves/ 2) A  NSFW (Not Safe For ... http://sharpobjectconsulting.com/blog/?p=39 I recently listened to the cockpit audio from Flight 1549 which crash landed on the Hudson river last month.  You can find the audio with some video below.  What I find amazing about this is the absolute calmness that the pilot shows. Given that the recruitment industry as a whole lost ... http://sharpobjectconsulting.com/blog/?p=24 I saw an infomercial today for a ridiculous product called the "Snuggie" which is essentially a blanket with sleeves build into it.  Seriously, I'm not making this up - check out www.freesnuggie.com What struck me about this commercial is that they manage to communicate two separate ways in which the features ... http://sharpobjectconsulting.com/blog/?p=32 The most important lesson in RPO (heck, probably in ANY business) is to play to your strengths. I remember the frustration I felt in my early days because we never seemed to win any RFPs.  We'd have a GREAT meeting with the client, they loved our solution, we knew our pricing ... http://sharpobjectconsulting.com/blog/?p=25 Without exception, everyone I speak with in the RPO industry experienced a dramatic slowdown in their business starting in October or November of 2008. The consensus seems to be that business dropped off between 25% and 50%, with most companies experiencing a 35-40% drop. Most of these same ... http://sharpobjectconsulting.com/blog/?p=15 In a previous post I discussed how the financial crisis is driving some baby boomer retirees (or Reluctantly Returning Recent Retirees - or RRRRs as I’ve dubbed them) back into the workplace.  I promised to follow up with some specific ideas you can put into place right away to target ... http://sharpobjectconsulting.com/blog/?p=17