First impressions are lasting, and in the case of a job application, critical.  The resume is usually one of the first items, along with a cover letter and sometimes job application packet, which a potential employer encounters regarding a job seeker and is typically used to screen applicants.  If the resume is satisfactory, only then will an interview follow.

The Global Human Resources Outsourcing (GHRO) team has seen many a good resume, and rejected many a poor one.

Having a solid and effective resume can increase your chances of getting a call from a recruiter. Applicants need to be aware that recruiters spend, on average, about 10 seconds reviewing a resume, so having a top-notch resume is critical to land the interview.

A good resume will:

1. Have the basic information listed: At the top of the page, all relevant contact information should be listed which includes your name in larger font as well as phone and email information.  Also, check that your voice mail message is appropriate. If a recruiter calls and hears an inappropriate voicemail message, they may just hang up.
2. Be current:  a recruiter is not in favor of finding out during the pre-screen that the resume they have is not current and is missing relevant information.  So keep your resume current! A current resume demonstrates you are serious about finding a job and is detail oriented.
3. Have a career objective: what is the objective of the applicant’s career path.  Be realistic.  Writing you want to be President of the company but yet have not made it to management is probably not realistic.
4. Use the right key words: Recruiters are now using electronic databases to mine for applicants, which mean they put in key words into a ATS (Applicant Tracking System) and if your resume doesn’t have the key words they are searching for, chances are you are already out of the running.  One way to understand what an employer is looking for is to review the job posting and job description. Identify what the employer is looking for and add those key words into your resume.
5. Include professional accomplishments vs. responsibilities:  What are some significant professional accomplishments that could possibly get the recruiters attention?  Use action verbs and statistics here.  For example, “Project managed a team of board operators to design and implement a new manufacturing process which increased production by 30% resulting in $300k in revenue per quarter.”
6. Include a descriptive past professional experience:  Applicants should list, most recent job title, company name and brief description of the company, City, State and dates of employment.  For example,

Director of Manufacturing

“XYZ Company, a semi-conductor manufacturer “ Ontario, CA

Jan 2009-present

If you have been at one employer for several years, you may want to note all positions you have held there and include the skill sets you developed.  It can also show you are promotable.

1. Demonstrate Continual Education, Professional Development & Professional Memberships:  In this area, the recruiter is looking for educational credentials and looking to see how the applicant is staying current in their profession.
2. Be straightforward and to the point: Save some stuff for the interview, please.  One of the oldest rules of resume writing is “Limit it to one page.”  Also, use bullets; a recruiter does not have time to read a full page of text so keep your thoughts straightforward and to the point.
3. Keep work experience relevant to the job you are applying: Recruiters are looking for applicants that have a solid experience in their profession.  It could create an unfavorable image if you mentioned you were studying culinary but are looking for an accounting job.
4. Proof read your resume:  Recruiters frown upon resumes with typos, and one small typo can decrease your chances of landing that interview.  So proof it a couple times and have someone else proof for you.

Every business has at least one HPE: a habitually problematic employee.  As an owner or HR manager, your lucky day comes when that employee parts ways with the business—lucky, until another employer calls for your opinion of HPE.  Awkward.

So what now?  Do you tell the employer what you really think about HPE?  Do you gloss over HPE’s 2-hour lunches?  Do you fake static and hang up?  Not only is this situation uncomfortable, but it presents potential legal troubles if improperly handled.

Some businesses solve this problem by routing all reference checks through the HR Department.  There, only basic information is verified, such as dates of employment and job title.  This option will definitely keep your business out of legal hot water, but it may displease managers who want to shout HPE’s negative qualities from the rooftops.  In these cases, advise miffed managers how important it is that the business distributes consistent, carefully worded statements.  Even the most truthful statements, if poorly worded, can be twisted into legal ammunition.

Another way to shield personnel from these uncomfortable inquiries is to deal with HPE proactively.  There are two ways to do this.  First, ask HPE for a signed release allowing the business to give out reference information.  If HPE refuses to sign, explain to reference-seekers that HPE did not consent to release information.  Second, tell HPE at the exit interview that the business won’t be able to provide a positive reference.  That should be enough for HPE to look for support elsewhere.

As businesses gradually return to hiring new employees, they may feel out of practice when developing recruitment strategies.  This is a good time to revisit how to attract the best and brightest with effectively written job descriptions.  It goes without saying; the best job description will clearly lay out the duties and expectations of the position.  The information that should not be included in a job description may be less obvious.  Job descriptions should be free of errors and potentially misleading statements that could upset employees and pose potential legal troubles.

To make sure your latest round of job descriptions isn’t saying more than you mean, be careful to avoid these common wording mistakes.

1. Elaborate Job Titles – To prevent misunderstandings, it’s important to use plain English in job descriptions, particularly in job titles.  It may be tempting to reword job titles to sound more attractive to candidates.  That’s how a secretary can become an office administrator or a janitor can become the director of waste management.  This seemingly innocent reinvention could mislead candidates, or worse, affect the position’s overtime eligibility under the Fair Labor Standards Act.
2. Excessive Physical Requirements – Every job has some sort of physical requirement.  An office worker may be required to move boxes of office supplies or copy paper, while a warehouse worker may be required to regularly lift and carry heavy loads of inventory.  The typical problem is, nobody really knows the realistic lifting limit for those jobs.  An arbitrary figure, such as 50 pounds, is often used in the job description.  This may seem like a good idea to cover the bases, but a candidate who can’t fulfill that requirement won’t see it that way.  Any arbitrary physical requirement opens the door for discrimination lawsuits, so be certain any physical requirements in a job description are accurate.
3. Promises of Advancement – Job descriptions should describe the available position, not tout future advancement opportunities.  This includes avoiding language such as, “This position is the first step toward [a higher position],” as this may imply a future promise of advancement or an employment contract.  To avoid this potential pitfall, keep the job description simple and focused on the position at hand.

These days, it seems everyone from your 12-year-old niece to your Great Aunt Jayne has a Facebook page chock-full of information you may (or may not) want to know—everyone, including all those candidates who sent you a résumé for your latest job posting.

With so much personal information readily available on social networking sites, it’s tempting for you, the recruiter, to use these sites as tools to screen applicants.  In fact, Microsoft recently commissioned research that shows 79 percent of you already look at applicants’ online information.  Screening candidates’ Facebook pages can help you learn more about how those candidates operate, professionally and personally. Screening can also provide answers to questions that would be illegal to ask in an interview.

It’s true online information can help you learn more about a candidate’s personal life, but it can also present an ethical dilemma.  What if a candidate’s Facebook page showed photos from a wild party or pictures of an emerging baby belly?  Would this knowledge prevent a job offer, even if that decision were based on a candidate’s typically off-limits personal life?  According to Microsoft’s study, 84 percent of recruiters think it’s appropriate to consider personal information posted online, while only 40 percent of job seekers think it’s at least somewhat appropriate to review candidates’ online photos and videos.

Appropriate or not, the truth is, once a candidate’s personal information makes its way into a recruiter’s head, it doesn’t find its way out.  Microsoft’s research shows 79 percent of recruiters have used online personal information to reject a candidate—a sharp contrast to the 7 percent of candidates who believe their online information impacted their job search.  Realistically, if a recruiter is shown two identical candidates, the candidate without the damning Facebook evidence will earn the job offer.

However, recruiters must be careful to avoid discrimination lawsuits when using Facebook to screen candidates.  Just as interview questions must focus on a candidate’s ability to perform relevant job duties, Facebook screening should focus on the same.  Unfortunately, there is no way to ensure information learned from a candidate’s Facebook page will be relevant to the position.  Should a rejected candidate choose to file a discrimination lawsuit, it’s important to be able to prove the candidate was objectively rejected for job-related reasons other than the personal information posted on Facebook.

The bottom line: When reviewing social networking sites, use common sense and defensible decision-making to accept or reject applicants.

Good news, job seekers: October marked the tenth consecutive month of increased hiring in the private sector.  October’s addition of 159,000 net new private sector jobs indicated the highest increase of any month since April.  Could this mean businesses are moving past the hiring slump?

Only a few employment sectors benefited from October’s new jobs. Education and health led the pack with 53,000 new positions, followed by temporary agencies with 34,900, retailers with 27,900, and bars and restaurants, which hired 24,400 new workers.  Construction businesses also added a small number of jobs.  On the other hand, the manufacturing industry cut 7,000 positions.  The public sector also continued to cut jobs in October, by 8,000 workers.

On the brighter side, workers in every employment sector enjoyed small but important gains.  The number of hours in the work week enjoyed a modest increase to 34.3 hours, and average paychecks gained a few percentage points to settle at $780 per week.

Despite all the positive additions, the unemployment rate for October remained steady at 9.6 percent.  Of the 14.8 million unemployed Americans, 6.2 million have been out of work for six months or more.  Nearly two million new jobs have been added in 2010, but that recovery represents only a fraction of the eight million jobs lost in 2008 and 2009.  To merely sustain population growth, up to 150,000 net new jobs must be added each month.

Although October’s job gains are modest, they’re a good sign that the economy is slowly improving.  Every extra dollar in people’s pockets means more money to infuse into and revitalize the economy. That’s news every American can appreciate!

Via Yahoo! News

It’s usually very clear why a company would invest in hiring an excellent law or accounting firm to represent their interests.  These two industries offer services that save their clients countless amounts of money annually. Business owners easily see the intrinsic value of investing in these firms, yet often have a hard time seeing the benefits of investing in their company’s human resources.

Recruitment Services: Attract Better Talent

It is necessary for a firm to identify the skill set that they are seeking in a potential employee in order to target their search appropriately.  An empowered Human Resources team is able to clearly identify their firm’s hiring needs and is less limited in the tools available when seeking out the best ways to fill those positions.  In the long run, better hiring practices will bring better employees.

Employee/Labor Relations: Minimize Employee Turnover

Maintaining high levels of job satisfaction amongst staff is the key to keeping long-term employees, especially in this tumultuous economy.  By investing in Human Resources, companies are able to stay on the leading edge of benefits; employees can trust that their employer cares about their health and happiness, adding to their overall opinion of their workplace.

Human Resources Management: Increase Productivity

By identifying and targeting productivity goals, firms are able to set realistic expectations for growth and monitor progress over time.  Additionally, maintaining long-term staff allows for growth and development within a position, allowing employees to bring more beneficial skill sets to the table and positively impact their work environment.

By putting these ideas into practice with Human Resources Outsourcing, companies are able to focus directly on the task at hand and become more productive and thus, more profitable. What would your company be capable of accomplishing if you streamlined your operations through HR Outsourcing?

Companies invest a lot of time, money and energy sending recruiters to job fairs conducted all over the world. However many employers are finding they are leaving empty handed, frustrated and without the qualified employees they were seeking.

Although job fairs are not completely unsuccessful, many companies realize that the resumes they collect at such events are far below the standards they were originally searching for. The fact remains that most employers are just not willing to settle, especially in an economy ripe with individuals seeking employment.

Top Reasons Why Job Fairs Fail to Find Talent:

• Low Caliber of Attendees
• Poor Turnout
• Disorganization
• Lack of Strong Candidates
• Insufficient Promotional Efforts

The failure of companies to effectively find strong candidates at job fairs is one of the major reasons they are turning to professional employment organizations as an alternative. By utilizing the staffing and recruiting services of human resourcing outsourcing specialists companies are finding talented employees when they need them. A PEO will provide the expertise to handle recruiting, pre-screening, position placement, training and even HR management.

Top Reasons Why Human Resources Outsourcing Works To Find Talent:

• Large Inventory of Candidates
• Thorough Pre-Screening Procedures
• Highly Skilled
• Invaluable Referrals
• Flexibility

By choosing human resources outsourcing over a job fair for finding talented employees companies can rely on the expert recruitment services of a professional team of HR specialists to assess each candidate ensuring the right fit for employers while saving them both time and money.

Many businesses are finding they need a work force with specific skills but do not want to take on the expense of hiring full time employees. Human resource outsourcing provides an alternative solution for businesses looking to control costs while  avoiding the added burdens of paying out employee benefits packages and managing the additional personnel.

When a company hires a Professional Employment Organization (PEO) they can rely on their expertise in recruiting highly qualified applicants and effectively managing them once they are hired.

More and more businesses are benefiting by hiring a PEO to handle their human resources. Not only are they better able to spend more of their valuable time and energy on their core business, but it also allows them to expand and elevate productivity without the additional responsibilities of payroll, workers compensation, tax deposits and government compliance.

The most commonly outsourced jobs include the following:

• Call Centers
• Accounting
• IT Consultant
• Product Design
• Financial Research
• Website Development
• Software Sector
• Medical Transcription

A Professional Employment Organization will also manage the following:

• Employee/Labor Relations
• Employee Leasing
• HR Audits
• Recruitment Services
• Safety and Worker’s Compensation
• Other Related Personnel Issues

HR outsourcing provides businesses with employees who have the specific skill sets they need along with an experienced management team to carry out the many HR functions required to sustain an employee.

Global Human Resources Outsourcing understands that every company deserves the opportunity to have well qualified personnel working for them and they provide the perfect solution to bring businesses together with experienced employees while reducing the costs of managing them.

The Internal Revenue Service (IRS) has created a new webpage to assist employers with questions on the Hiring Incentives to Restore Employment (HIRE) Act, recently enacted legislation that provides tax breaks to employers that hire and retain new employees in 2010.The “HIRE Act: Questions and Answers for Employers” page provides frequently asked questions and answers broken down by two major categories: the payroll tax exemption for hiring qualified workers and the business credit for retention of certain newly hired individuals in 2010. Sub-categories on the payroll tax exemption include FAQs about the payroll tax exemption and qualified employers; qualified employees; and claiming the payroll exemption. A menu of the questions and answers is available on the IRS website.

Also see BLR’s previous coverage of the HIRE Act.

Publication: Business Wire

IRVINE, Calif. — GHRO Total Solutions, a Human Resources Outsourcing firm and PEO, announced this week the appointment of Brandon Carl as our new Business Development Manager. Brandon has been involved in the sales and development of PEO’s for the past five years and GHRO is very pleased to have Brandon join our company. Brandon’s unique knowledge of the PEO field makes him uniquely suited to lead our Business Development effort.

Before joining GHRO Total Solutions Brandon achieved great success in the PEO market by exceeding sales goals and expectations from his years with Administaff and Paychex. In his sales roles at these two fierce competitors, Brandon was able to outsell and outperform even the most seasoned and experienced sales professionals. Brandon is truly a wonderful addition to the GHRO team.

Mr. Carl received his B.A. degree in Psychology from the University of California, Irvine. Prior to UCI, Brandon also attended Santiago Canyon College where he held the role of Student Senator for two semesters. Brandon also greatly contributed to raising more than $300 million dollars for school expansion while attending SCC. Brandon believes in philanthropy and as such volunteers with the Big Brothers Big Sisters Orange County chapter as a Board of Directors Planning Committee; he donates his time to the Discovery Science Center, the Orange County Rehab Center, and the Isaak Walton League of America and attends the Crystal Cathedral Church. Networking is important to Brandon as he serves on the Board of Directors for Southern California Venture Network and is a part of their planning. Brandon has been married for only one year and is happily planning his future family with his wife, Lisa, in Irvine, Calif.

About GHRO Total Solutions

Human Resources can be complex. See how easy it can be with GHRO. Your Trusted PEO.

As a Professional Employer Organization (PEO) GHRO Total Solutions provides integrated services designed to streamline the cost and complexities of HR management, employee benefits, payroll, Workers’ Compensation and more. We offer this through a unique and seamless co-employment model that provides the benefits of a highly staffed HR team, without the overhead costs. Call GHRO at (888) 308-0338 or (949) 797-2001 or check out our website at http://www.ghrogroup.com.