Managing Your Career and Compensation During Tough Economic Times

A friend of mine is senior analyst, skilled in Agile, formal business analysis techniques, and active in the professional community. She sent me the following note:

"I've been having a conversation with my peeps about handling job offers/changes as the market picks back up. I think that in the bleak times, a lot of people like me accepted job offers that were less than ideal, but way better than nothing.

As thinks pick up though, I think some of us are going to be recruited heavily, and for some of us who were in long-term jobs, this is new experience.

- Is there still a concept of a "minimum" length of tenure at a job?

- Do frequent changes make a prospective employer wonder how long you'll stay with them?

- If you are on a project as an employee of a contracting company, is it honorable or naive to think you should stay with that employer through the term of that project and not pursue other offers?

- What other things should prospective employers and candidates be thinking about?"

Great questions, and quite timely given the nature of the market. Let's address these.


Q: Is there still a concept of a "minimum" length of tenure at a job? Do frequent changes make a prospective employer wonder how long you'll stay with them?


A: Yes, for both permanent and contract positions.


Hiring managers today are much more understanding of the fact that the market is volatile and people are impacted by layoffs that have nothing to do with their individual performance. Depending on the geographic location and the industry, it is not unusual to see a person have three full time employment positions within a five year period.


Similarly, most hiring managers know and accept that individuals who have worked as consultants for any length of time will have numerous client engagements and possibly consulting companies on their resume'.


At the same time, most hiring managers (and HR specialists that screen resume's) still apply some sort of test of reasonableness to tenure. For an employee, while one or even two short term jobs may be understandable, a consistent pattern of multiple short term professional positions generally signals caution.

Similarly, most contract / consulting positions last at least three months, and more typically six months and longer. Having numerous consecutive short term engagements raises question marks.



While a candidate can often explain away specific situations, there is only so much bad luck one person can have! Given the number of candidates on the market right now, employers can be very selective, and will look for easy reasons NOT to hire a person.



Q: If you are on a project as an employee of a contracting company, is it honorable or naive to think you should stay with that employer through the term of that project and not pursue other offers?



A: Yes it is honorable and the right thing to do from a professional perspective, but there are exceptions.



The keys are communication and timing. An experienced consultant knows there are times that are more appropriate for him or her to transition from an assignment, and this guides their actions.



For example, a Project Manager would not leave in the middle of a project. They would wait until completion a phase or key deliverables, and / or have a successor ready to take over for them. A Business Analyst would not leave in the middle of client interviews or JAD sessions, but rather upon acceptance of business requirements by the stakeholders and sponsors.



Still, opportunities sometimes present themselves at the most inopportune times. Should a career opportunity present itself while you are in the midst of another engagement, my recommendations are to:

• Work with your consulting company to discuss the situation and develop a plan. If you truly have a career opportunity, chances are they will want you to leave on a good terms as a friend (and potential future client!).
• Have at least one contigency plan developed that will help ensure the client's success without your presence.
• Time your departure to minimize impact to the client and engagement.

Similarly, there may be personal reasons you may need to leave an assignment (ex: care for a sick relative), and these are generally understood. Still, the same rules apply.

However, these exceptions occur maybe only 10% of the time. A position that simply yields shorter drive time or is closer to your favorite beverage provider is hardly the same as a "career opportunity"! I recommend in the vast majority of cases they commit to and fulfill the duration of the engagement, particularly if they plan on workng as a professional consultant for their career.

Q: What other things should prospective employers and candidates be thinking about?

A: For the employer: Building the right culture and team. For the candidate: Career management, from a broad perspective and for the long term.

The most successful organizations all share a few things in common:

• They are crystal clear from the top of the organization to the bottom about the business they are in, where it is going, and what is happening in the environment that might impact it.
• They expect and develop high performance from all areas of the organization, and constantly strive for improvement.
• They treat the hiring employees as the most sacred and important duty they have.

Right now we are seeing companies hire strong technical and analytical individuals who have traditionally worked as consultants and who happen to be on the market. These professional consultants are taking Full Time Employee positions as a "safe haven" while the economy recovers. I am betting most of these folks will return to consulting within two years.

Why? Because they are not the right long term fits for the organization, and the culture is at odds with what they are all about. My experience has been that once an individual becomes accustomed to consulting / contracting, the tend to prefer it over full time employment.

From a candidate perspective, we all understand that we need to think about continually adding skills, knowledge, and capability to our portfolio so that we can evolve to the jobs of tomorrow. We need to understand what is happening in the industry / business sector we are in. But there is one more thing we need to think about.

At certain points during our professional careers, we need to take risks. We need to move beyond our traditional area of expertise into roles that require different knowledge and skills. We need to put ourselves in situations where there is risk of failure so that we challenge ourselves and grow. Why? Because we are in a world where organizations, jobs, and even entire industries can shrink significantly or even vanish almost overnight.

Ask yourself: "Do I have 20 years of experience, or 2 years of experience 10 times over?". If it is the latter, I hope you have a contingency plan from a financial perspective.

I tell my college age kids that there are only a few things they have to think about in order to manage their careers:

• Work in a job where you get to do the things you like to do, that you enjoy doing, and are interesting to you.
• Understand how you get paid, where the money that pays your salary comes from.
• Study and understand what is happening in your company and industry, and the forces that are impacting its future. Adjust as necessary.

Pretty simple stuff, yet most of us get so wrapped up in the skills and knowledge required for our respective disciplines that we forget to consider the big picture.

I'm Going To Jail!

Yes, it's true. I will be arrested and tossed in the slammer on November 19. Check it out.

http://tinyurl.com/yz4pwd7

All in good fun, of course, and for a good cause!

What Candidates Should Expect From IT Staffing Firms - Part II

At the beginning of the summer, I had Part I of this post where I asked the question "What do you look for when working with IT staffing firms?". My original topic was "What Candidates Should Expect from IT Staffing Firms" which has morphed into "What do you look for when working with these firms?"


Though I used to be a Project Manager, scope management was never a strength! However, I promise I will answer the "what you should expect" question at the end of this multi-post topic. Similarly, there are dozens of questions one might ask when choosing to deal with one firm vs. another. I will provide the "laundry list" in another post; the questions I have here are those I feel are most important.


Now, more than ever, a large number of folks are finding themselves working as part of the contingent work force, and are in unfamiliar territory. There are things that a traditional staff employee takes for granted when working as an full time employee (FTE) that don't always hold true when working for a staffing firm.


I polled my network of folks and consulted a few other sources and came up with a number of things. I will attempt to group related comments together:


ABOUT YOU:


Time to do some self assessment. Is it tough for you to walk into unfamiliar situations, or do you like the challenge of a new situation? Do you work best in a structured work environment in cubes, or are you happier in an open office environment in an old building somewhere downtown?


Think about yourself and your aptitudes to help structure your selection criteria:


What am I looking for in my next opportunity? How well does the staffing firm and this particular engagement align with what I want out of this experience?


Think about your goals for your next move. Are you just trying to get back working and generate income? Are you looking to get a foot in the door at the end client so you can hire on full time? Or, are you looking to extend and grow your career as a consultant?


In a soft economy like this one many folks are just looking to generate income, and are less concerned about career growth. Still, think about it and ask the relevant questions:

• "What is your policy for converting to FTE with the client?"
• "How can you help me grow my skills by working with your firm?"

If you are the type of individual that is selective about the nature of the work and the environment, the consulting world may not be for you. A large part of the success for an individual working in a consulting / staff augmentation position is their ability to work effectively within the client environment, to mold themselves into the work and the culture.


I found when I was consulting that I could learn something from every engagement. Even the most difficult environment, or the most mundane engagement also came with the opportunity to learn how to deal with a difficult manager, or how to effect change in an environment that was not receptive. At the very least, I found ways to lend value to the client organization regardless of the constraints and difficulties I faced.


I suggest you think about this as you move into consulting and staffing positions.


ABOUT THE FIRM:


There are hundreds of firms out there with all sorts of different opportunities. Go to Monster.com or DICE.com, and most of the positions will be from staffing firms. You will likely see multiple firms advertising the same position. Which one do you choose to work with?



Does the firm specialize in my area of expertise, or do they provide more general staffing? Regardless, how many engagements do they currently have doing what it is I do?


There are pros and con's associated with boutique or niche firms, and general IT staffing companies. A niche firm certainly is more familiar with individual market spaces and clients, and may be better equipped to get you into that perfect assignment. On the flip side, chances are a general IT staffing firm will have a broader reach and larger client base, and be able to reach areas that a niche firm can't.


The key is to ascertain how well the firm understands what you have to offer a potential client. The better the recruiter and sales person understands what you do, the more effectively they can look at opportunities and needs in the market place. Ask:

• "Can you describe the type of engagements you have today that are similar to what I am looking for?"
• "Can you connect me with one of your consultants who is doing this type of thing today?"

It's not so much what the answer is but how the company answers that will tell you a lot about the firm. Read between the lines: are you hearing the truth or fluff?


What is the firm's reputation in the market place with both clients and with consultants?


This is a key question. In central Ohio, there are probably at least one hundred IT staffing and consulting firms. Some are widely known, large national companies. Some are small firms that focus on a couple of clients or in a specific niche or industry. Most are reputable; some have questionable practices.


Regardless, ask people for recommendations and ideas on firms that are good to work with. If you are approached by a firm, do a little homework before committing to work with them. How can you check out the reputation of a particular firm?

• Leverage social networking tools such as LinkedIn and others to find people who have worked with a firm. LinkedIn is a great place to search. Find the sales people and recruiters for the firm, and see what others have to say about them. Find consultants that work for the firm and reach out to them via LinkedIn.
• Check with former colleagues or managers that have engaged the firm from the customer side to get direct insight.
• Ask the recruiter and sales people you talk to "How long have you been with the firm?". Look on LinkedIn or other social networking sites to look at the tenure of the internal staff of the firm. A firm with high turnover in their sales and / or recruiting staff is a warning sign. Even in today's world of "Vendor Management Systems", the success of a staffing or consulting company is still based in large part on the ability to build and maintain relationships with candidates and clients. A firm with high turnover, particularly in their sales staff, can not maintain relationships with customers.

Every firm claims to be professional, high end, and "just like the big firms". Some are, some are not. Some firms simply match candidates with clients, and handle payrolling and invoicing, but provide little additional support to clients or consultants.

How do I get paid and what are the benefits like?

Some firms offer salary and benefits; some only pay hourly with no benefits. The different types of arrangements include:

• W2 Salaried: You are a salaried employee, and get paid a fixed amount every time period (ex: $6,250 / month). The consulting / staffing firm takes care of payroll tax withholding, FICA, etc. There may or may not be compensation for hours in excess of the standard hours that are billed to the client.
• W2 Hourly: You get paid a set amount for every hour you bill the client (ex: $38.50 / hour). The consulting / staffing firm takes care of taxes and other withholding.
• Independent Contractor (IC): Sometimes referred to as a "1099 contractor". You are paid a set amount for every hour you bill the client. You are treated as an independent business entity by the consulting / staffing firm, and are responsible for all of your own tax reporting, and generally are required have general liability and other types of business insurance.

There are pro's and con's to each these, too much to go into here. For "rules of thumb":

• If you need health benefits, W2 Salary is generally your best bet. However, some firms offer health benefits with W2 Hourly. Ask.
• If the assignment duration is relatively short (<>
• If your goal is to be a long term, professional consultant, known as an expert or highly skilled in a specific market space, then take the time to get set up as an IC.

Regarding benefits, most reputable firms offer some form of health, dental, 401k, and other benefits to W2 salaried employees, and a few offer benefits to W2 hourly employees. However, some firms do not offer health insurance and other benefits at all! Be sure to ask!

IC's are not eligible for benefits such as health and 401k as they are independent business entities by definition. If you are looking at working as an IC through another firm or by marketing yourself direct to a client, then I strongly advise researching the subject and consulting a professional accountant / lawyer accustomed to dealing with IC's.

WHAT ABOUT THE ENGAGEMENT?

More about things to think about in my next post. This one is getting a bit lengthy!

Quick Update and Thoughts

Since my last post, business has picked up significantly. This seems somewhat at odds with the general trend in the economy, as layoffs are ongoing in many firms and financial results continue to suffer. This trend is impacting my company across the country, and seems to be consistent in the vast majority of regions.

What is happening here? Why are we seeing a rise in IT staffing positions when the media reports a very slow recovery? If a recovery is underway, why aren't companies hiring FTE?

My thoughts on this are that the cost of contingent labor has dropped to the point where the hourly loaded cost of full time employees and IT contractors is very comparable. Most large clients with formal procurement processes and Vendor Management groups have imposed rate reductions on their staffing supplers. Similarly the supply of skilled IT staff on the market has increased due to slowness in the economy. Conversely, few clients have been able to force a similar reduction in cost on their FTE's.

This has resulted in a very comparable hourly cost between contractors and FTE's. The advantage of contractors is that they can be hired and released quickly without worrying about costs for severance and such. This continues a trend that started some time ago where companies maintain a minimum level of staff to preserve core business knowledge and then use contractors for projects and initiatives that arise. Sort of like a general contractor outsourcing the carpentry work to another company on a building project.

The other oberservation is that I have never seen so much senior talent on the market. Clients seem to be focused on the 5 to 10 year technical professional that can be told what to do and left alone to do it. The demand for management talent in particular as waned. It is as if companies are leaving the technical staff alone to do the work in a self managed manner, and even when a "lead" position comes up, it usually entails the person also being a direct contributor.

This may be short sighted as individual contributors are notorious for shortcutting process and practices such as project management, requirements definition, etc. It is somewhat of a cycle: I expect we will see a rise in demand for Project Managers within the next year or so to fix the initiatives that have gone out of control.

What Candidates Should Expect From IT Staffing Firms - Part 1

Originally, my plan for this post was to do a short piece on what to look for in an IT staffing / consulting company. However, when I asked people for their thoughts and experiences, I received way more questions and and anecdotes than I ever anticipated!

In today's market, many folks are finding themselves working for IT staffing / consulting companies for the first time in their careers. Unfortunately, many are also getting surprised by what they find.

For example:

• The compensation discussed during the interview is not the compensation presented at time of offer.
• The consultant is not paid in a timely manner or at all.
• The consultant is not eligible for health insurance and other benefits that were previously discussed.
• The position is actually a subcontracted position.
• Travel and other expenses are not reimbursed.
• When the consultant comes off assignment, their employment with the consulting company ends.
• They are offered an independent contractor (1099) position rather than a W2 employee position.

And so on. It is understandable that miscommunication happens from time to time, but there is no excuse for a lack of clarity on the key aspects of an engagement and working with a company. It reflects poorly on the Recruiter and Account Manager as well as the industry as a whole.

I had coffee this morning with an individual who worked in the IT consulting industry in the 1990's, and recently relo'd back to central Ohio after working as a staff employee for a leading firm in the IT sector. She was quite surprised - actually, shocked - with practices today compared to ten years ago. For those of us who have been in the industry for awhile, perhaps we have been desensitized to the amount of change that has occurred. For candidates who are just getting acquainted with the industry, it can be an unpleasant experience should they fall prey to an disreputable firm.

If you have questions or observations on working with IT staffing and consulting firms, I would like to hear from you as I am preparing a series of blog posts on this topic. My goal is to coach and advise folks on how to mitigate their risk and align with the higher caliber firms like mine. Please respond via comments on this post or email at Rich.Grunenwald@gmail.com.

I appreciate your thoughts.

A Breath of Fresh Air

I attended and participated in an event this evening, the "TechColumbus IdeaPitch and Industry Forum" (http://www.techcolumbus.org/techcolumbus-ideapitch-and-industry-forum). It was organized by the Ohio State university Business Builders Club, a student organization with the objective of promoting entrepreneurship as a career path for gratuates.

The agenda included three separate forums for the students. One forum was the "IdeaPitch" where budding entrepreneurs pitched their ideas for new products and services. This forum was the most heavily attended as it tapped on the energy and creativity of students. Another was the "IT Industry" forum where panelists from various firms discussed the industry with students.

The third forum was the "Industry Forum" which concentrated on discussion about how to market one's self and what companies look at when hiring a recent graduate. I was a panelist for this forum, and must say, I really enjoyed it. I learned as much from the students as they learned from the panel, and it provided an excellent perspective for me as I, uh, " continue" in my career and work with folks that are significantly younger than me.

What impressed me the most was the number of people that were really looking at entrepreneurship as a career path. The creativity, energy, and passion displayed was a breath of fresh air.

How can industry take advantage of this?

Simple Job Hunting Tip

If your are using job boards as a source for opportunities, there is a site that can help save you significant time and energy.

A nifty tool I use is a web site http://www.indeed.com/. "Indeed" does a scan of job boards and provides a singular portal to view jobs that meet your search criteria.

Essentially, you can search multiple job boards, both external (Monster, DICE, etc.) and internal (corporate, staffing companies, etc.) to find jobs that meet your search criteria (location, salary, type, etc.). You can also save your search and have it run automatically as a search agent.

A weak point of Indeed is that the search criteria is fairly basic. It does not do a particularly good job of categorizing jobs as to search for a specific job by title. Searching is done via a simple keyword search. Indeed is really a "broad net" when it comes to sweeping up jobs posted elsewhere. But, it saves time from going to multiple company web sites, and leads to positions you might not have thought about.

Job Hunting Tips...

Given the economy, many folks who are not used to looking for employment are finding themselves doing so. Job-hunting (more importantly, job FINDING) is a good skill to have in your portfolio, and one that most of us acquire the hard way.

There are countless books, web sites, and blogs on this topic, so there is really no reason to go in depth here. However, I have developed a standard email with a few tips that I send to people, and thought I might share them here.

Some of this is local to central Ohio, but can be applied to other geographies.

RESUME'

• Make sure your resume' is top quality and targets the position you for which you are applying. Your resume is the marketing collateral for "You, Inc.", and reflects an image of what you are all about.
• PLEASE ensure your resume' is without errors, typo's, and formatting issues! It never ceases to amaze me how many people looking for six figure jobs have resumes that look like they were written by a fifth grader.
• I highly recommend going to the library or book store and getting a book about resume' writing. There are many styles and formats, and unless you spend your days looking at resumes, it's difficult to know what a good resume' needs to look like.
• If you are struggling developing your resume', consider enlisting professional help. There are services that range from basic resume' writing to all out career counseling, and pricing varies accordingly. Locally, I recommend Worthington Career Services, http://www.worthingtonresumes.com/

NETWORKING

If you have read this far, you are probably not sitting around evaluating competing job offers. Get out there and talk to people.

• http://www.meetup.com/ Go to Meetup.com and search on “ColumbusTechLife” and sign up for it. You will get emails about things going on. There is also a group on LinkedIn for ColumbusTechLife. As I mentioned, these are a great way to get intro’d to tech people around town that you might not normally be aware of.
• http://codemgmt.blogspot.com/ There are a ton of IT related groups on this site. Some may be relevant, some not so much.
• http://www.sciotoridgejng.com/ This is a great group run by Janice Worthington who writes for Business First of Columbus, and who has been featured on TV news. My company has done some job fairs with them and they are good. There are multiple meetings each month with speakers and other events.
• http://www.linkedin.com/ If you are not yet on LinkedIn, then join. It is a great tool for finding professional contacts. From a sales perspective, I use it to search companies for people I used to work with, so then I can call them to get reacquainted and if it makes sense to introduce my company to them. You can do the same thing from a job search perspective. Find and call folks you know from your past (work, schools, etc.) to see if there are opportunities or if they know of something going on.
• http://www.facebook.com/ LinkedIn has purposely targeted the professional market. On the other hand, Facebook is truly a socially oriented networking tool. If you haven't already, set up an account, get your profile out there, and get connected to folks you know.
• Traditional Networking: Clubs, churches, and other social organizations have traditionally been a great source for networking and finding out about jobs, and still are. Leverage them.

ACTIVITY

Your job now is to get a job. Be the best employee that "You, Inc." has ever had, and work your buns off. Everyone's style is a bit different, but every day you should be able to point back at a list of completed activities. For example:

• Made 40 calls to former co-workers
• Applied for 4 jobs online
• Set up coffee meeting with former college room mate.
• Tailored my resume for a different type of position
• Met with a temp agency / staffing firm in my geography
• Went to a networking event at church
• Researched how to market myself as independent consultant
• Identified three alternatives to jobs in my current field

...or whatever. The point is that you need to be BUSY, show results of your activities, and apply discipline and rigor to your search, and be in control of your search.

SUMMARY

As I mentioned at the beginning, most of this can be found elsewhere, and much of it seems to be common sense when you think about it a bit. However, most of us aren't used to looking for a job, and a few pointers on what to do can go a long way in making our search more productive, even in a slow economy.

Driving Cost Out Of The Contingent Labor Supply Chain

Another winning post title.

When I speak with a procurement professional, the discussion always comes around to bill rates for contingent labor and how our rates compare to others. The importance of low bill rates is constantly impressed upon me, and the offering of most favorable pricing and terms is a requirement to win the contract. Then, the next items discussed are service levels and the added value that I as a supplier of contingent labor can provide to my clients.

I wonder whether this has been given real thought. It seems to me that to drive costs down in the contingent labor supply chain, there needs to be efficiencies in both the supplier AND client organizations. For example, that coverage SLA that the supplier needs to meet? It INCREASES costs to the client because the supplier has to staff recruiting to cover requirements they have no hope in ever filling.

To date most of the discussion in the IT space has been aimed towards the supplier, and solely in the form of rate management. Rates are only one aspect of managing cost. What about sales costs? Administrative costs? Recruiting costs? The cost of a reactive supplier model vs. a more proactive model?

For example, there are many clients that require the assistance of a skilled sales person to help them define their IT staffing need. The sales person has to spend time with the hiring manager, be knowledgeable about the technology and role, and step the hiring manager through definition of their need. Then, the sales person has to accurately communicate this need to internal recruiters who screen and match up candidates with the position, rewrite the candidate's resume', and present the candidate.

Think of the costs incurred by the supplier:

- Sales person salary
- Recruiter
- Time spent: determining need; communicating to recruiter; finding, recruiting, screening and presenting candidate.

This doesn't even get into the interview phase. When the hiring manager decides who they want to interview, the sales person is contacted, then a series of back and forth communications to get the candidate confirmed occurs, candidate prep is done, and then we go from there.

Now, what if it worked like this:

Client company regularly communicates contigent labor forecast for the next 30, 60, 90 days so supplier is able to proactively recruit talent. Hiring manager goes to a portal where he can search through a pool of available candidates from approved vendors. Hiring manager selects candidates they want to interview and sends an interview request along with available times. Candidate and vendor respond back through the portal. Interview happens.

A lot of cost is eliminated in this type of model. There is really no "selling" going on at the transactional level. The supplier's role becomes more of a "resource pool management" and "fulfillment" type of role, and the sales person really becomes more of a true Account Manager, ensuring the process moves smoothly, and that the supplier focuses on value adds rather than managing the individual transactions.

There are other variations of the supplier model, and there are parts of the current processed that can be greatly improved with minimal cost. Still, the point is that a mature client organization and a mature supplier organization can work together, collaboratively instead of adversarially, to effectively to minimize costs in the supply chain, benefiting both organizations directly through cost saving efficiencies and indirectly through increased competitiveness in their respective markets.

So far, the vast majority of the dialog I have read or been exposed to has happened solely within the supplier community or solely within the client community.

I wonder what would happen if a group of supplier organizations with relatively mature processes and a group of client organizations with relatively mature processes got together and discussed how to make the contingent labor supply chain more effective and drive cost out of the process. Think of the discoveries that could be made and the "light bulb moments" that could occur when both client and supplier organizations look at the process as a whole, and work together to optimize it.

Nah, it'll never happen.

You 2.0

OK, so the title is a bit cliche', but so were the others I came up with.

I talk to people all the time, and in particular I come into contact with a lot of folks who are looking for a new opportunity in a field where employment is soft or in decline. Too many of the conversations go like this:

• Me: "Tell me what you might be looking at doing in your next position".
• Candidate: "Well, I've got a lot of experience as a (pick your job name) while working at my last job, and before that I was (pretty much the same thing) at my previous company".
• Me: "Really. Tell me about some of your talents and strengths".
• Candidate: "I work well with others, I am really good with (whatever the core skills are for what they've been doing for the past 15 or 20 years), and I am a great, loyal employee".
• Me: "Tell me about some of the skills you've added or responsibilities you've taken on over the past few years. I'm really interested in how you've grown". (this is a big hint)
• Candidate: (long pause)"I took some classes on (something they've never applied) and they sent me to training on (something else they've never used)".
• Me: "Why do you think your job went away, and why would they release somebody like you who has been a good employee?"
• Candidate: "The company had to save money due to tough times, and they let a bunch of us experienced folks go."
• Me: "Really? What happened to the work that needed to be done?"
  Candidate: "The company decided to (cut back on projects, sent work offshore, kept the less expensive people to do the work that needed done, consolidated operations in one location, etc.)".
• Me: "What did you learn from this?" (hoping for a light bulb moment...)
• Candidate: (spews forth something about cheap offshore labor, poor leadership, bad management, or that they don't understand how the company will keep its doors open without them)
• Me: "Companies go through changes through all sorts of reasons, and it can be tough. Tell me what you are looking to do in your next position".
  Candidate: "I'd like to get on with a good company doing (pretty much the same thing they've been doing the past 15 years...)".
• Me (trying to lead to an obvious conclusion): "What have you found out there in the market?"
• Candidate: "Not much. There aren't very many jobs posted, and what there is out there doesn't pay very well".
  

And so on.

As mentioned in my bio and earlier posts, I have been blessed through my life and career. One of these blessings was an early lesson about volatility in employment and managing your career. My father was out of work in the early 1980's during a recession that hit his industry (civil engineering / construction) fairly hard. He still had six kids living at home, a ton of expenses, and not much in terms of a fallback plan from a financial perspective.

What did he do? He reinvented himself and became successful in a loosely related, but quite different, job than what he had been in. He decided to adjust, adapt, and thrive. Similarly, my experience in the IT consulting / staffing / contingent labor field for the past 18 years has sensitized me to the ups and downs of the economy and how one needs to evolve to survive and prosper.

I see too many people that when faced with a job that has gone away, they refuse to change or adapt themselves, and instead become disenchanted when the world changes and doesn't accommodate them. It is a shame because so many of these folks have a lot to offer, just maybe not in the way they are used to.

We all have the tendency to define ourselves in terms of the job titles we have held, not in terms of the jobs we have the potential to do. When we look for a job, the first thing we do is look at jobs just like the one we had. However, we have aptitudes, knowledge, and abilities that can be combined and leveraged in all sorts of jobs that are quite different from each other.

For example, I met a person not too long ago who was a senior IT manager / director at a large financial services company. He's been looking at similar positions, a tough find given the market. As we talked, I asked him about his accomplishments, his hobbies and interests, and what he felt he was really good at and what he got the most satisfaction out of. One of the things he felt he was really good at is bringing people together across a diverse, large enterprise, and getting them to act together to meet objectives and accomplish projects.

I told him working effectively across large organizations is golden and applies to all sorts of organizations and industries. It shows excellent communication skills, ability to work with diverse groups, political sensitivity, etc. These skills can be used at:

• Any geographically distributed company
• Sales / account management / sales support
• Not for profits
• Rapidly growing companies

He had been thinking primarily of senior IT management positions in financial services, but by they end of our discussion started thinking of a much broader field of possibilities.

I encourage people to go through what I call a "personal inventory" to see what they might have to offer. Essentially,

• Create a set of lists with the following headings: "Job Titles", "Roles", "Industry & Company Experience", "Subject Matter Expertise & Business Knowledge", "Technical & Professional Skills", "Personal Characteristics & Aptitudes", "Passions, Interests, and Hobbies"
• Under each heading, list everything you can think of. Go back to your old resumes, your old performance appraisals and project notes. Think about your volunteer, charitable, and church activities. Do this over the period of a couple days as the more you think about things, the more you will recall.

Look at what you've put together. I am betting it is way more impressive than what you thought. If nothing else, you just went through a huge exercise in self affirmation! You've got way more to offer than simply 15 years at Company X.

Now, start to think about different types of jobs and how you can pull skills, experiences, and aptitudes from your inventory to do some of these jobs. Look at a newspaper or an online job board at jobs you never targeted that you can probably do. I am betting that you will be pleasantly surprised at the possibilities open to you.

While I am certainly not a career coach by any stretch of the imagination, there are some basic things we all need to consider to remain viable from an employment perspective.

The observations I have made include:

• We need to constantly be adding skills, experiences, and talents to our portfolios so that we can proactively move to new jobs, roles, and / or companies as needed.
• Furthermore, we need to be cognizant of these skills, experiences, and talents that we are adding to our portfolios.
• The paradigm of what work and career means has changed. "Go to school, get a job with a good company, work hard and be loyal, and things will work out" is just about gone in many if not most fields of endeavor. The paradigm now is, "Add value in every way you can, and if you aren't adding value, move on to where you can".
• If your job responsibilities and skills are essentially the same as they were five years ago, you are at significant risk. Chances are that you are probably compensated at higher level than a replacement person. The added value of your company knowledge only goes so far when the company is looking at dollars and cents.
• I tell my college aged kids that there are only a couple things you need to think about when you pursue a career and a job. First, understand what pays your salary and how what you do contributes to this. Here's a clue: it isn't the department budget. Secondly, think about some of the trends that are impacting the industry sector you are in or pursuing, and how these trends will shape the future of your company and job.

Economic times are challenging. The companies and people that prosper are those that understand what is happening and innovate. Pay attention to what's happening in your company and your industry, and plan, learn, and adapt to ensure your continued viability in the market.

IT Staffing Supply Chain Thoughts...

I just finished working with a team of folks on an RFP response to do business as an approved vendor in the IT staffing space, and this got me to thinking about the process. I've been directly responsible, led, and / or contributed to about a dozen of these types of responses during the past ten years. The client companies generally have most of these characteristics:

• Annual spend on IT staff augmentation services in excess of $100m.
• A formal procurement group and process for securing services.
• A few major centers where most of the IT staffing services are used, as well as ten or more additional locations in various areas of the country.
• One or more of the following business goals: lower cost, improved quality of services delivered (however that's supposed to be measured), favorable contractual T's and C's, etc.

Typically, the evaluation of the RFP response ends up with the client company comparing strict objective factors like price, ability to support the enterprise across the geography, etc. If all goes well, the vendor gets added to "the list" and starts to receive staffing requirements, and goes from there.

What I don't see a lot of is dialog on how a provider can help make the client organization stronger or more competitive. I would be ecstatic to see a question on an RFP such as:

"How would working with your firm help us be more competitive, realize higher profits, and / or be a better member of the community?"

My observation has been that the most effective business relationships take into consideration a variety of factors over and above things like price, contractual T's and C's, and quality of services. In a customer-supplier relationship with a product or service that is relatively mature, there is an implicit assumption that the goods and services delivered will be high quality and cost effective, that working together on the delivery will be seamless, and that issues that come up will be handled in a responsive and appropriate manner.

Doing a good job may get you in the door, but providing added value and making the client better is what defines a true partner. What really helps a client at this level are things like:

• Working jointly with them to streamline their procurement and on boarding process for IT staff. For example, how much time and energy would be saved in hiring managers really understood how to define their needs and write a position requirement?
• Bringing technology insight and business approaches to a client that will help the client achieve a competitive edge.
• Connecting executives and leaders with others who can provide thought leadership.
• Aligning community involvement / charitable efforts with those of the client.
• Sponsoring joint efforts to pilot innovative processes for services procurement.

It is understanding the client's business and environment so well that you can anticipate their needs and wants, and be positioned to respond to them. We are near or at the point in the IT staffing business that being a strong company with geographic coverage, efficient processes, and competitive pricing is not enough.

Our job in the IT services sector is not just to provide good people. It is really to make our client organizations more effective. The IT services companies who will prosper long term will be the ones who figure this out.

More Trends...

I make it a habit to regularly meet with folks in the IT staffing industry on a regular basis. It is always good to keep up with what is happening around town, and to discuss ideas on dealing with the challenges we all face. In fact, I estimate that on average, I talk to anywhere from two to ten sales people, recruiters, branch managers, or senior consultants every week. These are one on one conversations, not networking events.


It's no secret that the economy is tough and that there are changes happening in the business. We saw this back in 2001 - 2003 when the economy was soft. Formal procurement practices really took hold in most companies with large IT services spend. Off shore competition from the likes of TCS and Infosys have found a nice niche and will only continue to grow their market share. We are seeing a similar (although I feel more systemic) change today as companies evolve their "procurement" to more of a "human capital supply chain" type of model.

(As an aside, I despise terms like "human capital". We are talking about PEOPLE, not widgets!)

What really surprises me is the reaction of my peers and colleagues to this change. It ranges from subtle resistance to outright denial. Per my previous post, IT is a typical industry on a product life cycle, and IT services are following the product life cycle. Given this, should anyone really be surprised that margins are going down, the supply chain is consolidating, costs are being reduced in the supply chain (or profits depending on perspective!), and labor rates are being impacted? Particularly in a down economy?

I suppose I can understand how a person that has been insulated inside the walls of a large corporation for 20 years or so might be unnerved by these changes. You dedicate your career to a company, put forth a good effort, and drink from the company fountain. Then, one day you see your colleagues laid off and jobs go out the door, only to be replaced by lower cost labor. I can understand how a person might have some resentment.

At the same time, it surprises me that my contemporaries and competitors who are out in the market in front of customers and companies every day resist and deny the changes happening. How can a person be in an industry for 15 or 20 years in a sales capacity and not understand the trends and adapt their business to the direction the customer base is headed? Or, decide to target another market with their services?

Can there be anyone that's unaware of what has happened to the manufacturing base in the US and not see the same thing in the services sector? It boggles my mind. In the technology field, we like to point out how innovative we are and that we serve as change agents for our clients and business at large by providing better solutions and tools to facilitate commerce. But when it comes to change that impacts us, we are among the worst at dealing with it!

One of my sayings is, "I'm not that smart, and even I can figure this out!" For whatever reason, I tend to try and step back and look at the big picture. I can thank my parents and upbringing for the inquisitive and analytical nature, and my education from The Ohio State University and University of Dayton for providing the framework for looking at the macro picture. I've been fortunate to meet get to know people along the way that provide other ways of looking at things, and additional perspectives. There are reasons that companies do what they do, and my job as a services provider is to understand and acknowledge these reasons.

It's pretty simple, really. Be aware of what is happening in your market space, adapt and evolve, or move on.

Staffing Industry Trends

As noted in my description, I lead a branch of a IT services firm in central Ohio. We help clients who are challenged by new technology, who are struggling to get projects done, or need help finding the right people to fit in their environment. It is a great company led by smart people who get the business.

Note that my thoughts and opinions here are mine only and do not reflect those of my employer, its management, or its employees.

Information Technology at large is a maturing field. While there will continue to be technology advances that will change how IT is levereaged to help people and business, it is unlikely that there will be revolutionary changes similar to those of the past 15 or so years (the Internet, Distributed Technology, etc.).

Much of what I am seeing is that the IT services sector is following a traditional product life cycle:

• Market introduction stage: Costs high, sales volume low, no/little competition, demand has to be created, etc.
• Growth stage: Costs reduced due to economies of scale, sales volume increases significantly, profitability, competition begins to increase, etc.
• Mature stage: Costs decline as you are well established in market and there is public awareness, sales volume peaks, increase in competitive offerings,
  prices tend to drop, etc.
• Saturation and decline stage: costs become counter-optimal, sales volume declines or stabilizes, prices and profitability diminish, profit becomes more a challenge of production/distribution efficiency, etc.

Depending on what segment within IT services that you look at, the sector is somewhere in the mid to late Growth stage or early in the Mature stage.

Why is this noteworthy?

Virtually all of the people employed in the IT services sector - Developers, Analysts, Exectives, Project Managers, Engineers, Sales people, etc. - joined the industry when it was in the heart of the growth phase. We have enjoyed great careers, significant compensation growth, and job security. However, our world is changing and we aren't used to it.

This is causing discomfort for many:

• People used to 6 figure incomes are faced with a potential decline or adjustment.
• Companies accustomed to traditional profit margins have to reengineer the way they do business as well as adjust their mix of services to stay vibrant and growing.
• Customers for IT services are changing how they have to buy these services as formal procurement and supply chain practices are applied to what is a significant expenditure for companies.

What we are seeing is more fundamental than a temporary drop in demand like we saw early in this decade. It is a major realignment of the sector.

Now, more than ever, it is critical that IT services providers:

• Have 100% clarity and definition as to what business they are in.
• Understand how their business and target markets are evolving.
• Adjust their operational models and tactics to align with the direction in which the sector is moving.

Some thoughts on the implications of this later.

What's Happening?

I am not quite sure what to say for my first post. Several thoughts and observations today.

There are so many things happening in the micro and macro environments that it is difficult to make sense and cope with it all:

• Friends, colleagues, and family members are being terminated from their employment for all sorts of reasons.
• Folks I know well are struggling with serious health issues, or are support providers for family members with serious health issues.
• The volatility in our economy and the noise about it leaves a person not knowing what to think.

And so on.

It is interesting how we react to this. We take granted that we live in a secure environment and when things happen that shake and even crack the foundation, we don't know what to do.

For me, I have found that focusing on the good in the world and in people at large makes a tremendous difference. I can't change the world, but I can change my corner of the world, particularly the part that exists within.