Despite the economy, most recruiting professionals I speak with are busy. As the head of global recruiting for Expedia (I have returned to the corporate world!), I can tell you that we’ve never been busier. Candidate applications are up more than 100% from last year, recruiting budgets and teams are smaller, but the business is growing, not shrinking like you might expect.
I feel like we’re on the cusp of another breakout period for our profession. Good stuff is ahead, and I’m excited to be part of it. As a regular ERE speaker, I’ve enjoyed networking with and learning from my colleagues over the past five years, and I’m thrilled and honored to be your ERE conference chair and MC for the Spring Expo March 15-17, 2010.
ERE has put together a great program for us. Some of the usual suspects, plus a bunch of newer faces. All ready to share best practices and help us improve our personal and organizational recruiting capabilities as we prepare for what will certainly be a year where our businesses need us more than ever.
So, what do we have lined up for you? Check out the speakers and topics here. Here are a few things I’m most excited about this year…
- GLOBAL: Almost every recruiting team I’ve worked with in the private sector is going global or is struggling to support global markets. ERE has put together a slate of great speakers who will share best practices for recruiting outside the US. A global mindset is key to taking our careers to the next level.
- BIG BUDGETS, BIG BRANDS … AND SMALL BUDGETS, SMALL BRANDS: We’ve got speakers from big companies like AT&T, Starbucks, Ernst & Young, Microsoft, and Sodexo — which is great. But the ERE team also listened to feedback that not all of us work for big-brand, big-resource companies, so you’ll find speakers this year who are from lesser-known companies that lack the big dough to spend on recruiting. In fact, we’re offering a special brainstorming session for companies without a big staff or budget.
- FROM INBOX RECRUITING TO SOMETHING MORE: A number of speakers will share how you can bring a headhunting orientation in-house and how you help your corporation (or government agency, or non-profit) achieve its business goals.
- SOCIAL MEDIA: It would be impossible to hold a recruiting conference in 2010 and not talk about social media’s impact on our worlds. We’ll learn about building talent communities at a company that has embraced social media, and how a conservative company convinced its organization to get on the bandwagon with great results.
- FUTURE OF TALENT ACQUISITION: Learn where “Top 100 Influencers” in our industry think recruiting is headed, and how we need to morph our thinking to remain relevant and add value in a world that’s changing.
- AND MORE: We’ll also have great topics around creating a phenomenal candidate experience, leveraging the right metrics, building a quality college recruiting and executive recruiting function, and a facilitated, audience driven Q&A session with ERE Excellence Award winners.
I’m excited to learn from our speakers and colleagues, get exposed to tools and partners that can help me recruit the best people, and build new connections that can help me grow as a recruiter and recruiting leader. I always leave ERE inspired to try new things, reframe critical conversations I’m having with the businesses I support, re-prioritize my workload, and put all of the great ideas into practice back home. I hope you’re able to join us this Spring in beautiful San Diego.