Dear APSO Conference Attendees

Thank you for your commitment and support through attending this year’s APSO Conference. We would have loved to host each and everyone within the recruitment space and broader but quite understandably, circumstance dealt us a challenging hand this year 2020. Nevertheless, we will continue building and fostering our relationship as evidenced by one of the key take-aways which was building trust whilst engaging in collaboration.

A special thanks to all our keynote speakers for bringing your expertise and experience around the table and engaging in such fruitful, constructive and open exchanges throughout the day of the APSO Virtual Conference. It is refreshing and encouraging that you have committed to continuous engagement with all attendees within the recruitment industry and beyond.

To our sponsors, we salute you for making our event possible.

Many thanks for the leadership and support of our APSO President Tsholo Ramodibe and his co-chairs including the APSO team for bringing such an innovative top-notch Conference.

Significant ground was covered across the various facets that make up the recruitment industry framework. The agenda of the dialogue was Reform, Revival, Recovery and several key take-aways came out of this thematic Conference.

We noted that moving forward to 2021 the need is to focus on value and unique aspects of your service offerings to your clients in order to be able to stand out and be noticed. This can be supported by drawing up plans in 90-day blocks which helps drive and achieve your long-term goals. Fundamentally, we are identified by what we do and not by what we think, hence after setting those goals you need to execute them otherwise it will undo all the work you put into Reform, Revive, and Recover your business or career.

Despite 2020 having been a demanding year with a steep learning curve, it is reassuring that you came out of Conference with new determination and rejuvenated energy to focus on the way forward.

I would like to conclude by thanking all of you for your time and valuable insights. You are shaping an important future which will be used to advance the sustainable development of the Recruitment Industry.

I look forward to welcoming you again at the next APSO event.

Jacqui Ford

APSO CEO

Hey

Today's message is all about learning that action is the most powerful force you can wield on this earth!

When I was younger, I always thought that the people who went on to do amazing things were simply in a different league. Maybe they were super smart, or they were just born with incredible abilities that the rest of us don't have. But these days, I can tell you that this simply isn't true. Of course there are some exceptions, but even then there's more to the story than meets the eye.

Over the years, I have been very lucky to be able to interview many high performers, and I've come to see that most of them are ordinary people with extraordinary habits. Quite simply put, your habits influence every facet of your life. Better habits lead to better outcomes. We are effectively who we PRACTICE to be.

In other words, your actions are the single biggest contributor to your success. But most people wait for some kind of motivation to take action, when in reality it works the other way around. Action is what creates motivation.

The really interesting part is that there is always a story we are telling ourselves in our head, and these stories dictate why we take action, and why we don't. We have to get to a point that we are able to question the validity of every story we tell ourselves.

For the longest time, I could never train consistently at gym. I would be doing well for three months, and then fall off the bandwagon, and I could never understand why. And then as I started to do deeper work on myself, I started to understand that the story I was telling myself about training, motivation, and hard work was outdated. Once I fixed the narrative in my head, my training came right. It's been three years of consistent training without fail.

It's very difficult to paraphrase a very detailed topic like this into a short space, but what I'm trying to do is highlight some important points for you:

• You become the collection of tiny second-by-second and minute-by-minute decisions that you make each day.
• Your actions are preceded by subconscious stories in your head that you may not be aware of. Those are worth investigating.
• Asking yourself these questions is hard work. Not asking yourself these questions comes at a price too. What cost will you pick?

I promise you when this penny drops for you, your life will indeed change, but as always, this only happens when you put in the work.

..................................
Mark Sham <This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.>

• Working from home during the coronavirus pandemic has seen South Africa’s national office vacancy rate shoot to a 16-year high of 12.7%
• Real Estate Investment Trusts (REIT) are now rated as the worst-performing asset class on the JSE, losing more than half of their value in 2020
• Local company SiSebenza and Australia’s Office Hub believe this is the time for a "Tinder of the office rental market", with peer-to-peer space sharing.

Even after the pandemic has passed, offices are unlikely to just return to normal, both labour and property experts say. And as commercial property owners count their losses, landlords and tenants are quickly re-evaluating their options.

According to the latest report by the South African Property Owners Association (Sapoa), office vacancy rates have reached a 16-year high of 12.7%, while overall asking rental growth remains sub-inflation at 2.2%. Sapoa’s third-quarter survey notes that 2.4 million square metres of office space is available to let and that vacancy rates within the prime office segment are at an all-time high.

It's against this bare backdrop that South African company SiSebenza has partnered with Australia’s Office Hub to launch what they refer to as a Tinder-type service for property.

Recruiters, Inhouse and Agency, sometimes lapse into hubris and complacency.

This, we know. Don’t take offence. It’s a fact. I have been guilty myself.

The candidate experience has been a disaster for decades, ironically made exponentially worse by all the Wizz-bang technology tools, added in to ‘enhance the process’.

But now it’s potentially much worse.

The boot is seemingly on the foot of the hirer right now. We are in a recession. Some countries back in lock-down even. Jobs are hard to find. Agency recruiters are scrambling to secure scarce job-orders from tentative clients.

Meanwhile, candidate flow has increased in volume across the board.

Every day I hear of fresh appalling candidate experience situations. Lack of response. Bad or no communication. Lowballing on salaries. Offers reneged on. You know what I am talking about.

But beware my recruiting friends.

The talent shortages we all grappled with pre-COVID have not disappeared forever. COVID did not miraculously create more developers, UX designers, legal secretaries or forklift drivers.

Sure, right now, there may not be enough jobs to go around. But when the market recovers those talent shortages will re-emerge. Just worse! (the are already in Australia and NZ in some cases)

Looking after your candidates via simple behaviours, like responding, informing, providing feedback and coaching, is the right thing to do as a professional, empathetic human. Especially now.

But it’s also the commercially smart thing to do.

Because when the wheel turns, and candidates are in short supply again, trust me on this.

They will remember the companies and agencies who treated them like cattle. And the names of individual recruiters who demeaned and disappointed them will be burned on their brains.

And they will hurt you—a lot.

And you will deserve it.

Remember, please.

The candidate is assessing you too.

Watch my sixty-second video. Then show it to your whole team. Then come up with a plan to fix your candidate process.
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by Greg Savage

#newnormal #verify #employwithcaution #safetyisapriority #beintheknow

The fact is that Covid-19 has hit most of us square in the face, creating numerous challenges for our economy and society at large. Even more so in the case of parents with children under the age of 18.

Parents have to fend for their kids during these abnormal times, ensuring that education remains a priority. Quite a feat in South Africa, with schools and educational institutions being closed then opened, then closed (you get the idea). While most South Africans were confined to staying at home for the first few weeks even those fortunate enough to continue working, getting into “home schooling gear” was a massive change to adapt to across the board.

Presently, parents still remain at their wits end, without the support network of grandparents acting as caregivers, due to the risk of infection, and absence of the daily school routine, regardless that most of the country has returned to normal work activities or rather work activities under the #newnormal.

Subsequently, the employment of au pairs, bro-pairs (the male version), caregivers and home school teachers have spiked.

CHILDREN’S SAFETY COMES FIRST

The hand that rocks the cradle rules the world. A poem written by William Ross Wallace back in the 1800s and the theme of quite a disturbing movie in the 1980s.

How well do you know the person behind the CV?

Finding someone to look after your children to either act in a caregiving and supervisory capacity or take responsibility for children’s educational needs, is quite simple (if you can afford it). As a result of the Covid-19 pandemic, numerous new entrants to the childcare environment have emerged, with little discrepancies between supply and demand in terms of jobs vs candidates.

Parents may engage either with an agency or find someone themselves via social media. Employing au pairs and care givers may ensure that children are receiving adequate education and have supervision available to facilitate their academic and extramural activities. However, a significant concern is the lack of proper vetting and screening taking place. Parents should first be asking how they can secure the physical and emotional safety of their kids when left in the custody of an au pair, education professional or caretaker.

A STARTLING SURVEY

We did an informal survey to ascertain whether parents, as well as agencies, exert sufficient due diligence when acquiring the services of an au pair or caregiver.

Shockingly, very few agencies go beyond resume shortlisting, video interviewing, and perhaps a reference or two when allowing candidates to register on their database. In a similar fashion, parents will review an application and if they like what they see, have a quick discussion with the incumbent and in some instances do a reference from a previous employer is done with literally a name, surname and cell number. The majority of parents were satisfied with copies of written references, without considering the need to conduct a telephonic conversation with a previous employer.

When parents were questioned whether they have ever thought of doing criminal checks and ID verifications on the au pair, results were – ZERO!!! At least some of the agencies did ID Verifications, and a minimal number carried out a criminal check.

These results were split tested and uniformly confirmed when we had similar discussions with au pairs and caregivers to find out whether they were subjected to criminal screening. We were flabbergasted to discover that only one person recruited via an Agency had to participate in biometric screening.

KYC – KNOW YOUR CAREGIVER

Being “in the know’’ as to who takes care of your child should be a priority in the times we live in right now. Strict measures are followed in the USA where the hiring process of au pairs include criminal checks, social media screening, identify verification, psyche evaluations, competency assessments and references from previous employers. Additional checks are done to confirm that references provided are in fact from former employers.

It seems as if South African parents, are merely outsourcing the caregiving and educational function to whoever is available instead of who is morally capable.

Fortunately, in the formal education sector the “powers that be” have finally woken up to the realization our children are subjected to incredible physical, psychological, and emotional risks and that parties responsible for their wellbeing should be undergoing more stringent screening. It now mandated by SACE for teachers and other educational professionals to provide criminal clearance certificates before SACE accepts their registration.

CYBER THREATS

Temporary social distancing has proliferated the usage of eLearning functionalities, and many parents have opted for online educational solutions and will choose to do so regardless of whether schools are opening or not.

Online learning is a logical alternative for sure, but within this realm, the threat of cyber abuse is very imminent. We have to assure that the individual responsible for guidance, attention, and academic supervision on the other side of the screen, is in fact whom they say they are, with no unsavoury skeletons in the closet posing a potential risk to our children’s wellbeing.

HEARTS-EASE WITH HURU

At HURU, we are exceptionally well-positioned to assist educational professionals in the formal sector, as well as the informal sector, to get criminal checks and id verifications done. 

Furthermore, we may aid employers (whether agencies or parents themselves) to conduct background screening with quick and affordable verification solutions.

Concerned about the physicality of the biometric process? There is no need to risk potential candidates coming to your home for biometric screening. We offer a complete mobile solution and will send a certified fingerprint technician to a candidate’s preferred location to conduct screening. Another alternative is to send potential candidates to a Jetline or Postnet store that participates in the Capture Partner Network that we have in place.

For Agencies we offer and in-house solution where the HURU hardware may be purchased in conjunction with our software capturing application which may be downloaded at no charge.

This is more than a business for us. Let HURU be part of the solution to ensure the safety and wellbeing of your children during and after Covid-19. Whether your children are in preschool, high school, or somewhere in between, we can help you to execute adequate oversight as to whom you are entrusting your kids to. 

.........................................................................

Published by

Devin Ashman

Co-Founder & Director at Encapsulate Consulting | Co-Owner & Director at Huru Technologies

This local conference with a strong international flavour will offer insights into current global trends and recovery strategies to set you up for success!
Attendees will be able to:

• Watch the event program live - a video stream of sessions crammed full of insights from experts from the recruitment and staffing space as well as the wider business community 
• Engage with pre-recorded material - attendees will also be able to access a selected library of pre-recorded content which they can view at their leisure
• View the latest from our solution providers - our event partners will host dedicated pages to show you how their solutions can drive better business for your organisation 
• Revisit content - with so much on offer as part of the event, attendees will be able to revisit selected content until 15 December 2020
• With empowering keynotes and insightful panel sessions broadcast directly to you via an all-new conference format, you will be ready to embrace 2021 and move your business forward

The Covid-19 crisis has wrought disruption on economies and labour markets around the world and left millions of people out of work or with their livelihoods severely threatened. It has also laid bare the inadequacies of social protection systems in many countries and exposed gaping differences between the protections afforded to workers with an employment contract and those who are self-employed.

While the current crisis has served to increase the urgency of providing support to vulnerable workers, the underlying situation is not new. Governments have been slow to adapt their social protection systems and safety nets to meet emerging labour market trends.

Today’s labour markets offer a larger range of working arrangements than ever before – providing choice and flexibility to both employers and workers. While flexibility is key for well-functioning labour markets, this also needs to be balanced with sufficient levels of security and protection. To realise inclusive labour markets around the world, we must ensure that all workers have access to basic and adequate levels of social protection – regardless of their employment status.

The World Employment Confederation’s latest Social Impact Report, ‘Protecting people through times of crisis’ launched in July 2020, comes at a highly opportune moment. It explores levels of social protection coverage across diverse forms of work in some 42 countries around the world and identifies both where the shortcomings lie and the challenges to providing effective access to social protection for all.

Social protection systems ill-prepared to serve diverse forms of work

A key finding is that current social protection systems are ill-prepared to serve labour markets characterised by diverse forms of work. There are significant gaps in access to social protection between different employment statuses. This enhances the risks for some groups of workers and the unprecedented circumstances created by the Covid-19 crisis have left many workers exposed and in need of social support.

In most countries, workers with an employment contract receive largely similar access to statutory social protection branches. Workers with open-ended, temporary or agency contracts are entitled to benefits including unemployment benefits, paid sick leave, health insurance, labour accident/disability insurance, parental and childcare benefits and pensions.

The self-employed by contrast have access to statutory safety nets much less frequently.  Just 20% of countries surveyed offer the self-employed full statutory access to unemployment benefits. Often access to different social protection schemes is only partial or on a voluntary basis. Many self-employed people decide not to insure themselves in order to cut costs and be able to offer their services at more competitive prices.  This ‘moral hazard’ as it is known, results in underinsurance among the self-employed, thereby increasing their vulnerability.

The World Employment Confederation’s Social Impact Report 2020 further establishes that one particularly challenging feature of current social protection systems is the discrepancy between statutory or formal and effective access to social protection benefits for employed workers. In the case of unemployment and sickness, eligibility criteria, such as thresholds in terms of working days to be reached, can prevent some groups from accessing benefits.

Learning the lessons of Covid-19 and taking action for the future

Governments need to take action now and make basic, minimum levels of social protection available and accessible to all workers, irrespective of their work arrangements. The Covid-19 crisis provides an opportunity to speed up the innovation of safety nets to accommodate all and share costs, benefits and risks proportionately.

Protecting people also goes beyond the provision of basic safety nets. With the majority of the global workforce operating in the informal economy – over 80% – and hence the majority of the world’s population lacking any kind of social protection, efficient labour markets can play a crucial role in reducing risk and vulnerability. It requires the raising of employment levels, the facilitation of swift transitions between jobs and sectors and the implementation of life-long learning.

Throughout the Covid-19 crisis, the private employment services industry has taken a host of initiatives at both national and global level to support workers – ensuring access to support measures and relocating laid-off workers into new jobs in essential sectors. The sector’s role in facilitating labour market transitions and lifting people out of unemployment or inactivity plays an important role in driving labour market inefficiency and thereby reducing risk and vulnerability. On average, 12 months after having started in the sector, 73% of agency workers are either employed on an open-ended, fixed-term or agency work contract.

Through social dialogue the private employment services industry has developed initiatives to provide protections for a dynamic workforce, offering inspiration on how safety nets can be reformed to cover workers moving between jobs and sectors. We are ready and able to play an even greater role in working to deliver security to all workers and ensure higher levels of protection for people everywhere.

Denis Pennel

Managing Director, World Employment Confederation

@PennelDenis

Asking someone how they are just isn’t the same anymore

is not a pleasantry. Even when well-intended, the invitation comes with a pause and a breath. Neither one of us is sure we are sufficiently fortified for this to become a conversation.

How many caveats, allowances, and exceptions can one reasonably provide without turning a breezy and blithe throwaway question into an intervention, a rescue, an assurance, or a lifeline? You want to be available but don’t want to be held emotionally, hostage. I don’t want to be jilted, ignored, and dismissed… or too vulnerable and exposed.

“How are you?”

Rarely have I imbued an anodyne question with such meaning and weight. It becomes a calculation of the strength of my relationships + the genuine desire to want to know + the investment of both involved parties in giving a shit.

I went to the dentist today. I hadn’t been for a long time. Maybe a year? More than a year. In good times, when I could humblebrag about how busy I was and see-you-sometime-soon-but-I’m-flying-again-next-week-and-let’s-do-lunch-when-I’m-back, I neglected my dental health because I was so wonderfully, painfully, and luxuriously busy that my teeth could wait. They’ve always been there. They will be fine. After all, they’re teeth. Timeless and constant.

I don’t trust people with perfect white teeth… even though I want to be just like them.

In pandemic times, I neglected my dental health because I needed to tighten my belt and set some priorities. I don’t need dental health. I don’t need nice teeth, nor the premium cable plan. I don’t need the multiple subscriptions even though I want to support the media. I can buy the imperfect produce at a discount. The canned goods are on sale. I can read (or re-read) the books I already have. I can sit with my malocclusion and grind my teeth because that’s what anxious people do. I don’t trust people with perfect white teeth—obviously, they are self-involved—even though I want to be just like them.

My dentist and I have a curious relationship. I like her, and I trust her. Our rapport resembles something akin to 12-year-olds figuring out how to French kiss. We have some weird small talk, we laugh nervously but respectfully, and then I let her inside my mouth. We play around, I’ll try to do something useful and clever with my tongue, but then what? Mostly, it’s about keeping my mouth appropriately open without slobbering and experimenting in the moment how to breathe through my nose.

When she asked me, “How are you?” I paused.

Do I provide the safe and brief answer? The real answer, which might cost me a fortune in “additional service” fees? The philosophical and nuanced answer, mysterious enough in its omissions but suggestive enough in its implications to save me from having to admit that I’m something other than “okay?” The oblique and abstruse answer: “Well, I’m getting by…”

I settled for something economical, judicious, yet somewhat revealing.

“Um, every day is different. I have good days and bad days. It’s a very different world than when I saw you last year.”

Nice one, Anthony. You said nothing. That is like a dental diagnosis along the lines of: “You have somewhat white teeth stuck in your head that help you to chew on a mostly regular basis. Your teeth will serve you for basic functions until they don’t.”

In the attempt to be less burdensome, we say nothing.

I don’t fault my dentist for asking. She was being kind. I don’t even blame myself for having a bullshit answer. “How I am” seems to be in constant flux.

Moodiness and emotional lability used to be indicative of a diagnosable mental health disorder. When I was in graduate school in the early 1990s, studying psychopathology and the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, version whatever, we used to joke about how we each had at least four diagnosable mental illnesses.

Our Black colleagues, as well as women who had been in abusive relationships, reminded us of the Joseph Heller quotation from Catch-22: “Just because you’re paranoid doesn’t mean they’re not after you.”

If we aren’t “okay,” maybe there is a good reason for it.

They were right. Psychopathology assumes a perfect world in which deviations are, well, deviant. “Mental disorders” assume a world in which the normative answer to “How are you?” is “I’m just fine.”

Because you are paranoid doesn’t mean they’re not after you. Because you’re depressed doesn’t mean there isn’t cause for despair. Because you’re anxious doesn’t mean you shouldn’t be alarmed. Because you’ve forgotten what day it is doesn’t mean you are demented.

I forgot that today was Thursday… because these days, Thursdays don’t mean much.

If we aren’t “okay,” maybe there is a good reason for it. We would all do well to be more trauma-informed and to understand what “trauma” means.

“How are you?” isn’t just a greeting or a way of making nice. Maybe it is political. An existential pose. The impetus for a revolution. Of thought. Of reason. Of compassion. Of relationship.

Given the upheaval, the uncertainty, the chaos, the trauma, and the violence of the present, I’m less surprised by the question “How are you?” I remain confused by it, sometimes, but I’m intrigued by it as well. It’s a question worthy of a dissertation. An inquiry. An interrogation. A meditation. The small stuff — the inconsequential detail — is important and fundamental.

Perhaps we shouldn’t invest ourselves in dissertations and treatises, but rather, in openings of space, allowance, and recognition. For some, this precariousness is new. For others — those we love, work with, commune with, and think we know — it’s a state of chronic, tentative being.

“How are you?” is a getting-to-know-you and getting-to-love-you. A way of getting to see you more clearly. A long-awaited and overdue epiphany. I’m sorry it has taken so long.

“How are you?” wants to know. It is a question. A portal.

Let’s take the time.

A simple diagnosis that locates “the problem” as one of individual maladaptation to a world that is badly designed and configured does not seem to work anymore. What if we used the question “How are you?” as a starting point for authentic and empathic design — politically, economically, socially, and spiritually?

I am getting my teeth fixed because I see myself on Zoom more often than I would like, and I find myself distracted by people whose teeth look better than mine. If we are going to be meeting like this, I’d rather do so with nice teeth. Yes. I would like to look nice for you. I’m still ensnared and enthralled by wanting to be liked.

More importantly, I’m getting my teeth fixed because I am caring for myself. This is a hard time. With all that is going on, I don’t want to be hobbled by a toothache. I have had toothaches before, and they make me want to cut my head off. For now, it’s important to be present and to be here for all that will come. The decay and pain are already here, as is the desire to heal. I want to be able to say that I’m okay without lying.

“How am I? I’m doing as well as I can. I’m taking care of myself. It’s a crappy set of circumstances right now, and I know I have it better than many. I feel able and accountable. I have enough. I’m feeding myself.”

That is my answer. Today.

And how are you?
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