Johnson & Associates, LLC

Instinct

As a recruiter I try to ensure the candidates we consider for submittal to our clients have the skills, personality, and genuine interest in our contracts or employment. The technical skills and communication abilities are fairly easy to evaluate unless the candidate is dishonest. And, unfortunately, that does happen in the competitive world we've created. The personality profile can be measured and we will test for certain traits and compatibility factors for our clients. We also measure our interaction with our candidates on phone calls, meetings, and now on Skype. If a candidate is difficult, impatient, or displays certain negative characteristics in the early stages of screening we can only expect them to be that or worse for our clients. But gauging interest in the position is most difficult. Sure, when candidates need a placement they are interested but there are other factors to consider.

If a candidate is from out of state we need to know why they'd come here for the contract. We get resumes constantly for candidates portraying themselves as qualified and interested applying to Iowa jobs who have never worked within 1500 miles of Iowa. When I ask them why they'd come here for a contract some tell me they have friends here. Flush. Some say they have family here so we discuss further to determine if the claim is legitimate. Some will really press for decisions once they've interviewed. These are the candidates who ALWAYS back out because they're using us to leverage another (likely local to them) opportunity.

We've had great success bringing in top talent from out of state on projects where the skills needed are very specific and unique. We've also been let down on occasion by candidates kicking tires or leveraging multiple openings. When candidates begin telling you they are weighing options our odds of landing them are slim. If a candidate after an interview is unresponsive to follow-up, no longer answers their phone, and emails go unreturned for a day or more they're gone. Instinct is the only recruiting intangible we have in weeding out undependable candidates.

Skype

I'm not a Facebook user and only use Twitter for work related information. Linked-In is fantastic but they try to sell me on using their full blown version of their application. Basically, you can't connect to people who don't want you to. You have to know someone or try to connect with them and they have to accept. But if you pay enough to Linked-In you can access people's profiles and use their In-Mail (in limited quantities) to 'connect' to people you find meet your target criteria. For sales people and recruiters you can see how this might be attractive. But to the folks on Linked-In who prefer to control who contacts them is it?

But I did sign up and use Skype today. I've got a great candidate who lives in the Boston area. He can't come to Des Moines for a face to face interview request and the client suggested Skype. Why not? So, we both downloaded the software and began using it shortly after. We had a great 20 minute conversation before the interview scheduled for the next day and it worked wonderfully. Video and Audio were excellent with only a few instances of lag on video.

Going forward we're going to utilize Skype for screening candidates. We can tell a great deal more from face to face conversations than we can over the phone only. We'll see how many candidates are willing. I would guess most would not have an issue but some obviously might.

Our Nation's Image

If you're a liberal, great. If you side with Democrats that's great, too. There are so many enormous issues ranging from the economy, national debt, education, and health-care that anyone with half a brain knows that one side, left or right, doesn't have an ideal solution that works for the most people. But, if you're reading this you're American. Or, you're in America because this is THE place to be for freedom, opportunity, and living in a manner that you enjoy.

Yesterday I come home early to run kids to practices and activities and The Ellen DeGeneres Show is on the kitchen tube. I like Ellen. She's a good person, funny, and likable. Her guest coming on the show happened to be our First Lady, Michelle Obama. I found it odd that our First Lady is on a talk show like Ellen. I guess with Oprah off the air this is the next best thing? But anyway, if you've seen Ellen before you've seen her dumb ole dance she does all the time. Johnny Carson had his trademark smirk and salute at the end of the show. Ellen has her dancing. So, our First Lady comes out to music, Ellen dancing, and she starts doing her own version of the dumb-ole dance. And she's wearing tight jeans, a tight fitting top, and a what appeared to be a black leather blazer.  Very disappointing.

Here we are amidst high unemployment, at war around the world, a crippling national debt, high crime, under-performing students everywhere, a health-care crisis, you name it, and we've got the First Lady dressed like a hipster doofus dancing like a clown on national television. Are you kidding me? I heard she was on Leno the night before, too.

What happened when the First Lady meant a reserved role championing a worthy cause? Sorry, First Lady, but getting in shape and exercising so you can show off your personal results to fight childhood obesity isn't what someone in your position should be doing. Kids are overweight today because of their parents plain and simple. What kid wants to be fat, out of shape, and hardly able to climb a set of stairs without breaking a sweat? Even if your child is the Chess Club Champion of the City and doesn't do anything athletically you can't feed him/her a box of Velveeta and Shells, a frozen Tombstone, and liter of regular Coke at night for dinner followed by a Hostess cupcake and glass of 2% milk before bed. And we certainly don't need our First Lady dressing like a 25 year old clowning it up with Ellen to make her point. Would Hillary Clinton, Jackie Kennedy, or Barbara Bush have been caught dead acting like that?

Ok, I'm done. Vote your conscience, your wallet, your heart. But for Pete's Sake, expect and demand that the leaders of our nation at least act the part. Our President once apologized for our global behavior to the World since he apparently was embarrassed at how we'd behaved as a nation. It appears we're concerned with how the world perceives our image and actions but inside our own borders let's ham it up, act like everybody else, and deliver the message that acting cool is what counts. I thought 'Character Counts'? And don't give me the 'venue is large/public venue' excuse. Did some tax-payer funded marketing team suggest that if you relate to the pop-culture crowd you'll be more effective?

 

Fast January...

We had more than our usual number of client req's to fill last month. Many are still pending decisions and in the interview scheduling stage. But overall the business climate is good.

We had a couple of interesting candidate interactions that I'd like to share. One is funny and the other is funny after the fact but at the time it wasn't.

First, the not-so-funny story. We had a long-term DBA position open up. Per my routine I go through my existing candidates that I've screened and or worked with previously. Then I browse on-line for resumes that fit the niche. I will post jobs on-line, Twitter, and Linked-In messages indicating our need and will draw some good interest from those. But when I get dozens of foreign H1B candidates from all over the place (mostly the DC area since a large number of H1B's are working Federal Government gigs) and the occasional candidate from 1500 miles away I don't get too excited. But one guy had a terrific resume, great writing skill, and seemed genuinely interested. We had a little back and forth on email when his rate quote arrived. He stated his rate is $150/hr to travel outside NYC and $115/hr to work in NYC or remotely from home. This wasn't a negotiation per his email and knowing that my client could afford something in the $80/hr to $85/hr I knew this guy was either overpriced, over-qualified, or both. I told him I base my prices off of what our consultants need/expect to be paid. He comes back at me on the phone with 'I find it amusing that you'd pretend to know what any consultant needs'? Well, I say, what do you need other than $150/hr I ask. Nothing much from the King of New York. I then tell him I've got alternative options that are qualified for half his asking price. To which, as you might expect, the candidate declares that the market is full of candidates claiming to be able to do the job for half the price and he commends me for taking that risk. You can't win with some people, obviously. His email is blocked as is mine to him I'm sure.

The second story is a bit more fun. The candidate came into Des Moines for the interview from Chicago. I offered dinner Sunday night but he declined. I know better from experience that when this happens there's an avoidance going on if they're here in time, don't have family here, and don't want to meet to prepare and simply socialize - on my dime no less! He shows up just in time to my office to head to the interview. We exchange pleasantries, talk some about the players involved, and head to the interview. I leave him the capable hands of the client after introductions and get to work on my Blackberry. I wait. And wait. The interview takes 2 hours! Later, we have lunch and discuss the interview. He has very little detail to tell me after being very talkative most of our past conversations. Something was up. He then tells me the interviewers were somewhat hostile to him at times. I'll spare you the 'he said this or that' schpeel. It seems the interview went well from a technical perspective and from common sense telling me that 2-hours must mean they're interested! I'm suspicious about something but can't put my finger on it. I follow up with the manager and get vm so I send an email and I don't hear back. The entire next week we hear nothing so Friday I call up the client for an update or decision. They're going to pass they say. No problem, I understand but isn't two hours of interviewing a bit excessive if the candidate isn't the one? I get a brief silence then an explanation that during the interview our candidate had to leave the conference room for extended periods of time. The suggestion that 'stomach flu' was involved brought a 'you've got to be kidding me!' reaction and then the client couldn't stop laughing. Maybe the candidate was a great fit technically. Maybe he'd do a great job - I think he would have. But you can't disappear during an interview for restroom breaks for long-periods of time and expect to make a favorable impression. Naturally, when I tell the candidate about them not selecting him he stood firm on 'why the two hour interview then' premise. I left it alone. I mean, how do you reiterate with a good candidate that you should have your personal 'business' taken care of betore entering an interview. Incredible!

Candidates and Market...

We've been extremely busy the last few months. Moreso than in past years. We're hopeful that these busier times are a forebearer of what is to come in 2012.

We've seen PeopleSoft openings, BA openings, BizTalk, .Net, Mainframe, and a few other positions in the last 60 days. Some of the contracts are long-term and some are 3 months to 6 months. Typically, candidates are more difficult to find for us because they've latched on to what they have to avoid being benched during the holidays or they're taking time off and not pursuing anything until early January.

We're seeing a heavy dose of H1B solicitation again this month in response to our openings. Many of the candidates we have on speed dial are unavailable so some cold recruiting is necessary. There is a large amount of H1B candidates in NJ, DC, and Virginia. Some have worked in the Midwest but most haven't. They're interested in working here but they're prices aren't any more competitive than American candidates and the conditions for interviewing and working seem rigid I.E. 'I won't work on-site on Fridays' or 'I need to work every other week from home.'

Last year we had two candidates released for underperformance and one other candidate that was retained but the feedback was clear that the resume did not represent the capability of the consultant. Both released candidates were H1B and were used only because of necessity. That isn't a market issue for candidates that's a recruiting issue that we're going to resolve this year. So, look for our calls, candidates. We're going to work harder at proactively seeking you out before we need you so that when we need each other we've got that line of communication established. We understand that many candidates don't want much from us until we have a hot req to fill that meets their needs. We respect that but we'll remain professional, aggressive, and communicative towards the end of meeting candidate's and client's demands.

Caucaus 2012

Did any of you head to the Caucaus? My family had sports camps/practices throughout the Tuesday night and didn't attend. I wished I would have after hearing from a friend who did in his neighborhood. Kind of interesting and I'm sure it would be a positive learning experience.

If you're like most, though, you're happy to see it done. My home phone was called over 20 times a day or more the last week with computer generated calls. The negative ads on TV and radio became tiresome. It really becomes an issue of money on who gets elected it seems. Without campaign finance reform we're still under the yoke of a system that doesn't represent the people of America. A majority of Americans don't have time, don't care, and don't take time to learn any difference in the candidates. They take the sound bites they receive and conjur up facts in their minds. I find myself doing this during discussions on occasion. But, I have read the candidates web sites and I can't honestly tell you whom I think is best equipped to lead. I don't relate to any of them - they're doctors, politicians, millionaires. Do I think they're honest? Only as far as our political system will allow them to be. I wish I could combine them into one super-candidate as they appear to have unique qualities that if combined would be potentially advantageous.

Best of luck to us all, America! Let's hope things improve, we give our leaders the support they need, and we pray that the ills of the world are changed for the better.

2012 Promises...

Do you make resolutions for the new year? I do and I'm going to post about a few of them. Hopefully, I'll have some people out there to help keep me committed. Here goes: 

Work Goals:

1. Blog something more often than every few weeks.
2. Enter in my open client req's on my website as soon as possible each day.
3. Post my open req's wherever I can to gain a positive candidate response.
4. Recruit proactively versus reactively.
5. Use the digital tools I have more to their capability.
6. Get a Facebook page for my company and use it.
7. Call people whenever possible versus email reliance.
8. Visit my clients and consultants more often.
9. Manage my time better.
10. Grow business 50% from last year's sales.

Personal Goals:  

1. Lose 25 pounds.
2. Eat lunch more often at my desk.
3. Balance my children's efforts between sports and education.
4. Keep perspective.
5. Eat more at new restaurants (I know, too cliche)
6. Lower handicap 1 stroke from today's number.
7. Stop volunteering for everything.
8. Actually finish house projects that need finishing.
9. Wash my own car from April to November.
10. Take it easier on sports officials during games.

Blackberry Wins...

My previous post concerned an experiment with a Droid OS phone after over a decade with a Blackberry. There was a fairly easy learning curve with the Droid getting used to the OS and I had a nearby friend who showed me the 'ins and outs' of the Droid OS. Lots of short cuts. Many features like weather app that changes as does your location. Great apps, lots of them, too.

But...I couldn't get used to it. My primary complaint was the time it takes to get anything done. The Blackberry allows you to navigate quickly with point and click simplicity. Droid is a touch screen so you have to touch/click to open an app, then navigate around with additional touches or key strokes and one last double touch to open a contact, for example. Notifications for email and texts were similar and opening the application to read them was pretty straight forward. But the Blackberry is so much more intuitive to click on the email and have a drop down menu populate to reply versus the procedure on a Droid. Sure, when you get used to it the time is comparable. But the potential for a touch-error is much higher and I frequently found myself spending time correcting inaccurate touches.

Email was easy to type and send. Finding the contacts, though, takes touches/clicks which I equated to steps. More steps than a Blackberry. Attachments won't open like they do on a Blackberry without downloading apps to make the device compatible with Word, Excel, or PDF files. Also, I read that not having a gmail account would make it cumbersome to push mail.  I do not but it worked right out of the box seamlessly. I scheduled my email refresh every 15 minutes but also whenever I opened the email app. It worked well initially but as time wore on during my two week trial the email became less reliable. Bounce backs occurred more often when sent from the Droid phone. Email delays would occur whenever I would drive from one location to another. It seemed that when my desktop weather app would delay so would everything else. In fact, the last day (or straw) was when my desktop weather app began to display a town in my home state that I have never been to, wasn't near at the time (in fact, I was at home) and the phone basically froze. I did a soft reset and removed the battery twice to no avail. I finally completed a hard reset and it still displayed this other town on my desktop as my current location.

The other major complaint I had was battery power. Under daily use I would deplete my battery before bedtime without fail. With my Blackberry devices battery power is superior. I read under Droid forums that there are a multitude of tricks and apps to save battery life. I only used what was delivered with HTC Sense and that should be enough. It isn't.

I will miss the way the Droid surfs the internet. It is pretty quick and the page sizing taps on the face are very convenient compared to a Blackberry. But Blackberry has improved this with their latest models. A family member loves his HTC Droid phone. Loves the apps, gadgets, widgets, and such. But he texts mostly and likes to play on his phone. I work on mine for the most part. He did say he didn't get about 100 text messages the past weekend and was frustrated by the delay in them arriving. I don't know if this was a carrier issue but I'd guess it was the phone OS.

Maybe someday I'll try another smart phone but for now I'll continue to use my Blackberry phones. They're faster, more reliable, easier, and they're more intuitive. But I'm older than most Droid users who would argue otherwise. I sure hope Blackberry keeps up their market share. I'd hate to have to switch to something that isn't as strong for my purposes.

Blackberry/Droid/IOS...

I've been an avid Blackberry user for more than a decade and have loved the service and my devices. I've had two devices and tried a couple of others that weren't quite what I would use from RIM. My son uses an iPhone and is just getting started with it and so far loves the phone. My biggest concern was typing. The virtual keyboards just weren't to my liking and the absence of tactile accuracy was hard to overcome. But the evidence of people moving to Droid phones and iPhones is compelling - enough for me to give it a go.

My contract allowed me to upgrade to a new iPhone for my son. Upgrading to another device means full retail and that's an outrageous 'not-gonna-happen' price. I checked Craig's List and only found unlocked devices. Some things I'll buy on CL but an unlocked phone isn't one of them. So, I went to eBay. Bought an HTC Status because it has a nice keyboard. The Status is designed to incorporate your Facebook account with a touch of one button provided button with the Facebook (F) on it for simplicity. I'm not a Facebook user but will be establishing a company Facebook presence as an experiment. But back to the phone.

The setup was easy. Transferring contacts via Bluetooth from the BB to the Android was easy. Getting used to navigating email, browsing, and settings was difficult. The touch screen navigation was different and cumbersome driving me to want to sell it back on the Bay. Syncing my phone to Outlook and my contact database was impossible and buggy. The 'widgets' were pretty cool but how to get them to work and to even get to them was frustrating. I gave up. Put my card back in my BB and set up email and was working in minutes. Ahhh, relief.

But I knew I didn't get it a real chance. I'm not a patient person and I'm resistant to change. My decision to give it another try was imminent. I researched Android forums on how to sync and how to get used to navigating the system. Most of what I read was overly done and I've since found ways to accomplish my goals much more simply. Sync this time was easy using only HTC sync. Sure, I created a gmail account (you have to just like in iTunes for an iPhone) but I don't have to push my email and better still, I don't have to put my contact and calendar information on the cloud. The touch screen is a blessing and the navigation gets easier each hour I spend on the phone which so far is only about three (including the first week). The learning curve is fast but the amount to learn is vast compared to a BB. I like that - more options, more functionality. That's a good thing.

I'll write future posts on what I'm doing and why on my Android phone including how I like it better or worse than Blackberry. Business class Blackberry are hard to beat but Android has enough neat things, productivity tools, and other features that make them worth a try.

What is your experience with Android phones?

SAT Scores and Education...

I read on CNN.com recently about SAT scores falling to record lows in reading. The article didn't say anything regarding a lag or spike in Science. (http://www.cnn.com/2011/09/21/opinion/bennett-education/index.html?hpt=hp_t2). Fearless William Bennett was the author.

The gist is that scores are lowering so the target bullseye on our education system and teacher's unions was, naturally, blamed. There were opinions expressed that diversity and increased test takers will naturally lower the scores which Bennett declares an 'excuse' not justifiable.

He among many others claim the strong teachers' unions are too powerful. They burden our progress with unrealistic compensation and a seniority driven system versus a performance driven contract. He suggests that we can afford to pay the top performing teachers more and pay the low performing teachers accordingly. I have a problem with this...

First, how do you rate teachers' performance? By how well they're liked by the students, parents, other teachers? By how well their students perform on standardized tests? I'm sure you all can see the hazards here.

Second, say we have a rating system and performance based pay? What if my incoming 4th grader is assigned the lowest performing teacher in the school? Are the kids who get the best teachers a product of a random draw? Hey, teach, I have a fifty-spot here says you put my kid in Ms. Top Pay Grade's class. Nudge nudge, wink wink.

Third, has anyone ever thought of grouping children according to achievement? Put the top students together, mid-performing students together, and the ones needing the most help together and strive to eliminate the lowest level of achievement each and every year. Some of the world's brightest have a cut-throat educational system based on student performance that has little mercy for the kids not able to keep pace or unwilling to excel. It sounds harsh but is it really?

Not an easy issue to fix but something that needs addressed now. In a down economy can we afford to become a C average nation any longer?