Business Week Covers Online Recruiting of Immigrant Workers

In a story titled Click For Foreign Labor  Business Week explores the use of online recruiters to hire legitimate unskilled workers:

When she could not find enough workers for the construction firm owned by her son Thomas, Ann Carroll decided to go online. After typing in such search terms as "construction laborer" and "Mexican workers," she landed on the Web site for Labormex Foreign Labor Solutions. Within days she had a quote: $100 each for 11 Mexican workers and $1,340 to cover the visas. In October, Carroll Construction Co.'s recruits began laying sewer pipes in Ocean Springs, Miss., where the company is located. "I don't know what we would've done if we didn't go this route," says Carroll. "We're very happy with the workers."

It's not really a story about job boards but very interesting considering how few employers will sponsor work visas.  With time and labor shortages, that should change. 

But as Carroll's experience shows, using a legit online middleman can be efficient and cost-effective. Labormex was founded in 2002 by Seymour Taylor, an entrepreneur descended from a family of American settlers in Mexico. Business took off when he set up a Web site about a year ago and began advertising on Yahoo (YHOO ) and Google (GOOG ). The site boasts of "hardworking people acclimated to tough physical labor and who have worked under severe warm-weather conditions"--guys like Andreas Alcala Martinez, 29, who works for Carroll Construction. "Little money, but not hard work," says Martinez. He makes $9 an hour and arrived on an H-2B visa, of which the U.S. issues 66,000 annually for low-skilled work. He can work for Carroll for 10 months, with the option of renewal.

  

Here in South Florida, if you show up with no visa and no special skills, expect to make just $5 an hour on a construction site!   Next, you'll see BW confuses staffing firms with job boards.

Next to the big job sites, Labormex is a minnow. Taylor says he placed about 200 people in 2006 and expects to triple that in '07. But the company, which has offices in New York and Monterrey, Mexico, has reeled in big clients, including Super 8 Motels and the Sonic Drive-Ins (SONC ) fast-food chain. "Labormex has been very helpful," says Gary Wilkerson, president of Kergen Brothers Inc., which owns 40 Sonic franchises in Louisiana and has placed 25 Labormex workers in its kitchens. "Working with them has put us a step ahead of our competition."

 

Quite interesting anyhow to see Google adwords used to recruit laborers from Mexico, even if somewhat indirectly.