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Our information, collected by industry experts, serves as a useful reference for individuals, companies, training institutions, and planners when devising strategies that can prove useful in planning the direction of your career..

Last Tuesday's Edition: Recruiting News


	Mergers & IPO's:	01/21/2005
	Financial activity is a bellwether of both hiring and right-sizing. The Mergers & Acquisitions / IPO Report takes a weekly look from both perspectives.
	Net News:	01/20/2005
	A summary of weekly news about the career sites, search engines and other tools that affect your online recruiting activities.
	Real Tools:	01/19/2005
	Learn about products and services that can make you a more effective recruiter.
	Recruiting News:	01/18/2005
	A summary of recruitment-centric news bites gleaned from a broad range of news sources, on and off the Web.
	Outplacement:	01/17/2005
	A summary of employers that have announced downsizing initiatives over the past week.

THE NEW MILLENNIUM BENI
Forget the gold watch, some companies are going with a particularly high-tech employee benefit. In a sign that the 21st century is fully upon us, AIG Insurance says that an increasing number of companies are offering identity theft coverage as a corporate benefit. On average, a consumer whose has been stolen will spend about 200 hours (lots of it during normal business hours) restoring his good name. AIG (American International Group) says it only makes sense for businesses. "The victim of identity theft is left with a tremendous burden of cleaning up the problem, and the employer becomes an indirect victim," said Nancy Callahan, vice president of AIG's Affinity Group Services. Insurance companies say that the benefit, which costs only a few dollars per year per employee, is quite popular with workers because of all the attention that identity theft has received in the last year. Skeptics, however, say there are already a significant amount of free resources available about safeguarding identity theft and that companies would be wiser to focus the money on workplace security, where many cases of identity theft take place.
Lexington (KY) Herald-Leader , 01/17/2005

PLAYING THE WORK GAME
Nimble fingers, Good hand-eye coordination, calloused thumbs; they might not necessarily seem like the attributes of good employee but their presence may indicate some other important skills. A growing number of employment experts believe that some of the skills acquired by playing video games such as Playstation are very valuable in the workplace. "The skills that gamers develop are exactly what we want in good business professionals," said Mitchell Wade, author of "Got Game: How the Gamer Generation is Reshaping Business Forever." Experts say that many different kinds of games help players learn to think strategically, absorb information quickly, multitask and make quick decisions ? all good business skills. Others add that gamers, because they typically come from an age demographic that has been used to absorbing lots of information since birth, offer a glimpse at the future workforce of America ? they are "digital natives," said Marc Prensky, a consultant on learning, technology and generational change. "We've come to the digital shores later in life and we'll always have an accent." The smart immigrants will look to the natives for help, says Prensky. "The dumb ones will grouse."
Hartford Courant , 01/16/2005

PARTING SHOTS BEST ONLINE
The liberating anonymity of the online experience apparently translates well to employee exit interviews. Beth N. Carvin, chief executive of the human resource consulting company Nobscot Corporation, says her company's WebExit product helps companies gather the real reasons for the departure of employees and that helps reduce employee turnover. Workers are more willing to be candid about reasons for leaving if they don't have to sit with corporate execs in a face-to-face exit interview. Among some particularly pithy responses, "Banks should work bankers' hours," said one employee after resigning. "It is the reason you have lost other employees and, in part, the reason you are losing me. Banks are not retail. In terms of convenience, robbers found it convenient to rob the banks during our extended hours."
Miami Herald , 01/17/2005

MOM'S THE WORD
Mom is a word with positive connotations everywhere, everywhere except on resumes perhaps. A new set of findings from a small study of undergraduates shows that significant work stereotypes still exist about mothers in the workplace. As part of the study, 196 college students in New Jersey and Kansas were given the same resume for a position as an entry-level immigration lawyer. Half the participants received a resume with a male name; the other half received a female version. Half the resumes identified the applicant as single with no children, the other half as a married person with two children. While parenthood was supposed to signal that the applicant, male or female, was less available for work and less committed to the job than a single applicant might be, only the mothers were penalized. Fathers, on the other hand, were as likely to be hired as childless men and were considered good candidates for promotion. "People see more negative consequences of hiring a mother," said Kathleen Fuegen, the co-author of the study and an assistant professor of psychology at Ohio State University. "Mothers are expected to be the primary caregivers and employment takes a back seat to that." The study is published in the December issue of Journal of Social Issues.
Wisconsin State Journal , 01/17/2005

DIFFERENT FATES POST MERGER
The mailbox held much different messages for some of the people involved in the Oracle ? Peoplesoft merger this past weekend. Oracle Corporation announced last week that it would cut about 5,000 jobs in the first quarter of this year after its $ 10.3 million takeover of Enterprise software rival Peoplesoft. But while some Oracle employees received pink slips last week, Peoplesoft workers were told to expect either a dismissal notice or an offer letter in the mail on Saturday. "As expected, it said I'm terminated," said Janna Thomas, former Director of Creative Services at Peoplesoft. "I didn't anticipate hearing anything different." Len Cook, on the other hand, works as a senior product manager and was relieved to find that he had been offered a similar position. "It's actually a sweetened offer," he said. "I'm very pleased, very relieved." Although the layoffs figure to hit hard in the Pleasanton, California area where Peoplesoft is based, the number of job cuts announced so far is significantly lower than some estimates that were reported soon after the merger.
San Francisco Chronicle , 01/16/2005

ADVICE FROM THE EXPERTS
A look at how the other half lives, that's what a pair of Texas recruiters are offering and its helping lots of individuals find jobs. Gail Houston, an AIRS CIR recruiter who works for Electronic Data Systems (EDS) and Rex Saoit, a recruiter at Fujitsu Transactions Solutions, spend a day every month teaching job seekers in their native Dallas area how to impress them and their recruiting brethren. Houston, who is allowed to take the day off as a means of providing a community service, says it is a win-win situation. "When they (job seekers) learn how recruiters work ? what we see, how to communicate with us, we can help each other," she said. Sometimes other area recruiters serve as guest panelists and the events have proved very popular; almost 100 people show up for the free, all-day events every six weeks. But for her part, Houston looks forward to the day the sessions become unnecessary. "We would like the recruiters to be the ones begging again."
The (Portland) Oregonian , 01/17/2005

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