Cheezhead Recruiting News and Opinion

Following the layoffs at CareerBuilder last week that cut an estimated 15 percent of the job board’s workforce, a source who wishes to remain anonymous sent us an email allegedly from Matt Ferguson, CareerBuilder’s CEO, written in October regarding the economy and the job board’s staff.

The email makes no mention of the impending layoffs but does say that they will be forced to cut staff “by the end 2009″ and that the staff cuts will mainly come from not hiring to fill positions from the people who leave.

The source also sent us an email allegedly from John Smith, CareerBuilder’s SVP of Enterprise Sales, which admonishes sales reps for not meeting their quotas and talks about swift terminations if these quotas aren’t met.

Here are the emails:

From: Matt Ferguson
Sent: Friday, October 10, 2008 12:53 PM
To: Careerbuilder Bangalore; CareerBuilder Canada; Careerbuilder France; Careerbuilder Germany; Careerbuilder Greece; CareerBuilder India; Careerbuilder Italy; Careerbuilder Netherlands; Careerbuilder New Delhi; Careerbuilder Norway; Careerbuilder Romania; Careerbuilder Spain; Careerbuilder Sweden; CareerBuilder UK; CareerBuilder USA and Personified
Subject: Where We Go From Here

The events of the last few weeks have been a shock to all of us. We are all concerned about what these events mean for us as citizens and employees. This email is an attempt to provide some clarity on these issues.

How did we get here?

The answer is we have borrowed too much for too long. Here are some simple examples:

1) The United States debt has gone from $5.7 trillion in 2000 to over $10 trillion today and has gone from 58% of GDP to 65% of GDP
2) Personal savings rate in the US has gone from around 10% in 1980 to a negative savings rate recently.
3) The trade deficit has increased to over $800 billion dollars.
4) Outstanding consumer debt in the US has increased from $1.5 trillion in 2000 to over $2.5 trillion today.
5) Bank and investment bank leverage has increase every year since 2000. We are seeing the fall-out from that.
6) 1 in 6 homes in the US have a mortgage that is more than their value. This has no comparison to any other time in our history except the Great Depression. We started making negative amortizing loans to people that could not afford them. It is the loans made in 2004, 05 and 06 that are all defaulting right now. Not prior loans.

How do we get out of it?

In the short-term, the Paulson Plan in the US (and several plans around the world) just moves the debt from consumers and businesses to the government so that the whole system does not crash. In the depression, the government refused to move debt from businesses and consumers to the government, trade barriers went up between countries immediately reducing business activity, and the whole system crashed. Governments today are working hard to solve the problems and are generally working together. We are not headed for another Great Depression.

The long-term question is what do you do now that the US government will owe $12 trillion which will be over 80 percent of GDP, and the economy is growing again albeit slowly. At that point, we have to give our politicians the strength to do something that has never gotten anyone elected: raise taxes and cut spending. America will again be a great economic power. The world economies will all start growing again. Let’s just be smarter about the way we achieve that growth.

What does this mean for CB?

First and foremost, we are financially strong. We have no debt, we have cash, and we are making money.

In the US, we will have fewer employees by the end of 2009 than we do today. Our current plan is that the vast majority of the reduction in headcount will come from not hiring to fill positions of people who leave. We need to be leaner and stronger by the end of 2009. We should grow revenue in the US even in this economic climate. There will still be opportunity, but we will have to work much harder to find it.

Internationally, we should still grow quickly. We actually should grow more outside the US next year than in the US. That is in real dollars terms and not in percentages. We thought it would be five years before that happened. We have always planned on diversifying our revenue outside the US, and now we will see the benefit of that diversification.

Most importantly, in this environment, we will need to show customers our return on investment. We have to show customers how many people we hired for them and what those people did to grow their revenue and reduce their expenses. Our best people have been doing this all along. Now, we all have to do this. In addition, we have to continue to innovate. Most companies stop doing that in this environment. It is now more important than ever that we bring creative and innovative solutions to our customers through Personified, CB Media, WorkInRetail, etc.

What does this mean for you?

There are things in life you can control and things in life you cannot. We cannot control the stock market or the banking system. We can control what we do every day to get smarter, work harder, and find the best solutions for our customers. You will have to work harder and smarter to succeed in this environment. You will not make it if you just do one of these. I ask that you all start today.

Thanks

Matt

And the alleged email from the SVP of Enterprise Sales:

From: John Smith
Sent: Thursday, September 25, 2008 9:23 AM
Subject: Activity Plan – Please Read

All,

It is with severe disappointment that I write this email.

At our last ASM meeting we discussed activity at length. Additionally, we all made activity commitments prior to leaving the meeting. As a group we committed to 200 dials a week or 800 per month. Some of you thought that would be a little steep so we then said bare minimum 150 dials a week or 600 per month. In the months following the meeting, none of you have even hit the 600 dial mark. With that said, you may all consider this email a warning and the following action will be taken:

If any office averages below 300 dial per rep in October the ASM will be put on plan in November. If the office fails to hit the 300 dial mark in November that ASM will be terminated. Tenure or current standings will not be taken in to consideration for this program. This program will be indefinite.

AVP’s,

I advise you to start recruiting heavily in the markets you are at risk. . .

It is my belief that we simply cannot win averaging between 6 dials(Orlando 121/20days) and 13 dials(San Mateo 2 277/20days) per day. If you disagree, I am more than open to discuss your thoughts on what it takes to win. If you have any questions or concerns please let me know.,

Regards,

John Smith
SVP – Enterprise Sales
Careerbuilder.com
(numbers withheld)

The source that sent these emails said that there are more layoffs to come but not until after the first of the year.

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