Review

My review on Tuesday went very well. I got the maximum possible raise - it's only about half the increase I really need, but it beats nothing by a long shot. However, I was also advised that part of my review next year will be based on my marketing accomplishments, which is to say how many candidate referrals and job orders I generate.

See I work for a major provider of various kinds of contract labor all over the world. When most people here the name of the division that I work for, they immediately think of what this division is most famous for: temporary accounting staffers - you know, the folks you call when your payables clerk goes on vacation for two weeks. Which is fine, if that's all you need. The thing is, a regular temp is always looking for something better, because they only get paid for hours worked. Either that, or they're expecting the position where they're temping will turn into a permanent job with the client company.

On the other hand, I work as a different kind of contractor. I am a full time employee of my company, with vacations and benefits and everything else that goes with it; and I work long-term assignments with any given client. For example, my shortest assignment so far was 5 months. My current one will run well into 2008. It's good for me, because it gives me the stability of full-time employment, and the flexibility of contract work. It's good for the client because s/he knows that I will stay until the project is completed, instead of always looking for a better job.

Now here's the tricky part of marketing this service: it's currently operating as a subset of each of the company's other divisions (each of which provides a different type of temporary help); instead of being a separate division, providing this kind of staffing in all of the different categories. The result is that we're kind of a "stealth" service, and hardly anyone knows who we are or what we do. Unfortunately, until there are more of us doing more business, the parent company won't make us into a separate division (even though that would make effective marketing so much easier). Kind of a catch-22 situation.

So they encourage us to market for the service, by offering us bonuses for each new candidate or job order we generate, if it works out. Between the commissions and the boost it can give to one's year-end raise, the staffer who is also a good marketer can make a fair chunk of change. One of our people made $5,000 in 2006, just in referral bonuses!

Obviously, I need to sharpen up my marketing skills! I've asked my boss to give me whatever marketing tools have already been created (brochures, etc.), since my business card only has the name of the service in a small font - hardly visible next to the logo of the temp division I work for. Depending on what materials they give me, I may wind up either modifying it or creating something new that highlights the service and shows how we're "not your ordinary temp". I talk it up all the time, but without something tangible to leave with folks as a reminder, how much of it can stick, you know?

Anyway, I also filled my boss in about my current housing situation, and persuaded him to try to do something that this company almost never does - give me an advance to help alleviate the problem.


Well, this post has gotten quite long enough. Stay tuned!