Comments

Revenue over $25 billion... kinda puts the Temps biz in focus.

Posted by Jeff SKI Kinsey at January 13, 2010 7:03 AM

Dear Cathy, did it ever occur to us that Tom would not make his home in VT if he did not like it? Winter in VT beats a lot of places hands down.

Posted by Eric Lapp at January 13, 2010 8:32 AM

The question with these temp agencies is who benefits most? Obviously, the employer profits more. While we can appreciate the burden of the responsibility and often debt of business owners, does temping put the worker at a disadvantage often with several temp jobs that don't allow for health care, sick days, and vacation. Do we want a healthy viable workforce? Everybody will not be entrepreneurs which temps or day workers by default tend to be. If everybody became a temp agencies, who would then be employed by them?

Tom tweeted yesterday about the temp/brand you that he and Dan Pink has championed for many years. My question was who benefits most aside from experience that does not necessarily equate presently or in the future to a living wage, while employers make net profits as with the $25 billion stat above. Nothing new here when the wages are less and there are no benefits of any kind as mentioned above.

We want businesses to be released from paying health care. Yet, we don't want a single payer program and we want to force people to buy insurance. We don't want to increase taxes. Yet, we don't want employers to have any responsibility to the worker. We don't want a single payer. Yet, we want more temps running around with labels of Brand You and if they'd actually internalize the message perhaps it will be beneficial to them.

I love the Brand You concept on my levels, but it is a part of the entrepreneurial lexicon and the average worker anywhere in the world simply wants an honest wage to keep a roof over head and feed and clothe their families. For all of you pull yourself up by your bootstrap types, let's level the playing field first.

While Brand You is a great concept and should be addressed from more than one perspective, the reality of its essence may be different in the general economy such as what we have today. I understand that this is a business blog, but I also understand that business is not in a vacuum and that people run business and hire other people to work in them.

Brand You works from a position of respect and empowerment of all. It also works for self-empowerment. But it takes a fearless kind of person--usually entrepreneurs though they often live on the edge but will have it no other way--that embraces this kind of empowerment. Temps are probably doing well because there are hoards of people because someone is benefiting at the expense of someone else.

Is this capitalism as we have come to know it? Has this chasm widened? Bob Herbert in his article, "An Uneasy Feeling" of January 4th column wrote "As the Washington Post reported over the weekend, the entire past decade 'was the worst for the U.S. economy in modern times.' There was no net job creation — none — between December 1999 and now. None!" Do temp agencies benefit most in such an economy where they just move displaced people from spot to spot, benefiting themselves and the companies, but not necessarily the worker?

Posted by Judith Ellis at January 13, 2010 9:49 AM

Judith;

Afternoon from a snowy warwickshire, my guess is Trevor is snowed in? Nowhere near as VT!

Quality goes missing when staff are temporary or it requires processes that then add to the bill?

Temporary gives flexibility or should I read disposable?

I like you am unsure as to who benefits?

Have a lovely day.

Patrick

Posted by patrick at January 13, 2010 10:38 AM

Eric, true! But though we choose to live here in the Northeast, a lot of us enjoy a break in a sunny place during the lo-o-o-ng months of winter.

Posted by cathy mosca at January 13, 2010 10:54 AM

The temp biz has certainly morphed over time into something not intended.
Now, there seems to be extraordinary parallels to the old, often miserable migrant worker system - without the miserable housing often in the past provided by the employers.
For study:
Hypothesis A: The modern temp biz is a modern migrant worker scheme.
Hypothesis B: The McKinzie/Enron model of everyone virtually a free agent inside of a company was an (unintended) temporary worker scheme.

I also have long been taken with the "Brand You" approach. It, too, has been taken over by exploiters.

To Tom: Isn't it time for a Reformation of "Brand You". Reformation: To identify and correct errors and return to a rightful course.

Tom, Don't let them continue the mutation of a great concept - important to individual creativity and freedom - into a new form of serfdom.

Posted by Randy Bosch at January 13, 2010 11:00 AM

Thanks for the perspective Judith! I see the picture a bit differently.

You are absolutely right that the economy is changing and that we have major issues to face down and conquer. Our ability to look forward, challenge the future, and bring everyone along to a better place is something good people will be required to do for the foreseeable future. It's a mess out there!

Where we disagree is on the impact of temporary agencies. All of us are being required to take responsibility for our own careers and the value we create in the world. There is very little (none?) corporate paternalism left to take care of us over the long haul. We are left to our own wits and devices.

That's a good and bad thing in the short run. It's good because we all are being forced to be honest with our circumstances and surroundings. As I see people coming to grips with those things, it is also creating more community, as people find more power and energy in community than they do as lone wolves. The bad part of the equation is the pain and the separation people are experiencing as this adjustment takes place.

We believe our company (an interim provider of C-level talent) is a catalyst in making the adjustment quicker and easier for employees and companies. We provide a way for talent to match opportunity in a relatively frictionless fashion, as we provide appropriate C-level talent usually within 48 hours. This enables talented people to find roles much more quickly and companies to staff much more aggressively. This is going to become more important in the future.

I share your concern for bringing everyone along into this new economy. The old models no longer work, so it's up to us as leaders to build new models that take us to a better place. Real business leaders realize that taking care of their people is the right thing to do AND it's good for business!

One way we're doing this is by starting a discussion on these changes and how they affect people and organizations throughout the economy. Check it out at: http://blog.vallonllc.com.

Posted by Buckley Brinkman at January 13, 2010 11:15 AM

Is it about respect?

Patrick says, "Quality goes missing when staff are temporary or it requires processes that then add to the bill." Judith mentions temps being lower paid and not getting benefits.

Buckley talks of, "...making the adjustment quicker and easier for employees and companies... a way for talent to match opportunity in a relatively frictionless fashion..."

I suspect, no, I know darned well, there's a massive difference between the effort an organisation will make to integrate one of Buckley's C-level newbies with someone whose covering in the warehouse or Accounts Payable for a fortnight. But it seems to me that if either is to work properly, the organisation and the staff should treat both people with equal respect and dignity.

Posted by Mark JF at January 14, 2010 8:13 AM

When I was a struggling artist I took many temp jobs in between gigs. It was quite obvious that these companies could care less about me and more about filling their position and not necessarily about the job I was doing. I suspect the kind of job matters here. I was often invisible or disrespected by the managers and employees.

Many times, the employees concerned about their own jobs, would treat me terribly. There was absolutely no team building or respect going on there. But the schedule worked for me in one sense: It wasn't my main gig. I can imagine in such a perilous economy that the tension is even more tense for temps and employees while companies and temp agency benefit from a profit standpoint, at least in the short-term.

In this environment, I would imagine that temps are holding their breaths for a permanent position.

Posted by Judith Ellis at January 14, 2010 10:06 AM

Good Discussion. To add to the mix, see John Robb's "We're All Temps Now" posting at http://mail.live.com/default.aspx?&ip=10.1.106.221&d=d3067&mf=a0&rru=inbox

What is incorrect about the analysis he posts?

Posted by Randy Bosch at January 14, 2010 10:34 AM

Uh, Randy, where's the post?

Posted by Judith Ellis at January 14, 2010 10:45 AM

I guess I could find it, eh? :-) Will do.

Posted by Judith Ellis at January 14, 2010 10:47 AM

My question is simple.
Why should life get harder as society advances forward?
It makes no sense.
But that is essentially what is being advocated here.

Posted by zorro at January 14, 2010 12:36 PM

Great question, Zorro. There's a simple answer as I see it, Advancement for many means never having "Enough."

Posted by Judith Ellis at January 14, 2010 3:08 PM

Here's the correct link for the "We're All Temps Now" post by Carl Camden, CEO of Kelly Services on John Robb's "Global Guerillas" site:

http://globalguerrillas.typepad.com/globalguerrillas/2010/01/journal-tribal-opportunity-space.html

Widely differing viewpoints in the tempbiz - healthy for discussion!

Posted by Randy Bosch at January 14, 2010 4:01 PM

How is this good?
http://www.businessweek.com/magazine/content/10_03/b4163032935448.htm?chan=rss_topStories_ssi_5

Posted by zorro at January 14, 2010 7:04 PM

Hi Patrick - hope you are well. Not snowed in at all. Travelled by train to Whitehaven (a million miles away it seemed) on Wednesday to deliver a workshop on Thursday. Train delays due to weather meant journeys of approx 7 hours each way. Only 3 of 11 participants were able to make it. We just can't deal with snow in England can we? Its now raining in glorious Warwickshire this morning and the snow is rapidly disappearing as I look out my window.Happy New Year Patrick.

Best wishes.

Trevor

Posted by Trevor Gay at January 15, 2010 5:09 AM