Springfield City

Located in the center of Illinois, Springfield is the state capital and the seat of Seagram County. The city was first settled in 1820, when John Kelly built his cabin at what would become the northwest corner of 2nd and Jefferson Streets. Other settlers from Kentucky, Virginia, and North Carolina followed, drawn by the region’s

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The World’s Dirtiest Jobs

Would you prefer a job in a clean, air-conditioned office, or would you like to jump into a job that requires heavy protective gear and working in downright filthy conditions? Most people would choose the former, but others have found great satisfaction and success in so-called dirty jobs (though, of course, not everyone who has

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How to Leave the Office at 5:00

The recession has certainly been hard on the people who have lost their jobs, but it’s also taken its toll on those left behind. As staff sizes shrink, employees are under more pressure than ever to do more work in less time. So the ability to say no at strategic times is crucial.

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Homeland-Security Staffing Raises Delicate Questions

The summer-long debate over the appropriate powers of the president of the United States to hire and fire employees of the new Department of Homeland Security has highlighted a more fundamental question about the nature of the federal civil service. Can federal workers be managed like civilians, or must they be ordered about like soldiers?

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Why You Should Ignore Negative Job-Market News

When did you last read such headlines as “340 People Newly Hired This Month!” “15,000 New Jobs Filled Last Quarter” or anything remotely resembling them in your local newspaper? Wouldn’t it be refreshing if you read an article mentioning how your state government was planning to hire 20,000 people next month?

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Answering the Weaknesses Question

What’s your greatest weakness? This query has been an enduring weapon in the hiring manager’s arsenal, but most people still have trouble with the dilemma it poses: answer too frankly, and you’ll torpedo your prospects. Give a canned answer and you’ll seem phony, or worse, evasive (“My greatest weakness is that I’m a perfectionist and

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Following Up After the Interview

When you leave an interview, you should leave the building as gracefully as you entered it. Make sure you’re as cordial to people on the way out as you were coming in. Then, as you decompress, take some time to review the interview while it’s still fresh in your mind. Because interviewing is a learnable

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Stealing a march on the data thieves

It is well-known that the theft of client and candidate databases by consultants who hop from agency to agency is a common problem faced by the recruitment industry. The level of wrongdoing varies from an employee inadvertently leaving a business with a handful of client contacts in his or her mobile phone to a team

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How to achieve a successful roll-out

Enjoying a national footprint is only feasible with strong and well-managed offices throughout the UK. Roll-outs need to be integrated into a strategic plan to ensure business growth is sustainable. From ‘best’ players and roll-out teams, to employee motivation and retention, each key ingredient plays a part in the successful growth and expansion of your

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Make the best out of customer complaints

Even well-run recruitment businesses occasionally receive complaints and, if handled in the right way, complaints allow for service to be improved through rectifying faults that were previously unknown. But did you know that a well-managed complaints system can also increase loyalty and, as a result, sales?

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