Author: Julia
Hordle
Director - Corporate
Intelligence Recruitment
- Big picture view essential for Knowledge workers in 2010
- Innovation and process harnessed together are productive
- Employers striving to finding global/local balance
It’s definitely time to blog a little on the feel of the market place this year – inevitably, everybody asks...
The simple replacement hire is almost non-existent at the moment, as firms need a clear purpose to hire to justify head count. We are seeing a need for experienced heads with a portfolio of hard, transferable skills – project design, product development, the development of research & knowledge-based products and services – a steady stream of tangible products and outcomes required, derived from real business need.
No matter where the demand is from, the common requirements seem to be these – evident client relationship management skills and an ability to research, analyse and present a business case, all in addition to the core foundation skills of the job itself.
But there is also another factor all clients are looking for which doesn’t typically show up in the brief your recruitment consultant is given or the job description itself – and that this that potential employees must fully accept an organisation’s right to manage resources in more than one location and to contemplate change, with or without open consultation with its workforce.
For this reason, I thought it was worth thinking about the visceral response of “at risk” individuals to the prospect & consequences of outsourcing and off-shoring.
Understandably, organisations have had to look to cost reduction as a response to the uncertainty of trade confidence over what is now a prolonged period of global credit crunch. Make no mistake, your organisation will be continually looking for opportunities for cost reduction. Down sizing, M&A activity, automation, relocation of services all amount to a shake-up of the status quo. And this search for efficiencies doesn’t stop after the first functions have been resourced elsewhere. International firms have no choice but to look for the optimum location for cost as well as proximity to market, and a decision to offshore depends on the balance between the two.
As an employee, don’t be despondent if your career choices look compromised for the present time, and try not to allow sentiment to cloud your judgement, even if (understandably) you have an emotional response to impending change. Although many “vanilla” roles have been outsourced, one way or another there are still opportunities for knowledge workers with a commercial outlook and excellent communications and project or programme management skills. There is a clear demand for individuals with an international outlook who have taken responsibility for linking up or responding to the needs of more than one office and a variety of local cultures and client interest groups.
If you are senior enough to have been involved in business and user needs analysis, then your fact-finding and primary research skills are definitely transferable – within your current organisation or outside it.
In the insight community, the overlapping disciplines of analysis & consulting, primary & secondary research, intelligence, how far can you push research beyond what already published?
In Knowledge & Information Management, how well do you really anticipate the needs of your customers? How fresh is your thought leadership support, how tailored your content & web channels, how streamlined the library & information services?
In Records Management, how much could you help your organisation control risks, and keep the integrity of its audit trails?
In Publishing & Content Provision, how much intellect is really going into your sales cycle and product feedback, or are you sales force on a treadmill?
The point of these questions, is that with the boundaries between disciplines becoming more blurred, it is people who can see what’s required and provide change and bridging solutions who are thriving.
Think about it this way. In a buoyant recruitment market, you might leave your current firm because their pace of change is too slow for your ambition. In this climate, it can work the other way round – your organisation’s ambition can leave you wrong footed.
Because roles are evolving quickly, it isn’t always easy to identify alternative posts, if you face redundancy. But you can insure yourself against it by continuously stretching yourself and improving your skills, and by having “Plan B” and “Plan C” in place.
If you find yourself affected by phases of transition (consultation for redundancy, for example) or corporate planning for finite timeframes, your best plan is to keep all your options open, no matter how much residual resentment you have about the changes afoot. Feeling you have a choice is important to your morale. Having seen some very good friends in the industry suffer through the aftermath of redundancy, there are a few tips:
- It is important to keep your “soon to be ex-employer” and your viable referees on your side. Many new opportunities come through old firm recommendations, and you should not queer your pitch.
- For this reason, no matter if you have had differences of opinion with colleagues, you need to work hard to maintain positive channels of communication with you old customers, line management and HR professionals
- It is never too early to contemplate alternative lifestyles and careers. This is not quitting, it is a deliberate option for widening the choice of next steps. It is also a method of consciously choosing to remain in your current niche
- Be clear about your own cost base; many people find the experimental aspect of taking contracts and testing new opportunities refreshing to their professional as well as their private life, but setting out on a year or so of contracting is a challenge to personal finances
- Keep yourself positive by refusing to take redundancy personally
- Put any old prejudices to one-side – every opportunity is fresh and should be seen as new, even in a firm you are familiar with
- Go back to square one in developing a CV, make sure none of the good track record you have is lost through omission or false modesty.
This brings me back to what you should expect from a good Recruitment Consultant. First of all, if you are in transition, you should expect more than short shrift. A good Consultant will help you dissemble your skills, and identify which are readily transferable. As your market value may well be in your knowledge and experience rather than in your skills on their own, make sure you have mapped these before you meet up. That way, there can be more time spent productively thinking ahead. If you think you may be given a choice between redundancy package or new role, research the recruitment market before you enter negotiations into a settlement – you need to have a realistic idea of how long it is likely to take you to regain meaningful employment.
TFPL Intelligent Resources can’t create demand from nothing, but we do have an ever broadening outlook on the employment prospects for Knowledge workers worldwide. For us in 2010, we will be improving our coverage of specialised industry segments and also country and regional recruitment. A number of our Global clients report an inconsistency in the quality of recruits available for global roles in intended locations, and have had to think again. I think this means that for some enterprising individuals there will certainly be meaty international roles available in the UK, as well as for those brave enough to relocate.
Please respond to this blog with any anecdotes, supportive of these views, or contradictory – any anecdotal evidence of the state of the market is welcome!!