Human Resources News

Wednesday, March 17, 2010

Women to Watch alumni offer tips for girls, advice for business and government
Three of the 2009 Women to Watch honorees offered some tips to girls who may be interested in entering a technology-based field of study and future career. They also gave their opinions on what needs to change in business, government and academia in order to help these girls fulfill their interest in tech careers.
No more excuses: Bring women on board
Go to any event or look at any tech company today. Women clearly have made their mark as inventors and entrepreneurs. Now the women profiled in this issue and the earlier Women to Watch honorees have to stake a claim on the corner office and boardrooms.
The List: 20 public companies with women execs
The local tech sector lags behind industry as a whole when it comes to female representation among executive officers at Massachusetts public companies. Still, some companies do "get it." Here's a list of 20 Massachusetts public companies that rank high for gender diversity in executive roles.
Policy Tracker: ARRA jobs update; Vacant jobs out of reach to many workers
U.S. Rep. Edward J. Markey said in a letter to constituents that the Recovery Act was responsible for creating or preserving as many as 2.4 million jobs. And in other news, although there are more than 50,000 job vacancies in Massachusetts, nearly half of the state’s 3.2 million-person work force lacks the necessary education to fill them, according to the Crittenton Women’s Unions “Hot Jobs 2010” report.

Tuesday, March 9, 2010

Boston rated first among telecommuting cities
Boston is the top U.S. medium-sized or large city for telecommuting, according to a new survey of 3,600 workers in 36 markets. The survey was commissioned by Microsoft Corp. but performed by an outside market research company.

Wednesday, March 3, 2010

20 largest tech employers in New England
Positions that save companies and their customers money, and federal stimulus funding comprise the hottest areas of tech hiring in New England. Here's a list of the top 20 largest tech employers in the region.

Wednesday, February 17, 2010

Checking the Traffic Density Jobs Indicator
The experience of zipping along the highways into the city got me thinking about an economic indicator that anecdotally tends to be pretty accurate: Let’s call it the Traffic Density Jobs Indicator. Fewer jobs have meant fewer cars on the roads and fewer people on trains.

Thursday, February 11, 2010

Cisco eyes new hirings in New England region
Cisco Systems Inc. has big plans to grow its global workforce this year, and New England Cisco officials say the region is no exception. The company has just short of 50 positions they would like to fill locally and expect to fill 15 to 20 of those with people outside the company.

Wednesday, February 3, 2010

By the numbers: New England technology companies look forward to hiring
New England tech companies may be putting the recession in their rearview mirrors based on hiring and confidence data collected by Mass High Tech in the fourth quarter of 2009. Almost one third of the regional tech companies responding to MHT’s quarterly Pulse survey plan to grow their local head count by more than 10 percent in early 2010.

Wednesday, January 20, 2010

How I See It: Spending control means open communication
Spreadshirt.com CEO Jana Eggers: Everyone has been talking about cutting costs, but the problem isn’t costs, it’s people. You (alone) cannot control costs, so this is about organizational development, not personal development. Here are some often-overlooked areas for cost control.

Tuesday, January 5, 2010

Authoria, Peopleclick merge software firms
Authoria Inc. owner Bedford Funding has paid $100 million to acquire Peopleclick Inc., a Raleigh, N.C.-based competitor, and merge the two human-resources software companies into a combined entity called Peopleclick Authoria.

Wednesday, December 16, 2009

How I See It: 10 ways to recognize the innovators in your organization
Business Innovation Factory's Saul Kaplan: People are either wired as innovators or they aren’t. The trick isn’t to create more innovators; it is to identify them, connect them together in purposeful ways, and give them the freedom to innovate. Here are 10 behavioral characteristics I use to recognize an innovator.

Wednesday, October 21, 2009

Invest for the long run in employee training during an economic downturn
BBN's Gabriella La Monica: Rather than eliminate employee training during an economic downturn, managers should use the slowdown as an opportunity to invest in developing a process for establishing an effective training program.

Monday, October 12, 2009

MHT survey: Tech job openings expected to grow
Technology jobs may be on the rebound, as more respondents to a recent Mass High Tech survey said they would be adding employees soon, compared to respondents in the second quarter of 2009.

Wednesday, September 23, 2009

Born in the Recession: Execs advise fair compensation over cheap hiring in downturn
Mass High Tech asked tech company executives and entrepreneurs “Myth or Fact: Tough times are the best time to hire good people cheap.” We were surprised at what we heard back: Hiring on the cheap may be possible, but is it a good growth strategy? Most of those we spoke with were more interested in being fair.

Friday, September 11, 2009

AstraZeneca reported to cut 113 jobs
London pharmaceutical giant AstraZeneca PLC, which runs some local operations in Massachusetts, is losing 113 jobs from its manufacturing plant in Westborough, as of early October.

Wednesday, September 9, 2009

Heartland Robotics' $12M funding fuels hiring spree
Heartland Robotics Inc., the manufacturing-focused robotics company founded by iRobot Corp. (Nasdaq: IRBT) co-founder Rodney Brooks, has taken in $12 million from three investors, and is aggressively hiring engineers, the Cambridge-based startup announced.

Friday, August 14, 2009

Hiring strategies shift toward social media
As the beginning of a turnaround appears to signal the return to hiring, recruiters and hiring managers say they’re posting fewer and fewer jobs to online job boards. Instead, they’re headhunting at every level of the organization, using online social networks to spot and recruit candidates from temporary workers to executives.
How I See It: Bonus abuses arise at banks that got TARP funds
Jack Dolmat-Connell, president and CEO, DolmatConnell & Partners: When bonuses are greater than the entire profitability of a public company, the situation is clearly wrong, regardless of the claims that they needed to do this to be “competitive.” This is simply not good business judgment.

Friday, August 7, 2009

TradeStone rewards workers with unique take on gift cards
With wage and hiring freezes lifted, TradeStone Software Inc. CEO Sue Welch decided it was time to hand out bonuses. But in a twist on a traditional cash payout, Welch is giving the firm’s 95 employees gift cards to shop at the retailers that use her company’s software.