“It is a national scourge”, according to José Caetano Silva, Partner at Talent Search, another company specialising in head-hunting. “The situation is dramatic. The country has problems training people, and those who are trained are being overwhelmed. We are destroying directors between 30 and 40. There are people who were earning more than one million escudos and are now on unemployment benefit”. Caetano Silva recalls that in 2002 there were moments “when there was simply no demand. There are multinationals with the recruitment frozen, prohibited”, he laments. “I experienced the reengineering of 1992 to 1994 – when companies were downsizing – but then key people were sought for the new policies. Now there is a total block on investments ...”