GSETA

Beyond the Resume

According to a recent article in the Wall Street Journal, some companies are beginning to forego the traditional resume, particularly for positions that require higher skill levels and thinking:

Companies are increasingly relying on social networks such as LinkedIn, video profiles and online quizzes to gauge candidates' suitability for a job. While most still request a résumé as part of the application package, some are bypassing the staid requirement altogether.

A résumé doesn't provide much depth about a candidate, says Christina Cacioppo, an associate at Union Square Ventures who blogs about the hiring process on the company's website and was herself hired after she compiled a profile comprising her personal blog, Twitter feed, LinkedIn profile, and links to social-media sites Delicious and Dopplr, which showed places where she had traveled.

Some other application techniques recruiters are using include:

• Requiring candidates to complete an online questionnaire that asks about things like "your ideal job" and "the best job you ever had."

• Posting a series of challenges on the company website that job seekers must respond to. This gives the company insight into their thought processes. 

• Asking candidates to submit videos describing their love of the company's products. 

• Having candidates complete sample work products for evaluation. 

While some companies are using these technique in conjunction with asking for a resume, a number are getting rid of the resume requirement altogether as they feel it doesn't give sufficient information about the candidate's skills and knowledge. 

In some cases, this can work to the candidate's advantage. One gaming company put 30 people through a 6-week program that required them to demonstrate their programming chops. Six candidates were hired, several of whom would not have made it past a resume screen. 

For One Stop Career Centers, it's important to know this information in advising job seekers. But it can also be helpful to advise local businesses of these new techniques, which many companies report nets them much higher quality applicants than more traditional strategies. 

Friday Link Round-Up

New Jersey's Youth Agenda

View more presentations from GSETA.

Here's your first round-up of links for the Fall season. The summer went by WAY too quickly, didn't it?

• The Start-Up Daily--Great Ideas from Great Books--Each day this blog features a great idea/quote from a classic business book. This would be excellent information to share with your business customers, possibly in a daily email. 

• Manage Your Energy So You Can Manage Your Time--Some good advice on how to manage your time by taking advantage of your natural energy cycles. If you're not a morning person, don't try to get a lot of stuff done in the AM.

• That Was a Spectacular Fail!--Learning from failure is a key skill. This post includes some good resources and links for exploring this idea. 

• Generation X Stymied by Boomers--Apparently Boomers are staying in the workplace longer than expected, which is blocking and frustrating Gen X-ers who thought it was going to be their turn to run things. 

• The Poverty Crisis is Devastating Young Americans--Some VERY sobering statistics on how the recession and unemployment are disproprtionally impacting youth and African Americans. 

• Strategies for Managing the Boundaryless Career--For many people, the nature of work and careers has changed in profound ways. Here are some strategies for managing a career without boundaries. 

• 7 Easy Ways to Give Your Resume a Psychological Edge--It's all about influence. 

Sector Strategy Resources

Sector strategies are a hot topic. Here are some resources to help you develop and implement your own projects.

• Sector-Based Information and Resources--put together by the EPA, this site includes a ton of resources, profiles, reports and stakeholder groups. As of March 2010, it is no longer being updated, but many resources are still very timely.

• Sector Strategies Toolkit--developed primarily for states, this toolkit contains 12 modules and includes videos and information on roles, lessons learned and pitfalls. Also check out their blog, which links to additional reports, resources and tools.

• National Governor's Association (NGA) Resources--Includes a link to an evaluation framework.

• National Network of Sector Partners Resources and Publications--Includes links to several sector-specific resources and a national map of sector strategy projects.

• Workforce Strategies Inititative--From the Aspen Institute, you will find "Skills to Live By," a report on the experiences of people who have participated in sector strategy training initiatives and the Sectoral Employment Development Learning Project (SEDLP), which evaluated the outcomes, strategies and partnerships of 6 major sectoral initiatives. 

• INSIGHT Center for Community Economic Development Archived Webinars--includes sessions on work-based learning in healthcare, promoting regional economies and developing business partnerships. 

• Building Effective Employer Partnerships--This publication, developed by the Aspen Institute's Workforce Strategies Institute, reports on the key lessons learned in choosing employer partners, structuring relationships with employers, and providing services that are valued by businesses. It provides guidelines for measuring success with employer relations and designing communications structures to ensure a win-win partnership.

• Profiles in Career Pathing--This publication reviews career pathing strategies sector and other workforce development programs. Included are profiles of programs involving partnerships with community colleges. They are targeted to both incumbent and low-income workers. Also included is a listing of lessons learned during the implementation of these programs.

 

Friday Link Round-Up

Hard to believe it's Friday already. And here's some Friday trivia for you. In October 2010, we have 5 Fridays, 5 Saturdays and 5 Sundays--an event that apparently occurs only every 820 years or so.

But you're here for the links. So here they are:

• Job Openings Per Unemployed Worker Unchanged in August--The chart above is from this article. Note that in every industry, there are many more workers than jobs.

• Youth Employment Transporation Resources--Best practices, issues briefs, etc. from the Community Transporation Association. There's also a version for Older Workers. 

• 10 Things Recruiters Won't Tell You--Includes a webinar and resources for dealing with these. 

• Pre-Crime Comes to the HR Department--A new software package trolls your online identity--Facebook, LinkedIn, blogs, etc. and provides an evaluation of you in several categories, including "Poor Judgment," "Drugs and Drug Lingo," and "Demonstrating Potentially Violent Behavior." It can be used for applicants and current employees and claims to help companies predict a person's character, not their behavior. This could be the trend of the future, folks, so one to watch for.

• College Fish.org--A compilation of tools and resources to help people transfer from community colleges into 4-year degree programs.

• How Do I Develop and Deliver an Elevator Speech--The title says it all. 

• 4 Digital Alternatives to the Traditional Resume--Especially good for job seekers who need to stand out in a crowded field and have digital artifacts they can share.

• How to Find Good Hourly Employees--Some good advice for employers in here.

• Teach on the Road by Broadcasting Yourself Live--Did you know that with a Droid or iPhone, a Ustream account and the Ustream broadcast app you could be running live streaming video of any event? It's easy and free!

• 37 Productivity Tips for Working from Anywhere--Surely there's something on this list that can help.

Livening Up Employer Engagement: Some Alternatives to Meetings

Traditional strategies for engaging employers in workforce development have included job/career fairs, seminars and meetings. But recent developments in alternative conferencing options also suggest some ideas that could be adapted to engage employers.

BarCamps/Un-conferences

BarCamps and unconferences are open, participatory workshop events whose content is provided by participants. Organizers identify a theme and provide the workspace, but the agenda and workshops are set up and delivered by participants, decided on during the first hour of the conference.  The focus is on networking and learning based on the topics that are of interest to the participants. Examples of this approach include  THATCamp and BarCamp Philly. The BarCamp.org site offers additional information on the approach and BarCamp events world-wide. BarCamps are based on the "Open Space" structure, so this reading list on open space may also be useful.

Case Studies

Running for about 2 hours, the Case Study conference features a small business with a problem talking to a panel of experts who can help the participant solve his/her problem. The case study business presents on the problem, panelists can ask clarifying questions and then offer some thoughts on improvement. Attendees are also able to ask questions and provide some feedback.

FailFaire

Structured as a way to learn from failures in IT and mobile technologies, the FailFaire concept is based on the idea that failure can teach us as much as exploring best practices. Participans present the story of their failures in fast-paced 10-minute presentations that address several questions:

• What was the project?
• What were you trying to do?
• What was the fail/where did it go wrong?
• What would you do differently next time (or never do again!)?
• What lessons can be learned?

FailFaires are meant to be a fun way to explore failures and to share hard lessons learned.

Ignite

This is a high-energy event filled with 5-minute talks by people who have an idea. They can be random or tied together with a theme. The goal is to get people sharing and talking. This "How To" gives more information on how to run an Ignite event.

Pecha Kucha

Pecha Kucha (pronounced peh-chak-cha) is a presentation format originally devised by Astrid Klein and Mark Dytham of Klein-Dytham Architecture. Think of it as presentation haiku--a highly structured environment for expressing ideas concisely and clearly.

A pecha kucha presentation consists of 20 PowerPoint slides, 20 seconds per slide, for a total presentation time of 6 minutes, 40 seconds. In a live pecha kucha event, you give the tech person your 20 slides, already pre-timed to transition every 20 seconds, so you're forced to keep moving whether you're ready or not. Check out this Pecha Kucha Primer for more information.

All of these formats could be adapted to explore workforce development-related issues and ideas. They could also be strategies to help businesses explore particular issues that face their industries.

To Create New Jobs, Nurture Start-ups

According to recent research (via this NY Times article), when it comes to job creation, start-ups are where it's at:

For decades, the assumption has been that small business is the economy’s dynamic engine of job generation. Look at the numbers broadly, and that is the irrefutable conclusion: two-thirds of net new jobs are created by companies with fewer than 500 employees, which is the government’s definition of a small business.

But research published last month by three economists, working with more recent and detailed data sets than before, has found that once the age of the businesses is taken into account, there is no difference in the job-producing performance of small companies and big ones.

“Size plays virtually no role,” says John C. Haltiwanger, a co-author of the study and an economist at the University of Maryland. “It’s all age — start-ups are where the job-creation action really occurs.”

What does this mean for WIBs and One-Stops? A few ideas come to mind:

• Job development efforts should focus on contacting and serving newer companies in the area. These are often the companies that do not have an HR department to manage the recruitment process, so One-Stops can also provide a much-needed service. This may mean establishing stronger connections to local business incubators, Small Business Associations and other organizations supporting start-ups.

• Applicants must be prepared with entrepreneurial skills and attitudes. Working in a start-up is qualitatively different from working at a more established company. It requires greater flexibility and ingenuity. It also requires workers to be able and willing to take on a multitude of tasks that may not technically fall into a particular job description and to approach their jobs as business owners, not as "employees." For many job seekers this is a mentality shift that will require new skills and a new way of seeing themselves in the work environment.

• Staff need training and tools to understand and support start-up companies. Start-ups are dealing with different issues than more-established companies. They are less likely to have HR policies and practices in place--or to even have a staff person devoted to hiring. They often need a quicker turn-around on their new hires and more support in recruiting and screening applicants. They are also more likely to prefer the use of new technologies and social media for communication and services. Staff who are accustomed to working with larger, more "mature" companies will need new skills and tools to provide services to this kind of business customer.

Supporting start-ups can have great benefits for the economic development efforts of a local area. But doing so also requires WIBs and One-Stop Career Centers to rethink their strategies and service delivery options.

Friday Link Round-Up

30 Recruiting Strategies in a Down Economy in 30 Minutes

View more presentations from Geoff Peterson.

Here's this week's round-up of links:

• 3 Ways to Demonstrate Your Value in a Job Search--Demonstrating value is definitely the key to a successful job hunt.

• Use Social Media to Target Hiring Managers--Social networks can help you get around gatekeepers and directly to the hiring manager.

• A Directory of Networking and Job Search Support Groups for NJ

• 30 Recruiting Strategies in a Down Economy--something to share with employers. 

• 5 Tips to Stay Focused in Your Job Search--these are good.

• Where to Get the Best Free Education Online--there are a surprising number of great online learning resources available for absolutely nothing. 

• SME Business Toolkit--free forms, training, how-tos, etc. for would-be entrepreneurs.

• Workforce Solutions Website--The Austin, TX area WIB/One-Stop is using a variety of social media tools to communicate with their community, including a blog, Facebook Fan Page, Twitter and LinkedIn. 

• Exploring Careers from the Comfort of Home--online resources for exploring career options.

Friday Link Round-Up

It's Friday the 13th, but hopefully these links will bring you some luck.

• How to Prospect Using LinkedIn and Twitter--a very nice article on how to use these two powerful social media tools to get into the right networks without cold calling. Good for job seekers AND for job development.

• SHRM Disability Employment Resource Page--A fabulous collection of webinars, guides, videos, etc. from the Society for Human Resource Management. Great to share with your employers. 

• Middle Skill Jobs: Going Strong or Fading Away?--New labor market analysis from David Autor of MIT suggests that middle-skill employment has bottomed out — at a rapid rate — and the workforce has split predominantly into high- and low-skill/wage jobs.

• Employment Transportation Encore--"Use this site as your portal into a virtual learning experience on how to improve people’s access to jobs and job training through improved transportation options. We’ve organized Web-based presentations from recent conferences, webinars, and other interactive resources that showcase useful practices from communities just like yours. The best part is that you can design your own conference based on topics that interest you most and then “attend” this customized conference from the comfort of your own desk at a time of your choosing."

• Hidden LinkedIn Tips and Tricks--Again, good for job development and for job seekers.

• Can Community Colleges Save the US Economy? --An interesting Time Magazine article on the value of CCs and the challenges they are currently facing.

• Including Presentations in Your Nonprofit's Strategy--Slideshare is a free online presentation sharing site that offers a lot of potential for WIBs and One-Stops. This article includes some excellent ideas and links for how you can use online presentations to market, fundraise, educate, etc.

10 Tech-Enabled Business Trends: Is Your WIB/One-Stop Keeping Up?

McKinsey Quarterly has published Clouds, big data, and smart assets: Ten tech-enabled business trends to watch. They are: 

• Trend 1: Distributed cocreation moves into the mainstream
• Trend 2: Making the network the organization
• Trend 3: Collaboration at scale
• Trend 4: The growing ‘Internet of Things’
• Trend 5: Experimentation and big data
• Trend 6: Wiring for a sustainable world
• Trend 7: Imagining anything as a service
• Trend 8: The age of the multisided business model
• Trend 9: Innovating from the bottom of the pyramid
• Trend 10: Producing public good on the grid

You have to register (it's free) to read the entire article, but it's well worth it. Then have a discussion with your WIB members and One-Stop staff to see how well you're keeping up with these trends.

You might also want to check out this McKinsey article on e-government 2.0. Key quote:

In the face of unprecedented fiscal constraints, as well as users’ heightened expectations based on the integration of the Internet into their daily life and work, it is imperative that the public sector refine its approach to e-government to ensure that these initiatives achieve maximum impact.

Webinar Resources

As WIBs and One-Stops try to do more with less, webinar technology becomes increasingly attractive. It minimizes the costs and logistics of face-to-face events, allowing you to provide services to hundreds of people using computers and a phone line. With webinars you are also able to record and archive events for posting on your website and ongoing use with customers. Both employers and job seekers are increasingly looking for online options for learning and information sharing and webinars can be a perfect strategy for accomplishing this.

Here are some webinar resources to get you started.

Webinar Platforms

Your webinar starts with a decent platform. There are a variety of options on the market, each with different pricing plans based on the number of webinar hosts, number of attendees and the features you want to select. It's a good idea to look for platforms that integrate audio and web conferencing so that people can listen to audio through their computers or through the phone. You also want to find platforms that allow you to record your webinars so that you can upload and share through your website.

• Go-To-Webinar--for $100/month or less than $1,000/year you can host and record unlimited webinars with up to 100 people.

• DimDim--DimDim offers webinars that can be hosted through your browser and don't require attendees to download any software to their computers. With DimDim Pro, you can offer unlimited webinars to up to 50 participants for $25/month. They also offer an Enterprise version with pricing based on number of users.

• WebEx--For $49/month, you get unlimited meetings with up to 25 participants with free mobile access, voice conferencing and online recording. Additional options will increase your costs.

• Adobe Acrobat Connect and ConnectNow--Pricing starts at $40/month for up to 20 participants with ConnectNow. After that, you need Connect which is priced based on the number of participants. 

For more on platforms, check out this article on 17 Online Meeting Tools that Facilitate Collaboration.

Planning and Running Webinars

Webinars are not the same as doing in-person meetings or trainings. Not only do you need to deal with technology issues, you are also missing the in-person opportunities for audience feedback that can trip up even the most seasoned presenters. If you're going to go into the webinar business, it's a good idea to be prepared. Here are some articles to get you started.

• 10 Steps for Planning a Successful Webinar
• 7 Tips on How to Run a Webinar
• 28 Web Conference Training Tips
• Tips for Remote Presenters
• 10 Best Practices for Webinars or Webcasts
• Tips to Pulling off a Successful Webinar
• Tips for Delivering Webinars/Training Online
• Running Effective Online Trainings

What experiences have you had with webinars? Are you using them at your WIB or One-Stop Career Center? Leave us a note in comments!