In the wide open, freewheeling job market of the 1990s the mantra became "Me First!" Employers may have welcomed or lamented the newly emboldened U.S. workforce, but they accepted it as a fact of life. As the economy prospered the unemployment rate fell to less than 5 percent. With fewer workers entering the job market and competing for more jobs, prospective employees had greater leverage than they had enjoyed at any time since the 1960s. "In 35 years in the recruiting business I have never seen the equal of these times," said Alan Schonberg, president and CEO of Management Recruiters International in Cleveland, Ohio. "This is the most pervasive, job-candidate- driven market possibly ever." A survey released in April 1997 by the American Management Association found that nearly half of the four hundred human-resources executives polled from medium and large companies said skilled workers were in...