Unemployment: temp or part time job opportunity into fulltime career

As the unemployment circle bites, many are now looking at the prospect of job hunting for the first time in many years, if not decades. On that note, I have sympathy with Harry Blackwood, the journalist turned college lecturer who now finds himself unemployed after 35years.

However, much as though sympathy and understanding is fine, it is finding work quickly which is the key; and from some, only in the right sector.

I have written here before about changing sectors, but how about if you can’t get the dream job, but just want a job in your dream company or ideal sector? The reason you probably can’t get in to your ideal job if you have tried every tactic and lesson possible, and had your CV checked over, is then based on:

- Your skills
- Your experience
- The competition is better qualified

If you still really want that job, how about getting it from the inside rather than the outside? How about a contract or part time job then? And in the credit crunch, this tactic works even better.

Most employers today want flexible workforces. People unlike chocolate bars don’t come in half size pay scales, but there is the option to take on half a wage or less than a 28day notice period, either through part-time workers or agency staff/contractors. The immediate advantage to the employer is that they get a flexible workforce, and their pay costs better match their income profile.

However, there is a distinct advantage to the job seeker. This choice by an employer means you have a far better chance of becoming an insider when a new job post comes up. The advantages to the employer of this tactic is that they know you and your capabilities. Should a suitable job come up, any issues you may fall short on with regards skills, qualifications or experience are made up for by the taking the risk of hiring out – if they are considering letting you on to the applicant list, its says: “we think we can bridge that gap with training.”

If you know your ideal sector or employer, check the local newspapers for adverts. These may not always have the employers logo or details stamped on them, so if in doubt ring the employer/s HR department and ask for a list of the recruitment agencies on their Preferred Supplier List (PSL). Then call these agencies, and register ONLY for this employer or sector.

Be flexible in terms of the types of work you will do when an opportunity comes up. It doesn’t have to be your ideal job in your ideal employer, as my sister found out when temping as a typist having just finished her degree, and being offered graduate training posts for HR and finance work: it just has to be in your target sector or employer.

Once on the inside, be clear on communication and the targets expected of you. One thing you need to discover are the high performer targets, and to make sure that within your first 20 days of working there you hit them at least once. Yes, it might mean long hours and not a lot of social life, but it will be worth it.

After 28days or at the end of your period of employment if less than that, ask for a meeting with HR. Get them to review your work and agree you have done a great job while working with them. To confirm this, ask for a written reference – say it is for your portfolio if asked. Now you have that check knowing that they think you are great, ask if there are any job opportunities? They may say no, but having just handed you a fresh hand written reference they are more likely to say yes or at the very least say “stay in touch.” Make sure you do that, and in either case make it clear you don’t expect a job on a plate – you are happy to compete, and prove you are the right person.

Job hunting need not be hard, and getting your ideal job may not be difficult. But it may require the job seeker to deploy some thought and tactics to get what they want from the inside.

Good Luck!

Why has Wales suffered so much in the credit crunch – and why it should not have

There are many pieces of news hitting the headlines over various layoffs and redundancies at present. It is unfortunately inevitable that companies will cut expenditure in light of falling revenues – because if they didn’t survive, where would the jobs come from in a revival?

However, from various pieces of government funded analysis, the Welsh economy is presently suffering more in the down turn than most economies, with redundancies around one quarter higher than the average in the UK. The excellent Jamie Owen asked a commentator last night on Wales Today why, and the answer was at best fudged: so here is a personal view.

The Welsh boom time lasted 100 years, from about the 1820’s when the first pits were sunk, to the post war 1920’s when the great depression hit. Since then it has been a slow bleed from employment to unemployment, investment to decay; with around two thirds of the pit jobs lost by the start of World War Two, and Maggie Thatcher just finishing the inevitable in the 1980’s.

At that point, Wales had a clean slate and was offered investment – according to a talk I heard from Ieuan Wyn Jones, from 1973 to 2003 it had some £930million pounds of grant investment made into it, and it’s in how that money was spent as to why Wales is now suffering.

Firstly, 60% of it was invested within 12mile radius of Cardiff Bay. Now partly that should not come as a surprise – that’s about equivalent to the amount of Welsh GDP generation – but that doesn’t reflect the distribution of the Welsh population. Merthyr Tydfil sits at a radius of 18miles from the bay, and has the highest unemployment rate of most towns and cities in the UK.

Secondly, the way the money was invested. Most of the money was given to large incoming investment projects by non-EU head quartered companies. Sony is probably the best example at Bridgend, which was held up as a world class centre by even Sony themselves; the same can be said of the GE engine facility at Caerphilly, or the BAe facility at Wharton. But some of those projects didn’t come off – the LG Philips plant at Newport being the highest profile example, and the film studio at Valleywood presently looks like a missed opportunity. Most of the money was placed in singular large profile projects, around a strategy of “hub and spoke” with the WDA investing in hubs and the companies themselves creating spokes in the local economy. They even created a series of large industrial estates for the developments of these spokes, many of which are still empty rows of large steel sheds. However, unlike the Scot’s the Welsh picked no core hubs, and so there were no world class spokes – which would have led to more hubs.

Thirdly, the local grants were handed out at a local business initiative level in an adhoc and splash the cash manner. A conversation I had 18months ago with a council based business development unit went:
• Me: how many of the following skilled people do you have? (I knew they had the answer, as they would come up with such stat’s when we were looking to place call centres in the UK)
• Council: well, we offer a grant to find out such answers in developing your business. We pay £X for such investigations and reports, and it will cost you £Y (about twice X) to buy the report from one of our approved consultants
• Me: how often do you get asked this question?
• Council: about twice a week at minimum
• Me: so to answer a common question, I have to get a grant to pay someone to answer it for me?
• Council: yes!

The problem this generated was a grant-dependent culture, in local small businesses, and also a series of weak SME businesses. Grants should be from a business level seen as a bonus guarantee, not an essential of business as they have become here. Every time I hear a new business proposal in Wales from a local person, the second issue on the table after the concept is the detailed list of grants available!

The result of the grant expenditure from 1972 to 2003 is that 97% of the jobs created have gone. They came to Wales, were created, and have now left. There were insufficient local roots placed down by the hub investors, so they could leave easily when technology changed – or a downturn came. And the spokes were not strong enough to survive alone.

Have there been successes in the Welsh economy? Yes – and the thing they have in common is that they were in general created by people who are or have strong ties to Wales. Such enterprises include insurance group Admiral, the only Welsh headquartered business listed in the FTSE100 – they are about to take on 500 people into a new centre in Newport; or the Lanelli based TV production company Tinopolis, without which Dr Who could never have been attempted in Cardiff.

Wales will now suffer as a result of poor central strategy – and one which missed its greatest strength: the Welsh people. On any measure, compared to an average UK worker they are three times as loyal, and as a whole are as well educated as any part of the UK thanks to large investment in the educational sector. They are also quite creative and adaptable, in part because of this love and existence of an old Celtic language. What I am trying to say here is that the Welsh people could be horribly entrepreneurial if given the right infrastructure around them, but what appears to have happened is the creation of a grant-dependent business focus. Thankfully most of the new businesses coming through from the sub-25 year old bracket can stand on their own two feet.

I think Wales will go through some tough times, probably even longer than the rest of the UK: we might just as well be in Bejing in 2012, such is the amount of Olympic money that will at presently planned flow down here. But I am convinced by the Welsh people, and that the central government – thankfully because it won’t have the cash – will change it strategy to local entrepreneurial investment focus, over one of buying in multi-national hubs. Modern businesses need to be adaptable, and such choices even by the companies themselves will need to come with far quicker payback timescales.

When faced with that unknown choice, versus a bet on your own people, I hope it is even obvious to central government where the financial investment bet needs to be placed – your own people offer a far, far better set of long term employment odd’s.

Good Luck!

The pound and employment – why a falling currency should be good

In light of poor and fast declining economic data, and media comments by both the Bank of England and the Prime Minister that the UK was in a recession, the pound has dropped to low levels against the US dollar. Since July, it has fallen by 25% in value, from $2.00 to $1.50 to the UK pound.

If you look at this further, it gets to be a consistent pattern of the pound dropping in value against numerous currencies:
- 220 to 160 against the Japanese Yen (27%)
- 86 to 74 against the Indian Rupee (14%)
- 1.40 to 1.25 against the Euro, although in the past three months it has been quite stable (10%)

However, all this bad currency data could be good for UK employment: that holiday in Florida, the most popular location for Brit’s abroad, is now 25% more expensive. It makes Margate look a lot more attractive, and a lesser drop against the Eurozone makes the Mediterranean interesting for guaranteed sunshine

But that’s consumer spending – what has it got to down with your job?

When I ran a large UK Call Centre design team – we turnover £127million in the last year I ran the team – we were faced with the onslaught on the overseas location. The main reason was, it was cheaper to run. We were at a disadvantage any way, as we worked for the most expensive telecoms company in the market by around 15% to 25% - so just selling in the UK was a chore, let alone against Phuket or Mumbai!

One of the most powerful statement’s I have ever been taught was as an engineer in Bournemouth, being taught how to sell modems. The trainer taught us that learning lists of features was fine, but what was the business benefit? To find them, he taught us the statement “Which means that…..” So for instance, a dual processor design meant better up time, which means that you don’t need to design in as much redundancy to ensure critical delivery – that actual line won us a £15million contract with Chase Manhattan, and meant we also won a contract into just post communist Russia!

So, for UK businesses exporting, what does a quickly falling pound mean? Take Jaguar cars for instance – the £35,000 XJ top line saloon is now 25% cheaper at the dock in New York. That is also true of the 50mpg BMW Mini, and in a country which is running scared of their beloved SUV’s and not having enough for a deposit for one anyway, a cheap and economical branded car should sell well.

What about call centres? I always felt the flight to India was short termed in sight. The way we overcame selling at a premium UK price was to train engineers who designed whole customer service solutions, over just the flashing light telephone bit in the middle. We hence thought about market position, registration, time to answer, environment (yes, we had colour awareness training!), and follow-up. It meant when you engaged us, you engaged a whole solution over an engineer – hence why we did £127million, or 53% of then BT Solutions group turnover. Hence from my point of view as a whole solution, the mass flight of call centres to India was illogical and daft, when the majority of the customers were over 50, and couldn’t understand many UK call centre operators, let alone someone who had never been to the UK apart from watching an episode of Eastenders. The clear result would be greater market switching, which those who either choose to stay in the UK or were to slow to react would suddenly find the results of – Nationwide made a conscious decision to leave their call centres in the UK, and took a 20% boost in business.

We have in the past two years seen a flight back to the UK as annual market switching rates in financial services rose from 10% to 35% , but the back offices – rightly – have stayed in the cheaper economies of India. However, many organisations which don’t benefit from scale economies are finding the communication lines stretched, and hence projects delivered late: its why there is a boom in need for qualified project managers, but the problem is communication.

So, what will be the effect of a falling currency? We are in a recession in the UK, and reduced consumer spending (probably agitated further by higher high street prices) will result in increased unemployment: but to stay employed, you just have to get focused, there are many opportunities. However, with a quickly falling currency, the rates of UK export will quickly rise – plus financial services will recover, as UK law is open, stable and friendly: thank you Sarbanes Oxley! I expect to see the result in the UK balance of payments by mid-2009, and it’s why BMW are choosing to lay-off over redundancy until Easter: because they know what the reaction could be, and there is still a skills shortage in the UK labour market of engineers. Any decision announced to outsource offshore in the past 12months that has not yet been implemented I am sure is being looked at by every Finance Director right now – it not only requires an often capital sum to achieve, it also now is looking around 20% less cost effective.

Clearly there will be redundancies, as UK companies can’t bleed to death through lack of cash when they can’t borrow. But the depth of the redundancies may not be as high as suspected – such a sharp fall in the UK sterling is like installing a rubber floor as a safety precaution, and make FD’s listen to HR directors about long term skills shortages as there is a tightening of the pull of export sales.

Good Luck!

The problem of being low paid and self employed – but the universal lesson that doesn’t mean anyone has to be unemployed in the economic down turn

I recently gave advice to a husband of a friend’s friend, who as a Polish economic migrant to the UK had found himself unemployed.

The gentleman was an eminently hard worker, who for the past five years had worked as a self-employed body repair technician at an East London garage, specialised in repairs to that superb Eastern European brand – and probably better to drive in an economic downturn than the Bentley’s they derive many of their parts from – Skoda. In fact, so impressed was his boss with his work, when his brother decided to come to the UK the boss employed him as well. Last summer, the boss took on an a 16year old English apprentice, and my friends husband has been training him up.

When the downturn came, my friends husband was the most skilled worker, so you would have thought he would have survived any downturn. No, he was first out of the door with 2weeks notice: the apprentice he trained is half as good but cheaper on minimum wage due to his age. The concern of my friend was that her friend is pregnant, and due to give birth in December, so could I help find him a job?

Firstly can I state up front, I don’t let Ajiri deal with minimum wage work as I find that many employers don’t treat their workers well at that wage level. A low wage level tends to translate into a low respect for their employees, and you hence also see low levels of work place environment, poor health and safety and many other problems. Often the employers will tell you that the reason that it all looks so grotty is because of the way the workers treat the place, but personally I think standards come from the management and flow down to the employees, and not visa versa. However, I got into recruitment because I like people, and getting people to find their feet in the work place and reach their goals is satisfying whatever the wage level, so I agreed to a phone call.

Firstly, the guy was bright and enthusiastic – employers love that, and he had an easy to get along with personality: they adore that. Secondly, he loved what he did, but had a long term goal to get into truck/HGV driving – I translated that as liking the transport sector. And thirdly, he wanted to stay in the UK for a period. However, on the downside, although he is legal (Poland is an EU state, so there are no need for entry/employment visa’s etc), and he is paying his UK taxes, he still had no UK driving license. Also, on checking his National Insurance (health and unemployment insurance), although it was all up to date, as he had worked for his employer full time for three years, the employer had not when the legislation changed added his contributions. Further, the employer was now giving him two weeks notice, when he needed to give him at least 30days.

My friend’s husband didn’t want to hassle his employer on the NI contributions or notice period, as his own brother was still working at the establishment. So we just focused on the “what next” question.

What all people need to look at when faced with such a situation, is to answer the question: What are my transportable skills? This question is easier answered if you have a certificate for some training, which as most self-employed people need to fund themselves they don’t. Hence although my friends husband was an excellent body repair technician, he didn’t have a certificate or qualification or registration with a professional body to verify any of this. Secondly, the lack of a UK driving license restricted his UK employment prospects – most employers want a photo ID for identity, and if you are a foreign national some UK paperwork to prove you are resident and won’t walk out next week.

After our first phone call, I did some checking at jobsites for work (note – I always love the online jobsite stat’s for hits, but many in my experience are just browsing: employers, recruiters and employees to check markets. The question is conversion ratio); and found without surprise that no qualifications and no UK driving license meant he was looking at minimum wage again at best, possibly as a drivers mate (ie – a health and safety load lugger). I immediately texted him back, and gave him the address of the nearest DVLA centre in London, and told him to get down their ASAP and get a UK driving license. Apparently this was quite easy for a Polish national, but ring them if in doubt – always very helpful people, but then most of them are Welsh!

In our second telephone conversation, we talked about why driving? In my view, he still seemed very committed to the sector, which was both good (employers love enthusiasm), and bad (so I had to find him a role in transport). I had done some research, and suggested a role in bus driving:

• It's like trucking, but in often prettier looking but just as macho vehicles
• It doesn’t involve long distances away from home
• The working environment is much cleaner, and involves people over constant listening to cheese radio stations
• As the employers are subject to a higher level of regulation, they are generally more respectful of their employees
• And if you don’t like it, as a formal qualification it is fairly easy to convert from a bus/PSV to a truck/HGV license

Best of all, because of the credit crunch, there is a so great a shortage of bus drivers out in the work place at present – people can’t afford to run cars, so take the bus instead – the employers are paying people to take the qualification, as long as you stay in employment for three years: you would have to pay for your won HGV training in full. Transport for London even at present have a scheme which focuses on finding and training more women bus drivers.

So, we are now two weeks later, and my friend’s husband just rang me to tell me about his first day of training to be a bus driver – and he’s over the moon with happiness!

All people are responsible for their own career management, and particularly the self-employed. Always think about what you are putting on your CV whatever work you do, and how transportable those skills are – qualifications make them more transportable to other employers. Secondly, if you do find yourself unemployed, think about how those transportable skills could be deployed in other markets – sales in real estate is a transportable skill for sales in many other sectors.

Good Luck!

Remember, even in the credit crunch, there are still Births, Deaths, Marriages – and SEX!

It’s tough times now, and it is going to be even tougher times ahead in 2009 – I think we are close enough now for me to be able to write that. Many people are losing their jobs, and those who are unemployed can’t find jobs – so what hope is there?

Last week, there was a lot of bad economic data either side of the Atlantic, even after Barack Obama became President elect:

• Car sales down a record 26% to a 20 year low. The big three are hurting, and GM has said it will run out of cash in early 2009
• House sales down a further 20%, effectively now down 48% in the UK from just two years ago
• Retail sales down 12%
• Unemployment at five year highs, and heading higher

But please note – although the figures are DOWN, they are not ZERO. Why is this? Let’s take a simple scenario:

Young man on a rare night out that he can afford meets a young lady, takes her back to his place and ….. nine months later, after getting married and buying a family car, they welcome a child. His apartment now won’t suit their needs, and nor will hers, so they need a house. Houses require mortgages, and after doing a deal with both fathers on a 20% deposit, he needs a better job to pay for it while she will do some part-time work from home for the next 12months – or perhaps she employs a nanny? The house needs decorating…

One thing that is always constant, whether we like it or not, is the fact we are time-limited biological life forms on this earth. You can check this out by reading your local BDM column – it might be shrinking a bit now in the M section, but B and D are still at pretty much the same level they were last year.

These life forms are also emotional, made up of complex calculations and mixtures of chemicals which play a huge part in the micro-second calculations we each make to stay alive on this planet – including the answer to the immortal question of time, life and the universe of “do you want fries with that?”

This is because every one of them needs energy, and hence has to eat, drink, sleep – you can check this one out at the local supermarket: I still see people buying food. And every so often, because no man can be an island from his fellow man – and certainly no lady can resist the odd bit of male company, accepting that shirt doesn’t match his trousers – we all need to get merry with a few other people out there.

And every so often, when people on the odd occasion make a single mistake, they need new cars. And even if they don’t know they need a new one, the old one is also time limited through a form chemical interaction between iron and oxygen which is as old as the earth itself.

So, why are the economic figures not zero? Because life carries on – check BDM, check the supermarket, check that the sun goes up and down, and the moon comes out: life carries on.

So if life carries on, are people still being hired – Ah, YES! Why – do I have to explain BDM again? And now your question is – and how do I make myself one of those people?

Honestly, its simple – and here’s the answer: realise who you are, what your skills are, what you like and could do even if it means doing something different from what you are doing now; and then get a PLAN and IMPLENT IT.

If you have a plan and a goal, and the gumption to stick to it, something inside you picks up and wham – you ace the interview. If you don’t have a plan or know what you want to do, then you need the world’s largest economic boom to stand a chance of being employed at all.

And the amazing thing is – you don’t need to be great to get employed right now, just focused and resultantly enthusiastic; about the job, and the employer:

• If you just did 15minutes of investigation of the employer you are about to apply for a job to, your chances of getting the job would rise by 25%
• If you rang to enquire about the job before applying, your chances would rise by 50%
• And if you re-read the night before just the stuff you printed off of the computer before the day of the interview, and prepared six questions about the employer and the job, your chances of getting the job would rise by 100%.

You have just trebled your chance of getting employed, and all it took was an economic down turn to learn how to do.

Still, even now that I have told you that, I bet there’s a 66% chance you won’t change and hence do it. I know that, because I do read the BDM column and I am still interviewing candidates on a weekly basis – and both tell me that probable outcome.

So, stop reading and take some action – life is still going on, people are still getting hired.

Good Luck!

What prospect for UK unemployment in 2009?

The credit crunch, created by the US housing market crisis, has so far not affected either headline UK consumer spending, or UK unemployment - but are the first signs of the rot now beginning to show?

In summary - YES! We might not yet be seeing the scale of unemployment, but it is now revealing itself.

The reasons for this long gestation period are three fold:
- The UK is always at least six to twelve months behind the UK
- The industries effected so far are long cycle: how often do you move, and hence buy a kitchen, carpets or new bedding?
- UK consumers have so far switched spending: now they can't switch any more to lower cost items. The next thing to do is cut

Already, house builders and associated industries have shut down - even the solicitors are laying people off. Construction is highly reliant on finance models, so no loans means no construction. The only thing keeping some sites going were sales, at hugely discounted levels - often up to 35%, the properties industry average Gross Profit Margin, just to keep the cash flowing.

The next industry to fall was finance, with the remortgage and consolidation loans financing products stalling and the collapsing.

In the past few week, we have seen national level banks collapse: Wachovia in the US, HBoS and Bradford and Bingley in the UK; and now Fortis in Belgium. The HBoS Lloyds TSB merge offers 40,000 redundancies at the headline level - gulp!

And now its the turns of the retailers, showing that UK high street spending is being effected: furnishing group Roseby's went into administration, while MFI was bought out by management (both part of the hosuing slow down), and now sports retailer JJB warns that it may not survive - no wonder SportsDirect founder Mike Ashley has put Newcastle FC up for sale!

Are there any good signs? Not yet, with the US House of Representatives rejecting the $700bn (£380bn) rescue deal, global stock markets have fallen an average of 7% in one day. What economists are hoping is that two groups will help out to reduce UK unemployment impact: the elderly retiring in the face of such vast unemployment, while the Eastern Europeans go home in part due to the construction needs of Euro 2012 in Poland.

While some skills and sectors remain solid employment areas - Human Resources for instance, with such high levels of redundancies - others are falling quickly: anyone can be a sales person!

My thought here is that, whatever the fixes of the politicians, this recession will be a middle class one: the low skilled will just move and do anything to survive; the rich can ride out the storm - while the middle class will be too slow to react, worrying about paying their buy-2-let mortgages and honouring their education/tofu suppers to notice the approaching storm.

I predict UK unemployment will rise by at least 1million in 2009 - those jobs left by the elderly and the Eastern Europeans will remain unfilled, until 2010 when they return to fill them.

Watch out middle England!