Employees Will Stay For The Work But Leave For Career
BlessingWhite’s recently released 2011 Employee Engagement study provides insight into the factors that drive employees to stick with – or quit – their current job.
PRINCETON, NJ /PRNewswire/ ~~ In a global study by consulting firm BlessingWhite, the top reason employees worldwide give for staying with their employer is “My work. I like the work that I do.”
What is the most important factor influencing your plans to stay?
~~ My Work. I like the work that I do. 30%
~~ My career. I have significant development or advancement opportunities here. 17%
~~ My organization’s mission. I believe in what we do. 11%
~~ No desire for change. I am comfortable here. 10%
~~ My job conditions. I have flexible hours, a good commute, etc. 10%
~~ My finances. I expect a desirable salary, bonus, or stock options. 7%
~~ Other (The Economy, My Manager, My Colleagues) 15%
In contrast, the top reason employees of all age groups give for jumping ship: “My career. I don’t have opportunities to grow or advance here.”
What is the most important factor influencing your thoughts about leaving?
~~ My career. I don’t have opportunities to grow or advance here. 26%
~~ My work. I don’t like what I do or it doesn’t make the most of my talents. 15%
~~ My finances. I want to earn more money. 15%
~~ My desire for change. I want to try something new. 12%
~~ My manager. I don’t like working for him or her. 10%
~~ Other (The Economy, Job Conditions, Org. Mission, Colleagues) 18%
“Business leaders are right to be concerned about retention of top talent,” said BlessingWhite CEO Christopher Rice. “And while raises may encourage some workers to stick around, our findings suggest that employees – especially high performers ~~ will remain in jobs that challenge them, utilize their expertise, and provide meaning.”
The Employee Engagement Report 2011 explores workplace attitudes among employees on four continents and is based on survey responses of nearly 11,000 employed professionals. Among the study’s other findings:
After enjoyable work, career advancement is the second most important retention factor in India, China, Australia/New Zealand and Southeast Asia. In North America and Europe, favorable job conditions (e.g., a good commute or flexible hours) ranks second.
Although workers across generations agree on their top reasons for staying and leaving, the youngest workers (Generation Y or Millenials) place higher priority on career opportunities than they do their work. Likewise, Gen Y employees are more likely to leave in pursuit of more money. Baby Boomers, on the other hand, seek more interesting work and change (something new).
Rice advises business leaders to help their workforce rethink career notions. “When employees understand that today’s career is all about creating a portfolio of assignments and projects, not necessarily promotions and new titles, they’re better prepared to concentrate on finding work that they enjoy – and work that can help the organization achieve its goals.”
Intended for line executives and HR leaders, Employee Engagement Report 2011 presents five levels of engagement: Engaged, Almost Engaged, Honeymooner & Hamsters, Crash & Burners, and Disengaged. The recommendations focus on the roles and responsibilities of executives, managers, and individuals in driving engagement every day. The report can be accessed at http://www.blessingwhite.com/eee__report.asp.
The engagement survey was conducted between July 2010 and October 2010, and results were compared with pre-recession data (gathered December 2007). 27% of the 10,914 survey respondents reside in North America. More than half of respondents hold executive, management, or supervisory titles.
About BlessingWhite:
BlessingWhite is a global consulting firm in Leadership Development and Employee Engagement. Based in Princeton, NJ, with locations in London, Chicago, San Francisco and Melbourne, the firm has worked with nearly three million professionals in thousands of organizations. www.blessingwhite.com
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SOURCE BlessingWhite
Contact: Christopher Rice, President & CEO, BlessingWhite, 908-904-1000, ext. 8000, chrisr@bwinc.com, or Mary Ann Masarech, Employee Engagement Practice Leader, 203-368-6694, maryannm@bwinc.com.
Web Site: http://www.blessingwhite.com
Top 25 Oddball Employer Interview Questions of 2010
Glassdoor.com Reveals Top 25 Oddball Interview Questions of 2010
SAUSALITO, CA /PRNewswire/ We all know the job interview process can be stressful, but for many candidates it can feel like a pressure chamber, especially when questions seemingly come out of left field. Glassdoor.com, a career and jobs community offering insights on companies and workplaces, has compiled its annual list of oddball interview questions based on the tens of thousands of interview questions shared by job candidates during the past year.
The Top 25 Oddball Interview Questions of 2010 on Glassdoor:
1. “If you were shrunk to the size of a pencil and put in a blender, how would you get out?” – Asked at Goldman Sachs, Analyst position
2. “How many ridges [are there] around a quarter?” – Asked at Deloitte, Project Analyst position
3. “What is the philosophy of Martial Arts?” – Asked at Aflac, Sales Associate position
4. “Explain [to] me what has happened in this country during the last 10 years.” – Asked at Boston Consulting, Consultant position
5. “Rate yourself on a scale of 1 to 10 how weird you are.” – Asked at Capital One, Operations Analyst position
6. “How many basketball[s] can you fit in this room” – Asked at Google, People Analyst position
7. “Out of 25 horses, pick the fastest 3 horses. In each race, only 5 horses can run at the same time. What is the minimum number of races required?” – Asked at Bloomberg LP Financial, Software Developer position
8. “If you could be any superhero, who would it be?” – Asked at AT&T, Customer Sales Representative position
9. “You have a birthday cake and have exactly 3 slices to cut it into 8 equal pieces. How do you do it?” – Asked at Blackrock Portfolio Management Group, Fixed Income Analyst position
10. “Given the numbers 1 to 1000, what is the minimum numbers guesses needed to find a specific number if you are given the hint “higher” or “lower” for each guess you make?” – Asked at Facebook, Software Engineer position
11. “If you had 5,623 participants in a tournament, how many games would need to be played to determine the winner?” – Asked at Amazon, Manager position
12. “An apple costs 20 cents, an orange costs 40 cents, and a grapefruit costs 60 cents, how much is a pear?” – Asked at Epic Systems, Project Manager position
13. “There are three boxes, one contains only apples, one contains only oranges, and one contains both apples and oranges. The boxes have been incorrectly labeled such that no label identifies the actual contents of the box it labels. Opening just one box, and without looking in the box, you take out one piece of fruit. By looking at the fruit, how can you immediately label all of the boxes correctly?” – Asked at Apple, Software QA Engineer position
14. “How many traffic lights in Manhattan?” – Asked at Argus Information & Advisory Services, Analyst position
15. “You are in a dark room with no light. You need matching socks for your interview and you have 19 grey socks and 25 black socks. What are the chances you will get a matching pair?” – Asked at Eze Castle, Quality Assurance position
16. “What do wood and alcohol have in common?” – Asked at Guardsmark, Staff Writer position
17. “How do you weigh an elephant without using a weigh machine?” – Asked at IBM, Software Engineer position
18. “You have 8 pennies, 7 weigh the same, one weighs less. You also have a judges scale. Find the one that weighs less in less than 3 steps.” – Asked at Intel, Systems Validation Engineer position
19. “Why do you think only a small percentage of the population makes over $150K?” – Asked at New York Life, Sales Agent position
20. “You are in charge of 20 people, organize them to figure out how many bicycles were sold in your area last year.” – Asked at Schlumberger, Field Engineer position
21. “How many bottles of beer are drank in the city over the week?” – Asked at The Nielsen Company, Research Analyst position
22. “What’s the square root of 2000?” – Asked at UBS, Sales and Trading position
23. “A train leaves San Antonio for Huston at 60mph. Another train leaves Huston for San Antonio at 80mph. Huston and San Antonio are 300 miles apart. If a bird leaves San Antonio at 100mph, and turns around and flies back once it reaches the Huston train, and continues to fly between the two, how far will it have flown when they collide?”- Asked at USAA, Software Engineer position
24. “How are M&M’s made?” – Asked at US Bank, Leadership Program Development position
25. “What would you do if you just inherited a pizzeria from your uncle?” – Asked at Volkswagen, Business Analyst position.
The interview questions are part of the Glassdoor Interview Reviews section, offering in-depth accounts of the interview process for specific job titles at specific companies – all for free. To date, approximately 80,000 interview questions around the world have been collected. Interview Reviews include details from actual candidates about the entire hiring process — from the interview format and average duration to overall difficulty. Each review also includes details as to whether an offer was made and whether it was accepted or rejected — and why — along with any negotiation tips.
Users can find or share Interview Reviews through the “Interviews” tab from the Glassdoor.com home page or via http://www.glassdoor.com/Interview/index.htm.
About Glassdoor.com
Glassdoor.com is a career and workplace community offering a free inside look at jobs and companies with access to millions of job listings. Glassdoor enables employees, job seekers, employers and recruiters to simultaneously see – for the first time – unedited opinions about a company’s work environment along with details on salaries, company reviews, CEO approval ratings, job interview questions and reviews, and office photos as well as career advice.
Headquartered in Sausalito, Calif., Glassdoor officially launched in 2008, and was founded by Richard Barton, Robert Hohman and Tim Besse in 2007. The company has raised $9.5 million from its founders, Benchmark Capital and Sutter Hill Ventures. More information about Glassdoor can be found on its blog (www.glassdoor.com/blog), Twitter (www.twitter.com/glassdoordotcom), and Facebook (www.facebook.com/glassdoordotcom).
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SOURCE Glassdoor.com
CONTACT: Samantha Zupan, +1-925-324-3954, or Dawn Lyon +1-415-846-4706, pr@glassdoor.com, both of Glassdoor.com
Web Site: http://www.glassdoor.com
Finances of State and Local Government Employee Retirement Systems, 3rd Quarter 2010
WASHINGTON, DC /PRNewswire-USNewswire/ Finances of Selected State and Local Government Employee Retirement Systems: 3rd Quarter 2010.
This quarterly survey provides national summary data on the revenues, expenditures and composition of assets of the 100 largest state and local public employee retirement systems in the United States. These 100 systems comprise 89.4 percent of financial activity among such entities, based on the 2007 Census of Governments.
This survey presents the most current data about investment decisions by state and local public employee retirement systems, which are among the largest types of institutional investors in the U.S. financial markets.
These data tables are published three months after each calendar quarter and show national financial transactions and trends for the past five years.
You can view the different finance summaries online at http://www.census.gov/govs/qpr/ .
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SOURCE U.S. Census Bureau
CONTACT: Census Public Information Office, +1-301-763-3030, pio@census.gov
Web Site: http://www.census.gov
Cautious Optimism for 2011 on Hiring, Salary Increases, and Bonus Awards
NEW YORK, NY /PRNewswire/ A survey conducted in November/ December by Empsight International, LLC, of 142 Fortune 500 and Large Multinational corporations regarding forecasts of 2011 salary Merit Increases, Bonus Payouts, and Hiring, suggests cautious optimism.
Hiring expectations showed a significant improvement over 2009, with 39% of companies expecting headcount increases of 1% to 5%, and 18% expecting reductions of the same amount. The corresponding figures in last year’s edition of the survey were 21% and 26%. Retail, Professional Services and Technology companies showed the strongest hiring forecasts. The greatest impediments to Hiring were seen as:
– The Broader Economic Outlook (49% of responses)
– Level of Demand for Company Products and Services (36% of responses)
– Government Regulations (8% of responses)
– Health Care Costs (7% of responses)
“While there is an active societal debate on Health Care, this survey shows economic fundamentals are a more significant driver of hiring decisions,” stated Vincent McHugh, Managing Director of Empsight International, LLC.
Survey numbers, which are detailed in the link below, show salary Merit Budgets forecasted at 3.0% at Median, compared to 2.6% in the same survey in 2009. The number of companies planning Merit increases was 98% of the total compared with 94% in last year’s edition of the survey. Of the 11 Industry group breakouts, the Oil/Gas/Services industry group recorded the highest Average Merit Increase, at 3.24%, while the Insurance industry the lowest at 2.37%.
78% of companies expect to pay Annual Cash Bonuses at the same or higher levels than last year, with 27%, at the executive level, expecting payouts Somewhat or Significantly Higher. 90% of companies expected their Long Term Incentive awards to be About the Same or Somewhat Higher.
Employee Retention, Employee Morale, Cost of Benefits, Compensation Competitiveness, and Managerial Skill Levels continue to register as Somewhat to Very Significant Concerns for companies. These factors will increase in importance if there is significant growth in the economy.
The survey was conducted between November 18 – December 8, 2010 by Empsight International, LLC a compensation survey and consulting firm focused on Fortune 500 and large multi-national companies.
Full survey results available for download at http://www.empsight.com/spotsurveyresults.
Note to media:
Vincent McHugh vincent.mchugh.pr@empsight.com (212-537-0187), and Jeremy Feinstein jeremy.feinstein.pr@empsight.com (212-683-7745), Managing Directors of Empsight International, are available for interviews.
About Empsight:
Empsight International, LLC is a human resource consulting firm which helps employers make better decisions about their investment in people. Our primary focus is on conducting compensation surveys in niche markets (Law, Government Relations, Corporate Communications, Compliance, Audit, Risk, Security, HR, and Executive Administrative Support), domestically and internationally. Our surveys are seen as definitive data reference sources in markets where such information is critical to maintaining competitiveness. Our clients are, predominantly, leading multinational corporations. Our Principals and staff have significant experience in consulting on compensation, organizational and human resource issues across multiple industry sectors.
For information about Empsight please visit http://www.empsight.com/.
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SOURCE Empsight International, LLC
CONTACT: Vincent McHugh, +1-212-537-0187, vincent.mchugh.pr@empsight.com, or Jeremy Feinstein, +1-212-683-7745, jeremy.feinstein.pr@empsight.com, Managing Directors of Empsight International
Web Site: http://www.empsight.com
Job Listings Rise Significantly – but does it mean the economy is improving?
The ‘Job Offers Rising as Economy Warms Up’ article from the Wall Street Journal linked below has some good numbers and interesting perspectives (no, no one is sure what it all means).
HOWEVER, the article has a consistent theme: education matters. Being tech-friendly and having higher skills matters.
Those areas that are trending towards job growth generally require a four year degree and recent experience functioning at a high level of expertise.
College students being recruited are at the upper end of their classes.
Read Story http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748703548604576037612752480904.html
Employment Trends
i2 and Northrop Grumman Collaborate to Connect Local Law Enforcement and U.S. Navy Law Enforcement Information Exchange
i2 Builds COPLINK Interface for U.S. Navy’s LInX to Enhance Information Sharing; State of Alaska to Pilot the System
MCLEAN, VA /PRNewswire-USNewswire/ i2, the leading provider of intelligence and investigation software, has built an interface between COPLINK and the U.S. Naval Criminal Investigative Service’s (NCIS) Law Enforcement Information Exchange (LInX), creating vital information sharing capabilities between local, state and federal law enforcement agencies.
Developed by Northrop Grumman, LInX enhances information sharing between local, state and federal law enforcement in areas of strategic importance to the U.S. Navy and Department of Defense, including Washington, Oregon, Alaska, Hampton Roads, Va., Florida, Georgia, the Gulf Coast region, the National Capital Region, North Carolina, New Mexico and Southern California. LInX provides more than 800 participating law enforcement partner agencies with secure access to regional crime and incident data and the tools needed to process it, enabling investigators to search across jurisdictional boundaries to help solve crimes and resolve suspicious events.
COPLINK, the most widely deployed lead generation tool in the United States, enables law enforcement agencies across the country to organize and rapidly analyze vast quantities of seemingly unrelated criminal data currently housed in incompatible databases and records management systems. More than 3,000 law enforcement agencies have access to COPLINK data and about a half billion records are shared securely in COPLINK today.
i2 is working with the State of Alaska, NCIS and Northrop Grumman on a pilot program that will connect Alaska with Washington, scheduled to commence in early 2011. Agencies in both states use a combination of COPLINK and/or LInX. Once the connection is live, agencies in Alaska, Washington or Oregon that use one or both systems will have access to both resources. Based on results of the pilot, the new capability will be extended to other jurisdictions throughout the country using COPLINK and/or LInX.
“The investigative and analytic power of information sharing systems is directly proportional to the amount of information in them. Our 617 users across Alaska who use both COPLINK and LInX will have access to additional data that can help solve crimes,” said Bob Griffiths, executive director of the Alaska Association of Chiefs of Police. “Officers, investigators and analysts will greatly benefit from the ability to easily use law enforcement information from areas outside their region. And they will benefit from the significant cost savings by implementing a simple connection between compatible systems rather than starting from scratch.”
As the former director of the U.S. Department of Justice, National Institute of Justice, National Law Enforcement and Corrections Technology Center – Northwest, Griffiths was instrumental in helping implement Alaska’s Law Enforcement Information Sharing System for 42 local, state and federal agencies, which utilize COPLINK, making it the first statewide information sharing program.
“With so many law enforcement agencies using both systems, it was only natural for us to integrate COPLINK with LInX,” said Robert Griffin, i2 CEO. ”Now agencies in places like Alaska can access records from one fully integrated system based on COPLINK.”
“Northrop Grumman is committed to providing the best possible services to our customers and helping increase security for the citizens of the United States,” said Ed Sturms, vice president of Civil Safety and Infrastructure for Northrop Grumman’s Information Systems sector. “The LInX-COPLINK connection will allow the 9,000 LInX users in Washington, Oregon and Alaska to access COPLINK data in Alaska and Washington. This connectivity will enhance situational awareness and promote cross jurisdictional investigations.”
About i2
i2 is the leading provider of intelligence and investigation solutions for defense, national security, law enforcement and commercial security. Over 4,500 organizations in 150 countries rely on the i2 Intelligence-Led Operations Platform to proactively deter, prevent, predict and disrupt the world’s most sophisticated criminal and terrorist threats. i2 started the intelligence revolution in 1990 and continues to lead the industry in innovation with products like Analyst’s Notebook® and COPLINK®. These solutions enable public safety officers, analysts, managers, detectives and investigators to uncover hidden connections faster, deliver timely and actionable results and communicate complex situations more clearly than ever. For more information, please visit www.i2group.com. Follow i2 on Twitter @i2group and read the i2 blog iConnect.
About Northrop Grumman
Northrop Grumman Corporation is a leading global security company whose 120,000 employees provide innovative systems, products, and solutions in aerospace, electronics, information systems, shipbuilding and technical services to government and commercial customers worldwide. Please visit www.northropgrumman.com for more information.
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SOURCE i2
CONTACT: Mitch Derman, +1-703-842-4771, mitch.derman@i2group.com, or Christy Whitman, +1-571-213-5302, christine.whitman@ngc.com
Web Site: http://www.northropgrumman.com/
COPLINK, Northrop Grumman, i2, Analyst’s Notebook
