When man carries out an act of kindness, which can be anything from letting a harassed mum with two crying kids go before you in the Supermarket queue, to saving a elephant cub and his mother from drowning in mud, we illuminate and lift our souls due to this kindness.

On the news they were discussing how, during the riots, what shocked the Nation more was not that people could steal, destroy and loot, but rather that people  decided, without being asked, to pick up their brushes and go out onto the streets and help in the clear up.. and how bizarre is that?

So my tip for the day is carry out one act of random kindness every day, let someone into the traffic queue even if it does add an extra 20 seconds onto your car journey, go and check on your neighbour if they have been unwell or just smile at everyone you see on the street and say hello. I know when I am walking my dog, Doogle my prince, the sociability of smiling, saying good morning and passing the time of day is one of the nicest parts of being part of the Dog Owning Community.

Hope you all have a lovely day!

That has been down to how well all our candidates have prepared themselves for interview, how they have expressed enthusiasm and a determination to work hard and as a result you have all succeeded in one of the most competitive environments we have ever known… well done to you all.. and let’s now get more of you permanent jobs in October!

This is a free service to candidates, but the “return” we receive in “Thanks” is more than any fee they could pay us.

We placed a wonderful lady yesterday, who hadn’t worked for 6 months and she actually cried when we offered her the job… and that is why we do this, to help people, and to make a genuine difference to people’s lives… We are not Brain Surgeons nor are we going to bring about World Peace, reinvent the wheel or discover a cure for the Common Cold, I will grant you that, but we do try very hard to help people.

I just wanted to make that point, that the vast majority of people we deal with are terrific, a pleasure to meet, help and get to know..

This has happened to us 3 times this week and its only Tuesday!

In this day and age of modern technology there is no excuse for it, text, email, send a letter, make the call or send a carrier pigeon.. anything but not turning up without a word.

Candidates complain that they do not get feedback from companies and as an agency, we try really hard to make sure that they get the service they expect. The very least we want in return is some basic manners to ensure our clients, who have had to set time aside in their demanding schedule, are then not sitting in a room waiting for someone to turn up.

There is no excuse acceptable, we have had candidates who have been involved in car crashes and they have still managed to call us on the way to hospital! So please be aware…Any candidate that just does not turn up for an interview is removed, permanently, from our files. And we don’t forget, so when candidates try and re-register months later, we will not do it.

Sorry if this is more of a rant than a blog but quite honestly, we are tired of having to apologise to clients for other peoples bad manners

Just recently I have noticed that candidates are being offered jobs at slightly less salaries than they have hoped for and I just wanted to explain how recruitment today is working.

We are all aware there is a recession on, that the economy is struggling but do we realise what that means for employers?

It means that they struggle to justify to recruit staff! It means that they have to look at costs and cut them, and the biggest cost is their salaries which in turn means not recruiting unless absolutely essential. Which means there are less jobs out there, and more competition for the ones that do exist. It is no different from when you go shopping, you look for quality at value.. are you paying the same today for  products you bought a year ago? Or are you shopping around for better deals? You don’t want to compromise on quality but you just won’t pay the same for it, and if you don’t get it at one store, you go to another who will give you that deal. Exactly the same in the recruitment market place

Now we are lucky, the vast majority of our clients are recruiting and we have lots of jobs on offer, but clients are very specific in their requirements and are being very conservative in the salaries they are offering.

I have also noticed that in the last 6 months, the majority of people we have interviewed are not working and HAVE NOT WORKED FOR MANY MONTHS. These are good candidates, with excellent experience and skills, and who really want to get back into the market place as fast as they can. And I find that incredibly sad and we work very hard to get them back working as fast as we can

So my advice is this, please put some realism into your salary requests, this is a Buyers Market. I am not advocating selling yourself short, slave labour or working for peanuts but I am advising that you , if and only if, you want the job, like the company, know you will be happy working for an employer, think about those aspects first before turning down a job because it is £x less than you hoped for.. ask for a review instead, consider the market you are operating in, just until the world comes back around again.. keep in work because when it does pick up and becomes a Sellers Market place again YOU will be the most attractive candidate out there and then you will be able to dictate the price at which you will want to sell your skills… and then I will be blogging about how clients need to pay more to attract the best candidates..

Once the frenzy has died down, it would be quite wonderful if society took a step back and took a long hard look at itself and how it operates. And don’t let celebrities and MPs take charge here, they have very selfish motives as to why they want to change the way the press operates. This should be led by the people of this country who are tired of “Its all about me”, weary of hearing the chant ” What about My Rights ?” and desperate to bring back morals, ethics and understand that society is a joint effort. Its the only way for society to operate, standing together as a group, taking all the parts together to achieve a whole.

And why is this important for work… well we have seen at a very basic level how important Branding, Perception and First Impressions really are. Hats off to Ford for leading the way. They understood immediately how their brand would be affected by being associated with News of the World. And this happens every single time you go for an interview, you are branding yourself, you are selling yourself, asking to be a part of a whole, so my advice is.. look the part, be the part, be someone the interviewer wants to buy into. Individuality is for home, conforming is for work.. and this continues when you are in work.

Work is a culmination of people from many diverse backgrounds coming together to achieve a joint aim, and that is not only salary or profits achieved but also job, personal and team satisfaction together with social interaction. Its a society within society.

So you know what? Its not all about you, its about your team, its about respect and this works both ways. After salary, respect and recognition are the most important reasons why people leave a job. Managers should take note of that, a pat on the back or a Thank You can mean so much more than a 3% payrise. In fact many less well paid employees will stay longer with a company that values them than a better paid employee whose efforts are not recognised. And in certain sectors Companies who treat their employees poorly HAVE to pay more than the industry norm in order to attract staff, imagine how much they could cut from overheads if only they learnt to say “Well Done!”

So maybe the News of the World debacle will have a positive slant for us all, maybe we will start to understand how important our First Impressions are, how important our Branding is, in work and the world at large and maybe we will recognise that we operate as a team for the good of the whole not the individual parts

One girl in particular was individual in her “look”,  punk red hair piercings etc.. now I am all for individuality, my son is an individual and I love him for it, but please lets not be naive about this.. you have to look the part to get the part.. I do not care how relaxed society is today, how we should embrace individuality or how we should not judge someone on how they look.. we do judge and its a scientific human process.. our advice to anyone looking for work is to invest in an interview outfit, a bland smart conformist outfit.. when you get the job, wear whatever you fancy but first impressions count, it takes 5 seconds to make a good/bad first impression and once made it is almost impossible to change it..we hear and retain only a small proportion of what is said but our brains “see” everything and remember it permanently..

so worry less about making a verbal gaffe at an interview and more about how you look because how you look says something about who you are and more importantly how you will perform in a job.. look sloppy, work sloppy, look individual then unlikely to be a team player, look outlandish unlikely to follow company processes, look smart, work smart, look tidy work tidy, look conformist, fit in with team.. I will bet even Richard Branson, when he went for his first interview with the banks to raise money for his Virgin ventures, would have put his woolly trademark jumpers to the back of the wardrobe and dragged out a little worn but well cut suit shirt and tie!

The lady, sorry her name escapes me, tried to say that the youth of today are desperate to work, and the Headhunter coined Mr Tebbit’s phrase of  getting on one’s bike.

I think the truth lies somewhere in between.. I feel so sorry for the younger generation. What does the future hold for them? Is it correct, and I think it may well be, that this will be first generation that is less well off than its parents.. now I don’t think that this in itself is an issue, a shame but not the end of the world.

However what is more serious is the lack of jobs for them. If we have raised the age at which people retire, that means that there is less movement upwards in the job chain and ultimately that means there are less jobs at the beginning of the ladder. No jobs for the younger generation.. has noone in Government got that very basic fact?? and if not why not??

 I ultimately believe that we are facing a  generation, if not many generations, of unemployed youth who may well never find a job. The adage…The longer you are out of work the harder it is to find work, is an absolute truth.

Now about getting on your bike…. well there is most definitely some truth in that also.. We have developed a culture in this country whereby we are owed something.. by whom may I ask?

Actually we owe ourselves something.. self respect, a work ethic and a desire to succeed.. this country has been so dumbed down its criminal. The last government was so keen to protect the weakest that it took away the ability of so many to support themselves. The Benefit system allowed so many to opt out of work and that attitude became the norm. Why would you work if you got paid more in benefit? Well how about because you achieve something at the end of each day? How about because work gives you a place in society? How about because you won’t always be on that salary and you can progress, earn more, and value your self more?

I read a letter in the Times from a GP saying that the way the NHS handles the elderly is not about faults within the NHS but more an indication of how society as a whole operates.. and he is right.  This problem highlights an issue throughout modern day Britain..This lack of care, this lack of self respect, the desire to work, the desire to achieve, the desire to stand on ones own two feet and most importantly the desire to contribute to society has all but been eroded.

So if this is true of the adult population, what chance for the younger? So many, not all but many, of the youth of today can’t be “Bovvered”, have no sense of urgency, do not understand how important it is to have manners, to turn up on time, don’t think twice about not turning up for interviews..NOT all of them I grant you, but those youngsters who do want to work stand out like stars and we get them work.. the rest, well unless there is a huge culture shift then they will be on a scrap heap even before they leave school, or university.. and what does that say about our society??

Now that sounds ridiculous, I know but lets look at this whole argument from another point of view.. should all children go to University and if they should, should  Tax Payers who will not benefit from these Students have to pay for them to do so?

Or would it be better, shock horror, for only those who are capable and who wish to do decent courses attend Further Education?  Why has society changed so much that we all feel we have a “divine right” to everything? When will we start to ask again those well worn but forgotten words, “Ask not what my country do for me, but what can I do for my country?”

£9000 is a lot of money for any family to find, I don’t care how wealthy you are, but maybe we should see it as an opportunity to rethink the whole University Question.

Would it not now be a good opportunity to get rid of some of these airy fairy courses? Should we be looking at introducing more Vocational/Traditional courses that will ensure that a) Graduates are able to get a job and b) Society will benefit from their education.

Should we have more sandwich courses where students work for a year in industry, giving them both the eductational gravitas but also experience to offer when they do graduate?

What about re-introducing Polytechnics? You remember those! They offered far better  more vocational courses than the Universities. And should those Polytechnics be individual specialist places  offering courses, for example, in Film and Media, only offering 60 places and have links to the BBC and ITV etc… making sure they only get the best 60 students in the country who can do internships with the BBC etc, and more than likely work for them when graduating?

I believe, and I am happy to be corrected, that past Governments have pushed kids into Further Education to keep them out of the unemployment figures for another 3 years. So now we see far too many unemployed graduates, many of whom are first class but also far too many of whom who STILL have nothing to offer the work place, because not only are their Degrees in subjects that are unsuitable for the work place but their A Levels and GCSE results are not at a level that would have been considered for University 15 years ago.. surely it would have been better for them to have left school at 16 or 18 and gained 3 years work experience?

So no,  I don’t think all kids should become Undergraduates, and although uncomfortable with the huge hike in fees because why shouldn’t extremely bright less well off children  have the same opportunities that other children have? (Although they will still be able to claim financial assistance) This will be a huge loss to this country in the long term,  but eventually it may mean that University will go back to what it was previously… for the intellectual elite. We all have something to offer Society, we do not all have to follow the same course in life to achieve it

Our Government may being using a sledge hammer to crack a nut, but in these times of cutbacks, austerity and hardship, we need to accept that some fairly difficult decisions have to be and are being made.. and sorry Students but you are going to have suffer along with the rest of us, and actually your world is very much in need of an overhaul

And finally, to the NUS President of London University.. to state that people were over reacting to a few broken windows at Tory Headquarters, may I  just say that that kind of attitude does absolutely nothing to benefit your cause.. protest by all means, but violence of any kind is totally unnecessary and no one listens to it