Employers throughout Asia Pacific continue to keep a tight rein on the purse strings in 2009, as salary increases remain at low levels, according to an Asia Pacific Salary Increase Survey conducted by Hewitt Associates (NYSE:HEW), a global human resources consulting and outsourcing firm. This trend looks likely to continue in 2010 as base salaries are projected to rise only slightly in most Asia Pacific markets.

The Hewitt 2009/2010 salary increase survey sees a dramatic decline in salary increase in the two prominent markets of China & India for the first time over the last five years. The 2009 actual salary increase rate went down by 4 percent and 8 percent respectively, which is also the lowest salary increases recorded since 2005.
This year, there is no Asian market which experienced a double digit salary increase. India had the highest percentage pay rise in the region with the average overall salary increase at 6.3 percent. Indonesia ranks second, with the average overall salary increase at 6 percent, followed by China (4.5 percent) and the Philippines (4.3 percent).

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Tags: economic downturn, recession, compensation, asia pacific, talent

Categories: Research | The Economy

PHILADELPHIA--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Entrepreneurship and emerging businesses are expected to play a major role in the economic recovery. Yet finding a place in the entrepreneurial world can be a challenge; especially if a professional is coming from a large company. BioAdvance, the University City Science Center and Wharton Small Business Development Center (SBDC) are collaborating to develop Career GPS, a program which is designed to help displaced biopharmaceutical professionals navigate the Greater Philadelphia region’s entrepreneurial career eco-system.

Career GPS – Navigating the Job Market in the Philadelphia Region’s Entrepreneurial Life Science Community, targets the broad group of life science professionals (manager and above) across the region who are seeking new employment options. The program, which is funded in part by the Delaware Valley Innovation Network, will be held on Friday, November 20, 2009 at The Wharton School of University of Pennsylvania, Huntsman Hall. Registration details will be available at www.bioadvance.com and www.sciencecenter.org beginning on October 1, 2009.

“As the recent Milken Institute study of life sciences in our region noted, Greater Philadelphia is in a unique position to redeploy displaced executives into emerging biosciences companies and new ventures and harness the region’s world-class talent to create an unparalleled global hub for new life sciences companies,” said Barbara S. Schilberg, BioAdvance CEO.

“Our goal is to redeploy the region’s rich scientific expertise to trigger growth in life sciences entrepreneurship,” added Stephen S. Tang, PhD, president and CEO of the University City Science Center. “At the same time, we can create new connections between established and emerging life sciences firms.”

Read the full release.

Tags: entrepreneur, talent, employee development, life sciences

Categories: The Economy

From the Times: The failure of financial institutions to manage risk and the role this has played in creating today's economic crises has created awareness of the need for a new risk-management approach. This may well become the new Holy Grail of financial economics. There are two essential constituents: first, developing a more diverse mindset regarding financial risk; and second, applying more powerful techniques to capture financial reality than risk managers have used in the past.

A new method for risk management does not mean that all elements of the present system must be replaced or that all the discredited financial instruments they spawned should be discontinued. Discrimination is needed: Many existing techniques have validity, but only in certain market conditions; and innovative financial products can contribute to wealth creation, but only if they are used judiciously.

A new approach must start by understanding the reasons for the failure of risk-management systems. Why did risk models grossly understate risks? Why did managements fail to understand this? And why did regulators fail to provide effective checks and balances against the banks' risk-management mistakes?

(Read the entire article.)

Tags: diversity in the workplace, community, talent, workforce

Categories:

(The Examiner, Workplace Diversity Examiner Jessica Faye Carter) Examiner Jessica Carter explores employee diversity, Gladwell's poptech! presentation, and "capitalization" within communities.

From the Examiner: Gladwell's point is that the children selected are not necessarily better at first, but that the cutoff date makes it appear so. And this ultimately results in a lower capitalization rate for hockey players in Canada. His remedy? Harness the talent of players born in the second half of the year by creating a second league with a cutoff date midway through the year. I’ll leave the merits of the parallel league idea for another column.

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Tags: diversity in the workplace, community, talent, workforce

Categories: News

(Chicago, IL, February 12th, 2009, Talent Drive) TalentDrive, the creator of the advanced SaaS recruitment technology, TalentFilterSM, just today released the results from the recent “How is Your Firm Adjusting to the Economy” January 2009 survey.  This survey investigated the tactics Staffing Firms are employing to transition to the new economic situation.  The most profound statistic was over 58% of those surveyed reported implementing new services and re-positioning their company to attract new clientele.  52% of the firms are investing in more marketing and a sales force increase as the major strategic effort. 

The survey went on to explore staffing firm predictions for the hiring return and major concerns for 2009.  Surprisingly, 57% predict the staffing downturn will lighten by the end of Quarter 3 2009, returning to near normal hiring conditions by fall.  65% of firms surveyed feel the overabundance of resumes flooding the market and resume quality issues to be the two major concerns for 2009.  As the talent pool continues to expand, firms are struggling with the quantity versus quality conundrum. 

Over 7,500 Staffing Firms and Independent Recruiters were surveyed.  This survey was conducted between January 16th, 2009 and February 6th, 2009.

In summary, the survey found these key points:

• 52% are investing in increased marketing efforts and a sales force increase as the number one strategic effort for business development
• 58% are implementing new services and re-positioning their company to attract new clientele
• 57% predict the staffing downturn will lighten by Q3 2009
• 65% of staffing firms find the overabundance and quality issues of resumes the number one concern for 2009

“With the weakened economy and raising unemployment rate across the US, the exponential increase in the talent pool is causing real issues for staffing firms and the recruiting industry as a whole.  It is important that staffing firms work towards improved efficiency and possibly technology solutions to help make sense of the mess,” Sean Bisceglia, CEO TalentDrive.

(Media Contact: Alissa Gothard, TalentDrive, 312.676.4204, alissa@talentdrive.com)

Tags: economy, economic crisis, staffing companies, talent

Categories: The Economy

(Atlanta, GA, PRWEB, February 12, 2009) PreVisor, the global leader in employment assessments and talent measurement solutions that connect employment decisions to business results, released its 1st annual Global Assessment Trends report today summarizing findings from over 170 companies representing nearly two dozen industries located around the world. This first of its kind comprehensive survey will help human resources practitioners and consultants evaluate their own practices related to assessing current and future employees.

The 2009 Global Assessment Trends Report (GATR) was completed in conjunction with U.S. and companies based outside the U.S. in Australia, Canada, India, United Kingdom, New Zealand, South Africa, and elsewhere. Most respondents worked within the human resources organization, with others representing operations, sales, training, IT, finance, and others.

"While the report findings must be tempered based on the disturbances in the global economy, the survey results may become even more relevant as organizations begin to increase their focus on internal talent as well as becoming more selective when hiring new talent," explained Dr. Sarah Fallaw, co-author of the GATR.

(Read the entire article.)

Tags: economy, economic crisis, talent, assessments

Categories: News

LinkedIn Launches New Tools to Boost HR Professionals’ Efficiency as Responses to Job Postings Double in Challenging Economy

LinkedIn Talent Advantage and New Custom Company Profiles Help Companies Respond to Market Conditions and Hire Top Talent Faster

MOUNTAIN VIEW, Calif.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--LinkedIn, the world’s largest professional network with more than 35 million members, today announced LinkedIn Talent Advantage, an exclusive suite of solutions for recruiters. The newest feature of Talent Advantage is a “viewer-aware” hiring technology called LinkedIn Custom Company Profiles, designed to help companies present information that is relevant based on a job-seeker’s function, industry, location, etc.

LinkedIn saw responses to job postings on the professional network double over the last six months, resulting in more resumes for recruiters to sift through and more candidates to qualify. Yet, the best employee for the job may not be actively looking. LinkedIn Talent Advantage helps HR teams efficiently find the best talent to fill open positions, a growing challenge given HR resource constraints and the cost of making a bad hire.

“LinkedIn Talent Advantage lets recruiters unlock the power of LinkedIn’s extensive professional network so they can uncover quality passive candidates who are unlikely to be on traditional job boards,” said Francois Dufour, LinkedIn’s Senior Director of Enterprise Marketing. “Over 900 leading companies already depend on LinkedIn’s recruiting solutions. The hiring market has changed, and the new LinkedIn Talent Advantage is a game-changer for the human resources community.”

LinkedIn Talent Advantage now includes:

• LinkedIn® Recruiter™: an exclusive tool for corporate recruiters to source top passive talent, with extended search, full profile viewing, direct messaging and team collaboration tools
• LinkedIn® Jobs Network™: job postings on LinkedIn that deliver precise targeting, candidate match recommendations and viral distribution of job postings throughout the network
• LinkedIn® Talent Direct™: InMail campaigns to reach more potential candidates faster and more precisely
• LinkedIn® Employer Advertising™: advertising on LinkedIn’s uncluttered environment that can be targeted to specific groups of professionals
• NEW LinkedIn® Custom Company Profiles™: rich and extensible company profile with viewer-aware information that can adapt to the viewer’s location, industry, function, etc. to build an employment brand

Company Profiles have been available on LinkedIn since early 2008. Now LinkedIn Custom Company Profiles allow companies and recruiters to develop their employer brand and uniquely inform and engage high value candidates with content specifically designed for particular profiles.

For example, viewers of a LinkedIn Custom Company Profile have the opportunity to discover:

• Recruitment messaging that helps HR teams appeal to candidates on a personal level
• Employee spotlights that introduce ”birds of a feather” peers
• Interactive polling that engages viewers on the page
• Video clips that showcase corporate culture
• Recruiter Profiles and Career Page links that make it easy for interested candidates to take action
• Jobs with “company insider” information that show how a job seeker is connected with the company and the job poster

In addition to adding LinkedIn Custom Company Profiles to the LinkedIn Talent Advantage suite of solutions, LinkedIn has also improved LinkedIn Recruiter and LinkedIn Jobs Network, which now includes LinkedIn Talent Match, a proprietary technology that automatically recommends talent matches for job postings. It also includes “Super Viral” forwarding that makes it easier (just two clicks) to forward jobs to people who would be interested or would know a good fit for the open position.

Visit LinkedIn Talent Advantage – http://talent.linkedin.com - to find out more information about how LinkedIn can help your organization cost-effectively find and hire senior and hard to fill positions.

Tags: networking, linkedin, hiring, jobs, economy, social networking, talent

Categories: News | The Economy