B2B Data Integration and Transformation Blog

Through my 5 years at Remedi, I have been constantly searching for the best EDI talent in North America. There always seem to be plenty of EDI Administrators available but I can’t say the same for EDI Mappers, Developers, and Architects. These individuals tend to have full schedules throughout the year. Many EDI Managers wonder when is the best time of the year to find the best talent in EDI. Most new EDI projects usually kick off in January for the 1^st quarter of the following year where the budget is available. In my experience, if you wait until January to start hiring you have missed an incredible window. Most EDI projects wrap up with companies in November before the Thanksgiving holiday where people usually take vacations, which means most EDI talent is looking for a new project in December.

A recent article on Yahoo! Finance discussed the top 54 companies to work for based on employee feedback. Eight of the top ten were in the technology sector, while 7 of the 54 use consultants. As the article states, “The best companies to work for were concentrated in particular industries. For example, technology companies are well represented among the highest-rated employers, as are consulting firms.” So what is it about technology companies and consulting firms that create high morale and satisfaction for employees?

As a small business active for more than 20 years, Remedi understands the value of employee morale and retention. While our business and workforce has grown, we have seen the need to find dependable, long-term employees.  In our experience, by treating employees like extended family, we have been able to sustain high morale and retain valuable employees. The investments made have since paid major dividends. Some of Remedi’s longest tenured consultants have been with the company for more than 17 years.

That is a great question that we get a lot here at Remedi.  When it comes to software companies, they are great at developing software, but are often challenged to keep up with the demand to provide ongoing follow up, deployments, and go live support.  You’re probably thinking to yourself, that doesn’t make sense because if I buy the software from the software company shouldn’t they do it all?  Install, configure, setup all my trading partners, support, and training….

From a Bigger Picture Perspective.........

Do you ever wonder why you have all these updates on your computer when you boot up in the morning?  How about when you first buy a computer you have to spend hours to catch up on all the upgrades?  I remember when I started my career in IT back in 1997, Microsoft’s stock price was over $100 per share and then the bottom dropped out.  Microsoft had a great product but people only had to buy it once so they didn’t have a consistent revenue stream.  Then when the new release came out a couple of years later no one needed to buy it because the original version still worked fine.  I could see the marketing department at Microsoft sitting at conference table and pontificating on how they would get people to buy new versions of their products.  Then they announced that they were no longer going to support older versions and that forced companies to have to upgrade to newer versions.