RSSVetJobs Agency Eagle
Issue 10:10, Thursday, October 1, 2009
www.vetjobs.com
VetJobs is an appropriate employment service delivery system for EEOC, VEVRAA/JVA and OFCCP compliance!
Please feel free to forward this newsletter to friends and other recruitment advertising agencies.
The VetJobs Agency Eagle is the VetJobs newsletter for recruitment advertising agencies.
This issue sponsored by TECHEXPO Top Secret
Contents:
1. Message from the Top
2. VetJobs Case Study
3. US Chamber Veteran Event in November
4. History of Columbus Day
5. History of Navy Day
6. Discriminatory Twist in Networking Sites Puts Recruiters in Peril
7. Flag Etiquette
8. National Guard and Reserve Mobilized as of September 29, 2009
9. Significant Events this Month in Military History
Thank you for reading the VetJobs Agency Eagle recruitment ad agency newsletter. If you like this newsletter, please go to http://www.weddles.com/poll.htm and vote VetJobs for the WEDDLE’s User’s Choice Award.
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1. Message from the Top
Every once in awhile you find information that reinforces what you are doing. You know you are doing the right thing and are a leader in your space, but you are always looking for hard, concrete data to back up your position. This month VetJobs had that happen when I was given the results of a campaign Maid Brigade was running on VetJobs and on Military.com/Monster.com. The results are described in article 2 below. The results confirm again that VetJobs has the best market penetration in the transitioning military and veteran market space. The bottom line is VetJobs delivered 845 quality candidates to only 44 from Military.com/Monster.com. The data was captured by Google Analytics. This information is now on www.vetjobs.com in our new Media Kit.
If you need to reach transitioning military and veteran candidates for one of your clients, or if you have a client in need of EEOC, VEVRAA/JVA and OFCCP compliance support, please consider proposing VetJobs as a recruiting site! VetJobs can deliver for your customers!
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OFCCP – The mere pronouncing of the letters will give many of your clients and HR managers the chills. The acronym stands for Office of Federal Contract Compliance Program, a division of the US Department of Labor (DOL). The law that created OFCCP was meant to promote compliance with equal employment and non-discrimination among Federal contractors, but in the process of writing applicable statutory regulations, bureaucrats at DOL have “re-interpreted” the law so it applies to just about any organization over 50 employees.
In FY 2008, OFCCP made total financial assessments, the new politically correct way to say fines at DOL, of $67,510,892 in back pay and annualized salary and benefits for a record 24,508 American workers who had allegedly been subjected to unlawful employment discrimination. This marks the fourth consecutive year that OFCCP has posted record enforcement numbers. FY 2009 has already surpassed the $67 million in assessments. The 2008 monetary assessments reflected a 133% increase over financial assessments obtained in FY 2001. This also represents a 30.8% increase over assessments of $51,680,950 received for 22,251 workers in FY 2007
OFCCP reportedly quadrupled their staff last year and now many of the new auditors are hitting the streets conducting audits of your clients. The FY 2010 budget request includes a program increase of $25,600,000 to fund another 213 FTEs and a new case management system. Obviously, DOL has found a real money maker for the government.
It is well understood that OFCCP intends to audit significantly more construction contractors than it has in previous years in light of the increase in federal construction contractors resulting from the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009 (Recovery Act). And OFCCP is targeting many large defense related contractors where the potential for assessments are the greatest.
To learn more about OFCCP compliance, I strongly recommend you and your clients visit http://www.dol.gov/esa/ofccp/regs/compliance/ofcpcomp.htm and read the areas on compliance and the FAQs as an OFCCP auditor may be visiting you soon. There are strict (if not onerous) requirements for record keeping regarding job postings and resume searches. You need to be aware of these myriad record keeping requirements so as to protect your clients (some of which conflict with EEOC) or they will be paying assessments.
When your client is going through an audit, they cannot tell the auditor they will provide the requested data in a few days or weeks. They have to have all the data available during the audit. A rhyme has started making the circuit for those who have been audited that goes: have the right data right now or write a check!
With the increased number of audits taking place, I am hearing of some strange activity that is not covered on the OFCCP internet site, in the FAQs or the final rules when it comes to how the audits are taking place.
Here are some examples:
- Several national members have seen a distinct pattern in the audits. When an auditor conducts a desk audit and does not find anything on which to give an assessment, the auditor’s superiors, particularly at the regional level, tell the auditor to go back and dig deeper until they can find something on which to assess. The obvious goal of the return visits and deeper digging is to levy an assessment. This no longer sounds like a government audit, but does sound very much like a person who has to meet a quota!
-When companies have membership on various job boards, the recruiters who conduct resume searches frequently all use the same access codes. In one audit, I am told the auditor looked at the various resume searches conducted on a major job board and asked which recruiter did which resume search. The company did not keep track of who was doing each search, so could not answer specifically. The company was reportedly hit with an assessment. On the VetJobs site, we make it possible for an administrator to assign access codes to each recruiter so the company can track which recruiter conducted which resume searches. All the required data for an OFCCP audit is captured for each identified recruiter.
-Last month, a major government contractor was receiving a desk audit and the auditor asked for something no one had heard of before. Many companies use job posting services to broadcast their jobs to various job boards. In the past, auditors accepted the batches as proof that the jobs had been posted to the listed sites. However, this auditor asked to see a screen print of a specific job on specific job boards from a date last year. Of course, no one has been keeping such records as this “new” requirement is not listed on the DOL OFCCP site or in any of the final rules. The government contractor was reportedly hit with an assessment since they could not produce a screen shot.
After hearing about this latest incident, VetJobs is now working on a program that will capture screen shots of all jobs posted via the FTP batch system and keep the data for the required two years. We hope to have the system live in sixty days.
There have been other disturbing incidents reported to VetJobs. The incidents seem to indicate that the sole goal of some audits is to raise money and we are looking to verify the reports. If you have heard of a strange or disturbing incident during an audit of one of your clients, I would like to hear about it. You can send it to me at info@vetjobs.com.
The bottom line here is OFCCP is not something to be treated lightly when it comes to the onerous record keeping required of your client’s company. The assessments are growing and it is quite apparent that OFCCP is being used by DOL as a money maker. So prepare well. Be sure the internet sites you recommend to your clients can truly provide them OFCCP compliance support. Caveat emptor really does apply in this arena. If you have questions, feel free to contact me via email or call me at 877-838-5627. I look forward to hearing from you.
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This month we celebrate the 234th birthday of the United States Navy. At an October 13, 1775 meeting in Philadelphia, the Continental Congress voted to fit out two sailing vessels, armed with ten carriage guns, as well as swivel guns. The frigates were to be manned by crews of eighty and to cruise the Atlantic for three months to intercept transports carrying munitions and stores to the British army in America. This was the original legislation out of which the Continental Navy grew and as such constitutes the birth certificate of the Navy. If you meet a current or former member of the Navy, say Happy Birthday!
Other events celebrated this month include:
October 12 – Columbus Day
October 13 – Navy Day.
September 15 through October 15 – Hispanic Heritage Month
October 31 – Halloween.
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Have you ever been to a function where the United States flag is presented and seen people who do not put their hand over their heart as the flag goes by? Or been to a political event and seen individuals who do not rise when the group is saying the Pledge of Allegiance? Unfortunately, this is happening more now than in the past. Much of this improper behavior is due to ignorance. Much can be attributed to the fact that many schools in the effort to be politically correct do not teach flag manners – how to honor and display the American flag.
Case in point, I was recently at a town hall meeting where four protestors deliberately sat through the presentation of the flag and the Pledge of Allegiance. This was disturbing to many of the attendees, and while it is the right of the protesters to make a political statement by refusing to honor the flag of our country, I considered it an insult and a public display of their gross ignorance. There are better ways to protest than to dishonor the flag of the United States.
An unfurled flag symbolizes the love and pride that we have as a nation. The flag is a poignant reminder of America’s greatness and our fortune to live in a country which values freedom above all else. The flag signifies the commitment made by our forefathers and fallen comrades who battled bravely to defend the honor of this sacred emblem of a free federal republic that signifies American unity, power and purpose as a nation. Our flag continues the promise of liberty, justice and freedom for all. The flag reflects America’s continuing pledge to uphold our democratic based ideas and work for peace throughout the world.
So starting with this newsletter, I will be adding a paragraph each month on how to properly display the flag – See article 7 below. Be sure to fly your flag at both home and at your place of work. If you need a flag, a great place to buy one is at the VFW Store at www.vfwstore.org.
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On the economic front, the US economy may have bottomed out and is slowly starting to climb out of the recession. Many pundits and politicians like to claim it is due to the stimulus package passed by congress, but I rather doubt that is the reason since less than five percent of the stimulus package has been spent! For many sectors, the federal stimulus may provide the economic shot in the arm that is critical to stemming catastrophic job and population losses. But these short-term stimulus projects must be conceived, developed, and managed in the context of a longer-term plan for economic health of the economy. If the economy is indeed resetting itself, as the data suggest, then communities and regions must commit to a longer-term vision, strategies, and implementation plans to ensure continued growth.
Some indications that the economy is improving include:
- Jobless claims fell to the lowest level since July
- The Federal Reserve reported that American households were $2 trillion richer on June 30 than they were three months earlier, the first time in two years that household net worth had increased.
- The Conference Board reported the index of leading economic indicators rose 0.6% in August, the fifth straight increase.
- In some markets home prices have increased the most since 2005.
- Gross domestic product contracted at a 1.2% annual rate from April to June, the smallest drop in a year.
- The “cash for clunkers” effort and first-time homebuyer credits are giving manufacturing and housing, the two areas at the center of the economic slump. The plans were a boost last quarter, but will not help as the economy moves forward.
- Many economists predict the worst is over and the third quarter will be a strong growth quarter.
- The Standard & Poor’s 500 Index has jumped 57% since it reached a 12-year low on March 9 of this year.
- Encouraged by government subsidies to buy cars, U.S. consumer spending soared 1.3% in August. This is the fastest increase since the post-9/11 shopping binge eight years ago
- Declines in business stockpiles, which dropped last quarter at the fastest pace on record, have set the stage for a pickup in manufacturing.
- The drag from housing is dissipating. Sales of new homes rose last month to the highest level in almost a year.
- And finally, payroll decline is slowing.
While all this is good news, we still have a long, long way to go before the economy is sound again. Importantly, while the worst of the housing sub-prime debacle caused by the Congress and the socialistic Community Re-investment Act has passed, the country still faces the possibility of a similar debacle in the commercial real estate sector. How that will play out is still very much up in the air.
Let us hope that some of our leaders in Congress will follow the much heralded moves by European governments away from socialism to capitalism. Europe had been the largest test bed for socialism in world history and all the European states have concluded socialism does not work. The ideas were great until they had to start paying the bills. Hopefully our government leaders will learn from the European experience!
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Please look at article 3 below concerning a special program called Business Steps Up: Hiring Our Heroes Summit sponsored by the United States Chamber of Commerce. If you can attend on November 12, you will be participating in a very exciting program. I will be participating in the program and look forward to seeing you there!
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Also, be sure to read article 6 below about the legal perils of using social networking sites (SNS) as a sourcing tool for candidates. SNS can be effective in some cases, but if used exclusively as a source will have serious EEOC, JVA and OFCCP compliance issues. And those issues mean your clients may pay some serious fines. So beware.
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Finally, October is National Domestic Violence Awareness Month. One in every four women will experience domestic violence in her lifetime, and women 20 to 24 are at the greatest risk. Most cases of domestic violence are never reported to the police. And men are victims, too. More than 834,000 men report being domestically assaulted annually. People who are abused often feel as though no one will believe them, or they think they have nowhere to go for help.
While we cannot concern ourselves with every detail of a person’s life, we can be aware of changes in behavior, moods and certainly appearance of those around us. If you are in a leadership position, part of the responsibility of being a leader is taking care of those for whom you are responsible. It is your responsibility to make sure your people are OK, both at work and at home. The mark of a good leader is the ability to listen and then act.
Please be aware. For more information, visit the National Resource Center on Domestic Violence at http://dvam.vawnet.org/. No one deserves to be abused!
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As always, if there is anything we at VetJobs can do for you, please do not hesitate to call or email. Feel free to share the Agency Eagle with your clients!
And remember, Freedom Is Never Free – Support Our Armed Forces and Veterans!
Best regards,
Ted Daywalt
President
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2. VetJobs Case Study
Maid Brigade recently posted information on VetJobs, Military.com/Monster.com and other sites. Maid Brigade used Google Analytics to track their responses. After seven weeks, here are the responses the company received from the various sources:
Source/Medium Visits
walletpop.com/referral 813
(direct)/(VetJobs) 556
vjw2.vetjobs.com/referral 257
maidbrigade.com/referral 251
maidbrigadefranchise.com/referral 110
mail.google.com/referral 110
Google/organic 61
franchise.org/referral 48
military.com/referral 44
vetjobs.com/referral 32
In the above information, the 556 direct applicants were attributed to flyers VetJobs distributed at various veteran service organization (VFW, VMW, VVA and AUSN) conferences. The flyers were the only advertised source where candidates had to type in a URL. The 257 vjw2.vetjobs.com and the 32 vetjobs.com were referral accessions directly from the VetJobs site to a Maid Brigade URL.
RESULTS
The combined total for VetJobs is 845. Military.com/Monster.com delivered only 44. In total, VetJobs delivered 19.2 more applicants than did Military.com/Monster.com.
On the direct site to site referrals where candidates clicked on a hotlink to go to the Maid Brigade promotional URL, VetJobs delivered 289 versus Military.com/Monster.com 44. On site to site referrals VetJobs delivered 6.5 times more applicants that Military.com/Monster.com.
This case study confirms again the effectiveness of VetJobs and how VetJobs dominates the military and veteran market space.
3. US Chamber Veteran Event in November
On November 12 the United States Chamber of Commerce’s National Chamber Foundation will host its second annual Business Steps Up: Hiring Our Heroes summit to focus on employment issues facing returning military, veterans, reservists, National Guard and their families. Key leaders of the U.S. military and members of the veteran’s affairs community, including keynote speaker General Eric Shinseki, will discuss ways the private sector can support our returning military personnel while benefitting from that workforce’s extensive training and experience. For more information, please visit http://ncf.uschamber.com/businessstepsup2009/. If you attend, please be sure to tell the Chamber you heard about the event via VetJobs Early Eagle!
/—October Agency Eagle sponsor is TECHEXPO Top Secret—-\
TECHEXPO Top Secret’s next job fairs are:
10/6, TECHEXPO Top Secret Career Fair, Doubletree Hotel Colorado Springs, 1775 E Cheyenne Mountain Blvd, Colorado Springs, CO, 10:00 AM to 3:00 PM. Pre-register at http://www.techexpoUSA.com/index_VJS.cfm
10/6, TECHEXPO Top Secret Career Fair, Doubletree Hotel Colorado Springs, 1775 E Cheyenne Mountain Blvd, Colorado Springs, CO, 10:00 AM to 3:00 PM. Pre-register at http://www.techexpoUSA.com/index_VJS.cfm
10/20, TECHEXPO Top Secret Career Fair, BWI Marriott, 1743 West Nursery Road, Baltimore, MD, 10:00 AM to 3:00 PM. Pre-register at http://www.techexpoUSA.com/index_VJS.cfm
10/21, TECHEXPO Top Secret Career Fair, Sheraton Reston, 11810 Sunrise Valley Drive, Reston, VA, 10:00 AM to 3:00 PM. Pre-register at http://www.techexpoUSA.com/index_VJS.cfm
TECHEXPO Top Secret job fairs bring you face to face with security-cleared professionals. For 2009 event schedule, contact Nancy Mathew 212-655-4505 x225 or NMathew@TechExpoUSA.com. http://www.TechExpoUSA.com
\—–Please visit your October Agency Eagle sponsor TECHEXPO Top Secret —-/
4. History of Columbus Day
The first recorded celebration honoring the discovery of America by Europeans took place on October 12, 1792 in New York City. The event, which celebrated the 300th anniversary of Columbus’ landing in the New World, was organized by The Society of St. Tammany (also known as the Columbian Order). San Francisco’s Italian community held their first Columbus Day celebration in 1869. In 1892, President Benjamin Harrison urged citizens to participate in the 400th anniversary celebration of Columbus’ first voyage. It was during this event that the Pledge of Allegiance, written by Francis Bellamy, was recited publically for the first time. Colorado was the first state to observe the holiday in 1905. In 1937, President Roosevelt proclaimed October 12 as “Columbus Day” and in 1971, President Nixon declared the second Monday of October a national holiday.
5. History of Navy Day
In the United States, the Navy League of the United States organized the first Navy Day in 1922, holding it on October 27 because it was the birthday of the Navy-supporting President Theodore Roosevelt. Although meeting with mixed reviews the first year, in 1923 over 50 major cities participated, and the United States Navy sent a number of its ships to various port cities for the occasion. The 1945 Navy Day was an especially large celebration, with President Harry S. Truman reviewing the fleet in New York Harbor. In 1949, Louis A. Johnson, secretary of the newly-created Department of Defense, directed that the U.S. Navy’s participation occur on Armed Forces Day in May, although as a civilian organization the Navy League was not affected by this directive, and continued to organize Navy Day celebrations as before. In the 1970s, the “birthday” of the Continental Navy was found to be October 13, 1775, and so CNO Admiral Elmo R. Zumwalt worked with the Navy League to define October 13 as the new date of Navy Day.
6. Discriminatory Twist in Networking Sites Puts Recruiters in Peril
The following information is summarized from an article by Fay Hansen at Workforce Management.
Sourcing applicants from Twitter or LinkedIn or screening candidates through Facebook or MySpace may open employers to discrimination charges.
In the rush to cut recruiting budgets and avoid the avalanche of résumés now generated by job boards, employers are increasingly tapping professional and social networking sites as a sourcing tool. Some employers now rely heavily or even exclusively on Twitter or LinkedIn to fill open positions. While this approach may create short-term cost savings and new efficiencies, it may also skew applicant pools and trigger discrimination lawsuits.
“Networking sites, including Twitter, exclude whole populations,” says Jessica Roe, managing partner at Bernick, Lifson, Greenstein, Greene & Liszt in Minneapolis. “We are going to end up with a very homogenous workforce. The social networks represent limited social groups and very small labor pools. It’s an enormous issue……Social networking sites are problematic because the population is limited and highly selective,” Roe notes. “I anticipate more race and age claims over the next two years, and a significant portion will be from sourcing through social networking sites, where the users are generally white and age 20 to 40. We’ll see lawsuits.” According to the latest data from Quantcast, only 5% of LinkedIn users are black and only 2% are Hispanic.
Using networks for recruiting is ripe with risk for future discrimination claims, says Pamela Devata, a partner at Seyfarth Shaw in Chicago. “Sourcing from professional network sites such as LinkedIn carries a risk that the method could be challenged on discrimination grounds,” Devata says. “It represents a hiring pool that is not open to the general population. Using a limited network may have a disparate impact. If hiring through these networks can be challenged, it will be.” Employers should consider the risk of litigation arising from disparate impact claims.
Employers who rely heavily on professional and social networks for sourcing candidates may also encounter record-keeping issues. “When the OFCCP [Office of Federal Contract Compliance Programs] or plaintiffs’ attorneys come along with a discovery request and want to see the trail for recruiting, these employers are going to come up short,” Mollica warns. “The problem they will have created is that the data and the paper will not be there, and they will only have evidence in digital form on smart phones and flash drives. How will they pull it together? Employers will be left throwing up their hands. Worse yet, when the EEOC comes knocking to investigate a complaint, the records are in a digital mist, and that could be a terrible problem. It’s risky because the records aren’t there.”
When sourcing is complete and recruiters move into the selection phase, using social networks to screen candidates generates additional legal risks. “The use of the Internet to screen candidates exposes recruiters to information on individuals who are members of groups protected under federal law,” Mollica notes. Some of the information recruiters gain from Facebook or MySpace pages, such as race and gender identification, would normally be available on applications or in interviews. “But identifiers that might not normally be apparent, such as religion, pregnancy, age and sexual orientation, may be revealed on social networking sites,” Mollica notes. “The risk is that visiting Facebook or MySpace pages or even Googling candidates may reveal information that no employer should have in a properly constructed application or interview.” Consequently, recruiters must think carefully about what they may find before they troll social networking sites.
In addition, record keeping becomes an issue. “It is perilous to search the Internet for information about candidates without keeping a record,” Mollica notes. “But where does that record live? On every office computer, on the recruiter’s home computer, on smart phones? What happens is that a judge or jury draws an inference that if you didn’t maintain records, the records must have been prejudicial.”
7. Flag Etiquette
The Flag Code, a national guideline on ways in which the flag is to be respected, states that no disrespect should be shown to the flag of the United States of America. When rendering the Pledge of Allegiance, persons should stand at attention, face the flag, and if in uniform, salute, or otherwise place the right hand over the heart. Persons wearing the caps of veteran service organizations may salute. Uniformed organizations like Boy Scouts and Girl Scouts should render respect to the flag in accordance with the traditions of the organization whose uniform they are wearing.
8. National Guard and Reserve Mobilized as of September 29, 2009
The total number currently on active duty from the Army National Guard and Army Reserve is 109,188; Navy Reserve, 6,405; Air National Guard and Air Force Reserve, 15,949; Marine Corps Reserve, 8,559; and the Coast Guard Reserve, 656. This brings the total National Guard and Reserve personnel who have been activated to 140,757, including both units and individual augmentees. A cumulative roster of all National Guard and Reserve personnel who are currently activated may be found at http://www.defenselink.mil/news/Sep2009/d20090929ngr.pdf
9 Significant Events this Month in Military History
1781 – British troops under General Lord Charles Cornwallis surrendered to General Washington at Yorktown, Virginia, effectively ending the American Revolution.
1775 – The US Navy was established.
1901 – The first British Navy submarine was commissioned.
1944 – Battle of Leyte Gulf
1950 – The invasion of North Korea started.
1952 – Battle of Hill 598 began, Korean War
1957 – The Soviet Union launched Sputnik I, first man-made earth satellite.
1962 – The U.S. began its blockade of Cuba to compel the Russians to remove long-range missiles aimed at the United States.
1964 – The Chinese exploded their first atomic bomb.
1965 – The Battle of the La Drang Valley, Vietnam War.
1968 – The Bombing of North Vietnam ended.
1969 – Battle of Loc Ninh, Vietnam War
1971 – Operation Jefferson Glenn, the last major operation in which US ground forces participated in Vietnam
1973 – Egypt and Syria launched military offensive against Israel
1983 -Terrorist attack on Marine Barracks, Beirut
1983 – Operation Urgent Fury, Grenada
1993 – Battle of Bakhara Market, Mogadishu, Somalia
2000 – Bombing of the USS Cole by Al-Qaeda terrorists
2001 – Operation Enduring Freedom began in Afghanistan
2001 – War on Terror Began
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VetJobs is exclusively sponsored and partially owned by the Veterans of Foreign Wars of the United States (www.vfw.org) and endorsed by The Vietnam Veterans of America (www.vva.org), the Naval Reserve Association (www.navy-reserve.org), the Veterans of Modern Warfare (www.vmwusa.org), the Student Veterans of America (www.studentveterans.org), the Military Order of the Purple Heart (www.purpleheart.org) and Hope4Heroes (www.hope4heroes.org).
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VetJobs is an appropriate employment service delivery system for EEOC, VEVRAA/JVA and OFCCP compliance support!
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