Korn Ferry's "War for Talent" now a "War for Employment"

Forget about the war on terror. 2008 was the war on talent. 2009 will probably be the war for employment. Despite subtle domestic signs of a biting economic crisis in the making, Gary Burnison, CEO of expensive search services provider Korn Flake (KFY) claimed last summer, repeated in the not so subtle eye of the storm in September (on the eve of Lehman's bankruptcy) that despite rising and massive unemployment, a war for talent was going on, and executive rescruitment was going strong.

Furthermore, so the oracle went, the war for talent would continue incessantly and unabated into the far future. So what to do with all those American executives being sacked, a prelude instead to.... the war for employment? Not so quick mister.

Mr. Burnison will send the US executives to Brazil, China, The Middle East (probably not to blacklisted evildoers Iran, Syria and Sudan though), Russia,..... Even the word outsource was uttered. Technically, Gary was right. Those markets were still doing fine that time. High gas and commodity pricing kept somehow the cash flowing in. Fast forward to 2009.

I am not well aware of the situation in Brazil these days (I read about soaring unemployment though), but I know The Middle East lost north of two trillion petro dollars in the meanwhile. A case in point are the thousands of cars left behind (some with maxed out credit cards in the glove box) at Dubai Airport by expatriates fleeing the emirate. China's mighty manufacturing engine caught a nasty cold, and is laying of by the hundreds of thousands, Russia's oligarchs lots billions, the ruble lost a third of its value and.... Well, seems there is a war for employment there too. Maybe Gary would out source those executives to the USA, his strongest market. Anyone ?

What about the 400 headcount Korn Flake themselves are laying off - with probably more to come ?

The emerging markets, at least those with open capital markets, or those dependent on debt and natural commodity exports, became quickly more submerging than emerging over the last months. Though there is no need to sugarcoat a bad economic environment, I am certain the situation is neither a walk to the gallows: some perspective is required. Gary's upbeat optimism is probably solely directed at restless, itchy shareholders; including his own restless, panicky flock.

There are again opportunities, the markets seem to have stabilized, and are, with the work president Obama's economic team is putting in, climbing up slowly but steadily. To the credit of Gary, the New York office of his company recruited William Dudley to replace Timothy Geithner, who left the Federal Reserve Bank to join Obama's team as one of its principal architects.

See the summer 2008 interview for yourself.

Gary was wise not pull another McCain. As for the follow-up September interview, 3 months later: