Minnesota Headhunter

Is Your Major Metropolitan Area A Smart City? Mine Is. Minneapolis/St. Paul #4

I do not put a lot of emphasis on surveys because how one measures, asks questions and differing criteria can give varied results.

But I am competitive.

And I am a homer.

So when The Daily Beast announced the results of their survey and Minneapolis - St Paul is #4 I am going to blog about it.

They ranked cities with 1,000,000+ in population (including suburbs) from 1 to 55 and came up with the following order (click America's Smartest Cities—From First to Worst to get their criteria, slide show and brief commentary on each city):

Paul DeBettignies Included On Minnesota Social Media Innovator Lists

The Minneapolis and St Paul area has one of the strongest marketing, public relations and social media communities in the country. What sets the Twin Cities apart from most cities is the open collaboration we see from firms and individuals and the ongoing learning that takes place with the areas many organizations and events.

Arik Hanson (@arikhanson) who writes the Communications Conversations blog took nominations to find a list of social media innovators and came up with this list Top 20 Minnesota Social Media Innovators.

I am very humbled that I was included in the list.

Just as cool is that there is another Minnesota recruiter on the list, Joshua Kahn (@joshuakahn) who writes the find+attract blog.

Minnesota Layoffs: St Jude Medical | BAE Systems | ADC

There has been a lot of talk about the bottom of the employment market being reached (I agree) and a pick up in hiring (depends on who you are, where you live and what you do) but to think the bad news is over is putting ones head in the sand.

The other issue is that jobs are being increased 1, 5 and 10 at a time while cuts are still much larger.

St. Jude Medical – 200 jobs

• St. Jude Medical cutting 200 jobs Minneapolis St Paul Business Journal
• St. Jude Medical Lays Off 200 TwinCities Business Monthly
• St. Jude Medical cuts 200 jobs in U.S. St Paul Pioneer Press

BAE Systems – 314 jobs

• BAE Cuts 314 Jobs in Fridley TwinCities Business Monthly
• Fridley defense contractor BAE confirms 314 layoffs Minneapolis St Paul Business Journal

ADC – 55

• ADC expands global workforce reduction; 55 cut in MN Minneapolis St Paul Business Journal
• ADC to Expand Workforce Reduction TwinCities Business Monthly

13 Minnesota Companies In The 2009 Inc. 500 | 106 In the Inc. 5000

The 2009 Inc 500 | 5000 has been released with the fastest growing privately held Minnesota companies. Minnesota is very consistent with the number of companies making the list with one notable difference being a couple of companies ranked very high.

Here are the last two years lists:

• 5 Minnesota Companies In The 2008 Inc. 500 | 106 Minnesota Companies In The 2008 Inc. 5000
• 10 Minnesota Companies In The 2007 Inc. 500 | 116 Minnesota Companies In The 2007 Inc. 5000

Here are the companies in the 2009 Inc. 500 | 5000 list from Minnesota:

Who To Follow In Minneapolis On Twitter

UPDATED: I should have titled this How To Find People To Follow...

I get this question regularly from new users to Twitter. I don’t put a lot of weight on the rankings on these lists (including my appearance on them) but they are a good place to start.

Note that you see Minneapolis and not St. Paul or Twin Cities. Most directories recognize Minneapolis as “the city” when they mean both. Some folks in St. Paul are being creative and in their Bio saying, “St. Paul not Minneapolis” and are getting listed in the Minneapolis directories.

To my friends across the river, no I am not trying to be a snob. I am just going with the crowd:

19 Minnesota Companies In The Fortune 500 | 32 In the Fortune 1000

The Fortune 500 has been released with little change in the list of companies from Minnesota. With mergers Northwest Airlines and Travelers are out. Added in 2009 is Michaels Foods.

Most of the Minnesota companies moved up quite a few spots from their 2008 rankings.

Here are a couple of rankings from last year:

• 5 Minnesota Companies In The 2008 Inc. 500 | 106 Minnesota Companies In The 2008 Inc. 5000
• 8 Minnesota Companies On 2008 Fortune Global 500 List

Here are the companies in the Fortune 500 list from Minnesota:

Minneapolis/St. Paul Business Journal Announces 2009 40 Under Forty

This is the 16^th year the Minneapolis/St. Paul Business Journal has recognized leaders in our area based on professional achievement and community service.

Below is the list of honorees with links to their bio page or click Minneapolis-St. Paul Business Journal’s 2009 40 Under Forty for the main list.

Here is a link to past honorees 40 Under Forty Alumni.

Target Corporation To Keep Headquarters in Downtown Minneapolis

Did you hear that giant “whooshing” sound Thursday? That was a massive sigh of relief as Target Corporation announced that it would be keeping it’s headquarters in City Center (a big deal) and not moving them completely to Brooklyn Park (a really big deal).

Since the layoffs in January there has been noticeably less foot traffic in the skyways and streets in the immediate downtown area. As the economy comes back hopefully more jobs are added in the Downtown Minneapolis location.

Links to read more:

• Target news welcomed by city boosters (Finance and Commerce)
• Target will keep offices at Minneapolis City Center (Minneapolis / St. Paul Business Journal)
• Target to stay put in City Center (Minneapolis StarTribune)

Thoughts On Best Buy Voluntary Buyout And Involuntary Layoff

Seems everyone is aware (but just in case) that in recent months Best Buy offered 4,000 corporate employees the chance to take a voluntary buyout. Numbers I hear are a few more than 500 applied for it and a few less than 500 were accepted.

Unfortunately 500 (to make the math simple) were not “enough” so the announcement of an involuntary layoff was made.

As I understand around 250 jobs will need to be eliminated but they have 210 internal jobs that need to be filled.

OK, these numbers are not what this blog post is about but I wanted to catch everyone up.

What this post is about is how Best Buy has handled the situation.

Let me be clear, anytime people are laid off, that sucks. And on this scale and in our community I am guessing that most of us know directly or indirectly (a degree or two of separation) someone who was impacted.

But unlike all the stories we hear about people finding out they are laid off via phone, email, or the ones given five minutes and a box with the escort out the door Best Buy has done an outstanding job (in my opinion) handling this situation:

• Transparency – Best Buy has been very open about the changes that needed to be made. But more than that they have not tried to “hush” their employees from talking about it.

#bby500 is the Twitter tag used by Best Buy employees to talk with each other and share their thoughts. I monitored this quite a bit last week and even while folks were saying they were let go they also said how much they appreciated Best Buy was doing for them.

Barry Judge, Chief Marketing Officer, did this blog post My Thoughts On Best Buy’s “Voluntary Separation” Package. Read the comments, more people saying nice things about how Best Buy has handled this.

• Severance and benefits – The voluntary layoff package varied but if one took it between 6 months and 1 year pay included along with 1 year of health and life coverage was included. The estimated cost of this is $60M.

For those who were caught up in the involuntary layoff they too have a good severance package.

• Career support – Besides the usual outplacement service Best Buy has taken other steps to help those impacted. I was not aware of this until last week; Best Buy has a career services department. They have been holding classes on interviewing, resume writing, etc.

They have invited speakers from outside the company, including me, to present on career related topics. Feb 23^rd (and again March 2^nd) I did a LinkedIn and Social Media job search presentation.

Yesterday, Feb 25^th, Best Buy held a career fair. An email was sent out to local companies (including my Minnesota Recruiters list) to ask if local employers would like to speak with those laid off. They had space for 30 companies. 110 or so replied. Yeah, they had a wait list of companies to recruit their former employees.

I hear 200+ former employees (and a few current ones) attended.

Do not mistake that I am “happy” about this situation. I have friends who are involved in both the voluntary and involuntary layoffs. This is not a great time to be doing a job search.

But my point is this, name another company who has gone to this length to try and do right by their now former employees? I am sure that Best Buy has not done everything perfect or right for everyone but I do suggest that given the economy and their circumstances they have done well.

I do have one issue with Best Buy. It would have been great if executives had been talking about this more in a public forum. Maybe they have been so busy with the process that there was no time for it but I know of a lot of companies around the country who have interest in what Best Buy has done.

Maybe just maybe some companies will learn from Best Buy that in tough times and when tough decisions are made that lay offs are numbers but people who live and work in the community, have mortgages, car payments and children or parents to care for and that they should do the best they can to help those who helped build their company.

Two Minnesota Companies Make The Fortune 100 Best Companies To Work For

Mayo Clinic and General Mills make the 2009 Fortune 100 Best Companies To Work For list.

Click Mayo Clinic (#63) and General Mills (#99) to see their Fortune information. There are quite a few companies on the list with offices in Minnesota.

There is also a lot of competitive intelligence in the associated links including who is hiring, pay and percentage of women in the work force.

Minnesota Layoffs: Pentair | Colliers Turley Martin Tucker | Navarre | Select Comfort | Tennant | Graco

Here is a list of announced layoffs by Minnesota companies from December 15 - 18, 2008 . Not all layoffs are in Minneapolis, St. Paul or greater Minnesota:

Pentair | 1,600 | 10%

• Pentair cutting 1,600 jobs (Business Journal)
• Pentair cuts forecast; to shed 1,600 jobs – Update (RTTNEWS)
• Pentair cuts forecast, plans to cut workforce (MarketWatch)

Colliers Turley Martin Tucker | 11 | 10%

• Colliers cuts 10 percent of local workforce (Business Journal)
• Colliers cuts 10 percent of Twin Cities workforce (Finance and Commerce)

Navarre |10-20

• New Hope multimedia publisher to cut 10 to 20 jobs (Finance and Commerce)

Select Comfort | 120 | 22%

• Select Comfort cuts 22 percent of headquarters employees (Business Journal)
• Select Comfort employees won't be sleeping easy this month (MinnPost.com)
• Select Comfort Cuts 120 Jobs; Suspends SAP Implementation - Update (RTTNews)

Tennant | 240 | 8%

• Tennant cuts 8 percent of workforce (Business Journal)
• UPDATE 1-Tennant sees Q4 loss; to cut 8 pct jobs (Reuters UK)
• Tennant to cut 240 jobs, 8 percent of workers (CNNMoney.com)

Graco | 150 | 6%

• Graco to lay off 150 (Business Journal)
• Graco To Cut 6% Workforce – Update (RTTNews)

Study Shows 51,500 Minnesota Jobs Directly And Indirectly Tied To Auto Industry

A study called when When giants fall released by the Washington, D.C. based nonprofit, nonpartisan think tank Economic Policy Institute shows that as many as 3.3 million US jobs are tied to the auto industry and as many as 51,500 in Minnesota.

The Economic Policy Institute has a good reputation of putting out fair numbers so until I come across another survey I will be quoting from this one.

Top 5 states hit hardest by total shutdown: Michigan, California, Ohio, Texas and Illinois

Top 5 states in terms of employment: Michigan, Indiana, Kentucky, Alabama, Tennessee

Minnesota ranks #21 if just GM were to close. An estimated 14,200 jobs would be lost and if a total shutdown 51,500 jobs.

As a percentage of the work force the .5% to 1.9% of state employment ranks Minnesota #28

Included in the survey are the recently announced sales figures for November:

• Domestics sales -40%
• GM -41%
• Ford -30%

Not widely carried are the equally bad sales figures from foreign auto makers:

• Asian sales in US -35%
• Nissan -42%
• Hyundai -40%
• Honda -32%

I am sure it would be hard to quantify but I am wondering if the auto makers closed, what would pop up in their place? I find it hard to believe that the US would produce no cars or that other industries would not evolve from the carnage. That 3.3 million jobs would be lost and nothing to take their place.

I am not suggesting we let the auto makers go quiet but just thinking about all the what if’s.

I am also wondering how current plants could be retooled to take on things like electric cars, batteries, green technologies, etc.

Lots of wondering and thinking on my part. The problem for me I am not seeing much more out of Capitol Hill or Michigan for answers. I would hope and expect they would be much further along in their thought process and have an answer or two.

So far I am disappointed.

As Usual.

Minnesota Layoffs: 3M | Hutchinson Technology | North Memorial | Park Nicollet

Here is a list of November and December 2008 layoffs, job cuts, whatever you want to call them announced by Minnesota employers. Not all layoffs are in Minnesota:

• 3M | 1,800 2% worldwide
• Hutchinson Technology | 900 - 1,100 | 20% -25% | Remaining to take 5% pay cut
• North Memorial | 380 | 7%
• Park Nicollet | 230 | 3%

Here are previous announced layoffs going back about 45 days. I know I am missing some so if you see a company to add, leave a comment.

December 2008

• U.S. Steel KeeTac | 400 | Could be temporary shutdown or all of 2009
• Hubbard Broadcasting | 18
• StarTribune | 25
• EnteroMedics | 13

American Red Cross Twin Cities | 15

November 2008

• Cirrus | 500
• Denny Hecker Automotive Group | Unknown number | Multiple dealerships closed
• Ryan Companies | Unknown number | 5%
• Taylor Corporation | Unknown number | 4% this year
• Ballistic Recovery Systems | Unknown number | 25% | Temporary
• IBM | 12
• Lawson Software | 200
• LifeTime Fitness | 100 | 12%

Paul DeBettignies In The New York Times And Business Journal

OK, it feels really weird to write my name in a blog post. Usually I say “MN Headhunter” but neither of the articles have anything to do with this blog.

The New York Times article from September 28, 2008, Turning to the TV for Explanations and Answers, is the first time in the paper and the second time on their web site. The first was in this blog post August 17, 2006 Northwest Workers May Strike, Judge Says.

The newspaper article came about of my watching CNBC coverage of the credit crisis, fledgling economy and particularly how this would impact national, regional and local employment.

I was contacted by Brian Stelter of the New York Times after he did (of all things) a search on Twitter for CNBC. He came across my MNHeadhunter profile and my many, many Tweets (as they are called).

He was a cool guy. Had a nice chat. And three days later I am in the paper.

A few hours into the day and into the next days I had quite a few cool email including old friends I had not seen/heard from in years including a guy I sat near in home room in high school for four years who now lives in Tennessee.

Some day I will be able to tell my kids (need a girlfriend and then wife to make that happen) one day about how I was named in an article with:

• Ben Bernanke, Federal Reserve Chairman
• Henry "Hank" Paulson, U.S. Treasury Secretary
• Mark Hoffman, President of CNBC
• Jon Stewart, The Daily Show
• Jim Cramer, “Mad Money”

Who knows if my then kids will find this cool but for a couple of days I did.

The second article was September 26^th, 2008 in this Minneapolis/St. Paul Business Journal article Sites: not just for personal connections anymore. The article is about how social networking sites are not just for social purposes but also a business tool.

I am including my quotes below because I am not sure how long this link will work:

Recruiters, too, are increasingly turning to social-networking sites to find job candidates, said Paul DeBettignies, managing partner at Nerd Search, a Minneapolis-based tech recruiting firm. And they’re not just looking at LinkedIn; Twitter — a “micro-blogging” tool that lets people dispatch 140-character messages or “tweets” that can be shared with fellow users — is especially popular in the tech crowd, and fertile ground for IT recruiters.

“The idea is you should probably go where your talent pool is,” DeBettignies said. “If you’re an IT person, you want to go on Twitter. If you’re in marketing, get on Facebook.”

About 85 percent of employers use Facebook to either find candidates or do quick background searches on prospective hires, DeBettignies said. The technique is especially popular with recruiters who are competing for strong intern candidates.

And:

“The hard sell is dead,” Boardman said. “It doesn’t work door-to-door, and it doesn’t work on social networks.”

That’s a rule followed by many savvy recruiters, DeBettignies said. “What some recruiters do is become a bull in a China shop and start spamming people. Then it’s like fishing — they all scatter and don’t come back for a while.”

Minnesota Recruiters 2008-2009 Job Market Survey Results

As posted on the Minnesota Recruiters group page October 21, 2008

After being a part of many national and local conversations regarding hiring, the economy, and the credit market crisis it seemed to be a good time for me to do a survey of the Minnesota Recruiters group.

The survey is unscientific but does give a good reading on what local corporate, search and consulting firm recruiters are experiencing and how they see the job market into 2009.

SurveyMonkey was used to collect responses. Approximately 1,150 received the survey link. Within a few percentage points the category of recruiter mirrors that of the email list. 338 started and 300 completed the survey between October 8-10, 2008:

Corporate Recruiter	42.90%	145
Search Firm Recruiter	29.30%	99
IT Consulting Firm Recruiter	14.20%	48
HR/Recruiter Consulting Firm Recruiter	13.60%	46

 

Items and thoughts to note:

• Generally it appears that our area and companies are doing better in terms of hiring and optimism than other regions.
• Generally speaking hiring cycles are becoming longer in terms of process, interviews, and back ground checks. Many times the word “deliberate” has been used to suggest companies are being very specific on who they hire.
• Generally speaking most Recruiters say that even if not hiring in an area, if a very talented candidate contacted them there is a good chance they would be hired.
• The Corporate Recruiters who did the survey like the Corporate Recruiters on the email list are 80% in a large company category. It does seem at this time larger companies are feeling the economic issues more than small and mid size companies.
• There are signs from the survey and through conversations that small and mid size companies are continuing to hire at a slightly slower pace. Only a little slow down has been seen with small to mid size companies.
• On a national level conversations are that one need to analyze regions and industries separately as there are many areas of strength and weakness in the economy.
• On our local level this too is seen. Some industries are doing better than others. Saying that there is evidence that at the company level each situation is different. For example, one healthcare company is not hiring IT, Marketing or Recruiter staff but another company down the road is.

Suggestions for the next survey(s) of this kind have been to add:

• Recruiter role as in VP, Manager, Recruiter, Sourcer
• Add 2 categories “Not Hiring” “Staff Reductions”. While the number of those who would have used those terms in their answers for this survey is very small if we continue to see the job market deteriorate then they will be needed in future surveys

If you have any questions, comments, suggestions about the survey please send me an email:

Paul DeBettignies
Co-Founder and Coordinator
Minnesota Recruiters
paul@mnheadhunter.com

 

SURVEY QUESTIONS AND RESULTS

We hired/placed _____ than planned for the 3rd Quarter (July-September):

	Corporate Recruiter	Search Firm Recruiter	IT Consulting	HR/Recruiter Consulting
significantly more	6.80%	1.20%	4.50%	2.60%
slightly more	18.90%	31.40%	18.20%	10.50%
the same	28.00%	23.30%	6.80%	28.90%
slightly fewer	22.70%	25.60%	40.90%	36.80%
significantly less	17.40%	15.10%	27.30%	21.10%
not sure	6.10%	3.50%	2.30%	0.00%

 

We plan to hire/place ___ in the 4th Quarter (October-December) compared to the 3rd Quarter:

	Corporate Recruiter	Search Firm Recruiter	IT Consulting	HR/Recruiter Consulting
significantly more	10.60%	14.90%	20.50%	5.40%
slightly more	7.60%	27.60%	27.30%	29.70%
the same	30.30%	25.30%	27.30%	18.90%
slightly fewer	25.80%	19.50%	18.20%	27.00%
significantly less	22.00%	8.00%	6.80%	18.90%
not sure	3.80%	4.60%	0.00%	0.00%

 

I am ___ about the job market for the first half of 2009:

	Corporate Recruiter	Search Firm Recruiter	IT Consulting	HR/Recruiter Consulting
Optimistic	20.60%	39.50%	25.00%	18.40%
Neutral	42.00%	30.20%	47.70%	34.20%
Pessimistic	25.20%	25.60%	20.50%	26.30%
Not Sure	12.20%	4.70%	6.80%	21.10%

 

I see the most job openings in:

Corporate Recruiter	Search Firm Recruiter	IT Consulting	HR/Recruiter Consulting
Healthcare	Engineering	Web Developers	HR Generalists
IT	IT	Java	Recruiters (IT)
Sales	Sales	.Net
Engineering	Finance	Open Source
Senior Management		ERP Systems

 

I see the fewest or no job openings in:

Corporate Recruiter	Search Firm Recruiter	IT Consulting	HR/Recruiter Consulting
Marketing	Manufacturing	Project Managers	Training
HR	Accounting	Business Analysts	Recruiters
Senior Management	HR
Accounting	Executive
IT

I am ___ about my job security:

	Corporate Recruiter	Search Firm Recruiter	IT Consulting	HR/Recruiter Consulting
Optimistic	48.5%	64.40%	56.80%	39.50%
Neutral	32.6%	20.70%	27.30%	42.10%
Pessimistic	12.9%	9.20%	11.40%	5.30%
Not Sure	6.1%	5.70%	4.50%	13.20%

Two Minnesota CIO’s Make It On 2008 CIO 100 List

Minnesota has two CIO’s (companies) on the 2008 CIO 100 list.

Congratulations to (links are CIO.com entry and company site):

• Kathleen McNulty, SVP of Information Services/CIO of Schwan Food Company
• Robert Willett , CEO, Best Buy International & CIO of Best Buy

Schwan’s is also featured with this: How Schwan Food Cashed In on Server and Desktop Virtualization.

5 Minnesota Companies In The 2008 Inc. 500 | 106 Minnesota Companies In The 2008 Inc. 5000

The 2008 Inc. 5000 is out and this is the second year of their expanded coverage of privately held companies.

About 30% of the Minnesota companies are new and you can compare this year’s list to last years 10 Minnesota Companies In The 2007 Inc. 500 | 116 Minnesota Companies In The 2007 Inc. 5000

# is rank in the 5000 and link is to the Inc.com page on the company:

• 207 Midwest Recreational Clearinghouse
• 254 Adayana
• 378 Logisolve Consulting
• 402 Verisae
• 479 Custom HBC Corporation
• 524 ActiFi
• 556 sierra bravo corporation
• 574 ChemSol
• 618 CotterWeb Enterprises
• 628 First Commercial Bank, Bloomington
• 738 Mindsharp
• 746 White House Custom Colour
• 750 Xylo Technologies
• 856 AJASA Technologies
• 908 Coolibar
• 916 space150
• 950 GetWireless
• 962 Quality Label
• 999 Renodis
• 1030 Iconoculture
• 1273 BuyOnlineNow.com
• 1325 Eniva
• 1387 SALO
• 1396 HRST
• 1403 CollegeRecruiter.com
• 1435 EAC Product Development Solutions
• 1491 ImageTrend
• 1544 Cedar Valley Exteriors
• 1627 Proto Labs
• 1651 McKinley Group
• 1812 TAB India-Amsum and Ash
• 1819 Bridgewater Tech
• 1839 Olson
• 1885 Versare Solutions
• 1888 KTI
• 1897 Digineer
• 1909 Comm-Works
• 1982 XeteX
• 2026 MedNet Solutions
• 2242 DDL
• 2259 d.trio marketing group
• 2339 Techbarn.com
• 2363 nParallel
• 2393 Dashe & Thomson
• 2412 Weatherly Consulting
• 2477 Verifications
• 2643 Simacor
• 2654 PeopleNet
• 2662 Restaurant Technologies
• 2721 Kahler Automation
• 2806 Tier 3
• 2866 U.S. Energy Services
• 2871 Ergotron
• 2938 ProMed Molded Products
• 2990 Third Wave Systems
• 3004 European Roasterie
• 3023 Tiger Oak Publications
• 3095 Milestone Systems
• 3119 Cyber Advisors
• 3139 Facet Technology
• 3176 The Aagard Group
• 3183 Dahl Consulting
• 3190 Micromedics
• 3232 Laser Design
• 3240 Paisley
• 3278 Apex Print Technologies
• 3293 Pro Print
• 3341 Northland Concrete and Masonry
• 3396 Northstar Aerospace
• 3398 CorVal Group
• 3429 Mortenson Construction
• 3455 All About Gifts & Baskets
• 3466 Glenn Metalcraft
• 3469 Atomic Playpen
• 3509 Superior Industries
• 3642 Introworks
• 3793 Harbinger Partners
• 3844 Tele Resources
• 3890 Adolfson & Peterson Construction
• 3910 Techfluent
• 3920 World Block
• 3941 Priority Envelope
• 3966 Rock On Companies
• 3996 Advantage Performance Network
• 4021 Room & Board
• 4098 Strategic Fundraising
• 4103 Showdown Displays
• 4124 Select Communications
• 4152 Video Guidance
• 4168 Hanson Communications
• 4173 SDQ
• 4177 Vanpro
• 4238 Orbit Systems
• 4247 Petters Group Worldwide
• 4267 Logic
• 4348 TempWorks Software
• 4366 Imaging Alliance Group
• 4413 KEEPRS
• 4632 Loffler Companies
• 4658 Imagine! Print Solutions
• 4708 InTouch
• 4724 Pinnacle Services
• 4874 Alternative Business Furniture
• 4942 Shapco Printing
• 4961 Dynamic Solutions Group
• 4999 Intertech

8 Minnesota Companies On 2008 Fortune Global 500 List

The 2008 Fortune Global 500 has 153 U.S. companies with 8 from Minnesota:

World Rank | U.S. Rank | Fortune link | Ticker Symbol and link to company web site

• #81 | #25 | UnitedHealth Group | UNH
• #102 | #32 | Target | TGT
• #157 | #53 | SuperValu | SVU
• #177 | #61 | Best Buy | BBY
• #308 | #96 | The Travelers Companies | TRV
• #327 | #103 | 3M | MMM
• #417 | #128 | U.S. Bancorp | USB
• #490 | #150 | CHS | CHSCP

Going through the U.S. list it is good to see so many of the companies with a significant Minnesota presence including Wells Fargo and Honeywell (HQ’s used to be here) along with McKesson, Microsoft, Lockheed Martin, Johnson Controls, General Dynamics, Northwestern Mutual, Express Scripts, Oracle and others.

Carlson Companies, UnitedHealth Group And Northwest Airlines Layoffs | Why I Did Not Break The News

I would never consider writing this post but a local business reporter sent me an email this morning and it caused the following reaction, “are you kidding me?”

There are a few things in the email I take issue with but here is the quote that has me a little bent out of shape:

“Paul, I hear you had information prior to official announcements about the layoffs. You blew your chance to break news. What kind of a blogger are you?”

If you are thinking to yourself that maybe this person is joking they are not. There are lots of juicy quotes in the email.

So let me answer the question, yes in all three cases I was aware well in advance of official announcements.

A disclaimer, in not one instance did a recruiter or HR professional confirm what I was asking but their “I don’t know” or “I can’t say” replies were some form of confirmation by tone of voice or a short but odd silence.

There were other signs too. More frequent resumes posted on job boards from the companies. My blog statistics were showing more frequent referrals from those domains.

So when I started asking questions I only needed some indirect confirmation. Then I was getting employees who were doing active job searches saying they heard what was about to happen.

My first message on Twitter (and messages are reposted on this blog) was:

Daily Twitter Notes June 16, 2008

• MN layoffs: Receiving inquiries, seeing trends on Monster, hearing rumors. Might see multiple stories before end of the month/2nd quarter

The second:

Daily Twitter Notes June 18, 2008

• Carlson Companies: I have been sitting on this for 2 weeks. Hear that major force reduction has been announced. Anyone know anything?

And the third:

Daily Twitter Notes June 24, 2008

• Carlson Companies to layoff 200. Thank you to my Twitter friend for confirming the rumor I had been hearing for almost 3 weeks now.

During this time I had passed on the Carlson Companies information to a business reporter who also was not able to get confirmation.

So why did I not run with it?

I was not sure I had the numbers correct. For Carlson Companies, it was correct. For UnitedHealth Group I incorrectly had more and Northwest Airlines I incorrectly had less.

I have friends that work at all three companies and family at one. It did not feel right to me that I would be posting information that would impact them before hearing about it from their employer. I had been asking them though if they knew and they had not.

I do little “breaking news” because that is not my day job, being a reporter. I do not do investigative journalism. Surely I check facts, source, etc but again I am an IT Recruiter and a blogger not a journalist.

So back to the business reporter. Rather than hack on me for not “breaking news” maybe you should look at yourself and your own newsroom.

How did some blogger dude know this stuff and you professional types did not?

Oh, and the next time I write about something and you or one of your colleagues see it here, write about it there, and do not cite the source (being me) maybe I will do a nice article on your “research” skills.

Minnesota Business News: Arbita | JobDig | Zanby | Compellent Technologies

• Minneapolis/St. Paul Business Journal has an article on the Arbita (Minneapolis) and JobMachine (Atlanta) merger. Arbita and Don Ramer have become good friends of mine and are also the Group Sponsor of Minnesota Recruiters.

  Of course the article is only fully viewed with a subscription but here is the link from the Page 9 story, Online recruiter, JobMachine to merge

• JobDig has started a blog for the company, J.D.'s Blog

• Zanby is a Minneapolis based company that to be honest, I had not heard of before this story from the folks at Minnov8, Zanby.com Relaunched: Groups for Groups

• Compellent Technologies has a great product review for Storage Center 4.0 in InformationWeek, A Compelling SAN For IT