Remarks by Jeff Taylor, Chief Executive Officer and Founder, Monster.com
Summit on the 21st Century Workforce, June 20, 2001
MCI Center, Washington, DC

MR. TAYLOR: I'm delighted to be here. When I told my wife in 1993 I was going to name my company Monster, she said she wouldn't leave the house with me, and here we are today, so …

The revolution is in full swing. There's a little debate that the Internet is reshaping the economy and everything about it, but there are some challenges. The dot.com bust and the uneasy stock market aside for a moment, top of the mind for all of us is the radical transformation of the American workplace and the fiercely competitive market and war for talent. The quest for great people continues to test our leadership. I've dedicated my life to helping people love their jobs, and we agonize, we worry, we dream, we fantasize about our careers. Thoreau said most men live lives of quiet desperation. So with that in mind, I thought we'd play a little bit. Can we do that? Yes? (Applause)

They said I could come off the podium. Does the mike work? We'll get it to work. I've got to get this mike to work, there we go.

All right, first thing. I've been asking this question for five years. I used to ask how many of you were on the Internet, but half of you would lie and raise your hands, so how many of your Moms are currently on the Internet, raise your hands. Very good. Someone will always say, "Well, my Dad's on," so how about anybody over 68 years old that you're communicating with over the Web, raise your hand one more time. Okay. While we're doing this, I'll make it a little more difficult. How many of you have downloaded Napster? Yes. Raise them high. Metallica has asked me to collect business cards right over here in the corner. You can help me out on this.

Are you in the mood to be a little bit interactive? Yes? I've got another thing I've been doing with some bigger crowds. I've got some words I'd like to say, and when I say a word I'm going to have you say a work back to me. Can you do that? All right, so I'm going to talk about the future and I want you to say, "I believe." I can't wait to see how he's going to do this, right?

Okay, so I'm going to talk about the future and you're going to say?

THE AUDIENCE: I believe!

MR. TAYLOR: Except for you're going to say it like you mean it. We're a big room of people here, so I'm going to talk about the future and you're going to say?

THE AUDIENCE: I believe!

MR. TAYLOR: That's good. Up on the top too. I'm going to talk about human resources. How many of you are in human resources? Raise your hand. How many of you are in sales? We're all kind of in sales, right? How many of us are in human resources? I think we're all in human resources, right? So when I talk about human resources I want you to say, "We rock!"

THE AUDIENCE: We rock!

MR. TAYLOR: All right, so I'm going to be going along, I'm going to say human resources and I want you to say?

THE AUDIENCE: We rock!

MR. TAYLOR: Except for I want you to get it from the gut somewhere down here. So it's loud and clear. So I'm going to talk about human resources one more time and you're going to say?

THE AUDIENCE: We rock!

MR. TAYLOR: Very good. Couple more. I'm going to talk about the American work force - don't start writing it down because you'll never keep up with me. And I want you to say Hallelujah.

THE AUDIENCE: Hallelujah!

MR. : Hallelujah!

MR. TAYLOR: Ah, there we go! So I'm going to talk about the American work force and I want you to say Hallelujah.

THE AUDIENCE: Hallelujah!

MR. TAYLOR: Okay, except I don't just want you to say it, I want you to put your arms in the air like this. All right? One more time, I'm going to talk about the American work force and you're going to say?

THE AUDIENCE: Hallelujah!

MR. TAYLOR: Hallelujah. That's good. We can make it louder, too, and one last one. When I talk about the new economy, I want you to say, "To the Batmobile!"

MS. : Say what?

THE AUDIENCE: To the Batmobile!

MR. TAYLOR: I know you always wanted to say that in business, all right? So I'm going to talk about the new economy and you're going to say?

THE AUDIENCE: To the Batmobile!

MR. TAYLOR: I'm going to talk about the future and you're going to say?

THE AUDIENCE: I believe!

MR. TAYLOR: Very good. Are you ready? We're gathered here today to discuss the future!

THE AUDIENCE: I believe!

MR. TAYLOR: I said the future!

THE AUDIENCE: I believe!

MR. TAYLOR: Gathered around me are the leaders of human resources.

THE AUDIENCE: We rock!

MR. TAYLOR: I said the leaders of human resources.

THE AUDIENCE: We rock!

MR. TAYLOR: We come together on this special day, thanks to Secretary Chao, to look at the opportunities of the American force.

THE AUDIENCE: Hallelujah!

MR. TAYLOR: On the horizon we can see things are not going to stay the same, things are changing, the new economy --

THE AUDIENCE: To the Batmobile!

MR. TAYLOR: I said the new economy!

THE AUDIENCE: To the Batmobile!

MR. TAYLOR: It's going to change all of our lives. So, all eyes are on the future.

THE AUDIENCE: I believe!

MR. TAYLOR: In human resources --

THE AUDIENCE: We rock!

MR. TAYLOR: We need to embrace diversity. In human resources --

THE AUDIENCE: We rock!

MR. TAYLOR: We need to communicate in the global village. In human resources --

THE AUDIENCE: We rock!

MR. TAYLOR: We need to understand the skills guys. The American work force --

THE AUDIENCE: Hallelujah!

MR. TAYLOR: I said the American work force --

THE AUDIENCE: Hallelujah!

MR. TAYLOR: Need our leadership. The future -

THE AUDIENCE: I believe!

MR. TAYLOR: Looks bright. Give yourselves a nice round of applause. (Applause)

MR. TAYLOR: All right, I actually do have a presentation. We'll see if we can get it to come out here.

All right. So human capital, we're all talking about a word. We don't necessarily know what it is, it has lots of different facets, there's no question it is the issue of this decade, and at the center is what I call the seeker revolution. The revolution, or for some a revelation, is that the employee is taking control. What I'm seeing right now, they're taking control of their jobs, they're taking control of their careers, they're taking control of our companies, they're taking control of profits.

The slow evolutionary march has been happening over the last century. Figure out how to push the button, we'll see if we change. Is this the button? I believe. There we go!

Okay. So I'm not going to spend much time on this, but if you look at the left it's the industrial age, the pyramid goes like this, you've got the executives at the top, they're making the decisions for the entire employee population, you got a few thousand companies that basically control most of the GDP.

If you look at the center, the shape is starting to change. At the top is the executives, you've got that management layer underneath, you've got the skills layer which is new and in formation If you look at decision-making in the information age, it begins to push down, the number of companies dramatically increases, and we have a lot more decision-making taking place in the hands of the skilled work force.

If you go to the right in the knowledge work, you see the pyramid being turned upside-down. I think Nordstrom was the first to have this shape of pyramid. I've kind of adopted it. If you look at the skills are evolving. Now executives are on the bottom, you have a few managers, and you have what I call a hundred million micro-business owners, the knowledge universe, all of the knowledge employees out there, making decisions for our companies. They need more than just technical skills. We've been talking about that a lot today. They need problem-solving, they need communications, they need interpersonal skills.

The new work force is no longer waiting for the machines. They're not waiting for the steam engine, they're not waiting for the Gutenberg press, they're not waiting for the cotton gin, they're taking information and they're running with it.

If you go to the next slide, what you see is the dot.com frenzy is today's reality. Well, maybe it's just yesterday's reality. The dot.com frenzy threw everything out of whack, including the work force. Twenty-two year zillionaires, nearly 100 percent employment for those that are interested in working, your talent left you and took a pile of stock options and a dream to go somewhere else. Many of you felt this over the last couple of years. You didn't know what to do.

Then comes the dot.com bust in April of 2000, this has created confusion. If we go to the next slide what you see is the eye of the storm. I call this "dot?coma." No management experience, no business models, very little if any profit, no money, what you have is the dot.com bomb.

Now, what's going on in the middle of this? It's been aggressive, many will fail, but the few survivals will exert enormous pressure on the traditional or old guard. In dot.coma what I'm talking about right now is an opportunity for the traditional companies, because what's happened is the work force has been retrained as I-workers. What you see is a huge opportunity - if we go to the next slide - momentary confusion creates opportunity for companies that may have missed the Internet. A hundred thousand-plus dot.com workers have been laid off since last April. That's about 25 or 28 percent of the pure dot.commers. But there's over 3 million people that now call themselves part of the Internet economy. The positive front on this, dot.com pioneers have paved the way for all the traditional companies. They've trained this new set of workers. Don't confuse dot.com's demise with the march of new technologies. The Internet continues to grow aggressively, and with it my expression, which is "The Internet is the river that runs through everything." Think about your businesses and how the Internet could change every part of what you do.

Go to the next slide. There's two things that I think are certain. One, the Internet will continue to grow. We talk about E and My - everything will be E, E?everything, E-Commerce, E-Learning, E-Convenience. E or employee self-service, et cetera, et cetera. I think what you'll see is every company will be a E?business within the next five years. My calendar, many of you were using your Palm Pilot, you're beginning to get that E-feeling. Gotta love that E-feeling - I can't sing, but - and it's moving toward my life, everything in your life I think is going to be organized around notification and the way you work with the Internet.

We're headed toward the worst employment crisis ever. Go to the next slide, what you see - my own version of a weather report.

Next slide. Ah. You have five things that I think are really impacting things right now. Baby Boomer exit, we've talked a lot about it. You look at 2003 to 2005, Baby Boomers begin to leave faster than the entry level work force. Who can tell me what the Baby Boomers do in our companies? Actually, a lot of them do manage but the bulk of the Baby Boomers move something from Point A to Point B, and they've been doing this for 20 years, and do they complain? Not at work - maybe at home. But as they leave the work force, an entry level worker, how long is it going to take him to learn how to do something, moving from Point A to Point B? And how long are they going to be happy in that job? About a week. So what's going to happen? We're going to have to keep pushing t About a week. So what's going to happen? We're going to have to keep pushing technology, and you've got some other problems.

Tenure continues to shorten, people are working less and less time at their companies, they're taking their skills with them. With that comes the broadening skill shortages. The E-business resolve? Every company is going to have to retool their company, they're going to have to retrain their current workers, and they're going to have to recruit new workers, to be able to deal with what's happening with E-business issues.

If we go from here, we're going to push employee confidence sky-high over the next ten years. And with that, everyone, we say, in our companies is replaceable. I would challenge in every one of our companies, there's 15 to 25 people that are not replaceable. Some of our companies only have 15 or 25 employees. So the only one that's really replaceable in the new economy, based on the executive at the bottom, supporting the organization, is us. The executives. So what happens is the companies that continue to run and they're getting more profitable, and they're developing more knowledge, but it's the employees that are doing it, not the leadership of the companies. Next slide.

For most that have experiences this, what you find is one counter-offer will make you tell this. I had a guy come up to me after one of my presentations. He said, "Somebody asked for $50,000 more than they were currently making, but they were the number one programmer in their company so I paid him." And he said, "By the way, when he was taking the money he said, 'And I also want a brand-new Mustang.'" How does that employer feel? Like the war is over, the war for talent is over and the employee has won. I feel like we are now in the idea generation, we've moved beyond McKinsey's report that we're in trouble, and the control is shifting. Next slide.

What you see now, Monster.com is embracing, the secret revolution. If you look where we're headed, we're going for here - next slide - to our mission, which is to take people further. We are excited about the concept of being an advocate for the jobseeker's right to a more fulfilling work life. Almost everything we do at Monster is focused on those areas. Next slide.

What you see, Monster's community right now is 7 million unique visitors come every month. They come 27 million times, 620 million page views a month. Sixteen million members, and we are currently in 20 countries and we're a profitable dot.com company. We have been for three years. (Applause)

What you see as we go forward - next slide - is the online résumé is going to become the new currency. Many of you are beginning to understand this. Look at the number of résumés that are going to be on the Internet over the next there or four years. Monster already has 11 million résumés. We grew by 2.2 million résumés in the first quarter. So you look at the momentum that's happening right now. I can see - I have visibility to 18 million résumés by the end of this year. I have visibility to over a hundred million résumés by 2004. What is this going to mean for us?

I think the résumé is going to become the new currency, and everyone is going to post their résumé into some sort of a public résumé database. If you don't want your employer to know, you turn your contact information off. Now your résumé skills are there, but they don't know who you are. If you're not looking for a job and you're happy, you turn your résumé off completely, but it's there waiting for you to turn it back on if you have a bad day. Next slide.

So the Monster brand has been out there. How many of you saw the first ad, "When I grow up I want to file all day." That guy was from the bayou - (Applause)

It took him 25 times to say the word "fiiile," until it came out "file." And so the ad to the top right, Robert Frost, "The Road Less Traveled," take a little bit of risk. The ad on the bottom was, "It's never too early or never too late to change your career," but that little kid is saying, "Can you hear me now? Can you hear me now?" And then the one on the right is what I call Happy Guy. USA Today called it a corpse. It was a guy who was at the end of his life, who had had a good life and couldn't get the smile off of his face. I think we have to start looking at this. We have to start being more positive. We got to take control of this. Next slide.

Where's this going? I think we have to learn the new talent language. All of us are going to be responsible for this, as employers. We're going to have to understand that the job seeker, the seeker or your employee, is more in control than they've ever been. If you look at where we're going - next slide - you will see we've got to treat them like gold. One of the tings that I've talked about is becoming an employer of choice. It's not your right, it's a privilege. Or privilege. Not quite there. Close. You have to put your employees at the center. Most companies - I even see it today - still say, "Our customers are first, our employees are second." I think this is a pile of baloney. We have to put our employees at the center, treat them like gold, and what'll happen is magic will come from there. They will take care of your customers. (Applause)

You have to adjust baseline expectations. Your employees should expect a good job and good benefits, just to show up at work. So what are you going to do after that? I have something I call the employee buzz check. If one of your employees goes to a party on the weekend, what are they going to say about working at your company? If somebody said, "What's it like to work at your company?" what do you think your employee would say? "My job…" Is great, or stinks. How's that? Is that a good s-word for there? Where we're going with this is do something for your employees. Have a good time with them. It doesn't cost very much. We have a full breakfast bar at our company. We bring in 500 bagels and fresh cut fruit in the morning. We have a gym with a trainer. We have parties once a quarter, where we invite the employees to come and have a good time. If you want to bring your friends, you're welcome to do that. They don't have to bring a résumé, but this becomes a great recruiting opportunity for us. I'm a DJ from a past life. I DJ my own company parties. There's nothing better than saying you want to meet the CEO, come on up and I'll introduce you to the DJ. What that's done for me is it's allowed employee buzz to take over for many of the traditional programs that you tried and put in place that never work. Next slide.

So defining attention. I'm getting to the end. For the job seeker, I have something called "earn, learn, and yearn." This is a jobseeker's life. They want to earn some more money, they want to try to learn a few things, and then they yearn to go somewhere else as quickly as they've learned it. For the employer, it's "obtain, train, and retain." They want to get the person, they want to give them some training because the goal here is to retain them within the company. The first line, "earn and obtain," is a perfect match. The second line is a perfect opportunity. The employer wants to keep people, so give them some training. The employee wants to learn something, so they will take courses or in-house direction. In any shape or form. Where the conflict is is around yearn and retain. And it's what we're going to be dealing with for the next ten years, so we might as well get used to it. Last slide.

So here we are, I have a message for all of you from Monster, I would like to challenge you to never settle in your career. Thank you very much