Minnesota Headhunter

Event: Terry Petra Presenting At MNTRN

This week MNTRN (Minnesota Technical Recruiters Network) is hosting Terry Petra. This will be my first time meeting Terry and I am looking forward to it. He has a great reputation as a trainer and I am going to ready to take some notes.

Event info:

“Just Do It … Right!”

Terry Petra, CPC, CTS, CIPC

This fast paced, action packed program will show you how to get top results regardless of economic uncertainties! We’ll begin by taking a look at the differences between those who succeed by making a positive difference from those who do not, while keeping in mind “The Success Question”.

Minnesota Startup News: MinneBar, TrackIF, SportNgin, Google Demo Day and Kidizen and Docalytics

There is a bunch of news the past two weeks with Minnesota startups and I am posting the ones I know about. I think I am missing a few so if I am send me a note so I can write about them too.

MinneBar

MinneBar (@MinneBar) is next week, April 12^th at Best Buy HQ’s. While not focused on startups there are a number of sessions relating to starting one, running one and going to work for one.

I am doing two sessions.

Managing Your IT Career v6

Last year I had some thoughts and slides prepared and decided to simply ask:

“What do you want to know?

And the first question that drew loud laughter was:

“Why do recruiters suck?”

From conversations I have already had I expect this to be a fun session and pick up where I left off.

Minnesota Headhunter Brown Bag Lunch With Recruiter And HR Friends

This is an idea that I have had for more than a year now and I want to float it out “there” and see what happens.

Back when I was coordinating the Minnesota Recruiters group I never had time to see friends and make new ones at events. I was busy making sure wireless microphones had batteries, slides were ready and we had enough coffee.

After an event there were always a number of email exchanged with friends with something like:

Hey I saw you, but you were busy.

Were you there? I didn’t see you.

We should get together the next week or two.

And it never happened.

2014 Minneapolis St Paul Business Journal 40 Under 40

A few weeks ago Minneapolis St Paul Business Journal introduced their 2014 40 Under 40. This is the 20^th year of the 40 under 40.

There are a number of friends and colleagues on this list and as best I know the first time each individual has a short video to go along with a bio and Q&A.

Clicking their link gets you to their 40 Under 40 bio:

• Amy Alegi, Meet Minneapolis
• Stacy Anderson, Anytime Fitness
• Meghan Barp, Greater Twin Cities United Way
• Tony Barranco, Ryan Cos. US Inc.
• Lauren Beecham, Women Winning
• Tomme Beevas, Cargill Inc.
• Jack Brewer, The Brewer Group
• Mike Buttry, Capella Education Co.

• Nicki Donlon, Baker Tilly
• Michelle Dustin, Arc’s Value Village
• Christianna Finnern, Winthrop & Weinstine
• Benjamin Graves, Graves Hospitality Corp.
• Scott Grossbauer, Donaldson Co. Inc.
• Blake Hastings, CBRE Inc.
• Abby Hoeschler, Key Log Rolling
• Arrianne Hoyland, UnitedHealth Group Inc.
• Shiva Jayaraman, Capgemini
• Matt Kjorstad, YMCA of the Greater Twin Cities
• Elizabeth Kramer, Stinson Leonard Street
• Dr. Nathaniel Kreykes, Children’s Hospitals and Clinics of Minnesota
• Lindsey Kurhajetz, Life Time Fitness Inc.
• Mike LaFontaine, U.S. Bancorp
• Jeff Lin, Bust Out Solutions Inc., Smart Factory, and Swing Set Labs
• Alissa Luepke Pier, ADL Pier Design Inc.
• Courtney Mattson, The Mosaic Co.
• Ryan Miske, Faegre Baker Daniels
• Jenny Munyer, MN Chamber of Commerce
• Justin Noznesky, AtriCure Inc.
• Jeffrey O’Brien, Lommen Abdo law firm
• Brad Paine, Honeywell Inc.
• David Saber, Wipfli
• Jatin Setia, Twin Cities Film Fest
• Hans Siefker, Greiner Construction Inc.
• Laura Smith, J. W. Hulme Co.
• Lindsay Sokolowski, Boottique Inc.
• Jessie Sorensen, Catholic Charities of St. Paul and Minneapolis
• Doug Stang, 3M Co.
• Björn Stansvik, MentorMate
• Brad Tabke, City of Shakopee
• Jennifer Zick, Magnet 360

 
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New Target Dress Code: Dress For Your Day

Last week Target announced a new dress code that has been received very well by their employees and contractors.

While I have not seen the internal memo sent to Target employees I did get a version that was sent out to consulting firms with contractors on site:

Hello,

Dress for your day was announced at Target Headquarters this afternoon, replacing the dress code that exists today. We ask that you share the guidelines below with your employee’s on assignment at Target today, and in the future. Please ask that they take the time to review the policy and ensure that it is followed. Note, the new policy is effective immediately.

Dress For Your Day Guidelines:

Target CIO Resigns Following Security Breach

I was behind the curve on this one… I did not know Target CIO Beth M Jacob had resigned until I was contacted by a friend at Minneapolis St Paul Business Journal and a reporter from the Wall Street Journal.

This time I was of no help to them.

From the Target press release:

"While we are still in the process of an ongoing investigation, we recognize that the information-security environment is evolving rapidly," Steinhafel said. "To ensure that Target is well positioned following the data breach we suffered last year, we are undertaking an overhaul of our information-security and compliance structure and practices at Target."

I monitored articles most of the afternoon and there are two questions as best I can tell that are still hanging out there:

Event: Minnesota Recruiters Spring 2014 Conference

The 20 something Minnesota Recruiters Conference is Friday, March 14th from 8 am to noon at the Mall of America.

This will be the first event since we started the group in 2007 that I have not a role in an event.

And the first time I have to pay to attend… I should have negotiated a lifetime ticket.

I am looking forward to being “just an attendee” and hope there will be a couple of Diet Mountain Dews on hand.

While speakers have not been named here is the agenda for the event:

Event: Jennifer McClure Presenting At MNTRN

 

The first event of 2014 for MNTRN (Minnesota Technical Recruiters Network) is February 28th from 8 am to 10 am at the Radisson Blu - Mall of America in Bloomington.

My dear friend Jennifer McClure (Unbridled Talent - @JenniferMcClure - LinkedIn) is speaking and her topic is:

Becoming a Recruiting Ringmaster in the Employment Circus

This is Jennifer’s 4th or 5th trip to Minnesota to speak to a Recruiter and HR group. I am a BIG fan of her personally and professionally and look forward to seeing her again.

The event is open to members and non members of MNTRN.

To register click:

MNTRN Event - Jennifer McClure

Info:

Event: MinneDemo #16

Tonight is MinneDemo #16 and as usual I am jacked up for it.

Much of my time for the past weeks has been spent hanging with the Recruiter and HR crowd. I like them, I really do but…

The tech folks are doing things. Making things. Dreaming… dreaming big.

And I need to be around that vibe for a few hours.

2 lots of 350 tickets were made available and each were gone in 30 minutes.

If you wanted to go but don’t have a ticket there will likely be a live stream. Click MinneDemo live stream

And if you want to assure yourself of tickets to these events you can do so by becoming a Community Supporter. $100 for the year allows you a guaranteed ticket. A whole lot easier than hitting “refresh” every 5 seconds leading up to a ticket release.

Here are the folks with demo’s:

Minnesota Jobs Scene: Q1 2014

I started writing this post more than a week ago and set it aside to work on a couple of other things. With the Target layoff announcement yesterday I thought I should pick this up. See my Thoughts On 2014 Target Layoffs.

There have been a number of “what happens next” from former Target employees and local and national media wondering about the Minnesota jobs scene.

When I first started writing this I was surprised at the number of companies who were saying they were unsure of their 2014 hiring plans.

And a large number of people who are still thinking about their job and career path and they are wondering what the market is like… is this time to make a move.

With the Target folks it is more immediate, like right now… what are they going to find.

Let’s see if I can handle this well enough for the moment with this one post.

I have a bunch of anecdotal data from hiring managers, companies, associations and personal observations here in Minnesota and I believe that generally we have a positive jobs scene:

Thoughts On 2014 Target Layoffs

Note the ADDED and UPDATED

I received a number of phone calls and email this morning from friends at Target HQ’s saying they had to be in a meeting in 15 minutes and asked if Target was laying off people today.

Yes, today was the day.

That this was coming was not a shock… there was “writing on the wall”:

The layoffs in November ‘13 were lower than some expected

After the November ‘13 layoff there were immediate rumors of a Q1 2014 layoff

Retail sales are down

Seeing that when some folks were leaving their jobs over the past months some were not being filled

Data breach (more on that below)

Canadian expansion not going as expected

The announcement yesterday that part time employees would no longer have health care coverage

I do think there is some pause from my perspective because of the numbers. I was not aware that this many people were going to be impacted.

Q4 2013 Trend: Minnesota Companies Hiring Jr Recruiters And Coordinators

There are a number of noticeable trends in the Minnesota hiring scene right now. One of the most obvious is the hiring of Junior Recruiters and Recruiting Coordinators.

To the point now that the I am asked the following almost equally:

Do you know any developers looking?

And…

Do you know any recruiters looking?

The recruiting of recruiters is always a positive sign. It means companies are hiring now and plan to in the near future.

Last year almost to the day I posted this:

Minnesota Recruiter Jobs Take A Q4 2012 Pause

I was little concerned about what I was seeing and it turns out all three points were true to some extent:

There was a natural pause after a long hiring frenzy

There was a seasonal pause

Some, many, companies were waiting until after the election to hire

Thankfully there was no long term slow down in the economy and hiring resumed in many skill sets as 2013 started. And it has continued through the year.

Dear Minnesota CEO’s... An Open Letter On IT Recruiting

Dear CEO’s,

Today in the StarTribune is an article from Adam Belz (@adambelz) Minnesota companies need IT workers, but stumble in hiring.

I missed Adam’s phone call, and his deadline, to contribute to the article. I agree with what he published and after speaking with him today look forward to future articles on this and related topics.

Here is what I want you to do…

Read it.

Right now... read it.

And then read the comments section. Try to get through some of the political comments and rants.

Do you really want to know what your IT staff is thinking? There it is.

Now what are you going to do about it?

See, you can’t sit in your office, board meeting, angel investor meeting and lament about the “talent shortage” without asking yourself these questions:

- Does anyone know we are hiring?

- Do we have an adequately staffed HR/Recruiter team? Do they have the resources they need to find who we are looking for? Do they have the time to recruit for what is needed today and also for next week, next month, next quarter?

MinneDemo 14 Recap | Thoughts On Recruiting

At CoCo Minneapolis this afternoon I was asked if I enjoyed MinneDemo last night.

And I paused... one of those awkward long ones.

Yeah, I said but... and then another long pause.

I had a great time last night. There were 500... 600+ folks in attendance. A lot of really smart tech people and friends I had not seen in months.

At the beginning of the 4^th demo I received a text from a tech friend who was in the lobby. There was a conversation about recruiting going on and he thought I should get out there and get in on it.

And this is where the but comes in...

The next 2+ hours was mostly spent having conversations with tech leaders about recruiting issues they were having.

Let me be clear, anyone who knows me knows that I enjoy this part of my job. This is my version of “geeking out”.

But... here it is again... last night I found myself annoyed. Frustrated may be a better word.

3 Minnesota Companies Rank In 100 Best Places To Work In IT 2013

Computerworld released their 2013 100 Best Places To Work In IT and 3 Minnesota companies make the list again.

I say again because these same companies always seem to be on the list (see notes below).

They are (click links for more stats and info):

#12 General Mills (2012 #4)

Why you want to work there:

Top 10 ranking: No. 1 for benefits

Want To Learn Ruby on Rails? Check Out Rails.MN

Last night I attended my first Rails.MN (@RailsMN) user group meeting.

This is not a typical user group meeting where developers demo, talk about what they are working on... cool tools they are building… a place to show how smart they are.

Rails.MN is more of a learning lab and a great opportunity to pick up the Rails skill set.

Derek Rockwell (@DerekRockwell) is leading the group with tutorials, hands on learning. The current learning series is on Building OpenCamp (a project management tool).

Minnesota IT Jobs Most In Demand By Title

Wanted Analytics used a recent report on cities seeing the most growth in IT jobs, Minneapolis was on the list, and did a little research to see which jobs were most in demand.

There are a few interesting points to note for Minneapolis (sorry St Paul friends, but you know you are included)…

- With Project Manager and Senior Project Manger both on the list we know this is good news for the IT community. This means we have a lot of work going on now and down the road. Good news for all in IT.

- Business Analyst and Senior Business Analyst same as above

- Software Engineer and Web Developer: I am mighty curious about what skill sets are listed with those jobs. it also leads me to believe that my Recruiter and HR friends could do a better job of listing the skill set needed… I wonder how many false positives candidates are seeing in searches. For example, a JavaScript developer is likely clicking on Web Developer and finding PHP jobs. That is a rant for a future blog post.

Here are the IT job titles by rank for Minneapolis, MN:

Minnesota Recruiter Jobs Take A Q4 2012 Pause

Since January 3, 2011 (the first work day of that new year) Minnesota companies have been on a hiring spree of recruiters. It was as if someone flipped a dimmer switch from off to on and then turned it up brighter and brighter

Not surprising since many of these jobs were eliminated during the recession and companies were going to start hiring… we do tend to be a leading indicator of how the economy is going.

The increase in hiring was a good thing... and we saw salary and hourly rate increases. And if you were a recruiter with a proven record in IT there was a competition of your services.

After seeing the many upticks and infrequent plateaus we are seeing a noticeable pause since Labor Day.

There are many fewer jobs posted on the job boards, Twin Cities Human Resources Association and here on my Minnesota Recruiter Jobs wall.

Call For Speakers: MidwestPHP Conference

 

The Midwest PHP Conference has put out a call for speakers:

Call for Speakers closes December 1, 2012

We're looking for fun, entertaining, and educational talks on pretty much anything related to PHP development! Can you help?

More specifically, we're looking for 45 minute talks that fall into one of these categories:

• PHP Basics - intros, how-tos, etc
• Advanced PHP - SPL, OOP, etc
• Frameworks - Zend, Symfony, Cake, etc
• Databases - SQL and NoSQL
• Other Components - Gearman, Varnish, etc
• Web Development - HTML5, CSS, JavaScript, etc

Tata Consulting Services Opening A Large Minneapolis Office

There have been a handful of rumors the past months about large organizations coming to or expanding their Minneapolis and St Paul offices.

A couple of weeks ago Minneapolis St Paul Business Journal had this article (premium content) Tata to open 300-person office.

While Tata already has a local presence with a sales office and a number of clients this is a large expansion.

In the article I was quoted:

Tata is a well-known name in the IT industry. However, if it plans to predominately hire tech workers, that will shake up the already tight labor market for IT workers, said Paul DeBettignies, vice president of recruiting for Minneapolis-based HireCast Consulting.

Best Buy recently swallowed up a lot of talent when it hired 200 workers for an in-house IT team, he added. “It’s not to say they won’t be able to do it, but the talent pool is only so big.”