Editors Blog

Shock, horror, surprise - philosophy graduates are in demand in the workplace.

For years derided as navel gazers good for nothing other than, well, navel gazing, philosophy graduates are in demand by employers because they're good at thinking.

Fresh calls for the Football Association to re-think its recruitment processes after the Steve McClaren fiasco have been bandied about.

The association representing more than 10,000 private recruitment and staffing professionals, the Recruitment and Employment Confederation (REC), has called for the FA to:
- conduct negotiations for the job behind closed doors
- provide a clear brief and
- be open with candidates about the job specification at the very start of the recruitment process.

Surely this is all pretty regular recruitment practice you would expect as a new employee joining a company. So how come the football world has got away without it for so long? Is the football job market different to a normal 9-5 job?

Talk to anyone about whether good looks affects the outcome of an interview and they'll probably agree that it does.

Indeed, one could argue that it is a relatively unavoidable bias wired deep in human nature and that we shouldn't worry about it. But, a ha, what's this you say, men aren't as guilty of it as women?

A new study published in Annals of the New York Academy of Sciences found that the attractiveness of interviewees can significantly bias outcome in hiring practices - no change there then...

Fabio Capello's appointment as the new England football manager puts the issue of employment contracts into the spotlight once again.

The Football Association (FA) was hammered by critics for its decision to award lengthy contracts with generous terms to the two previous managers, Steve McClaren and Sven Goran Eriksson.

McClaren was reported to have been given a year's salary of £2.5m in lieu of the two years left on his contract, despite failing miserably in the role.

Eriksson was still being paid by the FA until he found new employment at Manchester City, more than a year after leaving the England job.

It's one thing trying to attract and retain the best talent in any competitive industry within the UK, but what happens when you are competing with an island that boasts better weather and the world's best cricket team, to retain your best employees?

South Australia has today launched an advertising campaign aimed at luring a new generation of British immigrants to the state.

Some of the slogans that will be used in the campaign are akin to sledging and they include: “Screw working in Staines, hello Adelaide” and "Sod London house prices, choose Adelaide instead".

And just like Ricky Ponting skipper of Aussie cricket team during the recent controversial tour by India, the campaign's brainchild Bill Muirhead is not afraid to mince his words.

Muirhead, an Adelaide-born founder partner in advertising firm M&C Saatchi who has been appointed agent-general of South Australia, told the Times: “It might appear we are being rude, but a lot of things in Britain aren't good."

Teaching bosses have been hopping about at the NUT annual conference in Manchester showing more productivity than the Easter Bunny himself.

Along with the promise of more strike threats, teachers have vowed to stop military recruitment campaigns in schools that promote pro-war "propaganda" to teenagers.

Teachers are accusing the http://www.mod.uk/defenceinternet/homeMoD of offering monetary payments to youngsters known as 'salaries' or 'wages' as well as 'opportunity' and 'adventure'.

The National Union of Teachers (NUT) voted to back staff who resist Armed Forces recruitment drives and called for "education for peace" to be embedded in the school curriculum.

Education for peace? Who is going to fight the next terrorist threat, or an invasion into the UK when teachers run around with long hair and Jesus robes spreading the word of education for peace man?
What kind of talk is that? As it is the UK immigration is having trouble keeping terrorists out of the UK, see Omar Bakri Mohammad and his mates for further reference.

I honestly believe that the MoD does not purposefully enter schools to recruit killing machines. It offers young people a chance to enter a military career, whether it be a soldier, an engineer, or a doctor.

And of course I would expect the MoD to pay me a salary if I enlisted, and I would also expect 'opportunity' and 'adventure', like any career. Hell, I would demand it!

What are the most unusual things candidates have done in a job interview? Fall asleep? Strip naked? Show up a day late?

Job site CareerBuilder.co.uk has conducted a survey of the most outrageous interview mistakes candidates have made, according to 281 hiring managers and HR professionals across the UK.

This year’s Top 10 list:

* When interviewer asked candidate why he wanted to work for the company, he replied: “Because I fancy the girl who works in reception".
* Candidate turned on a CD player to play the song “I feel good” during the interview.
* Candidate performed magic tricks for the interviewer.
* Candidate showed up for the wrong job interview with the wrong company.
* Candidate kept checking his mobile which was in his hand under the desk during the interview.
* Candidate told interviewer: “I don’t have any particular ambitions for advancement, as long as I am paid a lot more in five years time.”
* Candidate told interviewer that he would not be able to travel for work when his football team was playing at home.
* Candidate told interviewer he would wrestle clients to the ground rather than trying to diffuse difficult situations.
* Candidate tried to pick up (physically, I think) the interviewer.

And my personal favourite:
* Candidate gave the interviewer the impression that she had murdered her husband.

The greying clouds that hang over the current financial market will have had even the most prized and stubborn bull running for the nearest tin shed.

Warnings of consumer’s slowdown and job losses in the financial services industry spell a sustained period of gloom for the UK and the global market.

Despite this, some analysts point to the perfect time for companies and indeed employees to adapt to these difficult times. A perfect time then for HR to get its hands dirty, to stand up and be counted and all that? Well that is according to Chris Stone, chief executive at Northgate Information Solutions. And good on him too, I couldnt agree more.

"The Credit Crunch has created an opportunity for the HR sector to make a name for itself. HR professionals can stand up and be counted. The fundamental building block of the economy is its people and HR sits at the very heart of that," Stone said.

And recruitment consultancy Morgan McKinley yesterday also warned that the job market in the financial services sector will be “tough” for the remainder of 2008, after new figures revealed a severe decline in new employment in London’s financial district.

A new survey reveals that three-quarters of bosses say they would not take on a new recruit if they knew they were going to fall pregnant within six months of starting.

The survey by Employment Law Advisory Services (ELAS), comes in the wake of £1m newsreader Natasha Kaplinsky telling her new bosses at Channel Five News that she was going to have a baby just weeks after starting.

ELAS commissioned the survey of 1,100 company bosses and personnel managers after finding that they were dealing with an increase in the number of cases involving pregnancy and new employees.

These included cases where candidates were asked in interview if they had plans for a family – something banned under sex discrimination law – and jobs withdrawn after making an offer – again a practice that is banned.

Earlier this month, I used this column to accuse Gordon Brown of dithering over what to do about the rights of agency workers.

Well, I send my apologies to the embattled prime minister, despite a rogue Bill making its merry way through Parliament which threatened to throw a huge spanner in the works, plans were obviously being drawn up in smoke-filled rooms to reach a compromise. The government has now struck a deal with the CBI and TUC to give agency workers equal treatment after just 12 weeks in a job.

Brown is in need of some kind words after the drubbing Labour suffered at last week's by-election in Crewe and Nantwich. But it is unlikely he will get any from the HR community.

Once again the BBC has been slapped on the wrists for overpaying its leading presenters and DJs.

The BBC claims that Oliver & Ohlbaum, the consultants it invited in (probably at a huge cost to licence-payers), found that the likes of chat show host Jonathan Ross and radio DJ Chris Moyles were not paid above the market rate. But O&O also found that the BBC relied on "a limited number of lead presenters" and questioned how successful the organisation had been in nurturing new talent.

Ross reportedly signed a 'golden handcuffs' deal recently for £18m over three years, and the BBC has an overall 'talent budget' of £242m.The very top stars can expect to earn at least £3m annually from appearance fees, repeats, publishing deals and royalties.

Pay will always be a thorny issue, especially when the public are bankrolling these salaries, but are the likes of Rossy really overpaid? All HR professionals know that nurturing new talent is a high priority - especially in these times of financial instability and demographic change. But talent pipelines can take years to get results, and in the interim it's important to keep your key people happy.

That said, money isn't everything. Just ask Natasha Kaplinsky, who left her already well-paid job at the BBC last year for a £1m a year role as the anchor on Five News, only to tell bosses six weeks later that she was pregnant.  

What another shocker. Not only is it now acceptable to lie on CVs, it's also advisable to bang on about how young you are in the hope that will win you a contract as Sir Alan's apprentice.

When The Apprentice candidate Lee McQueen lied about the length of time he'd spent at university on his CV - claiming he'd been there two years when, ahem, he dropped out after four months - he was apparently doing what many other job applicants have done and so should be forgiven.

You could see the sparkle in Sir Alan's eye when he found out poor Lee had no real education and couldn't spell. The business moguls that interviewed Lee told Sir Alan they too had lied on their CVs to get their first job - and that rather than showing dishonesty, it showed committment and a will to get on in the world.

But employment lawyers were inevitably unhappy about the act. Pinsent Masons employment partner Tom Flanagan said: "If the deceit had remained hidden and Lee went on to become the Apprentice, he could well have been in breach of his contract if it was uncovered at a later date."

Just weeks ago Patrick Imbardelli resigned from his position as chief executive, Asia Pacific Region at InterContinental Hotels Group last June, after it was discovered that he'd lied on his CV, Flanagan reminded us. 

Now in Lee's case you could see why he had lied about his education. He said so himself - he just wanted to keep up with the other candidates and he had proved his worth during the ten weeks he'd been on the show. Fine, but most candidates don't get ten weeks to prove they're good at a job.

For weeks the email inboxes of the Personnel Today team have been bombarded by press releases from all manner of companies jumping aboard The Apprentice bandwagon.

Now ahead of the show's final episode tonight, that bombardment has reached unprecedented levels with firms eager to dispense advice on interview techniques, employment law, pyschometric testing, body language, CV-writing... the list goes on.

Perhaps the naffest example of this publicity seeking comes from Essex County Council.

The council has said it would consider offering the runner-up in tonight's final a job "to help the authority continue its drive to deliver excellent quality services".

Council leader Lord Hanningfield said he wanted the "best and the brightest" to come and work for the organisation. He obviously hasn't been watching the show. The remaining contestants have spent most of the last two months lying, back-stabbing, lurching from one balls-up to the next and desperately trying to save their own backsides.

Actually, perhaps they might be suited to a career in local government.

The move has been attacked - quite correctly - as a publicity stunt. Note the council's use of the word consider. No cast iron offer, and a convenient get-out clause for the brainiacs in Essex's PR department, just in case the bloke who does the pterodactyl impression wins.

Brummies beware - a whopping 76% of employers have discriminated against job applicants because of their accents, with candidates from Birmingham the worst hit.

A study by law firm and prolific survey producers Peninsula found that 'accent discrimination' is widespread and job seekers are becoming increasingly desperate to disguise their regional twangs.

The worst accents as voted for by 2,647 employers, according to the survey were:

1. Birmingham
2. Liverpool
3. Newcastle
4. Glaswegian
5. 'London' Cockney

There's certainly an argument to be had that the Brummie accent is grating, but is it really enough to not give a job to someone? I'd certainly think about hiring Birmingham-born Cat Deeley.

A new website that allows employees to rank their workplace was launched this week.

Work Rewired is designed to give a heads up for prospective employees interested at working in certain companies, using feedback and written reviews

Anonymous entries are permitted, which may allow for the website to be abused.

People are undoubtedly beginning to tighten the purse strings as the UK economy moves ever nearer to recession.

High street retailers have been feeling the pinch for a number of months now as consumers cut their spending on all manner of purchases, from eating out to electrical goods. The rising cost of food and household bills means there isn't much choice to do otherwise.

A report by PricewaterhouseCoopers out today predicted it would be "a survival of the fittest" among retailers and leisure operators as consumer confidence plummets and fears over job security rise.

If that indeed is the case, then the fast food retailers, ironically, seem to be shaping up as the fittest of them all.

McDonald's has revealed plans to hire an extra 4,000 staff over the next three months - its biggest recruitment drive since the turn of the century. And sales of Dominos pizza have rocketed as more people choose to eat at home rather than dine out.

The seeming over-confidence and intense demands of Generation Y (dubbed Gen Why?) is, to say the least, proving to be a challenge for employers.

There's a growing perception that this generation believes it can have it all and is not embarrassed to ask for it. Put simply, they want to get the job done on their own terms and, unphased by hierarchies, have a strong tendency to challenge managers. There's no doubt that this is resulting in a clash of values.

So it's time to really gen up on Gen Y and help managers understand the generational differences and not get frustrated by them.

'Green shoots of economic recovery' aren't exactly the words most people would use to describe the current business climate, following announcements of thousands of job losses last week.

And government minister Baroness Vadera's 'insensitive' and 'embarrassing' remarks on the economy last week rightly earned her the reputation of 'living in a parallel universe'.

Regardless of the intention behind her comments, Personnel Today's new redundancy tracker shows the harsh reality - with the shocking statistic that more than 76,000 jobs have been lost since September 2008.

And the news that demand for HR jobs has slumped to a record low might not come as a surprise either as firms put a block on hiring.

Is the recession really hitting women harder than men?

Equality minister Harriet Harman has warned employers that the government will not tolerate firms cutting female employees - associated with maternity and flexible working benefits - in a bid to cut costs in the recession.

Harman is reported to want prime minister Gordon Brown to introduce new measures to protect the female workforce. These include monitoring companies to check women are not being unfairly targeted, and new training for women to help find jobs.

But is this actually happening in reality, or is it a case of flat earth news, where distortion is eventually accepted as truth?

CIPD chief economist John Philpott, rapidly becoming the voice of authority on the 'jobs recession', says there is so far no evidence on which to base this assertion.

So the government finally admitted that the decision to toughen up new immigration rules could only result in reducing the number of migrant worker applications by 6,000.

With a net immigration of 240,000 a year, what difference will that make then? Well, the obvious difference is the increased bureacracy it will impose upon employers. HR now has to advertise all skilled jobs through Jobcentre Plus for two weeks before they look outside of the EU for employees that are, quite frankly, in short demand in the UK and that's why recruiters go outside the EU anyway.

As several HR experts told Personnel Today recently, the tough new rules will only add unnecessary delays to the recruitment process for employers: thanks for that. It's clearly a political decision, say many HR directors, to try and ease the row over British jobs for British workers.

HR directors already have enough on their plate without the 'tough new rules' likely to make only a drop in the ocean of difference.

Do you agree the government should back down and allow employers the right to use their own judgement when advertising for skilled workers?

Following the loss of four of the most senior women in British politics this week, it naturally follows that people are starting to wonder whether Gordon Brown's new government will continue to represent women.

Equality campaign group the Fawcett Society has already voiced concerns that the prime minister's cabinet re-shuffle won't lead to many top jobs for females.

Over the past couple of days, Jacqui Smith (now ex-home secretary), Hazel Blears (now former communnities secretary), and 'Blair Babes' Beverly Hughes (now the ex-children's minister) and Patricia Hewitt (a former health secretary) all quit the government for a variety of reasons from being caught up in the expenses scandal to wanting to spend more time with their families.

Details of the re-shuffle have been emerging all day, but it is not yet clear how many women will make up the final cabinet team.

Fawcett said it was watching closely to ensure that women were represented in Brown's new government 'of all the talents'.

Director Katherine Rake said: "Having lost two senior women from cabinet, eyes are on Brown today to ensure that he does not backslide on women's representation. We await with anticipation the full results of the reshuffle to find out what the balance will look like."

Before leaving office Blair had eight women in his cabinet of 23, making it 35% women.

Microsoft's recruitment costs have been slashed thanks to LinkedIn.

What's more, it's not alone according to a report on Personnel Today's sister site Computer Weekly by Karl Flinders: Will LinkedIn and Second Life kill the recruitment industry? Here's an extract: