ARCO Alumni

AWS was featured in the June edition of UK HR magazine The Grapevine. President Cathy Clonts shared the benefits enjoyed by companies with an alumni community from which to source specific talent, "there are cases where someone who left is suddenly needed on a new project and a current employee might not fit the requirement as well. HR can’t talk to everyone but through the network they can see who’s become available". Read the article summary.

AWS was also featured in the Friday May 21 2010 Houston Business Journal HR Focus magazine. Cathy Clonts shared the value former employees can play as boomerang employees and referring quality talent to the organization. The article looked at the top HR Challenges for 2010 including re-establishing loyalty in the workforce, changing legislation, re-establishing job duties and recruiting in a high-tech era.

Unsurprisingly, throughout the recession those remaining employed have had to accept changes such as a more concentrated workload, reductions in development programs and cuts in bonuses and base salaries. This is supported by Kevin Mulligan, president of Ascent Growth Advisors, who further states that “employees that were retained during the downturn were probably asked to accept more responsibilities”.

Kevin believes that one of today’s main challenges during the uphill recovery is to re-establish trust in the workplace. Michael Lamb, senior partner with Korn/Ferry International concurs, suggesting that with so many layoffs, many employees are doing more than one job right now. He asks of employers, “If an opportunity comes an employee’s way, what are you doing to make sure they are not tempted to jump ship tomorrow?”

In addition to re-establishing a sense of trust and retaining quality employees, as the economy recovers new recruiting challenges have arisen, perhaps most significantly an increased desire for “A-players”. Recruiting in such a high-tech era can be effectively managed via social recruiting, a new term coined in the search industry. “This practice involves using social media to maintain candidate networks and source and identify candidate and lead referrals,” explains Marie Guillot, CEO of ABACO International Executive Search.

Social Media has already changed the face of recruiting, establishing itself as an effective tool to attract those individuals for whom there is growing competition. Calling on former employees via personal alumni networks refines your talent pool, enabling efficient recruitment of skilled workers for either long or short-term projects in “a move that saves training and recruiting costs”, says Cathy Clonts, President of Alumni Web Services.

By identifying those who are or will soon be in the job market, HR and recruiting managers can ensure they are first in line when key talent becomes available.