Notes from Staffing World: Fun, Facts and Otherwise

I’m an avid reader of the Baseball Notes column of the Sunday Boston Globe, and I always fancied myself writing something similar. So here it goes from the show floor of Staffing World…

Danny Cahill, always insightful, very entertaining and a Bullhorn partner, gave yet another terrific session yesterday commanding an audience of close to 1,000. A couple of very interesting tidbits…two key secrets to being a big biller:

  • Communicate to Gen X (the sweet spot of today’s candidates) in their way (forget your paternal instincts if you’re a baby boomer)
  • Work a niche, while building your company and then work more niches as you grow.

Here’s a fact from Danny’s session and it’s probably statistically significant. Of the 1,000 attendees about 60% were Gen X (born 1964 to 1980), about 30% were baby boomers and 10% Gen Y. Guess what? Gen X has a lot of employment power and they live by technology and self-interest (not meant pejoratively)… And Danny’s right, at least about the technology. Today’s Wall Street Journal reports in A Day Without Email Is Like that Gen Xers revolted when the baby boomer COO at U.S. Cellular thought he was doing them a favor by declaring “no email Fridays.” Shameless plug…

Art’s vision about integrated email is spot on. According to the WSJ story, email usage will increase 27% next year. If you’re in staffing and recruiting and you don’t have integrated email, then you don’t have a fully synchronized relationship between all of your candidate, client, colleague and contact information. It’s that simple. But don’t take my word for it…Walk around the show floor and see how many competitors to Bullhorn are springing up trying to offer integrated email. Imitation is the sincerest form of flattery and we are practitioners of Intel’s Andy Grove’s Only the Paranoid Survive philosophy. But we process 180 million transactions per month, including tens of millions of emails, almost flawlessy, and you just don’t wake up one day and decide to offer the market integrated email. It takes years of refinement and a maniacal customer focus. Check out our latest integrated email innovations right here, many of which are available through our Summer and Fall editions…Note: the Fall Edition is available tomorrow…

More from the Wall Street Journal, and speaking of niches,…since 1990 because of globalization and technology, the U.S. job market is polarizing around the low end unskilled worker and the high end knowledge worker, e.g. hedge fund managers. Jobs in the middle, industrial and office workers performing rote tasks, are getting squeezed out…

Now for the fun stuff…Staffing Industry Analysts is throwing a great party tonight at the Firewheel Room. SI always throws great parties at Staffing World and their SI Executive Forum…CareerBuilder is also throwing a great party tonight, a Rock’in Rodeo with Edwin McCain, at the Aztec Theater… Permission Marketing Guru Seth Godin speaks this afternoon (I’m a disciple and I suggest you become one too) and I’ll blog about it tomorrow…Till the next time.

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