HR Insight

It's for free...

2011-08-17T03:39:00.001-07:00

Anunturi gratuite

Going free lancing is not an easy job. Proffesionals in every field are looking for challenges in the quest of enhancing their knowledge. However, matching one's skills and abilities with clients needs and wants becomes a very difficult job to perform, especially in the incipient phase when the business is trying to build it's own portfolio. At this point, I have recently discovered the "for free" advertising accounts, on the internet. When spreading the word from mouth to mouth is not enough, professionals start looking for alternatives. Operating such as LinkedIn does, these free advertising accounts can help within the country boundaries for a free lancing boost. At least this is the case for Romania, as I see it. Wonder what the western counter parts have to say about it...?!

Hiring interview

2011-08-08T05:15:00.000-07:00

One of my favourite videos related to hiring interviews, telling a lot if you know how to watch it and what to listen for. Come back soon and enjoy our tips about questions during the interview.

“To LinkIn or not to LinkIn?” – this is the question

2011-07-27T05:47:00.000-07:00

LinkedIn is currently the world’s largest professional network, with over 100million active members. It provides quick access to employment resources and contributes with an impressive database to continuously increasing competitiveness amongst worldwide professionals. And most important, it’s free to sign up and navigate (unless you’re looking for premium accounts, but that is another story). Many recruitment consultants advice their clients to create a strong LinkedIn profile and consequently, capable professionals, challenged against powerful working environments, succeed in obtaining the desired role.

However, as it always happens, there are a number of professionals which strongly disagree with the use of LinkedIn in setting and maintaining durable professional relationships. The group in question argues that LinkedIn networking is less efficient than face to face networking.

As I understood, participating in similar debates, it appears that the first step taken by some employers in selecting resumes is looking up for the candidate’s profile on LinkedIn. And, if not satisfactory, the resumes is put aside and forgotten about it.

In my opinion, LinkedIn has advantages and disadvantages. The main plus of LinkedIn would be its worldwide recognition and use: both employers and employees have access to large resources and therefore increase their chances to find the best fit. The main disadvantage would be the lack of personal interaction. However, this can be further argued: LinkedIn is used in order to find the best profiles that suit one’s needs; but phone and face to face interviews are always carried on before final employment arrangements being made.

Am very much interested in hearing your opinion!
Other sites that debate the above issue:
http://www.bnet.com/blog/evil-hr-lady/unemployed-for-a-long-time-try-this/2627?tag=mantle_skin;content
http://www.gautamblogs.com/2011/07/linkedins-apply-button-and-india-effect.html#comment-266447513

TED ideas worth spreading

2011-07-26T05:58:00.000-07:00

A very interesting video that is "worth watching": Matt Cutts describing in a light, relaxing manner the easy way to follow personal and/or professional goals.

Managing the personnel issues during economic downturns

2011-07-25T05:05:00.001-07:00

Gathering material for a country report as part of the International HRM module, it appeared challenging to compare Romania and UK. The current topic is concerned only with the personnel management function, by drawing some conclusions about possible actions that can be undertaken by the personnel specialists in order to help revive the economy and surpass the recession.
For anyone interested in developing the subject and analyse my findings, please leave a comment or send an email.

According to scholars, personnel management broadly refers to and covers everything connected to employment rapports, by managing the relationship between employees and their employers and by supporting the employers in their relation to legal authorities. However, the personnel management function differs from one organisation to another, accounting for industry differences and organisations specifications. Nevertheless, the personnel function is placed at the center of every organisation and represents a very complex and focused activity, established on the grounds of institutional rules. As seen in the literature review, by facing economic downturns during times, organisations were forced to look for fresh solutions in order to survive on the increasingly competitive market. One good example is the UK ‘80s recession, well documented in the personnel management literature. It was the personnel specialists that came up with solutions in order to strengthen the organisation performance, first of all by transferring more personnel responsibilities to line managers.

Even in Romania, which is still going through a transition period, the personnel function is changing continuously, supporting the organisations increasing need to become more and more competitive on a continuously changing and instable market. From the small number of studies performed in Romania, it appears that together with the fall of communism and later on the EU integration, Romania attracted many foreign investors, mostly coming from the west. Together with the investors came the western policies and business models according to which organisations were demanded to function. The transition has been too sudden and personnel specialists struggled in order to adjust their practice and respond to new demands. However, the imposed models often failed to be implemented, simply because several aspects have been ignored, mainly differences in cultural specifics, societal values or economic and political framework.

My opinion is that Romania needs to recover through own means, it needs to implement the lessons learnt and try to retain talented people, young specialists with fresh perspectives and openness to new ways of managing. And the key players in the above mentioned game are the personnel managers through their gained abilities and experience as well as native understanding of our needs.

This is an open topic. So far it has only addressed one general issue of what I consider to be the main problem faced by today’s managers in the personnel field.