Meet the 2007 Global Services 100

Global Services, an integrated media brand servicing corporate professionals engaged in the sourcing and management of business and technology services, recently provided their list of the world's most innovative providers (prepared in conjunction with neoIT ). These providers are, for the most part, business outsourcing services working within 11 different functions; including IT, Call Center, Managed Services, and Engineering.

Company	CEO	URL
24/7 Customer	P.V. Kannan	www.247customer.com
Accenture	Bill Green	www.accenture.com
Affiliated Computer Services	Lynn Blodgett	www.acs-inc.com
Augmentum	Leonard Liu	www.augmentum.com
Auriga	Alexis Sukharev	www.auriga.com
Bleum	Eric Rongley	www.bleum.com
Caliber Point	Ashok Bildikar	www.caliberpoint.com
Cambridge Solutions	Chris Sinclair	www.cambridgeworldwide.com
Capgemini	Paul Hermelin	www.capgemini.com
CGI Group	Michael E. Roach	www.cgi.com
ClientLogic	David Garner	www.clientlogic.com
Cognizant Technology Solutions	Francisco D'Souza	www.cognizant.com
Convergys	James F. Orr	www.convergys.com
Covansys	Rajendra B. Vattikuti	www.covansys.com
CPM	Antonio Carlos Rego Gil	www.cpminternational.com
Darwin Suzsoft	Dan Ross	www.darwinsuzsoft.com
DataArt	Michael Zaitsev	www.dataart.com
DBA	Danilo Meth	www.dba.com.br
Dextra Technologies	Daniel Chavez	www.dextratech.com
e4e	Somshankar Das	www.e4e.com
ea Consulting Asia Pacific	Chin King Wong	www.eacap.com
EDS	Michael H. Jordan	www.eds.com
EPAM Systems	Arkadiy Dobkin	www.epam.com
Etech	Dilip Barot	www.etechinc.com
ExlService Holdings	Vikram Talwar	www.exlservice.com
FCG Software Services	Subramaniam Ramachandran	www.fcg.com
Freeborders	John Cestar	www.freeborders.com
Genpact	Pramod Bhasin	www.genpact.com
Globant	Martin Migoya	www.globant.com
HCL Technologies	Shiv Nadar	www.hcltech.com
Headstrong	Arjun Malhotra	www.headstrong.com
Hispanic Teleservices	Alberto Fernandez	www.htc.to
HTC Global Services	Madhava Reddy	www.htcinc.com
Hinduja TMT	Partha D Sarkar	www.hindujatmt.com
I.T. United	Cyrill Eltschinger	www.ituc.com
IBA Group	Sergei Levteev	www.iba-it-group.com
IBM	Samuel J. Palmisano	www.ibm.com
ICT Group	John J. Brennan	www.ictgroup.com
i-flex solutions	Deepak Ghaisas	www.iflexsolutions.com
Infinite Computer Solutions	Upinder Zutshi	www.infics.com
Informatica Integral Empresarial	Antonio Velasco	www.sinersys.com.mx
Infosys Technologies	Nandan M Nilekani	www.infosys.com
Innominds Software	Rao Vemula	www.innominds.com
Intelenet Global Services	Susir Kumar	www.intelenetglobal.com
Intetics	Boris Kontsevoi	www.intetics.com
ITC Infotech	Sanjiv Puri	www.itcinfotech.com
Kepler - Rominfo	Petrisor Guta	www.kepler-rominfo.com
Knoah Solutions	Myneni	www.knoah.com
Lason	Ronald D. Risher	www.lason.com
Lohika Systems	Daniel Dargham	www.lohika.com
Longtop	Eric Liang	www.longtopinternational.com
Luxoft	Dmitry Loschinin	www.luxoft.com
marketRx	Jaswinder S. Chadha	www.marketrx.com
Mastek	Sudhakar Ram	www.mastek.com
MERA Networks	Dmitry M. Ponomarev	www.meranetworks.com
Microland	Pradeep Kar	www.microland.com
MindTree Consulting	Ashok Soota	www.mindtree.com
Mistral Software	Anees Ahmed	www.mistralsoftware.com
Motif	John Coker	www.motifinc.com
MphasiS	Jaithirth Rao	www.mphasis.com
NCO Group	Michael Barrist	www.ncogroup.com
Neoris	Claudio Muruzabal	www.neoris.com
Ness Technologies	Raviv Zoller	www.ness.com
Neusoft Group	Jiren Liu	www.neusoft.com
NIIT SmartServe	Paul Barrow	www.niitsmartserve.com
Objectiva Software Solutions	Douglas Winter	www.objectivasoftware.com
Ocwen Financial	William C. Erbey	www.ocwen.com
OfficeTiger	Randolph Altschuler and Joseph Sigelman	www.officetiger.com
Outsource Partners International	Clarence T. Schmitz	www.opiglobal.com
Patni Computer Systems	N.K. Patni	www.patni.com
Perot Systems	Peter Atlabef	www.perotsystems.com
Polaris	Arun Jain	www.polaris-america.com
Politec	HÉlio Oliveira	www.politec.com
Promantra Synergy Solutions	Praveen Vadlamudi	www.promantra.net
QuEST	Ajit A. Prabhu	www.quest-global.com
Sapient	Jerry Greenberg	www.sapient.com
Satyam Computer Services	B. Rama Raju	www.satyam.com
Scicom (MSC) Berhad	Leo Ariyanayakam	www.scicom-intl.com
Sierra Atlantic	Raju Reddy	www.SierraAtlantic.com
Sinapsis Technologies	Gerardo Rodriguez	www.sinapsis.com
SnT Global	David Wong	www.sntglobal.com
SoftServe	Taras Kytsmey	www.softservecom.com
Softtek	Blanca TreviÑo	www.softtek.com
Sonata Software	B. Ramaswamy	www.sonata-software.com
SPI Technologies	Ernest Cu	www.spi-bpo.com
StarSoft Development Labs	Nick Puntikov	www.starsoftlabs.com
Stream	Toni Portmann	www.stream.com
Summit HR Worldwide	Ranjan Sinha	www.summithrww.com
Sutherland Global Services	Dilip R. Vellodi	www.suth.com
Symphony Services	Gordon Brooks	www.symphonysv.com
Syntel	Bharat Desai	www.syntelinc.com
Tata Consultancy Services	S. Ramadorai	www.tcs.com
TransWorks Information Services	Atul Kunwar	www.transworks.com
Unisys	Joseph W. McGrath	www.unisys.com
vCustomer	Sanjay Kumar	www.vcustomer.com
Vee Technologies	Chocko Valliappa	www.veetechnologies.com
Vsource Asia	Jack Cantillon	www.vsourceasia.com
Wipro Technologies	Azim H. Premji	www.wipro.com
WNS	Neeraj Bhargava	www.wnsgs.com
Zensar Technologies	Ganesh Natarajan	www.zensar.com

Meet the Global Services 100. [Global Services - Rusty Weston]

Workforce Vision * Post: Bill Inman * Human Capital * Contingent Workforce * Globalization * Trends * Outsourcing

2007 Temporary Jobs Guidebook by Staffing Industry Analysts

Staffing Industry Analysts has created the 2007 Temporary Jobs Guidebook which outlines “a fundamental shift in the make up of the U.S. workforce.”

"From our analysis, we predict that over the next 10 years, corporate America is likely to face a distinct challenge to find highly skilled workers to help them achieve their business objectives," said Barry Asin, Chief Analyst of Staffing Industry Analysts. "As a result, employers can expect rising prices for skilled temporary help and longer waits to find these workers. For temporary staffing firms, the demand for contingent workers will translate into a growth opportunity for the foreseeable future."

Here are some interesting facts on temp labor contained in the Guidebook:

The Guidebook can be orderded by contacting Staffing Industry Analysts' sales at 650-232-2350 or kmarechal@staffingindustry.com.

Workforce Vision * Post: Bill Inman * Human Capital * Contingent Workforce * Globalization * Trends * Outsourcing

United States Workers' Compensation Resources (Employee Injury Insurance)

Need to get a question answered or know more about Workers' Compensation in a specific state? Use the following resources from StaffMarket.com:

U.S. States		Other
A-M	N-W
Alabama	Nebraska	U.S. Department of Labor
Alaska	Nevada	American Samoa
Arizona	New Hampshire	Guam
Arkansas	New Jersey	Navajo Nation
California	New Mexico	Northern Mariana Islands
Colorado	New York	Puerto Rico
Connecticut	North Carolina	Virgin Islands
Delaware	North Dakota
District of Columbia	Ohio
Florida	Oklahoma
Georgia	Oregon
Hawaii	Pennsylvania
Idaho	Rhode Island
Illinois	South Carolina
Indiana	South Dakota
Iowa	Tennessee
Kansas	Texas
Kentucky	Utah
Louisiana	Vermont
Maine	Virginia
Maryland	Washington
Massachusetts	West Virginia
Michigan	Wisconsin
Minnesota	Wyoming
Mississippi
Missouri
Montana

Workforce Vision * Post: Bill Inman * Human Capital * Contingent Workforce * Globalization * Trends * Outsourcing

The Big Ten Innovation Killers

In today’s business environment innovation is about more than new products. It is about improving and reinventing processes and quickly tapping into new markets that meet rapidly changing customer needs. As globalization increases the flow of new ideas, innovation has become about selecting and executing the right ideas and bringing them to market in record time. This requires efficient and flexible Human Capital. Here are the “Big Ten Innovation Killers”, as written by Joyce Wycoff, that your company will want to avoid when managing its labor pool.

1. Not creating a culture that supports innovation
2. Not getting buy-in and ownership from business unit managers
3. Not having a widely understood, system-wide process
4. Not allocating resources to the process
5. Not tying projects to company strategy
6. Not spending enough time and energy on the fuzzy front-end
7. Not building sufficient diversity into the process
8. Not developing criteria and metrics in advance
9. Not training and coaching innovation teams
10. Not having an idea management system

The Big Ten Innovation Killers. [Joyce Wycoff]

Workforce Vision * Post: Bill Inman * Human Capital * Contingent Workforce * Globalization * Trends * Outsourcing

Boom expected in hiring security-cleared workers

In 2007 will see a surge in the hiring of workers with security clearances as a result of the many multimillion-dollar Department of Defense contracts that were awarded in December 2006.

Security Cleared Workforce Data:

• 18 Months - The average time to thoroughly vet a prospective worker with no security clearance. (Office of Personnel Management reports that clearances can be reduced to six months or less)
• More than three-fourths of government contractors agreed that the need for cleared employees to work on federal contracts had increased, in the past five years:
• “greatly” (51 percent)
• “somewhat” (26 percent)
  
  
• 50% of the respondents of a 2006 Federal Computer Week survey believed the security clearance process, run by the Defense Security Service and OPM, had:
• worsened (31 percent)
• not improved at all (24 percent) in the past year.
  
  
• There are some 79,500 contract employees working on federal information technology projects.
• Of the top 10 locations seeking cleared candidates, seven are in the national capital area.

1. Chantilly, Va.
2. Washington D.C., metropolitan area
3. McLean-Arlington, Va.
4. El Segundo, Calif.
5. Fairfax-Reston, Va.

In terms of salary:

• Cleared workers sent to Iraq can earn on average $98,400
• Cleared workers earned on average $78,400 in Maryland
• Cleared workers earned on average $76,500 in Virginia
• Arizona ranked tenth in the nation at an average earning of $64,400.
• Candidates with higher clearances can earn on average $10,000 more a year than workers with only a secret or confidential clearance.

Boom expected in hiring security-cleared workers. [Clearancejobs.com, Federal Computer Week]

Workforce Vision * Post: Bill Inman * Human Capital * Contingent Workforce * Globalization * Trends * Outsourcing

The Rise of Crowdsourcing

The Wired magazine article "The Rise of Crowdsourcing" reads, "Remember outsourcing? Sending jobs to India and China is so 2003. The new pool of cheap labor: everyday people using their spare cycles to create content, solve problems, even do corporate R & D."

The internet, low cost equipment and access to information, and professional and hobbyists who have extra 'cycles' to burn have become low cost resources for corporations big and small. Here are some crowdsourcing examples (from Wired magazine):

Lego
The beloved toy company encourages its fanatical customers to design everything from robot operating systems to Lego sets.

SportingNews.com
Last summer, the sports media company made blogs and social networking the foundation of its Web relaunch. Traffic and ad revenue soared.

Second Life
Residents of this popular online world put in more than 22,500 hours of “work” each day, stocking the virtual world with everything from ninja armor to giant tree houses.

Threadless.com
This hipster company prints T-shirts with designs submitted to its Web site. It expects to earn $20 million in revenue this year.

What are the rules of Crowdsourcing? Here are 5:

1. The crowd is dispersed
People spread around the world can perform a range of tasks – from the most rote to the highly specialized – but this would-be workforce needs to be able to complete the job remotely.

2. The crowd has a short attention span
These new workers find time after dinner and on weekends. So jobs need to be broken into “micro-chunks.” Most tasks on Amazon Mechanical Turk, for example, take less than 30 minutes to complete.

3. The crowd is full of specialists
For Procter & Gamble, the crowd is the world’s scientific community; for VH1 it’s any ham with a camcorder; for iConclude it’s the handful of professionals with experience troubleshooting Microsoft’s server software.

4. The crowd produces mostly crap
Networks like InnoCentive, Mechanical Turk, and iStockphoto don’t increase the amount of talent – they make it possible to find and leverage that talent. Any open call for submissions – whether for scientific solutions, new product designs, or funny home videos – will elicit mostly junk. Smart companies install cheap, effective filters to separate the wheat from the chaff.

5. The crowd finds the best stuff
Even as a networked community produces tons of crap, it ferrets out the best material and corrects errors. Wikipedia enthusiasts quickly fix inaccuracies in the online encyclopedia. Viewers of Web site YouTube find the one tastelessly funny amateur video from the 10 that are merely tasteless.

The Rise of Crowdsourcing. [Wired Magazine - Jeff Howe]

5 Rules of the New Labor Pool. [Wired Magazine - Jeff Howe]

Look Who's Crowdsourcing. [Wired Magazine - Jeff Howe]

Workforce Vision * Post: Bill Inman * Human Capital * Contingent Workforce * Globalization * Trends * Outsourcing

U.S. Contingent Workforce Statistics

Jobs

Staffing companies match millions of people to millions of jobs.

• 2.9 million people per day are employed by staffing companies.
  
• 12 million temporary and contract employees are hired by U.S. staffing firms over the course of a year.
  
• 79% of staffing employees work full time, virtually the same as the rest of the work force.

Flexibility

The staffing industry offers flexibility to both employees and companies. People can choose when, where, and how they want to work. Companies can get the skills they need to keep fully staffed during busy times.

• 66% of staffing employees say flexible work time is important to them.
  
• 64% of staffing employees report that their work gives them the scheduling flexibility and the time for family that they desire.
  
• 90% of client businesses say staffing companies give them flexibility to keep fully staffed during busy times.

Bridge

Temporary and contract work provides a bridge to permanent employment. People can try out a prospective employer and showcase their skills for a permanent job.

• 88% of staffing employees say that temporary or contract work made them more employable.
  
• 77% of staffing employees say it’s a good way to obtain a permanent job.
  
• 80% of staffing clients say staffing firms offer a good way to find people who can become permanent employees.

Choice

Many people choose temporary and contract work as an employment option. They can select their work schedules and choose among a variety of diverse and challenging assignments.

• 67% of staffing employees say choice of assignments was an important factor in their job decision.
  
• 23% of staffing employees have little or no interest in a permanent job—they prefer the alternative arrangement over traditional employment.
  
• 33% of staffing employees say they work for a staffing company because they like the diversity and challenge of different jobs.

Training

The staffing industry provides free training for millions of temporary and contract employees to help meet today's demand for skilled workers.

• 90% of staffing companies provide free training to their temporary employees.
  
• 65% of staffing employees say they developed new or improved work skills through their assignments.
  
• 40% of staffing employees say they choose temporary or contract work as a way to obtain employment experience or job training.

Staffing Statistics - Staffing Facts. [American Staffing Association]

Workforce Vision * Post: Bill Inman * Human Capital * Contingent Workforce * Globalization * Trends * Outsourcing

Who Rises to Power in American Business?

"Who achieves success and power in the United States? In the twentieth century, the easiest path to power was available to certain individuals—mainly men, mainly white—who were otherwise favored with the right religious, family, geographic, and educational ties. But a significant number of "outsiders" created their own road to success, overcoming significant odds."

Here is a summary of a recent Q&A with Anthony Mayo of Harvard Business School and author of Paths to Power: How Insiders and Outsiders Shaped American Business Leadership:

Q: Your research suggests that for the first three quarters of the past century access to positions of power and leadership in America was not available to all equally. Who was favored during that time?

A: What is often overlooked or forgotten in the Alger stories is that the individuals who "came up from their bootstraps" did so with the assistance of an important and influential benefactor...the benefactor helped to channel that energy into an opportunity with potential. In a sense, this personal network or connection helped to facilitate access to others in positions of influence which in turn provided opportunities for advancement.

In Paths to Power, we trace seven factors that either provided easy access to an insider track to power or functioned as obstacles to success. These include birthplace, nationality, religion, education, social class, gender, and race. Those from privileged families have always had an easier path to traditional power. Those on the outside—foreigners, women, African-Americans, non-Protestant religious affiliations—often pursued other paths to power. When doors were closed, outsiders created their own paths.

Q: How has that situation changed today? Do paths to power mirror trends and values in society at large?

A: There has been a gradual opening of access. In our research, we saw education supplanting religion, birthplace, and nationality as a more important factor for success by the late 1950s. The MBA as a prerequisite for success in the top tiers of business became increasingly important from the 1970s through the end of the century, and as a result, we have seen a massive proliferation of MBA programs. At the elite graduate institutions, there may be less access—in essence, a closing of the funnel.

Q: In what areas do paths to power still appear to be closed today? Who is being excluded?

A: The three areas that are still part of the outsider path are social class, gender, and race. The most intractable issue is probably social class. The composition of leaders who overcame poverty to achieve the pinnacle of success in business changed very little over the course of the twentieth century.

Q: What does your research suggest about American business leadership in the future?

A: Businesses that will succeed in the twenty-first century will be those that embrace the diversity of their workforce, that can compete in a global, competitive landscape. Education is far more important today. Going forward, a global perspective will be increasingly vital.

Q: What do you think is the single most important finding from the research that went into the book?

A: At first glance, the composition of CEOs in America seems to have changed little in 100 years—it's mostly comprised of white men. But digging deeper, it is apparent that the composition has changed in some dramatic ways. There are more foreign-born CEOs today, religion is no longer a barrier to entrance, education has helped to level the playing field for some from less advantaged backgrounds, etc.

Link to Who Rises to Power in American Business? [HBS Working Knowledge - Anthony Mayo]

Workforce Vision * Post: Bill Inman * Human Capital * Contingent Workforce * Globalization * Trends * Outsourcing

Companies, Compliance, and the Contingent Workforce Statistics

What are companies thinking about their contingent labor? Yves Lermusiaux provides the following statistics:

• 92 percent cite inconsistent costs and a lack of price control a primary “pain point” with their current contingent labor workforce.

• 69 percent are highly concerned about their organ ization’s compliance with industry regulations such as Sarbanes-Oxley, SEC, FDIC, etc.

• 66 percent are highly concerned about employee misclassification and co-employment risk.

• 50 percent do not know if their company has ever defended itself against a lawsuit associated with contingent labor.

• 33 percent could not report which, if any, department holds primary responsibility for minimizing their company’s risk and liability as it relates to contingent workforce management.

• 21 percent could not estimate their company’s current annual spending for contingent labor in the U.S.

• 18 percent could not estimate the number of suppliers currently providing contingent labor to their company.

Contingent Workforce Management Trends. [Sarbanes-Oxley Compliance Journal - Yves Lermusiaux]

Workforce Vision * Post: Bill Inman * Human Capital * Contingent Workforce * Globalization * Trends * Outsourcing

Tracking the Rise of Global Contingent Workforce

Steve Marlin of Global Services writes, "CONTINGENT workers, also known as temps, part-time and contract workers, have long been a staple of the global labor force, providing a flexible and cost-effective means of smoothing out fluctuations in demand and production...Small wonder that companies are clamoring for ways to reduce the costs and improve the efficiency of their contingent workers."

"Beset by a lack of uniform hiring processes and procedures, minimal controls and high administrative costs, companies have found themselves in a quandary in managing contingent workers. And now that the contingent workforce has gone global, the level of complexity has ratcheted up, with a patchwork of labor laws, wage rates and cultural differences thrown into the mix."

In response to this companies are:

* Investing in processes and technology to meet demands for greater visibility into * Setting up master contracts with staffing-services companies to handle requisitions for every kind of worker, from unskilled to the most technically
* Implementing supply chain software to put in place the same controls over contingent-worker procurement as they have for indirect goods and services.
* Being challenged to bring consistent process, technology and program governance to a function that’s historically been decentralized.

Companies are taking these initiatives because they are looking to:

1.) Reduce the time for candidate-sourcing and filling requisitions was cited as a challenge by nearly half (48%) of participants in an Aug. ‘06 study by Aberdeen Group.
2.) Improve collaboration (48%)
3.) Obtain greater visibility into rates and processing costs (40%)
4.) Increase compliance and verify worker qualifications (36%)
5.) Reduce runaway spending (33%).


Tracking the Rise of Global Contingent Workforce. [Global Services - Steven Marlin]

Workforce Vision * Post: Bill Inman * Human Capital * Contingent Workforce * Globalization * Trends * Outsourcing

Vendor Management Standards Committee Formed

The Human Capital Institute and a coalition of seven contingent workforce industry vendors announced today the formation of the Vendor Management Standards Committee. Advancing best practices and benchmarks for clients, COMSYS, Beeline, Allegis Group Services, Bartech Workforce Management, Comensura, MyBizOffice and ProcureStaff joined forces with the Human Capital Institute to develop and publish best practices and industry standards focusing on vendor management.

Here are some quotes from press releases on the Committee:

• "There is a great deal of confusion among buyers and industry insiders as to what constitutes a Managed Service Provider (MSP). The vendor management industry lacks consistency or standards around the services it provides."
  
  
• "We continue to see a substantial increase in the use of vendor management systems, especially with large- and medium-size firms nationwide . "
  


• "The Vendor Management Standards Committee will help to establish base standards that will serve as a fundamental set of expectations for any buyer who contracts with an MSP that adheres to the standards. "

More information can be found at the following link:

Vendor Management Standards Committee Formed to Promote Contingent Workforce Industry Best Practices. [Human Capital Institute]

Workforce Vision * Post: Bill Inman * Human Capital * Contingent Workforce * Globalization * Trends * Outsourcing

Top Business Trends for 2007

Top Small-Business Trends for 2007 as stated by Vistage, the world's largest CEO membership organization:

1. Increased Globalization


2. Heightened M&A Activity


3. Increasing divide between Baby Boomer and Generation Y workers

The above trends revolve around cost cutting, increasing profitable growth, and human capital.

“The global economy is increasingly being fueled by small businesses,” said Rafael Pastor, Vistage CEO and Chairman of the Board. “In 2007, more small businesses will not only experiment with global opportunities, but significant percentages of their growth and ability to compete will depend upon it.”

Vistage sees many of its members in the $50 - $100 million range either recently having gone through a merger or acquisition, or are anticipating one. In fact, a recent poll of Vistage members revealed that more than 50 percent are considering a merger, acquisition or both in 2007 as a way to help their businesses grow.

With staffing the No. 1 concern of small and medium-sized businesses executives, a new challenge will impact their ability to hire and retain skilled employees in 2007: a clash between work styles and expectations of Boomers vs. Gen Y. In many cases, Boomer executives are not creating work environments that fit the Gen Y mindset. Other Boomers are actively seeking out and catering to younger, less experienced employees because of their creativity, knowledge of new technologies and different viewpoints on business.

These trends are based on feedback and issues raised by Vistage members. Vistage International has more than 13,000 members worldwide who meet regularly to discuss their most pressing business issues and opportunities.

Vistage Reveals Top Business Trends for 2007. [Press Release]

Workforce Vision * Post: Bill Inman * Human Capital * Contingent Workforce * Globalization * Trends * Outsourcing

"Attempting to Stop Globalization Can Cause More Harm Than Good" - Yale Center for the Study of Globalization

"The global economic transition to a post-industrial economy has increased pace since the end of the Cold War, but the dislocations caused by rapid globalization rage on...Politicians find themselves pandering to narrow constituencies with petty, irrelevant legislation to build coalitions, often with majorities so razor thin that they are ungovernable. From France to Poland to the US, the appeals to the extreme groups result in proposals of nativist immigration and trade policies that do little to assuage the economic uncertainty confronting increasing numbers of voters around the globe. ... journalist Richard Hornik warns that “the dislocations wrought by globalization’s creative destruction are nothing compared to the economic chaos unleashed when efforts are made to halt or reverse the process.”

Is this true? Does attempting to halt or slow globalization do more harm than good to the countries that take this strategy?

Here are some quotes from this Yale Center for the Study of Globalization article:

• Politicians are reaping the whirlwind of more than a decade of over-promising and scapegoating.


• For the workforce, no job is safe. For all but the very wealthiest, working lives will henceforth be spent worrying about tomorrow's paycheck, health benefits and pensions.


• Parties at both ends of the political spectrum in Europe and the US will be left with self-defeating policies of raising trade barriers, defending domestic industries in distress, limiting social benefits to “true” citizens and wrapping it all in patriotic bunting.


• If politicians at both ends of the political spectrum continue to win votes by pandering to the worst fears and basest instincts of a frightened electorate, it seems only a matter of time before the resulting governments indulge in the self-destructive grand gestures that could lead to a global trade war or a violent anti-immigrant backlash or both.

Globalization: When Cure Is Worse Than Malady

Workforce Vision * Post: Bill Inman * Human Capital * Contingent Workforce * Globalism * Trends * Outsourcing

U.S. Temporary Employment in Decline for 1st Time in 3 Years

Temporary help payroll growth, as measured on a 12-month trend, has been weakening steadily over 2006, and finally crossed the line into the negative zone in November, falling 0.8% from the year earlier. This was the first recorded year-over-year decline in temporary help payrolls since June 2003. Part of the reason for this decline is the effect of Katrina on previous year’s numbers. November 2005 saw a large increase in temporary help usage in the weather-beaten Gulf Coast. Nonetheless, even taking this liberal perspective, it remains that temporary help payrolls are also up less than 1% above pre-Katrina levels, so volume growth is unquestionably weak at best. On a month-to-month basis, temporary help services rose 0.2% from October, adding 4,800 jobs, the Bureau of Labor Statistics reported today.

Workforce Vision * Post: Bill Inman * Human Capital * Contingent Workforce * Globalism * Trends * Outsourcing

Global Talent Management for Technology Executives

A recent study by the Economist Intelligence Unit and PricewaterhouseCoopers states:

Workforce investments represent a singular untapped opportunity for technology companies to drive financial performance in the coming decade. The effectiveness of these investments may well determine which companies succeed or fail; which companies continue to innovate, cut costs and drive productivity; and which companies spend too much energy just to replace the talnt they once had or work without cohesion due to poor leadership and direction.

The studies main observations about talent management for technology executives:

1. A priority with failing grades. Many technology executives are making human capital management a greater priority, but the survey shows they do not have a high regard for their firms’ capabilities in this area.

2. Acquiring hybrids. Executives are beginning to experience a painful scarcity for the essential employee: that talented, technically-savvy individual who can collaborate, innovate, and manage change.

3. Harvesting talent from within. Technology companies worldwide are focusing on personnel development and training, and, by inference, on the retention of new hires and existing personnel.

4. Managing global markets and global talent. Nearly half of all technology companies say they difficulty finding technical talent in emerging markets, and just under half say these difficulties include the retention of skilled people around the globe.

Read the study at:

Technology Executive Connections: Successful Strategies for Talent Management. [Economist Intelligence Unit and PricewaterhouseCoopers]

Workforce Vision * Post: Bill Inman * Human Capital * Contingent Workforce * Globalization * Trends * Outsourcing