Are sourcers bellwethers?

A bellwether is any entity in a given arena that serves to create or influence trends or to presage future happenings. The term is derived from the Middle English bellewether and refers to the practice of placing a bell around the neck of a castrated ram (a wether) leading its flock of sheep. The movements of the flock could be perceived by hearing the bell before the flock was in sight.

Are sourcers bellwethers?
I think they might be. I was talking to Bob last night about the year-end book preparations that are being sent to the accountant and he made the remark (about the downturn) that, "Really, this thing started, really started, for us, eighteen months ago!"

I looked at him, kind of surprised, and argued back, "No it didn't - maybe six months ago but NOT eighteen months ago!"

"Oh yeah, look here," he remonstrated, best Brooklyn brogue, pulling up an Excel spreadsheet that clearly showed a descending graph line that did in fact start in 2006. "You didn't feel it 'cause you're not the greatest in keeping your billing up-to-the-minute." (I confess I do let things pile up abit and then sometimes send some mountainous billing tasks to Bob.) "But if you look at when things started to fall off it was clearly by the Fall of 2006..." he dutifully and rather matter-of-factly noted.

Okay, I get it. Now leave me alone. As they say, the numbers don't lie (or do they?) and he may, just may, have made a point. On the other hand, this past week has seen my telephone-that-has-gone-pretty-quiet-these-last-two-months ringing again with a few new job orders and talk of a couple good-sized projects that will start in early January.

As they say, it is what it is but maybe, just maybe, this is a precursor of things to come. I'm ready -are you?
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Tags: bellwethers, prescience

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Permalink Reply by Todd Kmiec on December 23, 2008 at 6:38am

Maureen,

Interesting. For us (client side perm placement agency) things clearly peaked in Dec '07 / Jan '08. The first half of '08 was down, but the second half was far worse with the Sep / Oct / Nov period being the worst. We also have seen some indication of things picking up lately. Pessimism among clients and candidates does seem to be as negative as it could possibly be. But pessimism and optimism at peaks are typically contrary indicators, so maybe we've reached a bottom on this thing. It would be very interesting to see the Sourcer Bellwether Theory update in a month and then further down the line.

Todd Kmiec

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Permalink Reply by Maureen Sharib on December 23, 2008 at 6:44am

Good idea. I'll come back to this.

It would be very interesting to see the Sourcer Bellwether Theory update in a month and then further down the line.

Todd Kmiec

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Permalink Reply by Steve Levy on December 23, 2008 at 8:58am

Maureen, one thing to do is to create a LINS - Leading Indicator of National Sourcing - along the line of SHRM's LINE. You line up the sourcers across the country, I'll create the methodology and survey and let's do this...

Get interested sourcers to comment to this thread (and sign them up for RBC too); we'll publish this thing monthly on RBC.