The present world economic situation is still troublesome. I read the news and there are still many negative developments. Many people are losing their jobs and it’s hard to find decent employment with a company that pays well.  Not all workers are sure how long they can keep their jobs and they undergo the everyday [...]

Last night we held our St. Louis Staffing holiday dinner.  Before our dinner, we participated in our normal business meeting reflecting on last month’s business and looking ahead to the next three months.  I initiated an exercise that I’d done before and read about recently and seemed to make sense for this time of the [...]

During a recent conversation with my friend, Jason Cleveland, we discussed the whole notion of being a “social worker” vs. having a “social mindset”.  Jason works with ex-offenders helping to re-acclimate them into society specifically on the job front.  That is where he and I share a passion: helping others find meaningful work.  We both [...]

A close friend shared with me an experience that really made him feel great and gave me some insight that I would like to share.   My friend posted a message on his Facebook page that said something to the effect of “Please respond to this post with one word that you think best describes me.”  [...]

As I speak with my colleagues in the staffing industry, the one consistent thing that they share with me is “We are busy!”.  This means good news for business in America. 
Staffing is a leading indicator of doom and turnaround.  As I’ve written here before, our people were the first to be laid off in late [...]

Recently I was honored to serve as a judge for the Idea 2 Product competition sponsored locally by St. Louis University.  Students from the business and engineering schools are encouraged to submit their ideas for original products or services for cash prizes and to move on to a regional competition next Spring.  Throughout this month-long [...]

It happened again this morning.  I was attending a speaker series and was engaged in conversation over coffee with the controller for a local lighting distributor.  The conversation centered, as it usually does these days, on the amount of growth or lack thereof we’ve been experiencing over the past year.  This person indicated that while [...]

I believe it was providential that yesterday my working day began and ended with meetings discussing the same topic: how the convicted felon who has paid their debt to society for their crimes, is going to find gainful employment.  In the morning I had a breakfast meeting with Janis Frick and Jan Gannon from Soaring [...]

This is the third post in our series about effective hiring practices.  This is one of the more basic steps in the process, it demands plenty of attention and certainly cannot be skipped, but for the most part it is an opportunity to listen to people talk about themselves without diving in too deep as [...]