Webinar: Five Easy Steps to Start Your Sourcing

Hello All. Its been a while...But I am happy to say we are swamped as I assume all of you are. Heads UP! I am holding a free webinar on July 17, 2007 at 1:00 EST which will be co-hosted with Shally Steckerl called "Five Easy Steps to Start Your Sourcing". Very soon we will begin sending invitations with hopes of having new and current clients take away a few tips as it relates to recruiting and sourcing. It will cover all the steps of the recruiting process, examples of the processes used by 3 companies, tips on using the internet to source resumes, contacts and tools used by successful recruiters, to include a 5 minute demo of SGA ExecutiveTracker and a question and answer time period. We are very excited about it and we look forward to this being our first of many. Check Shally out at www.jobmachine.net.

The war for talent...

The war for talent...we are all feeling this effect. Corporations and search firms alike are seeking the best, most talented professionals when conducting search assignments. After speaking with 20 professionals in this space, all stated that a majority of their hires are coming from the results produced while speaking with professionals in the industry  and doing direct sourcing. Many corporations are building up their internal search teams and hiring telephone direct sourcing recruiters. How powerful and meaningful it is to the team when a  potential candidate is uncovered from a targeted list of companies and names produced either internally or externally. In order to stay ahead of the competition, driven producers still pick up the phone and recruit. Research is needed for this type of work, and can be done in a variety ways to include research tools, the Internet, associations, using an internal database etc.

As the conversations continued, a few began to say that they believe within the next 5-10 years a true research analyst will be hard to find. Wow....do you think this is true? I began to think about this, wow! Anyway, just food for thought. But for now we move on and continue using research in a variety of ways. We use the Internet, many firms have Internet researcher, which is very valuable too, but so is finding the untapped professionals. Those who use both can say that they are really looking at the entire universe of candidates, each complements the other.

Remember, recruiting is a process and every step is important. Research is very important and we should thank the ones producing the names and the candidates. So don't forget to say thanks to the team when a hire is made!!! And when it is not, it is not just the little guy/gal on the totem pole's fault. Team work is where it is at!!! Things to take away from this.....there is a talent shortage, maybe soon in our world too;search is a process that needs to be carefully executed, by using all the tools available to you, pick up the phone and search out the candidates and find the potential candidates together, as a team.

Until next time....

Our Women in Technology Study on Forbes

I am proud to say that SGA's 2007 Women in Technology study was the main source for the recent Forbes article "Tough, Tech-Smart--And Female" by Rachel Rosmarin.

It is a must read for recruiters and any one interested in what is happening in this area. Just to share a few of the details, the number of woman who have the title Chief Information Officer is up to 9% from 7% compared to a few years ago. Thirteen percent (13%) seems to be the lucky number of woman in technology’s representation from 1075 companies that have been analyzed by us since 1998. If you are interested in knowing who these women are, we have the top 25 listed in the report and for a price we can sell you 135 women in technology contacts we uncovered while working on this project this year. Register here to receive a complimentary copy of the Women in Technology study.

Net/Net, we need more women in these jobs. If your daughter asks what profession she should be in, you may want to think about having her go into the technology field. When college graduates enter this field, the salary level is pretty constant and similar; however as they climb the ranks, the salary levels begin to separate and the male counterparts begin to make more money. What women need to do is negotiate more as they climb the ranks and take other positions both internally and externally from their current organizations. As a thought leader in this space, if you are looking for a tech position, want advice or are recruiting in this space, let’s chat. I look forward to it.

AESC's Researcher & Associates Summit

Hello everyone and welcome to my blog. I am very excited about starting this and hopeful that all of you will enjoy it.

As a thought leader in the research and recruiting world, part of my responsibility is to attend events where I can learn from others and share with them what I know. Just recently we were in New York City at AESC's Researcher & Associates Summit (May 3, 2007) and it turned out to be one of the best events we have attended. It was very relaxed, informative, and many of the professionals were actually speaking about how business is conducted at their firms. Lots of sharing of ideas were buzzing all around, the energy levels were high, and all were there to learn and walk away with actionable & beneficial knowledge.

I truly enjoyed one of the last events, the panel discussion that took place at 4 o’clock called the Value of Research. It was an open conversation in Q&A format moderated by Veness Nettles of Russell Reynolds, and there were 4 great panelists: Susan Chadick of Chadick Ellig, Daniel Kelley of Heidrick & Struggles, Carrie Pryor of Korn Ferry, and Joseph Ziccardi of Cromwell Partners.  AESC did a great job of constructing the panel. Some firms on the panel have a recruiting process which relies almost exclusively on external research firm resources like SGA, while others primarily rely on internal research, only going to a third party source when internal research can't come up with desired results or they are under "last minute" time constraints. All agreed that Research firms like SGA are a valuable resource, and also that when you decide to team up with a research firm they all target to bring them on as early as possible in the process.

What impressed me the most about this panel was that all were honest about how they conducted research within their individual practices. They all really talked openly about how research was viewed in their businesses and what could be done to make it better.

I found this very uplifting that there is hope that we can all share ideas and best practices amongst each other at these events as opposed to holding information close to the chest. Let me know your thoughts.

Introduction to the SGA Blog

Hello, I’m Sheila Greco. Welcome to my blog. For those of you who do not know me, I am President and Chief Executive Officer of Sheila Greco Associates, LLC. As an entrepreneur specializing in human resources consulting, I have gained extensive experience in research, recruiting, competitive intelligence, and business intelligence focused on company and executive contact information. As a strategic results oriented leader, I pride myself on building long-term and solid relationships with clients and candidates. I have over 20 years experience and I am STILL PASSIONATE ABOUT WHAT I DO. 

I want this blog to be a very interactive forum. I encourage questions regarding corporate research, recruiting, benchmarking studies, corporate and executive information. I encourage that same open forum policy myself here at SGA. As a result, myself and my team of Research professionals at SGA can offer you valuable information that is not always available to you from other sources or elsewhere on the internet. I plan to share my experiences in the business as well as what I learn at industry events, evaluating them and offering suggestions. I want this to be a source of information to those in need of company and executive contact information.

So let me know how can I help you. I look forward to providing great information to you and all my readers.