High Five Friday - February 24, 2012

Another week, another high five.  Here are some highlights / lowlights from the week.


First a highlight.  Our wonderful Kathi, aka K, has been championing a mine prevention project in her adopted home of Patagonia, Arizona.  Please take a look at this video to learn more about protecting where she lives, how mines affect the greater area, community and businesses, and share with your friends.  Just this week, she and her husband, Michael, presented the video to the Santa Cruz Valley Citizens Council, whose mission is as follows. "Santa Cruz Valley Citizens Council, Inc. is a non-profit Arizona corporation, whose purpose is to inform and educate its members as to local and regional issues affecting the community interests of members, and to express the view of members regarding such issues."  I guess 120 people showed up to watch.  Good stuff.





Not really a lowlight, but certainly a challenging topic right now is Internationals, otherwise known as foreign workers or those seeking employment in the U.S. as J-1 or H-2B visa holders.  They have been in the news again, and certainly are a common part of my day here at Cool Works.  I get inquiries from all over the globe including Africa, yes, Africa, the Caribbean, Europe, everywhere about work opportunities in the U.S.  Unfortunately, with the State Department taking a closer look at this program, due to the violations at the Hershey plant in Pennsylvania, the number of visas are being limited.  It's tough to know what to say to students who call, because, unfortunately, I don't believe that it will be a good year for students to come over.  Many of the larger employers who advertise on Cool Works have either reduced or completely shut down their J-1 programs.  And, frankly, in a time where it is difficult for Americans to secure employment, hiring foreign workers does not sit well with the unemployed or under employed.

The Department of Labor has announced three seminars that will be held in March to help explain the new rules for the H-2B program.  Thanks to the Cape Cod Chamber of Commerce for this information.

Wednesday, March 14, 2012, 1:30 pm - 4:00 pm, EDT Public Access URL: click here Teleconference information: Dial-in #:888-810-9161 Participant passcode: 7393731 Tuesday, March 20, 2012, 1:30 pm - 4:00 pm, EDT Public Access URL: click here Teleconference information: Dial-in #:888-810-9161 Participant passcode: 7393731 Tuesday, March 27, 2012, 1:30 pm - 4:00 pm, EDT Public Access Webinar URL: click here Teleconference information: Dial-in #: 888-810-9161 Participant passcode: 7393731 Materials, including fact sheets, are available athttp://www.foreignlaborcert.doleta.gov/h-2b.cfm andhttp://www.dol.gov/whd/immigration/H2BFinalRule/index.htm. For more information, please contact Tony Zaffirini in the Office of Congressional and Intergovernmental Affairs atzaffirini.tony@dol.gov or (202) 693-4600.

More information can be found on their newsletter.

That's it for me.  I hope everyone has a wonderful weekend!

High Five Friday - February 17, 2012

Another week, another Friday.  This week I got to meet some clients in person, which always makes me happy, and we, as Cool Works, signed a campaign to support the National Parks.

• First off, I met some recruiters, Steve, Mandy and Carleton, from Silver Bay Seafoods, who happened to be in Bellingham at our local Work Source.  Silver Bay came on to the site to recruit earlier this month for seafood processors in Alaska.  They also are using us for their applicant tracking and have really enjoyed using our Staffing Center thus far.  We love to hear that.

• Last month, Bill, our founder, attended the America's Summit for the National Parks in Washington D.C. and he met with legislators to share the goodness that is the National Parks.  This week, we stepped it up by signing the "National Park for a New Century - Statement of Principles."  We hope you'll join us.  Click here to sign the petition for your organization.
• Lastly, I'll leave you with a comprehensive report on Google+ from Ian at Portent Interactive.  He specializes in SEO (search engine optimization) and over the years has been a great source of information about all things Google.  Check out the report if you want to learn more about the ranking possibilities of Google+.  Cool Works does have a page on Google+, but we're still not sure how much traction it will get as the years go by.

Happy Weekend, folks!

High Five Friday - February 10, 2012

It's been a quiet week in Lake Woebegone.... Oh wait!  I'm here to talk about seasonal job stuff.

• Well, first off, it's always big news when any of us Cool Workers get together since there are only five of us and we live in three different states!  This week it was B and Q's turn to have a meet up in SeApple, as we like to call it.  B, aka Bill's, wife's family lives all over the area, so Q, I, drove down from Bellingham to meet him.  It's always good to catch up face to face, compare notes, and just hang out.  His wife is retiring from the National Park Service soon after many years of being a Park Ranger at Tower in Yellowstone National Park.  They'll get a chance as a family to celebrate that life change on Sunday.  Woo hoo for them!

• On the chat Monday night we covered packing, which I'm sure we'll talk about again.  There are always lots of questions from the job seekers about how much space they'll actually have for storage when they get to your places of work.  To help them plan, I recommend posting housing photos on your employment pages or on your Cool Works' profiles.  The more information they have in advance the better.  It helps set their expectations and they'll be better prepared for the summer they spend with you.  Also, if you want to participate or help me host a chat, please let me know.  We cover all kinds of things on our weekly chats.
• And lastly, thanks to my friend, Laurie Ruettimann, HR / Cat Blogger Extraordinaire for sharing this ultimate list of HR blogs, including ours, yay!

Happy Weekend, Folks!

Q

Termination Quote

"While terminating an employee is hard for you, getting fired is way harder for the employee." --Jeff Haden writing at Inc.com  (via SmartBrief, Inc.)

High Five Friday - 2/3/2012

Yo!  We're trying something new to keep our readers up to date on what we're seeing in the seasonal recruiting space.  Each Friday we're going to post a blog called High Five Friday and share our thoughts from the week that was.  We encourage you to post comments and your thoughts from your perspective out there, wherever you are.  Hopefully, by mutually sharing our views, we'll find not only common ground, but we'll learn something from each other.


So here goes the week that was January 31 to February 3...

• Cetusa - Council for Education Travel, USA was in the New York Times on February 1 because it has been banned by the State Department from bringing foreign students to the US under the J-1 program.  Cetusa was responsible for the 400 students involved in the Hershey's debacle in 2011.   From the article - "The ban of Cetusa was hailed as a victory by the National Guestworker Alliance, a labor group that helped organize the Palmyra protest and demanded that the State Department take action against the sponsor."
• On the Cool Works website, we added the category "Jobs with Fish," which not only make us giggle a little, but is a practical page for fish processing jobs as well as fishing guide jobs.  Check it out!
• Our traffic is humming!  In the last month, we've had over 1.2 million page views and 55% of our visitors are new to the site!  If you're looking to fill positions for the summer of 2012, now is the time to get your jobs posted.  Get in touch or sign up to post your jobs.

So what happened in your world this week?  Please share in the comments.  Happy Friday!