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What is the impact of not having a daily news service for the recruitment industry?
167 Plays16 days ago
News for 17 February plus question of the week - what is the impact of not having a daily news service?
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Transcript
Bullhorn Engage and Future-Proofing Businesses
00:00:11
Speaker
Bullhorn Engage is only three weeks away and there's an impressive speaker lineup. Who are you looking forward to hearing from Ross? Well, as well the session by Matt Church, thoughts about tomorrow you can talk about today seems very relevant in the current market. He's covering how old leadership and business models will become extinct and how to future proof your business. I've seen Matt speak many times and he's always thought provoking. I haven't heard him speak, so I'm looking forward to that session even more.
00:00:41
Speaker
Join us at Bullhorn's Engage on the 6th of March in Sydney, limited tickets left via bullhorn.engage.com.
Closure of Shortlist and Its Implications
00:00:51
Speaker
This is the news for the 17th of February 2025. I'm Adele Last. Local recruitment industry news service Shortlist ceased publishing last Thursday and has been closed by its owner, Specialist News, after 27 years of daily reporting.
00:01:07
Speaker
In an article published on its own site last Tuesday morning, the owners attributed the decision to the significantly higher costs and lower profitability of publishing shortlists compared to the company's other specialist titles, ah HR Daily, Workplace Express and OHS Alert. When ah RNA-contacted specialist news director Jo Knox about the decision, she said the cost of producing articles that shortlist subscribers will pay for has increased disproportionately compared to the company's other titles.
00:01:37
Speaker
Overall, we definitely had to work a lot harder for every dollar of profit that Shortlist made compared to our other news sites and over the years it's become a much smaller part of the business," Nock said. The closure makes perfect business sense. Nonetheless, it's incredibly sad to say goodbye to something that's been part of the industry and people's lives for so long, she concluded.
Collar Group's Legal Challenges
00:01:57
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The seventh largest global recruitment market now has no daily news service.
00:02:02
Speaker
According to Shortlist, Collar Group's administrators last week confirmed they are seeking legal advice over the failure by former director Ephraim Stevenson to comply with the deed of company arrangement as well as his sale of the company's business assets. Shortlist reported that Collar Group administrator I&R Advisory subsequently sent a report to creditors confirming the sale of Collar Care Group to mass resources owner Charlie Massarella last week for an estimated $2.4 million. The shortfall in payments Stevenson is responsible for is reported to be $2.17 million. dollars Collar Group's fate remains uncertain but it seems unlikely it can continue as a going concern under its current structure and leadership.
Impact of Right to Disconnect Laws
00:02:48
Speaker
Workers are doing less unpaid work since right to disconnect laws kicked in with a warning from unions that scrapping the measure
00:02:55
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would add 100 minutes of overtime each week for which employees aren't compensated. Under the laws which came into effect for most workers in August 2024, employees are allowed to reasonably refuse to answer phone calls and respond to messages and emails after hours. Analysis by the Centre for Future Work found since the laws were introduced, the amount of unpaid overtime fell from 5.4 to 3.6 hours per week, a 33% reduction.
00:03:23
Speaker
Before the right to disconnect was introduced, average wage earners in Australia completed about 3.3 billion hours of unpaid work, with that figure dropping down to 2.2 billion. Young Australians aged 18 to 29 were the group who experienced the greatest decline in unpaid work. Newgov's latest poll found 86% of Australians support the right to disconnect, including 75% of coalition voters. For employees of small businesses, the laws will apply from August this year.
00:03:53
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Opposition leader Peter Dutton pledged to wind back the laws should the coalition win the next federal election during the next three months.
Randstad's Financial Performance in Q4 2024
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Ransad, the world's largest staffing firm, reported revenue for the fourth quarter ending 31 December 2024 of 6.08 billion euros.
00:04:11
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Organic revenue per working day was down 5.5% compared to the same quarter in the prior year. Rand said APAC's region sales declined 3% and Rand said ANZ dropped 8%.
00:04:24
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The positive impact of currency effects of 2.7% was offset by the loss caused by the disposal of job board monster. In Q4 2024, Randsted's gross profit was 1.1 billion euros, down 11% on a reported basis. Quarters operating loss was 13 million euros, compared to the Q4 2023 operating profit of 162 million euros.
00:04:52
Speaker
Revenue for the full year stood at €24.12 billion, euros down 7% on an organic basis when compared to the previous year.
Regional Financial Trends in Recruitment Industry
00:05:02
Speaker
Tokyo Listed Recruiter Wheel Group, owner of local brands, DFP recruitment, key appointments, UNU recruitment partners and Ethos Speech Chapman, reported revenue of US$692 million for the nine months ended 31 December 2024. An increase of 1.4% when compared to the same period last year. Gross profit was up 4.6%, but operating income declined 36% and net profit dropped 33%.
00:05:34
Speaker
Tokyo-based recruit holdings, the fifth-largest global staffing firm and owner of local brands, Chandler McLeod and PeopleBank, reported an increase in revenue of 3.5% to US$5.83 billion u s dollars for its fiscal third quarter ending 31 December 2024. The company's staffing segment grew revenue 1.1%,
00:05:55
Speaker
with Japan up by 7.8%, while revenue in the rest of the world covering Europe, the US and Australia fell by 4.2%. Hayes Australia and New Zealand revenue decreased to $2.5 billion dollars in the year ended 30 June 2024.
00:06:13
Speaker
down 14% from $2.9 billion dollars the previous year, according to the company's latest results filed with ASIC and reported by Shortlist. Revenue for Hayes Australia was down 14% to $2.3 billion, while New Zealand declined by 19% to $134 million. dollars Temp revenue, which accounts for 65% of the ANZ business, declined by 16% year on year.
00:06:38
Speaker
gross profit was down 22% in the year to $268 million dollars and pre-tax profit was $19.6 million, dollars down 68% on the prior year.
Australia's Flexible Work Policies vs. NSW Office Returns
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Hayes ANZ consultant head count dropped by 350 to 729 in the year to the 30th of June, 2024.
00:07:01
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Just as the New South Wales government seeks to push workers and executives back into offices across the state, The Department of Prime Minister and Cabinet in the nation's capital has publicly promoted its flexible work options following the new APS Common Conditions Agreement. The PM&C is now advertising formally Canberra-based roles as open to hybrid arrangements for executive assistance. The prominent advertisement of hybrid conditions is also a sign that federal government departments are willing to accommodate the demands and desires of the right candidates to secure them quickly
00:07:35
Speaker
rather than leaving roles open for long periods in the hope the right candidate will eventually appear. No prior experience as an EA in the APS is necessary. We offer training and support for career growth. Plus we offer flexible work arrangements, a competitive salary, 15.4% superannuation and a relocation assistance, PM&C's generic ad says.
Elmo Software Survey on Fair Pay and Automation Concerns
00:08:01
Speaker
1 in 4 Australian employees don't think they're in the right role according to Elmo Software's Employee Sentiment Index for Q4 2024. However, those that believe they're paid fairly for their work has continued to increase reaching a new peak of 69% of 4 percentage point increase since last year and an 8 percentage point increase over the past two years. Employees believe their role will be automated in the next five years has reached a new peak of just over 21% compared to 19% in the previous quarter. Turning to recruitment, 34% of respondents rated their most recent recruitment experience as good. However, the majority of the sentiment is held by baby boomers, 44% while millennials, 32% and Gen Z, 33% are less likely to hold this view. 54% of employees rated as neutral while 12% rated their recruitment experience as bad.
00:08:56
Speaker
38% of respondents said no salary information till late in the process is the most frustrating element of the recruitment process, followed closely by prolonged decision making or response time at 35%. Unrealistic job descriptions, multiple interview rounds and being ghosted after the interview round out the top five most frustrating aspects of the most recent recruitment experience.
00:09:22
Speaker
remuneration, flexible or remote working, organisational stability and the commute to work are all key priorities for employees that have remained relatively unchanged across the last three quarters. Onigan Research surveyed 1,021 Australian workers aged 18 years and over between the 17th and 28th of December last year on behalf of Elmo Software. The research was conducted via a 15 question online survey.
Launch of No Sunday Blues by Creative Natives' Former Leaders
00:09:51
Speaker
Former AQINT leader and creative natives director Charlotte Flood has joined forces with her former creative natives colleagues, Steph Graham and Michaela Warburton to launch a new Sydney-based creative industry recruitment agency called No Sunday Blues. According to their respective LinkedIn profiles, Flood and Graham left creative natives at the end of 2024 and Warburton left earlier this year month.
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Speaker
former Acron and Vitamin T leader Ryan Kelly formed Creative Natives in 2019. The departures of the three No Sunday Blues co-founders halves the Creative Natives employee numbers. No Sunday Blues will offer creative design, PR, communications, advertising, account services, social media and marketing, permanent contract and freelance recruitment Australia-wide.
00:10:45
Speaker
And that's the news for the 17th of February, 2025. I'm Ross Clennet. Stay tuned for Question of the Week.
Future of Independent Journalism and News Services
00:11:00
Speaker
Question of the Week. What is the impact of not having a daily news service? Hidal. So we're talking about what we've just recently reported, which is that shortlist, our only daily news service for the recruitment industry closed last week. So we now no longer have that service across the industry. And I think it is really important. My answer to that question, Ross, obviously, as founder with you of Recruitment News Australia, we both think it's very important that there is available news service to our industry.
00:11:38
Speaker
We don't do daily. Of course, we're only publishing weekly and we're doing it in podcast format as opposed to um you know written kind of um newsletter style that Shortlist was doing. um But we think it's really important. We think that you know for the professional development of the industry of you know increasing business acumen and and and business knowledge, both ah in Australia and and globally, we think having a new service is very important.
00:12:06
Speaker
And the daily one was something that's very fresh, very up to date, very current. Yes, it's astonishing, really, when you think about it. at dealt We're the seventh largest recruitment market in the world with a turnover.
00:12:22
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of over $25 billion dollars a year and we can't financially support a profitable daily news service. Like frankly, I think it's embarrassing for our industry. And I think there's going to be a lot of downstream consequences that certainly I'm very sad about. I'm not sure about enough other owners, but the first one is, and I'll be selfish about this, is my own blogging. Because a number of my most popular blogs, such as Rise and Fall of Future You, Rise and Fall of HJB, my various blogs on Rubicor and Clarius, all of those blogs have been credible, or to the degree that they're credible and readable.
00:13:20
Speaker
is due to Shortlist's original reporting on a lot of the information that I referenced in writing those blogs. Now, Shortlist didn't produce ah editorial articles like I do about those companies, but they produce factual news reports, which I used and credited them. And so from my own point of view,
00:13:46
Speaker
I don't have time to go and find all of the original sources. i'm I'm not a journalist. I'm not trained as a journalist. I don't receive any money for publishing my blogs. ah So the quality of my own material is going to be severely diminished when it comes to reporting about people and companies.
00:14:08
Speaker
or commenting on people and companies in the industry. And I'd like to think, given the feedback I've received over the years, that people have valued the quality of that material and now it's, well, severely compromised. Well, that's the thing though, isn't it? Your blog is a free subscription where they can access some highly valuable and credible information and editorial type articles, as you said. ah Our industry obviously isn't putting value to the idea of having you know current, fresh, up-to-date, independent, new service um across the industry. And as you said, we know we are a sizeable industry in itself, you know somewhere between 8,000 and 10,000 recruitment agencies across Australia and New Zealand. um We don't know how many subscribers ah were subscribing to Shortlist, obviously a very small percentage. I would hazard a guess, Ross, and say it was perhaps 5% or less.
00:15:08
Speaker
Probably less, I'd say. Yeah, across the whole industry, which, as you said, is embarrassing. It's a little sad. Why do we not um see the impact of, and and the ripple effect, the impact this is going to have in not having ah that regular industry news service? And I use that word independent again. I think that's really key. That's right. Because who else, I mean, yeah, who else is going to do this? Well,
00:15:35
Speaker
I mean, we don't have the capacity to increase our output. I mean, you and I don't earn any money. From this, um we barely, in fact, we don't even have our costs covered really. We've got obviously Bullhorn as a sponsor, but that just barely covers our costs. We're certainly not paying ourselves. The RCSA and APSCO have regular newsletters, but clearly those newsletters are to promote the services and resources and events of those respective associations. They're not there to provide
00:16:11
Speaker
an independent news service that's not part of the charter of either of those. Although, of course, as you and I know, Leslie, the CEO of Appsco, used to be the owner and editor of Recruitment Extra, which for older listeners of our podcast, who've been around a while, will remember was a print publication that came out every month. And that started, I don't know, probably the mid 90s. And Leslie closed that.
00:16:40
Speaker
I don't know. Can you remember it was probably it'd be at least 15 years ago, I would have thought. But maybe, maybe we don't need it then. Maybe what that's what the industry is saying, right? That we don't need a daily service. Maybe there was something broken in the model, Ross. You know, maybe um daily was too frequently, sometimes twice daily, I know. So, um you know, it was it was very journalistic, as you said, very factual. There was research. I mean,
00:17:08
Speaker
Maybe we don't need this service. Is that what the industry is actually saying? it's It's not really a requirement. um Well, ultimately, the commercial reality was that not enough people in our industry regarded it as valuable enough, clearly. Now, what if Every single person who now knows shortlist has gone was ah given a time machine and could go back to the 1st of July this financial year and make a decision about a shortlist subscription. I suspect.
00:17:50
Speaker
you'd probably have at least 100 to 150 people that would probably go, I'll buy one. But would that be enough? Would that make enough of a difference? I suspect it probably wouldn't because I guess since Michael Byrne started Shortlist in 1998, the number of ah recruitment agencies and staffing businesses in Australia's tripled, maybe be quadrupled.
00:18:17
Speaker
And I bet that there's nowhere near the similar growth of shortlist. and In fact, I suspect COVID was probably, and I don't know this, I suspect COVID was a real problem in terms of subscribers dropping off.
00:18:34
Speaker
and then not resubscribing when the market picked up again. And that probably was a bit of a fatal blow because again, I'm completely guessing because I don't know the numbers, but I'm suspecting 200 to 250 subscribers dropped off in the 2020 and 2021 years and didn't pick back up again.
00:18:57
Speaker
And yeah, you're right, probably pinpointing COVID as as a catalyst to it. But is this just also how we as a society have become in relation to and you our news and our new service? We don't want to pay for it. we want you know If it's important enough, we're getting the information. We're finding out the information one way or another. you know Social media or you know lots of other media outlets are available for free. So we've become groomed and accustomed to receiving information without having to pay for it and we don't put the value there. Yeah, look, I mean, I mean, it's true. mean I I've subscribed to, I don't know, six or seven different types of news service for different types of things that I'm interested in. And I pay either a monthly or an annual subscription to all of those.
00:19:46
Speaker
because I want to support people who produce content I enjoy and value and clearly not a significant proportion of Australians feel the same way. I mean, I have no idea, but I'm guessing I reckon 90% of Australians do not have any sort of annual subscription to any sort of news service. Yes, they've got an annual subscription to Amazon Prime or Netflix, but I suspect not to a new service. Yeah, I think you're right with that. What do you think the future looks like then? We don't have a daily news service as of this week. So what does the recruitment industry future look like? Honestly, Adele, I really don't know. I just,
00:20:33
Speaker
unless someone's going to come in and fill the void, but unless they're going to produce independent journalism.
00:20:44
Speaker
and I can't see it happening because if you're asking people not to pay, then you have to have sponsors. Assuming that you don't have someone who doesn't care about making money and just wants to produce an independent news service out of the goodness of their heart and the depth of their pockets, I don't think that's going to happen. So the alternative is you take advertising.
00:21:10
Speaker
And the moment you take advertising, you've got to sell it. You've got to keep selling it. And that does potentially compromise what gets reported on the site. Shortlist did not have advertising. So I'm pretty despondent really about the future of independent news for our industry locally. Yeah, I have to agree with you. I think it's something to note and we'll say to our listeners that that Ross and I started.
00:21:41
Speaker
without any sponsorship, as many of you know. And we did that actually consciously. We wrote ourselves a little kind of guidelines um around what we were going to report and how we would report it. And we both wanted to maintain a level of integrity around being honest about what was going on in the industry and reporting the facts, even if they were unpalatable at times to put some of our clients. You know, Ross and I both still work in the industry and we have clients who are recruitment agencies, so we still report what we need to report. We did take a sponsor at the end of last year with Bullhorn, and and ah we also have an agreement with them that we ah will still report what has to be reported ah and not shy away from the facts. We do have to be careful, though, if you have sponsors, you can't go out there and be you know saying whatever you want to say. If if the sponsor's found that you know uncomfortable or difficult, you do have to still have that consideration. so
00:22:37
Speaker
Yeah, it's a really interesting um turn of events. It's a sad day, sad week for the recruitment industry. And I guess we watch on and see what happens from here. Yeah, let's wait and see. I'm not optimistic that a white knight will come charging in.
00:22:54
Speaker
But ultimately, there is a demand for news in our sector. It's just whether it can be serviced at a commercial profit. And that's the big question mark.
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