Author Archives: Antonio Green

Industry Insights

A Look at Economic Development in Trinidad & Tobago and the Region

Last Friday the Trinidad and Tobago Chamber of Industry and Commerce in collaboration with Jamaica Money Market Brokers (JMMB) provided a forum for stakeholders to have a discussion on Economic Development in Trinidad and Tobago and the Region.

The format was an animated presentation given by Keith Duncan on the Jamaica experience and lessons learned, followed by a panel discussion lead by of Dr. Marlene Attzs (Moderator), Ronald Hinds (President of the T&T Chamber of Industry and Commerce), Terrence Farrell (Chairman of T&T’s Economic Development Advisory Board), and Keith Duncan (Co-chairman of Jamaica’s Economic Programme Oversight Committee – EPOC).

Keith Duncan gave an overview of Jamaica’s economic woes explaining why they needed to turn to the IMF for funding. His presentation included a statistic driven account of the progress that Jamaica had made over the last year. Duncan highlighted their major priorities for economic growth, which included macro-economic stability, reduction in crime, a debt to GDP ratio of 60%, and maintaining comfortable NIR levels. Duncan indicated that Trinidad and Tobago’s economic position was salvageable; saying that our debt to GDP ratio was more favourable than Jamaica’s. He suggested that we should not wait until our backs were against the wall before choosing to act. Duncan explained that the key to Jamaica’s successful implementation of policies and fiscal measures was ongoing public consultation and community activity, this helped EPOC to gain buy-in from the population. Duncan also mentioned that there was public accountability and transparency for achieving pre-determined targets for economic progress, and the establishment of three independent oversight bodies aided with this – the Economic Growth Council (EGC), the Economic Programme Oversight Committee (EPOC), and the Public Sector Transformation Oversight Committee (PSTOC).

During Dr. Marlene Attzs’ opening remarks she made reference to Trinidad and Tobago’s current state of Economic Stillness. The panel discussion revolved around overcoming this. Dr. Terrence Farrell gave some compelling arguments for diversifying away from the Oil and Gas Sector. Farrell commented that “Lower for Longer” oil and gas prices, depleting natural gas reserves, and Trinidad’s high oil production price were all signals that our Nation’s dependence on the Energy Sector was not sustainable. Ronald Hinds supported Dr Farrell’s perspective. The discussion continued around the need to adjust our foreign exchange rate and reduce Trinidad and Tobago’s reliance on imports while increasing exports from other sectors. Dr Farrell alluded to seven alternate sectors with seven enablers that could assist in boosting the economy.

Questions and comments were taken from participants across the floor including Marla Dukharan (Chief Economist at Bitt Inc. and former Group Economist at RBC Caribbean), Howard Dottin (Programme Director at the Arthur Lok Jack Graduate School of Business), as well as a cross section of business leaders from various industries in the Private Sector. The majority of comments were in support of the panelists’ perspective. It is interesting to note that there were no decision makers from Government Ministries in attendance.

 

Posted by on September 15, 2017
Career Advice, Recruitment & Job-Hunting Tips

How to find that First Job

When searching for that first job Caribbean students are often trapped in an exasperating chicken and egg scenario. You need work experience to be considered for the position but employers are reluctant to give you that first job until you have work experience.

The secret to getting past this initial challenge is to work hard during your undergraduate years. Good grades always help but grades will only get you so far. How does one bridge that gap between University and work? The answer: look for internship opportunities and enroll to gain work experience during term breaks or apply for one of the few coveted “on campus jobs”. If you take an assignment every summer you are likely to gain six to nine months’ work experience while at university. Also don’t shy away from taking low level roles and working your way up. This is an excellent way to learn the ropes; many of the world’s strongest leaders started their careers this way.  The key to success is humbleness, once you get an opportunity be prepared to use your initiative, offer to assist with tasks, and maintain a high level of mental engagement so you learn quickly on the job.

Posted by on August 25, 2017
Career Advice, Recruitment & Job-Hunting Tips

Don’t Price Yourself Out The Market

Are you interested in changing jobs or casually looking at your options?

It’s important to note that most people don’t move for money. Motivation for career change often comes from a desire for career progression or a need to find a culture fit that’s more suitable.

With this in mind I advise candidates to take a practical approach to salary negotiations. A good rule of thumb is to expect an increase in salary of 10% or less. Also you should think of justifiable reasons why you deserve that 10% increase. Experienced professionals often move jobs because that are primarily focused on the role, remuneration is secondary.

To be through you may want to conduct research to understand what the current market rate is for similar jobs within your industry, bearing in mind that in Trinidad and Tobago the same job could have a vastly different salary range across different industries or different size businesses.

Also remember that good negotiations are based on give and take. If you are pushing for a higher salary be prepared to work long hours to deliver outstanding performance in return.

Posted by on July 28, 2017
Industry Insights

Insights on T&T Clean Energy Conference, June 2017

T&T’s inaugural Clean Energy Conference was well attended. The Energy Chamber did an excellent job of facilitating. Participants and presenters appeared to have aligned goals; to achieve a 15% reduction in T&T’s greenhouse gas emissions by 2030 and to have 10% of our energy come from renewable sources by 2021. The impetus for these goals came from the Paris Agreement.

The major players that contribute to industrial emissions in T&T appear to be onboard with achieving the outlined objectives. Both NGC and T&TEC gave excellent presentations that signaled their commitment to the process.  Having said that, there was no clear indication from the Power Generators (Powergen, TGU and Trinity Power) regarding whether they would be open to switching all their generation units to the more efficient combined cycle option. At the moment TGU uses a combined cycle facility.

On a couple occasions it became glaringly obvious that two key things must happen before any action is taken; revisions must be made to the T&TEC Act and the Regulated Industries Act. Such revisions will allow individuals to feed their excess (renewable) energy on to the national grid.  In this regard we are relying on Government Ministries to jump-start the process, or to put it another way, to remove the legal obstacles.

Other areas for improvement include government or agency incentives for individuals wishing to switch their homes or cars over to green or renewable energy sources. The cost of solar panels and wind turbines is substantial. Infrastructure also needs to be put in place e.g. charging ports for electric or hybrid vehicles, or CNG stations for cars wishing to switch from traditional gas or diesel tanks to CNG.

Info on the conference:
http://energynow.tt/clean-energy-conference/

Posted by on June 22, 2017
Recruitment & Job-Hunting Tips

Why Use Placement Agencies?

What is your image of Placement/Recruitment/ Employment Agencies? Are they a god-send for the busy I.T. or HR Manager? Or are they an expensive luxury that only wealthy large companies can afford?

Let’s look at the savings. Suppose you need to recruit a technical professional. Many companies advertise in the newspapers or on internet job boards and the timeline could look like this:

1 week – design, vet and submit ad
2 weeks – time span of ad campaign
2 weeks – wait for resumes to come in
1 week – go through resumes to select short-list of candidates

6 weeks total, and this is a conservative estimate as you have so many other things to do, and the technical person to vet the resumes is also very busy. Who actually LIKES to read through scores or even hundreds of mostly unsuitable resumes! So, it’s something everyone keeps putting off. In fact, it can take months to get to the point where you arrange interviews.

Compare this with placing a call to a reputable agency, such as CRS, that has a readily accessible database of technical professionals. Once the agency has a good profile of what you require and there are candidates available, then they can start sending you a short-list of candidates within a day or two. Certainly it should take no longer than 2 weeks to submit a complete short-list of vetted candidates, ready for you to interview.

Not only have you brought forward the interviewing stage by at least a month but the candidates you have short-listed are already screened for suitability and salary expectations and are briefed about the job, the company and its environment. So your time is not wasted interviewing people who don’t want the job. Time is money!

Best of all, the calibre of candidates will usually be very much higher than those responding to an ad. The reason is that ads work best for inexperienced people perhaps looking for their first job, and also for people out of work or anxious to change jobs for whatever reason.

Of course, some high profile companies would always attract experienced people and their problem would be more of finding these resumes amongst the deluge that comes through the door.

An agency would have access to “passive candidates”. These are skilled professionals who are reasonably content in their job and who are most unlikely to respond to ads. However, if it’s very easy (and free) for them to register with a reputable agency, e.g., on the Internet, then they would do so as they would like to get a sense of the job market out there.

A big advantage of an agency is that a Recruitment Consultant can present the job and the company in the best light, overcoming any prejudices that the candidate may have about certain companies or industries. The Recruitment Consultant works to ensure that there is a best fit between candidates and jobs. When there is a “magic” fit, the agency becomes worth their weight in gold!

We had a case where a candidate was rejected because he didn’t seem to have certain experience. Our Recruitment Consultant asked him about this and it turns out that he had omitted to specify this knowledge in his resume.  An interview with the client company was arranged for the following week. If he had sent in his resume to the company directly then he would have been overlooked!

But isn’t an agency expensive? Consider the cost of advertising – TT$4,000 – $12,000 or more with no rebates if the person hired doesn’t work out. In fact, you may not find any suitable candidates at all, and what do you do then … go to an agency anyway? Plus there’s a huge cost in terms of man hours to process the resumes, and wouldn’t you rather be doing other more interesting work?

An agency usually charges the company a fee based on the recruit’s starting salary. It is just like paying an extra month’s or so salary for that person. There is normally a small or no charge if you do not hire anyone from the agency, and there would be a partial refund should the recruit leave the job within a certain period of time.

When you add up all the costs and benefits of advertising versus using an agency, then it is just good sense to put your money where there are guarantees and better and quicker results.

(Susan Hale, Managing Director, Caribbean Resourcing Solutions Ltd)

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Posted by on June 25, 2005

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Career Advice

¿Habla Español?

Editor’s Note

Thanks to all those who have been assuring me that they enjoy reading this newsletter. If you have any ideas for topics for the future, then I would be happy to hear about them.

 

¿Habla Español?

Recently, I was at a breakfast technical presentation and the gentleman sitting next to me turned out to be an American working in Trinidad. As I started to eat my eggs and buljhol, he said “Buen provecho”. When he saw my puzzled look, he translated “Bon appetite!”.

First of all, I was ashamed that I didn’t understand such a simple Spanish expression, and secondly, it’s ironic that the English translation was actually a French one. Thirdly, how come an American can speak Spanish and I can’t, and I grew up and live in a country just 7 miles from South America? The reason, of course, is that he does business with South America.

The odd thing is that CRS also does business with South America. We have an international client doing work in Trinidad and our client contacts live in Brazil. I know, they speak Portuguese, but they can also speak Spanish and English.

From time to time, we are asked to source Spanish speaking I.T. professionals to work in Trinidad and be able to communicate with regional head offices in South America or the Dominican Republic, and that combination of skills has been virtually impossible to find here in Trinidad.

Globalisation is already here as large multi-national companies lump the Caribbean with Latin America rather than English-speaking North America. We’re more comfortable shopping in Miami or visiting relatives in Toronto, than traveling to our much closer neighbours like Venezuela, because of the difficulty of the language barrier. Yet, many of the bars and gyms in Port of Spain (note the irony of our capital city’s name) are full of Spanish speaking people, mainly from Venezuela.

Years ago, I was playing a game of “Trivial Pursuit” in Tobago with some visiting English friends. The question was “What is the official language spoken in Trinidad & Tobago?”. To my amazement, my friends answered “Spanish”. Maybe I don’t pronounce my words well enough for them to think that English is my first language? Actually, they were misled by the fact that our country has a Spanish name … another irony.

So, I’m very pleased that the T&T government has a plan to establish “Spanish As First Foreign Language”. The SAFFL initiative is designed to help our nation become proficient in Spanish within the next 10 to 15 years.

This will make my job much easier when sourcing people for my Latin American clients, and we may get more such clients as a result. Also, some of our local clients are already expanding to Latin America and I’m sure the demand for Spanish as a pre-requisite for good I.T. jobs will escalate as a result, together with the opportunities to work abroad.

So, think about enrolling in a Spanish language class. You can find them at UWI, NIHERST, the Venezuelan Embassy and many private institutions in T&T. Some companies are also introducing training for employees to learn business and conversational Spanish.

Hasta La Vista!

Tell Us What You Think

Letters to the Editor:

(replying to last month’s letters)

My experience has been that a lot of Trinidadians while willing to do a lot of work are more interested in doing all that work at their own pace.
They are quite capable of working hard, and will work extremely long hours, but it seems as though they are more willing to do this if their senior management is interested (or feigns interest) and/or willing to work the long hours alongside them as well…
It amounts to management implementing a “do as I do” attitude and not a “do as I say…” and most Trinis are generally the questioning sort. Why should they change their methods or getting stuff done if their own methods were achieving the desired results? It’s a Trini thing that unless you are really good with marketing of your change…you will have problems with … Shelly-Anne

Is this the difference between Trinis (and other Caribbean people) and Europeans or North Americans … we question our supervisors rather than just accept instructions? ….. Ed.

We would love to hear what you think of this issue of CRS News. And of course, if you have any suggestions for upcoming issues that you would like to share with us, please send those too.

Posted by on May 26, 2005
Recruitment & Job-Hunting Tips

Counter Offers-Should You Accept Them?

Editor’s Note
I look forward to getting feedback on these newsletters so that I know if I’m providing any useful or interesting information. I seemed to have hit a nerve judging from the responses I’m getting on the question of the work ethics of Trinidadians. See Tell Us What You Think.

Counter Offers-Should You Accept Them?
Suppose you are tempted to apply for a new job. You may not be desperate to leave and, in fact, you are quite happy in your current job; it’s just that you would like a change and a new challenge, and you will earn more money to boot. Your resume will look better if you have a history of good jobs to show your career progression and the breadth of your experience.

Then you are made an offer and it’s time to make a decision. You talk to your family and you decide that this is a good opportunity that you should not pass up. You feel that now is a good time to leave your employer as you’re not working on anything so crucial. You sign the job letter and hand in your resignation to your boss. Then the @#$% hits the fan!

Suddenly you discover that your current employer thinks highly of your talents and that you have great prospects with their company; only they never gave you this impression before. They want you to stay with them and they prove this by presenting you with an equal or better counter-offer! What do you do?

What you should do is think very carefully about the motives behind the counter-offer and also what you may be doing to any future chances of working with the new company should you renege on your signed job contract.

The reason your current employers are so keen to keep you is that your leaving will make life very inconvenient for them – it’s costly to recruit a replacement and it takes time and is a hassle. Plus, a new person has a learning curve to get up to speed and won’t have all that on-the-job knowledge that’s in your head. They are thinking of what’s best for them, not for you.

The fact is that nearly every person who accepts a counter-offer leaves, or tries to leave, that employment within a year. By accepting another job, you have shown disloyalty to your employer. This will impact on your promotion prospects and probably the quality of the work that comes your way, despite their promises to the contrary.
They will never trust you again not to leave them in the lurch. They just wanted you to finish whatever you were working on and give them time to work around your loss. You will find yourself being left out in the cold and you will eventually become unhappy enough to start actively job-hunting.

I have seen this happen over and over again. I know from my own experience what it’s like to be torn between the comfort of your current employer and the attraction of a new opportunity, and the pressure an employer can put on a person to stay. I decided I needed to move on and never regretted that decision. My advice is to be absolutely sure you can resist any counter-offer before accepting another job.

If you have any doubts then by all means talk to your current boss about the reasons why you may consider looking for other opportunities, so that you can explore what potential there is in staying put. But do this before you go as far as accepting an offer for another job. Word of warning – do not resign before you get that job offer in your hand!

Another consideration in a small society like a Caribbean island is that if you turn down a job offer you may be spoiling any chances of ever working with that company again. Also, one day you may go for a job interview with a different company and come face to face with the same person you let down. So, do consider very carefully what’s best for you!

Tell Us What You Think
Letters to the Editor:

In my more than 25 years in IT, 15 abroad, 10 in Trinidad, I do not see more or less commitment from Trini IT professionals than professionals from abroad, UK, USA or otherwise. What I do see is, professionals or even people with personal pride who are committed will always do their best, and even work very long hours/weeks/months to complete the job on-time, mainly due to bad management/planning/short staffing.
However, there is too much poor project management, poor senior management, with a large slant on keeping the bigger boss happy (sucking up, not wanting to say no), a tendency to wait until the last minute to get things done by some staff and using others to get one’s own job done, and reaping the reward for themselves. Most of this of course being human nature. …. Philip.

As an IT manager coming from Germany to Trinidad some years ago I can follow these described problems. My own experience is very mixed if it comes to such issues. I met both, highly educated and motivated Trinidadians working very professional and also the “typical” Trinidadian worker, getting defensive on every suggestion of improvement and having real problems with time management and authorities.
Implementing changes into an average Trinidadian company is a real challenge to every manager involved. The very positive aspect to me is the experience and learning factor.
It is so very easy to change habits and policies in an environment as you find it in Europe, preferable in Austria, Germany, Italy and France where no worker would ever question your order but just run to get it done asap. Yet, you suddenly find yourself involved with staff that want to know why and how and by the way “me was limin so me not doin nothing now ‘cause me tired, boss”.
It is a true challenge and even as an international experienced manager you have to re-think and be creative. Also it can be very tiring – to an European manager it seems there is a lot of time wasted – but let me tell you something: it is not! Job wise there is nothing like the satisfaction of getting the team working and the job done, especially in Trinidad, with Trinidadians.
And PLEASE don’t misunderstand me! There are true and amazing professionals out there I have the most respect for and fun working with!!! …. Dirk

Interesting thoughts. Is it true that Trinis are typically resistant to suggestions of improvement? Do you agree that staff having to work long hours is due to poor project management and bad senior management? What are your feelings on our “carnival” mentality and resulting lack of productivity? ….. Ed.

We would love to hear what you think of this issue of CRS News. And of course, if you have any suggestions for upcoming issues that you would like to share with us, please send those too.

Posted by on April 25, 2005
Career Advice

Degrees and Certifications

Editor’s Note

We are constantly cleaning our subscribers list of invalid email addresses, so please remember to re-subscribe with your new email address when it changes.

It is also a good idea to put our address crsnews@crsitjobs.com on your address list so that our newsletters won’t be treated as unsolicited mail.

 

Degrees and Certifications

A question that school leavers who want a career in I.T. have to face is whether to invest 3-4 years getting a degree, or instead get certification in networking or PC repairs or other I.T. qualification while getting actual work experience.

Many I.T. managers in Trinidad insist on a degree, at least for the more senior positions in the company. A degree demonstrates that a person is intelligent and has the discipline to learn. Some consultancy companies insist on a degree so they can prove the high calibre of their staff to their clients.

There’s another school of thought that actually discriminates against graduates as being too arrogant and having too high expectations of their worth. This can also apply to people who have invested in very expensive certification.

It is interesting to note that In North America and the UK, the requirement for a degree is usually waived if an applicant can show strong work experience, i.e., from the “University of Life”. So it is frustrating for non-nationals with extensive I.T. experience, who have acquired T&T citizenship, to be faced with this cultural barrier here.

Certification provides excellent training in specific I.T. areas and in some cases, such as networking, is essential to get a job. Trinidadians tend to work hard at improving their credentials and their résumés are often an impressive listing of certificates, diplomas, first and second degrees and various short training courses. So, if you don’t go this route, then you lose out to the competition for the best jobs.

My own view is that, if it is at all possible, you should get that degree under your belt. It doesn’t matter that what you learn is soon obsolete (if it’s I.T. related). A degree gives you better job options all through your life. The latest must-have certification will become obsolete at some point too but the difference is that once obsolete, it only serves to show that you’re not keeping up-to-date with technology.

A degree is expensive and you have to invest years of your life in its pursuit. These days, however, there are options available to allow you to do classes in the evening so that you can work during the day (see http://sta.uwi.edu/evening/ for information on the University of the West Indies evening degree programmes). No matter how experienced you are, getting a degree is a passport to the best jobs in this part of the world.

Tell Us What You Think

Letters to the Editor:

There is one other aspect I think is worth considering before taking a job with a TT firm: the culture. As you said, very rightly, managers here may be blown away by the resumes some IT professionals [who have worked abroad] can present. But they may also be blown away by the level of initiative that foreign workers have, and may react defensively and indeed try to shut down the new employee, fearing they will show up their colleagues or bosses.
Our clients here are mostly Government and large organizations, and we see it from the outside all the time: an entrenched culture of obeying rules and sticking to the prescribed job description, suddenly is upset by a proactive, enthusiastic individual who is accustomed to being rewarded for innovating and doing more than his/her share.
They can’t both win, so either the co-workers begin to feel resentment, or the new addition begins to feel his team is working against him. A lot of maturity and wisdom is needed to enter a new work culture without causing upset–and without losing the very ‘edge’ you bring with your new ideas! …… Repatriated National

This is a sad indictment of our work ethics. However, I don’t think it’s true for most private sector companies. My experience is that Trinis are very hard working (at the professional level) and display a keenness to get the job done even at great sacrifice to their personal lives. Trinis tend to do very well abroad because of this.
I was very impressed by the strong work ethics and team spiritedness I encountered while contracting for a chemical company and then a bank when I first returned to Trinidad – much more so than what I experienced in nearly 20 years of working in many types of companies in the UK. What is everyone else’s view on this? ….. Ed.

We would love to hear what you think of this issue of CRS News. And of course, if you have any suggestions for upcoming issues that you would like to share with us, please send those too.

Posted by on March 26, 2005
Career Advice

Returning To Trinidad To Work

Issue 2.7
February 2005

Carnival 2K5

If you were lucky enough to be in Trinidad for Carnival (February 7th and 8th) then I know you had a wonderful time. Sorry to all those who missed “the greatest show on earth”.

Here are a couple of CRS staff “freeing up” over Carnival.

Check www.playcarnival.com and www.playyuhself.com/galleries.php for some more pictures of Carnival in T&T.

 

Returning to Trinidad to Work

Are you a Trini living abroad, perhaps somewhere cold? Have you dreamed of coming home one day for the warmth (people as well as climate), the food, the fun and the good life? Maybe you are married to a Trini and want to experience these things.

Despite some of the alarmist reports that are circulated abroad, there’s something about Trinidad that makes people want to be here. I know many ex-pats who became desperate to find a way to stay here, even proposing marriage to anyone who would listen, so that they could continue to work in Trinidad when their contract expired.

So what do you have to consider before taking that big step of leaving your well-paid, career-enhancing job in a first-world country?

1) Are you really ready to give up the big bucks and your material wealth in exchange for a quality of life that has little to do with how much money you have? What about your family? What are their needs and expectations?

It’s tempting to always convert TT$ to your current currency and then be outraged at how small the salaries are here. It’s better to work out what level of lifestyle your Trini salary will buy you here. I made that move from England over 10 years ago and I was horrified when I could only land an I.T. contract at half my English permanent salary. I later found out that my contract salary was nearly 3 times that of the equivalent permanent staff that I worked with. Although my income is a fraction of what I could be earning in England, I have never regretted my move for a single second!

However, if you have financial commitments that have to be paid in a foreign currency, then you have to make sure that these are covered.

2) Don’t want to give up your current job until you’re offered a good job in Trinidad? You expect to be relocated at your employer’s expense?

In my experience, you will never be offered a job unless the employer can interview you in person and be confident that you can start work within a month or so of the offer being made. There are good enough skills available in Trinidad so that the employer will take the easy route of hiring someone from right here. They never want the expense of hiring someone with high expectations or requirements.

My advice is to take the plunge and relocate before you start looking for a job. Be prepared to manage for up to a year without getting employment as employers here tend to move slowly with their recruitment processes.

3) Want to use your excellent skills and experience gained in a foreign land to help out our wonderful country?

The truth is that your mind-blowing résumé could scare the pants off the I.T. Manager. He may feel intimidated that you are more skilled than he is! In any case, there is no need for these “fancy” skills here just to work on fairly ordinary projects. I know of some highly skilled Oracle people who took a year to find jobs here. They were not stretched by the work and when they returned to Canada, they found that their time here hardly counted as useful experience. I hope that this situation will change by Research & Development companies setting up operations here, perhaps encouraged by the creation of the Wallerfield Industrial & Technology Park.

My suggestion is to tone down your résumé to suit the companies that you are applying to.

I you are considering a move here then drop me a line and I’ll be happy to advise and assist you. If you are not a Caribbean national and not entitled to citizenship, then I warn you that it’s very difficult to get a job here because companies do not want to deal with work permit issues.

Tell Us What You Think

Letters to the Editor:
I noticed you mentioned C++ as the programming language potential employers will be looking for [in the January issue]. I however have been thinking that java may make me more marketable. What are your views on this? …… Dirk

Funnily enough, we have hardly ever been asked to source Java skills. I know it’s used out there for web development and if you are freelancing in that area, then it’s a “must have” skill, along with HTML, ASP and PHP. C++ is more used in backend web application development and good experience in that area is much harder to find and so companies will pay a premium rate for this. C and C++ are often required by companies developing software for specialist products such as smart cards, identity management systems, electronic devices, and so on. The development of these types of applications is not commonly done in this part of the world but this may come in the future (if we can find the skills here) …… Ed.

We would love to hear what you think of this issue of CRS News. And of course, if you have any suggestions for upcoming issues that you would like to share with us, please send those too.

Posted by on February 26, 2005
Career Advice

Are You in the Right Job?

Issue 2.5
December 2004

Compliments of the Season

Christmas is in the air (and in the malls) and, in Trinidad at least, that’s another excuse for partying. Normally, that means that this is a quiet time of the year for recruiting, but we are receiving many new job requirements so clearly, people are busy and businesses are growing. There’s an increasing demand for contractors and we rarely get to advertise these jobs as they are filled very quickly from our database. So, if you are registered with CRS, now is a good time to send in an updated résumé to us.

The staff at CRS would like to take this opportunity to wish you all the very best for the holiday season.

 

Are You in the Right Job?

Have you ever considered using a personality test to determine where your talents lie? How about using the results to enhance your résumé?

When the personality and work style of a person is critical to the success of his/her role in a company, e.g., management, sales, business analysis, project management, etc., then more and more companies are using psychometric testing to gain an insight to a candidate’s suitability for the job. If you are looking to move into such a role and don’t have a track record to prove your capability, then you could enhance your chances by attaching the results of such a test to your résumé.

·A lot of science and psychology goes into developing an effective psychometric test, and the results are mind-blowing in their accuracy. CRS has aligned with a UK company that offers a simple, quick and very cost effective test that you can do online and pay for via a secure credit card transaction. This test is based on the time-tested DISC method that measures Dominance, Influence, Steadiness and Compliance. It only takes about 20 minutes to do and the results are immediately available online. You also have an option to match your profile against a number of built in ones to see how well you are suited for these roles.

To find out more about the myDISCprofile test, click on http://www.crsitjobs.com/psychometicTestCandidates.htm and scroll to the bottom of the page to click on the link to see samples of the 2 types of reports (Classic and Enhanced) as well as sample questions.

If you are an employer, click on http://www.crsitjobs.com/psychometicTestingEmployer.htm to get instructions on conducting the test for your employees/candidates. Alternatively, CRS can carry out the tests on your behalf should you wish, for example, to profile your top employees and identify key success traits. The results are totally confidential.

All of the staff members at CRS have done this test and everyone has been amazed at how accurate the results are. I have done the test 3 times over a period spanning 15 years, and of course each time I must have answered differently, but my true personality (in the workplace) always comes through clearly in the reports. I find it useful as it offers suggestions for improving and developing my management style and other traits, and it correctly stated that an ideal role for me is a technical one, i.e., in I.T.

So give yourself a Christmas present of a professional psychometric profile to help you with a New Year resolution to move your career in the direction that capitalizes on your skills and talents. I am sure you won’t regret it.

 

Tell Us What You Think

We would love to hear what you think of this issue of CRS News. And of course, if you have any suggestions for upcoming issues that you would like to share with us, please send those too.

Posted by on December 26, 2004