ALC - CareerArc blog

Labor stories made headline news in 2015, and the most notable of them revealed big shifts in decades-old labor traditions showing just how fast our work and workplace are evolving.

Looking back at the stories that defined the past year, we find recurring themes and resilient trends destined to continue into 2016. Here is our list of the top labor headlines of 2015 that shaped the year and unearthed the paradoxes of modern work life:

So, who should own social recruiting within an organization? Yes, the question is a bit controversial. But it’s a valid one, and one that comes up more often as talent acquisition results become increasingly dependent on employer brand strength and appeal.

It’s a question that Protection 1–the largest full-service security provider in the US–had to answer when launching their first social recruitment program. With about 300 open requisitions per month, the company had observed that the traditional job boards they relied on were not providing enough qualified candidates. They sought a better alternative, and they soon decided to expand their hiring efforts using social media.
So far it’s a pretty straightforward case, much like the start of our other client success stories. But what makes them different is their decision to have their marketing team own and manage the effort.
Related: Read the full Protection 1 Case Study

Amazon announced its plan to hire 100,000 seasonal workers for its U.S. fulfillment centers this holiday season–up from 80,000 hires in 2014, and double the hires it made in 2012. With this announcement, Amazon becomes the largest employer of seasonal hires in 2015.

Amazon has been growing strong. The e-commerce giant added 39,300 employees this last quarter, marking a record quarterly growth for the company. Amazon also broke 200,000 headcount for the first time, now at 222,400 — that’s a 49% percent increase from the same time last year.
This is positive news for a company which just this year came under fire for its alleged “bruising” employment practices of its white-collar employees, as detailed in a New York Times expose. And this wasn’t the company’s first encounter with bad press threatening its employer brand: A few years back another widely circulated piece revealed the harsh working conditions of its blue-collar, order fulfillment workers.
Amazon’s brand resilience is evident, and to drive more fulfillment center recruits Amazon is sweetening the deal this year with a 23% increase in hourly wages, shuttle services, and sign-on bonuses. These employee incentives were not offered to workers last holiday season, and only time will tell if they are enough for Amazon to reach it 100k-recruit target. 

Watch our video to learn how CareerArc helps simplify the two critical points in the employment lifecycle–through social recruiting and modern outplacement–so employers...

We’ve been keeping a close eye on the tech market as news of prominent tech layoffs and devaluations of prized tech unicorns have drummed up talks of a market bubble....

Silicon Valley has become the mythical land of “unicorns”–the term coined to define the 100+ tech startups valued at $1 billion or more. But in the past few weeks that fantasy hit a few snags with news of devaluations of prominent tech unicorns, including social messaging app, Snapchat, and HR benefits startup, Zenefits.  

As Fortune and the WSJ report, Fidelity has marked down the value of its investments in Snapchat by about 25 percent, and of Zenefits by about 48 percent. According to the WSJ, Zenefits has cut employee salaries and curbed employee benefits.
This news comes soon after several recent layoffs in tech, helping fuel talks of an impending pop in what some perceive is a more volatile tech bubble than the dot-com blow of the 90’s.
Related: Webinar – 3 Keys to Protecting Your Brand in a Downsize: Lessons from the Tech Industry
NYT tech and business writer, Nick Bilton, illustrates in his recent Vanity Fair piece how the tech bubble debate is hitting home, becoming the central topic of both opening address and casual conversation at a recent glitzy Silicon Valley event hosted by renown VC firm and major Zenefits-backer, Andreessen Horowitz.

Related: How to Prepare for Layoffs – 3 Tips for Tech Companies
One of the most notable points Bilton makes is in reference to the 1,070-ft Salesforce tower now under construction and soon to eclipse the hallmark peak of the Transamerica tower, a defining symbol of San Francisco’s skyline for nearly four decades. Bilton explains why monuments made in the name of empire building may actually serve as signs of bad times ahead:

As the technology event in the HR industry, HR Tech is the place to see which products tech firms big and small are rolling out. HR buyers of all industries and various...

Facebook, the largest social networking platform, has made its repository of over 2 trillion posts and real-time content searchable. How can this impact how job seekers find jobs on social media? And what could this mean for recruiters and sourcers who use Facebook as a social recruiting tool?

Last week Facebook announced Search FYI, its significant upgrade to Facebook’s search capabilities that effectively made all public posts in the Facebook index searchable.  Prior to the update, Facebook users were primarily limited to seeing and searching posts of friends, family, liked groups, friends of friends, and other affiliations. Now, public Facebook posts–be they from individual users or brands–can be found with the right combination of keywords entered in the Facebook search bar.
Here are three things recruiters and employers need to know about Facebook’s new Search FYI: