• Deb Loveridge, Vedior’s CEO, Asia-Pacific, argues that "recruitment companies that care attract the right talent" 
• Sheryle Moon, Managing Director, Julia  Ross, rants on 457 Visa restrictions placed on recruitment firms.
• AFR BOSS announced Young Executive 2008 Winners. "This year’s winners are really aware of their own personal desires and achievements that are non work related" declared the judges.
• In the US, AllianceQ launched with the aim to cut recruitment cost, ban recruitment firms and share candidates.  Some aspects of the model looks very similar to the Cyberlynx experiment in Australia.
• Interesting Harvard Business Review article on Zappos, an online shoe retailing company, which offers new employees bribes to quit , if they think they are not a good fit.
• Finally, Linkedin introduced DirectAds, which will allow employers/members to "specify the audience that will see their ads".

Australia’s No 1 Job board SEEK makes further inroad into China’s fast growing employment classifieds market, by increasing its stake in local job board Zhaoping.com to 49.2.% . Marketing recruitment firm, Aquent, also moved into India’s burgeoning recruitment market, confirming its acquisition of  Professionele Consulting.

Given the enormous long-term potential offered by both China and India, it is surprising that Australian talent service providers (considering our close proximity to the region and existing good trading relationship in other sectors) are not swarming to the region.  Already, both China and India are top source of outbound talent, it is only a matter of time that the local employment market in the two growing countries will mimic the sophistication of those in the west. In India, for instance, returning expats (inbound talent), keen to capitalise on India’s growing economic prowess, are driving demand for recruitment services.

Do the math - If 1% of India’s estimated 500 million workforce change their employer in a calendar year ( a conservative number given attrition rate is as high as 15-20% in some sectors like call centre), there are around 5 million employment transactions (either job board activity or recruitment placement) taking place.

From here, it looks like SEEK and Aquent are making the right move.

Another nugget from Seth:

“ Your sales force and your customers may scream that you need to lower your price. It’s not true. You need to increase your value. If people don’t want to pay, it’s because you’re not delivering enough value for the money you’re charging.  You’re not selling a commodity unless you want to.”

From job boards to recruitment agencies, pricing is a theme central to all talent service providers.  The current thinking is exemplified by recruitment industry guru, John Sumser who believes ‘low price means low quality’ and attracts the wrong type of customers.

Still, business models evolves quickly and one of the most thought provoking piece this year, from Chris Anderson, is the new business of  ‘FREE’‘. Increasingly, companies are offering their service or product for free or at ridiculously low price, but are making money elsewhere.

There are reasons to believe that the talent service industry will start to embrace new pricing models. Nowhiring.com.au allows free job postings , instead charging for associated services like screening and CV database access, is one example.  We have seen new pricing models in the recruitment industry, and perhaps it can be argued trends like RPOs and in-house recruitment are new pricing methods as much as they are a new way of delivering service or an attempts at ensuring process efficiency.

Be prepared, to see a range of new pricing models in the talent service/products space.

So, here are a few questions - is your current price reflective of the value you provide? Is pricing a good mechanism to differentiate yourself? If the service/product you are selling is perceived to be a commodity, how would you stand out?