We can confirm a “massive” layoff tomorrow at CareerBuilder, but we’re waiting on official word, if any, from a spokesperson.
Rustling of the move first appeared on a comment from a recent post, saying “Some maintenance guys are carrying up about 300 boxes for everyone to pack your stuff up in at 200 N. LaSalle St in Chicago tomorrow. Merry Xmas CareerBuilder.”
Roughly one hour later, sources at CareerBuilder – some of whom were from those getting cut – confirmed the action. One described it as “God awful.”
This round of “rightsizing” is apparently the third since around summer 2008, however the first two were described as “pretty mild” compared to this action. Estimates are putting the number between 200-300, or roughly 10-15 percent of their labor force.
Also, unlike earlier trimmings, this round allegedly includes executives. We’ll be updating as we know more.
Update (12/4, 9:39 p.m., ET): The “big” layoffs are apparently actually happening tomorrow (Friday). Edits have been made to the post to reflect this change.
Update (12/7, 9 p.m., ET): No official word from the company to date on a headcount or percentage from Friday’s layoffs, but from what we can piece together through sources, no executives were cut on Friday. However, of the “several hundreds” laid off, one was a sales manager. How it went down: Apparently, certain groups were alerted via e-mail at 12:50 p.m., CT that at 1 p.m. they were to go to a conference. Those going to one room were safe, while those in the other were cut. Then, at 3:30 p.m., there was a company-wide conference call with CEO Matt Ferguson who communicated the difficulty of the day. Most people cut were apparently from the small business units, which call on companies with less than 100 employees. However, every unit was said to be “affected in some capacity.” Marketing was another department that may have been hit harder than most. Sources explained the firings were in large part due to the fact that “revenue is down 5 percent.” One source expressed fear that if the economic decline continues, there will be more cuts.
Popularity: 31% [?]
December 5th, 2008 at 2:18 am
It just seemed like yesterday I was at a party and Monster reps were popping bottles of Dom Perignon at $150….money was just a flowin 10 years ago… I really think this recession will take down 1-2 big players and reshape an industry. Consolidation is another option, but can some of these highly charged sales egos, who have had equally charged bonus structures live a normal comp lifestyle??
I am very curious as to which of the “Big 3″ fall first? – Cheez any prediction?? How about a poll?
December 5th, 2008 at 10:21 am
Interesting that a company with so much focus on headcount is now cutting….Starting to look like the good times are over.
December 5th, 2008 at 10:48 am
I was axed a few months ago. Heads continue to roll. Most people I know are gone and those who have been performing reps were given the boot.
A conference call is scheduled for 1:00PM today CST. All people are sent into specific conference rooms based on who they are. I figure they will get the axe there. Happy Holidays
December 5th, 2008 at 11:19 am
It seems people at the office are scared right now cuz of this article. There is no indication that the conference rooms we’re being put into are specific to “who we are”. Most people, even management, don’t seem to know of any kind of lay off though. Either case, top performs are getting a boost in 2009 so maybe CB is just becoming a little more lean during tough job board times. It’ll all pick back up. The timing is pretty poor but this is still a strong company.
December 5th, 2008 at 12:03 pm
Yeh there has been 1.2 million job lost in US over the last 3 months.Unfortunately the people making millions are still doing so. For example a law firm in Boston “Wilmer Cutler Pickering Hale and Dorr”. An associate 26 years old just out of law school makes $200000, is not at all worried about their jobs. We need to pay closer attention to these ind of sleazy organization who are still making their billions.
December 5th, 2008 at 12:04 pm
As long as I’m getting paid I don’t care. I’ll continue running this into the ground and brag to people on how many condo’s I own.
December 5th, 2008 at 12:46 pm
I think that the minorities will be the first to get the ax…after that people who havent hit quota will go…activity alone will not save the people who have been dragged along
December 5th, 2008 at 12:47 pm
I think that there is alot of misconception about whats going on here. The top divisions of CareerBuilder are still performing at or close to plan; and for the reps who are doing the same there is really no concern. The company is still strong and to criticize the right sizing of an organization in this economy seems fruitless. Everyone is struggling in one degree or another. If we lose anyone (which I am sure we will) it wont be from their money making sales force. It will be from where they can afford to.
I feel like this articles respondants have been very quick to point and laugh or, on the other side, quick to jump to conclusions. Relax!
December 5th, 2008 at 1:05 pm
“I think that if rape is inevitable, relax and enjoy it.” Bob Knight. This is being blown out of proportion, BUT…if it happens, it happens.
December 5th, 2008 at 1:11 pm
I think the number of employees who might be cut is being over estimated. I work in the office where the cuts are rumored to be taking place and I do not see large stacks of boxes. There is a buzz going around about this article but nobody seems all that worried. I also agree with the Captain above. If you are preforming you are safe. In a sales organization they are not going to get rid of the profit makers. It’s a tough economy and in order for the business as a whole to prosper cuts have to be made. I don’t think this makes CB heartless in anyway. Best of luck to anyone who gets the axe.
December 5th, 2008 at 1:13 pm
I think that 1pm is dooms day for many people, who honestly, deserve to be fired. They simply dont work, dont sell and just read these damn websites all day. Leaning down the company should have been done the whole time there have been dead weight, especially in sales positions. Good job CB, let go of the people who dont deserve to get paid the little they do get. Now go live off the government and make the same wage, sitting at home in your boxers playing Madden ‘09
December 5th, 2008 at 2:09 pm
I can pretty much say this is true since I was laid off a couple weeks ago along with about 30 others and some of my freinds myspaced me last night that our account management and sales directors told them yesterday that there was a big layoff tomorrow. But they have been doing this for weeks but it hasnt been this bad but I really feel bad that the economy is so bad careerbuilder has to do this and good people have to loose there jobs.
December 5th, 2008 at 2:17 pm
Careerbuilder gives employment advice and in reality practices the exact opposite.
The attitude of this VP is truely amazing.
>>>Hunter Says:
>>>December 5th, 2008 at 12:04 pm
>>>As long as I’m getting paid I don’t care. I’ll continue running this >>>into the ground and brag to people on how many condo’s I own.
December 5th, 2008 at 2:19 pm
I heard they’re having a draft right now to see who stays …
December 5th, 2008 at 2:23 pm
Careerbuilder gives employment advice to others but in reality practices the exact opposite.
The attitude of this VP is truely amazing.
>>> Hunter Says:
>>> December 5th, 2008 at 12:04 pm
>>> As long as I’m getting paid I don’t care. I’ll continue running
>>> this into the ground and brag to people on how many condo’s I own.
December 5th, 2008 at 2:36 pm
I love everyone’s speculation on all of this. Yes the economy sucks right now, yes people at CB are losing their jobs. Is there any point to guess and make rumors to put everyone in a panic? People just love drama and this gives them something to talk about.
Also, I work at CareerBuilder and I haven’t heard anything about any conference call at 1:00PM central time.
December 5th, 2008 at 2:41 pm
I think for large incumbent job boards there is a combination of problems. You have your standard shrinking economy and much less demand from employers to post jobs or search resumes. You also have your past customers abandoning the “pay-to-post” pricing model in favor of less risky and more affordable alternatives to recruiting staff. The legacy job boards are hurtin for certain. As the joker says, “This town needs an enema”
December 5th, 2008 at 2:42 pm
This is in response to the person who wrote the “Glad I’m Gone” post.
Do you really think a well respected VP of a large company would post something like that? I really hope you’re smarter than that and understand that anyone can post someone’s name on this site and post an idiotic posting like that.
December 5th, 2008 at 3:08 pm
I’m in the meeting now and they just said they are eliminating the entire Atlanta office!
December 5th, 2008 at 3:16 pm
You know careerbuilder is a messed up company. You have a woman named Hope that has no clue on how to run an advertising division. You moron do you really think recruiters will buy all your ad space, Monster would of done it years ago. And it is funny I heard all your major advertisers cancelled ads when you switched ad servers, good job. How is it you get paid again?
December 5th, 2008 at 3:25 pm
Hey Joel,
Have there been any updates or confirmation of the number of layoffs? I haven’t heard anything on the web. You, of course, can find out!
Thanks.
December 5th, 2008 at 3:38 pm
They should never cut out of town reps, we do jobs from home. Leave us alone.
December 5th, 2008 at 3:57 pm
I highly doubt the entire atlanta office is being laid off.
December 5th, 2008 at 4:10 pm
how many have been canned so far?
December 5th, 2008 at 4:21 pm
I just got laid off an hour ago with a group of 20.
Just 1 area of CB, in one office.
December 5th, 2008 at 4:22 pm
They just cut about 1/3 of our staff here in the ATL! Merry Christmas to us I guess!
December 5th, 2008 at 4:25 pm
i know from folks who just out of meetings that they did indeed layoff between 300-400
December 5th, 2008 at 4:29 pm
I can confirm that they have laid off at least 100 sales reps in the O’hare office. As I am one of them. Best of luck to everyone out there! The bitter irony of the whole ordeal is that now I have to look for a new job on Careerbuilder.com.
December 5th, 2008 at 4:31 pm
Got the axe along with 30 of my fellow employees at 2pm EST at the Atlanta office. Layoffs seem to be random, and affect tenured, well-performing reps all the way down to the new hires.
They gave us no notice (ok, 10 minutes notice), basically sent out an email that said “get your stuff and get out.” I’ve never seen a more under-handed move by CB.
December 5th, 2008 at 4:39 pm
Yeah I was at the O’hare office where they laid off about 100-150. You know it is bad when the HR people come in with Kleenex and Matt F. the CEO of Careerbuilder.com is in a suit with a frown on his face. There seemed to be no rational for the people who were cut.
People who have been there for 2 months and haven’t made a sale stayed, I’ve performed over 150% of my numbers and I got cut, I would love to be a fly on that wall when they made those decisions…
I gotta say though if you gotta go being laid off by the CEO personally telling you is pretty good, I got some nice severance and I guess I get a long X-mas break…
Som
December 5th, 2008 at 4:43 pm
One of the many axed today.
I’m guessing every area was given a percentage they needed to reduce their headcount and did so accordingly.
They ignored layoff/firing rule #1 – do it at the end of the day, so that you give people dignity/privacy. (And send others happily home early on a Friday, so that the departed can pack up and leave in peace.) Instead, people walked around with a big scarlet E for Eliminated on their forehead.
For people who are supposed to be experts at jobs, they sure have a few things to learn about talent management and treating employees.
December 5th, 2008 at 4:46 pm
In response to jo momma:
3000 have. They lost all their clients except for one for being shady and it finally caught up to them!
Oh wait, there is another CB rep going over the decision makers head again!!! Make it 3001.
December 5th, 2008 at 4:49 pm
Leave it to careerbuilder to fire everyone be4 xmas but probably still spend millions on super bowl ads, which by the way were the worst ever last year. Hmmmm does richard c. still have a job after making those decisions?
December 5th, 2008 at 4:51 pm
I just got out of the meeting. Most people are gone from this office. (200) It’s sad but they gave their reasoning and it seemed business sound. Good luck to all who got let go.
CB did as good of a job as they could dealing with this situation. If you hear otherwise it’s mainly because the person is bitter.
December 5th, 2008 at 4:57 pm
Just a week ago it was Chrysler, this week it’s Career Builder, and tomorrow it’s you. Or your Mom. Or your spouse.
I want to know: where are people finding work, these days? Who the hell is hiring, anymore?
December 5th, 2008 at 4:57 pm
*****************************************************
i use to work at cb.com (2 months ago) in atlanta and just got word today they they laid a lot of people off! THIS IS VERY TRUE!!!!!
I feel so sorry for my old friends! for a long time I felt like cb.com was a safe place to work! but i see now no where is safe!
*****************************************************
December 5th, 2008 at 4:59 pm
Yeah it was a reasonable thing business wise.
My team can afford it.
I can’t, oh well.
Most people gone? Which office?
I was in Tech in Atl.
December 5th, 2008 at 5:00 pm
I don’t want to get into an online foray about if those are bitter or not, I just know that looking around the room there wasn’t really a pattern especially who hit there numbers two months in a row, but what’s done is done. I know my ex-co workers are gonna be getting some getting some decent accounts
December 5th, 2008 at 5:15 pm
if you get canned from CB see it as a god send. Do you REALIZE how many other sales jobs are out there with bases salaries that are more than TWENTY FIVE F’ING GRAND and you get a % of what you sell, you dont get raped when you dont hit qouta even if you are only a dollar short
embrace it people. go out. get drunk. then hit the pavement and get yourselves a new, better j-o-b
December 5th, 2008 at 5:23 pm
I worked for CB in the past year and saw this coming from a mile away. Careerbuilder had grown into the kind of company that had figure heads for Directors and operated like an arrogant 14 year old child, masking bad ethical decisions as business-savvy moves.
It is really sad that this continues to happen over and over, companies fail because of leadership, yet the frontline employees are the ones who get trampled.
For those who lost your job, good luck, there is a lot of competition out there.
For those who still have yours, rape the company for all the money you can while you are there, for they will surely rape you if given the chance.
December 5th, 2008 at 5:24 pm
Not all of us were in sales making 25k base…
I’d say I was well compensated for my job.
I loved my job, actually.
December 5th, 2008 at 5:24 pm
Good call cbforthe win, good call haha
December 5th, 2008 at 5:26 pm
To the CB people that were laid off, don’t go use CB, use Monster.com or if need be yahoo. Your company did not show you loyalty, don’t show it loyalty.
CB has just used the race to the bottom mentality in selling there stuff, give away everything. Well eventually what you give away is your revenue and it looks like a lot of peoples jobs.
When they sold the stock for so little you knew that layoffs were coming.
December 5th, 2008 at 5:26 pm
Nice severece package?! WTF!? 1 weeks pay for every year worked? The shelf life of CB employees is less than two years. “Thanks for all your hard work this morning, watch for your $50 check in the mail.” There is no logical reason for why people were let go. People who were hitting quota got canned. People who got to stay were told those let go were getting “hefty” severence packages. 1 weeks pay is not hefty, nor is it nice. Read “Winning” by Jack Welch. You didn’t do this right CareerBuilder. Happy Holidays.
December 5th, 2008 at 5:28 pm
Did they send out this article prior to layoffs
http://www.careerbuilder.ca/Article/CB-347-Workplace-Issues-Six-Ways-to-Prepare-for-a-Layoff/?ArticleID=347&cbRecursionCnt=1&cbsid=29b6958ba040455a8a1423d24e91a449-281809646-KA-5&ns_siteid=ns_us_g_careerbuilder_layoffs
December 5th, 2008 at 5:35 pm
I understand layoffs are necessary at the moment but there is no rhyme or reason for who was cut. I mean, there were people who hit 200% of quota every month. There were some of the hardest workers (upper level employees). A girl on my team in the non-cut group actually stood up and asked what the reason was because she said she didn’t know why she was there and I wasn’t. Managers had no idea it was happening. You would think that they would ask them who they would like to keep. Seriously, how did they not have any input. They are the ones that work with us every day. They told us they didn’t see us as being able to grow in the company. Really? You don’t think that our managers would be the people that know the best for that one?
December 5th, 2008 at 5:39 pm
Laurie – There are still a few people hiring although I agree its a little scary. if there are any laid off Careerbuilder Sales Reps in the NYC tri state area or even not in the area – I want to hire you today! Want to work for a well funded and quickly growing employment platform? You can apply here:
http://sciam.realmatch.com/affiliatePages.aspx?pg=planding.aspx&positionid=3752337&sourceid=30
or email me at rcosentino (at) realmatch.com.
To anyone looking now, Realmatch has over 142,000 active jobs (not at realmatch but with other companies) waiting to be matched with candidates.
December 5th, 2008 at 5:40 pm
CareerBuilder just quotes as saying they are keeping SB Ads
“Year after year, it makes business sense and branding sense for us, being able to reach 90 million to 100 million in the U.S.,” says Cynthia McIntyre, CareerBuilder.com’s senior director of advertising. “It has great timing for us. Employers are looking at a fresh, new calendar year and new budgets. We see a clear ROI from the Super Bowl — a job-seeker traffic surge, a surge in applications.”
December 5th, 2008 at 5:46 pm
I don’t understand them either.
I was a non quota salary employee.
My manager had no clue, he seemed to be more shocked than myself.
Unable to grow – BS, I JUST finished a week long IT class to the tune of a couple grand. In fact, I went in the office right after finishing the exam, and bam, laid off. So I was ‘growing’ right in until this afternoon apparently.
December 5th, 2008 at 5:52 pm
Well, it’s true and it sucks. I can understand the decision to eliminate jobs to remain competitive. The thing that pisses me off, is that they straight up told everyone, that it wouldn’t happen until the 1st of January; and that they FLAT OUT SAID, there won’t be a “doom’s day” where it just happens. It was supposed to be a gradual lowering through natural routes. Not a company-wide, go get your phone and leave, chopping block.
Like I said, I understand it from a business sense. But laying off A game players instead of C players…hmm sounds like something that was constantly drilled from upper-level…
anyways, to everyone who was in the cattle-slaughter house today..Good look finding jobs, stay optimistic, if at all..(if you were one of us who did hit #’s and still got canned) walk away knowing you sold literally one of the toughest products to sell in this economy….jobs.
And to those who are still over there…beware..the manner in which they treated their now-former employees today; could be replicated to you any day soon…maybe this Monday? Christmas Eve? Do what you can and everything else is out of your hands.
December 5th, 2008 at 5:56 pm
This is something that was coming for awhile. I will say I was a long tenured member of the Atlanta office and a bunch of folks were shocked when I left. As somebody who wasn’t in sales, I always told the folks around me “If you can show why your boss would miss you, when ish hits the fan, you’ll be ok” The 2 people from my former team, I hate to say it, but they were the bottom folks who were let go and sadly I say “Good Riddance”
Other folks included were on disiplinary action as well. Yes some good people got cut, but this is something that I believe is going to be better for them in the long run. To quote an old coach of mine…
“Sometimes you gotta shake the tree and let the dead leafs fall”
Once again, not trying to be mean, but you gotta do what you gotta do.
December 5th, 2008 at 6:03 pm
The company often boasted about never laying anyone off. Prayerfully those let go will find something bigger and better. The company didnt treat the ATL employees to well.
December 5th, 2008 at 6:04 pm
Now go take a vacation at one your “Condos” Hunter!!!
December 5th, 2008 at 6:04 pm
echo is hiring! send me your resume at smagsiu9999@yahoo.com
its 10 times better then CB
December 5th, 2008 at 6:06 pm
Just got the axe too. They were good to me but I’m out looking now and not going to post my resume on CB. Found a site that will get my resume to Monster and a bunch of other sites for free, http://www.gadball.com. Looks pretty good.
Thanks for the merry x-mas, cb!
Good luck to all.
December 5th, 2008 at 6:27 pm
Rafael – your site doesn’t work. I registered to check it out and when i login it errors out. What’s your email, I have a business opportunity for you.
December 5th, 2008 at 6:42 pm
jo momma is trying to sell the careerbuilder resume databse illegally..NICE
December 5th, 2008 at 7:02 pm
jo mamma – Site is up..no problems. rcosentino (a) realmatch.com
December 5th, 2008 at 7:35 pm
Ok, everyone needs to just cool it. Let’s face it… newsflash the economy SUCKS! It’s not just CareerBuilder it’s everywhere you look, on every tv station, radio, newspaper and right now it’s not getting any better. Of course CareerBuilder was going to be effected especially being directly involved in the job market. It’s nobody’s fault not the business itself, the executives, or employees.
Right now those who fortunately still do have jobs should be more concerned how they can better target employers on finding their perfect candidate to help their businesses. Work as hard as you can, stay focused, and ALWAYS remember it’s business not personal.
December 5th, 2008 at 7:43 pm
Sorry to all those who were let go but lets not ignore the facts. This is a business. This is a business that is built around agility and the ability to adapt to the market. The market is down, jobs are down, headcount must follow. Don’t badmouth CB, bad mouth the big players in the economy that let this happen. Those of you complaining about your 25k base sales salery obviously never did your dials and hit those kicker checks. It is sales, you need to claw, bite, and chase the money. Its a good product (better than the other sites people on this board are hyperlinking) but it is DIRECTLY tied to the labor market. Best of luck to all of you in your search for a job but please remember CB is just doing what it must.
December 5th, 2008 at 8:20 pm
We were lied to plain and simple. When the financial crisis occurred in September, I seem to remember an email by a certain CEO, that said not to worry and that they might need to trim a little, but those trims would come from not filling vacancies. He said that the company was financially sound? Then they pull this. I understand that it’s only business but I do not believe that this just snuck up on the management team. Cutting 10-15% of your labor force takes consideration and time to plan. They willfully lied to 2,500 people. This deception is despicable they let us believe that all was well, when it fact it wasn’t. I guess you can look at the CB management team one of two ways either they are liars or they are incompetent! Great timing a week after the start of holiday shopping, Glad I kept the receipts. So much for “Candor!”
December 5th, 2008 at 9:10 pm
I left CB almost a year ago – I saw this coming… From what I gather, if you weren’t “drinking the Kool-aid” and were hitting your target #s (in sales) you got the axe… really sad.
I agree with an earlier post.. there are so many better jobs out there… so many sales reps at CB are quite young and don’t know any better. Companies are hiring GOOD sales people. So take a day off, a week off, then hit the pavement… you don’t need a base of $25k-$35k… many companies are hiring at $65k+ with comp plans at $150k and up… Good luck.
My advice. Work hard, focus, have passion for what you do!
Good luck Ex CB’ers…..
December 5th, 2008 at 9:36 pm
I got the axe today too. I could not believe it. They called us in a conference room at 1pm and told us that our jobs had been eliminated and they were sorry. I had been with them for 5 years, held several different positions. I lost all respect for CB and the CEO who just 2 weeks ago told us that they would not lay-off anyone, they would simply not fill a position that is vacant. This was my career!! I had a corporate non-sales job. Now i have to start all over…
December 5th, 2008 at 9:55 pm
All in all it was about 300 people across the US laid off. They explained that in preparation for this possibility they stopped filling positions of people let go back in July, in September they thought we’d be ok, but after everything in November they realized the economy was worse than they could have predicted, and in order to not “starve the people that were here at the expense of keeping everyone” they had to cut some to maintain benefits for the ones they knew they’d still need to keep everything running. All in all they lost a ton of sales reps that catered to small businesses, obviously because a lot went under and they just couldn’t keep them on with fewer people to service.
December 5th, 2008 at 10:03 pm
that’s pretty crazy that the CEO told you no lay offs and then turned around and did the opposite if that is indeed the case.
December 5th, 2008 at 10:31 pm
I was one of the first 50 employees of Headhunter.net and stayed with Cb for a few years after the merger. Made a lot of money had a great time. But then the company really started to change. Promotions were made based more on who drank Mary D’s koolaid than actual talent. There is a VP there(BP) who is Mary’s best friend who is absolutely clueless–iun my current role I’ve had some dealings with her and am amazed she still has a job! And a friend of mine who is still in managment at CB has told me quite a few amusing stories of her having absolutely no clue what she is doing. Mary and her cronies ruined that company–they take care of their own little clique and everyone else be damned.
Sure the economy has an effect on CB, but bad decisions have caught up with them more than anything else. I am sure more layoffs are to come!
December 5th, 2008 at 10:36 pm
I was one of the lucky ones who did not lose their jobs at the O’Hare office today. It seems like it doesn’t matter which side of the table you were on.. today just sucked all around.
We lost friends and team mates today.. and not all the cuts made sense. There were good reps in that room today that, in the eyes of their colleagues and leaders, did not deserve to be there. There were others however whose performances in past months clearly warranted what happened today. And there are reps who kept their jobs today that people are equally mystified about…
I will say that, while I understand that business is business… and that in order to keep afloat in a tough economic climate sometimes CEOs and leaders have to make difficult decisions, the manner in which things were conducted today can only be described as cold and mechanical.. with a tinge of shady thrown in for fun.
I’m not going to bad mouth CB or Matt Ferguson.. I don’t think anyone wanted it to come to this… it just blows. FOR EVERYONE.
Good luck to all of you who were let go today… all of us still at CB will miss you.
December 5th, 2008 at 10:39 pm
It is unfortunate to see such a huge layoff right before the Christmas.
I have a friend who works as a recruiter and aske me to provide this email address. If anyone is interested in work email @
NewOpportunity09@yahoo.com
Best wishes to everyone else who got layed off.
For those who were “saved” this time around I’d say its time to look for a company who really can offer that Job Security CB once provided.
December 5th, 2008 at 11:34 pm
did monster not layoff 700 worldiwide last year? companies needs to understand that in this economy and this market companies need to make sure they have positive cash flow while sales are going to drop. therefore companies need to cut costs. CB is doing this so that they have a future. If they kept on the 300 employees and paid these salaries while next quarter we lose even more jobs then CB would be risking their future.
it does sound weird how they approached this. but then again if all these reps were hitting 200% i highly doubt they would be spending their day on this blog?
don’t get me wrong i wish you all luck. i feel bad for you. i feel bad for the 1,800 people at state street, the 9,500 at DHL the thousands at Citigroup who have lost their jobs and so on and so forth. hopefully these companies are lead by smart people who will make tough but smart decisions in the short term to help in the long term.
ps their will always be politics in large organizations. one has to play the game or find a new career.
i just find joel hilarious because he has nothing good to report about these companies or their employees. he is a perezhilton knock off, but in stead of trashing on celebrities he trashes and gossips on job boards. he has this smarter or holier than though attitude.
December 6th, 2008 at 12:36 am
I was one of the fortunate ones that got to stay. There seems to be no rationale behind who got cut. I noticed a lot of people saying they got rid of the people who weren’t performing and who were dragging the company down. This is SOOOO NOT TRUE!!! I team member of mine was a top notch performer and she still got canned today!! She has been with CareerBuilder for 5 months and has never missed quota. Meanwhile there were people that got to stay and have only been with CB for a month or two. THIS MAKES NO SENSE AT ALL!! After speculating with co-workers, we came to conclusion that some of the ppl that got fired were coming close to making their 5K bonus and CareerBuilder, with cutting finances and all, wouldn’t want to pay these top performers their bonuses. Just speculation, but it makes sense. CareerBuilder is headquartered in Chicago and I find it strange that no news stories have been released about this. Could it be the Tribune/CareerBuilder connection and they want to keep it quiet??? Scandalous!
December 6th, 2008 at 12:38 am
I want a Snow Cone and BubbleWrap. It’s all I can afford these days! CareerBuilder promised growth and a future; a safty net if we were willing to put in the hard work. Goes to show you that working hard gets you no where when your standing in the “Pack your shit” room! I’m thankful this happend now and now after years and years of investing my dedication to that rip off of a company. So yes, I need a snow cone because my days of fine wine and ResumeDataBase are over!
Merry Christmas to all
even
Mr. Matt Scroogerson
P.S. Can I still attend the Christmas party!?!?!?!?!
December 6th, 2008 at 12:39 am
sit back and enjoy
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xDGLDLbfSgU&feature=related
December 6th, 2008 at 12:48 am
I understand that business is business and things need to be done, but the thing is Joe Peck is a prick.
December 6th, 2008 at 12:53 am
“P.S. Can I still attend the Christmas party!?!?!?!?!”
No, they cancel’d that too…
December 6th, 2008 at 1:17 am
There is a reason CB is listed as one of the top 200 companies to LAUNCH a career, not BUILD one.
After reading all of these, I think a lot of people are missing the big picture here. I did this job for about two years, it is not hard, especially for those who were handed accounts. Of course they canned the people who were at 200% of quota. Why pay more if you can just fire them and bring in newbies to manage and upsell these accounts when they come due.
My personal favorite is the fact that Ray D managed to reach such a level of importance at CB. When he was pitching how great that revenue comp plan was, someone I know and respect had a private conversation with him about it and he didn’t even understand revenue. Not surprising at all if you have ever had a convo with him. He excelled in three things. Flirting with female employees to make sure they got good re-assigns, putting his feet up on desks and shallow pep rally’s that made him look nothing more than foolish.
Matt ferguson is a great CEO but he entrusted too many people who are utterly clueless about management to run a bloated ship.
Your requirement to pound those phones created an atmosphere of empty dials, fake appointments and wasted opportunities by eliminating many people’s base skill set and greatly interfered with what makes people successful…working smart.
Good luck with those commercial leases, hope they are not too long!
December 6th, 2008 at 1:22 am
The thing is…we were told about a month ago no head count was going to be taken going into the new year, which is EXACTLY what the CEO told us today. Im not bitter for the fact that people were laid off, because this is a business and things like this need to be done, but the way it was handled was piss poor. I just like how the manager of the area that took one of the biggest hits couldnt even show up to the meeting. nice way to handle things.
December 6th, 2008 at 1:34 am
this is the joke about these companies. they have managers who were ther ten years ago when it was a new idea, a new sale, who have no clue how now some reps make 200k cause they have NYC and the rep who has nashville is not goingto make shit eventhough they are better than the nYC rep.
i hear the same stories i heard on the floor three monster blog months ago
still screw joel
December 6th, 2008 at 2:40 am
I hope all the people who were laid off today challenge themselves in finding a new way to earn a living. Follow your dream and don’t let the economy stop you!!! Don’t waste a good economic crises.
December 6th, 2008 at 4:12 am
I’ll say this about my experience at careerbuilder. I had worked there for a year and a half as a sales rep in the u30 I believe that I had truly become a great salesman. It’s funny because everything I had heard about careerbuilder was that it was a stepping stone to a great career in sales. That being said the typical situation was that a person would be there for about six months and then move on, proving the stepping stone theory. I, however, took an ostensible pay cut by staying in the u30 instead of taking my skills elsewhere to make more money. I stayed there for one reason, I believed in what careerbuilder stood for. All of the core values were something that I stood by. When I took a company that had 2 employees and built them to a company that had 45 employees at a fraction of the cost of what a recuiter would cost them I believed that I was doing something good, and I still do. What amazes me is that the company can tell me 2 weeks ago that if I am a performing sales rep, of which I absolutely was, that I have nothing to worry about come the upcoming year and then they completely change their stance because they have to meet some arbitrary head count. Do I blame Joe Peck for not telling us? Absolutely not, how could he? Do I blame Pete Jansons? Yes. He should have been more upfront with the situation. Let us know that there is a possibility of losing our jobs, even though we were performing, that way we at least have the opportunity to “build” our resumes and move forward with a better career. Overall I can say this, anybody who was producing for the company that got laid off was given a gift. The gift being that we are able to now move on to a better career. We, and by we I mean the people who were producing and were let go, we, are the people who should thank careerbuilder for truly building our careers as salesman [excuse the gender bias]. We will move forward making more money than careerbuilder can offer. Upper management was foolish for not talking to the sales managers and team leads about the people who have progressed. And they will most definitely suffer for their actions.
December 6th, 2008 at 9:15 am
Done very poorly. Conference calls and meetings were unprepared for and all execs looked and sounded like Homer Simpson DOH! They looked and sounded like jackasses, fools and they should. They let people go who would and do work smart and could pull the pieces together. Their values and mission on paper are garbage and worse. They have no connection to what their real stance is. Sad for us, good for them. Take the money and run. Cowards
December 6th, 2008 at 9:40 am
USE MONSTER SAID…”To the CB people that were laid off, don’t go use CB, use Monster.com or if need be yahoo. Your company did not show you loyalty, don’t show it loyalty.
CB has just used the race to the bottom mentality in selling there stuff, give away everything. Well eventually what you give away is your revenue and it looks like a lot of peoples jobs.
When they sold the stock for so little you knew that layoffs were coming.”
Using CB to find a job–still a good idea. Let’s think about this. They have twice as many jobs as monster…and easier to use interface and since most of these people came from CareerBuilder they know the system works.
Also, CB barely discounts…race to the bottom? ALL that happens at this job is CareerBuilder makes an offer to a company. Monster undercuts us (cuz their product is bad so they have too) and we sell on value and get the deal anyways…but we have to give a slight discount at this point. Monster is terrible.
Lastly, so you know this person is an idiot…we don’t have public stock. So what were we selling at a low cost per share? Excuse me? (NOT PUBLIC). USE MONSTER–you’re an idiot.
December 6th, 2008 at 9:55 am
I gather, they love their employees, and this was hard for them. It’s business–it was necessary–and our owners required it.
Those of your reading the horror stories about working for CB…some of it is true. It’s hard. However, I’m making 120,000 within a couple years of college. If you work hard and do well you will easily make more money here then any other sales job. My friends who went to Harvard aren’t making near what I’m pulling from CB now.
When April comes around and CB looks to hire again–check it out!
December 6th, 2008 at 9:55 am
Ok if this sounds rude I apologize, but at least in the case of my sales team they kept the individuals with a) a great personality/ability to set and keep appts and b) some kind of business savvy/potential. They let go of 3 ppl who had less personality than my left cheek and one who made quota most of the time but was struggling to make and keep appts. It’s sad because the latter is a friend but she understood. Of course you don’t want to see anyone get axed like this especially before the holidays but I’d rather Matt F save the company for the ppl we have left than keep ppl on that (once we’re in a REAL bind) would get axed anyway down the road. Good luck to all that were laid off yesterday.
December 6th, 2008 at 10:05 am
TO STILLREMAINING (and anyone who thinks like this):
“Those of you complaining about your 25k base sales salery obviously never did your dials and hit those kicker checks. It is sales, you need to claw, bite, and chase the money. Its a good product (better than the other sites people on this board are hyperlinking) but it is DIRECTLY tied to the labor market. Best of luck to all of you in your search for a job but please remember CB is just doing what it must.”
SCREW YOU.
i had my dials, i hit quota every month, last month i was at 263% of quota actually. I know what sales is and i know how it works. and i did my job very well. so dont give me the this shit that layoffs happen, ya i know – i have a business degree. but to layoff someone averaging 180% of quota – thats pretty cut throat. and when you go into your desk come monday morning… and you might have numbers like me… but guess what you too could get laid off – completely out of the blue.
to rid A players like myself and some of the other employees in that slaughter house yesterday is something i still cant believe.
so still remaining – get off your high horse for thinking you are better, because you arent. i guarantee that i am a much harder worker then you ever were or are… and that you are just lucky that they let you “slip through”.
OH AND THE WORD IS SALARY, NOT SALERY OR CELERY
December 6th, 2008 at 10:49 am
I hear they are having an “Amazing Race” in the snow to see who stays.
Many people were “fired” so they didn’t have to be paid severance. Lawsuits are coming.
December 6th, 2008 at 11:20 am
I got the ax yesterday. Happy? No. Did it blow my mind? No. I worked at CareerBuilder for two years and a half years. There was no rhyme or reason for what happened. We had some great times, obviously the last quarter, my clients were struggling across the board, therefore my monthly revenue was struggling.
The company was and for the most part still is a great company to work for. They treated their employees very well. I can’t speak for what goes on at O’Hare, but at 180 N I know that is a fact.
A lot of unanswered questions might be raised for what took place behind closed doors over the last quarter, however that doesn’t remove what CareerBuilder provided for me over the last 30 months.
I know it’s rough out there, but I’m optimistic. We are human capital, if you are intelligent, if you have a good head on your shoulders, then you will be fine. If you don’t, you might want to reposition yourself to gain value in this tough economy.
Go Sox!
P.S. Best of luck to my colleagues on 9 @ 180 N.
December 6th, 2008 at 11:22 am
hey ‘ proud of cb’ would you still be so proud if you came in monday and they told you to pack your stuff. dont think so.
im getting so irritated reading these blogs that say that the people who were let go had as much personality as your ass cheek or that we werent scrappy enough. my companies loved me and told me daily. i worked hard and did well and this what i was given. the axe.
so – to those of you who are “sympathetic but understand why they chose who they did” you really have no idea what you are talking about.
December 6th, 2008 at 11:26 am
DON’T WORRY TOO MUCH EVERYONE, OBAMA WILL GET YOU ALL JOBS, FREE HEALTHCARE, AND YOU REALLY DON’T HAVE TO DO A DA*^ THING. BE LAZY AND WAIT FOR THE GRAVY TRAIN BABY!
December 6th, 2008 at 11:27 am
careerbuilder have done the right thing to protect the business that is left and the people that are left however……
they have made me redundant yet they are about to spend a small fortune on taking all their international directors and salespeople for a few days holiday (oh sorry I should say conference as that’s what they are calling it) to Greece!
How can they possibly justify this spend when they have just made 300 people redundant! They could have paid me and many others for another month or two and not gone ahead with this.
December 6th, 2008 at 11:30 am
Heated CB Employee–That’s silly. If you were let go there was some reason. You obviously did not make yourself valuable ENOUGH for the company in some way. It’s more than just activity and numbers. I suppose it’s hard to see where you went wrong but it’s also not right for you to come on here and throw around your anger. If you were in the EBU/U30 you were laid off because of your division not because of your skill. If you were elsewhere it’s the value you brought. In the TAG the people who were left in the room, on average, were the highest quality of the group. The people left behind either were new or not bringing value.
Lawsuits are not coming….those who were let go are getting some sort of severance. Those let go last month were fired though.
December 6th, 2008 at 11:31 am
i do think careerbuilder have done the right thing to protect their business and the people that are left, however…
i was one of the people to go from atlanta but i know they are spending a small fortune on taking around 200 people from international to greece for a few days holiday (or conference as they are calling it)! This is just unnaceptable!
They could have paid me and many others for a few more months and not bothered with this holiday.
How can they possibly justify doing this?
December 6th, 2008 at 11:59 am
I worked at CB for years and was very shocked when I got word I was being released. I understand today had to happen, at least from what I see with the economy and company. However, I do think that if the company is hurting, everyone has to make sacrifices. Our executives work just as hard as any finance, marketing, or sales person, however paying a new VP a $200,000 bonus for just Q3 is wrong. The economy started to spin out many months ago. For a company to remain strong and healthy, and have the ability to take the waves and bounce back, everyone needs to make sacrficies with pay and work load. Not just those at the bottom.
December 6th, 2008 at 12:05 pm
What’s really interesting to me is that all these people who are currently still employed at Careerbuilder after this “doomsday” somehow think their jobs are still secure. The reality is that all of you were lied to in September when the CEO said your jobs were safe, and this is just the beginning. Where are all the accounts of the people who got the axe going to fall? Right in your lap, I know of at least one person that was laid off had 80+ accounts, and now there are fewer people on the team to handle these accounts, and most of those people have >3 months experience with the company. It’s interesting that they decided to keep people who don’t know about the product, this really throws them into the fire now. Careerbuilder has just started to sink, and your sitting here being arrogant about still having a job…until next month…Then people like “Proud of CB” can realize that they are fools.
December 6th, 2008 at 12:14 pm
The leads are weak. It’s all about the leads. I mean, I’d call these people and tell them about our product and so on and so forth, and they didn’t even want to buy, what’s up with that?
What Careerbuilders needs is a way to make people want to call us, not make us call them. I mean, come on!
I knew this company was going downhill once James Levin left, he embodied all that was good and decent about inside sales. I blame myself for lingering around once the writing was on the wall.
Also, who does Joe Peck think he is?
December 6th, 2008 at 12:48 pm
First, I think it is absolutely horrible that this Blog is how a majority of my colleagues found out about this layoff. You are posting information that affects people’s lives, and regardless of which group you were in, I know my morning sucked because of this damn blog. Next time, consider that this story was directly about people and try to be a little bit more considerate of this fact!
Secondly, to those who are upset about Careerbuilder because you were let go, I agree, that it sucks. But I also know that they couldn’t have done it any other way but than with numbers. My team lost about half of its people at Ohare, one person had about as much seniority as I did, but I pretty sure my numbers (all of them) were consistently better. I personally think that they looked at every number divided it by a magic number and then decided. I’m not saying that anyone deserved it, but I truly think that it was a numbers game, since that is how everything else is judged in sales at CB.
Finally, to those who are saying that people who were fired are worthless, you really need to grow up and respect people a little bit more. You heard the phone call, and I wouldn’t be so arrogant to think that I can’t be next in this economy. We sell a product that is only a necessity when someone has the need to improve their staff, and if that goes away, so to does the need for more sales reps.
December 6th, 2008 at 12:51 pm
Great invoicing in ATL, that lasted really long!! Must have been another great leader promoted by Hunter to run that unit!!!!
Truly sorry for the people that where let go in ATL. Believe me, its not your fault.
Hire leaders that actually understand business, not drink your kool-aid all day long…….
December 6th, 2008 at 1:42 pm
“Matt ferguson is a great CEO but he entrusted too many people who are utterly clueless about management to run a bloated ship.”
Thats like saying the captain of the titanic was a good captain he just didn’t see the iceberg. A good leader delegates power to the correct people! Not saying all the cuts could have been avoided but I do think better middle management could have saved some of us from getting pink slipped. There really is only one of two ways to look at, if this situation caught leadership by surprise, they are bumbling idiots at best. Considering most of them have graduate degrees from Chicago or Kellogg, I doubt that to be the case. That leaves option b greedy heartless liars. “Greed is Good”. I know those of you that didn’t get axed will be quick to defend them, but you cannot deny the deception that occurred over the past quarter. Now there is a comforting thought the ” good CEO” who lied to you on a conference call from India two weeks ago is still in control of your future. I am sure Matt & Co will be shedding a tear for all of us that they slaughtered on Friday while they are partying on the Aegean Sea in January for Kickoff ! Now if that doesn’t scream good leadership, I don’t know what does!
December 6th, 2008 at 1:43 pm
I’m surprised no one here is talking about the CareerBuilder product itself. Blaming management but not talking about the company or the industry (at least a little)?
When is the last time CB innovated on behalf of the job seeker? The product almost worse than Monster, almost. The most interesting thing about CB used to be its advertising and now that’s not even sensible. CareerBuilder lost its way a long time ago, in my opinion, and it can’t be blamed just on the relationship between management and sales.
That gravy train supported how many hundreds of sales people without much useful change in many years? Did any engineers lose their jobs? How about the marketing staff that’s been wasting money on Facebook?
I feel bad for everyone being laid off and its very poor that they did this right before the holiday after saying they wouldn’t. I wish you all the best of luck.
- And shame on those above who are pimping their own sites after others have just lost jobs. It’s easy enough to suggest people contact you, no need to include urls to another job site.
December 6th, 2008 at 1:46 pm
They put something in the water over there at CB………people need to realize the grass is greener on the other side. People are scared to leave but trust me there are big and better opportunities outside of CB. Granted I learned a lot but I also got to a point where I stopped learning and growing. Advice to CB upper management – focus of middle management and not international growth. Just because you perform well as a sales rep doesn’t mean you are a good manager……and a lot of those good sales reps are usually set up quite well or they are at the right place at the right time. CB is a club (you know who you are) and if you are not in the club then its time to start looking elsewhere. Just like every other company in this world there are positives and negatives of CB. There are some good people over there but there are also some people that shouldn’t be where they are. Best of luck to those who were let go. My advice is to be creative when looking for a new job……we all saw firsthand how companies’ hiring processes are disconnected.
December 6th, 2008 at 1:55 pm
For those arguing the merits of layoffs or the more politically correct Reduction In Force at Careerbuilder. Please stop and consider the situation of those who feel they were blind sided. They are simply following the Kubler-Ross model known as the 5 stages of grief.
The stages are:
1. Denial- “This can’t be happening, not to me!”
2. Anger – “Why me? It’s not fair!” “NO! NO! How can this happen!”
3. Bargaining – “Can’t you stretch it out a few more weeks?”
4. Depression- “I’m so sad, the economy sucks. Wonder if I’ll be able to even get another job?”
5. Acceptance – “It’s going to be OK.”
So, let them vent and please don’t try to defend business decisions that regardless of the logic, appear to have been handled VERY poorly by CB’s Management team. Management’s decisions only appear rational to you because you were not personally affected.
Rafael – Show some F-ing class. You never miss an opportunity to pimp your crappy business. Stop using the comments on Joel’s blog as an infomercial. We get it, enough already. Talk to the guy’s over at jobing.com, they had a can’t miss business model too. Learn a lesson from Jason Goldberg at Jobster and Rob McGovern over at Jobfox; start showing some humanity and humility. Otherwise, we will all pile on and kick you A$$ when you are on the way down.
December 6th, 2008 at 2:00 pm
To those of you whose jobs were eliminated, I am truly sorry that you each have to live through that experience. It is probably one of the most humbling experiences anyone can go through and I would never wish it on anyone.
Remember that this was not a personal decision by CB. It was a business decision that seemed most rational to those in leadership. The entire situation is humbling, embarrassing, and probably one of the most difficult choices any of them have had to make in their careers, but they had to consider what was neccessary to ensure the future success of CareerBuilder.
To those who are surprised, are you paying attention to the jobs reports each month? No doubt, CareerBuilder is the industry leader and has always maintained impressive growth, but how can you expect them to maintain the headcount given the drastic economic events. Did you really not expect jobs to be cut at CB in this economy.
Most of us have never lived through a down economy like this. No one should feel completely secure in their job today. If your resume isn’t current by now, get it ready, even if you still have a job today.
Good luck to all.
Fortunate to Have a Job
December 6th, 2008 at 2:07 pm
Well “Heated Ex CB Employee” thank you for calling me out. Take away all the BS and here is what you are left with. The mgmt team looked at you as not important. I don’t give a shit what numbers you were hitting. Stop going off on CB and look at what you could have done differently. I am not worried about loosing my job at all. It I do randomly get taken into a conference room and let go I will shake Matt’s hand and tell him thank you for the opportunity. When it comes down to it the average salary for someone my age with my skill sets (english not being one of them as you have pointed out) is 37k. I am killing that. CB thanks for the good checks and the good times.
December 6th, 2008 at 2:15 pm
does anyone know if any execs, VPS or direcors were let go during this doomsday? if so does anyone know wo they are?
December 6th, 2008 at 2:38 pm
For anyone in Accounting or Finance, take a look at http://www.AccountingJobsToday.com great opportunities. And for any sales reps interested in job opportunities email me at todd@accountingjobstoday.com.
Hang in there, things will turn around.
December 6th, 2008 at 2:39 pm
I was on 9 yesterday and was let go. I had been with CB for about 6 months, but knew a lot of people across divisions because I had initially interviewed there about 2 years ago while still in school.
Anyways, here’s my take —
3 of my 250 leads were hiring. That sucks, but its nothing that I can blame CB for. I understand why I was let go. I don’t like it, but I get it. And the severance I got was great. Not that it was a great amount, but I had been there 6 months, hadn’t made any significant sales, and got a package and unemployment. The company I worked at before wouldn’t have been damn near as classy and they are in the top 5 of Fortune’s top 100 companies.
It sucks, but I feel that CB took care of me the best it could while facing those tough decisions and times.
December 6th, 2008 at 2:55 pm
“the Company sold a 10 percent interest in CareerBuilder, LLC to Gannett Co., Inc. for $135 million.”
The Tribune company in the call with investors usually highlights the profits from CB, in the last call they did not bring up CB. Why do you think? It would seem that it is because they are bleeding money (my opinion).
Main difference between Monster and CB is that Monster is killing CB globally where CB is just a minor player (or not a player at all). CB has done a great job in building the US brand, and has not done a good job globally.
If you look at 3rd party data on who visits the sites (not the internals that each company try to sell customers) Monster has far more UNIQUE visitors a month than CareerBuilder
http://siteanalytics.compete.com/monster.com+careerbuilder.com/?metric=uv
26+ million US for Monster
12+ million US for CB
But I am sure people from both companies will come on here and try to say their internal numbers are different.
December 6th, 2008 at 3:05 pm
First, the way in which the layoffs were carried out were not in good taste by any measure. I was a lucky one in the Atlanta office…. no, wait, I made myself a more valuable asset than my peers.
If you were on any sort of disciplinary action plan, didn’t bring anything besides attendance to the office, and bitched and complained whenever possible- why did you not see this coming?? When tough business decisions need to be made, a lot of factors need to be considered in who gets trimmed- and it’s not an emotional decision like most of the posts seem to think.
And lastly, the inside “sales” people that are crying about what they made and the percentage you were “over quota” when you got canned, have some self-awareness. If your base is $25k, you’re a entry-level phone jockey that actually costs CB more in salary, benefits, and overhead than your “huge” 3 job pack contracts bring in.
I wish you all the best, but remember to make yourself more valuable in your next endeavor and you could be writing this painfully candid comment.
December 6th, 2008 at 3:12 pm
If CB would have lowered head count through attrition all along, decent reps would not have had to been cut yesterday. They gave everyone the benefit of the doubt, a testament to their ultimate good-will. When it didn’t work out, they did what they had to do to make sure that those reps with potential would be successful. It is unfortunate, but in the end it is the best thing for customers and employees who directly bring in the money to keep the people who are still there gainfully employed.
December 6th, 2008 at 3:22 pm
My belief is timing is everything. CB grew very quickly. Why, the partnerships between AOL and MSN at the time and alot of marketing followed up a mass blitz of hiring. Great strategy and it worked. Now for the first time they realized they had to many people (for about 2 years) and the growth has slowed down tremoundously due to market share, right? CB will need to come up with something new as my belief the industry is changing again with all the new niche websites coming up. Job postings and resume database are not going to cut it anymore, at least with large organizations. It was once said by a high executive at CB, dont expect to be no. 1 forever……Bell curve is at its tip in the US, hence international penetration. My advice to CB is stop irritating your clients, are you in this for the long term??
December 6th, 2008 at 3:25 pm
Anyone notice Joe Peck wasn’t in the office yesterday? Maybe he got canned, we can only hope.
December 6th, 2008 at 3:44 pm
I was laid off from CareerBuilder.com yesterday. I was just promoted into the IAG in November 2008. My year to date was well over 150%, I already qualified for the Presidents Club Trip, and they laid me off. I am still in disbelief, hoping, praying that there had been some mistake. I know there are other opportunities out there, but I really thought I would grow at CareerBuilder.com and eventually make it into outside sales. I just can’t think of why I was so expendable. I emailed all the head honchos today, even Matt Ferguson, and I want some answers.
December 6th, 2008 at 4:03 pm
I concur with everyone above that said it was about the value you brought to the organization. Do I come in every day and bust a$$, make my calls, run appointments and sell business? Yes, obviously, or I would have been in the axed group. But what added to this value? What made me REALLY valuable to the company besides sales? The fact that I come in every day PUMPED to be there, heightening morale on my team. I’m upbeat, kind of obnoxiously so to some people, but my managers LOVE that I come to work absolutely amped to be there. If you come in complaining every day, like several of my colleagues, your manager (and likely upper management, because they do make visits to different groups, especially in 200 N. LaSalle) notices, and they aren’t jazzed up about your attitude. Chances are this may have been a deciding factor in your case. Also, if you weren’t producing, this is an obvious area where they cut individuals.
All that I’m saying is that they kept as many as possible of those individuals who they felt brought value to the business in a variety of ways. Just because you were at 200% of plan doesn’t mean you didn’t bitch and moan with the best of ‘em. And just because you come to work chipper doesn’t mean you’re closing biz. It was a combination of the two, and likely a whole constellation of other factors I’m failing to mention (sorry I’m no CEO). At least in the case of my team, the right people were chosen to stay and pick up the pieces.
The next few months are going to be difficult. Believe me, I am preparing for the worst and hoping for the best. My resume is ready just in case. I know that I bring all I have to work each day, and that’s the best I can do. I know, if I’m laid off down the road, it’ll be due to financial constraints of the company, not for any other reasons. They “cut the fat” as best they could yesterday. The timing was unfortunate, but it had to be done.
December 6th, 2008 at 4:47 pm
Those of you that are defending the business decision are missing the bigger point. Yes the cuts needed to be made, of course it made sound business sense, but the bigger issue is the lying. If Matt & Co would have come out and not reassured us that our jobs were safe, I think the outrage would be minimal. They could have been silent on the issue or at least had the dignity or “candor” ,if you will, to say that job cuts are a possibility and they will only cut jobs as a last resort.
Mr CEO reassured everyone that we were safe, he should have been silent on the topic. Whether he wanted to or not, he lied! Again for all of you calling us naive for not looking at the economic reports, your missing the bigger picture. I believed my former CEO was a man of integrity, and if he tells me twice that no jobs will be cut, I guess I was dumb enough to believe him. Boy that’s real crazy of me to believe my former CEO was being honest. Yeah what was I thinking? I think the pop psychologist is right those that were spared and those of us that got cut, are all in “denial”.
It’s a business decision when it involves someone else, it’s personal when it involves you. Ronald Reagan said it best during the last deep recession in the early 80’s “It’s a recession when your neighbor loses their job, when you lose your job its a depression…”
December 6th, 2008 at 4:56 pm
when i told my rep that we are laying off and needed to cut back our renewal she coldly switched gears and tried to “help me find other budget” for the fabulous new product: CB transitions. how’s that working for everyone?
December 6th, 2008 at 5:12 pm
Not a great time to be laid off ! At least its a fresh start in 2009. In this day and age its not as easy to Build a Career . Too much credit , blame Mr Ass Face Bush.
December 6th, 2008 at 5:57 pm
Stay tuned for a couple of VP layoffs end of the month…
The fact that someone inside is talking and releasing information to people before employees know is complete horse shit in my opinion. Granted the severence was much better for people that were not in introductory sales, as in months of pay instead of weeks x years.
Good luck everyone in finding a job, mine will be secure at CB.
December 6th, 2008 at 6:01 pm
Well I for one very much am in disagreement with the opinions of those that say shame on this web site. I say shame on you I for one am for realizing bad new so I can be prepared as and many other were yestereay wich was my first time to visit this site and I say thank you that I was able to read this before my former employer that I had high regard and trust for went against the promise made to us a few weeks ago. I worked in HR previous to my employement with careerbuilder and I will now go back to HR and I will remember this treatment. Yes I realize the business is doing badly and I realize decisions have to be made but I am a hard working and honest Christian single mother with a family which I support and I feel that my fellow former employees were not only the result of a difficult decision but we were deceved with intent. Also I do not know the detailed ratings of my coworkers but I was awarded several times for my performance in recent times and I admit I am angry but I do forgive and I know that I am in the long run better off not working for an emplyoyer which deceves in the same manner that uses inapropriate advertising and spam mail to the customers that support it I suppose I should have seen this based on the way careerbuilder has chosen to conduct in self in the past but I chose not to see the truth.
December 6th, 2008 at 7:15 pm
I look at the the events that happened on Thursday and Friday in a number of perspectives – here are my thoughts.
First of all, I would like to thank Careerbuilder for the one-year that I had worked there. It was a my first real job and I appreciate the time I had working there. No other job allowed me that type of independence and company culture.
I believe Careerbuilder is a job where you get out what you put in. You are a part of a media network that has established a name for itself – the rest you do on your own. It gave me a chance to personally develop my own business style and etiquette and have the means and resources to deliver what I promised clients to do. I believe it is a good thing what they do for job seekers and they do offer a great medium of communication for businesses.
On the development / training side, I was truly blessed to have such a great team lead to work under. He was THE ABSOLUTE BEST SALESMAN I have ever seen, and it was truly a privilege to work under him. He gave it to me real, he didn’t sugar coat things, and he looked after me not just as a boss and coach, but as a friend. I cannot say the same for upper management and individuals on the executive level.
I believe that many people feel victimized in this situation because they or people they know got SOLD the idea that things were okay, we were not looking to do a complete organizational restructure, and that ultimately they were not expendable items. Shame on you for filling people’s heads with such false beliefs and making absolute liars out of those with truly good intentions for the people that worked under them.
Within the U30 and EBU many people applied to the position because they were willing to be coachable. For many, the companies they called into were like pulling a needle through a haystack and trying to turn water into wine. What resulted? A desperate attempt to make the impossible possible despite good wits and work ethic and in many cases truly harassing patrons who were themselves in fear of going under.
Many people in these positions were setup to fail, however, were continuously sold the idea that success was indeed possible. On the other side of things, many people were given accounts because of promotions or others being fired and got to enjoy some reassigned accounts despite any valid merit or work ethic.
Careerbuilder, if you truly want to deliver a great product, address the one thing that costs you the most money – your turnover and retention. Learn from this situation and don’t cycle people around to the point that alienates your clients and your employees.
I expected this coming because I listen to not only what is being said but what is not being said.
To those that were removed on Thursday and Friday, feel liberated and find jobs that leave you with more satisfaction and peace of mind. It sucks that it comes before the holiday, but think of it as a vacation that you otherwise afforded to have. I have no doubts that you will find jobs.
-Happy Holidays
December 6th, 2008 at 9:59 pm
I am a CB middle-management leader.
As a family woman, a mother, and a Christian, I have sincere sympathy for those who lost their jobs with CB, and I wish you the best of luck.
However, the won thing eye have noticed from the posts above are that the people that lost there jobs have shocklngly poor communication skills.
I invite you to scan the posts again. I counted at least 45 spelling or grammatical errors from the reps who was let go.
People, whether you are at 200% or 80%, take a good, honest look at your complete skill set. You are (were) in the advertising/communication/marketing/design/consulting business.
There was indeed a “rhyme or reason” behind the layoffs. If you possess ALL THREE of these traits — above-average business acumen, a dedication to constant professional development, and a massive work ethic — you will be back at CB on Monday.
That’s a fact.
December 6th, 2008 at 10:47 pm
There was indeed a “rhyme or reason” behind the layoffs. If you possess ALL THREE of these traits — above-average business acumen, a dedication to constant professional development, and a massive work ethic — you will be back at CB on Monday.
Sister Sunshine, let me tell you a thing or two. I vehemently disagree with your assessment and don’t appreciate what you imply.
I worked my ass off every day, had a serious work ethic and constantly pushed for my development and ways to make my product better and I was still axed. So PLEASE don’t assume ALL cuts were made because the people who were cut were slackers.
Many of the cuts were in non-sales positions. I saw a great guy who worked on a great project get axed with me because his project (like mine) simply did not bring in money. We may have added value to CB, but in this economy “value added” is no value at all. They want sales, revenue and cash flow and they want it yesterday.
CB gained so much from Monster’s stumbles financially, but they didn’t learn a thing from it otherwise. They pissed through money like it was Kleenex, developed rock star egos among much of the sales force, and put overgrown frat boys into positions of importance. Those who do not learn from history are doomed to repeat it.
P.S. Oh, and my grammar is just fine, thanks. (won thing eye?)
December 6th, 2008 at 10:50 pm
CB leader, you are an idiot. First off your religion is irrelevant and the fact that you are kicking those who are down speaks volumes about your faith. I missed the Bible story where JC criticized people who were down and out. How about being honest and admitting that upper management lied to these people. Of course you won’t because you still have your job. The whole thing was shady, and you should be ashamed of yourself for being a bad representative for your company and your faith.
December 6th, 2008 at 11:01 pm
CBleader,
Please tell me you were just trying to be humorously ironic in your post.
I can only hope your multiple typos and grammatical errors were just an attempt to be funny. If not, I guess we know where they learned everything . . .
December 6th, 2008 at 11:04 pm
Wow. After reading CBleader’s response, the reason for the layoffs becomes all too clear to me after I saw such arrogant and twisted comments. Obviously the company is sinking because people like this are at the helm. What an embarassment to the whole company and a slap in the face to the people who were let go.
I don’t know what being a Christian has anything to do with this, except to affirm the fact that you’re just another moron hiding behind your religion because you have nothing else to offer the world.
December 6th, 2008 at 11:57 pm
wow this post is more dramatic than some of the ones about Monster in the past.
what i find shocking is that reps at CB have been at 200% of quota as of recently. if you are crushing your numbers that much in this economy that is quite amazing.
December 7th, 2008 at 1:27 am
As a loyal and dedicated employee to one of the Big 3 job boards, I can only hope that everyone could have a little more professionalism and compassion at a time like this. Now is not the time to say “I told you so” or to use this as a platform to drive traffic to your company’s site. It’s certainly not the time to act untouchable if you were lucky enough to survive this latest cut. There will be more and they will be deeper and more inexplicable, so the only thing we can do is plan for it by either making ourselves invaluable to the company we’re at or by networking and trying to secure a good parachute so we can land safely somewhere else.
This economy is far too unpredictable to have job security nowadays, no matter who you are. Guess what? We’re in the business of helping people achieve their hiring goals, so it should come as no surprise that when companies slash jobs and don’t need to hire, the businesses that rely on selling that service are going to suffer too.
To my fellow account managers, sales reps, recruitment consultants or whatever title is on your business card if you’re lucky enough to still have them, let’s not waste time spouting off traffic statistics, comparing share prices or acting like we’re any more privileged than those who got laid off. It could very well be us that are soon considered expendable.
To those of you that are in the truly unfortunate position of being unemployed right before the holiday, my advice would be to enjoy the time with your families and start fresh in 2009.
By the way, there are plenty of jobs to be found on my site: http://www.$$$awesomesalesjobs$$$.com.
Just kidding. I don’t even know if that’s a real site, but if it is, I’m sure they’ve had to lay some people off too.
Good luck everyone.
December 7th, 2008 at 4:50 am
I use to work in the Atlanta office “upstairs”. First of all, I’d like to wish all my friends the best of luck, the ones who were laid off.
Second of all, I have to agree that some of those Directors were arrogant, stubborn, and unfair morons. Even though I had my 2 week notice turned in, I was still told to leave for good around noon. I’ve been there forever, and I was treated like a crook.
So once again, to my friends in Atlanta and Chicago who were gone, good luck to you all. Try Craigslist too… To my boss and her boss who was let go: Ha! F’ you and you deserve this bad karma.
December 7th, 2008 at 11:43 am
CB management (former Headhunter.net management) back to their old tricks. Original CB’ers remember the boxes and walkouts in Reston, VA many years ago. What a loving group of people at the top of CB. I guess when management ICP (Ideal Candidate Profile) for a sales rep is a young, former copier salesman that is willing to endure an abusive sales environment…why is there any need to show them any loyalty and dignity when times get tough? They are just cannon fodder anyway.
December 7th, 2008 at 12:43 pm
I am one of the employees still remaining in the Atlanta office. I know that I am extremely afraid as to what will happen to the rest of us. I know that in the conference call that Matt Fergusen gave, he stated that he could not say that this would be end of layoffs. Also, it was disapointing to hear that they would continue the Super Bowl ads as they cost CB 3 million per 30 seconds. 3 million that could have been used to pay laid off employees at least through the holidays. Also, I have not seen any news entities cover this story. Sad that we had to hear of this event and its aftermath on sites like these. Not a peep of it in the Atlanta Journal.Just curious if the severance packages were 1 week pay per year for everyone.If any one knows it would be helpful for those of us still with Careerbuilder.
December 7th, 2008 at 1:07 pm
To all my Cheeta’s on the street,
We just hired about 30 ex-CB reps and a hand full of managers around the country to grow the Monsta. As Bob Barker once said, “Come on down”. You little monkey’s sell circles around the “wait for the phone to ring” Monster reps every day of the week… If you want to own your career and make your mark here, please visit us at http://www.monsterhires/careerover.aspx
Warning to you all, If I catch any of you sharing MWW company secrets on the Y! message board I will clip you faster then “Jo Momma” and Ex-CB Reps” can say “A better job awaits”
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VRrMu7B1L2I
Jane
December 7th, 2008 at 2:37 pm
CB Leader, I don’t know why you feel it necessary to state your faith. I’m not sure what kind of Christian you are, but in my church, they don’t teach us to go around bragging about our faith and using it to make us appear like better people. It’s because I’m Christian that I’m a good person, but I don’t use it before slamming people I don’t know. Just because you prefaced with that doesn’t make your judging of us let go more appropriate. You say we didn’t have communication skills? Do you know how hard it is to sell eye glasses to a blind man? We did it, we must have been doing something right. I can’t speak for everyone else, but my clients loved me. If I was some idiot, I’m sure they would have taken their buisness elsewhere and not trusted ME to put up their postings day after day. Think before you speak CB Leader, clearly it’s YOU that has difficulty communicating.
December 7th, 2008 at 3:30 pm
Let’s not kid around here… a successful Telesales Rep at CB, Monster or any other like company is only as successful as sales ops allows them to be. If you are hitting 160% to 268% in a GOOD economy suggest an issue with forecasting never mind a shit economy. My guess would be there is a fruitful “downtown” territory with a slam dunk quota involved here. Seriously, it’s foolish to consider yourself a salesperson. Its glorified telemarketing and we all know it. Anyone at anytime can be laid off and the company can put another talking head in your seat that will be successful due to the territory… The so called “C” players are the ones that were unlucky enough to get stuck with territories like upstate NY verse “A” players that are handed business centers of the world like Manhattan. Consider yourselves lucky to be walked out of a dead end job like telesales.
December 7th, 2008 at 4:08 pm
Regardless of the lay off that just occurred on Friday, what may be even worse and scarier is what the U30 & EBU reps that were retained were told. I just earned my 5K bonus and was laid off, which is bad enough, but my friends who were retained are almost in just as bad a situation…if not worse. People were told that just because they were retained now does NOT mean they are safe. They were told that when this is done AGAIN it will not be as extensive, but just because you are here now does not mean you should be expecting to be employed through January. The remaining Reps have little incentive to really try and I know of more than a handful of people who are using their sustained employment to begin looking elsewhere.
CB really shot themselves in the foot here. They have shown their true colors in blatantly lying to their staff for months and have done little to reward the success of many of the “A” players they preach about having. It is truly a shame, I drank the Kool-Aid along with many others who were mercilessly cut (among us many who just earned our 5k bonus or were on the verge). A lot of my friends who were retained drank the kool-aid and now they are even more concerned about when the NEXT AX will fall. All in all, it’s a real shame; A lot of great people were lost.
December 7th, 2008 at 4:53 pm
Some CareerBuilder Managers are dogs. 2 coworker already knew I was laid off before I did. Why? because one big mouth Manager never kept anything confidential. She knows who she is. As soon as she found out who was getting laid off she went to some people (not even 2 minutes later) and told them they were not going to get laid off. How stupid was that!!Careerbuild can kiss my……
December 7th, 2008 at 5:03 pm
I use to work for CB and I won an award and went on the Mexico trip. I learned alot from the company. In fact I still apply my skills till this day. CB was good for something. I had some good managers and then as I climbed the ladder there I ran into the worst. I pray for everyone that has lost their jobs.
We have to find a way to save our own tails. Be creative and use the skills you have learned and what God has given you.
Earn your right..)
December 7th, 2008 at 7:26 pm
Careerbuilder is so fixed on helping Africa but look how they treat their own workers who have made money for them. Are you going to raise money for us who dont’ have any money until we get our package???? All the VP’s in Finance are COWARDS!!!You guys are LIERS and thank you for getting me out of the hell hole. Merry Freakin Christmas you no good son of a………………..
December 7th, 2008 at 7:31 pm
To everyone who lost their jobs, I hope you all land on your feet.
To the people still there, beware, looks like th Tribune is possibly filing BK.
http://dealbook.blogs.nytimes.com/2008/12/07/tribune-hires-bankruptcy-advisers/
December 7th, 2008 at 7:44 pm
As a rep who was in the 1:15 ‘meeting’, all I can encourage my peers to do is grab your sales stats IMMEDIATELY Monday morning, print them out and email them to a separate email account. Those who were fired Thursday were locked out of the system before they got back to their desks.
Those of us in the EBU/U30 recognize that a lot of the people who were laid off Friday were not measured by performance or value they brought to the company. Perhaps in higher sales divisions and salaried positions, layoffs were based on the individual. But there is no clear cut and common thread between the majority of the people who were let go, which is unfortunate.
As someone who has been with the company just under 5 months and is on pace to hit her 5k bonus at the beginning of January, I can’t say I feel confident that when the infamous ‘Jan 1′ comes around I will have a job.
December 7th, 2008 at 8:44 pm
Good Advice, Still There. Pack your personal belongs, get your contacts for networking, save them to a disc or e-mail them to yourself. Prepare. This is not over. I’ve been pressured into donating to their pet charities. Yes, saving and feeding a third world country is a good tax write-off for CB. Now, their ex-employees may not meet their obligations here. Merry Christmas indeed. I have my own charities, here in the United States. International growth while cutting your core, is like cutting off your nose to spite your face. That sounds like a CB policy, OH, Wait, Matt’s not a big fan of policy, is he?
December 7th, 2008 at 9:36 pm
You know what, I had a good attitude, I was over my year to date, I had the activity, I qualified for Cabo back in October, and I was just promoted. Don’t tell me I was lacking in any way. And today, for shits n’giggles I went on CB to see if they would add insult to injury, and would you believe that these assholes are hiring for the very positions they laid people off in. Don’t believe me, click the link or do a search on CB. Yeah, these douche bags did. My theory is that of others, they got rid of A-Players because we cost to much and left B and C players to pick up the slack n’ skimp on by for a lower price. These people don’t hit quota, activity, and kickers, they barely mozy on by. Management, you are a bunch of hypocritical douche bags. Go Monster!!!!
http://www.careerbuilder.com/Jobseeker/Jobs/JobResults.aspx?IPath=QH&ch=&rs=&_ctl0%3A_ctl0%3A_ctl0%3ABody%3ACBBody%3ACBBody%3As_rawwords=careerbuilder.com&_ctl0%3A_ctl0%3A_ctl0%3ABody%3ACBBody%3ACBBody%3As_jobtypes=ALL&s_freshness=30&s_education=DRNS&_ctl0%3A_ctl0%3A_ctl0%3ABody%3ACBBody%3ACBBody%3As_freeloc=&qsbButton=Find+Jobs+%3E%3E
December 7th, 2008 at 10:07 pm
thats pretty weak that CB has a bunch of sales openings on their site right now. what are they thinking?!?!?!
December 8th, 2008 at 12:26 am
I am a CB employee (still). I can tell you that Friday wasn’t easy for anyone (obviously harder for some than others).
To people who felt “deceived”: No one wanted this to happen, but you can’t predict these things either. You don’t work towards them and announce them ahead of time. You work as hard as you can to make it not happen, and you only give up and give in when you reach the tipping point. Due to the economy, we reached a tipping point.
Several factors were considered when the lists were drawn up, including tenure (first-in, first-out), salary, performance, attitude, commitment, and more. In non-sales departments, it also came down to how integral the person’s role was to basic business as opposed to nice-to-haves.
To be blunt, Friday sucked. And yes, I say that from the vantage point of still having a job, so I do understand that there are people who have it much, much worse than me. The thoughts and prayers of all CB employees – from Matt down – are with the people impacted in Friday’s layoffs. I personally, however, am grateful that I work for a company that is willing to make hard decisions so that the rest of the group can be stronger and more resilient.
December 8th, 2008 at 12:47 am
I left CB months ago and I’m kind of blown away with the stories of people getting let go who where on their way to the 5K bonus and that they flat out lied.
*They really want you to drink the koolaid when you start
*They gave me about 60 volunteer firefighter leads (gee thanks)
*Those Malawi trips were the biggest act of vanity I’ve ever seen.
Other than that, it was a fun corporate culture and there really are enough resources to develop your sales skills. You just aren’t likely to get any good leads.
December 8th, 2008 at 4:58 am
If you need work in sales, better yet if you want a challenge, you can help us get our job board off the ground. execassistance333@hotmail.com
December 8th, 2008 at 10:01 am
Hey USE MONSTER,
Cb has no stock genius – it’s a private company.
December 8th, 2008 at 10:34 am
BOB – I think Use Monster may have miswrote what he meant
“the Company sold a 10 percent interest in CareerBuilder, LLC to Gannett Co., Inc. for $135 million.” This was seen as cheap compared to what CB was supposedly worth.
With the Tribune on the verge of BK protection, get readt for all your clients to ask about it. The other boards are going to point this out.
Mr. Client, I know that CB is selling you a 20k plan and mine is 30k, but can you trust your investment in a company that is filing BK protection to get away from its creditors. Can you be certain that your 20K investment is going to get you the ROI and customer service you deserve?
A saleman is going to point out that CB’s 50% off December sale is a way to get money in now so they don’t have to fire more people (probably inevitable) and how can you be sure that your investment is safe.
CB can be shown not to be a safe choice right now for someone in HR
December 8th, 2008 at 11:20 am
I agree with Looking Mug, minorities will be first in line. As the single minority Sales Rep in my office, and the whole Region, I was put on a performance plan when I ran at 100% for six consecutive months and dipped to 96% the seventh month. I quickly received the notice while the other non-minority reps, who were far below my YTD performance, were allowed to underperform with no repercussions. Perhaps some were put on plan, but it was a fraternity style selection. In fact, most of the VP’s down to managers and sales reps all belonged to the same frat….Also, I actually sat through Matt Ferguson’s speech about “hiring the best man for the job” as he acknowledged that they had not a single minority manager in the entire sales organization. The only thing that ran through my mind was, are you kidding me, how can you possibly imply that there are no qualified, or much better qualified sales managers/leaders across the entire US…under what rock are you looking! The message was loud and clear!
December 8th, 2008 at 11:45 am
Co’s like CB, HJ and Monster are in the business of posting jobs and selling access to a massive resume database. If the demand falls off 30% then in order to hit numbers for investors, headcount will have to be reduced. It is basic ECON 101…supply and demand.
There could be more consolidation soon….Monster may get bought, CB may get bought, HJ may get spun off in MSFT buys YHOO. Tribune is getting ready to file Chapter 11. The newspapers are going away. I have been in this space for ten years…I have seen sales people let go mostly for not performing, but have also seen other high performers let go who were seen as complainers by management within the sales org.
My base salary was a bit south of 100K and at 100% I pulled down close to 200K per year. I also worked with a book of the top F 500. It was pressure filled but I loved it. Layoffs happen…it will pickup again….just not anytime soon in this space. Look for sales oppt’s in a new industry maybe. This space is headcount heavy folks. There are thousands of companies in the “jobs” space….many will fold up without much press and more will be without jobs. Keep the faith, look outside this industry and get that money! Merry Christmas everyone.
Joel, keep up the great job of uncovering what’s happening out there in this industry! YOU sir ROCK!!
December 8th, 2008 at 11:57 am
Oh and BTW….”minorities”, even those who underperform are always the last to go. Most companies are afraid to fire the “minorities” they have and open themselves up to the typical race attacks by the NAACP and the ACLU.
If you’re a “minority” and you’re fired there was ample cause I assure you. Minorities are unfortunately, a protected group in most companies and too often are kept onboard just to keep the, what I call color component up. I await the day when people can truly be judged NOT by the color of their skin, but by their actual job performance and the content of their character. Probably too much of a dream for me….true fairness. Maybe Obama will end reverse discrimination and the NAACP? LOL.
December 8th, 2008 at 12:20 pm
the good points about Careerbuilder. The downtown location is great off of Lasalle St. right in th middle of everything. The Team Leads in many ways realize the job sucks and while they can be tough as far as the numbers are concerned they are real people who when pinned down will tell you the job SUCKS!
The place is like a frat house and some Team Leads tend to guide the good leads toward their buddies. So, the potential for Career growth if you fail to kiss ass meaning two levels above you at all times in none. Basically you have to get lucky because all the leads are a joke, as they are called through 10,000 times a week among 5 business sales units. Don’t sweat this job because you have 4 months to figure out your next step when you walk in the door.
Trust me Careerbuilder has made the calculation. Your few sales short of goal will be reassigned to the “VETERANS” who sit in the corner and have 20 minutes worth of talk time a day and always manage to sell over 25,000 dollars a month in product.
Wonder how? Their sales are the reassigns from the suckers who sold below goal and didn’t hit bonus. At Careerbuilder the Math is against you from the start. For example if the goal is 5,000 dollars the first month and you sale 4,000 and miss the quota by 1,000 do you get 80% of your bonus? Hell No! You get ZERO dollars which means your 4,000 will be apart of the upsell for one of the “VETERANS” that sit in the corner once you are gone.
Moreover, the reward for missing a 5,000 dollar quoata by 1,000 the next month is a quota of 7,500 the next month and 10,000 the following month. So as a Rookie trying to hit the home run you pitch near your quota on every proposal and if some VETERAN in another sales unit pitches a 419 posting because that is all this VET may need to reach quota, has a way of undercutting the salesmen of women who pitched the customer a real solution.
Territory does not exist in this situation and you will lose because the VET will argue he pitched the prospect a 419 to win the business and trust, he makes the sell and you are out in the cold due to a bogus territory policy. After working in the downtown office I noticed something missing real CHICAGOANS.
All the workers are from IOWA, OHIO, TEXAS and name another state. I did not see many people from the City here it seems this place is a reunion of all the BIG TEN schools less Illinois. Overall, this place is nothing more than a professional halfway house for BIG TEN REJECTS less Illinois. The chicks at Careerbuilder are so loose, often rubbing their legs like crickets in the effort to turn on the Male Team Leads-all white male I may add, in the effort to get good leads. By the way the chick at personified within Careerbuilder makes all the males at the office do what she wants. Get hired and look for her.
I didn’t really see many minorities or women in the Team Lead position. I remember about a year ago an African-American fellow employee with an MBA who caught hell from his Team Lead and this guy knew more than his team lead about business.
As a White guy seeing this woke me up to alot. Careerbuilder is so bad, in fact it needs its own service because the qualified and over-qualified are never moved up and the frat boys run the place.
I rate this job a D+
December 8th, 2008 at 12:25 pm
CB layoffs in Atlanta…We are hiring “high energy” Sales people with energy industry jobs sales experience. Apply at:
http://www.albertenergy.com/engineering-jobs/jobDetails.asp?reqID=Job-10563
December 8th, 2008 at 12:32 pm
Mintel, a global market research company, is also hiring for New Business Salespeople. If interested, please e-mail me at dbisson@mintel.com.
December 8th, 2008 at 1:00 pm
CB Leader–is this grammatically correct? Those who live in glass houses….
“I counted at least 45 spelling or grammatical errors from the reps who was let go.”
December 8th, 2008 at 1:06 pm
Figure it all out! They are just trying to be profitable in the 4th Quarter. So they lied to you guys and used you. I don’t know if I were left at this company I would be organizing my fellow employees to pull”BLUE FLU” on this company.
Take their money and one day a week organize a day where 50% of your department takes the day off. Pull 20% of the workforce “Slip and Falls” and get paid off these guys they are going to can you anyway!
Leak information to the competitors, and the media, and finally if each of you tell 25 people in detail how you were screwed over this will hurt their image.
Also, be honest to your fellow job seekers Careerbuilder is a SCAM which makes most of its money from SCAM companies like GEORGE S. MAY, PRIMEAMERICA, AND WORK AT HOME SCAMS.
Tell your fellow job seekers they have a better chance on FACEBOOK AND MYSPACE TALKING TO ACTUAL RANDOM PEOPLE!
December 8th, 2008 at 1:42 pm
While the sales offices appear to have been hardest hit by the layoffs, I can assure all of you that the reach was far greater and more than a bit ambiguous. I had been with the company in the Atlanta office for 4 years, been promoted a handful of times and was even enrolled in the companies LDS (leadership development series) program designed for high potential employees. I had never been on any sort of disciplinary action plan nor had I received any indication that my career was in jeopardy. To the contrary the company was investing thousands of dollars into my education and development both within and outside the company walls. Earlier in the week I was flown to the Chicago office to present in a planning and brainstorming session with the business units I worked with only to be let go days later without even being asked for copies of anything I was working on. My head is still spinning a bit from this whole fiasco but at the same time I do not hold any of the executive leadership in contempt for what they had to do nor do I envy their situation. I know it was extremely difficult in particular for our CTO who was responsible for letting my group go – he is an outstanding leader and I would gladly return to work for him given the opportunity.
To everyone else who was laid off, good luck in your future endeavors. Just a thought, but as layoffs were made across the board, it seems like we would be able to pool our combined talents from sales, technology, customer service, marketing and business development to establish our own web-based business…. As I said; just a thought. There was a lot of exceptional talent that was released on Friday and I would hate to see any of it go to waste
December 8th, 2008 at 2:56 pm
OH i own so many condos. But I dont even have an undergrad degree
December 8th, 2008 at 3:01 pm
They Filed Chapter 11
http://www.marketwatch.com/news/story/tribune-co-files-chapter-11/story.aspx?guid=%7BD63DFE7D%2DA893%2D4F30%2D9622%2D5FBC4EB87A75%7D&siteid=bnbh
December 8th, 2008 at 3:05 pm
sales meeting at spin
December 8th, 2008 at 3:33 pm
I really feel for these verterans who had been there for years upon years. It just goes to show that what CB vowed they would never do, they ended up doing: Following in the footsteps of Monster. I still have a lot of friends who work there and the excessive spending I have heard is outragous. They can easily say “CB is still on target to meet 2008 goals” all they want. When people aren’t renewing their contracts for atleast 10% more than the previous year, careerbuilder can’t flurish.
PS – There is no way the Hunter we think is “Hunter” on here is really him. Career suicide. Its someone who has beef with him. Don’t be fooled.
December 8th, 2008 at 3:44 pm
upper managment in my company had more business sense then these clowns
December 8th, 2008 at 3:54 pm
Everyone, please be at the meeting tomorrow at 10:00 AM for another round of our weekly pointless meetings where we have the winner of “club moron” I mean “Club 21″ stand in front of the room and lead us off into shouting some random number followed by claps in unison.
Remember, keep your dials over 250 a day, and you will increase your job security by 5%.
Have a wonderful day.
CM Managment.
December 8th, 2008 at 5:35 pm
The company would not have any problems if middle management was competent. It is laughable how some of the ASM’s got their jobs. And the comments made about being in the “fraternity” are DEAD ON. If you aren’t from NY then you should start looking for a job.
December 8th, 2008 at 5:45 pm
hey I wasn’t in a frat!
December 8th, 2008 at 6:01 pm
CB Leader youra stoopid betch!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Mark that to you “Grammar Mistake” List.
Who’s balls are you blowing that you mangaged to be so “blessed” to keep your job. You sound like an idiot!!
You want to talk about “poor communication skills” And I quote you
“However, the won thing eye have noticed from the posts above are that the people that lost there jobs have shocklngly poor communication skills”
How about the “poor communication skills” from our VPs.
Your no better than anyone who lost their job
Amen!!!!!
December 8th, 2008 at 6:21 pm
Funny….EX-CbMinority….are Asians or Indians considered minorities? Does anyone ever hear them crying that the wite man…and America is keeping them down? LOL. And can anyone tell me if 52% of the population, women, are a protected “minority” group too? Look….if you group everyone that isn’t a white male, under the age of 50 into some bullsh*t minority group status, doesn’t that make the wite males from 18-50 the true minority? You’re only a minority in your mind. When I hear Asians and Indians screaming about discrimination I might take it seriously. Till then, look at Obama and understand that you rise and fall because of what’s between your ears and what’s in your heart and the effort you put forth….NOT because you have nappy hair and dark skin. Blacks are a protected class and it is very difficult to fire them when they suck. It’s like a quasi union. Got help us.
December 8th, 2008 at 6:55 pm
http://www.eastvalleytribune.com/story/132050
from the news here in az
December 8th, 2008 at 11:30 pm
Candor (I believe it is still a value correct)? Oh that’s right….as long as you agree with Hunter and team it is. I will give them agility!
If these guys can run the show and go to the top, I think anyone can!
December 9th, 2008 at 1:37 am
Gannett/CareerBuilder lays off workers after getting tax break to add employees. I’ve always believed these special local tax breaks for corporations are a scam. Here’s a how Career Builder cheated Chicago:
The big employment listings website controlled by Gannett has laid off more than 300 employees, a published report says today — just two months after winning a $2.9 million tax break to add 185 jobs at its Chicago headquarters.
“Most of the laid-off workers are from the Chicago corporate headquarters,” the East Valley Tribune near Phoenix, Ariz.
Also Atlanta.
Posted at Mon Dec 08, 2008 at 21:33
December 9th, 2008 at 2:43 am
Unfortunately, being laid off sucks. I escaped in August, but it still sucks to hear all my friends being canned in Atl.
But what everyone is forgetting is that this is indeed basic Econ101, Supply and demand. If no companies are hiring, who the hell are we going to sell to?
If there is no one to sell to, why the hell would CB (or any other firm) pay us to sit on our ass? Its not CB to blame (although they can be blamed their questionable methods).. but when there is no business, why bother spending money?
To the Director and mid-manager on the 2nd floor in Atlanta – FUC K YOU!!! YOU ASSHOLES DESERVE TO BE GONE FOR TREATING ALL THE “GOOD” PEOPLE LIKE SHI T, CUTTING EVERYONE BECAUSE THEY HAVE TO PROVE THEMSELVES TO YOU, EVEN THOUGH THEY’VE BEEN WITH CB LONGER THAN YOU, SHOWING MORE LOYALTY THAN YOU.. AND WE SHOWED MORE CLASS THAN BOTH OF YOU. I LAUGH AT YOUR FUC KING FACE FOR BEING UNEMPLOYED.
To my friends: Good luck
December 9th, 2008 at 2:55 am
I worked for CareerBuilder for close to 3 years and was made redundant on Friday. Yes, I use redundant for no other reason than I find it amusing. Across my time at CareerBuilder I can honestly say I didn’t see many if the horrible issues, like a Frat mentality, that people are complaining about. I’ll admit I heard horror stories from 2004 or so but haven’t seen it myself. I can say I don’t see much reason behind how some cuts were made. There were people that are truly phenomenal sales people who were let go, while others with a lower skill set were kept.
Personally, I’m not bitter, I was ready to leave CareerBuilder and was already starting job hunting. I did nothing besides sign up renewals since October and was planning on not doing anything until I was let go or found another job. Getting a nice little severance package was a plus I have to admit.
CareerBuilder was a great place to work, and I would recommend time there to any beginning sales person. While some people will need to leave to grow like me, I have some very good friends that plan on, and most likely will be life long CareerBuilder employees. Good luck to everyone who was let go.
p.s. CBLeader, I’m an ex-christian and current atheist. Your brand of self-righteous hypocritical bs is what’s wrong with the church. Haven’t you caught on, it’s not your God people dislike, it’s his followers.
December 9th, 2008 at 8:54 am
i’m surprised we haven’t heard more about this in the news.
then again, it depends on the spokesperson. they would have to teach castellini the official company statement phonetically….so it may take a few extra days…..
December 9th, 2008 at 10:40 am
The number is actually closer to 400. They have been laying/firing small numbers since August to avoid a mass layoff. There were several executives and managers laid off. Job losses were not just from sales- but from all areas of the company. With the tribune filing for bankrupcy…there will be more.
December 9th, 2008 at 11:42 am
A lot of ex employees are on this message board complaining about how much they disliked fellow coworkers and CB’s corporate culture while they were employed there. Then why didn’t you leave a long time ago if it was so bad. Somebody please answer this for me. Nobody forced you to come to work every day, did they? Must not have really been all that bad then, huh? Sounds like sour grapes to me. Regardless, layoffs are always a terrible thing – good luck to all who lost jobs on Friday.
December 9th, 2008 at 1:20 pm
I quit the salesforce in ATL a while back, not because I didn’t have the accounts, or because I wasn’t making $$$, I left because leadership there is a joke and it was insulting to have to report to someone who was an absolute moron when it came to business. No trip to Cabo was worth the daily agony of having to read his pep rally emails and highlighted activity reports.
It’s so sad to see so many people being laid off, but if you look at the people that are running the show (both in CHI,ATL and PHX,) it’s not surprising that things have turned out like this. When your leadership are a bunch of ‘roid raging cheerleaders that are making money off of team leads and salespeople that actually know what they’re doing then getting to the point of a 10% layoff should be expected.
Hopefully other companies are as smart as my current employer and are waiting outside the doors of all these offices ready to scoop up some great sales people.
December 9th, 2008 at 2:12 pm
All I know is, I worked at CB and was lucky enough to find a new better paying job 2 months before this happened…
They LIED constantly and took forever to correct their mistakes. I was on a team in one of the WORST states economically and when our entitre team missed quota multiple times nothing was done. I was at CB 10 months and hit quota twice, essetially missing quota 5 months in a row before I quit, and they only let me stay because they knew I was screwed with my teritory…
They finally decided to fix the 10 months by giving us another teritory during my last week but it was too little too late.. them telling us to just try harder when we tried harder than anyone finally caught up with them. Now whats left of my team, ( we lost 1 person a month..mostly quits) is still employed because I’m assuming CB felt bad… they fired 2 people because one was new and missed fast starts and the other was never there (missed 3 months in a row)..
I was even in line for a corporate non sales job and they played with me for 3 months holding it over my head, only to finally restructure the department and change the job description and pull back the offer without warning. Now I’m gald all of the happened because I would be without a job in a company that became seemingly amoral and corrupt.
CB is getting what they deserve for BAD buisness practices and the promotion of people to management positions who were only really good at selling, not managing.
December 9th, 2008 at 2:18 pm
“A lot of ex employees are on this message board complaining about how much they disliked fellow coworkers and CB’s corporate culture while they were employed there. Then why didn’t you leave a long time ago if it was so bad. Somebody please answer this for me. Nobody forced you to come to work every day, did they? Must not have really been all that bad then, huh? Sounds like sour grapes to me. Regardless, layoffs are always a terrible thing – good luck to all who lost jobs on Friday.”
Because the job market was tightening and getting a new job wasn’t as easy as it was a few years ago. You took what you could get. Everyone on my team was looking for new jobs the entire time, but it would take months for anything to pan out. For me CB was a last resort after 6 months of unemployment and for a time I drank the Kool-Aid about the potential of the job and I had loans and yeah… the job seems great until the truth is exposed.
December 9th, 2008 at 4:17 pm
ABC 7 reporting 200+ additional layoffs by next friday due to trib filing for bankruptcy protection at CB. Monster making moves to make bid to purchase CB majority shares from Microsoft and tribune company.
December 9th, 2008 at 5:52 pm
JayOhare, where are you getting this info? Nothing noted on ABC7, or anywhere else that I can find.
December 9th, 2008 at 6:17 pm
WGN radio 720AM was reporting earlier today. They mentioned ABC 7 as the source
December 9th, 2008 at 6:20 pm
I don’t see any info on Monster buying any part of CB. Please source
December 9th, 2008 at 8:54 pm
Jay O Hare-
Source or die! No link then I have to call this a bogus source.
December 9th, 2008 at 10:39 pm
Where was HR in this scene?
December 10th, 2008 at 11:00 am
There are no majority SHARES to take, as CB is privately held. Microsoft only has about a 4% stake in CB, and now Gannet, not Trib is the majority stake holder in CB. JayOhare is making stuff up.
December 10th, 2008 at 11:25 am
Seems like everyone who was laid-off on Friday is here- including me! I am not upset about the actual lay-off but how it went down was inhumane-I guess these things have to be done sans emotion. It’s confirmed that 400 employees were laid off. Just so glad I don’t have a family to support! Right before the holidays- seriously? They could have waited until Q1.
December 10th, 2008 at 11:37 am
That’s what I thought. Thanks Another Ex Kool-Aid Drinker. I know Gannett has 51% ownership, but didn’t know if I was missing something here.
December 10th, 2008 at 12:03 pm
Yes Gennett has 51%, they bought the last 10% for 135 million which was WAY UNDERVALUED for what CB was saying. The 10% they bought made them a majority shareholder, so it should have been more expensive.
I bet there are more layoffs this or next week
December 10th, 2008 at 12:08 pm
Gannett’s stock has fallen 75% this year too, they publish USA Today. All the Newspapers are failing, so having this company as a majoroty shareholder is not a lot better than Tribune.
December 10th, 2008 at 2:02 pm
I would like to take the time to remind you of something as you obviously have NO CLUE.
These lay-offs were not performance based. AT ALL. I repeat, they were NOT performance-based. These cuts were made with financials and financials ONLY in mind. It had nothing to do with your personality or “scrappiness” or how talkative you were. Don’t flatter yourselves. These cuts were made so that CB could retain/make MONEY now- and the cuts are reflective of that approach. If I were you and survived the cuts- I would spend less on this board and more on YOUR WORK.
December 10th, 2008 at 3:00 pm
First of all, I worked at CB for around 2 years from ‘05 to ‘07. Of course the cuts were not made on any “performance” model. Frankly, CB doesn’t care about your individual performance. If you sell, it’s simply a bonus to higher-ups. The inside sales groups were used as a marketing arm. If you saturate the market, leaving no room for a Monster or HotJobs rep to make the sale, of course you’re going to gain market share.
The trips, the rooftop parties, all that is gone. If anyone remembers the dot com bubble, CB was really no different. They had hordes of cash that they HAD TO SPEND. See, the owner companies only give CB enough money for operating cost. There was really no profit to be had there. Matt, Brent, and Mary we’re going to only make as much as they could spend. Don’t flatter yourselves – the money was being spent because the company had NO choice. If you’re still there, you are not profitable, and I would be wondering if you are going to have a job come January 1.
For those that were there when the MSG groups were cut out, we all remember that was the entire reasoning behind that move. Knight Ridder (God, that dates me, doesn’t it?) was only going to give CB enough money to keep the lights on. On paper this was a smart move, however small businesses usually hire on the local level. If they can get CB product PLUS the newspaper for cheaper than a CB ad alone, who the hell wouldn’t buy from the paper?
Let’s face it; Pete Jansons was the WRONG guy to run that division. He has zero logistical skills and while I’m sure the guy was a decent sales person back when he was selling banners for Headhunter.net – his idea that “more is better” is a joke. The guy literally had to have the difference between revenue and invoicing explained to him when the new comp plans came out. He hires his little lackeys into positions of power, insulating himself from any sort of criticism. Who are you going to replace him with? Peck? Please, that guy has the brains God gave a tomato. Zapata? Nice girl, but try and have her learn the margin in a P & L first.
CB is NOT A BAD COMPANY people. Really, it’s not. But hubris got to it. Pete really thought that if the company was number one, there was still no place to go but up. While every other Sales Dir and VP in Chicago (myself included) was hunkering down for what can only be a VERY cold winter, Pete let his own pride get in the way of good business. Sure, there were mistakes made higher up – Matt should have been more honest, Brent should have done a better job managing expectations and headcount – but all this could have been avoided had Pete built his department on realistic expectations and maybe a little intelligent thought. I’m sorry but more people do not equal more sales.
I do hope that all the people who were let go find employment, and for the people that are still there, I hope you see this as a warning. I still have friends there, and I wish you all the best.
December 10th, 2008 at 3:04 pm
WOW you sound like one of those “really reaaaallly talented managers” who just so happend to blow errr i mean moveup the corporate with YOUR scrappiness and hard work ethic. This company is a joke. I think its funny whenever I’m in a bar and I am talking to someone and they say “ohh careerbuilder? I used to work there. it was brutal”. Who in chicago has NOT worked at careerbuilder. 149% turnover? Really sucessful business model. I mean hunter and everyone really know what they are doing. I feel sorry for everyone left who is being told “dont worry you’re all safe!” I guarentee there will be more cuts by the end of Jan.
December 10th, 2008 at 3:39 pm
Serious?, chill out. I got laid off too, worked really hard and cared about the company- knowing all the while how defective it actually was. We were encouraged to use CB for all it was worth because they were doing the same to us. I didn’t do that (now I wish I had) but I did a damned good job. Am I mad about how it happened? Yes. Do I think it’s a blessing in disguise? DEFINITELY. I was simply trying to point out how people need to stop saying that they are still with CB because they’re awesome- that’s clearly not the case.
December 10th, 2008 at 4:33 pm
I got out over 2 years ago. The leads and “market” was way too picked over. if you got in when the timing was good its a great company.
December 10th, 2008 at 10:00 pm
A rat always knows when he’s in with weasels.
December 10th, 2008 at 11:15 pm
There is a big difference between working for a successful company and working for a company to be successful — if you never forget that you will be okay no matter where you are. If a company duncans you it is their loss.
December 11th, 2008 at 2:59 pm
To CB ex-staff: the Local JobNetwork™ is hiring.
We’re expanding our salesforce in Chicago and Atlanta and we’re looking for top-tier Account Executives with proven B2B sales expertise to join our elite sales team. Follow these links to apply:
MetroChicagoJobs.com: http://www.metrochicagojobs.com/jobs.asp?pagemode=15&jid=652617
MetroAtlantaJobs.com: http://www.metroatlantajobs.com/jobs.asp?pagemode=15&jid=652613
Call (800) 984-3775 and ask for Human Resources if you would like to discuss this further. We look forward to hearing from you.
The Local JobNetwork™ Team
http://www.localjobnetwork.com
December 12th, 2008 at 12:19 am
Wow,
I left CB in September. Why? One, I could see the writing on the wall. Two, I was miserable. Working there was like living through an abusive relationship. It takes awhile away from there to give you perspective on how truly awful it was. I came in with high hopes to knock the cover off the ball as I had in many previous jobs.But the comp system was ridiculous – who the hell was so in love with the rule of 78ths? There were some of the best sales people working for the company, yet they could be number one last year and bottom of the barrel this year. Major accounts/National accounts was like a roll of the dice as far as which accounts you had. Management was either non-existent or a total joke. VP’s could walk in and say you are gone without any notice. Candor? Are you kidding… drink the kool-aid baby or get out! There was no diversity of ethnicity, thought, nor age. If you were a 24 year old frat brother with spiky hair and a double windsor knot – you would go far… if you were a minority or over 40 , good luck. THERE IS LIFE after CB. Hang in there all of you.
December 15th, 2008 at 12:33 am
Number of times laid off at CB: 1
Number of times laid at CB: 7
Number of times that I will laugh about conference room rendevous: Infinite
December 17th, 2008 at 5:48 pm
Wow some guy with spikey Hair and frosted tips got laid at Careerbuilder! Sounds like just a typical day at Careerbuilder. All the girls are country bumpkins from Iowa and Missouri and all the guys are just dying to come out the closet.
But before this happens they have to do MANDY, MEGAN, ERIN OR SARA who needs to sleep her way to the top and do pencil dicks along the way. Careerbuilder…. start milking!
December 19th, 2008 at 11:17 pm
Wow…I can certainly say this. If you enjoy working all the time, not being appreciated, belittled, micro-managed and all the while on quota. Have an enjoyable career at CareerBuilder. I resigned today because I’d rather work in a toilet bowl. The view is more pleasant and you put up with less crap!
December 26th, 2008 at 12:57 pm
Follow-up: Not gone YET, but soon. Bizzare and unbelievable as it may seem, the remaining commoners still think they were left unscathed because they are special, or better than the ‘candidates’ chosen to be laid-off. The place is thick with arrogance. I almost want to be there for the next wave to see the looks on the faces of the cows (male and female) who believe they are vital and that CB cares about them.
December 29th, 2008 at 10:55 am
Companies go through layoffs in cycles and sometimes are necessary to secure the future of the organization. This layoff was trimming the fat. To mock any organization for doing that is ludicrious… I think Monster will be the first to go or get bought out. The new monster is not much new of anything and careerbuilder.com seems to always be a step ahead of monster with regards to site enhancements.
January 5th, 2009 at 7:35 pm
More layoffs today, some managers, have to wonder how many of the people on here who said they were better and more important to the company also got laid off…jokers.
January 10th, 2009 at 5:20 am
You know what “This Guy,” I really appreciate the update. As I am sure many would agree, there are alot of people, including Sales Managers, Team Leads, Personified Reps, etc. that should have been laid off on December 5th, 2008, because they haven’t a clue what they are doing. I could name names on who really sucks at their job in the upper level roles and got their position based on favoritism versus seniority, but what would be the point? Hopefully they are cutting the fat in the right places now instead of entering some variables into a matrix to figure out whether you made the grade or not. This ‘matrix’ is the method some CB employees have gossiped as being the method on who should stay and who should go. I am still a little bitter, yes, but not as much anymore. I have gone on several interviews, and have been offered a position from each. I hope that my colleagues that were laid off by CB will find better opportunities that will allow them to flourish. Good luck everyone and get that unemployment!!!!!!!! http://www.ides.state.il.us/
January 10th, 2009 at 11:01 am
After all of the layoffs… Careerbuilder will still be at it. The economy is not getting better in the next couple months. The first layoffs where considered a “right sizing” rather then layoffs. The company is based strictly on politics it’s funny. You can survive and make good money depending on how many peoples butt you can get your nose up or how you can use your non selling skills to get good accounts. The positions people have and how they get promoted should be another blog conversation. There will be layoffs within the next few months I would bet on it. Right now they are just looking for any excuse to let someone go.
January 11th, 2009 at 1:20 am
I hope you saw the piece on nightline. The VP from careerbuilders was all smug in telling the viewers how to get jobs AND one of the best jobs to be looking for was GET THIS sales !!! Funny how he choked when he was asked if THEY were hiring!!! Yeah right!
January 24th, 2009 at 2:22 am
Careerbuilder is in trouble right now. As a current account executive i can tell you that this restructuring of accounts sucks and it is not going as upper management planned. Will CB show profits in North America in 2009? Possibly. Our goal is to retain our current account base and maybe grow them with a whole new line of more focused products CB is roleing out in 2009. My opinion, 2009 will be hard. Chances for success suck, but once again only the strong will survive. Those who create and inovate will generate money. As much shit as people talk shit CB has continued to be profitable and inovative in hard time and will continue to do so. I attribute that to our strong leader Matt. Will I loose my job, i doubt. I have continued to be profitable for the company. Make you self an asset. Stop bitching and deliver. Do your job. It will be harder than 2008. The people who step up to the challenge will be rewarded in the long run. Your either gonna make it or sell yourself on a reason to fail. Step up and deliver cuz winners go home and fuck the prom queen.
February 1st, 2009 at 11:58 am
For those who think your job is safe by being a top performer think again. Your job will be safe the more U make your boss look good. Just remember who Matt idolizes. For those who were let go I am sorry for you have a drink on me. For those who may be up for the next round of “right sizing” American Idol style listen to this. “Wreak havoc and let loose the dogs of war” make copies of all propriety information; download sales lists, contact lists, customer information, vendors and protocol. Keep 15+ accounts available that you can access. Security and online safety is a joke CB has been protected by its media owners.
Remember CB staffing back in 2002-2004 that is the size CB will closely resemble when things pan out. The prom queen has gotten too fat with 14 kids. This is a dog eat dog fraternity/high school musical atmosphere and only the ones who kiss butt with the preferred shade of lip stick will endure. If you have your job still great but U must plan to be cut next because it will not be pretty the next time around. For the GA people plan to have that office closed or relocated to save money. Your leaders are looking at office consolidation. If you listen too much to your leaders you will get it in the end.
So again “Wreak havoc and let loose the dogs of war” so you can thrive.